Fear The Worst

“I swear I-”

“Shut up,” I said. “If you’re not straight with me, right now, right here, I’m calling Detective Je

“Honest, I don’t-”

“Tell him,” Bob said. “Tell him what you know.”

All eyes were on Evan. “She was just-first of all, she didn’t like her job.”

“What job?” I asked. “Where was she working? What was she doing?”

“She told me she was working at the hotel. Same as she told you,” Evan said, looking at me.

“What didn’t she like?”

“She said she wanted to quit, see if she could get her job back at the dealership.”

“What else?” I said. “What else did she say?”

Evan swallowed. “She was also kind of worried about another thing.”

Again, we waited for Evan to spit it out. Finally, he said, “She thought she might be late.”

“Late?” I said.

“Oh shit,” said Susa

And then she collapsed.

TWENTY-ONE

BOB AND I SHOUTED “SUZE!” at the same moment. But even after having been kicked in the nuts, he was down on his knees more quickly than I. He whipped off his sports jacket, folded it over, and slipped it under Susa

“Are you okay?” he asked urgently. “Suze?”

It was as though she’d simply crumpled. Her leg or hip or something had momentarily given out and she’d dropped to the pavement like a marionette suddenly without strings. She’d managed to put a hand out to keep her head from striking the ground with any force.

Bob looked at his son and barked, “Call an ambulance!”

Evan didn’t seem to know which way to turn first, whether to grab a cell from one of us or run back to the office. Before he could get his feet to move, Susa

“Don’t move,” Bob said. He was bent over, cradling her head with his arm. “What’s happened? One of the fractures give way or what?”

“Honestly,” she said. “It’s okay. I just kind of slipped. I don’t think I’ve broken anything again.”

I stood, transfixed, looking not at Susa

“You sure?” he asked, his voice shaking. “That was a nasty fall.”

“Really,” she whispered.

And then I thought I saw Bob’s chin quiver as he struggled to contain his emotions.

“Why don’t I get some water?” I said.

“I can do that,” Evan said, and ran.

“I’m just an idiot,” Susa

I found it on the ground, grabbed it, and handed it to Bob.

Bob, still cradling her, said, “It’s okay. There was so much going on.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, not just to Susa

Susa

We did. We had her on her feet just as Evan returned with a bottled water he’d just cracked the cap on. He handed it to Susa

“Thanks,” she said, getting hold of the cane and testing her weight on it. “I’m okay.”

We all took a moment. Then Susa

The implications of Evan’s last remark, that Syd was worried about “being late,” had finally sunk in. I wanted to hear what he had to say.

Evan kept his head low, like he was a puppy about to be hit with a rolled-up newspaper. “It was just the one time,” he said.

“That’ll do it,” Bob said.

“But like, a couple of days before she disappeared, she got one of those get-pregnant-at-home kits,” Evan said.

“Home pregnancy test,” Susa

“Yeah,” he said. “That’s it.”

“What did it show?” Susa

“I think it was positive,” Evan said.

“Oh God,” Susa

“Or negative,” Evan said. “Which is the one if you’re not pregnant?”

“Negative,” Susa

“Are you sure?” he asked. Susa

“Was she pregnant or not?” my ex-wife asked.

“I’m not really sure,” he said. “I wasn’t with her when she did the test. You have to go into the bathroom and pee on-”

“I know how it works,” Susa

“So she went and did it and she told me everything was okay, I didn’t have to worry about a thing. So I said, so, you’re not having a baby? And she said don’t worry about it, everything was fine.”

“Did she actually say she wasn’t pregnant?” Susa

Evan’s shoulders went up half an inch and dropped. “I think that’s what she meant. I kind of didn’t push it, you know? In case she told me something I didn’t want to hear.”

Susa

“When was this?” I asked.

“Just before she came to stay with you for the summer,” he said to me.

“Where did this happen?” Susa

Evan kept looking down. “At Dad’s. You guys were both here on the lot that night.”

“You’re really something else,” Bob said. “We welcome Susa

“Hold on,” I said. “Let’s not get sidetracked. We can all have a chat later about what Sydney and Evan did, but what matters now is finding Syd. When we get her home, when we know she’s safe, there’ll be plenty of time for lectures on all this.”

I took a couple of deep breaths. “Let’s get back to the job thing,” I said to Evan. “Why wasn’t she happy?”

“Like I said, she didn’t really go into it. She just said the job made her sad. She said the people there, lots of them wouldn’t talk to her. It’s like they were scared all the time. It was creepy.”

“Scared?” said Susa

Evan shrugged again. “I don’t know. That’s what she said. She didn’t like to talk about work that much when we were hanging out. It’s not like we were hanging out all the time. We’ve all got lots of stuff to do.”

“What have you been doing?” Susa

Bob said, “Suze. Come on.”

“I’d like to know,” I said.

“You’ve already admitted that you’ve had sex with my daughter,” Susa

“Susa

But Susa

“The thing is,” Evan said, now looking at his father, “I asked you if you could help me out a bit.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I told you I needed some money.”

“I gave you some money. For working around here.”

“I mean, more money.”

“Yeah, I remember,” he said. “And I said no.”

“Well, I kind of needed some extra cash,” Evan said.

“So you took it from my purse, from the office, and you took my watch,” Susa

“But I got it back from the pawnshop,” he said, like he thought he deserved some credit, “when I had a good stretch.”

“A good stretch?” I said. Evan glanced at me, realizing he’d made a slip. “A good stretch of what?” I took a shot. “Luck?”

“I guess.”

“What?” Susa

“Gambling,” I guessed. “Online gambling.”

“It’s just once in a while,” Evan said. “Just for fun.”

“So you’re stealing money to pay off your credit card bills,” I said.

Evan didn’t respond. His father jumped in. “I gave you a card for emergencies, not for playing poker on the Internet.”

“How much do you owe?”

“Just, like, a thousand or so.”