Little Girl Lost

  “Oh, hon, I’d bet every dollar I don’t have that your cheating manwhore of a husband is the daddy. You’ll have to leave him, of course. Nobody does this to you and gets away with it.” That crazed look in her eyes assures me she would gladly take care of James if I asked her to. Good God, if Jane doesn’t beat her to it, James is as good as dead.

  “He can’t be the father.” I pull the phone from her and flip through the pictures. The one with Hailey’s hands dripping off his face leaves me shaking my head. “Women cannot seem to keep their hands off my husband.”

  “That’s because he keeps meeting up with them after dark.”

  “You got me there.” Holy hell does she ever. One of the pictures clearly shows some kind of confetti raining from the sky. “Is that?”

  “Money. He must have gotten it from the ATM. I’m no idiot. That man has a thing for hookers, and if you keep doing the nasty with him, he’s going to give you the clap!”

  I try to take it all in, absorb these pictures, memorize them for later so I can ruminate over how angry I am during all those irate hours that sleep eludes me.

  She leans in panting. “So what are we gonna do?”

  “We’re not going to do anything.” I push the phone away as if it were the source of nausea. “I’m going to take care of the bastard myself.” As if my life hasn’t taken enough heartbreaking turns in the past few weeks, I have to worry about James and the whereabouts of his dick once again. “Yes, leave him to me.” I bleed a black smile, short-lived but dangerous. “I’d better get going.” I wince at the opened suitcase lying in the corner. “Heather, don’t you miss your family?” My stomach tightens because McCafferty let me in on the fact her husband left her—not that I’m placing blame. “Your girls?”

  She gives a solid blink. “How did you know I had another one?”

  My fingers claw at the Formica table as if begging to dig their way out of this one. The last thing I’m going to tell her is that I stalked her on social media, that I spoke to my sister. “I don’t know. I just guessed. You used the word kids the first day I saw you.” I can’t remember if it’s true, but the important thing is that she doesn’t remember. Then it hits me. “College. You came to visit. You said you met a boy and you were knocked up again.” Thank God for the sparse brain cells I have left.

  “That’s right!” She lets out a bleating laugh reminiscent of a dolphin. “You’ll never guess what I named her in a million years!”

  “California?” I frown because I should at least get one answer wrong.

  “Allison!” She jumps a foot in her seat. “I named both of my babies after you! My very best friend in the whole wide world!” Heather springs to her feet, clapping and spinning in a circle like the loon she’s always been, but in this moment it feels harmless. Her hair is matted in the back, and her sweatpants are dripping off her body as if she’s starving herself to death. I don’t know how she has the money to stay here night after night but if her choices are helping me or food, I think I know where her loyalty lies.

  “Wow.” I feign enthusiasm. “That’s pretty amazing. I’m so very flattered. Thank you. I really don’t know what to say.”

  She settles back into her seat, giggling like a schoolgirl who just landed her first kiss. “You’re amazing.” She leans in close, her entire face smooths out as she gazes at me with a marked level of admiration. “I couldn’t have done it without you. My girls know all about their favorite Auntie Allison. They love you so very much.”

  My heart wrenches to hear her talk like this. Those poor girls have to recognize the fact their mother isn’t sane. Even at a young age behavior like this sends up a red flag.

  “How is—big Allison doing with you here in Idaho?” I figure I’ll work my way to the younger version, the one I suspect might be Ota.

  “She’s great! She’s in school, some fancy academy up in Highland.” She makes a face as if she’s openly disgusted by the place. “She calls me about once a week. But I got my baby.” She pushes up her glasses and nods.

  “That’s great. And little Allison? She’s in school, too? I’m assuming back in Nevada? That is where you said you came from, right? The night I was on live with Gretchen MacAfee and you called in.” Damn liar. McCafferty said she was living in California, a stone’s throw from me right up until my sister tipped her off and helped shuttle her to Idaho. She’s been here for months. I want to shake her. Ask her what the hell she’s really up to. But Heather is far from brilliant. She shouldn’t be too hard to trip up.

  “Nevada?” She purses her lower lip as if I’ve just made the whole state up. “It was just a cover-up. If my best friend can hide things from the world, so can I. Right?” She titters into her hand as if it were the funniest thing and my skin breaks out in goose pimples. Dear God, is she hiding Reagan?

  “So where is little Allison?” My voice shakes and I do my best to iron out the rage building in me. “Do you have a picture? I’d love to see her.” Why do I get the feeling I’m about to stare into the face of Ota? I should have known. If that ridiculous pig Latin name didn’t tip me off, then that equally ridiculous pinafore and throwback clothing circa Heather Evans’ time traveling mind should have pointed straight to her insanity.

  “Oh, hon”—Heather leans in with a curious look, her hair disheveled from the theatrics, her lipstick knifing into the hard lines around her upper lip, a cackle caught in her throat—“why would I need a picture? She’s sitting right there.” She points to the arid space behind her.

  “She is?” I strain into the shadows to make out a human figure but come up empty. “Where? Is she hiding?” My body pulsates with a mixture of elation and fear. I’m going to catch her. I’m going to snatch that little devil and not let go until Heather surrenders my child.

  “On the bed, silly! She’s sitting right there on the edge.” She points hard to a shadowed void, and I’m suddenly light headed, afraid I might faint. A bout of nausea rolls through my stomach as a paralyzing fear grips me. Heather hops up and wraps her arm around thin air as if it were a child. “Come here, pretty girl. Your favorite auntie finally wants to meet you! Oh, come now. Don’t you get shy on me.” She walks over with an arm still firmly secured to nothing. “Isn’t she pretty, Allison?” Heather takes a step toward me, her mouth squaring out in an elated, deformed smile. “Why, she looks just like you.”

  My legs wobble as I struggle to rise. “I—I have to go.” I make a beeline for the door and Heather chases me down, snatching me by the wrist.

  “What’s the matter, Allison?” Gone is the enthusiastic fervor that’s gripped her, replaced with a cutthroat rage. “Isn’t she pretty enough for you?”

  I break free from her hold and open the door so fast I thump Heather in the face with it. The icy air welcomes me as my feet knife their way down the stairs.

  “Is she being rude? I’ll punish her, Ally!” Her voice cries out into the sky as I bolt for the car. “Why! Why! Why!” she screams from the balcony in a choir of harrowing cries as I speed the hell out of the lot.

  I glance in the rearview mirror just as she tosses that ball of nothing over the side of the railing—her face beet red with rage and fury.

  Jane was right. I should have stayed the hell away.

  And when I get home, James is going to wish he stayed the hell away from Hailey Preggers Oden.

  * * *

  The drive home is set with the white-hot embarrassment of ever trusting myself to be in the same air space as that woman. I’m calling McCafferty. I want Heather under full investigation. I demand she tell me what she did with her daughter and mine. Although, after that hallucinogenic display, it’s doubtful she’s competent enough to pull off something so well-orchestrated. God forbid, she even try. Poor Reagan might actually end up in a river no thanks to that loon.

  The cul-de-sac is filled with bodies this afternoon, so much so that it’s nearly impossible to get my car through the crowd. News outlets that I haven’t seen in weeks have sprouted back up
with their giant satellite dishes, an entire infantry of reports all butting one another in the shoulder for a glimpse of something near the house.

  “Oh my God.” My adrenaline kicks in hard, fire burning through the tundra that has become my heart, and I stop the car and run out to the driveway, fully expecting to find James with Reagan in his arms.

  I clear the wall of reporters, pushing and shoving, threading my way through a wall of limbs, only to find a thing of horror planted on my front lawn.

  Standing next to James and Rich are Ann and Walden Greer, my parents. My mother has her hair cropped short around her jaw and she’s dressed in a baby blue wool dress with a matching pillbox hat pressed over her neat dark tresses, doing her very best to channel her inner Jackie O. My father, the retired teacher, looks every bit the part with that slouched suit jacket, that worn basset hound look on his face that mirrors my own. But it’s my mother who looks ready for war, pumped to tell the media and the world her two contentious cents on the subject. For all practical purposes, it would seem this is a good thing to sic my mother on the public at large—on the bastards that did this—however, that’s not how my mother operates.

  My mother is a sopping wet towel of a human being, prone to use her devices to smother those around her. And now that she’s here, I will most certainly smother under her weight.

  “Holy hell.” I run up the side and my mother stops the woman dusting powder over her face from continuing her task. “What are you doing here? What are all these people doing here?”

  James starts to say something and my mother clips him as she pulls me in.

  “Come here.” Her voice is stern, no nonsense, and this rattles me right down to that three-year-old inside of me who still very much fears her. “I’m going to straighten this whole mess out,” she gruffs while patting down my shirt, ironing it with her hands. “Just stand next to your husband like God intended, and we’ll have this taken care of like it should have been weeks ago.”

  “What? No. I don’t want you to do this.”

  “James?” she shrills like a drill sergeant and thrusts me into his arms. “Man your wife. This will only take a moment.” She stalks off, a few feet to the makeshift podium, and the crowd bleeding into the street quiets and stills.

  My mother dips her head into the microphone like a seasoned pro. “Good afternoon.” She pulls the equipment closer and my father shoots me a quick wink.

  “What’s going on?” I whisper to James, my philandering husband. After all, I seriously doubt Hailey Oden traveled across three state lines to show off the new figure Faulk gave her.

  “She insisted. You know your mother. You can’t stop her. She had every media outlet here twenty minutes before she arrived.” He winces, looking disarmingly handsome, and seeing him this way makes me wish Hailey Oden had never existed. We could have been something great if his penis hadn’t intervened.

  Rich comes over and lands a quick tap to my arm. “How do you think this is going to end?” He gives my mother a quick glance.

  “Badly,” I say. It’s the only real answer.

  My mother clears her throat. “I want to thank everyone who has thus far committed in the search for our precious little Reagan. I want to apologize for the lack of direction and organization on the part of the Concordia Police Department and that of my daughter and her husband.” A faint gasp circles the crowd, but the bigger news crews simply lean in as if the real story were about to unfold.

  “Shit.” James looks to Rich. “I’m sorry, man. I didn’t think it would go this way.”

  A dull huff escapes me. “It’s my mother we’re talking about. It’s mandated it go this way.” A part of me wants to get Janey on the phone. I’d hate for her to miss the show. God Almighty, if Jane was going to use her jail-issued superpowers for good, why couldn’t she use them to stop this woman?

  My mother turns slightly to glare at me as if she heard. She spins back around, offering her full attention to the waiting crowd. “I’m here to assure you that there has been a changing of the guard. No more of this hurry-up-and-wait strategy that has gotten us absolutely nowhere.” She raises a hand as if she were about to slap every person in this crowd, and knowing my mother this isn’t a far-off possibility. “We are reissuing new posters, updating all our technological resources. I, myself, have hired the best PI firm in the country to assist the police department, to assist you the people, and to assist my family in bringing little Reagan Price home!” She raises her voice as if to rally the masses but is met with a stony silence instead. You can feel the judgment stemming from the peanut gallery, hot as a nuclear wind.

  “Welcome to my world, Mother,” I whisper.

  James leans in, his breath hot in my ear. “Half the country will hate her by midnight.”

  I look up at my handsome husband, with his hair slicked back to perfection, his dimples cutting in without even trying. “And what will they think of you once they discover Hailey Oden is having your child?”

  10

  James

  An hour after the impromptu press conference let out, exactly forty-five minutes after Allison and I convinced the Greers to find a nice hotel here in town, twenty minutes after I convinced my father, the potential serial killer, to hightail it back to his own house, Allison and I circle one another in the living room like two cage fighters waiting to pounce.

  After Allison dropped a very pregnant Hailey Oden onto my lap, McCafferty showed up and injected herself between us, demanding an explanation, asking why her expertise and that of her team was being so publicly demeaned. That’s when Ann took over and reamed McCafferty and her so-called team for botching things up, letting this drag out unnecessarily, and vowing to show them all up by bringing Reagan home immediately. Of course, immediately, in this case, is a nebulous term. I’m sure Ann would love the accolades of handling this correctly, and bringing Reagan home, but at this point I don’t give a shit who gets the credit. I can’t breathe without my daughter. This suffocation killed me the moment I realized she was gone. It’s a wonder I’m still standing.

  But now Allison and I are alone in the living room, about to rip the lid off what really happened last summer between Hailey and my dick—even if we are both painfully aware. The questions she has are all valid and should be answered truthfully. The only question I have is how the hell is she tracking me so efficiently and how I wish to God we had tracked Reagan that way.

  I take a deep breath and dive right in. “I think we need to—”

  “You don’t get to go first!” She charges me with that wild, red-faced fury, embedding her nails into my arms like knives through butter. The rage in her eyes eviscerates me all on its own. I can smell the hatred on her, and it suddenly feels impossible that we will ever recover from this. She gives me a firm shove, and I do a little awkward dance as I stumble toward the fireplace. The curtains are drawn, but the lights are on. I’m sure our silhouettes are providing all the dialogue anyone needs. “Where is she? Where are you hiding that little whore?” She staggers forward, her ankle slightly twisting in her shoe.

  “I’m not hiding her. I don’t know where she went. She said she didn’t have money or anywhere to stay. And I tried to give her some to get back home, but she wouldn’t take it.”

  Her eyes stretch wide, examining me from head to toe in this new disgusting light.

  “Of course, she didn’t. You are her new home. Congratulations, James. You’re going to be a father.”

  Allison’s barbed words aim straight for my balls. I’m going to be a father—as if I wasn’t one already. I’ll let her have at me, though. I deserve that much, and more.

  “Now we’re going to play a little game.” She sets her legs in a defiant stance as if things were about to get physical, a sumo wrestler ready to knock me on my head. “I’m going to ask you a question, and you’re going to answer me.” The ridgeline of her jaw flexes. Allison has taken all of the rage, the hatred, the utter destruction she feels for the monsters who took our
child and is funneling it all my way. And I want it. For as much as she detests me, I cannot stand myself that much more.

  “Okay.” I raise my hands in surrender. “Anything. I’ll be truthful. I promise.” There’s not an ounce of enthusiasm in me at the idea, but I will comply. I don’t have a single thing to lose. I’ve already lost it all.

  “Why did you lie about sleeping with her?” The storm clouds in her eyes linger over mine, and in that moment I can feel her pain so completely it feels as if the universe has collapsed over my chest.

  “Because I’m a coward.” There. Now at least there is a shred of truth between us.

  “When did it begin and how many times did you fuck her?”

  I wince at the expletive. Allison has always had a way to utilize her words far more efficiently than a slap. “Last summer when you went to see your sister.” It comes out low, the words staggered disproportionately. “It lasted three weeks, and I don’t know how many times.”

  Her chest rattles with a dull laugh, her eyes still set over me, angry and wild.

  “Three weeks.” She snorts at the thought. “That’s quite a honeymoon. Where did you do it?”

  “Ally.” I close my eyes and an image of Hailey bouncing over my lap comes to mind and my lids spring open.

  “Coward”—she ticks her head as if enticing me with a dare—“where did you do it?”

  I push a breath from my lips. “The pool. Her house.” Shit. I lean my head back and my vertebrae snap like candy canes, click, click, click. I wish they would break for good.

  “In our bed?”

  “No. God no.”

  “Our house?”

  I keep my eyes trained on the ceiling. “Once.”

  “I hate you.” It comes out so soft, so benign. She’s said I love you before with the same enthusiasm.

  “Join the club. I hate me, too.” True as God. “I have made so many mistakes”—I fall onto the sofa, my catatonic gaze fixed straight ahead at the fireplace—“screwed up in so many incredible ways. Sometimes I wonder why I’m still here. Why didn’t the misfortune strike me? Why Reagan? If I had died a year ago, Reagan would still be here. My living was a liability. I’m the reason we’re in Concordia. I’m the reason we landed in this very neighborhood.” It’s true. Allison preferred High Ridge, a far ritzier zip code, but I thought we should live well under our means. “I’m the one who gave our daughter away like a door prize to a little girl I couldn’t identify in a lineup.” I bury my head in my hand and sob long wailing sobs, distressing soul-aching, please-God-let-me-die-right-this-fucking-minute, uncontrollable soul-shattering, far from masculine blubbering cries.