Before We Were Strangers Page 5

It didn’t look as though anyone was home, so Sloane pulled to the curb a little ways down and let the engine idle. So much had happened in that house, both good and bad. For the most part, she’d loved the property—until it began to feel like a prison, of course. The older she got, the stricter her father had become, and the more claustrophobic she grew as a result. As she entered her teen years, she also began to see her father in a different light. That was what had allowed the suspicion she’d buried to become an obsession of sorts, which made it impossible to remain under his roof after high school graduation.

  Although the house wasn’t quite as big as those that had been built in the area since, like the one she was hoping to rent, the yard was almost three acres instead of two, and the estate as a whole spoke of timeless gentility. Her father had taken great care of the place; he’d always been exacting (of himself and others), which was why his home, his collectible Corvettes and other vehicles, even his suits, were immaculate.

  But the fact that he could afford to buy such a property so soon after he married her mother didn’t speak to his own accomplishments. He’d succeeded in business and small-town politics since then, but just before he graduated from college, an intruder bent on robbery had broken into his parents’ home in Dallas an hour and a half away and shot his mother, father and younger brother. He’d lost them all at once, which was beyond tragic. She’d often wondered how he coped with such a horrific thing, if that was what had made him so aloof and unable to really care beyond the incessant need to control everyone close to him.

  She didn’t know because he rarely talked about the past, and that incident in particular, which was understandable, but that was how he’d come into so much money at such a young age. His dad had been an oil tycoon.

  Sloane often wished she could’ve known her father’s parents. It might’ve made a difference in helping her understand him. She’d known and loved her mother’s mother, but Grandma Livingston had lost her husband, due to an infection that went undiagnosed until it was too late, before Sloane was born, and had died herself a decade later, thanks to a blood clot after having elective surgery to help her lose weight.

  Ed had always treated Grandma Livingston with disdain. To him, she was fat, sloppy and disorganized. But she’d always had plenty of love for Sloane, and to Sloane that was all that mattered. It was Grandma Livingston who’d helped her cope with the loss of her mother, even though Grandma Livingston was also hurt to think Clara would walk out on her and everyone else. Although she’d mostly kept her thoughts to herself, there was one time she’d hinted that she didn’t believe what had happened had gone the way Ed claimed. Grandma Livingston had been drinking that night, which was probably why she’d said what she did, but she’d seemed strangely lucid when she’d stated that Clara would’ve been in touch with somebody if she were still alive. As soon as Sloane questioned her, however, she’d quickly masked the strange look on her face and said not to listen to her, that she was just an old woman crying in her beer.

  That was one of the memories that most troubled Sloane. She needed to find Clara for Grandma Livingston, too.

  After glancing up and down the street to assure herself that no one was taking particular notice, Sloane got out of the car. If her father still lived by the same routine, he had the gardeners come on Friday mornings, but they were gone by now, and a lady who spent all day Saturday getting him ready for the coming week with groceries, a few meals and all the housecleaning.

  Sloane’s heels clacked overly loud on the cement, drawing her nerves taut, as she marched, matter-of-factly, down the sidewalk. She was self-conscious, would rather not be seen, which was probably why it seemed as though she was making too much noise. It was getting late in the day. If her father didn’t have a chamber mixer or some other plans for dinner, he could be on his way home. That was why she was moving so fast. She knew she was crazy to be doing this right now. But it’d been so long since she’d been home. She just wanted to take a peek, to see if it still looked exactly as she remembered.

  The deep woof of a big dog rose to her ears as she reached the front entry. A wave of nostalgia caused her to hesitate as her thoughts segued to Scout, but she understood it probably wasn’t the same dog they’d had ten years ago. Scout had been eight years old when she left.

  A narrow tan-and-black face appeared in the window, and she decided for sure that it wasn’t the dog she’d known. Her father must’ve gotten another German shepherd, since that was his favorite breed.

  They’re the smartest, most loyal dogs in the world. I could tell him to attack you right now, and he would. There’d be nothing left of you, not unless I called him off.

  Sloane shivered at the memory. After her father had told her that—while he was sitting at the dining room table one night, drinking a scotch and water, angry because she’d come home a few minutes after curfew—she’d begun to view Scout with more fear than love. She’d realized then that he wasn’t the family dog, her dog; he was her father’s puppet and a possible weapon.

  “What’s your name?” She tapped the glass to say hello, only to gasp and jerk back when the dog lunged at her with bared teeth.

  “Holy shit! You’re definitely not Scout,” she mumbled and crossed to the other side of the porch so she could peer inside without having an angry German shepherd trying to intimidate her.

  Had her father remarried? Did he have a live-in lover now that both children were out of the house?

  Paige had said she didn’t think so, but Sloane wasn’t sure Paige would know. Once Clara “left,” Ed had found solace in the arms of a woman named Katrina Yost, who’d worked for him as a receptionist at his car lot. Ed hadn’t yet entered politics at that time; he was simply a businessman, so it didn’t matter too much that Katrina wouldn’t make a good politician’s wife. She’d been quite a bit younger, didn’t care for children and craved a great deal of money and attention. Ed had been too smart to let her squander his fortune, and too ambitious to spend all of his time catering to her or any other woman—Sloane’s mother could’ve warned Katrina about that—so the relationship hadn’t lasted more than two years. Katrina moved away after they broke up, and that was it. Sloane had never seen her again.

  There had been others after Katrina, but Sloane could hardly remember their names. From that point on, her father had kept that part of his life very private. Rarely did he bring someone home to meet her and Randy, and, if he did, he introduced the woman as a friend.

  Since he hadn’t been elected mayor until Sloane was a junior in high school, she’d been around to observe him in that capacity for only a couple of years, but she guessed he’d become even more careful since going into public service. Her father had liked running the town, enjoyed having a position of power and authority, and romantic entanglements could all too easily go sour and threaten his image.

  Her father’s dog had figured out how to get inside the room she was now peering into, despite the fact that the door had initially been closed. Since he was once again growling at her, she moved on, around the house.

  She hoped her father’s pet couldn’t get outside. That possibility gave her pause before she opened the gate into the backyard. They’d always had a doggy door. Chances were that hadn’t changed. But if she could block it before the dog could come through, she’d be fine.

  To throw the dog off her trail, she left the gate ajar, went back to the front and tapped the glass. That brought the German shepherd’s nose to the window again, where he burst into an all-new barking frenzy, but as long as he was making so much noise, she’d be able to tell where he was.

  After kicking off her shoes, she dashed around to the back, where she quickly shoved the antique steamer trunk, in which her mother had stored her and her brother’s outside toys, in front of the back door just in time to stop the dog from bolting through it.

  Scout’s replacement wasn’t happy about his inability to eat her alive. She co
uld hear him jumping against the door and whining as if that might improve his situation.

  Reasonably assured she was going to be okay, she turned to stare out at the yard. There were so many places to hide a body on this heavily wooded piece of land. As a child, she’d played here for hours and, as she grew older, she began to look, almost unconsciously at first, for anomalies in the soil. She’d also eyed any slab of concrete, outbuilding or tree and tried to remember if it’d been there before her mother went missing. In many instances, she couldn’t rule out the possibility, but she never found anything definitive, never saw anything that stood out enough to warrant a deeper investigation.

  She did see plenty of terrible things in her dreams, however. Her most common nightmare featured her sitting on the tire swing that dangled from the burr oak right off the back porch—and was there to this day, just like the toy box—happily laughing with her brother until she happened to glance down and see a hand sticking out of the ground.

  She squeezed her eyes closed as the terrible feeling that nightmare gave her swept over her again. Where are you, Mom? Am I about to ruin my relationship with Dad and Randy forever by insisting you could be here?

  She missed her brother so much, wished she could rely on him to support her in some small way, or at least be impartial. But she doubted that would happen. If he was anything like he’d been before, Randy wouldn’t even give her an audience. Whenever she’d tried to bring up the sounds she’d heard the night their mother disappeared, he’d scowl and tell her that she’d been just a little girl when it happened and had no clue what she was talking about. If she insisted, he’d explode. “Dad would never hurt Mom! What are you talking about? That’s nuts!”

  She understood he was afraid they’d lose their father, too. But if their mother hadn’t run away, if Ed was responsible for Clara’s disappearance, didn’t they all deserve justice? Wasn’t it better to face the truth than let their father get away with such a terrible crime? If Ed had killed her, look what he’d cost them!

  The dog had stopped making a racket. Sloane checked her watch. It was five thirty. Had her father come home? If so, had he seen her car parked down the street?

  Didn’t matter. He wouldn’t recognize it as hers. That car could belong to anyone.

  But she had left her shoes on the front lawn...

  Her pulse notched up as she pressed her back to the wall of the house so that she couldn’t be seen through any of the windows. Odds were he’d pulled into the garage, which meant he hadn’t gone in through the front and might not have spotted her shoes.

  But if he had, she didn’t want to meet up with him alone in the yard where he might’ve buried her mother. The houses here were so spread out and the fences and trees so many and so tall, it was likely no one would even hear her scream.

  She pulled out her phone while she waited, listening with baited breath, and sent a text to Paige, just so that someone would know where she was.

  Stopped by to see the old house while my father was gone. Running a bit late. Be there shortly.

  She wanted to add: If I don’t show up, call the police, except Micah would probably respond, since it was Paige calling, and Sloane couldn’t believe he’d be too upset if something happened to her. Not these days.

  No problem, came Paige’s response. Just got home myself.

  Sloane let her breath seep slowly out as she edged around the house. She had to get out of there, couldn’t hide in the backyard indefinitely.

  Once she reached the front, she craned her neck to see the full length of the driveway.

  If her father had come home, she couldn’t tell. There was no car out in the open, and the garage door was down.

  It was likely she’d panicked too soon. But she didn’t care. She was leaving, and she was leaving now.

  Hoping he was busy changing out of his work clothes even if he was home, she darted from the shadow of the house, scooped up the low heels she’d kicked off before and ran, barefoot, all the way back to her car. She thought she heard the dog barking again but her father didn’t come out and call her name.

  Her heart was still racing as she climbed into the Jag.

  She’d just started the engine when someone knocked on the passenger-side window. Startled, she almost threw the transmission into Drive and took off without even looking to see who it was.

  Fortunately, she didn’t do that, because it wasn’t her father. It was Mrs. Winters, the mother of a girl Sloane had known growing up named Sarah, who had cognitive disabilities. Sloane used to attend Sarah’s birthday party each year, still remembered how impressed she’d been, even at a young age, by the constant, loving care her mother gave her. Watching the two of them had made Sloane miss her own mother.

  Willing herself to calm down so she wouldn’t seem too crazy, and cringing to think her father’s neighbor had witnessed her mad dash to the car, she lowered the window. “Hello, Mrs. Winters. It—it’s great to see you again. It’s been a long time.”

  Like her house behind her, the older woman had once been attractive but had long since fallen victim to neglect. She glanced nervously up and down the street. “Come inside for a moment, dear,” she murmured, her voice urgent, and hurried back up her own walk.

  * * *

  Micah remained at the station even though his shift had ended an hour ago. He’d been up since dawn, when he’d gone to the gym. It’d already been a long day, but he was staying late to catch up on some paperwork. He wasn’t particularly behind, but what else did he have to do? He wasn’t anxious to go home, didn’t care to sit in his new rental house, staring at four empty walls. He hadn’t yet hung a single painting, hadn’t unpacked anything except the bare essentials, so the place felt foreign, unwelcoming.

  He needed to settle in and make it a home, his home, but he was tempted to move back to the apartment above his parents’ barn. He’d been living there for the past year, ever since the divorce, and helping with his father’s chores when he had the opportunity and wasn’t working himself. Keeping busy meant he didn’t have to feel half the shit he felt when everything slowed down, but he needed to start living again, needed to establish some kind of social life, so he’d made the decision to move back to town. He had to face the void of no longer being a full-time parent at some point.

  Problem was...he didn’t seem to be adapting as well as he’d hoped.

  And now Sloane was back.

  Of course she’d return when he was still trying to climb out of the wreckage of his divorce.

  He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and scrolled through his recent call history.

  Ed McBride. 2:10 p.m.

  Ed McBride. 3:40 p.m.

  Ed McBride. 4:04 p.m.

  Ed McBride. 5:31 p.m.

  He’d ignored four calls from Sloane’s father and one voice mail. Normally, Micah didn’t have any trouble picking up for the mayor. These days, they played golf together on occasion. Back when he’d been dating Sloane, he hadn’t cared for the man. He knew what Sloane suspected, even if she never talked about it. But no one else seemed to think Ed might be responsible for Clara McBride’s disappearance, not even his son—especially not his son.

  So five years or so after Sloane left, Micah had decided it was silly to carry a grudge when there was no evidence Ed was guilty of any wrongdoing. Sloane’s father had been overbearing and overprotective—insufferable, at times—to Sloane, and that had made Micah defensive of her. But a lot of fathers with strong personalities fell into that trap. It wasn’t proof Ed didn’t mean well, that he didn’t care about her. In fact, many would argue that it established the opposite, something Micah had come to understand now that he had a child of his own.

  So why had he been avoiding Ed’s calls? Why did he suddenly feel like a traitor maintaining a relationship with him? Micah didn’t owe Sloane anything; he’d made that clear when he bumped into her earlier. And re
maining friends with the mayor could be beneficial to his career.

  He hit the button on his phone that would return Ed’s calls.

  “Micah, there you are!”

  “Sorry, it’s been a busy afternoon,” Micah said, but that was a blatant lie. It’d been slow, which was why he’d been able to obsess over Sloane. It drove him crazy that she was all he’d been able to think about since their unexpected encounter, hated that the one person who’d hurt him worse than any other still held any power over him.

  He was going to break her hold if it was the last thing he did.

  “Can you hear me?” Ed asked. “I’m on my way home so I have to use my Bluetooth.”

  “You’re coming through loud and clear,” Micah said. “What can I do for you?”

  “Just thought I should give you a heads-up.” He lowered his voice. “Sloane’s back in town.”

  Micah didn’t let on that he already knew. He was too curious to hear what Ed had to say—why, after Micah had had no contact with Sloane for ten years, her father felt the need to make this call. “How do you know?”

  “Paige stopped by my office earlier today.”

  “Paige...”

  “Yeah. I helped her out with some parking issues she was having in front of her store, so she did me this favor.”

  Micah felt his muscles bunch. He wasn’t cool with that. Regardless of how he felt about Sloane, Paige was pretending to be her friend. Going to her father didn’t seem very friendly, very loyal, but he tried not to let his ex-wife’s actions bother him. It’s not my problem. “Then you haven’t heard from Sloane yourself.”

  “Not since she left town ten years ago. You?”

  Ed had stopped asking in recent years. “No. Never.”

  “So you have no idea why she’s back?”

  Micah rubbed a hand over his beard growth. “This is where she was born and raised. Isn’t that enough?”

  “After a decade of total silence?”

  A decade was a long time. A child didn’t usually cut off a parent without some reason, not unless that child was on drugs or acting out in other ways, and Sloane had never been a troublemaker. She was sensitive and sweet—but Micah couldn’t allow himself to think anything that might soften his stance where she was concerned. He had to remain unsympathetic for his own protection. “Maybe she needs some time off. She’s been working hard. We’ve all seen the magazines.”