He blinked at her, shocked once again. ‘What? Who?’
‘His name is Stan and she met him at their therapy center. I’m sure they are adequately chaperoned while there, but you might want to talk to her about it. You know, about birth control.’
Frederick winced. He couldn’t help it. ‘Oh my God.’
Miss Brewster’s smile grew rueful. ‘Be gentle when you talk to her. She’s afraid you’ll “have a cow, man”.’
He pounced on the phrase, because the thought of Julie having a boyfriend – and needing birth control, for God’s sake – was messing with his brain. ‘So she’s watching The Simpsons too? I must really be falling down on the job.’
Miss Brewster’s small smile faded. ‘She worries about you, you know.’
Once again, he blinked. ‘About me? Why?’
Sadness filled her expressive eyes. ‘You should talk to her, Mr Dawson.’
Dread felt like a sixteen-ton weight on his chest, and he dragged in a harsh breath. ‘You’re not helping, Miss Brewster.’ He could see her choosing her words carefully. ‘You are scaring me. Just spit it out. Please.’
She sighed. ‘All right. Julie sees more than you know. She knows you’re worried about Daisy.’
‘She told you about Daisy?’
A nod. ‘She loves her sisters very much. She told me about Taylor, who is apparently a cross between Wonder Woman and Annie Oakley.’
That made him smile a little. ‘That’s accurate.’
But Miss Brewster did not smile. ‘She told me about Carrie. She misses her.’
Frederick felt the blood drain from his face and the hand on his tightened.
‘She knows you feel guilty that Daisy drank too much,’ she continued, ‘and that you sent her to “camp”. She knows you had some mini-strokes last year. She’s not sure if you’re telling her the truth when you say that you’re okay.’
He felt like he’d been shot. Multiple times. ‘I . . . didn’t know that she knew.’
‘Like I said, she seems to absorb more than you think. She doesn’t want to worry you any more than you already are. But she wants more from her life than she has at the moment. She knows you’ve made sacrifices for your girls – all of them, including her. She doesn’t want you to think she’s not grateful, because she is. She’s worried you’ll think she doesn’t love you, but she does.’
He stared, the deluge of information smacking hard against the wall of his brain. ‘How long did you talk to her?’
‘About an hour. She sounded eager for someone to talk to. Her caregiver has an addiction to The View and won’t allow Julie to bother her when the show is on.’
He gaped at her. ‘The caregiver came recommended.’
Miss Brewster’s smile was gentle. ‘I’m sure she did. And how you deal with that is your business. I can recommend some other agencies, though. If you’d like.’
He nodded, even though a small corner of his mind remained suspicious. It would be an excellent way for her to get more information. Although it appeared that she’d already harvested plenty. She knew his secrets. Not all of them, for sure, but enough.
‘Or not,’ she added, as if sensing his suspicion. She gave his hand an encouraging stroke before pulling hers away. ‘I won’t keep you any longer.’
He shook his head hard, trying to clear it. ‘Oh, right. Of course. I was about to walk you to your car.’ He opened the backstage door. ‘After you.’
Baltimore, Maryland,
Monday 13 June, 10.55 A.M.
Gwyn ended the call with a mix of satisfaction and frustration. ‘I got an appointment with Angie’s salon.’
Phil turned from the front seat of Jamie’s van. ‘What time?’
She made a face. ‘Not until tomorrow at five thirty. She’s penciling me in.’
Phil’s eyes twinkled. ‘I was impressed. I would have given you an appointment for sure. And maybe even a trousseau.’
Gwyn’s cheeks heated. She’d been hesitant to use the elopement ploy with Thorne sitting beside her. It seemed . . . cruel. But they needed to get to the bottom of this tangled mess, so she would do what she needed to do. ‘I wasn’t sure if she was going to buy my story, but I guess she’s a bit of a romantic. Elopement is always good for a fashion emergency. That way I’ll have her just style it in an up-do without taking scissors to me.’
Thorne narrowed his eyes at her. ‘Don’t let her dare touch your hair with scissors. It’s perfect the way it is.’
Gwyn’s heart did a little dance inside her chest at the compliment, but also at the fierce way he was staring at her. She wondered if that look had always been there and she simply hadn’t noticed. It did wonders for her ego, that was for damn sure. ‘I won’t. It’s taken me four years to get it this long again.’ Evan had cut it short because he knew she loved her hair. But then she cursed her words when a shadow passed over Thorne’s face.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said quietly. ‘I didn’t think.’
‘It’s all right, Thorne,’ she assured him. ‘We can’t keep walking on eggshells about it. Evan did . . .’
Things to me. Terrible things. And I can’t go there. Not today. And never with Thorne. She’d told the story in counseling. That would have to be enough. Chopping off her hair was the least of the things he’d done.
She exhaled, then drew in another breath. ‘I’m learning to move on, to not let it control my every decision. Honestly, his cutting my hair seems trivial compared to all the things he did to other people.’ And to me.
‘But it was a reminder whenever you looked into a mirror,’ Phil said gently.
Gwyn shrugged uncomfortably. Her reflection hadn’t really mattered. She hadn’t looked in a mirror for months afterward. ‘Yeah, well, it grew back.’
Jamie glanced at her in the rear-view mirror. ‘Who is Amber Kelly?’
It was the name under which she’d made the salon appointment. ‘My alter ego. Amber Kelly was my stage name when I was with the circus. I was a tween when Saved by the Bell was in its first run. I was a fan.’
‘I thought that might have been the case,’ Phil said with a knowing nod.
Jamie frowned. ‘I’m not seeing the connection.’
‘Because you never taught middle school or high school,’ Phil said with an indulgent smile for Gwyn. ‘Tiffani Amber Thiessen played Kelly Kapowski. She was the main character on the show. Definitely the good-girl overachiever. Kelly was the most popular girl in the school.’
‘I wanted to be her so badly,’ Gwyn confessed. ‘I copied her hairstyle and everything.’
‘Why?’ Phil asked.
‘She had it all. Looks, good grades, lots of friends. She was the head cheerleader and everyone loved her.’ And don’t I sound pathetic? She shrugged. ‘It was pure escapism.’
‘And then you actually joined the circus?’ Jamie asked. ‘I always thought that was just your stage story.’
‘Yes, I was the kid who ran away to join the circus,’ she said with a self-deprecating laugh. ‘Good times. So we need to be in Bethesda at five thirty tomorrow. What’s next?’
Thorne shot her a curious look at her topic change, but didn’t press her to share more. Neither did the men up front, for which she was grateful. Thorne knew part of her circus story, but not all. And certainly not the painful parts. She’d been far too raw to share them when they’d first met. And now she was far too vulnerable. So those stories would stay locked in the vault until she was ready to bring them out.
‘We’re almost at the home of Brent Kiley, one of the EMTs who brought Richard into the ER,’ Jamie said.
‘Where did you get his address?’ Thorne asked.
‘From Anne.’ Jamie glanced at them in the mirror again. ‘I gave her the names of anyone we hadn’t yet located. She’s been working on addresses all morning.’
‘Anne’s at our office?’ Thorne asked sharply. ‘All alone? She might not be safe. And there have to be a million reporters swarming the area.’