“That’s because I was aiming for irritating,” he called after her. She ignored that.
Out the window, he watched as she hopped into a rusty island pickup truck with a tall blond woman at the wheel. He didn’t know her, but that meant nothing. He’d only been back on the island for a few days. The last time he’d spent any substantial amount of time here was when he’d helped his mother move Granny into an assisted-living home in Harbortown.
With Chen gone, the quiet of the house settled around him. “Settled” was the wrong word; “unsettled” would be better. He felt Jessie’s absence like an aching tooth, something always at the edge of his mind, no matter what else he was doing.
He wandered into the room where she’d been staying, which was the only real bedroom in the house. The upstairs was little more than an open-raftered, low-ceilinged loft. That was where he and Jess had stayed when they were kids, on cots crammed between storage boxes and old trunks with brass buckles. One of those trunks had contained Granny’s favorite pieces of clothing from her days as the biggest flirt on Sea Smoke Island. Jessie used to love dressing up in those poodle skirts and faux satin gloves.
The downstairs bedroom held Jessie’s current-day wardrobe, heavy on the cozy sweatpants and paint-speckled chambray shirts.
He had no idea if some of her clothes were missing, since he didn’t know how many she’d brought with her. The bathroom sink still held strands of her long auburn hair, but her toothbrush was nowhere to be found.
He’d stayed here his first night on the island, in case she wandered back in the middle of the night. After that, he’d booked the Honeymoon Suite in case that offered up any clues.
“What the fuck, Jessie?” he murmured. “If you were in trouble, why didn’t you say something?”
In his searches, he hadn’t found any of her medications, no pill bottles or the essential oils she used to balance her moods. He found that reassuring, a sign that she hadn’t been kidnapped. Would a kidnapper allow her to bring her mood stabilizers or her anti-anxiety meds? Maybe, he supposed. But at least that meant this hypothetical somewhat-compassionate kidnapper wasn’t intending to end her life.
He shied away from that thought and went to the easel she’d set up in the corner of the bedroom, where the light was diffused by the slant of the ceiling and the lacy curtains left from his grandmother’s time. He’d been puzzling over the lack of a canvas since he’d arrived. Every time he’d spoken to Jess recently, she’d been excited about the piece she was working on. “It’s about ghosts,” she’d said.
“You’re painting ghosts? Do they stand still enough for you to get a good likeness?”
“Idiot. I mean the ghosts that live in your bones and your blood.”
He wasn’t exactly sure what she meant—maybe she was referring to her emotional issues—but that was Jessie for you. Cryptic and poetic. But once the painting was finished, he had no doubt he would understand. Art was her most eloquent way of communicating.
“Well, shit. Those are even harder to paint. Good luck with that.”
“Ha ha.”
So where was this painting? Where were the sketches she might have worked on first? None of it was in the house. Had she taken her latest work with her somewhere, to a gallery or a private collector? If so, why hadn’t she told him, or at least answered her phone one of the hundred times he’d called her?
Maybe Seth Baker had stolen it and planned to sell it. Was Jessie with him in that case? And again, why wouldn’t she answer his calls?
His phone rang, sending a jolt of adrenaline through him. Was it Jessie? He answered without even looking at the screen. “Jess?”
Silence on the other end. He pulled the phone away from his ear and saw a number he didn’t recognize. “Hello? Hello?”
He heard a soft squeal, then the phone went dead. He punched the call-back button and waited, his heart hammering. No answer.
Had Jessie made that squealing sound? He couldn’t say. If it was her, why hadn’t she said something? Was someone preventing her from talking? Or maybe it was just a wrong number?
He called Doug Logan’s number—the show consultant who’d been so helpful earlier. “I just got a call from a number I didn’t recognize. It had a Maine area code. Can you trace it down for me?”
“I’m not your on-call crime-stopper,” Doug grumbled.
“Please. It could be Jess. There was a little sound, like a squeak or a squawk. A squeal.” He imitated the sound. “It could have been her. I’m worried she’s being held somewhere against her will.”
“Jesus. Okay. Set visit for my niece? She’s a fan.”
“Of course. I’ll get her a t-shirt too.”
“And one of those fake scars you guys were giving out for Halloween?”
“Fake scar. Done. Here’s the number.” He texted it to Doug and waited impatiently. “How long does it take?”
“Depends on how many other cases I’m working. Happens to be six, at the moment.”
Oh shit. He needed this information right away. Urgency was making the blood pound through his veins. “Sooner is better.”
