Mother's Day Murder. Leslie Meier

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      “I’m amazed.” Lucy braked at the stop sign. “I didn’t know anything about this.”

      “I bet you don’t know she has a page on myspace. com, either.”

      Lucy didn’t know. “She does?”

      “Yes. And you know that sexual predators prowl those sites all the time, looking for unhappy, vulnerable kids.” Elizabeth sighed. “And believe me, that’s most high school kids.”

      Alarm bells were beginning to ring in Lucy’s head. Was this what had happened to Corinne? Had she met someone in a chat room, someone who seemed to understand her and appreciate her, but turned out to be some sort of sexual predator? “I’ll have a little talk with her,” she said, pulling up at the Quik-Stop, where the bus picked up passengers.

      “Before you do that, I think you should do some research, okay? You need to know what you’re up against.” Elizabeth handed her a slip of paper. “This is how you can break into myspace.com.”

      “Thanks for telling me,” said Lucy as Elizabeth climbed out of the car. “Have you got your bus ticket?”

      “No, I didn’t have enough cash for a round trip.”

      Lucy couldn’t believe it. Just when she thought Elizabeth was all grown up, she’d go and do something stupid, like taking a trip without bringing along enough money. And now there wasn’t time to go to the ATM. “How much do you need?” she asked, hoping she had enough cash in her wallet.

      “A couple of twenties would do it, Mom.”

      Lucy handed them over, leaving herself with a couple of tattered singles.

      “Thanks for everything, Mom.” Then the bus pulled in, Lucy gave her daughter a quick hug, and she was gone, in a puff of diesel exhaust. But the concerns she’d shared with her mother about Sara lingered like heavy smog, clouding Lucy’s mood.

      When she got back to the office, Ted was gone and Phyllis was waiting for her return so she could go to lunch. “Now that I’m on this maintenance diet, I’ve got to eat every three hours, or else I get so hungry, I overeat,” she explained, smoothing her gray sweater set over her flat tummy. “I get all shaky, you know, ’cause I don’t have any reserves.” She looked over her shoulder. “And you know how Ted is these days. He threw out the sign with the little clock that said back in whatever minutes.”

      It was true. They were under strict orders to never, ever leave the office unattended during business hours.

      “I’m sorry,” said Lucy. “I had to get Elizabeth to the bus. It isn’t as if she discussed her plans with me. It’s always last minute with her.”

      “You’re too soft on those kids. You let them walk all over you,” said Phyllis, who never hesitated to give child-rearing advice, even though she’d never married and was childless.

      Maybe she’s right, thought Lucy, listening to the little tinkle of the bell on the door as it closed after Phyllis. She sat down at her desk and shrugged out of her Windbreaker, letting it slip down between the chair and her back. She started working on the listings, then impulsively switched to the Internet and went to myspace. com, where she followed Elizabeth’s directions and called up Sara’s page. It was a bit of a shock to see a photo of her daughter on her computer, but she had to admit it was a flattering picture. There were also several other pictures of her with friends, and most surprising, one with the family dog, Libby. Although Sara volunteered regularly at the animal shelter, at home she tended to steer clear of the Lab, claiming she smelled bad. But here they were on MySpace, posed ear to ear and smiling, even Libby.

      When it came to personal information, Lucy learned her daughter liked “pretty much all music,” didn’t watch much TV but was addicted to Grey’s Anatomy, and didn’t drink or smoke. So far, so good. She hoped to go to college and become a veterinarian. Even better. She admitted to being straight, but that was all. She wasn’t looking for love on the Web. It all seemed pretty harmless. So what was Elizabeth making such a fuss about?

      Just to be thorough, she typed in a couple of Sara’s friends, with similar results. She even looked up Ashley Hume and Heather Nowak, again learning little more than that Ashley never missed Survivor and Heather loved Sudoku, before Ted marched in and she had to switch back to the listings.

      Phyllis was right; there were a lot. Now that the weather was warming up, every club and organization in town seemed to be planning a yard sale or rummage sale or silent auction. It made Lucy wonder if there was some giant pool of unwanted items that were circulated from one event to another, from sale to sale, year after year. And if they weren’t selling you old junk, they wanted to feed you ham and beans or barbecued chicken or roast beef. The VFW was even holding a pig roast. Those who still had some cash after the sales and dinners could see a show. The Tinker’s Cove High School Players were selling advance tickets to their upcoming production of Grease, the Comedy Club was putting on Sylvia, and the Wentworth College Drama Club was presenting Titus Andronicus.

      Just thinking about all this activity was tiring, and Lucy was glad when the clock finally read four thirty and she could leave.

      “Any chance you could stay late tonight?” asked Ted. “We’re swamped this week.”

      “I’ve got to pick up Sara,” replied Lucy. “But I can come in early tomorrow morning.”

      “I suppose that’s okay,” he said, grumbling.

      It was only a short drive over to the ball field behind the high school, where Lucy was supposed to pick up Sara. Today the boy’s baseball team was playing archrival Gilead, and there was a lot of interest. Quite a crowd had gathered to watch the game, and she could hear groans as a Tinker’s Cove player struck out, ending the game with a loss. She stood by the gate as people left the field, exchanging greetings with many of them. As the crowd thinned, and there was no sign of Sara, she began asking if anyone had seen her.

      “She was here,” recalled Wilf Lundgren, the letter carrier. “I saw her with a couple of other girls.”

      “When was that?”

      “Second, mebbe third inning. Bases were loaded, and that Gilead kid everybody’s talking about hit one right over the fence. It was a grand slam.” He sighed. “Gotta give it to the kid. He’s a phenom.”

      “But you didn’t see her after that?”

      Wilf shook his head.

      As Lucy followed the last of the stragglers to the parking lot, she checked her cell phone, just in case she’d missed a call. She hadn’t. She clicked the phone shut, unpleasantly aware of a tightening in her chest. Darn it, she thought angrily, everybody was all sweetness and light on Mother’s Day, but what about the rest of the year? Sara knew she was supposed to check in with her mother if she changed plans.

      The thought stopped Lucy in her tracks. The truth was, Sara was very good about calling. What if something had happened that made calling impossible, like an accident?

      No, if there had been an accident, she would have heard. There would have been sirens, at least.

      The tightening feeling in her chest was getting worse, and now she was aware of a sinking feeling in her gut as Elizabeth’s words came back to СКАЧАТЬ