He had her money. He knew she wasn’t going anywhere.
“Listen,” she said, twisting in the seat, her left arm draped over the steering wheel. “Let’s just forget what happened at the hotel. Okay?” It had been hard for her to bring herself to ask him for anything. But what she was offering was a truce. He had to see that. And anybody with a shred of human decency would take her offer.
He stared at her with spoon-bending concentration. “Not in a million years.”
Chapter Eleven
There was no sign of Beau. Daniel strode through the quiet house, shouting his brother’s name.
He unlocked the patio door and checked outside. Premonition came to greet him, tail wagging. Daniel gave the dog a distracted rub on the head. “Where’s Beau?” he asked.
Premonition sat on Daniel’s foot, tail thumping the ground.
Daniel went back in the house, rechecking the kitchen in case Beau had left a note. The counter was empty.
Daniel hurried to the bedroom, peeled off the ridiculous T-shirt, and slipped into a wrinkled cotton shirt. He buttoned the buttons, then hurried out to his car.
Before picking up Cleo, Daniel took a swing down Main Street so he could check out Beau’s usual haunts, slowing when he got to the Tastee Delight. No sign of Beau. The two picnic tables sitting in the shade of the awning were empty. He pulled up to the curb. Leaving the car and air conditioner running, he got out and went to the order window, tapping impatiently on the counter with his knuckles.
Someone appeared behind the glass. A man. About Daniel’s height, wearing a blue-and-white Tastee Delight cap and a blue Tastee Delight shirt.
Beau.
“What the hell are you doing in there?” Daniel asked in disbelief.
Beau grinned. “I work here.”
“Since when?”
“Since today. I said this would be a neat place to work, and Matilda said I could start today.”
“Matilda?”
“The manager.”
“Is Matilda in there?”
“Yeah. You wanna talk to her?”
Damn right he did. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”
A moment later a woman with a serious face and a brown ponytail that fell to her waist appeared.
“This is my brother, Daniel,” Beau told her.
“Hi.” The word came out more as a question than a greeting.
“Can I talk to you a minute?”
“Sure.” She glanced at Beau, obviously realizing that Daniel’s impatience and irritation had to do with his brother. “Why don’t you finish mopping?” she suggested to Beau.
Beau trotted off and Daniel leaned close to the screen. “What the hell’s going on here?” he asked in a loud whisper.
Frown lines appeared between her brows. “What do you mean?”
“Hiring Beau.”
“Beau’s been coming here every day for the past two months. He knows every single item on the menu. He’s clean. Is he ever clean. And he follows directions. He’s meticulous. Everybody likes him. And he’s enjoying himself. What is it you don’t understand, Mr. Sinclair? Are you insinuating that I’m taking advantage of Beau? I’m paying him minimum wage, just like I pay every other new employee. After he’s been here a month, that will go up, the way it does for everyone else.”
“It’s just-” Daniel scratched his head. He’d never thought about Beau having a job, making a living.
“I think you underestimate your brother,” the woman said.
What was his problem? He should be glad Beau had a job. Here he’d moved back to Egypt to take care of Beau, but Beau seemed to be getting along fine without him.
The motel room was every bit as bad as Cleo remembered, except that now it smelled like stale French fries, and her chopped-off hair was lying in a pile on the bathroom floor.
She threw away the stale fries, but for some reason she couldn’t make herself throw away the hair. She scooped it off the floor and put it on top of the TV.
It was weird being back in the motel room, seeing the belongings she’d thought she would never see again. It was almost as if she’d left a part of herself behind and had come back to get it.
Not wanting to remain in the room any longer than she had to, she quickly changed clothes. She put on a white V-neck cotton T-shirt and a pair of faded jeans that were ragged at the bottom and alarmingly loose around the waist.
While slipping into her sandals, she twisted her hair into a bun, then jabbed a wooden hair pick through it to hold it in place. After that, she gathered up a few tools of her trade and put them in a small bag.
When she’d first become interested in psychic phenomena, she tried all the aids. Although she’d taught herself to read runes and the tarot, she’d never felt anything other than a fraud. In fact, she’d come away from the lessons relieved and convinced that she had no power. That was until the child disappeared. But she hadn’t used cards or stones to bring about the answer, to bring about the nightmare.
She pushed that thought out of her mind, replacing it with another. If Mr. Daniel Sinclair wants a show, I’ll give him one.
Daniel hadn’t yet returned to pick her up. She took the opportunity to go to the gas station two blocks away in hopes of finding something she could eat. She ended up buying a loaf of white bread and a bottle of clear soda with the change she was able to scrounge from the bottom of her bag. In the motel, she opened the soda. Sitting on the bed, she took out a slice of bread, carefully removed the crust, and slowly force-fed herself.
Before she could finish, a knock sounded on the door. She put the half-eaten piece of bread back in the bag, sealed it with a twist tie, then hid the bread in her suitcase. Then she grabbed her supplies and headed out the door into the blazing sun where Daniel waited, arms crossed at his chest, feet crossed at his booted ankles, one hip against the hood of his car.
He pushed away from the vehicle and took his place behind the wheel while Cleo slid into the passenger seat. She could feel his muddled anger. His bad vibes were filling the car, invading her space. Silently, he pulled out of the weedy parking lot onto the two-lane highway.
“Was everything okay with Beau?” she asked.
“Fine,” came his terse reply.
“And Premonition?” she ventured, wanting her inquiry to sound casual, hoping to hide her anxiety.
“Fine too,” he said with distraction. “They’re both fine.” So don’t ask any more questions were his unspoken words. His preoccupation and moodiness didn’t improve when they reached the police station.
“Shit,” he muttered under his breath. “It looks like Jo’s invited half the town to witness the sideshow.”
“Are you calling me a sideshow?” she asked, her anger toward him building by the second. “I resent that.”
“Let’s not start this crap again.”
“You started it. I’m just speaking up for myself.”
His answer was a groan of misery, a sound that seemed to ask, What did I ever do to deserve this?
Because of the additional cars, Daniel was forced to park halfway down the block. He cut the engine then rubbed his forehead with his thumb and forefinger.
No wonder he had a headache, Cleo thought. He had enough tension in him to power an energy plant.
Inside the building’s cool darkness, Jo immediately greeted her. “I want you to meet my good friends.” She introduced Cleo to two women who could have been twins with their gray hair, pink tops, and tan orthopedic shoes. And Cleo couldn’t help but notice that they had the same tightly permed hairdo as Jo.
Burton Campbell was there, along with Harvey Jamison. The former was all pleasant smiles, the latter scowling as much as Daniel. Parker hovered nervously behind his desk.