These windows were the eyes of the house. One watched the cars on the road. The other watched the boats in the harbor. They watched people walk on the beach or fish off the dock. They watched Jill and her family as they went about their lives. They saw everything. Jill was sure of it.
The windows, the spiky fence, the creepy plants—they were all an extension of Mrs. Smith. Jill was sure of that, too.
The sensation on the back of her neck spread. It felt like a thousand earwigs were crawling over her body.
She ran faster.
As she put distance between herself and Mrs. Smith, Jill tried to focus on Una’s gentle face and soft voice. She wanted to reclaim that feeling of relief. Of safety. But she couldn’t.
She was almost thirteen—too old to be soothed by tales of wise grandmothers or trickster elves.
She knew there must be more teeth like the one she’d found. Braces were glued to the teeth and connected by wires. The wires on the tooth Jill found had been snapped.
Where are the rest of the teeth?
As soon as the thought formed, she wished she could retract it. She never wanted to know the answer to that question.
5
Natalie
Natalie attended the weekly sales meeting at the office, and after listening to Gina brag about the number of potential buyers expressing interest in her new listing—the adorable cape across the street from the elementary school—she had to get out of the office.
Did Gina get a listing like the McCreedy house when she first started?Natalie wondered as she watched Gina give Sid a flirty slap on the arm.
She knew the answer was no. Sid liked Gina. He wanted her around. She laughed at his jokes and nodded enthusiastically when he talked. She stroked his ego.
It’s probably not the only thing she’s stroking.
It had taken a Herculean feat of willpower for Natalie to ignore the platter of jelly donuts and sesame bagels on the conference table. She’d been too busy cleaning up dog puke that morning to eat breakfast, but donuts and bagels were fattening, so she kept her mouth occupied by drinking coffee.
By the time the meeting was over and she was free to leave the office, she had a bellyful of acid and a bitter taste in her mouth. She sat in her car for a few minutes, chewing a stick of spearmint gum. It tasted like envy.
Natalie was a confident person. She knew she could do things better than most people, but now her thoughts spiraled into an unfamiliar realm of self-doubt.
Does Sid want me to fail so he can hire a younger woman? Another Gina? Or is one female agent enough? Maybe someone higher up on the Gold Coast ladder told Sid to bring more women on board, but he doesn’t actually want us to stay.
“I’m not going anywhere,” she muttered, tossing a glare at the Gold Coast building.
As she backed out of her parking spot, she started a mental list.
First, she needed food. After stopping at the deli for a sandwich, she’d head to the garden center.
Natalie knew she had to improve the curb appeal of the McCreedys’ bedraggled split-level before she drove a Gold Coast sign into the ground.
When she’d asked Sid if the company provided a budget for cleaning supplies, balloons, or flowers, he’d laughed so hard that he’d nearly fallen out of his chair. When he recovered, he said, “You’ll have to look under the sofa cushions for your balloon money, Nat. Gold Coast pays your commission, but you have to earn it first.”
Natalie had wanted to stick her Gold Coast pen into Sid’s balloon of a gut. Instead, she’d thanked him and backed out of his office.
I’ll show you, she thought as she pulled into her favorite corner deli, where she ordered salami and cheese on a kaiser roll. She ate the sandwich in the car on the way to Greenlawn Garden Center.
She made a beeline for the annuals, hoping to find colorful blooms to brighten up the McCreedys’ mailbox bed. Begonias were on sale, but Natalie wasn’t a fan of the orange-red flowers. Petunias were also discounted, and even though she didn’t wantto spend time deadheading the spent blooms, they’d give her a good bang for her buck.
She loaded two flats of purple petunias into a Radio Flyer wagon and was mulling over whether to mix the purple with two flats of bright pink when she heard the velvety voice of her friend Elaine Bernstein.
“Fancy meeting you here.”
“Hi!” Natalie smiled a genuine smile for the first time all day. “I’m glad I ran into you. I’m buying plants for the McCreedy house, and I could use your opinion.”
