“I need to ask you some questions, Mrs.Drummond. There’s an alcove down the hall we can use. It’s probably better if we speak there.”
“I don’t want to be too far from Gracie. She’s been in here all alone.”
“We’ll be right across the hallway. You can see the door from there.”
The mother got up and exited the room woodenly. Angie escorted her to a group of chairs beneath a window, helped her sit. Seating herself opposite the woman, Angie took out her notebook. “Can you tell me when you last saw Gracie, Mrs.Drummond?”
Lorna Drummond pushed tangled strands of hair off her brow. “It was Friday morning. Before I went to work. I work a twenty-four-hour shift at a nursing home downtown. I start at four on Friday afternoons and end at four on Saturdays.” She worried her lip. “So I usually see Gracie before she leaves for her shift at the Blue Badger on Saturday evening, but I ... I had a date last night—I’ve just started seeing someone—and I got home in the early hours of Sunday morning, went straight to bed. I woke later than usual this morning, then I ... I heard the news. I went to check on Gracie. She wasn’t in her room. Her bed was still made. I ... you must think I’m a terrible mother. I shouldn’t have gone on that date. But I was finally feeling like I was getting my life back.” She fumbled in her pocket for a Kleenex, and she blew her nose hard. It was red. Swollen. Her eyes puffy. “You think you have all the time in the world, and then ... then you wish you’d ...” Her words were swallowed as her body heaved with a racking sob.
“I know,” Angie said. She waited until Lorna Drummond was able to look up again. “So Gracie works every Saturday night at the Blue Badger?”
“In the bakery, yes. Night shift.”
“Do you know of anyone who regularly catches the same bus as Gracie, perhaps, someone who might have seen that Gracie got both on and off the bus at the bakery stop yesterday, Mrs.Drummond?”
“No. I ... I don’t know. I think it’s usually the same bus driver, though. She’s mentioned him before. Gary, I think his name is.”
“Why did she mention Gary specifically?”
“Because he’s friendly. He always greets her by name.”
“Which school does she attend?”
“Duneagle Secondary.”
“Did she mention any concerns, whether anyone has been following her in the last while, bothering her?”
“No, I ... don’t think so. I shouldn’t have let her work nights. I shouldn’t have. She was working because I’m a single mom, right.”
“And her father—where is he?”
“We’re divorced. He remarried. Moved up island, but where exactly I couldn’t tell you. Can’t remember when I last saw a maintenance check from him.”
“You’ve been separated long?”
“Since Gracie was nine.”
“Does she work anywhere else?”
“Just that one day a week at the Badger.”
“Did her father perhaps send her money directly?”
She glanced up, eyes widening for a brief instant. “No, why?”
Angie held her gaze. “Your daughter was wearing some very high-end designer boots last night.”
“She ... must be paying those off herself. Through her work—that’s why she’s working. Like I said. To buy nice things.”
“Do you know how much a pair of Francesco Milano boots costs?”
“No—what is this about, exactly?”
“They cost upward of a grand, I believe.”
Lorna Drummond paled. Her eyes flickered. “Maybe she got them on consignment. She buys a lot of things secondhand. Maybe she was borrowing them. Oh God, I haven’t been paying attention.”
“Who is your new partner—your date?”
