Instinct by Jason Hough (ebook reader web TXT) 📗

“Sally, go check on your kids.” Can’t believe I have to tell her that, but it works. She moves off. I turn back to the man. “Let’s try again. Who are you?”

“Rob. Rob Key.”

“From?”

“Miami. Florida.”

“That’s a long way to come just to lure a woman away from her children.”

“Lure? Whoa, Jesus, hold on.” He raises his hands, palms out, as if I’ve drawn my weapon. “Lure?! Okay. Look. There’s no need for… I’m here looking at some properties. Factories. I work for Coca-Cola and thought we might be able to convert one of the old facilities here into a bottling plant. For water.”

“Your next sentence better get to the point, sir.”

He actually laughs at that. The nervous kind of laugh. “I took a wrong turn. The road wasn’t on the GPS. I was about to turn around when I saw Ms. Jones there, at the end of her driveway getting her mail. I stopped and asked for directions. She kindly offered to come with me into town, show me where the old factories are, the works. A grand tour. Then I mentioned being hungry and we ended up here for breakfast.”

Mr. Key stops there, eyeing me as I eye him for signs of deception. I can’t find any. “And her children?” I ask.

“Genuinely, I had no idea she had—has—kids until this moment, Officer. She didn’t mention them. Not once.” His eyes dart to Sally, then back to me.

“You expect me to believe that this kind woman, who famously dotes on her little ones to a fault, just hopped in your car and left them entirely alone?”

His hands lift even higher. “It’s what happened. I don’t know what else to tell you.”

A silence settles over us as I weigh all this. The warmth of the day has given way to clouds, and a light rain begins to fall, tapping on the hood of my cruiser. Sally is standing beside the back door, one kid in each arm, watching me.

From the corner of my eye I can see all the faces in the window of the diner. Twenty or so people, including Clara, all quietly judging how I handle this, no doubt already imagining what Greg would do. Comparisons will follow. I decide I don’t care. My performance is not the primary concern. It’s Sally’s children, then Sally, then this douchebag from Miami.

“ID?” I ask, holding out my hand.

He gives me a Florida driver’s license. Name and address noted, I offer it back but hold it tight when he tries to pull it away. Our eyes meet. “Don’t leave town,” I advise, “until I’ve cleared you to do so.”

“Okay?” he says, making it sound like a question. A question of my authority, or perhaps even my sanity.

“Got a business card?”

He hands me one.

“The number, is it current?”

A nod.

“Okay then. Shoo.”

“Officer, when do you think I’ll be cleared to leave? I’m due in Lake Stevens this afternoon for—”

I shoot him a cop look. One that lets him know that he’d better drop it and move along. It registers, and with slumped shoulders he turns and marches back into the diner, muttering something about what a weird-ass town this is. Since I can’t argue the point, I let it slide. There’s a chance, albeit a small one, that I just cost Silvertown a Coca-Cola factory and the jobs that it would bring.

He shoulders his way back to his table. Through the windows, I can see Clara in the kitchen, watching him pass. She stares daggers at him, breaking her gaze away only once he’s reached his table.

Clara takes her apron off and pushes out of the kitchen, weaving a path through the dining area that keeps her well away from the man. From all the patrons, really.

“Mary,” she breathes as she reaches me, gathering me into a hug. As we part she puts a hand on my forehead, then my cheek. “Are you okay? I heard what happened.”

I nod to her, lowering my voice to match hers. “Right as rain, actually. I know it sounds weird, but there was something… empowering about it. Was that how you felt?” I figure if there’s one person in Silvertown who knows this feeling, it’s Clara.

She shakes her head, though.

“I mean, a bit? Mostly it just reaffirmed my belief that you can’t trust anyone.” She glances over her shoulder at Rob Key. “Least of all strangers. What the hell’s going on?”

“I don’t know. Sally left her kids alone. Why, exactly, I’m still trying to figure out.”

“But why’d you bring the twins with you? What if it had taken you all day to find her?”

I start to respond, then hold back, realizing I have no answer.

“You could have called,” Clara adds. “Any of us would have stayed with them while you tracked her down.”

“I handled it,” I say. “Just like I’m supposed to. No need to drag anyone else into this mess.”

She squints at me. “That doesn’t sound like you at all.”

“Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think.”

Clara pulls a face. “And that definitely doesn’t sound like you.” She places her hand on my forehead again. “Look, we all process stress different ways. Least, that’s what Doc says in our sessions. Are you sure you’re good? You don’t need anything?”

I nod again, hug her, and tell her to get back to work. Clara is the closest thing to a friend I’ve got in Silvertown, and I know that this hug should make me feel good, but it… just doesn’t. “We’ll talk later.”

“Okay.”

As for Sally Jones, I’m still at a loss. She’s unapologetic as I drive her and the children back to her house. In fact, she pays me almost no attention at all, spending the entire time half-turned in her seat, cooing baby talk to the kids and fussing over the bandage one wears. She’s the model parent, like nothing happened. Like she didn’t just abandon a pair of two-year-olds to their fate so she could chaperon a complete stranger around town. If it had been