Diane Chamberlain - The Lost Daughter

“Don’t open the door!” He’d been sitting in the living room with Tim, but now he headed for the stairs.

“It’s all right, Marty,” Tim said. “It’s just a kid looking for a handout.”

“Don’t open it!” Marty stood at the top of the stairs, and CeeCee, cradling a bowl of chocolate kisses, saw real terror in his eyes.

“It’s okay, Marty,” she said. “I won’t open it.”

Tim looked at her with gratitude. “Sorry,” he said.

She went outside and blew out the candles inside the jack-o’-lanterns, then Tim turned out the front lights. Standing in the middle of the foyer in her Jolly Green Giant outfit, she looked up at Marty, who was now sitting on the top step like a little kid, elbows on his knees and his chin resting on his hands.

“Get your guitar, Marty, and come downstairs,” she said. “We’ve got some chocolate to eat.”

Four weeks after their first date, Tim called her when he got out of his evening class. It was nearly ten-thirty, and CeeCee and Ronnie were lying in their beds reading, but when he asked if he could come pick her up, that he had something important he wanted to ask her, she didn’t hesitate.

“I’ll wait for you out front.” She hung up the phone and hopped off her bed. “He said he has something important to ask me,” she said to Ronnie as she stripped off her pajamas.

“Oh my God!” Ronnie put down her magazine. “Do you think he’s going to propose? Today is, like, your one-month anniversary and everything, right?”

That had been CeeCee’s first thought as well, though she and Tim had never even mentioned marriage. The tone of his voice, though, told her that whatever he wanted to ask her was serious business.

“I don’t know.” She pulled a T-shirt over her head, not bothering with a bra. “I just can’t see him asking me to marry him right now.” Did she want him to? She wasn’t sure.

“You’re practically his wife already,” Ronnie said. “You do his laundry, for Pete’s sake. Maybe he figures he should make it legal.”

CeeCee ran a brush through her hair, bending low to see her reflection in the mirror above the dresser. “It’s probably nothing like that.”

“I bet it is.” Ronnie sat up on her bed, hugging her knees. “What will you say if he asks you?”

She gave her hair one final swipe with the brush as she thought about the question. “I’d say no,” she said finally. “I mean, I know he’s the right one, but I want to be out of college and supporting myself before I get married. I don’t want to be dependent on him.”

Ronnie held up the issue of Cosmopolitan she’d been reading. “You need to take a look at this article,” she said. “He’s rich. Let him support you.”

CeeCee opened the door, then turned back to her friend with a smile. “One day,” she said. “But not today.”

Today you rubbed my back after I got sick. It felt so good. It’s like you’re the mother now and I’m the child. You’re a natural-born caretaker, CeeCee. How did I get so lucky to have you as a daughter?

SHE CLIMBED INTO TIM’S VAN AND LEANED OVER TO KISS him, and she knew right away that he was nervous. His smile was brief and false and he didn’t hold her gaze the way he usually did. Instead, he started driving.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Nothing. I just don’t want to talk in front of your house.” He probably thought Ronnie would be watching from the window. “Should we go to your house?”

He shook his head and turned the corner into the parking lot of an old Baptist church. “Marty’s there,” he said, “and I want to talk to you alone.”

Oh, God. He was going to propose.

He turned off the ignition. “It’s getting kind of chilly out. Will you be okay if we just sit here for a while?”

“I’m fine,” she said.

The parking-lot lights filled the car and he looked pale, almost sick, in their glow. “I’ve got something heavy to talk to you about,” he said.

She couldn’t stop her smile. “Okay.” She would have to be very kind when she turned him down, very loving. She’d make sure he knew it was the timing that was wrong, not the proposal itself.

Tim rubbed his palms together as if trying to warm himself up.

“There’s a way you can help Andie,” he said.

Surprised, she swallowed the words she’d been ready to say. He was not going to ask her to marry him. She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed.

“How?” she asked.

He looked at her squarely for the first time since she got in the car. “I’m not sure how to tell you,” he said, pressing his hands together. “I guess what I need to say first is that Marty and I have been working on a plan. But it’s illegal.” He watched her face for a reaction. “And it’s dangerous,” he added.

She clutched his arm. “What are you talking about?” She remembered the waitress, Bets, who told her Tim was a dangerous man, and she felt a quick, sharp fear that she could lose him. He could get arrested and locked away, the way Andie was.

“You don’t have to say you’ll do what I ask. Okay?” He covered her hand with his. “I mean, I love you, babe. I’m going to go on loving you whether you help me with this or not. Is that clear?”

“Yes,” she said, “but—”

“Do you want me to tell you the plan or would you rather not know?”

“Well, I have to know what I’m saying yes or no to, don’t I?”

“If I tell you, you have to swear that you won’t breathe a word to anyone. Not Ronnie or anyone. So, if you might have a hard time doing that, please let me know now so I don’t—”

“I won’t tell anyone,” she said. “I promise.” They were planning to break Andie out of prison. What else could make him this jumpy and anxious? Maybe they’d ask her to drive the getaway car or something. If that was the only way to save Andie’s life, could she do it? “Dangerous” was an understatement. “If she’s on death row,” she said, “won’t it be nearly impossible to get her out?”

“What?” Tim looked confused. “Oh. No, that’s not it, CeeCee.” He let go of her and ran both hands through his hair. “You know we’ve tried every legal way to get her sentence reduced, right?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“Now, we have to play hardball. Listen to me.” He took both her hands in his. “Marty and I are going to kidnap Governor Russell’s wife.”

“What?” She giggled. “Are you kidding?”

He looked away from her, not a hint of a smile on his face, and she knew he was not kidding at all. “I’m very serious,” he said.

“Tim.” She let go of his hand, reached up and turned his face toward hers. “This is crazy,” she said. “This is like something Marty would come up with. Is this his idea?”

“Mine, actually,” he said. “And it’s not crazy. We’ve got it all worked out.”

“I can’t believe you’d even think of doing something like this.”

“I won’t tell you anything more about it, then,” he said. “Just don’t say anything to anyone.”

“I told you I wouldn’t. But I’m not following you at all. How will kidnapping the governor’s wife help Andie?”

“We’ll let her go when he commutes her sentence.”

“Then you could end up in prison, too,” she said.

“I won’t.”

“What if he won’t do it?”

“I believe he will.”

“But you—”

“Look.” He raised his hands sharply in the air, suddenly angry. “It’s going to work, okay? I need it to work. So please, cool it with the ‘but this’ and ‘but that.’ It doesn’t help.”