Last Seen Alive Read online

farm the surrounding twelve acres of land, he kept no animals and therefore had no use for the old barn, and after a brief, tumultuous marriage that ended six years ago with his declaration that he would never marry again, he certainly didn’t need a rambling five-bedroom house constantly in need of repairs. Or so his parents told him repeatedly. Gage, however, loved the privacy the house afforded him, no matter how old and impractical it was. He’d bought it with money left to him by his grandfather, money Gage knew his father thought he should have largely invested in Ridgeway Construction.

  Gage glanced at his watch. It was only midafternoon. He could have stayed two more hours and finished his work on the Greer house, but the more he thought about the way Chyna had looked at him before slamming down the window, the more agitated he felt. Finally, he decided he could not be there when she returned. He wanted to be alone. He wanted to think.

  He unlocked the front door, slammed it behind him, went straight to the kitchen, and opened the refrigerator. Not much food in it—he usually brought home unhealthy meals from fast-food restaurants—but at least he’d had the good sense to buy a twelve-pack of Michelob beer. Had he experienced a premonition yesterday that urged him to buy more beer when he already had a few cans left? No, premonitions used to be Chyna Greer’s specialty, he thought sourly, or so she’d claimed. He’d merely bought the beer because it was on sale. He wondered for a moment if it had been on sale to encourage him to buy it. Then he decided the day had shaken him into harebrained thinking. He’d also been shaken into unwanted memories of certain people.

  Particularly, Zoey Simms, Heather Phelps, and Edie Larson.

  When Zoey Simms disappeared, no one bothered him beyond asking the usual questions about the last time he’d seen her, because someone had reported his speaking to her downtown one day when she was with Chyna Greer. He had a girl to thank for making the cops back off immediately, a

  girl he’d been with the night Zoey disappeared, who told the police her date with Gage had lasted until nearly 1:00 A.M., hours after Chyna said Zoey had met her mystery man. The girl had added, “Who’d think Gage would even look at Zoey Simms when he’s dating me!”

  Over a year later, Heather Phelps had vanished, and once again, the police questioned him, because he’d done work at the Phelps house for Ridgeway Construction. The questions were cursory, though, especially when Mr. and Mrs. Phelps said they’d never seen Heather even speak to Gage.

  But two years later, Edie Larson became a different matter. Edie had been his girlfriend. His mother had dragged him to a community production of Our Town and he’d spotted a sixteen-year-old Edie who’d mesmerized him, not just because of her beauty but also because of her talent, a talent that had earned her rave reviews in every newspaper within a hundred-mile radius. He’d immediately asked her out and she’d accepted.

  But other people didn’t understand their relationship because Edie was three years younger than he was. Townspeople immediately thought it was suspicious that he’d date a girl—a minor—when he should have been with a girl his own age. Edie was quiet and kept to herself, so those people didn’t know how mature she was for her age, a consequence of growing up in a home where just getting through each day was a physical and mental challenge. They didn’t know she was smart and funny and upbeat. Edie never let her miserable life destroy her optimism or her dreams of becoming a movie star. In most of the locals’ opinions, Edie was just a pretty girl from a bad family, who’d happened to make a splash in a small-town play, but who was definitely too young for a man two months shy of twenty.

  And then she went missing just like Zoey Simms and Heather Phelps had.

  The continual police questioning, the sudden linking of Edie with Zoey and Heather, the growing suspicion of and antipathy toward Gage, had almost driven him out of town. He supposed that’s why when his grandfather Henry died,

  he’d left him so much money and a percentage of the business, a fact Gage’s father still resented after all these years. Henry Ridgeway didn’t think his son, Peter, had what it took to run Ridgeway Construction. Henry thought Gage did. He’d known that if he passed over his son, Peter, and left everything to Gage, townspeople would be appalled that the mild-mannered, ever-pleasant, malleable Peter had been cheated and would take out their indignation on Gage and the business. So, Henry had left the bulk of the construction company to Peter. Henry had left Gage enough of the business he loved, though, to make sure he wouldn’t abandon Ridgeway Construction.

  So Gage had stayed, every day enduring his father’s ill-concealed seething resentment, and bought a place where he could be close enough to his job to make commuting easy but still have plenty of privacy, which was what he craved.

  Gage popped open the can of beer, walked back into the living room, and dropped onto the old brown vinyl recliner. In places the vinyl had split and white stuffing stuck out, but he didn’t mind. When Architectural Digest came to do a spread on his home, he’d claim the stuffing-spouting tears in the vinyl added to the chair’s charm, he told himself, laughing. So did the faded hooked rug, the sagging couch, and the cheap plastic molding of a conquistador he’d bought at a yard sale and hung over the fireplace.

  He picked up the television remote control lying on the folding metal table beside the chair and flipped on a game show. He hated game shows, but he decided to make himself watch it, shouting out answers between gulps of beer. But his mind wasn’t on the show or the beer. It was on Chyna. She’d looked even more beautiful than ever. And when she’d opened the window, she’d seemed delighted by his mangled version of “Satisfaction.” She’d been friendly. His heart had soared. And then he’d seen the doubt in her eyes. The suspicion. Even the fear. When she slammed down the window, his wrath had been so great he’d seen nothing but black for a moment. He’d hung on to the ladder, fighting for control, willing relief for the sudden, stabbing pain in his head. Finally, his vision had

  cleared and he’d seen her tearing out of the driveway. “Get away, little Chyna!” he’d shouted. “Get away before big, bad Gage Ridgeway drags you into the void, just like he did your friend Zoey and poor little Heather and Edie!”

  He now took another slug of beer, realized he’d already drained the can, went back for a second one, then decided to bring a third and fourth along because the second one would be gone in less than five minutes. Maybe by the time he finished the fourth beer, he would be able to wipe the image of Nancy Tierney out of his mind. Nancy, with her long blond hair and voluptuous body. Nancy, who in spite of all his better instincts he’d picked up in his car a couple of nights when she’d told her parents she was going to study with one of her friends. How unfortunate that one of those nights, when he was dropping her off a block from her house, they’d been seen.

  He couldn’t believe no one had even questioned him yet about her, that the person who’d seen them together hadn’t said anything or didn’t recognize him. But eventually they would, even though Nancy had probably been with at least twenty older guys like him during the last year. She didn’t like boys her own age, she’d told him. They were just boys, and she liked men. Unfortunately, right before she’d died, she’d decided Gage was the flavor of the month, and as usual, he couldn’t say no to a pretty face and dynamite body.

  He’d been a fool to mess around with Nancy. A damned, stupid fool. Hadn’t age and his experience with Edie taught him anything? Apparently not. And now Nancy was dead.

  Gage thought about going out to the equipment shed, getting his Harley, and going for a long ride. After all, the powerful motorcycle was in excellent condition. He only took it out every couple of months, then washed it, covered it with canvas, and left it propped up by its kickstand on the clean concrete floor of the shed.

  But he never rode it when he’d been drinking, not because he was worried about his own safety but because he feared damaging the machine he’d loved almost as much as he’d ever loved a person. Perhaps even more.

  No, there would be no ride this afternoon, Ga
ge thought. He took another gulp of beer, knowing that not even four beers would help him today. Maybe six beers and a little bit of bourbon. Or a lot of bourbon.

  He was in that kind of mood.

  3

  Chyna was always so used to the fast-paced life of the hospital, she hardly knew what to do with herself on break. She’d taken Michelle for a walk, this time hiking up the gentle hillside behind the house, not downward toward Lake Manicora. Chyna had wiped down the kitchen, which was already spotless, and rearranged the spice rack because the bottles were slightly out of alphabetical order. Finally, she tried to play the piano the way her mother liked to do. Michelle loyally sat by Chyna’s side, but when she looked down into the dog’s unhappy face she had to admit that the years had not improved her talent. “Better hope I make it as a doctor,” she told the dog. “I certainly can’t support the two of us as a pianist in a restaurant.”

  When she rose from the piano bench, Michelle jumped up happily. “Glad the ordeal is over?” Chyna asked. “I promise I won’t play again. I’ll put on some real music.”

  She flipped through the box of CDs and picked out one by the Carpenters. Chyna could remember Ned rolling his eyes whenever his mother played the Carpenters’ music—they were far too all-American apple pie for him—but Edward liked the music and Vivian always sang along with Karen. Vivian’s voice was nowhere near the quality of Karen’s, but at least she didn’t mangle the songs as Chyna did when she used to wail out “Superstar,” setting their ancient hound dog howling.

  It was too early for dinner, especially after the biscottis Chyna had had earlier, so she decided to read. After flipping through a National Geographic, then a Vogue, then a Newsweek, choosing articles, reading one page three times

  and not remembering a word, she gave up. Next, she tried television but had no better luck with concentration there, either.

  Finally, she looked out the windows. At five forty-five, already yellow had faded from the sky, replaced by pale gray that would soon turn to a depressing shade of granite. “Well, I’m not hungry yet, but I’m sure you are,” she said to Michelle, who lay at her feet.

  Chyna fixed a heaping bowl of dog food—more than Michelle should have, because she already needed to take off at least five pounds—but reasoned that Michie didn’t need to be dieting on a vacation. And sadly enough, this would be their vacation for the year. As Chyna set the bowl on the kitchen floor, her eyes finally filled with tears for her mother. “Oh, Mom, why did this have to happen?” she asked aloud, wiping at her face with her hand. “You were so young, so full of life, so much my mommy, even when you were a thousand miles away.”

  Michelle didn’t touch her food but sat looking with what Chyna interpreted as concern at her mistress. “I’m okay,” she said to the dog, giving her a teary smile and one of the beef-basted biscuits she loved. “You know how humans are—a big mess of emotions.”

  Chyna wandered around the kitchen, wishing a biscuit could lift her spirits, but she’d finally hit earth, she thought. Her mother was gone. She’d never again play the piano, laugh, gripe at Ned for hanging on the phone too much, or call Chyna her “glorious girl.” Vivian was gone forever, or at least the rest of Chyna’s life, which to her was forever.

  “Your bedroom.”

  Chyna whirled around at the sound of Zoey’s voice. But of course Zoey wasn’t in the kitchen. No one knew where Zoey was or, rather, where the remains of Zoey were. Chyna hated the thought of her mother at the mortuary, perhaps in the hands of Owen Burtram with his breast-seeking eyes and unctuous manner, but even that was better than thinking of the horrors Zoey’s missing body might have endured.

  “Chyna … your bedroom.”

  Chyna spun again, looking at the other end of the dining room. Nothing except the kitchen table, shining cabinets, a hanging fern, and the kitchen door leading outside, which was securely locked. No voices spoke to her in this room. But Michelle had stopped eating and her ears perked up, her gaze roaming around the kitchen just like Chyna’s.

  “Zoey?” Chyna almost whispered, half in fear, half in disbelief. Then, much louder, “Zoey?”

  “Don’t be afraid,” Zoey’s voice soothed.

  Chyna’s heart raced. “Don’t be afraid? Zoey, I know you’re dead. You can’t be here just like you weren’t at the pond and your mother wasn’t on the phone and Nancy Tierney didn’t speak to me at the mortuary.”

  A lighthearted giggle. “Please go to your room.”

  Chyna slapped her hands over her eyes just as a child would during the scary part of a movie. No one is there, she told herself. Dear God, what’s wrong with me?

  Michelle had moved away from her food. She stood beside Chyna, the hair along her backbone raised, her legs rigid.

  The dog is just reacting to me, Chyna told herself, but she began to feel dizzy, desperately wanting to leave the room but too scared to move. “I won’t hurt you.” Chyna’s heart seemed to slow to almost normal as her eyes closed in a remembered sense of camaraderie and love she and Zoey had shared.

  “Chyna, your bedroom. Look at everything; feel everything.”

  Chyna decided to stop fighting what she thought she heard. The situation was ridiculous, impossible, maybe even laughable. But she was too tired, too confused, too afraid, to argue with the disembodied voice of an old, beloved friend. Besides, there was no one here to care how ludicrous Chyna was acting.

  Her hands icy, her breathing fast and deep, Chyna turned away from the kitchen, passed through the living room, and climbed the stairs to her bedroom. Night had fallen—a chill, moonless night that wrapped the house in silky darkness—but

  Chyna didn’t bother turning on lights. She knew this house like the back of her hand. She could walk through it blindfolded and never bump into anything.

  Now the house seemed to guide her directly to the staircase. She began climbing the stairs with what seemed like bodiless ease. All she heard was Michelle’s heavy panting, her big paws padding along behind Chyna through the house.

  She stood at the door of her bedroom for a moment, expecting to see the girl in white inside. But there was only darkness. Finally Chyna turned on the overhead light. After all, Zoey had told her to look at everything. She couldn’t do that in the dark. She stood in the doorway for a few moments, scanning the room. All seemed as usual—carpet the same color as her blue-gray eyes, muted blue and crisp white satin bedspread, sheer voile curtains beneath tieback draperies, shining cherry furniture, a jewelry box, a Tiffany lamp, a ceramic ballerina figurine …

  An eight-by-ten photograph in a silver frame. A photograph that had not been on her dresser this morning.

  Chyna stood perfectly still. Michelle rubbed against her leg and she looked down to see the dog’s raised hackles. Chyna wondered again if she was causing the dog’s fright, then knew with complete certainty she was not. The house seemed to be breathing heavily in anticipation, pushing her, vibrating in its anxiety for her to cross the room and look at the picture she was sure she’d been drawn here to view.

  Even before she could see the picture clearly, Chyna recognized the frame. She hadn’t seen the framed picture for many years, but she remembered every line of it. Now it sat—the picture clear, the frame dust-free—on Chyna’s dresser and she had not moved it.

  Chyna had always loved her bedroom, which was delicate without being frilly and in the daytime seemed to soak up every bit of available welcoming light. But now the room didn’t seem welcoming. It felt as if it had drawn in on itself, thrumming with silence, full of shadows.

  It seemed to be waiting for her.

  Her steps almost dragging, Chyna neared the picture, then picked it up and looked at it closely under the glow of artificial lighting, not that she had to look at it to know what it was. For a while after Zoey’s disappearance, it had sat in this exact spot on her dresser. Chyna, though, couldn’t even glance at it without crying. Without saying anything to her about it, Vivian had removed the framed photo. She never told Chyna whe
re she’d put it—only that it was safe and someday she’d return it when Chyna could look at it with joy, not sadness.

  The photo had been taken at the Fourth of July barbecue the Greers held every year. No invitations were sent out. Word had simply spread over the years that anyone who just wanted to have good food, lots of fun, and see a fireworks display at night was welcome. Only twice over the past twenty-five years had anyone been removed for bad conduct—Edie Larson’s father, Ron, who’d had too much to drink when he arrived, drank more at the barbecue, and began sliding his hands over women’s breasts and buttocks while bragging about the astonishing size of one of his body parts. Chyna remembered her and Zoey watching in teenage excitement as Uncle Rex corralled Larson while someone called a cab. In ten minutes, Rex and two other male barbecue guests stuffed a bellowing Ron into the back. Chyna remembered being glad Ron had come without his wife and daughter Edie, both of whom Chyna knew slightly from the Larsons’ fresh vegetable stand, which Vivian frequented every year.

  The color photo had been taken that evening, just as the sun had set. Chyna and Zoey had stood with their arms around each other’s waists, smiling happily, as a star-shaped golden firework lit up the pearl gray sky behind them. They’d each worn their four-leaf-clover necklaces, cutoff jeans, and cotton T-shirts, Zoey’s tighter than Chyna’s to show off her late-blooming curves.

  Their arms and legs were tanned, their faces lighter because Vivian had lectured them about preventing wrinkles by wearing sun block. Chyna’s hair hung long and loose, but humidity had caused Zoey’s short blond hair to transform

  from waves to the curls she hated. Looking closer, Chyna could see they each wore pink lipstick and she’d dabbed on blue eye shadow, which Vivian forbade. Zoey, with her round face and freckles and big brown eyes with naturally curling lashes, looked a year or two younger than Chyna and… and what? Chyna frowned, trying to figure out what seemed different about the girls so close in age. It was their expressions, she finally decided. Already Chyna had begun to look slightly sophisticated and worldly-wise. Zoey looked far more credulous. Innocent. Approachable.