“Perry’s parents were robbed and attacked last night,” Alena continued. She half turned to keep her body slightly at an angle away from Anat.
Player tightened his arms around Zyah’s waist, and she was grateful for his support.
“Why did Jonas come looking for him so quickly? How bad was it?” Player asked Alena the question Zyah had wanted to ask but couldn’t get the words out. She was terrified of the answer.
“His father is in a coma, Player. I don’t think he’s going to make it. And his mother isn’t in much better condition. Honestly, from what I understand, Perry could lose both his parents. Jonas, of course, didn’t tell Perry that, only that it was bad and Perry needed to get to the hospital. Blythe told me this morning when I asked. She’s got connections at the hospital.”
Zyah pressed her hand to her stomach, afraid she might vomit. Who in the world would beat older people to such an extent that they would put them in the hospital? Almost kill them?
“The thieves are escalating just the way Jonas said they were. I don’t understand why they aren’t leaving town the way they have every other place they’ve robbed,” Player said.
“Did Perry go to the hospital right away?” Zyah asked. “He never seemed very close to his parents, and from what my grandmother implied once when she talked about him, he didn’t treat them very well; he acted kind of mean to them. Still, I would hope he would have gone.”
There was a part of her that wanted him to be the informant. The local man helping the robbers. She wanted him to be vile enough to serve his own parents up to the robbers in order to keep the cops from looking his way, not realizing the thieves would kill him before they left town.
Alena nodded. “He turned almost white. He looked shocked. The weird thing was, Francine didn’t look so shocked. She must have been drunker than I thought, because it seemed to take a good while before it sank in that Perry’s parents were in the hospital. She kept chattering away and acting like they had all the time in the world before they had to leave. She even had her phone out and was texting. She pouted because she was going to miss dessert. He finally got exasperated and told her to catch a ride home with someone else, that he had to go right then. She left with him, but it only seemed to sink in right before they left that something was wrong.”
Zyah froze, everything in her going still. She had been missing something all along. Francine was texting. She’d been angry when Zyah refused to have Player come to dinner with her. When Francine was angry, she always struck out verbally—which she had. She was already fairly drunk. The robbers had an inside person—someone close to the elderly community. No way would Francine ever condone hurting her grandmother. Would she anyone else? Francine might not like Zyah, but she did like Anat. Didn’t she? And what about Lizz’s other friends?
Surely the things going through her mind couldn’t possibly be the truth. She didn’t want to even consider such a possibility. Had Francine been trying to get Zyah out of the way, taking her to dinner so someone could get back into her grandmother’s house? When she’d learned that Player was with her grandmother, had she insisted that he come to dinner with them in order to get him out of the house? Zyah didn’t want to think those thoughts, but they wouldn’t stop.
“What is it, baby?” Player asked, his lips against her ear.
She shook her head. She didn’t want to voice her doubts out loud. Certainly not in the tearoom, where someone might overhear her. She could barely allow herself to consider that Francine would really set Anat up to be beaten and robbed. Not just Anat, but all of Lizz’s friends in the community. Could she really sit at dinner with Perry, knowing his parents were being robbed? Would she go to a motel with him? Or worse, go to the guesthouse on his parents’ property and have sex with him knowing his parents were being assaulted? The idea sickened Zyah. Was Francine really capable of that kind of behavior?
Then there was the woman in her garage. The one yelling, Fuck her up, fuck her up. The voice had been muffled by the ski mask over her head, and Zyah had been occupied trying to fight off two men, but thinking back, the highpitched, eagerly gleeful sound could have been Francine when she was extremely drunk. Did Francine really hate her enough to have men kidnap her? Possibly kill her?
Zyah spun around, practically throwing herself into Player’s arms, willing him not to ask her any questions.