Last Seen Alive Read online

Scott shrugged. “Time and experience can change you, Chyna.”

  They had reached the spot on the shore where a wooden bridge used to lead to the gazebo on the tiny man-made island set picturesquely in the lake. At least, Chyna had once thought the gazebo was picturesque. Now it looked shabby, the wood weathered, a shingle dangling off the top of the structure, and fallen leaves blowing through it. Chyna had a feeling she was seeing the true face of the gazebo—bleak, lonely, and shabby. And something beyond those minor failings. Something dangerous and malevolent. Something that laughed in the night when bad things happened.

  Chyna couldn’t force herself cheerfully to assure Scott that of course he’d want to return to piloting. If she’d had his experience, she’d probably never again want to look at any airplane, particularly a commercial jet. To fill the silence, she gazed at the gazebo and said almost angrily, “That place looks like hell.”

  Scott nodded. “I agree. That storm we had late Friday night didn’t help. It even tore loose the gazebo bridge. Irma, who seems immediately to know everything that happens in this town, tells me the city council is debating on whether to repair the gazebo or tear it down and build a new one.”

  “They can’t possibly be cheap enough to just patch up this one!” Chyna said fervently. “The bridge is barely hanging on and the roof is in bad shape. Good heavens, I can see holes from here and most of the shingles are gone. I’m sure the floor isn’t safe.”

  “I wouldn’t want to go in it if they only spring for repair work. I don’t think most people would, either, especially those with children. It’s always been a big draw to the area, though. Tourists love it and it wouldn’t cost a fortune to replace it. I’ll bet Ridgeway Construction would do a beautiful job, and since they’re located in Black Willow, they might even be talked into charging only for materials.” For the first time, Scott seemed to brighten a bit. “I think I’ll talk to Gage Ridgeway about that. He used to be a friend of your brother’s and mine. He’d listen. Now his dad—”

  Suddenly Scott glanced at his watch. “I lost track of time. I have an appointment with a rehab therapist. I’ll be late if I don’t leave right now,” he said abruptly, a shadow falling over his face as the memory of the plane crash came back to him. “It was great seeing you, Chyna, even under the circumstances.”

  “Do you need a ride?” Chyna blurted, then realized that of course Scott hadn’t walked to the lake. Her face reddened, but Scott ignored her silly question.

  “Thanks, but I’m parked right over here.” He pointed to a white sedan. “Old car of Dad’s I’ve been borrowing. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again. Don’t stay out too long. It’s chilly.” He looked down. “Nice meeting you, Michelle. Bye, you two.”

  Michelle knew the word “bye” and held out her big paw. Smiling, Scott bent slowly and shook it. “You’re a doll,” he said with some of his old liveliness. In a few minutes, he waved to Chyna as he pulled out of the Lake Manicora parking lot and headed back for town.

  2

  Chyna thought of the crush she’d once had on Scott, remembering her fantasies about him showing up at the door one day announcing he’d realized she was the love of his life. She sighed. It had never happened, but to her he looked just as he had when he was in his twenties, only older and world-weary. I’m sure I look more world-weary than I did twelve years ago, too, she decided. That’s what time did to you.

  Unfortunately, time didn’t always erase bad memories. I wish I could look at this lake and not immediately think of Zoey, Chyna thought. Zoey with her freckled nose, her bouncy blond hair, her vibrant spirit—they’d all vanished on a warm summer night while Chyna had lain on the grass and slept like the dead. The thought chilled her. I slept like the dead while Zoey was probably being murdered.

  If I hadn’t been sleeping so deeply, Chyna thought guiltily,

  maybe I could have saved Zoey. Chyna had always believed that when it was too late, Zoey had recognized danger. If she’d been able to call out before the end, maybe Chyna could have gotten to her in time to do something to save the girl who’d meant more to her than a sister.

  No condemnations from her parents or Zoey’s parents for the girls’ foolishness or for Chyna’s irresponsibility had compared to the guilt with which she’d lashed herself like a whip. She hadn’t been the person who’d no doubt killed Zoey, but Chyna couldn’t have felt worse if she’d run over the girl with a car or pushed her off a cliff. And Chyna couldn’t forgive herself for not listening to her own instinct warning that Zoey was walking into peril that night. For years before Zoey’s disappearance Chyna’s life had been ruled by her instincts—instincts that had rarely been wrong—but that summer evening she’d let her desire to please Zoey overrule her intuition, and Zoey had paid the price. Not her—not Chyna—but dear little Zoey.

  As usual when Chyna let herself think deeply about Zoey, coldness and nausea almost overwhelmed her. I have to stop dwelling on this. My own mother just died, she chastised herself, and all I’m thinking about is Zoey. There are arrangements to be made, dishes of food already being delivered for which I have to make a list so the empty dishes can be returned and thank-you notes written. I haven’t even picked out an outfit for Mom to wear for burial. And will the coffin be open or closed? Ned and I really haven’t had time to make any decisions.

  While Chyna’s thoughts whirled, she’d let go of Michelle’s leash. The dog made for the edge of the lake, looked at it for a long moment, then took two tentative steps into the cold water. Michelle wasn’t fond of swimming, in spite of her part-Labrador background. She took one more step into the water until her paws were covered. Then she stood rock still and the hair along her backbone rose.

  “What is it, Michelle?” Chyna asked, going forward to retrieve the leash.

  The dog completely ignored her and stared out at the

  lake. Michelle had gone rigid and her nose twitched furiously. A dead fish? Chyna wondered. Maybe a dead animal?

  “Michelle?” she urged, gently pulling on the leash. “Michie, come with me. Don’t be stubborn.”

  Michelle remained taut, her ears standing up, the hair on her back stiff. Michelle was an obedient dog, violently attached to Chyna, but now Chyna felt as if the golden dog didn’t know she existed.

  “Michelle?” Chyna drew nearer, even taking a step into the edge of the pond. She didn’t mind getting her leather boots wet—they weren’t new, anyway. “Michie, what is it?”

  And then Chyna heard it. Soft, far away, and blurred, but a singsong voice. “Star light, star bright…”

  Chyna whipped around, expecting to see a child nearby, but there was no one.

  Chyna shook her head. I’ve gone too long without sleep, she thought. I’m hallucinating.

  Then she definitely heard a voice. A familiar voice.

  “Chyna? Chyna, it’s Zoey.”

  Chyna felt that if she had hair on her back, it would be as stiff as Michelle’s. Instead, Chyna’s neck tingled as the skin all over her body seemed to tighten.

  “Chyna, I’m lost in the dark. Lost and lonely.”

  Chyna’s gaze shot all around the lake. On the other side, a family with two adolescent children walked, the parents talking animatedly, the children looking bored. At the far end, two boys around seventeen sat under one of the picnic shelters, sipping out of cans. In the parking lot, an elderly man walked toward a car. No one else lingered near the lake.

  “Chyna?”

  “I’m listening,” Chyna said, helpless not to answer what sounded like Zoey’s voice. “What is it?”

  “You’re the only one who can help.”

  Chyna closed her eyes. She was tired. She was filled with sorrow over her mother. She was imagining things. She shook her head as if to clear it. “Come on, Michelle. We have to go back to the house,” she said briskly.

  “No, no, listen,” the voice from the lake pleaded, louder,

  clearer. “You have to find me, because there were other girls like me. There will be more
girls like me if you don’t do something. Chyna, help me. Help them”

  “I…” Chyna suddenly felt frozen inside. Her hands shook and she could barely breathe. Clutching Michelle’s leash, she turned and ran from the lake, the long-lost Zoey’s voice still calling after her.

  CHAPTER TWO

  1

  Chyna slammed the front door behind her, locked it, then leaned against the varnished wood as she drew long, ragged breaths. Michelle, also breathing hard, looked up at Chyna and pawed her leg. The dog is as scared as I am, Chyna thought, then decided no one was as scared as she was.

  She nearly staggered over to one of the wing chairs in the living room and sat down with a grunt. The chairs were elegant. They were also hard as rocks, made for looks, not comfort. But Chyna thought if the chair hadn’t been so close, she would have been lying on the floor by now.

  Chyna felt her heart pounding in her chest. Okay, you have to calm down, she told herself. This is ridiculous, especially for a woman who’s known for her unflappability. Of course, she wasn’t as imperturbable as she usually let on, but she was far from nervous, squeamish, or easily frightened. She knew that at the hospital some of the nurses called her Woman of Steel behind her back. She’d never let on that she knew, sort of liking the feeling that colleagues thought she was strong.

  Her breath was slowing and so were her thoughts. She closed her eyes again and reviewed recent events. Tuesday evening, before her night shift, she’d taken a nap. After an hour, she’d jerked awake from a dream of being chased

  through a wooded area. The dream had left her with a thumping headache for which she’d taken aspirin throughout a particularly rough night. She’d been unable to sleep most of the next day, and Wednesday’s night shift had been even worse than Tuesday’s. When she’d come off-shift, she’d been home only an hour when Ned had called to say their mother—their beautiful mother whom Chyna had adored—was dead.

  Stunned, Chyna had called the hospital to cancel the next few days—days she had coming to her for skipped vacations and extra shifts. She’d stuffed clothes in a suitcase, found Michelle’s travel cage, and headed for the airport, deciding simply to wait for “standby” on the next flight that would get her near Black Willow.

  After hours of pacing the airport terminal, eating a candy bar that tasted like cardboard and pretending to read instead of staring at fellow travelers, she’d boarded a flight, then endured a long layover and a change of planes before reaching Charleston, West Virginia. On both flights, she’d settled in her seat and found out that although she was exhausted, she couldn’t sleep even with the help of a vodka tonic to calm her nerves. The same was true when she reached the Greers’ beautiful stone house atop the hill overlooking Lake Manicora.

  By then, she’d managed to drift into a brief, dream-torn nap. When she awakened stiff and fuzzy-minded, she’d decided to take a walk, and even though she hadn’t planned it, she’d ended up at the lake, the last place she’d ever seen Zoey. That was smart, Chyna, she thought. That was damned brilliant. No wonder you imagined you were hearing her voice.

  Hearing Zaey’s voice. Chyna had heard voices before, but they were barely above whispers. “Don’t do this.” “Pick that one.” Phrases that when she was young she’d thought of as coming from a guardian angel. Never had Chyna heard a familiar voice. Never had she heard someone call her name and beg her to listen. The accumulation of events had thrown her imagination into overdrive, she decided. That’s why she thought she’d heard Zoey beseeching for her help.

  But I didn’t imagine the way Michelle went rigid and the hair on her back stood up, Chyna reminded herself with a dull, inexorable fear that no amount of levelheaded reasoning could banish. The dog had been terrified down at the lake.

  Michelle was not an aggressive dog, but she wasn’t timid, either. She wouldn’t have frozen at the sight of another dog or of a duck on the lake, even if there had been any other animal life around except a chipmunk or a squirrel Chyna hadn’t spotted. And Michelle wouldn’t have stood rooted with her paws in the cold water while Chyna pulled on her leash. The least tug had always immediately brought her to Chyna’s side. But today Michelle had refused to move. And when Chyna had “thought” she was hearing Zoey’s voice, Michelle’s ears had lifted stiffly, just as they did when she was listening with special intensity.

  The phone rang and Chyna literally leaped from her chair. Michelle cringed, bracing herself for flight, when Chyna rolled her eyes and said, “Just the phone, girl. At this rate, between the two of us, we should be dead by sunset from pure nerves.”

  Chyna crossed the tapestry rug covering a pale cream-colored carpet and picked up the phone. “Greer, here.”

  “Well, hello, Greer.” The voice was light and feminine.

  Chyna relaxed. Beverly, her sister-in-law. “Sorry, Bev. I answer to ’Greer’ at least a hundred times a day at the hospital. Sometimes I forget I have a first name.”

  “Well, you do, and it’s beautiful, so get used to being Chyna again for a few days. You got here so quickly you must be exhausted.”

  I’m exhausted to the point of losing my mind, Chyna almost said, then forced a bit of liveliness into her voice. “I’m tired, but I’m used to long hours. Michelle and I just got back from a walk along the lake. We ran into Scott Kendrick.”

  “Really?” Beverly sounded surprised. “I thought he hardly ever left the house. How did he seem?”

  “Physically, recovering nicely. Emotionally? Trying hard to pull himself together and maybe not doing so well.” She

  wished she hadn’t mentioned seeing Scott, feeling as if discussing his mental state even with Beverly was a betrayal of him. “How are my niece and nephew?” she asked abruptly.

  “A handful, but healthy, so I should count my blessings instead of my gray hairs, right?”

  “On my last visit, I didn’t see one gray hair,” Chyna teased. “You looked as young as you did the day you got married.”

  But I don’t know about me, Chyna thought. She glanced at herself in the gold-framed mirror over the marble mantle and decided she looked bedraggled, dry-skinned, sunken-eyed, and at least ten years older than she had two days ago.

  Beverly took a breath, then said compassionately, “I’m sorry about Vivian, Chyna. I know how much you loved her.”

  “I just can’t believe Mom had a heart condition I didn’t know about,” Chyna burst out. “I mean, that’s a hell of a thing to hide from your daughter, especially when she’s a doctor.”

  “Vivian didn’t tell anyone,” Beverly said soothingly. “I think she’d probably been seeing a doctor out of town. About six months ago when I was at her house, I saw an appointment card from a doctor on her desk.”

  “Do you remember the name of the doctor?”

  “Not right off the bat, but it will probably come to me. I’m fairly certain the card gave a Huntington address, although I didn’t really get a good look at it because Vivian walked in and started talking so fast I could hardly keep up with her. Now I’m sure she was trying to divert my attention from the card. I feel bad for not mentioning it earlier, but it didn’t seem important at the time.” Beverly sighed. “Anyway, there was nothing you could have done about her health even if you’d known she had heart trouble.”

  “I could have arranged for her to see some of the best cardiologists in the country.” Chyna paused and swallowed. “And I certainly could have come to see her more often. She was seriously ill and I stayed away because…”

  “Because of Zoey. I know. Your mother knew, too. She didn’t blame you.”

  “For what? Not coming home often? Or for Zoey’s disappearance?”

  “She didn’t blame you for either one.” Beverly must have heard the tears gathering in Chyna’s voice, because she said, “I think you need some rest right now. Drink one of those herbal teas that are supposed to be relaxing and get a couple of hours’ sleep. Ned and I are getting a babysitter tonight. We thought we’d come over about seven so you don’t hav
e to stay up late with us. I hate to intrude on you when you’re so tired and upset, but we have to talk over funeral arrangements. We’ll make it as quick as possible.”

  Chyna closed her eyes in dread. She didn’t think she could make even one suggestion about funeral arrangements, but she couldn’t shove off everything on Ned, either. “All right, Bev. I’ll see you around seven.”

  “Want us to bring you some food?”

  “No, there’s plenty of stuff in the kitchen. Obviously Mom wasn’t expecting something to happen, and she must have been to the grocery store day before yesterday.” Chyna felt her throat beginning to close with trapped tears. “If you’ll just stop by a convenience store and pick up a bag of Gravy Train for Michelle, I’ll be forever grateful.”

  “Gravy Train it is, then. Turn on the TV or some music. It sounds quiet as the grave over there.” Beverly caught herself. “Oh, that was awful! I just meant—”

  “I know what you meant and music would cheer up the place. Mom always kept on the television, or she listened to music. This silence is creepy.”

  “I’m sure it is. We’ll be there as soon as possible, Chyna.”

  The grandfather clock in the hall chimed five times. Five o’clock. Chyna wondered how she was going to keep herself occupied until her brother and his wife came to this house she’d always loved, especially when she was in it alone and could pretend it belonged to her?

  Chyna stood and walked over to the portrait of her parents, Vivian and Edward Greer. The portrait had been done nine years ago. Vivian sat on a velvet chair, her mahogany-colored hair—just like Chyna’s—touching her shoulders

  and gleaming with gold and red highlights pouring in from the window behind her. The artist had really done an excellent job of capturing Vivian’s hair, Chyna thought, although in real life Vivian had usually pinned her hair into a casual French twist, never visiting the beauty shop more than a couple of times a year for a trim. Her gray-blue eyes, also like Chyna’s, gazed from the portrait with a hint of amusement, as if saying, “Isn’t it silly for Edward and me to be posing here like royalty?” She wore a simple grayish blue dress that exactly matched her eyes, an eighteen-inch string of Tahitian pearls, and small pearl earrings.