Linwood Barclay - Fear The Worst

“What about your job?” she asked.

“I can always sell cars. I don’t know how much time I have to find Syd.”

Patty reached down to the floor for one of the damp, bloody towels, and used it to dry her feet before she swung them out of the tub.

“You need to call your mom and let her know where you are, that you’re okay,” I said.

A small smile crossed Patty’s face. “You think everybody’s family is like yours.”

“What do you mean?”

“You think all families care.”

I didn’t have anything to say to that.

“I know what it’s like for Sydney,” Patty said. “She acts like it’s a big pain in the ass, you guys calling her when she’s late, her checking in to let you know where she is, you looking out for her and all that shit. Sometimes, mostly when she’s with me, she acts like that stuff embarrasses her, but I think she just acts that way because she doesn’t want me to feel bad because nobody’s waiting up for me, wondering where I am, dragging me out of dumbass parties like that one I went to tonight, because no one gives a shit, you know?”

“I’m sorry.”

“My dad, one time-this was before I was six and he took off? He almost killed me.”

Maybe, when you’re already carrying a heavy burden, there’s always room for a little more. “What did he do?” I asked.

“It wasn’t usually his thing to take me to daycare, right? But this one day, my mom, she had this really early morning meeting to go to, so my dad had to drop me off, only he forgot, you know? I guess I was three, and I’m in the back, and I guess I fell asleep, and instead of going to daycare to drop me off, he just kept driving to work, and it was really hot out.”

“Oh no,” I said.

“So he went into work and it was like eighty degrees out but like a fucking million degrees in the car, and I guess when I woke up I was all dehydrated and shit, and my super-terrific dad didn’t remember I was out there until about two hours later. So he runs out and gets me out and runs me into the building and I’m totally like almost passed out and he gets me some water and makes me drink it and this is the thing, right, the first thing he says to me, and I can still remember this, even though I was three years old, he says to me, ‘Let’s not tell your mother about this.’”

I was slowly shaking my head.

“But she found out anyway, because just before my dad runs out, some lady saw me in the car and she wasn’t strong enough to smash in the window so she’d called the fire department. So everybody found out, my mom too, and that was the beginning of the end of their so-called marriage.”

“That’s an awful story,” I said.

“You know why I think he did it?” she asked.

I sighed. “It happens,” I said. “You just get into this kind of trance, you do the things you always do in the morning, and dropping you off was something different. He was on autopilot. I’m sure he never meant to do it.”

“Okay, maybe he didn’t mean to do it,” Patty said. “I mean, it wasn’t like he got up that morning and decided, hey, I think I’ll kill my little girl today. I know he didn’t actually do that. It was more like a subconscious thing. At this really dark level in his brain, he didn’t care what happened to me, because the son of a bitch isn’t even my real father.”

I didn’t have it in me to take this child’s pain away. Even if I’d had the energy to want to deal with it, she’d never be able to unload all of it. Right now, I didn’t want to know about her mother’s extramarital affairs, or whether she was adopted, or any of that stuff. The simple truth was, if I let my head touch the bath mat, I’d fall asleep right here on the bathroom floor.

“Did you ever cheat on Mrs. B.?” she asked.

“That’s kind of personal,” I said.

Her face cracked. “So you did . I thought you were different. I thought you were, like, all upstanding and shit like that.”

“The answer is no,” I said. “I was always faithful to Mrs. B.-Susanne-while we were together.”

“You’re shittin’ me.”

“No,” I said. “I am not shittin’ you.”

I struggled to get up off the floor. “Patty,” I said, “I have to get some sleep. And you need to get to bed. Take Syd’s room. In the morning I still want you to call your mother.”

“You hear my cell phone ringing?” she asked. “You hear anybody wondering where I am?”

“No,” I said.

As I moved to leave the bathroom, Patty said to me, “I have this really great idea.”

I stopped. For a second, I wondered whether she’d suddenly had an insight into where I might find Syd.

“What’s that?”

“Why don’t I just live here? While you’re out during the day finding Sydney, I can watch the place, make sure nobody breaks in again and fucks around with things, take phone calls, keep an eye on the website, have something ready for you to eat when you get home.”

Her eyes had brightened. She had a hopeful smile on her face.

“I can’t do that, Patty,” I said. “It’s a kind offer, but I have to say no. It wouldn’t be right.”

“What’s the big deal? You afraid people’ll think if I’m living here you’re doing me?”

As much as I liked Patty, she was wearing me out. I’d done all I could for her tonight.

“I’ve already got one daughter to worry about,” I said. “I don’t need two.”

She held my gaze for several seconds. The words seemed to have opened a new wound in her, bigger than the one in her knee.

“Okay, then,” she said frostily. She grabbed her shoes and brushed past me on her way to Sydney’s bedroom. “I didn’t mean like it had to be forever.”

“Patty,” I said to her, firmly but not unkindly, “in the morning, I’m happy to give you a lift wherever you need it, but you have to leave.”

And she did. Before I got up.

I SLEPT TILL HALF PAST SEVEN. Before heading into the en-suite off my bedroom, I went down the hall and looked in Sydney’s bedroom. The door was wide open. The bed was empty, and made. I wasn’t even sure Patty had slept there.

After telling her she’d have to leave in the morning, I’d gone into my own bedroom and closed the door. I’d fallen asleep almost instantly. It was possible, I now realized, that she had left then.

I went down to the kitchen to look for any signs of her, but there were none. The only glass in the sink was the one I had used to take some Tylenol the night before.

“Okay, then,” I said quietly to myself. I went to the front door, found it unlocked. Patty would have had to unlock it to leave, and without a key, had no way to send the bolt home when she stepped outside.

Before hitting the shower, I checked the computer to see whether anyone had tried to get in touch with me about Syd. And of course, every time I sat down to the computer, what I was most hoping to find was a note from Syd herself.

This morning, as was most often the case, there was nothing.

But the phone did ring just before eight.

“Hey,” Susanne said. “I was sitting here, wishing the phone would ring with good news.”

“I wish I had some,” I said. I filled her in on a couple of things. That I’d quit my job until I’d found Syd. That blood belonging to Syd, and some hood who had been found dead in Bridgeport, was on Syd’s car. That someone who’d been involved in the break-in at my house had come by the dealership looking for Syd, and had tried to kill me.

“What?” Susanne said. “And I’m hearing about all this now?”

I thought I had plenty of excuses. Exhausted. Traumatized. Overwhelmed. But I didn’t think any of them would fly.