LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter 2

      Peyton felt as if the ground beneath her feet was no longer solid. The world was no longer as it should be, and she’d never felt such fear. Lilly! Her heart cried in anguish. Where was her baby?

      Who was Kathy Simon, and why had she done this? Had anything she’d told Peyton about herself been true? One thing was certain: Peyton had wasted enough time sitting around waiting for something to happen.

      She needed to find Lilly, and she wasn’t going to find her sitting around and answering questions. Without saying a word to the sheriff or his deputies, she headed down the hall to her bedroom.

      Sheriff Grayson followed just behind her, as if afraid to let her out of his sight for a minute. “What are you doing?” he asked as she grabbed her purse from the top of her dresser.

      “I’m going to find my baby.” She turned to face him. “If I have to knock on every door of this town, I’ll find Kathy and my Lilly.”

      “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he protested.

      She raised her chin and embraced the anger that was so much easier to tolerate than her pain. “The only way you’re going to stop me, Sheriff Grayson, is to arrest me and lock me up.”

      Despite the fact that he was easily six inches taller than her and had shoulders as broad as mountains, she shoved roughly past him and headed for the front door.

      She’d gone only a couple of steps when he grabbed her by the arm. “I’ll take you wherever you want to go.” His dark eyes held her gaze intently. “We don’t know if this woman is dangerous. She might not harm your baby, but she would definitely be a threat to you.”

      She considered his words and gave him a curt nod. “Then let’s go. I can’t sit here another minute.”

      She was vaguely surprised to see that the sun was still high in the sky. It had been less than two hours since Kathy and Lilly had disappeared, but it felt like an eternity.

      Even the intensity of the late afternoon sun overhead couldn’t warm the glacier that had become Peyton’s heart. She slid into the passenger seat of the sheriff’s car and was instantly engulfed by the scent of leather and, more faintly, the spicy cologne he wore.

      As he got in behind the steering wheel he turned to look at her. “Do you have a plan?”

      She’d shot out of the house lit with the fire of a frantic mother seeking her child, but she realized with the question that she didn’t have a plan; she just knew she couldn’t sit still another minute.

      “The pizza place on Main Street,” she said suddenly. “Kathy told me she was working there until she could get something more permanent.”

      He nodded, started the car and pulled away from the curb. Peyton stared out the window, irrationally hoping that Kathy would suddenly appear on the sidewalk.

      The only thing that kept Peyton from losing her mind altogether was the belief that Kathy wouldn’t hurt Lilly. “She was good with Lilly,” she finally said aloud. “She seemed to love her.”

      “Did she mention wanting children of her own, maybe not being able to have them?” Sheriff Grayson asked.

      “No, nothing like that. I just know she was always very sweet to Lilly. Surely the pizza place will have her address on file.”

      “What I need you to do is think of all the conversations you had with her, any tidbit of information that might be helpful as to where she might go and who she might be with,” he replied.

      For a moment Peyton was overwhelmed. “Sheriff Grayson, we talked almost every day, about everything and nothing.” She frowned and tried to ignore the headache that pounded in the back of her head, the continuous frantic race of her heart.

      “Call me Tom,” he said. “There are four of us Graysons working law enforcement in Black Rock. First names make things easier.”

      “Caleb and Benjamin are your brothers?” she asked.

      He nodded. “My sister is also a deputy, then I have one other brother who doesn’t work for the town of Black Rock.” He frowned. “Did Kathy mention dating somebody here in town? Perhaps somebody she was interested in?”

      “No, in fact just the opposite. I got the impression she was a bit shy and was having trouble meeting people.” She released a sigh of frustration. “God, what did I miss? What didn’t I see or hear in all those conversations, in all the time we spent together?”

      “You can’t beat yourself up about that. How could you guess that something like this would happen?” He pulled into a parking space in front of the Canyon Pizzeria and cut the engine, then he turned and looked at her with his dark, intense eyes. “You let me ask the questions. I need to do my job.”

      She nodded and unbuckled her seatbelt, butterflies like little kamikaze pilots hitting the sides of her stomach. Please, let us get some answers, she thought as she got out of the car.

      It was nearing dinnertime and the air outside the restaurant smelled of tangy tomato sauce and baking crust. The food smells only upset Peyton’s stomach even more. The last thing she was interested in was food.

      All she wanted was her sweet Lilly back in her arms. She needed to smell her baby scent, feel Lilly’s wiggly warmth against her chest.

      She followed Sheriff Grayson through the front door. Inside, about a dozen people were seated at various tables and booths. Most of them raised a hand in greeting to the sheriff.

      He went to the woman standing behind the cash register. “Hey, Linda, is Don in?” he asked.

      “He’s in the back. You here to arrest him for spicy sauce?” The blonde gave him a saucy, flirtatious smile.

      “I need to talk to him. Can you get him out here?”

      Her smile faded as she apparently heard the seriousness in his voice. “Sure, I’ll go get him.”

      She disappeared into the kitchen and a moment later a big burly man clad in a tomato-splattered apron walked out.

      “Hey, Tom. What’s up?”

      “You have a Kathy Simon working here for you?” Tom asked.

      Peyton watched in horror as Don shook his head. “I’ve got a Stacy, a Katie and a Linda, but no Kathy,” he replied.

      “Are you sure? Maybe she was going by another name,” Peyton said desperately. “She’s tall with red hair?”

      “Sorry, nobody like that works for me,” Don replied.

      Peyton staggered back outside where dusk was beginning to fall, vaguely aware of the sheriff right behind her. Nothing Kathy had told her had been true. She’d lied about where she worked, where she lived. Why?

      She got back into the passenger seat and Tom slid in behind the wheel. “You okay?” he asked as he started the engine.

      “Of course I’m not okay.” She reached for anger, knowing that if she didn’t hang on to something she’d lose it altogether. “Nothing she told me was the truth. Why would she lie to me about the most basic things? God, she was good. She had so many details. She told me about a man who had tipped her twenty dollars, about a little girl who wanted pizza crust and cheese but no sauce. She was so good with her lies.”

      A sickness welled up inside her as she realized night was falling too quickly and she was no closer to finding Lilly than she’d been when she’d regained consciousness on her bathroom

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