CHAPTER FOUR
2373 Words
CHAPTER FOUR
Riley knocked on April’s bedroom door. It was noon, and it seemed high time for her daughter to get up. But the answer she got wasn’t what she had been hoping for.
“What do you want?” came the muffled, sullen retort from inside the room.
“Are you going to sleep all day?” Riley asked.
“I’m up now. I’ll be down in a minute.”
With a sigh, Riley walked back down the stairs. She wished Gabriela was here, but she always took some time away on Sundays.
Riley plopped herself down on the couch. All day yesterday April had been sullen and distant. Riley hadn’t known how to relieve the unidentified tension between them, and she’d been relieved when April had gone to a Halloween party in the evening. Since it had been at a friend’s house a couple of blocks away, Riley hadn’t worried. At least not until it got to be after one a.m. and her daughter wasn’t home.
Fortunately, April had showed up while Riley was still undecided whether or not to take some kind of action. But April had come in and stalked off to bed with barely a word to her mother. And so far, she didn’t sound any more inclined to communicate this morning.
Riley was glad that she was home to try to sort out whatever was wrong. She hadn’t committed herself to the new case, and she was still feeling torn about it. Bill kept reporting to her, so she knew that yesterday he and Lucy Vargas had gone out to investigate Meara Keagan’s disappearance. They’d interviewed the family Meara had been working for, and also her neighbors in her apartment building. They’d gotten no leads at all.
Today Lucy was taking charge of a general search, coordinating several agents who were passing out flyers with Meara’s picture on them. Meanwhile, Bill was none too patiently waiting for Riley to decide whether to take the case or not.
But she didn’t have to decide right away. Everybody at Quantico understood that Riley wouldn’t be available tomorrow. One of the first killers she’d ever brought to justice was up for parole in Maryland. Not testifying at that hearing was simply out of the question.
As Riley sat mulling over her choices, April came bounding down the stairs, fully dressed. She charged into the kitchen without even giving her mother so much as a glance. Riley got up and followed her.
“What have we got to eat?” April asked, looking inside the refrigerator.
“I could fix you some breakfast,” Riley said.
“That’s okay. I’ll find something.”
April took out a piece of cheese and closed the refrigerator door. At the kitchen counter she cut off a slice of cheese and poured herself a cup of coffee. She added cream and sugar to the coffee, sat down at the kitchen table, and began to nibble on the cheese.
Riley sat down with her daughter.
“How was the party?” Riley asked.
“It was okay.”
“You got home kind of late.”
“No, I didn’t.”
Riley decided not to argue. Maybe one o’clock really wasn’t late for fifteen-year-olds to be out at parties these days. How would she know?
“Crystal told me you have a boyfriend,” Riley said.
“Yeah,” April said, sipping her coffee.
“What’s his name?”
“Joel.”
After a few moments of silence, Riley asked, “How old is he?”
“I don’t know.”
Riley felt a knot of anxiety and anger rise up in her throat.
“How old is he?” Riley repeated.
“Fifteen, okay? The same as me.”
Riley felt sure that April was lying.
“I’d like to meet him,” Riley said.
April rolled her eyes. “Christ, Mom. When did you grow up? The fifties or something?”
Riley felt stung.
“I don’t think that’s unreasonable,” Riley said. “Have him stop by. Introduce him to me.”
April set down her coffee cup so hard it spilled a little onto the table.
“Why do you try to control me all the time?” she snapped.
“I’m not trying to control you. I just want to meet your boyfriend.”
For a few moments, April just stared sullenly and silently into her coffee. Then she suddenly got up from the table and stormed out of the kitchen.
“April!” Riley yelled.
Riley followed April through the house. April went to the front door and grabbed her bag, which was hanging on the hat stand.
“Where are you going?” Riley said.
April didn’t reply. She opened the door and went out, slamming the door behind her.
Riley stood in stunned silence for a few moments. Surely, she thought, April would come right back.
She waited for a whole minute. Then she went to the door, opened it, and looked up and down the street. There was no sign of April anywhere.
Riley felt the bitter taste of disappointment in her mouth. She wondered how things had gotten like this. She’d had tough times with April in the past. But when the three of them—Riley, April, and Gabriela—had moved to this townhouse during the summer, April had been very happy. She’d made friends with Crystal and had been fine when school started in September.
But now, just two months later, April had gone from a happy teenager back to being a sullen one. Had her PTSD kicked back in? April had suffered a delayed reaction after the killer named Peterson had caged her and tried to kill her. But she had been seeing a good therapist and had seemed to be working her way through those problems.
Still standing in the open doorway, Riley took her cell phone out of her pocket and texted April.
U come back here. Right now.
The text was marked as “delivered.” Riley waited. Nothing happened. Had April left her own cell phone at home? No, that was not possible. April had grabbed her bag on the way out, and she never went anywhere without her cell phone.
Riley kept looking at the phone. The message was still marked as “delivered,” not “read.” Was April simply ignoring her text?
Just then, Riley felt pretty sure she knew where April had gone. She picked up a key from a table near the door and stepped out onto her little front porch. She went down the stairs from her townhouse and across the lawn to the next unit, where Blaine and Crystal lived. Again staring at her cell phone, she rang the doorbell.
When Blaine answered the door and saw her, a wide smile spread across his features.
“Well!” he said. “This is a nice surprise. What brings you over?”
Riley stammered awkwardly.
“I was wondering if … Does April happen to be here? Visiting Crystal?”
“No,” he said. “Crystal’s not here either. She went to the coffee shop, she said. You know, the one close by.”
Blaine knitted his brow with concern.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Is there some kind of problem?”
Riley groaned. “We had a fight,” she said. “She stormed out. I was hoping she’d come over here. I think she’s ignoring my text.”
“Come on in,” Blaine said.
Riley followed him into his living room. The two of them sat down on the couch.
“I don’t know what’s going on with her,” Riley said. “I don’t know what’s going on with us.”
Blaine smiled wistfully.
“I know the feeling,” he said.
Riley was a bit surprised.
“Do you?” she asked. “It always looks to me like you and Crystal get along perfectly.”
“Most of the time, sure. But since she’s gotten to be a teenager, it gets pretty rocky sometimes.”
Blaine looked at Riley sympathetically for a moment.
“Don’t tell me,” he said. “It’s got something to do with a boyfriend.”
“Apparently,” Riley said. “She won’t tell me anything about him. And she refuses to introduce him to me.”
Blaine shook his head.
“They’re both at that age,” he said. “Having a boyfriend is a life-and-death matter. Crystal doesn’t have one yet, which is fine with me, but not with her. She’s absolutely desperate about it.”
“I guess I was the same at that age,” Riley said.
Blaine chuckled a little. “Believe me, when I was fifteen, girls were just about all I ever thought about. Would you like some coffee?”
“I would, thanks. Black will be fine.”
Blaine went to the kitchen. Riley looked around, noticing yet again how nicely decorated the place was. Blaine definitely had good taste.
Blaine came back with two cups of coffee. Riley took a sip. It was delicious.
“I swear, I didn’t know what I was getting into when I became a mother,” she said. “I guess it didn’t help that I was way too young for it.”
“How old were you?”
“Twenty-four.”
Blaine threw back his head and laughed.
“I was younger. Got married at twenty-one. I thought Phoebe was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. Sexy as hell. I kind of overlooked that fact that she was also bipolar and already drank a lot.”
Riley was more and more interested. She’d known that Blaine had been divorced, but little else. It seemed that she and Blaine had youthful mistakes in common. It had been too easy for them to see life through the rosy glow of physical attraction.
“How long did your marriage last?” Riley asked.
“About nine years. We should have ended it long before. I should have ended it. I kept thinking I could rescue Phoebe. It was a stupid idea. Crystal was born when Phoebe was twenty-one and I was twenty-two, a student in chef school. We were too poor and too immature. Our next baby was stillborn, and Phoebe never got over it. She became a complete alcoholic. She got abusive.”
Blaine’s look was farther away now. Riley sensed that he was reliving bitter memories that he didn’t want to talk about.
“When April came along, I was in training to be an FBI agent,” she said. “Ryan wanted me to give it up, but I wouldn’t. He was dead set on becoming a successful lawyer. Well, we both got the careers we wanted. We just didn’t have anything in common for the long haul. We couldn’t make the real foundations of a marriage.”
Riley fell silent under Blaine’s sympathetic gaze. She felt relieved to be able to talk to another adult about all this. She was starting to realize that it was almost impossible to feel uncomfortable around Blaine. She felt as if she could talk to him about anything.
“Blaine, I’m really torn right now,” she said. “I’m really needed on an important case. But things are such a mess at home. I feel like I’m not spending enough time with April.”
Blaine smiled.
“Oh, yeah. The old work-versus-family dilemma. I know it well. Believe me, owning a restaurant is awfully time consuming. Making time for Crystal is a challenge.”
Riley looked into Blaine’s gentle blue eyes.
“How do you find a balance?” she asked.
Blaine shrugged slightly.
“You don’t,” he said. “There’s not enough time for everything. But there’s no point in punishing yourself for not being able to do the impossible. Believe me, giving up your career isn’t a solution. I mean, Phoebe tried being a stay-at-home mom. It was part of what drove her crazy. You just have to make peace with it.”
Riley smiled. It sounded like a wonderful idea—making peace with it. Maybe she could do that. It really did seem possible.
She reached over and touched Blaine’s hand. He took her hand and squeezed it. Riley felt a delicious tension between them. For a moment, she thought that maybe she could stay with Blaine for while, now that both their children were occupied elsewhere. Maybe she could …
But even as the thoughts began to form in her mind, she felt herself drawing away from him. She wasn’t ready to act on these fresh new feelings.
She gently pulled her hand away.
“Thanks,” she said. “I’d better go home. For all I know, April’s back already.”
She exchanged goodbyes with Blaine. As soon as she stepped out the door, her phone buzzed. It was a text from April.
Just got ur text. Really sorry I acted like that. I’m at the coffee shop. Be back soon.
Riley sighed. She simply had no idea what to text back. It seemed best not to reply at all. She and April were going to have to have a serious talk later on.
Riley had just stepped back into her house when the phone buzzed again. It was a call from Ryan. Her ex was just about the last person in the world she wanted to hear from. But she knew that he’d keep leaving messages if she didn’t talk to him now. She accepted the call.
“What do you want, Ryan?” she asked curtly.
“Am I catching you at a bad time?”
Riley wanted to say that no time was a good time as far as he was concerned. But she kept her thought to herself.
“Now’s okay, I guess,” she said.
“I was thinking about dropping by to see you and April,” he said. “I’d like to talk to both of you.”
Riley stifled a groan. “I’d rather you didn’t do that.”
“I thought you said this isn’t a bad time.”
Riley didn’t reply. This was just like Ryan, twisting her words to try to manipulate her.
“How’s April doing?” Ryan asked.
She almost snorted with laughter. She knew he was just trying to get some kind of conversation going.
“Nice of you to ask,” Riley said sarcastically. “She’s doing fine.”
It was a lie, of course. But bringing Ryan into things was the last way to make them better.
“Listen, Riley …” Ryan’s voice trailed off. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes.”
No kidding, Riley thought. She kept silent.
After a few moments Ryan said, “Things haven’t been going so well for me lately.”
Riley still said nothing.
“Well, I just wanted to make sure that you and April are all right.”
Riley could hardly believe his nerve.
“We’re doing fine. Why do you ask? Has one of your new girlfriends left, Ryan? Or are things going badly at the office?”
“You’re being awfully hard on me, Riley.”
As far as she was concerned, she was being as gentle as she could manage. She understood the whole situation. Ryan must be alone right now. The socialite who had moved in with him after the divorce must have left, or some newer affair had gone sour.
She knew that Ryan couldn’t stand being alone. He’d always turn back to Riley and April as a last resort. If she let him come back, it would only last until another woman caught his eye.
Riley said, “I think you ought to patch things up with your last girlfriend. Or the one before that. I don’t even know how many you’ve been through since we’ve been divorced. How many, Ryan?”
She heard a slight gasp on the phone. Riley had definitely called it right.
“Ryan, the truth is this isn’t a good time.”
It was the truth. She’d just paid a nice visit to a man she liked. Why spoil it now?
“When will be a good time?” Ryan asked.
“I don’t know,” Riley said. “I’ll let you know. Bye.”
She ended the call. She’d been pacing since she’d started talking to Ryan. She sat down and took a few deep breaths to calm herself.
Then she sent a text message to April.
U’d better get home right now.
It only took a few seconds before she got a reply.
OK. I’m on my way. I’m sorry, Mom.
Riley sighed. April sounded fine now. She would probably be all right for a little while. But something was off.
What was going on with her?
- Writer
