Tara Quinn - Where the Road Ends

A part of her that needed to know she wasn’t doing this alone.

He picked up in the middle of the first ring.

“She wasn’t there. I’m on 196 heading north.” The two-lane highway was only slightly easier to travel than M-43.

“I’ve got someone heading up M-43 into South Haven and beyond in case you missed something.”

Amy nodded. Brad was taking her seriously.

Still, tension ate away at her regained sense of control.

“What’s your man going to do if he finds her?” As she’d already revealed to Brad, she had no concrete plan for getting information from the woman who’d managed to dupe the Chicago police and FBI into thinking she was innocent. Up to this point, her plan had always been about finding Kathy. And nothing about what she’d do when she actually did.

“Ask questions,” Brad said. “Try to get her to reveal something. It’s all he can do.”

“What kind of questions?”

A long pause. And then a sigh. “You’re in way over your head, Amy. Go home.”

The grassy median, brown now from the winter cold, sped by her window. Pine trees grew in the distance. “What kind of questions?” she asked again.

“Anything to keep her talking. Maybe ask her about a tire on her car needing air. Maybe about the food in the restaurant she stopped at. He’ll know what to do. The idea is to get her to disclose anything at all about her life. Where she’s been. Where she’s going. Why. And hopefully, if he can keep her talking long enough, she’ll give us a detail that’ll crack this case.”

He paused and she could hear him sigh a second time. “Details. It so often comes down to details.”

Amy quickly cataloged his response. When she found Kathy, she’d be ready. While the car heater blew steadily, warming her skin, her heart remained completely unaffected.

“What if she won’t tell me anything?” she asked, her mind already skipping ahead, playing out a full scenario. “I can’t just let her walk away.”

“She’d better not tell you anything because you’d better not be talking to her. My men will get her to talk, Amy. It’s what they’re trained to do. If not at first, they’ll just happen to turn up wherever she stops next. Go home. Let us do our job.”

Yeah, and if she’d done that, his men would still be in Wisconsin or Chicago or Washington, D.C. or wherever else they’d been looking. If not for her, they wouldn’t have any idea that Kathy Stead was traveling on an innocuous strip of highway in western Michigan.

“I’m going to stop in every small town along the way until I find someone who’s seen her,” she replied.

“Keep in mind that you’re doing this against my advice.”

“I know.”

“Call every half hour.” Brad’s voice was gruff, impatient. He was obviously not prepared to entertain any arguments.

She might have argued, anyway, except that he hung up.

And the loneliness once again consumed her.

“No, ma’am, no one here’s seen her.” The middle-aged woman at Monroe’s Café and Grill in Saugatuck handed the snapshot back to Amy with an odd, not quite suspicious but not entirely sympathetic look. “Is she your sister?”

“No.” Amy took the photo, eager to move on. “Just an old high-school friend who used to live in these parts.” She tried to deliver her spiel with some of the ease she usually exhibited. “She’s remarried and I don’t know her new name or I’d just look her up in the phone book.”

Shoulders relaxing, the other woman nodded, her brown eyes warming. “I wish we could be more help,” she said. “Have you tried the sheriff’s office in Douglas? It’s over the bridge, a little past the Holiday Inn. They’d probably know if she lived around here.”

Amy nodded, tucked the picture into the pocket of her parka, thanked the woman and hurried back out into the cold.

Saugatuck appeared to be a tourist town, judging by the marina, shops and bed-and-breakfast places she passed. But it was a small one, although it had its share of big old aluminum-sided homes in pleasant, shady neighborhoods. As quickly as possible, Amy perused as much of the town as she could manage, stopping at Mario’s Pizza, a convenience store and a couple of motels that weren’t name brand. She gave the artists’ shops a miss. Something told her Kathy would not be in the mood for shopping.

And then, as she turned, looking beyond the big trees that lined the town, her heart stopped. Just for a moment. But it was long enough to take her breath away. And to let panic in. There, by the lake, was a ferry. The perfect way for a woman—and her car—to disappear. Amy swore. She tried to take a deep breath to prevent the tears that threatened from falling.

Kathy could already have left. Gone. Missing again.

And if she had, Amy would have to wait who knew how long for the next ferry. By that time, her ex-nanny could be anywhere. Her hand came down hard on the steering wheel. Why the hell did this keep happening?

Johnny? Are you up there? Help.

The Butler served great steaks, a neon sign told her as she drove past to the ferry.

And the Bayside Inn had suites with fireplaces.

A worn wooden sign proclaimed the existence of the Singapore Yacht Club. The deserted facility did not deliver the promise of its expensive-sounding name.

The bandstand by the ferry was completely desolate. Forlorn-looking. Not even the ducks were venturing out in this cold.

Maybe the ferry would follow. Maybe it, too, would remain inactive, not operating on such a bone-chilling day.

Of course, Amy wasn’t that lucky. As the cold seeped through her jeans, she stood by the dock and waited while the elderly ferry worker thought back over his morning.

“No, miss, we’ve only had a couple of families and a few business travelers today,” he told her when she inquired about the day’s passengers.

“You’re sure you haven’t seen a green Grand Am? Or a woman who looks like this?”

She showed him the weathered snapshot again, just to make sure his old eyes really saw the woman depicted there. Her fingers were shaking, though from the cold penetrating her body or the stress consuming it she had no idea.

He held the photo close to his face.

“I’m sure,” he finally said, still studying Kathy’s image. “I haven’t seen her.”

Amy’s cheeks hurt as she broke into a grin. “Thank you, sir,” she said, and half skipped back to her car. This time no was a good answer.

Brad called. Three of his investigators were covering western Michigan. One was behind her. One in front of her. And one was taking the off-shoot roads. Amy was relieved to hear the news, but she couldn’t rest.

She did, however, take the time to scout out the elementary school in Saugatuck after her visit to the sheriff’s office turned up nothing. Or rather, the elementary school in Douglas, Saugatuck’s neighboring town. They split educational responsibilities; Saugatuck had the high school, Douglas, kindergarten to grade six.

If Kathy was living nearby with Charles, he might, at that very moment, be in Douglas Elementary. Learning to read. Or to do simple math.

Maybe playing in the schoolyard.

Amy hoped Charles had a warm coat with a hood. He’d always been prone to ear infections during the winter months.

But then, Kathy would know that. She was the one who’d taken Amy’s son to the doctor, picked up his prescriptions and more often than not, administered them. It had usually been Kathy—or Johnny—who was up nights, walking with the crying toddler, soothing him, while Amy got a few hours sleep before having to face another day of high-pressure meetings with powerful men who frequently tried to get the best of the young woman doing a man’s job.