Where the Road Ends. Tara Quinn Taylor
to five.”
Amy hooked a pillow with one arm, hugging it to her. She took an odd and immediate comfort from the soft worn cotton and flattened foam. A feeling similar to the reassurance brought about by Brad Dorchester’s thoroughness.
“Can you please call me Amy?”
“If you’d prefer.”
“I would.”
“If you won’t go home, at least give me your word that, in the future, you’ll call me before taking off on a chase.”
“You won’t stop me.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“Then yes, I’ll call you.” She’d at least try.
“Good. Now get some rest…Amy.”
As if she could.
She didn’t know how much more of this she could take.
The kid was crying again. She hadn’t been prepared for that. Never thought that a kid who was five years old would still cry.
But this one did. All the time—or so it seemed to her. He didn’t cry when she was pulling him along and he fell down and skinned his knee so bad there was blood all over. That she could’ve understood. Nor any of the times she’d slapped him. Not even when she’d made him throw his ice-cream cone away the day she’d seen a dress in a store window that she wanted to try on and there’d been a No Food Allowed sign posted at the front door.
She would’ve understood that, too. Probably would have yelled at him to shut up. But she’d have understood.
But no—she pulled one of her fluffy feather pillows over her head to drown out the pathetic sound before it pissed her off enough to make her get up and do something about it—this kid only cried for one reason.
The one reason she absolutely could not forgive.
The fucking kid was crying for his mother.
Needed ASAP, Blade, Loader & Scraper operators…
How did one operate a Scraper? For that matter, what was a Scraper?
Printing pressman, exp. only…
That left her out.
ADULT NEWSPAPER CARRIERS WANTED. Immediate openings. Must be 18 or older. Call…
Amy circled it.
Janitor needed, Lawrence Elementary School. No experience necessary. FT position. Salary commensurate w/exp. Apply M-F, 8-3, at Lawrence Elementary main office.
Perfect.
“Can I get you more coffee, ma’am?”
“What?” Amy looked up from the newspaper want ads. “Oh, no, thank you, I’ve had enough.”
“You sure I can’t get you something else to eat?”
“No thanks.” She smiled at the friendly girl dressed in an old-fashioned waitress uniform with big front pockets. “The toast was fine.”
“You hardly ate any of it.”
“I wasn’t hungry.” Amy glanced back at the paper. “Listen, you wouldn’t happen to know where the elementary school is, would you?”
“Sure, it’s just down this road.” She pointed out the window to the road Amy had taken into town the night before. “Go right at the corner. It’s about half a mile down the street. There’re some swings in the side yard. You can’t miss it.”
“Thanks.” Amy smiled again.
Coffeepot in hand, the girl continued on to the next table, and Amy read the ad one more time. Infiltrating towns had become a way of life for her. Plans formed naturally, as though she’d been living this way forever.
Sometimes that was how it seemed.
She hardly gave a thought anymore to what her shareholders would think of their CEO cleaning toilets.
Or sitting here, dressed in a pair of cheap jeans, a polyester orange sweater and tennis shoes, in this sticky-tabled restaurant with black scuff marks all over the floor.
Remembering Brad’s theory that someone might be out to destroy her professional reputation, Amy still didn’t care. She’d sacrificed so much for Wainscoat Construction, and in the end, all that money hadn’t been enough to buy her the one thing that mattered. Her son’s safety.
Which was why she was sitting in a greasy spoon in a town that would never be able to afford the services of a nationally renowned group of builders. And it was why she belonged there.
Each of the small towns was a bit different, yet her goal was completely the same. Get into the schools, scour records. Of course, Charles wouldn’t be registered under his own name, but maybe, being the boy’s mother, she’d recognize some hint. Some clue, however slight. Maybe a new student who chose chocolate milk on the lunch plan…
And outside of school, her aim was to get to know the townspeople enough to win their trust—and their confidences. Be an ordinary woman getting to know other ordinary people. Put herself in the various places where she might hear talk of children. And maybe the mention of one child.
The goal was to find Charles.
But never had a plan fallen into her lap as easily as it had today. It must mean something.
The job was made for her. She had to get to the school, show Amy Wayne’s fake ID she’d found frighteningly easy to obtain using her own social security number, give Cara as her reference and secure the position before it was given to someone else.
She should have asked for the check.
Where was that girl?
Amy glanced around—and noticed a car pulling out of the gas station/convenience store across the street. A green Grand Am.
Throwing a twenty-dollar bill on the tabletop, she grabbed her purse and the cheap navy parka and ran—across four lanes of traffic. Glad of the tennis shoes that were a regular part of her wardrobe now, Amy was only vaguely aware of the honking horns.
Yanking her picture of Kathy out of the back pocket of her bag, Amy cut in front of a man wearing overalls, buying a pack of cigarettes at the counter.
“Have you seen this woman?” she asked addressing both the bearded customer and the middle-aged female clerk.
“Yeah, she was just in here,” the clerk said. “Wearing a pretty fancy white ski jacket and expensive-looking black pants.”
“She left in that green Pontiac,” the man added. “She was real nice-looking in a natural sort of way.” And then, “You know her?”
Amy didn’t bother to answer, just ran to the door.
Her car was across the street. She was losing valuable time.
Hand on the door, she stopped. “You didn’t happen to notice if she had a small boy with her, did you?”
“Nope, she was by herself,” the clerk said.
“She bought animal crackers, though,” the man, a friendly sort, told her. “And two ice-cream bars. I noticed mostly because she cut in front of me and then I couldn’t figure out why a woman all by herself needed two of ’em at once. It wasn’t like she could save one for later….”
The door closed behind Amy, who was already halfway across the parking lot. Animal crackers were Charles’s favorite—next to ice-cream bars. Johnny had bought both for him regularly. To go with the brie and filet mignon her little boy more commonly got at home.
Amy’s son might not have been at the store, but Kathy had to be going to him.
And he had to be close. That extra ice-cream bar wasn’t going to last long.
Holding