What Lies Below: A Novel

by Barbara Taylor Sissel

  “I wasn’t there.” Jake looked back at Gilly. “I broke my promise.”

  “You can’t possibly be with her every moment, Jake. It’s not your fault. You can’t take this on.”

  Gilly’s defense of him was pained, as if she took it personally that he would blame himself. But she didn’t know the history, and to fully explain it would entail entering a labyrinthine cave full of his missteps, dating back to the moment of Zoe’s conception, the initial days when he’d first learned he was going to be a father. If he were to relate the details, he could only imagine Gilly’s disgust. It hadn’t been his finest hour.

  He said, “Zoe asked me about her mom on Wednesday, when I dropped her at school.” It was a simpler explanation and valid as evidence that he lacked fatherly skills. His inattention was inexcusable. “It was almost the last thing she said to me. She wanted to know if her mom knew where she was. I should have followed up, made her tell me why she was asking.”

  “It was unusual, Zoe bringing up her mom?”

  “The way it came out of the blue was weird. But I let it go. If I’d pushed, she might have told me she’d talked to her mom, given me a clue of their plans.”

  “Unless her mom asked her to keep them secret.”

  “Yeah,” Jake said. That was a possibility. As young as she was, Zoe was good at keeping secrets. Especially her mother’s secrets. After Stephanie had moved out, they’d been eating Froot Loops one morning when Zoe said suddenly that she knew where her mommy hid her “med’cine.” That was how Steph had explained it to Zoe. The bottle of vodka she’d been caught stowing in the linen closet was “Mommy’s medicine.” Don’t tell Daddy, Steph had said. She had made Zoe promise, and promises were serious business. Telling Jake had made Zoe cry. She might be young, but she understood about betrayal. It had nearly killed him. He’d wanted to smash the half-finished bottle of Smirnoff when he’d found it. Or drink it. But he wasn’t much of a drinker, near zero now since Steph. He could be kind of militantly antidrinking, actually, a real teetotaler, the way an ex-smoker could become a zealot about not smoking.

  He glanced at Gilly. “It’s hard to believe after everything Steph has done, that Zoe still wants her mom. She wants Steph’s attention, her approval. You’ve seen the satin ribbon she carries?”

  Gilly nodded.

  “It’s from one of Steph’s nightgowns. After she left, Zoe got scissors and cut it off herself. She wasn’t even two. I couldn’t believe it—when I think what could have happened! She’s never let it out of her sight since. Then there’s the front of the refrigerator at home. It’s covered up with pictures Zoe’s done for her mother. She draws them faster than I can mail them.”

  “That sounds—” Gilly broke off.

  “Sad,” Jake supplied.

  “Do you think Zoe’s with Stephanie?”

  “I don’t know,” Jake answered. “Of all the possibilities—”

  “Yes,” Gilly said, understanding his meaning at once: that from a veritable menu of horrors, the one possibility Jake—or anyone—would choose was that Zoe had been taken by her mother.

  He kept Gilly’s gaze. Her eyes, their expression, were commiserative. He had noticed them before. They were an unusual color, all shades of gray like a sky before a sudden summer storm.

  He said, “Did you know Clint is looking into your background?” He thought maybe it was her eyes that made him want to clue her in, or the air of vulnerability about her that seemed somehow braced with a kind of tensile strength. He didn’t miss it either. The flash of panic that leaped through her gaze was as sharp and silvery as a minnow and gone as fast. He thought of what Clint had said, that Gilly knew more than she was telling. Jake felt it, too, but she’d been through so much—maybe what she was withholding had nothing to do with his ex, or his missing daughter, and everything to do with maintaining control, some degree of privacy.

  Gilly said, “I guess I expected it. Would you like some coffee? Wouldn’t take a minute to brew. Or iced tea—”

  “You’re from Houston, right? That’s where Steph lives. Maybe you know her, crossed paths with her.” Jake repeated the theory Clint had floated.

  “No. I don’t—”

  “I think it’s the connection, both of you living there—that’s what’s got Clint’s interest. But like I said to Clint, Stephanie’s into booze and drugs. I told him I didn’t think you ran in those circles.”

  Gilly looked at the floor.

  “You don’t, do you?”

  It was a moment before she looked back up at him, and when she did there was something in her eyes, the set of her jaw—a kind of defiance. “I’ve been sober eight months and six days,” she said. “It’s still a battle. Some days I don’t know that it’s worth it. I don’t know your ex, though. I didn’t have anything to do with taking your daughter.”

  A silence gathered while Jake fought a muddy river of conflicting emotions. Part of him felt bad for Gilly. The handful of words she’d given him were freighted with new hope and old misery, but he wasn’t sure he trusted her, or maybe he just didn’t want to. It pissed him off, hearing she’d been on the same path as Steph. So now she was reformed. How long would that last? Stephanie had never stayed sober longer than a year.

  Jake studied Gilly, her straight spine, the stiff angle of her shoulders. Steph had never held herself so upright while speaking of her failings. She had never looked him so directly in the eye. Gilly wasn’t apologizing; she wasn’t making promises. It was as if whatever strength she had, she’d found it in her weakness. He remembered something his mom had said, that the other side of a person’s greatest character flaw was often what turned out to be their saving grace. Something like that. But he didn’t want it, this war in his head.

  “Clint doesn’t think Zoe’s mom is involved either,” he said. “He’s got local law enforcement helping folks from town set up a search center at Zoe’s school, where she was last seen.”

  “I heard about it,” Gilly said. “Look, you should know, Captain Mackie has a reason, or he thinks he does, to be suspicious of me—more than just the fact that I’m from Houston.”

  Jake waited.

  “Back when I was really out of it, after Brian was murdered, and I had lost Sophie, I suffered from blackouts. I lost time, lost track of where I was. I did things and later I couldn’t clearly remember doing them. I was in therapy for a while, and the psychiatrist I saw said it was to be expected—not only because of the drinking and drugs but also just the trauma of Brian being murdered and losing Sophie the way I did. He said the blackouts were also symptomatic of posttraumatic stress.”

  “It makes sense,” Jake said. “I have a buddy who fought in Afghanistan. Maybe you’ve met him? AJ Isley? He’s struggled with it, too—PTSD. He’s doing great now, but it’s taken a while.”

  “Yeah, I thought I was past it. But maybe not.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  Gilly tucked her hair behind her ears. “On Thursday, evidently around the time Zoe was picked up from school, I was—I can’t really account for my whereabouts for about thirty or forty minutes.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I was upset. I’d had the dream about Zoe, and the day before, I’d gotten an unsettling call from the detective who’s working my husband’s case. I went to the restroom and splashed water on my face. I thought I was gone a matter of minutes, but according to April I was gone a lot longer.”

  “What? Is she your keeper or something? She knows how long you’re on a break? Even if she does, let’s say you were MIA, what makes you think you went off and took Zoe?” As he questioned Gilly, though, the thought was there in his mind—how easily Zoe would have gone with Gilly. There was no doubt the two had formed a bond.

  “But I didn’t, right? She isn’t here. We both looked and didn’t find her.”

  Gilly looked uncertain, even frightened. Jake didn’t know what to make of her answer, her demeanor. It unsettled him, caught at his heart. Somehow he found
himself wanting to pull her into his arms and comfort her. He said, “I think April must be jerking your chain. Anyway, a half hour, even forty minutes, is only enough time to drive from Cricket’s to the school and back. You wouldn’t have been able to make it here, or much of anyplace else, and then back in time to work your shift.”

  Gilly traced a line across her forehead, ran her fingertips around the shell of her ear.

  “You did work your shift?” Jake held Gilly’s gaze.

  “Yes. But there’s still the missing time.”

  He could see it was working on her, that she honestly didn’t remember what she’d been doing. Either that, or she was a damn fine actress.

  “I honestly couldn’t account for my whereabouts when Captain Mackie asked, so naturally, he’s suspicious. If he knows about the drinking and drug use—that’s bound to make his impression of me even worse. But I swear to you, I’ve never met your ex-wife, and I would never—” Gilly broke off, jerking her glance away.

  “You’d never . . .” Jake prompted.

  Instead of answering, Gilly said, “April covered for me with Captain Mackie.”

  Jake sensed her sidestep was deliberate, and it gave him pause, but it was true, what he’d told her. She’d have needed more than thirty minutes to take his daughter. Clint must have come to the same conclusion. He’d indicated he had some concern in regard to Gilly, but it couldn’t be too serious, otherwise he’d have taken Gilly in for questioning. It was possible he’d have arrested her. In Jake’s experience, Clint wasn’t the kind of cop to mess around or take chances.

  Gilly said, “I don’t know why April spoke up for me. I don’t think it’s because she trusts me.”

  What about a motive? The question rose and fell in Jake’s mind, subliminal, fleeting. “Did you know—the statistics on kidnapped children, the ones who are taken by strangers—the longer it goes past the first twenty-four hours—” His voice cracked, and he paused, working to keep his cool. “If you know anything, I don’t give a shit how woo-woo it is, you have to tell me.”

  “I wish I did.”

  “I found a trike, a pink trike, in the woods behind the school. The same woods in the story you made up for Zoe about the eyeball-eating monsters.”

  Gilly hugged herself, rubbed her upper arms.

  Something in the gesture, her expression, brought Jake upright. “That mean something to you?”

  “No,” she said, and then, “Yes.”

  She was flustered, and Jake made himself wait, giving her space to sort it out, whatever was in her mind.

  “I saw a pink tricycle in my dream. It was turned on its side. There were trees—”

  “That’s it! That’s exactly how I found it—” Jake’s phone went off, and putting up his finger—a plea that Gilly hold on—he pulled it from his jeans pocket, intent on silencing it. But on seeing it was the Wyatt PD, he swiped the phone’s face, head empty, heart paused.

  “Jake? It’s Sergeant Carter, Ken Carter, with the Wyatt police.”

  “Yes?” Jake knew Ken but not well.

  “Listen, we’re up here north of Greeley, on FM 1097, at a Texaco station in Nickel Bend. You know where I’m talking about?”

  “My grandparents had a farm there.” They were dead now, but when Jake was a kid he had often spent summers with them, getting up before first light to help his granddad milk the cows and gather the eggs before they headed out to do other chores that centered around the crops he grew, mostly corn for silage and cotton. The farm had been sold years ago, but Jake still drove that way whenever he had business in Waco, or the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. Nickel Bend was a speed trap, a one-light, wide space in the road. Blink and you’d miss it.

  “Well, we found something here, in a dumpster behind the station. Clothes. A sack with some clothes in it.”

  Jake couldn’t speak. His gut squeezed into a hard knot.

  “Mr. Halstead? Jake? You there?”

  “Yeah.” He managed to work the word out of his mouth. He caught movement from the corner of his eye, became aware of Gilly, that she’d pushed a chair close behind him.

  “Sit down,” she said, and he did.

  “Zoe. Are they Zoe’s clothes?” he asked.

  “Might be. They definitely belong to a little girl—”

  Jake jerked to his feet. “The Texaco is at the corner of 1097 and CR 231, right? I’m on my way.”

  “Yes sir, but hold up a second—”

  Jake didn’t. He hung up on Sergeant Carter and left Gilly’s kitchen, aware of her half running to keep up as he strode through her house.

  “What’s happened? Did they find Zoe?” She grabbed his arm at the front door. “Maybe you shouldn’t drive. You look ready to pass out.”

  Jake shook free of her grasp. “I’m fine,” he said. He started down the front steps, then paused, turning back to her. “What you saw in your dream—the trike, the woman in her blue car—it’s no coincidence, you dreaming those things. I bet you saw more—more than you think. Please, please—whatever you can do to see where Zoe is, please try. Please.” He held her gaze.

  “Yes. All right,” she said.

  He pulled his wallet from his pocket, handed her his business card. “My cell number’s on there. Call me if you—” What? What did he expect her to do? Pull Zoe out of a hat?

  “I know what it’s like to be frightened for your child,” she said. “If I can help, if something comes—”

  He nodded, started to go, turned back a second time. “The call I got—Sergeant Carter found Zoe’s clothes in a dumpster in Nickel Bend.”

  “He knows for sure they belong to Zoe?”

  “That’s what I’m going to find out.”

  11

  After Jake left, Gilly went back to the kitchen where she gripped the lip of the sink, working to steady herself, her breathing, the rate of her heartbeat. God, she wanted a drink.

  You going to blow eight months of sobriety? a voice in her brain, the one she’d named Miss Goody Two-shoes, asked.

  Gilly hated that voice.

  Call your sponsor, it said.

  Shut up, she told it. Hearing the click of Bailey’s nails on the tile, the jingle of his tags, she knelt beside him, scooping him into her embrace, burying her nose in his furry neck, glad for his doggy smell, his warmth, his happy wriggle. “That’s what Brian and I should have named you,” she whispered to him. “Wriggle. Mr. Wriggle Bottom.” A half hour later, she was snapping on his leash, and the doorbell rang. She went still. Did you know Clint is looking into your background? Jake’s earlier question jumped up in her mind. Was it the police captain out there? Some other cop?

  Bailey accompanied her as she crept to the door as furtively as if she were a burglar. He kept giving her glances. She could almost read his mind: Is this a game? Are we playing? Are you crazy?

  Most probably the latter. She answered him in her head.

  Looking through the peephole, instead of the police she saw April Warner, a distorted image of her coworker in the flesh, and Gilly’s heart dropped. What was April doing here so soon after Jake? Did everyone in town suddenly know where Gilly lived? She turned her back to the door.

  April rang the bell again. She called Gilly’s name. “I know you’re in there,” she said. “Your car’s in the drive.”

  Gilly opened the door. “Actually, I was getting ready to leave.” She brought Bailey forward on his leash. “We’re walking to the park.”

  “I’ll walk with you,” April said.

  “I’d rather you didn’t.” Gilly brought Bailey out onto the porch, and as if he sensed her wariness, her barely stifled offense, he only eyed the hand April held out to him. “Not if you’re here to harass me some more about the time I spent in the restroom at work.”

  “If I’ve pissed you off, I’m sorry.” April followed Gilly down the sidewalk.

  Gilly didn’t say anything.

  “I covered for you.”

  “You think that entitles you to question me?�
�

  “Look, you’ve got to admit it’s damned strange you being gone so long at the same time Zoe was supposedly taken. And what gives with the bit you told Captain Mackie—that you know it wasn’t her mom who picked her up?”

  Gilly stopped, turning to look at April. “Supposedly taken?”

  “Let me rephrase. That Zoe is gone is the one and only verifiable fact. Somebody’s got her.”

  Gilly resumed walking.

  “You know I was in prison for killing my husband,” April said.

  Gilly’s step, along with her mind, faltered at the baldness of April’s confession, but not noticeably. The sidewalk wasn’t quite wide enough for two, and April walked a little behind Gilly, speaking to Gilly’s shoulder.

  “I’m by myself, too,” she said. “It gets lonely, doesn’t it?”

  “Did you do it?” Gilly glanced sidelong at April.

  “Kill my husband? Yep. I did.” April answered as if she was glad to be asked. “I’d do it again, too, a thousand times. Guys like him, abusers, woman haters—they can mess with me but not my kid. We were divorced when he came over one day, just barged in and went after Nicky in a blind rage for no reason. Nicky was his own son, for God’s sake. I had to stop him. No one else was going to do it. Not the law. I had a restraining order. I did everything the court said, everything the cops and my attorney said. That son of a bitch still came after me, and that was okay. I’m an adult. I could give it back as good as that bastard. I broke his fucking kneecap with a baseball bat once.”

  She sounded grimly proud.

  Gilly turned into the park entrance, heading for the path that meandered for nearly a mile around the perimeter. Bailey pranced ahead, nose to the turf, or in the air, mapping his surroundings, every so often raising his leg. She thought if they were to become separated, Bailey would find his way back to her by way of the trail he was marking. Humans—especially children—didn’t have the same ability. Birds had eaten the crumbs Hansel and Gretel left. Gilly thought of Sophie, of how precious she had been, and anger at Nick’s father jammed her throat. How dare he abuse Nick?