Mariah Stewart - Cry Mercy

Try as he might to keep his focus on the present, sometimes looking back was unavoidable.

He entered the house from the side porch and noted two of the steps were sagging. Just something else for the list to go over with Herb. Once inside, he got himself a glass of water and a kitchen knife and went into the front hall where he'd stacked Belinda's boxes. He opened the front door and the side windows to let the stiff, settled air escape and hopefully allow some fresh, dust-free air in.

His eyes went from one box to the next and wondered where to start. He didn't really want to start at all, he realized. If she were to come back, would she be annoyed that he'd rifled through her belongings? And if she wasn't coming back, it seemed macabre to him to go through the clothes she wore and the books she read and the things that mattered to her. The thought that she might not come back at all was one he'd avoided as much as possible, because it was too sad to think about.

Buck up, Perone .

With the knife, he cut through the tape on the top of the first box and peeled back the cardboard. Determining that the box held only clothes, Nick put it aside and turned his attention to the next one. Same thing: clothes. The third and fourth boxes were filled with more clothes.

“How many times a day did this kid change?” he muttered as he moved the unopened boxes to the living room.

Ah, this was more like it-books, papers, tests, more papers, notebooks. Nick took out a stack and shuffled through them, but he found no reference to anyone named D.S. nor anything that would give him a sense of where she was going on January twenty-fourth.

“Come on, Belinda. Help me out here,” he muttered.

On to the next box. More textbooks-had he known she'd been taking a class in genetics?-and a blizzard of index cards scattered throughout. He reached into the box and pulled out the one thing he could see that had color. The orange folder held some printed sheets, which proved to be Belinda's cell-phone bills. He recalled that the police had requested copies from the carrier, but they hadn't been much help in identifying D.S. He put the file back in the box, stood and stretched, thinking about where he might go to grab some food. His stomach had begun to loudly remind him that he'd skipped lunch and it was well past the time when he usually ate. There was the Friendly Diner down on Wilkins Road; they were always good for a decent meal.

He was out the door and behind the wheel of his car, about to make a K-turn, when he hesitated. Something nagged at him, something about the phone bills. Nick turned off the ignition and returned to the house, to the foyer, to the box he'd just closed up. The orange folder was visible through the crack made by the top flaps, and he stuck his hand in and pulled it out. The most recent bill was on top, and he scanned it for the date.

July, 2008. Then he remembered that she'd gotten a new phone, a new plan, a new carrier-and a new number that summer. What had she said at the time? Something about an old boyfriend who wouldn't stop calling. Deb would know.

He flipped through the pages, taking note of all the out-of-state calls Belinda had made over the 2007-08 school year and into the summer of 2008. Maybe Deb knew something about those as well.

He tucked the bill back into the folder with the others and took the whole thing with him. Back in the car, he plugged his phone into the charger to give it a little more juice. He had a feeling he'd need every one of those bars before the night was over.

So how'd your first day go?” Mallory said, as she stopped in Emme's office on her way home for the night.

“Good. Really good, actually.” Emme ticked off her accomplishments on the fingers of one hand. “I met with Nick Perone, Chief Dietrich, Debra New-house, and got back in time to pick Chloe up from school, though just barely.”

“I'd say that qualifies as damned good.” Mallory dropped her briefcase near the door and came partway into the room. “What's the uncle like?”

Emme thought it over for a moment, considering how best to answer. Tall, dark, and oh-my-goodness first came to mind, but this being her first case, she went for something a little more professional.

“Seems smart. Smart enough to run a profitable business. He's what a cop I used to know would call a gearhead.”

“A what?”

“A gearhead. Really into cars. He repairs-excuse me, he restores old ones. Excuse me twice, that would be classic automobiles. He has this spiffy garage that doesn't look anything remotely like a garage from the outside. It's brick, Federal looking. Very nice.” She paused before adding, “I'd say he cares a lot about his niece. I think he suspects she might be dead, but he needs to know for sure. I don't think he's deluding himself, where she's concerned. He pretty much reiterated everything in the report he had submitted, but I did learn something very interesting. I asked about getting in touch with the girl's father, you know, thinking maybe she took off with him, but according to Nick, he's never known who the father was. That had been in the report, but I thought it had been miswritten or something. I mean, you'd know who your niece's father was, wouldn't you?”

“The girl's mother is his sister, right?” Mallory frowned. “How could he not know?”

“That was my reaction, too, but he said that his sister never told him, and when he hinted around about it, she shut down the conversation. So he let it go, figuring it was just something she didn't want to talk about.”

“Like maybe a relationship that didn't work out?”

Emme nodded. “I suppose. He said the only thing she ever told him about Belinda's father was that he would never be a factor in her life.”

“So maybe she never told the guy she was pregnant, and decided to raise her baby on her own.”

“That's what it sounds like to me.” Emme rested her head against the back of her chair.

“Any chance the father might have found out somehow, and came looking for her?”

“There's no way of knowing. Wendy-the mother of the missing girl-died in a car accident five years ago. Who knows who she might have been in touch with before she died?” Emme swiveled the chair slowly, side to side. “Now, the roommate did say that Belle-Belinda-once said that she didn't have a father, but she assumed that meant the father was dead or was AWOL.”

“Did the roommate have anything else to say?”

“Only that while the police report reflects that Belinda took her laptop with her, Debra says that isn't so. She claims that the laptop was still on Belinda's desk when she woke up, hours after Belinda left the room. It was gone later that day, but she can't pinpoint when it disappeared.”

“Did she report that to the police?”

“No, but I called the chief on my way back and told him. He was going to speak with the reporting officer about that. Debra thinks he merely misunderstood what she said.”

“Any other little gems surface?”

“Not that I can think of offhand.”

The sound of two small feet running drew their attention to the hall. Seconds later, Chloe and Susanna appeared in the doorway.

“In case you were wondering, I've commandeered your adorable child,” Susanna told Emme. “She's been a great help to me, separating colored index cards.”

“I made…” Chloe paused to count. “Four piles. Blue ones, yellow ones, white ones, and pink ones.”

“Four very neat piles, I might add,” Susanna noted. “Maybe one day next week you can help me organize my pencils.”

Chloe draped herself across her mother's lap and nodded solemnly.

“Really, Susanna, you don't have to-” Emme began.