“I didn’t tell you everything that David found out. I said I was worried he’d make a scene. It’s more than that. Worse. Your fatherwants to hurt me. He told some prisoners before he left he was going to find me.” A deep breath. “He wants to kill me.”
“Bullshit. He’d never do that.”
“He’s not who you think he is.”
Hannah shot back with: “And how would you know? You sent him to prison, just threw him away. And that was it. You never visited him!”
No, she hadn’t. She couldn’t. Nor had she let Hannah. That was not going to happen. This had been an open wound in their relationship. One of them.
“You dumped him there and went on to something else.”
Parker felt her heart beat faster yet. If that were possible. “What?”
“Don’t you have anything to say?”
More silence. The car edged up over eighty. She eased off the gas.
“I’m sorry, Han. I know it’s hard to hear. It breaks my heart. I made a judgment. I had to press charges. It was time for somebody to stand up to him. And now I’m going to keep you safe. Whatever I need to do. And that’s the way it is. We need to be together on this. I need your help.”
The girl scoffed.
Parker reached out and set a hand on the girl’s leg.
“Don’t touch me, bitch.”
Parker stared ahead at the ribbon of highway they coursed along, like so many others around here in need of the blessing of new asphalt. Tears of a very different type from those just a few hours ago formed in her eyes.
Her daughter leaned as far away as she could and reached instinctively for her rear hip, before recalling that the phone was no longer in attendance. She crossed her arms and looked blankly at farmworkers burning the residue from a recent corn harvest, the low orange flames sending pale, aromatic smoke rising uneasily into the air.
47
Jon Merritt parked his pickup in a shady portion of a public park in northwest Ferrington.
Few people were present. Some joggers lost in the zone. Some businesspeople striding decisively, heads tilted sideways or down, concentrating on their phones. Some teens—dressed the sweatshirty way that Hannah dressed—walked or hung out in clusters or did their fine acrobatics on gravity-defying skateboards.
He’d learned that his ex and daughter had been staying at a place called the Sunny Acres in Marshall County. He’d been on his way there when he got the news they’d vanished. Maybe their trail would be picked up again, but until then he himself would search elsewhere for their whereabouts. He had braked hard, spun his truck into a wide, lawn-destroying U-turn, and, ignoring the horns, sped south.
And now it was:
Butterfly time...
Theodore Roosevelt Park was lush, one of the few urban spaces whose lawns, arboretums, planting beds, ponds and stream were kept up. Benches painted, graffiti scrubbed. Parks elsewhere got hardly a dollar for maintenance. But this was the Garden District, the poshest of ’hoods in Ferrington, and though that was a low bar,the area was really quite nice. Merritt didn’t know it well; FPD made few calls here. A doctor was collared for skimming opioids. There was the occasional break-in or Mercedes-jacking. One business partner shot another—and the case wound up on the cable seriesWhen the Rich Murder.The producer had interviewed Jon and his partner.
Not Danny. A different partner.
Before Danny.
He shut the engine off, climbed out and started toward the address handwritten neatly—and conveniently—in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope that contained the cannibalistic-insect greeting card.
The sender was Dorella Muñoz Elizondo, who his ex would have met within the past year. Merritt didn’t know her, hadn’t heard the distinctive name. Yes, there’d been blackouts, but he would have remembered Alli’s friends.
It was possible Allison could have confided in her. She might’ve given Dorella her new phone number. Dom Ryan was helping him in the search. If Merritt could find the number, Ryan could get a location out of a greedy or intimidated underling at her mobile service provider.
Dorella lived in the heart of the ritzy Garden District.
Merritt recalled the inscription in the butterfly card, penned by Dorella to his ex.
Sometimes the love for new friends can be as deep and enduring as the ones we’ve known since childhood. Hang in there, Alli, you’ll get through this...