Софи Райан - No Escape Claws

So it hadn’t been a notebook they’d been looking at. It had been a memo pad.

I pulled my left shoulder with one hand. “And?” I said.

Nick looked confused. “And what?”

“And did you learn anything?”

“No. No, I don’t think so.”

I caught just the briefest hesitation between the first and second no. “You’re not certain.”

He closed his eyes for a second and shook his head. “You’re as bad as Rose, Sarah,” he said.

I didn’t say anything.

Nick pulled the eye protectors off the top of his head and turned them over in his hands. “I didn’t see anything in those notes. Hannah Allison was the only one hurt. One of the coaches did first aid. Another took charge of the rest of the runners. As far as I could see, neither one of them had any kind of exchange with Gina Pearson or her son.”

“So why the lack of certainty?”

“Okay, this is going to sound weird and I can’t actually believe I’m saying this but I think Rose noticed something in those notes.”

“Okay,” I said.

He frowned. “You don’t seem that surprised.”

I smiled at him. “This is not my first rodeo. What makes you think she found something?”

“She went back and read the same page twice.”

“Did you ask her about it?”

Nick gave me a wry smile. “She said she just wanted to make sure she hadn’t missed anything.”

“And that could be all it is,” I said.

“Or?”

“Or it could be she discovered something she doesn’t want the rest of us to know, at least for now.

He bent down, picked up the drill and snapped out the battery pack. “So what do we do?”

“ You don’t do anything,” I said. “Right now you’re on her nice list and I’d like to keep it that way at least for a little while longer. I’ll talk to her.”

He narrowed his dark eyes. “You really think she’ll admit anything to you?”

I shook my head. “Not a chance. But she will tell Mr. P. and I’m pretty sure he’ll tell me.”

“What do you think she saw that I didn’t?” Nick asked.

“You know Rose’s mind doesn’t work like anyone else’s,” I said.

He smiled. “Oh yeah, that’s true.”

Liam came back then. Cleveland would bring the trim first thing in the morning.

“What time do you want to start?” I asked.

“Is eight too early?” Liam asked.

“Not for me,” I said. “I’ll see you then.” I ducked under the tarp. Nick hadn’t noticed that I hadn’t actually answered his question. What had Rose seen in those notes that Nick hadn’t? She didn’t want me to know, whatever it was. Was it something that might incriminate Mike Pearson?

I stopped at the Emmerson Foundation offices on the way home to pick up the papers Liz had promised to John. The foundation was located on the second floor of the old soap factory, an L-shaped brick building close to the harbor front. I took the stairs because I loved to look at the old photos of North Harbor that hung in the stairwell. I was expecting to find Liz in her office but instead discovered her assistant, Jane Evans, who was also mom to Josh Evans, the Angels’ de facto lawyer.

“Hi, Sarah,” she said. She was just putting two file folders into a cardboard banker’s box. Jane was about my height, albeit a lot curvier, with blond curls courtesy of Phantasy. At the moment a pair of half-frame glasses was perched on the end of her nose. She was wearing a green and black dress with heels, although not as high as Liz generally wore. Jane and her son had the same slightly mischievous smile.

“Hi, Jane,” I said. “What are you doing here?”

She put the lid on the box. “I came in to bring coffee and cream for Monday morning and found Liz trying to sort this box of papers into some kind of order.”

“And ended up doing it yourself.”

She ducked her head and smiled. “Liz has a lot of skills, but dealing with paperwork isn’t one of them. I sent her home.”

“You’re the only person on the planet who could do that. She’d never listen to anyone else,” I said. “How do you do that?”

The smile got a little wider. “I’d really love to tell you,” she said.

“But then you’d have to kill me,” I finished.

“Maybe not kill you. But certainly incapacitate you for a while.” She pushed the box across the tabletop toward me.

“Thank you, Jane,” I said, reaching for the carton.

“I was sorry to hear about Marie,” she said.

“Did you know her?”

Jane nodded. “We both started off working in the office at the chocolate factory. That was a long time ago.”

“What was she like?” I asked.

Jane smiled. “Liz said you were helping her with this book project.” She took a minute to consider my question. “Marie was a dynamo,” she said finally. “She was organized and efficient and she could keep a more complicated schedule in her head than most of us could keep with a datebook and a calendar. And I know it’s cliché, but she was married to her job after her husband died. Working for the foundation, for Wilson, was her life.” She pushed the chair next to her under the long wooden conference table. “I think it’s wonderful that you offered to help Liz with this project, Sarah, but don’t fall into the trap of work being your whole life.”

She laughed then, well aware that she was standing in her office on a Saturday. “I’ve been telling Josh the same thing. And I know I’m a fine one to talk.”

“I’ll keep your advice in mind,” I said, giving her a smile. “As long as you promise to do the same.”

“You have a deal,” she said.

I picked up the box, thanked her and headed for the stairs. I hoped John could find some answers in the contents.

I knew that Liz considered the Emmerson Foundation her family’s legacy. The thought that someone had tampered with it cut her deeply and I knew she’d do whatever it took to protect her family. I thought about Mike Pearson then. What had he done to protect his family?

Chapter 11

It hadn’t taken much effort for Mr. P. to find out that Gina Pearson had worked for a marketing consulting firm in Rockland until her drinking had become just too much of a problem for them. And it was one of her former coworkers who had told him about the affair with Gavin Pace. Molly Pace had admitted she’d had two different confrontations with Gina, but it was Charlotte who unearthed more details about their second encounter. Before he transferred to Avery’s progressive private school, Greg Pearson had been a student in the North Harbor school system. One of his teachers had told Charlotte about the confrontation in the school drop-off area between Gina and Molly. Although Molly seemed to have put her marriage to Gavin behind her now, back then she’d been very angry.

“Everyone within earshot heard Molly tell Gina to keep her hands off her husband,” Charlotte said as she made the tea Monday morning. “It got uglier after that.”

“I can’t imagine what that must have been like for Greg,” I said, leaning back against the counter with my coffee mug.

Charlotte shook her head. “I guess he tried to drag his mother away. One of the vice principals had had to step between the two women and some other parent called the police.”

“That is ugly,” I said.

“Is there any chance Molly Pace isn’t telling the truth about where she was the night of the fire?”

I took a sip of my coffee. “No. Mr. P. checked her Facebook page. There were lots of photos of Molly and her friends getting in the holiday spirit, if you get my drift.”

“I do,” she said.

“I’d like to talk to Gavin Pace,” I said.

A small smile played across Charlotte’s face. “I might be able to help with that.”