Marilyn Pappano - Criminal Deception

“You’re a good friend to take care of the dogs like this.”

Natalia’s eyes, magnified behind rectangular-shaped glasses, were blank for a moment, as if she didn’t quite grasp the meaning of the words, then she flushed. “I brought them here.”

“What else could you do? They needed a home.”

Natalia nodded as she came slowly down the steps. When she reached the bottom, Liz would bet, she was going to bolt for home. Grabbing at the only excuse she could come up with, she quickly said, “Hey, Joe suggested that you might be willing to loan me your bike for a ride tomorrow.” She gestured toward the bright green bike on the next porch. “It looks expensive. If you don’t want to, that’s fine. I’d hate to break it or something.”

Natalia’s smile was rusty. “It’s pretty sturdy. Other than flattening a tire, I don’t think you can do anything to it.”

“I haven’t ridden since I was a kid.”

“Until I moved here, I’d never been on a bike. If I can learn at this age, you can remember at your age.”

Liz grinned. “Be careful of the way you say ‘your age.’ After I passed thirty, I got more sensitive about it.”

“You’re not much older than I am.”

When Natalia started toward her house, Liz fell into step with her. “There’s a quote from a movie probably made before you were born, something about it not being the years but the mileage.”

“ Indiana Jones. I like movies.”

“Me, too. Sitting in a darkened theater, munching on salty, buttery popcorn, guzzling pop because the salt makes me thirsty and hoping I can hold off on going to the bathroom until the end.”

Natalia’s expression was blank, as if Liz was describing something alien to her. “I watch them here.” She gestured toward her house. The front door was open, and through the screen door filtered what sounded like an intergalactic battle.

“Do you mind if I come in and see your collection?”

Natalia hesitated long enough that a polite person would have rescinded the request, but Liz just smiled and waited. Finally, with a shrug, Natalia climbed the steps, opened the screen door and waited for Liz to enter first.

Like her house, like Joe’s, Natalia’s door opened into the living room, which wasn’t barren, as Liz’s was, or cozy, as Joe’s was. The furniture-sofa, chair, coffee and end tables-wasn’t antique but merely old and heavily worn. The television, muted now, was top quality, and the movies…

Liz’s brows arched. There were hundreds of them filling shelves that lined the walls: chick flicks, gangster movies, science fiction, thrillers, comedies, horror and entire seasons of enough TV shows to keep a television station in business for years. Liz circled the room, occasionally pulling out a case, then replacing it.

The information in her files on Natalia was minimal: born and raised in Florida, she’d been an honor student before she dropped out of high school and dropped off the radar. She’d had no driver’s license or tax returns in the years since. No arrests either.

Where had she spent that time? Doing what? With a pretty young girl, prostitution was always a possibility. Hardships were a given. But it was a fair bet that an honor student who’d quit school and run away from home was already familiar with hardships of one sort or another. Mrs. Wyndham had thought Natalia had been thrown away, like the puppies, and Liz’s instincts agreed.

Aware of Natalia standing motionless, watching her, she turned and smiled. “Wow. Did you buy out a rental store? This makes my little collection at home look pitiful.”

“Where is home?”

Liz would have bitten back the word if she could. Instead, she shrugged and perched on the sofa arm. “I don’t really have one right now. My parents are storing my stuff for me back in Kansas until I settle down somewhere. Where is home for you?”

Her movements economical, Natalia indicated the room around them. “This is it.”

“I mean, where are you from?”

“Everywhere.” Natalia sat in the armchair, feet flat on the floor, spine straight. “How is Joe?”

“You tell me.” When the blank look appeared, Liz went on. “I don’t know him that well.” Lie . In terms of actual contact, maybe they were still fairly new to each other, but in terms of intensity of contact…she knew him in her bones.

Natalia was silent a long time. “He’s a good guy,” she said at last.

“And you know that based on past experience with good guys?”

She snorted. “Just the opposite. You put a bunch of nice guys together and hide a loser among them, and I can find him blindfolded.”

As Liz slid to sit on the sofa cushion, she suspected that Natalia’s loser stories could put her own to shame. Some part of her wanted to know what the girl had been through and how she could help, but another part didn’t want to know at all. Sad stories were particularly sad when she knew the person involved.

“It must feel funny, going from his brother to him.”

As she considered the comment, Liz’s gaze skimmed across the framed art on the wall. Movie posters, of course, mostly for golden-age classics. If she’d truly been Josh’s girlfriend, it probably would feel strange. But she hadn’t been. “They don’t have much in common.”

“No family resemblance?”

“Well…” Had Joe told Natalia they were twins? “Yeah, I guess you could say that. But they’re very different.”

“So Joe’s the good brother, and Josh is the loser?”

“Yeah, you could say that, too.”

Natalia’s features darkened, and her lavender eyes radiated hostility, but just for a moment, the time it took for her to replace the mask. Did that home life she’d run away from-or been kicked out of-include a sister she couldn’t live up to? Had she been her parents’ bad daughter, their loser?

Liz wished she could magically undo the hurts Natalia had suffered, but she was short on magic. If she had any, she’d fix everyone’s problems. She would zap Josh back into custody, conjure a conviction for the Mulroneys and twinkle up a chance for her and Joe. Just a fair chance, with no baggage, no lies, no Josh between them. That was all she would ask for.

As if she’d had all the conversation she could stand, Natalia got to her feet. “Do you want to give the bike a ride now so you’ll be ready tomorrow?”

“So I can dazzle Joe by not falling off at his feet?” Liz asked drily as she, too, stood. Natalia handed her a white helmet, then went outside and wheeled the bike down the steps.

“I have to wear a helmet?”

“If you want to ride with Joe, you do.”

Liz plopped the helmet on her head, then fastened the chin strap. “I bet I look like a goober with all this hair sticking out.”

She didn’t expect a response, but Natalia looked her over, then soberly agreed, “Yeah, you do.”

After a quick lesson on gears and brakes, Liz climbed onto the bike and peddled between the cottages to the driveway without wobbling too much. The bike’s style was retro, looking like something her mother might have ridden forty years ago, with a wide comfortable seat and a design that allowed her to sit upright. Except for the helmet, it was fun, especially when she took a short spin on the paved street, without all the bumps, and she would get used to the helmet.

When she returned to Natalia, she grinned. “I’m not ready to give up my car, but this is cool. Way different from the bike I got for Christmas when I was eight.”

“It’s not a bad way to get around,” Natalia replied.

Liz climbed off and removed the helmet, shaking out her hair. “Maybe I’ll settle someplace where I can have a bike.”

“I figured you’d settle here. I mean, Joe says he’s not going anywhere.”