Was she being stupid? Maybe there was no “right time.” Maybe “now” was all there was, no matter what was happening around them, no matter her trepidation about Jolyon. She wanted kids, she thought – she’d just expected they would come later on, her first when she was thirty or so. Maybe another one a couple of years later so he or she would have someone else to build a life with.
Jolyon was already six. What did that mean? Have a kid as soon as possible so he had some chance of connecting with them? It was these types of questions, on top of everything else, giving her an early ulcer.
She looked away, to the dark water of the pond. Couldn’t really see into it, but the sky reflected above, the knots of suspended storm clouds. A bug whined in her ear and she fanned her hand at it, feeling frustrated. She was entitled to wait a few more years before becoming someone’s mother, wasn’t she? Or before a major relationship? She was allowed to pause things when her supervisor had been killed and her ex-boyfriend was texting her and everybody else seemed suspicious. Right?
Either that, or she was chicken shit.
No, not chicken. Maybe just getting ahead of herself. Jolyon’s mother had left him when he was three years old. She was scarce now, but what if she had a change of heart, like Carrie Lafler? What if she wanted back into his life? She needed to talk to Connor, to better explain that in the midst of all of this, she was a caseworker who encountered families in pain every single day.
Her phone tickled her leg. She withdrew it from her pocket – a text from Rachel.
Len not home… Where r u?
She typed back:
With Connor. What do you mean he’s not home?
The phone vibrated again a second later, this time with an incoming call. “Rachel?”
Rachel’s voice held a reedy panic. “Lennox is not here, Bobbi. I came by to talk about the body they found, check on him, and no one came to the door. I figured he was sleeping, so then I went into town, ran a few errands, and I came back, and he still didn’t answer so I tried the door and went in and he’s just not here…”
“Okay. Slow down. Take a breath. I talked to him a couple days ago; he was pretty sick. Maybe he went to the doctor.”
“I don’t… You think so?”
“Let me call the medical center, see if he’s there. Maybe he called someone, or brought himself to the emergency room. Alright?”
“I’m worried, Bobbi. I’m freaking out. With what’s happening, with what’s happened to Harriet, then this other one – it’s Corina Lavoie. They haven’t said, but I know it. Did you know that the cops went to see Dodd Caruthers? Did you know about that?”
“Who? I know they’re talking to some of the people from cases Harriet shared with—”
“He’s a neo-Nazi, Bobbi. A fucking white nationalist.”
Bobbi held her tongue for a moment. Lennox was born in the U.S., but he was mixed-race; his father was Jamaican.
Connor watched her, seeming to sense something was wrong. They’d moved off toward the barn, but he was facing her direction, head cocked.
“Alright, alright,” Bobbi started, but she didn’t know what to say next. Rachel’s alarm was catching. “Well, okay. Still, let’s check the hospital. Let’s not just freak out until… You know, let’s look at the everyday things. Okay?”
It was working, Rachel calming some. “Yeah. Okay. Do you want to go? I feel like I should stay here. Should I call the cops?”
“I’ll call Mike Nelson – I have him in my phone. Yeah, you just stay there. I’ll talk to Mike, and I’ll call the hospital.”
“Call me right back after. Jesus, Bobbi. This is… I’m sorry, it’s just… this has been another crazy weekend, and Lennox, you know, he doesn’t really have anybody…”
“I know. You sit tight. Call you right back.”
Bobbi hung up and keyed her contact for Mike as she walked away from the pond, toward Connor’s truck. She caught his eye – he seemed to intuit that something was amiss, and corralled Jolyon, started ushering him the same direction.
Mike’s voicemail picked up and she waited until the prompt. “Mike, it’s Bobbi Noelle. Listen, my friend Rachel – well, you know her, Rachel Watts – she just called from our other co-worker’s house, Lennox Palmer. He called in sick this week, and today he’s not home. His place was unlocked, and she went in… Can you just give me a call? I’m going to check the hospital, but she’s really worried, and I have to admit I am too with everything that’s happened.”
She ended the call thinking she could’ve been more succinct or something, she’d kind of rambled, then punched in the number for County Medical as she reached Connor’s truck.
Connor asked her, “What’s going on?” and she held up a finger.
A recorded voice greeted her, finally gave her the option for the ER.
Jolyon was hopping around the truck, asking for ice cream. “Hang on, bub. Here, let’s get into your car seat.”
Someone living answered in the ER.
“Hi,” Bobbi said, “looking to see if someone came in yesterday or maybe during the night – Lennox Palmer. I work with him at DSS. Roberta Noelle.”
“Hang on, Roberta, I’ll check.”
Connor got Jolyon strapped in, gave him a drawing pad and some markers, shut the door, then started up the truck, rolled down the window. The roar of the V6 was loud; Bobbi drifted away to hear over the noise.
“Roberta?”
“Yes?”
“No. Sorry, no one by that name.”
“Any John Does? He’s about six foot two, forty-five years old, he’s got his hair back in dreds, he’s kind of skinny, dark complexion…”
“No, definitely not. I was here all night, no one by that description. I’m sorry.”
“Okay, thanks.”
Bobbi slipped the phone in her pocket, feeling a bit nauseous. Where else would Lennox go? She didn’t want to call Rachel back until she knew he was safe and sound. Bobbi knew a little bit about him, knew he was from Syracuse, originally, had moved to the Adirondacks after his father died to get his mother out of the city, bought her a place on the edge of Lake Haven around 2000. She was now in her late seventies, had trouble walking…
Of course.
Bobbi didn’t know her number, though. She called Rachel back, Connor staring through the truck windshield as she paced, waiting for Rachel to pick up. “Yeah? You find him?”
“What about his mom’s?”
“First person I checked. Last she heard from him was Thursday. Didn’t even know he was sick. Just like Lennox, not to tell his mother. Probably didn’t want to worry her.”
“What did you say to her?”
“I mean, I didn’t want her having another stroke or something, but I asked if he’d been there. When she said he hadn’t, I asked if she knew if he was feeling any better, and she said she didn’t know he’d been sick. I sort of left it there, telling her I was sure it was nothing. But yeah… shit, she’s going to be worried.”
“Where else would he go?”
“I don’t know, Bobbi. I don’t know.”
It started to rain.
* * *
Mike pulled up to Lennox Palmer’s house, one of several around Moody Pond. The place was tiny, charming, engulfed by woods. Cattails swayed in the wind along the edge of the rain-chopped water. Mike jogged up to the front porch, met Lena Overton and the responding officer, Mullins. He found Bobbi inside, sitting at a small kitchen table with Rachel Watts.
“Had a quick look around the place,” Mullins said. “No sign of forced entry.”
“One of those cars sitting in the driveway is his?” Mike looked mostly at Bobbi and Rachel. They both nodded their heads. “Mine’s the other one,” Rachel said. “The Subaru with the big ding in it.”
He asked Bobbi, “How did you get here?”
“My friend dropped me off.”
“Okay.” Mike turned back to Lena and Mullins to get the full story. Alarmed, Rachel had called 911 to report her missing friend, and they’d polled the call; Mullins had been closest and responded, prepared to take a report, not realizing yet who the man was. “As soon as I saw her,” Mullins said about Rachel, “I remembered her from DSS. Then I called Overton. Like I said, gave the place a thorough look. There’s no food left out, but the bed is unmade.”