“If you didn’t want it, why did you sign the papers?” she countered.
“I don’t want to get into this, Isabella.”
“I know you’re not used to confiding in me. There are too many years between us. But I am your sister, and I’m not a kid anymore. I’ll listen if you want to talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. Rachel and I don’t want the same things. I was burned out on L.A. I was turning into someone I didn’t recognize and didn’t like very much. When I came here, everything changed. I hoped that Rachel would like Angel’s Bay, but she didn’t. So she left.”
Isabella shook her head. “It’s not that simple, Joe.”
“No, it’s not,” he admitted. “Rachel and I had a lot of problems that had nothing to do with Angel’s Bay.”
“I want to help you fix it.”
“I know—because that’s what you do. You’re our fix-it girl,” he said with a soft smile. “It must come with your gift for sewing: your desire to repair things, to make them right.”
That was true. There was nothing more satisfying to her than fixing something that seemed beyond repair and giving it new life.
“Let’s get back to you,” Joe said. “I know I’m your favorite brother—”
“My only brother,” she corrected.
“And that you care about Rachel and me, but did you have another reason for making this trip? Are you in some kind of trouble? Do you need my help?”
How much did she want to tell him? “After you sent me the pendant, I started having bad dreams. I’d see a sign for Angel’s Bay, the winding highway and the shadow of a man who seemed to be in danger.”
“And I’m the man?”
“I thought you might be, but I’m not sure anymore.” She didn’t want to get into the idea that she might have been dreaming about Nick Hartley, which seemed ridiculous. Her visions had always come from an emotional connection to someone she cared about.
“These dreams—they’re like the ones you’ve had before?” he asked, keeping his voice carefully neutral.
“Yes.” Like most of her family, Joe was practical and logical, and her visions had always been pretty much a family joke. “It’s okay, and you don’t have to believe me.”
“These visions always seem to get you into trouble.”
“Grandmother says that’s because I haven’t yet embraced my gift, and that’s why nothing is clear to me. I’m fighting my inner nature. I need to be still, to let the wisdom flow.”
“That sounds like Grandmother,” he said dryly.
She nodded. Their Grandmother Elena was a tiny Mexican woman with a fierce, loving spirit who believed in the legends of their ancestors, the power of the universe. Of all of the Silveira siblings, Isabella had spent the most time with her grandmother after their mother went back to work full-time. It was from Elena she had learned to sew, from Elena she had learned to dream, and from Elena she had come to believe that she was blessed with a psychic gift. “Grandmother would like this town,” she said. “Don’t you have angels here?”
“I haven’t personally seen any, but others claim to have had that experience.”
“Maybe this town will turn you into a believer.” Although she doubted that. Joe was as pragmatic as they came.
“So you came to save me and almost got yourself killed in the process. There’s something wrong with that equation, Isabella.”
“It is what it is.”
“Well, I’m fine, as you can see.” He grabbed his phone off the table as it began to vibrate and glanced down at the number. “I need to get this.”
“Go ahead.” She cleared the table while he took the call. He was doing more listening than talking, but she could tell by the tension flowing from him and the rigid posture of his back that he had gone into his chief-of-police mode.
She’d always admired Joe’s willingness to run straight into trouble; he had more courage than anyone she knew. As a teenager, though, that confidence had gotten him into some risky situations. Her older sister had told her that for a while, they weren’t sure which side of the law Joe would end up on.
“Police business?” she asked as he ended the call.
“A teenage girl has gone missing; there’s a chance she’s run away.”
“How old is she?”
“Eighteen,” he said as he stood up. “Annie had a baby a few days ago. She doesn’t have family, so she’s been staying with Charlotte Adams and her mother the past few months.”
“That was Charlotte on the phone?”
“Yes. I won’t be gone long. Will you be okay here alone?”
“I’ll be fine, Joe. Do what you have to do.” She paused. “You and Charlotte are pretty close, aren’t you?”
“We’re friends,” he said with a warning gleam in his eyes. “Don’t make assumptions, Izzy. You don’t know anything about my life. And whatever Rachel told you isn’t the whole story.”
A dozen reasons to explain why Annie hadn’t returned home ran around Charlotte’s head. She couldn’t believe that Annie would run away, nor could she imagine a darker alternative. She needed Joe to help her make sense of things and, more important, to find Annie.
As the baby cried louder, Charlotte paced around the living room, trying to find a rhythm to soothe his frustrated screams. He’d been fed, changed, and examined for any sign of a physical ailment. He was just very unhappy, and she had no idea why. She was used to delivering babies, not taking care of them. This was completely new territory.
“I’ll take him,” Monica Adams said, weary lines in her face, as she came into the room. “I can’t stand it a second more. I know what to do.”
Charlotte heard the unspoken you don’t, but this wasn’t the time for an argument. They were both tired and worried. She handed the baby to her mother and sat down on the couch with a sigh.
“I wish we had a name to call him,” Monica said as she put the baby on her shoulder and patted his back.
“Annie thought it would be too difficult to give him up if she gave him a name.”
Her mother’s lips tightened, and there was a fire in her eyes when she said, “Annie is being completely irresponsible. I didn’t expect this from her. She knows how lucky she is to have us, and she’s always been appreciative and thankful. How could she do this to us?”
It was the first time her mother had criticized Annie in the six months they’d all been living together. The two of them had gotten along so well it had made Charlotte wonder why Annie could get along better with her mother than she could. But then, Annie had never tested her mother’s authority until now. Charlotte had spent most of her life butting up against her mother’s opinions and rules. And the real break in their mother-daughter tie had come a long time ago . . . with another baby and another teenager.
She’d been seventeen and a senior in high school when she’d had to tell her mother that she was pregnant. There had been disappointment and anger in her eyes, cruelty in her mother’s words and in her actions. Charlotte had shamed the family. Her father was a minister. He preached abstinence and responsibility, and she had fallen short on both. But it wasn’t her father with whom she’d shared the secret, and her relationship with her mother had never recovered. There were still secrets and lies between them. They hadn’t talked about that horrible time in more than fifteen years, but it was always there in the background, making any hope of a closer relationship impossible.
“It’s okay; you’re fine. Sleep now,” Monica murmured, her voice soft and tender when she spoke to the baby.
Her mother had lost weight. Not that she’d ever been heavy; she was far too controlling to overeat or overindulge in anything. But she seemed more fragile now, more vulnerable, which seemed unthinkable. Monica Adams had always been a force of nature, powerful, opinionated, and invincible in Charlotte’s mind. Her mother had played the role of minister’s wife to perfection, tending to the physical and emotional needs of the congregation while her father addressed their spiritual needs.
When her father died, her mother had been left without a role to play. She’d gone from being very, very important to being very, very alone. Her father’s death was the reason Charlotte had come back to Angel’s Bay. Her sister and brother didn’t think her mother should be alone, and they both had other responsibilities, so Charlotte was elected.
She’d never planned on staying this long. But she’d found herself settling into her hometown, accepting a job at the Redwood Medical Center, reconnecting with old friends, and helping her mother move into a new house. She’d become even more entrenched in Angel’s Bay when she’d offered Annie a place to stay for the duration of her pregnancy. After that, she couldn’t leave. And to be honest, she didn’t really want to go—at least, not yet.
The baby’s cries began to diminish with a hiccup, a final sob, and then quiet—blessed quiet. Charlotte drew in a breath of relief.
“That’s better,” Monica said with approval, pleased with her success. “I’m going to put him down in his crib.”
Charlotte followed her mother into Annie’s bedroom. Monica carefully set the baby down in the crib next to the bed. He squirmed for a second, then dozed off again. All of that crying had exhausted him. Her gaze moved to the unmade bed. Annie’s bathrobe was tossed over the back of a desk chair.
The room was unusually messy. Annie had been almost obsessively neat, as if afraid she’d be asked to leave if she made one wrong move. The turmoil in the room now seemed to be a direct reflection of Annie’s emotional distress. Charlotte wished she’d offered more comfort or reassurance, something to ease the pressure Annie was feeling. But she’d never anticipated that Annie would take off. And she couldn’t imagine how the girl could make it on her own with no money, no car, and no real skills of any sort. She hoped this was a temporary flight, that Annie had just needed some space to think.
Her mother turned on the baby monitor and motioned her into the hall. They’d just returned to the living room when the doorbell rang. Charlotte rushed to open it, greeting Joe with a relieved smile. “Thanks for coming. We’re not sure what to do.”
“No problem. I’m happy to help,” he said with a calm, reassuring smile. He then turned to her mother. “Mrs. Adams, how are you?”
“Not particularly well. Can I get you some coffee or tea?”
“No, I’m fine, thanks,” he replied as they walked into the living room and settled on the couches. “When did you last see Annie?”
“Around three o’clock,” her mother replied. “The baby was asleep. Annie said she was going to walk down to the Oak Grove Market to pick up some formula. I had friends in the kitchen. We were making plans for the church bake sale. I assumed Annie had come home while we were talking, and it wasn’t until the baby woke up around six that I realized she was still gone.”
Joe checked his watch. “It’s almost ten now. Does she have a cell phone?”
“It’s in her room,” Charlotte interjected.
“Is anything missing? Clothes? A suitcase? Did she have cash?”
“She had some money,” Monica said. “A few families in town sent her cards with checks and cash. There might be some clothing missing; I’m not sure.”
“What do you think, Joe?” Charlotte asked, unable to read anything in his neutral expression.
“I don’t know yet. How was Annie acting before she left?” he inquired, directing his question to her mother.
“She’s been stressed out ever since she gave birth,” Monica replied. “Today was just the same. She was quiet, a little teary, exhausted, not moving very fast. I was surprised she actually wanted to walk to the store.”
“Did she get any calls? Talk to anyone that you know of?”
Her mother shook her head. “I don’t think so. As far as I know, Annie doesn’t have many friends. There’s a young woman at church who’s also pregnant, and Annie has spoken to her a few times after service. Her name is Kim Swanson. I called over there, but no one was home.”
“I’ll follow up with her,” Joe said with a nod. “Anyone else?”
“There is the baby’s father,” Charlotte said.
Joe’s gaze turned to her. “But you don’t know who he is, do you?”
She hesitated, and when she didn’t reply right away, her mother cut in sharply, “Charlotte, is there something you haven’t told me?”
She debated breaking the promise she’d made to Annie several weeks ago. She didn’t have a choice; Annie had been gone too long. “I know that he’s one of five men,” she said finally.
Her mother’s jaw dropped in astonishment. “What are you talking about, Charlotte?”
She winced at the storm brewing in her mother’s eyes. She would pay for this secret, even though it wasn’t her own. “Annie told me that the father is one of the men who’s trying to adopt the baby. He doesn’t want his wife to know he had an affair, and his solution is for Annie to give the baby to him without saying anything.”
Her mother tightened her lips. “Why didn’t you tell me? I had a right to know. I let Annie live in my house. I could have helped her figure out what to do.”
“She made me promise. She wanted to make her own decisions. I had to respect that.”
“I can’t believe she didn’t confide in me! I thought we were close,” her mother muttered with an irritated shake of her head.
“I’ll need a list of the men,” Joe said.
She was happy not to see any judgment in his eyes. But then, he turned on a switch when he was on duty. She supposed she did the same when she was with her patients, and she was happy for his objectivity now. “I have the information. I got it out of Annie’s room earlier.” She retrieved the files from the desk, then spread them out on the coffee table.
Attached to the front of each folder was a photo. There was Dan McCarthy, a fireman, married to Erin, who worked at the quilt store. Steve Baker, a dentist, married to Victoria Hartley Baker, who ran the community theater with her parents. Adam Goldman, a lawyer, married to Louise Jennings Goldman, a nurse at the medical center. Mitch Lowell, a contractor, married to Corinne Lowell, a bank teller, formerly of Angel’s Bay but currently residing in Montgomery. And Kevin Holt, a fisherman, married to Donna Holt, a florist.
“It could be any one of these guys,” Charlotte said, lifting her gaze to meet Joe’s. “I know several of them, none of whom I would suspect of being unfaithful to his wife. What do we do, just start talking to them?”
Before Joe could answer, the doorbell rang again. Her mother got up to answer it. When she returned to the room, Andrew Schilling was with her, an expression of concern on his face.
Andrew was an attractive man with golden blond hair and light blue eyes. He’d been Charlotte’s most serious high school boyfriend, but their teenage relationship had ended in disaster, and they hadn’t seen each other for more than a decade until Andrew had returned to town several months earlier—ironically, as the minister hired to replace her father.
Since Andrew’s return, they’d been dancing around the possibility of dating. Andrew had broken her heart once, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to go down that path again. But Andrew was trying to persuade her to give him another chance. It was quite the turnaround: she’d been the one after him when they were in high school, and it gave her some pleasure to have him doing the pursuing now.
But right now, the main concern was Annie. Andrew had been acting as a liaison between Annie and the prospective adoptive parents, and while Charlotte was happy to have his help, Andrew and Joe seemed to rub each other the wrong way whenever they were in a room together, especially if she was present.
“How can I help, Charlie?” he asked as he moved toward her.
She got to her feet, accepting his concerned embrace. “I’m not sure. We were just talking about what to do.” She stepped back, feeling a little awkward under Joe’s watchful eyes.
“Apparently, Annie had a secret only Charlotte knew about,” her mother cut in.
“What was that?” Andrew ask
ed.
Before she could reply, her mother jumped in. “One of the men asking to adopt the baby is the biological father.”
Andrew’s eyes widened in shock. “Are you serious? Why didn’t you tell me, Charlie?”
“It wasn’t my secret to tell,” she said again, seeing the same glint of anger in his expression as she’d seen on her mother’s face. “Annie is an adult. She has a right to privacy, a right to make her own decisions.”
“Legally, she might be an adult, but emotionally, she’s a child,” Monica said sharply. “She needed you to be a counselor, not a co-conspirator, Charlotte.”
“I told her that she needed to tell the truth,” Charlotte replied. “But Annie was torn. If she wasn’t going to raise the child, then she thought he might be better off with his biological father. She wasn’t sure she could give the baby to anyone else. But she was also uncomfortable going along with the lie.”
“If you’d told me, I might have been able to help her make a good decision,” Andrew said quietly. “I am a trained counselor, Charlotte.”
She saw the disappointment in his eyes, but she couldn’t feel guilty for keeping Annie’s confidence. Annie had been her patient as well as her friend.
“What we need to do,” Joe said, cutting through the tension, “is retrace Annie’s steps and come up with a timeline of her activities the last few days. Right now, there’s no evidence of foul play. Everything points to her leaving of her own accord. At the moment, we’ll consider her a missing person, and I’ll put out an advisory to that effect. In the meantime, we’ll check with the market, see if she ever made it there, and I’ll have some of my officers speak to the neighbors, the shop owners, anyone who might have seen her on her walk. I’ll also contact the prospective parents. Maybe she’ll come back on her own. As for the baby—”
“We’ll take good care of him,” Charlotte said quickly.
“That’s fine for tonight. But if Annie isn’t home by tomorrow, I’ll need to contact Child Protective Services.”
“I’m a licensed foster parent,” Monica said. “My husband and I took in a couple of children a few years back.”
At Hidden Falls (Angel's Bay Novel) Page 4
