Mommy Said Goodbye

by Janice Kay Johnson

  His son chuckled, his voice already slurring. “Like sugar plums.”

  Craig turned out the light and they exchanged good-nights. Lying in the dark, he knew sleep would be a long time coming.

  He heard Robin’s shy admission: If you were to ask for…for almost anything, I’d say yes.

  Did she trust him that completely? What if he’d asked for her love? What if he’d said, “Will you marry me when I’m free?”

  He gave a soft grunt. Didn’t he mean “if I’m ever free?” What kind of an SOB would he be to lay that kind of proposition before a woman?

  What he’d really be saying was, “We can sleep together now, but as for the rest…well, maybe someday I can marry you.”

  As if marriage to him was any kind of prize. At best, he’d have to ask her to pull up roots, leave her job and her friends to join him in making a fresh start somewhere far away.

  At worst…

  No. There wouldn’t be any “at worst.” He wouldn’t ask her to join him in his special purgatory. She’d endured enough stares and whispers just because she was befriending him.

  No, he thought again, his eyes burning. He was unbelievably lucky to have found a sexy, kind, gutsy woman who was apparently willing to trust him despite all evidence to the contrary.

  He wouldn’t abuse that trust.

  BACK TO SCHOOL.

  Robin’s classroom looked much as it did every Monday morning, the desks in neat rows, courtesy of the janitor, the blackboard clean, the hooks and cubbies for book bags and coats empty.

  She should be doing something more useful than standing here staring at the empty classroom, but she couldn’t seem to regain her usual beginning-of-the-week energy.

  Instead, depression hung over her like a too-heavy cloak.

  One more regular soccer game and the season would be over. Robin doubted that Mal and Brett’s friendship would end, so she’d still see Craig once in a while.

  She could see it now. Pleasant hellos, awkward conversation made on the doorstep while they waited for the boys to appear. Conversation couldn’t be any thing but awkward after her unprompted offer of her body and soul to Craig.

  The drive home had offered a sample. The boys’ ebullience had been dampened by their loss in the semifinals of the tournament to a select team from Vancouver. In the front seat, road conditions and weather had been the primary topics. Heaven knew she’d been devoid of ideas. What was she supposed to say?

  So, what do you think? Do you want me?

  Sure he did; she’d seen his arousal as he fled the hot tub. That meant nothing. Less than nothing. He’d likely been celibate since his wife disappeared. Robin was the first woman he’d spent any appreciable time with. She wasn’t bad-looking. She’d flaunted herself in front of him in the bikini she should have left in the drawer at home. So he’d become aroused. That didn’t mean he hadn’t been scared to death by her admission that she was in love with him.

  Because that’s what it was. Not the light “just want you to know I’m interested” she’d intended. Of course not. Lacking any gift for flirtation, she’d ripped open her chest and offered her heart instead.

  Robin let out a huge sigh and sank into the chair behind her desk. The bell would ring any minute, the kids would pour in. And she hadn’t even looked at her lesson plan.

  Forget it, she ordered herself. Most people had managed to humiliate themselves utterly at some point in their lives. Okay, so most did it when they were gauche and fifteen. Maybe sixteen. She could consider herself a late bloomer.

  And yes, her heart was cracking, but she still had a job to do and a son to raise. And she still nursed a tiny glow of hope that Craig hadn’t responded to her offer, hadn’t commented on it later, not because he was taken aback by it, but because he believed he had no right until Julie was found.

  The bell rang. She glanced blindly down at her les son plan.

  Where are you? she silently asked a woman she’d once thought she knew.

  MONDAY MORNING, Craig Lofgren answered his phone. “Hello?” He sounded cautious, as though nobody called him on a Monday morning with good news.

  Ann identified herself. “May I come over to speak with you?”

  “Was that a question?” He waited a beat. “I don’t know what else I can tell you.”

  “I’d like to talk to you anyway.”

  Again he was silent for a moment. “All right,” he said at last, even warier.

  When she arrived, he answered the door immediately and gestured her ahead of him into the living room. No offer of coffee. He simply waited until she sat, then chose the chair facing her.

  In jeans and a plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up, he was a good-looking man. He would have been a better-looking one without bitter lines etched in his face, without shuttered eyes and the rigid posture of a man waiting for another blow.

  “I have discovered evidence that makes me think your wife may have left voluntarily.”

  He jerked. His eyes came vividly alive. “What evidence?”

  She told him about the Volkswagen van and the long-haired man waiting for someone or something at the curb in front of his house that April morning, about the clothes his wife had bought from the Volunteers of America thrift shop just before she disappeared.

  “Was she ever involved with the community theater, Mr. Lofgren?”

  He shook his head in bewilderment. “No. No. We never even saw one of their shows. I…” His Adam’s apple bobbed and he bent his head. “God. A purse. She bought a purse?”

  “That’s right.”

  “But her wallet, her driver’s license…she left everything.”

  “Did you look for her birth certificate?”

  He nodded. “They asked me to at the time. I couldn’t remember ever seeing it, though. I don’t even know if she had a copy. I couldn’t find it.”

  “We’ve talked about it before, but maybe you’ve given more thought to how much money she might have taken.”

  “Uh…” He looked so stunned, she could tell he was struggling to focus. “There wasn’t any in her wallet.”

  “According to Sergeant Caldwell’s notes, she had made a $300 withdrawal from an ATM the day before.”

  “Yeah. He dismissed the idea she was planning ahead. Wasn’t it routine for her to make withdrawals? he asked.”

  “Did you check for other withdrawals in the weeks leading up to her disappearance?”

  “There were quite a few. More than normal. Not so many I had any reason to notice at the time, but she might have squirreled away eight hundred, a thousand dollars.”

  “What about other, more personal items from her purse?”

  “I still have it. I never took anything out. Do you want to see it?”

  “Yes.” Ann struggled to hide her elation. She should have asked sooner. “Yes, I would, if you don’t mind.”

  He shook his head and left the living room. She heard footsteps on the stairs. Not two minutes later he returned with an elegant embossed black handbag that had probably cost a week of Ann’s pay. Craig Lofgren set it on the coffee table and sat down.

  Ann removed every item and laid them out. Wallet—credit cards, driver’s license, a few ATM withdrawal slips, a clear plastic photo holder with school pictures of Julie’s kids and one of her husband in his navy blue airline uniform. No bills. Half a dozen coins. No…miscellany.

  Ann thought with some chagrin of her wallet, bursting with notes scrawled on corners of paper napkins, deposit and withdrawal slips from the bank, dog-eared business cards and phone numbers of people whose names she’d forgotten. Julie Lofgren must have been exceptionally tidy.

  Address book. Date book. A container of tissues. Car keys. Checkbook.

  Period.

  No clutter, no wads of coupons never used, no breath mints disintegrating on the bottom, no… Ann’s rueful list slammed to a stop.

  “Did your wife usually carry a hairbrush?”

  He stared at the things she’d laid out
on the table as if they were unfamiliar objects. “Yes. Yes, she did.”

  “Lip gloss or lipstick?”

  “Lip gloss.” Now he stared almost feverishly at the scant row of items. “And hand lotion. She bought some special kind. Emu oil. She always had it with her.” He let out a shuddering breath. “How is it that I didn’t notice?”

  How was it that Ann’s father hadn’t asked these questions? she thought on a surge of anger.

  “You were in shock. And you’re a man. You don’t carry a purse. The obvious things are here—her wallet, her checkbook, her car keys.”

  “But not the really personal things.” Craig Lofgren’s mouth twisted. “Not a birth certificate and not the things she would have taken even if she planned to assume another identity.”

  “No. Not those.”

  His shoulders had sagged and his face looked slack. He rolled his head as if his neck ached. “Now what?”

  “Now,” Ann said, leaning back, “you have to think hard. Where might she have gone? What name might she have assumed?”

  He shook his head. “Where would she have met this man who was waiting for her?”

  Now, that was an interesting question. Where would a suburban mom meet a scruffy, long-haired man and get to know him well enough to run away with him?

  “A craft fair?” she suggested, thinking aloud. “A farmer’s market?”

  “She did go to things like that. I told you she was a potter when I met her. She never seemed interested in using her artistic talent, but she did buy jewelry, artwork…” He shrugged. “Julie probably went to half a dozen arts fairs a summer.”

  They threw around ideas, people Ann could contact to discover what artists and craftspeople had displayed wares at any of the fairs Julie might have attended.

  “The farmer’s markets are more casual, though,” she said. “I doubt any organizers would have records.”

  “She might have sought this guy out,” Craig said. “If she wanted to run away from her life. It might not have been a casual meeting.”

  “What are you suggesting? She posted her name on an Internet bulletin board?”

  “Maybe. God. I don’t know.” He had aged in the past half hour.

  “We’ve done routine searches for her under her married and maiden names, which you provided. Can you think of any other names she might have used?”

  He shook his head. “She was Julie Gibbs when we met. That’s the only name she used until she married me.”

  “Do you know where she was born?”

  “Uh…” He obviously had to drag his thoughts from somewhere.

  “Waterloo, Iowa. Or so she said. But her stories about her childhood never seemed substantial. I’ve gotten so I doubt everything I thought I knew about Julie.”

  Ann closed her notebook. “If you think of anything, Mr. Lofgren…”

  He nodded and rose with her. Gruffly, he said, “I owe you an apology. I assumed you’d try to vindicate your father’s belief that I was guilty. I’ve probably been rude.”

  She couldn’t—wouldn’t—apologize in return. She didn’t yet know what had happened to Julie. Maybe all of this was a dead end. Maybe Craig Lofgren was lying through his teeth and he knew damn well why his wife had bought some thrift store clothes. Ann didn’t think so—but until she was sure, she had to stay professional. Dispassionate.

  “You’ve been cooperative. I appreciate that.”

  He walked her to the door. She was aware that he watched her until she was behind the wheel of her car. Ann prayed that she hadn’t given him unfounded hope.

  WHILE SHE CLEANED the kitchen, Robin sang along to Christina Aguilera on the radio. She kept her voice low both because Malcolm was asleep and because she wouldn’t want the neighbors to hear her tuneless drone. She sounded fine to her ears, but she knew from sad experience that she was her one and only fan.

  When the phone rang, she turned down the radio with one wet hand before reaching for the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Robin, this is Craig.” He paused. “Craig Lofgren.”

  As if she hadn’t known instantly whose voice his was. She tucked the phone between ear and shoulder and reached for the dish towel to dry her hands.

  “Hi, Craig. What’s up?” She was proud of her casual, friendly tone.

  “Malcolm in bed?”

  Surprised, she said, “Half an hour ago. I’m just washing the last few dishes.”

  “I’m flying out in the morning. But I had to talk to somebody.”

  Fear snatched her. “What’s wrong? Is it Julie?”

  “Officer Caldwell was here this morning.” His voice was charged with some emotion, repressed but powerful. “The woman cop. She’s discovered some things that make her think Julie left on her own.”

  Robin groped for a stool and sank onto it. “What did she find?”

  He talked about a hippie van and a long-haired man and the clothes his wife had bought at a thrift store. Robin tried without success to imagine the fastidious, elegant woman she’d known buying a fringed suede bag and secondhand clothes. Julie had been the only baseball parent who had always brought a plastic seat pad to every practice so she didn’t have to come in contact with the scarred, dirty benches.

  “Is it possible?”

  He said more, telling her about the items missing from Julie’s purse and the multiple withdrawals in the weeks before her disappearance.

  “I should have noticed before what was missing from her purse.”

  “You’re a man.”

  “That’s what she said. The policewoman.”

  “Well, it’s true. Men never understand why a woman can’t walk out the door with no more than her wallet in her hip pocket.”

  “Until he has to ask his wife for something.”

  “Exactly.” She drew a shaky breath. “Now what? Are they any closer to finding her?”

  “I don’t know.” He was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice had been stripped bare of the excitement and hope. “Maybe not.”

  She was sorry she’d asked. “But at least the police are looking elsewhere.”

  “That’s something.” After a moment he said, “I shouldn’t have called so late. I’m sorry.”

  “I’m glad you did,” Robin said softly.

  “Robin, what you said Saturday night, in the hot tub…”

  She held her breath.

  “If things were different…” He was having trouble finding words. Kind ones, to let her down easily. “If they become different…”

  Tears burned her eyes. “No. Don’t say anything. You don’t have to. Really. I don’t know why I did. We’re friends. Let’s leave it at that.”

  “Leave it at that?” His voice was quiet, raw. “I wish it was that easy. Good night, Robin.”

  Stunned, she realized he was gone. She could hardly breathe; her chest felt as if it were filling with helium that might lift her gently into the air until her head bumped the ceiling. At the same time, her vision blurred and her sinuses stung.

  Once again, he’d implied that he might care. Care! What an anemic word. Be falling for her. Feel something of the same turmoil that was making her realize she would happily, without the slightest hesitation, uproot herself and Malcolm to go anywhere at all with Craig.

  If only he asked.

  If only he someday became free to ask.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  NO INFANT named Julie Gibbs had been born in Waterloo, Iowa, or in any surrounding county. Somehow Ann wasn’t surprised.

  Could she have lied about her age? There were no records of an earlier birthdate, either. Julie Gibbs, as she had presented herself to Craig Lofgren, didn’t exist.

  It took Ann another twenty-four hours, but she found out why. Julie had been born in Waterloo, in a manner of speaking—a Julie Ackerman had married a man named Cameron Gibbs there five years before she met Craig. A divorce, Ann further discovered, was on the books in Chicago.

  Cameron Gibbs wasn’t hard to find. A building c
ontractor, he still lived in Winnetka.

  “Heard from Julie?” he repeated, once Ann had identified herself. “Hell, no! Why would I?”

  She explained, and he said, “Poor bastard. That is one strange woman, I’ve got to tell you.”

  “Strange in what way?” Ann rested her elbows on her desk, then muttered a curse when coffee sloshed from her mug.

  “She was this sweet young thing when I met her. Fascinated when I talked about my day. Wanted nothing more than to be a wife and homemaker. Man, I felt like the luckiest guy in the world the day she agreed to marry me! Lucky. What a joke. We moved to Chicago, see. She’s meeting me at the door every night, I can smell dinner cooking. I’ve got it good. Then, practically overnight, she changed. Started taking art classes, forgot to do the grocery shopping, had all new friends. She ditched me, just like that.”

  “People do change.”

  “Huh?” He sounded as if she’d interrupted a well-worn refrain. “Yeah, sure they do. Only, this wasn’t like that.” She sensed him struggling for a way to explain. “I encouraged her to take classes. I wouldn’t have cared if she’d gone to work, or found a career. I’ve remarried and my wife is a real estate broker. Let me tell you, the phone always rings at the worst time. But with Julie, it was more like…like someone took over her body. She looked the same, but she wasn’t. I’d stare into her eyes and my skin would crawl. You can believe me or not. She was weird.”

  Ann thanked him and asked whether Julie had to his knowledge ever used another name. He told her no, then agreed to look at a photo Ann would fax to confirm they were talking about the same woman. When she called again, he agreed, “That’s her.”

  He promised to call in the unlikely event he heard from Julie.

  Ann hung up and stared into space. Would Julie have gone back to a maiden name? That didn’t seem her style, but it did have the advantage that she’d be able to get a copy of her birth certificate, thus starting over again most easily.

  “Learn anything?” Diaz appeared in her line of vision. He grabbed a chair and sat in his favorite position straddling it, with his arms crossed on the back.

  “Huh?” She focused her eyes. “Oh. Yeah, actually, I did.” Ann told him what she’d learned.