Had anybody missed her yet? Had the girls at the boutique tried to call her? When they only got her machine again and again, had they gone to her house in search of her? They wouldn’t have found anything wrong. No one had broken into her home. Her car was gone. She had left of her own accord.

How had her life come to this? She wasn’t a bad person. She and Marissa had only set out to do a good thing. Maybe Marissa’s method had been questionable, but she had her reasons. And her only motive had been Haley. That they had both benefitted had been incidental to that goal—to provide for Haley.

How could such a noble motive come to such a bad end?

How did she know if any of this was real at all? Gina wondered. Maybe she really was losing her mind. Could she be hallucinating? How would she know the difference?

I don’t know what to do, M.

You’re going to get yourself out of here, G.

Don’t leave me.

I won’t.

I’m not as brave as you.

You’ll be as brave as you need to be.

Chapter 51

51

She had been watching television the night it happened. Not for entertainment, but for the live news coverage of a hostage standoff at the sheriff’s office. Dennis Farman’s father had a gun to the head of Cal Dixon. Vince was trying to talk him down. The situation that had begun with violence had ended in violence.

At the time that news had come, Anne had no way of knowing if Vince had survived. She had busied herself opening a small gift Tommy Crane had given to her earlier that night—a necklace. A necklace that could only have come from a murder victim.

And then Peter Crane was there, at her home, seeming fine, polite, apologetic. So sorry. A misunderstanding. He needed that necklace back. There had been a mistake. It belonged to his wife.

Anne had told him that was no problem. She understood completely. She just had to go into the kitchen to get it—a lie—thinking she would go straight out the back door and run for her life.

She never made it to the door. Peter Crane had her by the hair—

Gasping for air, her heart pounding out of her chest, Anne sat bolt upright in bed. For a moment she didn’t know where she was and panic grabbed her by the throat. She was soaking wet with sweat.

There was a light on in the far corner of the room. Just a soft amber glow to chase away the dark and the bogeymen that came with it.

She was in her own home. She was safe. This was the guest room she had chosen for Haley. She was safe. Haley was safe, sound asleep.