“Listen, miss,” the guard says, dropping the jovial tone. “You must be new around here, or otherwise you’d know that the county sheriff’s department contracts out our security firm for anything that happens within the gates of Olympus Hills. Which means we are far too busy for stupid teenagers looking for some extra attention …”
Tobin had put his arm around me as I told my story, his tone growing darker and stormier as he listened. He drops his arm from my shoulder now. He raises his finger at the guard, along with his voice. “Listen, ya rent-a-cop, my mother is Mayor Winters, which means she signs your paychecks. So how about you finish listening to my friend’s statement and take your job seriously, before I call her up and give a report on your performance? One of our classmates was just hurt, badly. Show a little respect.”
The two security guards exchange a look. The one taking my statement tells me to go on with my description of what happened. I catch a note coming off him that is pretty much the auditory equivalent of an eye roll when I tell him about how the guy’s slight touch had left marks on my arm—marks that are inconveniently gone now—but he doesn’t laugh again. When he finishes taking my statement and tells us we are free to go, I get the distinct feeling that everything he’s written down is going to end up in the trash.
“I’m not making it up,” I tell Tobin when the guards leave us standing by the trail with my bike.
“I believe you,” he says. I can tell by the stormy notes coming off him that he isn’t just being polite. “I told you, things aren’t as perfect as they seem around here.…”
I’m just about to ask him what exactly he means when I hear someone shout my name.
I look up and see a man, dressed in nothing but skinny jeans and a canary yellow bathrobe, wandering up the lake path. He’s barefoot. And carrying a golf club. He cups his hands to his mouth and shouts, “Daphne? Where are you?”
“Is that … Joe Vince?” Tobin asks.
“The one and only.” I sigh as I watch Joe poke at a row of bushes with his golf club as if he thought I was hiding in the branches. It’s a good thing paparazzi aren’t allowed past the security gates or I’m sure this little scene would be on the cover of next week’s OK! magazine.
“Why would he be looking for you?”
I bite the bullet. “Because he’s my father.”
Tobin makes a small popping noise with his lips. “You’re not a schollie, are you?”
“Goes to show you should never judge a girl by her clothes.”
“Daphne?” Joe calls again.
I decide I should probably respond before he brings out half the neighborhood. “Over here, Joe.” I wave at him.
Joe drops his golf club and comes jogging toward me. “Oh, Daphne, thank the bloody stars in heaven. You’re all right.”
“You were worried?”
“I heard there was a girl found unconscious in that grove you were talking about this morning. I tried calling you a dozen times and you didn’t answer. Those bloody security guards wouldn’t tell me anything. They only gave me a description of the girl they took to the hospital. And I thought … I thought … I didn’t know if …”
I realize then that Pear’s description would kind of match mine. Tall, tan, and blond. Though she is of the bleached variety and her tan probably comes from an airbrush—while mine is from living in the desert. Really, tall is the only thing we have in common, and I probably still have three inches on her.
“They said she was wearing pink and silver sandals, and I …” Joe gives me a stricken look. “And I had no idea what any of your shoes look like.” He covers his face with his ring-clad fingers. “I should know that, shouldn’t I? Why don’t I know that?”
Because you’ve ignored me most of my life is what I want to say, but when Joe drops his hands from his face, it seems as though he’s wiping away tears. Long, low, drawn-out notes come off him, and I realize that he really was worried.
“It’s okay,” I say to him. “I’m fine. I forgot my phone, that’s all.” I turn to Tobin. “I should get him home.”
“Need help?”
I shake my head. He doesn’t need to see any more of Joe in his grief-stricken state—which was probably spurred on by his vodka-stricken state.
I sling Gibby over my shoulder in her case and take my bike from Tobin. It’s a juggling act, but I lead Joe back to the house. I’m hoping I won’t have to search for his house keys in the pockets of his robe when Marta meets us at the door. She looks like she arrived a few seconds before us.
“There you are!” she says to Joe. “You let him go out like this?” she says to me with a stern look.
“Let had nothing to do with it.” I pass Joe off to Marta. “He’s your job, not mine.”
“Why don’t I know what any of Daphne’s shoes look like?” Joe asks her.
“Let’s get you to bed,” she says, ignoring his question as if this sort of thing is an everyday occurrence for her.
“Daphne,” he calls down the stairs as Marta leads him up to his bedroom. “I’m glad you’re still here. I’m glad you didn’t go away.”
“Come on, Joe, bed,” Marta says, like she’s coaxing a dog.