The Missing Woman: Utterly gripping psychological suspense with heart-thumping twists Read online

  But no, there’s no mistaking it. We’re across the deep end from one another, a short enough distance—less than twenty feet—for me to know her eyes are fixated on mine. Her smile is gone and replaced with something hard. Wincing. Pleading and pained.

  And something else—am I imagining this—does she look terrified?

  A chill tingles across my scalp, the moment slicing through time. The look only lasts a few seconds but it’s long enough. An unsettled sensation races down my spine until all I want to do is break free from her gaze and look anywhere else.

  We’ve just shared something—I have no idea what it is but it’s there. She thought of something. She remembered something. And I’m the only one who saw the shadow fall across her face.

  But what, Sabine?

  What could possibly be wrong with your life? And why look at me? We orbit in entirely different worlds. You live on Honors Row, and I do not. We don’t attend the same dinner parties. We only share this neighborhood pool.

  But I don’t get to ask because Sabine turns her head and she’s gone, the pool gate slamming behind her.

  And the truth is, if I’d called out to her, I’m not sure if she would have told me anyway. I’m not someone she would confide to. Despite the heat, I suddenly feel cold.

  “Ladies, is she here? Have you seen her?”

  I’m on the other side of the pool standing in line with the kids who have been begging the last hour to have their faces painted. Mark Miller, Sabine’s husband, is heading directly to where Sabine’s friends are sitting and when he reaches them, I can’t help but lean to one side to listen. I’m unable to forget that look she gave me.

  And something else, a bracelet I found near the gate. Silver with a bright blue charm and looking very much like the one she had been wearing on her wrist. Another strange coincidence—me finding this jewelry while a crowd rallied around the snow cone truck, the kids pleading with their parents for money.

  How did it drop—the bangle? Did it get tangled when Sabine hoisted the cooler bag up her arm, the clasp coming loose? And in her hurry, did she not hear the bracelet drop to the ground?

  The bracelet is shoved in my pool bag now. I’m thinking I can bring it to Sabine when she returns. I can hand it to her quickly or leave it on her chair when her friends aren’t paying attention. We don’t have to speak.

  But Mark is perched on the side of Sabine’s chair and looking sorely out of place from everyone else in his khaki pants, tie, and button-down shirt. An American flag button pinned to his chest, the man in constant campaign mode.

  He lifts his shoes, an expensive-looking pair of brown leather loafers, when he realizes he’s parked his feet in a puddle of water. He keeps a steady gaze on Sabine’s best friends.

  Mark Miller, our county commissioner, is running for a second term this fall with billboards lined up and down the parkway, his golden hair and brilliant white teeth smiling upon every commuter, his radio commercials promising continued transparency for local government. The election is this November and a slam dunk if you ask me. Many of our neighbors are voting for him.

  He’s intense but well-loved. A shining star in local politics who can do no wrong. The addition of the new surgery center at the hospital is his major coup, along with the economic growth he’s secured the last few years. Several companies have also announced they’re relocating their headquarters to North Alabama and bringing more jobs with them. Mark Miller is everything and more you would want in your county commissioner and it doesn’t hurt he is also drop-dead gorgeous.

  “Sabine?” Monica says as Mark waits for an answer.

  “Yes. She’s here, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah, but…” She leans over and taps Carol on the arm. “She went back to the house, right, Carol? Isn’t that where she said she was going?”

  Carol lolls her head to one side. “She went to get us more drinks.” She glances at the time. “But that was like an hour ago.”

  He presses his phone to his ear. “She’s not answering. I’ve called several times and nothing.” Motioning at Monica, he asks, “Can you try?”

  In front of me, two chairs open up and Taylor and Charlie leap forward as Taylor points at a picture and asks, “What about this?” or “What about a ladybug?” and I nod faintly, not sure if she’s asking me or Charlie, or the teenage girls assigned to face paint, because my head is tilted, painfully aware I’m still eavesdropping.

  Monica frowns. “She’s not picking up for me either. Maybe she has it on silent.”

  Carol shrugs. “Or maybe she ran to the store and left it in the car.”

  “I thought you were supposed to be at work?” Monica says.

  “I was but I finished early,” he says. “Thought it’d be nice to join you all and surprise Sabine. Come up here and watch the fireworks.”

  “You’re so good,” Monica tells him. “So sweet. Frank’s not bothering.”

  “Ted neither,” Carol adds.

  He picks up his phone and tries again. “Why won’t she answer?” A long, heavy pause as he stares at the pool. “I think something’s wrong.”

  The women don’t respond, and something about their silence is eerie. Carol’s shoulders stiffen. The hair on the back of my neck tingles with alarm.

  “Last night,” Mark begins. “She was spooked.”

  Monica whips her head. “We were all spooked.” She rubs at something on her towel, her fingers pressing harder. “She’ll be fine.”

  Mark stands up. “Something’s not right. I’m going home. I need to check.”

  She reaches out to him but he pulls away, looking worried.

  “They won’t try it again,” she says.

  But Mark doesn’t look so sure. His often confident-looking face now appears terrified. Almost in a whisper he says, “You know as well as I do she shouldn’t have gone home by herself.”

  Three

  My daughter Lydia’s voice from the backseat: “What’s happening?”

  Less than a half mile from the pool, we’re rounding the corner to Honors Row when we spot police cars lined up and down the street.

  We don’t normally take this route home; it’s much faster to cut through the back of the neighborhood around the other side of the golf course. But with the fireworks show finished, the crowd oohing and aahing at every pop, aerial, and bang, the kids begged us to drive past the waterfall, the multiple tiers of water splashing and cascading down the rocks. The kids reminded us how they light up the landscaping for the July Fourth celebrations.

  But it looks like we won’t be seeing the light show today.

  Lydia leans forward, her face appearing between the front seats, her eyes wide and unblinking, as she asks, “Whose house is that?”

  Tish stares out the window. “I think it’s the Millers’.”

  I slow down, a soft churn in my stomach.

  Tish puts a hand to her chest. “I hope everything’s okay.”

  I count eight patrol cars in all, their blue-and-red lights strobing against the Millers’ chateau-white walls. Just beyond their roof, the sky lights up with the flare of a neighbor’s firework, the pop and sizzle making my hands flex against the steering wheel.

  A police officer stands in the middle of the street and directs us to turn around. I do what he instructs but only after coming to a near crawl, my foot pressing gently on the brake, my speed dropping to five miles an hour. My head, along with every one of my passengers’ heads, swiveling to get a better look.

  The front door of the Millers’ house opens revealing a chandelier the size of my kitchen table rippling light against the foyer, a vestibule of marble floors and a grand curved staircase with several police officers assembled inside. Someone steps onto the front porch and closes the door, the light shining behind them through a patchwork of diamond shapes cut in the glass. He’s clutching an evidence bag and runs it down the sidewalk to a waiting patrol car. They drive off, and in their place, a news van pulls up, and then another.

  I
look for Mark, any signs of Sabine, but there are only police officers from what I can tell, the front sitting room filling with the outlines of black uniforms. An ambulance is parked out front with its doors shut—no indication it’s racing to the hospital any time soon. My stomach churns again.

  “This doesn’t look good,” Tish says, but she coughs lightly, covering her mouth as if she didn’t mean to say the words out loud, doesn’t want to scare the children, but everyone hears. There’s not a sound from anyone else in the car.

  In my rearview mirror, a minivan pulls in behind me, the driver forced to turn around too. They’re slowing down, both of us rubbernecking and cruising for a better look, but they’re too close and I wish they’d back off. Frustration riddles its way through my body and I push lightly on the gas to move ahead slowly. But what I really want is another thirty seconds to find out what’s happened.

  The thought comes to me from out of nowhere—but I know it, I can feel it. Something’s happened to Sabine. And she knew it too.

  That tormented look from across the pool. The way she walked out, the gate behind her swinging closed. I sat there for the longest time trying to make sense of it, not saying a thing about it to Tish. How could I explain a look?

  Time passed. The kids emerged from the pool asking for snacks and Tish and I went for a swim. Mark’s calls to Sabine went unanswered, and then, the moment when Mark feared for her too.

  He knew something… but what?

  She shouldn’t have gone home by herself.

  A chill washes over me again, an unrelenting tightness in my chest and I swallow it down, an electric jolt running through my belly.

  In my bag, Sabine’s bracelet remains shoved at the bottom. I never got a chance to return it.

  With the car behind me, I speed up until I have no choice but to turn at the next street, the Millers’ house disappearing behind us in a veil of blue-and-red patrol lights. The van turns away too.

  Several neighbors leave their houses and make their way toward the Millers’, most of them still wearing their bathing suits and T-shirts after returning from the pool. They walk slowly, pensive, several of them pausing on the corner to stare. But I don’t stop to ask. By the looks on their faces, they have no clue what’s going on either.

  Tish twists around in her seat and faces the front, and the kids do the same. She pulls at the seat belt that moments earlier was stretched across her collarbone and rubs at the skin.

  “You think someone broke into their house?” she asks me.

  “I don’t know.”

  “They’d have an alarm, wouldn’t they, Mom?” Lydia asks.

  “I’m sure.”

  “Or someone got hurt,” Taylor pipes up. “Maybe Mr. Miller fell down the stairs.”

  “Why the stairs?” Lydia asks.

  “I don’t know. People fall down the stairs sometimes.”

  Tish looks at me. “Didn’t we see Mark at the pool?”

  “He was up there.”

  “I saw him too,” Lydia says. “He was shaking hands with people.”

  “Was he there for the fireworks?” Tish asks.

  “I don’t think so…” She stops to think. “I don’t remember. There were so many people.”

  Tish glances at me again. “Or could it be Sabine?”

  “I saw her at the pool too,” Lydia confirms.

  “You think she’s the one who got hurt?” Taylor asks, a crack in her voice. “She’s too pretty to get hurt.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Lydia tells her.

  “I don’t want anybody to get hurt,” Charlie cries also.

  “No one got hurt,” Tish consoles him.

  “But you said Mrs. Sabine.”

  “I didn’t mean to. We don’t know what happened.”

  “I don’t want anyone to fall down the stairs.”

  “No one fell down the stairs,” Lydia says, sighing.

  Tish twists back around to look at each of the kids, hoping to calm them. “It will be all right. The police are taking care of everything, they always do. It’s nothing serious.” She shoots me a smile. “Besides, we live in one of the safest neighborhoods on the planet. Isn’t that right, Erica? The safest?”

  My hands remain locked on the steering wheel.

  “The safest,” I agree.

  Our other best friend, Amanda, calls as we pull into the garage. I’ve known Amanda Kimbrough since Tish introduced me at the neighborhood block party shortly after we moved in.

  “Yes, we heard,” Tish answers. “We drove right by. Yes, we’ll be here.”

  I throw the car into park. “Does she know anything?”

  “She’s coming over.”

  Everyone grabs their bags as I punch the code into the alarm keypad beside the door: 14-27, my kids’ birthdays. The children rush into the house and the tightness in my chest starts to ease, the steady relief of knowing we have an alarm and we’re safe at home. After seeing the police cars lined up outside the Millers’, it’s comforting knowing we can return without fear of someone leaping out. No boogie men here.

  But then anxiety riddles my chest. Had Sabine thought she was safe too?

  The kids scramble through the kitchen as Lydia flips on one overhead light, and then another. Tish helps me toss the pool bags and wet towels on the floor before wrangling Charlie into the shower. She calls for Taylor to shower in my master bathroom.

  In the kitchen, I set aside the remaining food from the cooler. Carrot sticks. Juice boxes. A soggy sandwich in a Ziploc bag that’s tossed in the trash. An unexciting dinner at the pool but at least it was cheaper than ordering from the club café.

  At the counter, Lydia pushes aside a stack of Taylor’s artwork, an assortment of watercolors my youngest daughter insists on keeping out on display, some of the corners curled from someone spilling juice earlier. “Why doesn’t she move this stuff?” Lydia mumbles, knowing as well as I do there isn’t enough space.

  We live in Green Cove just like everyone else at the pool but our home is a far cry from the wealthier section of Honors Row. While I might long for a larger kitchen with a stainless-steel island and marble countertops, enough surface area for Taylor to lay out each watercolor and a large prep space to make our spaghetti-and-meatball dinners, I know I shouldn’t complain. I should remember how lucky we are. Our home is more than sufficient for us, especially on my single income. My ex-husband, Derek, and I have joint custody of the kids and we split the costs right down the middle. But for my mortgage I’m on my own.

  Up and down our street, and particularly on this end of the neighborhood, our house looks like the others on our block, similar cookie-cutter style with nearly identical layouts: arched windows, white-bleached sidewalks, matching black mailboxes with our house numbers listed on brass plates on one side. Each house evenly spaced apart.

  The kids and I have been living here five years, since Derek found an apartment closer to work. Tish is the one who told me how tranquil Green Cove is, set apart from the rest of the city and nestled within this valley. And I love it here—the playground where the kids can play; the fishing pond where I’ve taught Taylor and Charlie how to set their own bait, my years of growing up in Louisiana and fishing with Granddad coming into their own. On the other side of the park, a lane for Lydia and me to ride our bicycles.

  But on the flip side of the neighborhood is Honors Row with its multi-million-dollar McMansions and chandeliers as big as the one we saw in the Millers’ home, with golf carts parked in their driveways. Movie rooms and landscaped gardens. Doctors’ and lawyers’ salaries with three-car garages to fit their matching Range Rovers. Not a glimpse of that wealth in my humble cul-de-sac. Although I’ve seen Sabine on multiple occasions taking evening strolls along our same bike lane, we’ve never waved. We barely know each other.

  The developers planned our subdivision twenty years ago with a vision this would be a place where all income levels could come together and share in the same space: same parks, same schools, the same
grocery store. All of us sharing neighborhood amenities including the junior Olympic-size pool and our local church. But something the developers overlooked: the miles of differences in between. Especially when they put in that golf course and it cut through our neighborhood straight down the middle. A line drawn in the sand. Two distinct halves. Us vs. Them.

  I’ve tried to ignore it, I really have. The feeling of inadequacy. My jealousy too, not wanting to let it get to me. But it’s hard. Working full-time and raising the kids while most everyone on Honors Row is still married with a nanny to boot. No one here to help me clear out the gutters or fix a pipe if it bursts. Certainly not a husband to help me landscape the garden, even though it was my idea to leave Derek. Sometimes a neighbor comes over and helps me pressure-wash the patio.

  Lydia removes a Coke from the fridge, her hair pulled back in a scrunchie, her face pinched tight with worry. She’s toggling the soda can tab back and forth while glancing nervously out the window.

  “People wouldn’t break into our house, would they, Mom?” she asks.

  I shake the ice chips from the cooler. “They wouldn’t dare.”

  “No, seriously. They wouldn’t, right?”

  “No one’s going to break into our house, honey.”

  “How do you know?”

  “They wouldn’t.”

  “But what about the Millers?”

  “The Millers have about eight thousand more things than us.”

  “We have stuff too.”

  “The Millers have nicer stuff.”

  “Well, I thought we had a Neighborhood Watch.”

  “We do.”

  “And the Millers would have an alarm.”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “Unless they were home when something happened.”

  “They were at the pool.”

  “Or when they got back?”

  Or when Sabine stopped at the house first…