Rocky knew she had been wrong about Isaiah’s intention with Cooper and she left a phone message for him to call her when they returned. When Isaiah called her that night, he said their flight had been delayed from North Carolina.
“Does this mean you’re speaking to me again?” he asked.
“Yes, and it means a lot more than that. It means I’m not going to quit my job, which I was going to do, and it means some really good things happened along with some moderately terrifying things. Can we be friends again? I’m sorry,” she said. They agreed to meet at his office the next morning.
She told him everything, or mostly everything, leaving out the breaking and entering. And she didn’t tell him how confused she had been when Hill said he had slept with Liz, that he had known her. She did say that she was done with her archery lessons.
Isaiah asked her why. “You worried about crossing the bay in bad weather? If the crossing is dangerous, the ferry doesn’t run. And there’s a place to practice in the winter. The VFW in Portland has a crappy banquet hall that they used to let people use for archery way back when. That’s an indication of how bad the banquet hall was; they had one section with hay and targets.”
Rocky considered telling him everything about Hill, and she knew Isaiah would be the perfect person to tell. He had heard everything when he was a minister, so she wasn’t worried that she’d shock him or that he’d judge harshly. But to her surprise, she had already carved a space for Hill where she afforded him temporary protection. She had told no one about the paper target with Hill’s mark on it that she had seen at Liz’s old house in Orono. Tess had already guessed that Rocky was falling for her archery teacher. She told Rocky that her color was vastly diminished since she’d banned Hill from coming to visit. Rocky quickly switched the topic before Isaiah went down the same road.
“There’s one more thing. Liz’s old boyfriend probably has figured out that I have Cooper by now. I sent him on a false trail, and unless he’s an idiot, he knows what I did. He sounded determined to get him. This guy has no right to Cooper, but he still sounds obsessed with Liz, and now that Liz is dead, Cooper has become his focus.”
Rocky didn’t tell Isaiah exactly how scared she was after Peter drove off. She already saw Isaiah’s eyebrows moving together in a mountain of worry.
“What’s his last name?” he asked.
“I don’t know, but I might be able to find out. I met a friend of Liz’s in Orono.”
“Once you get his name, I can call the Portland police. They’re used to me calling about ridiculous things. But I doubt there’s anything they can do about a man with poor social skills who wants a dog that doesn’t belong to him.” The older man paused.
“Did he threaten you?”
“No, it wasn’t me who he threatened. It was like he was still after Liz, or anything that belonged to her. I’ve worked with a few men who became obsessed with ex-girlfriends, and their ability to stay focused on one person was staggering,” said Rocky.
“I’ve known them too, and I’ll tell you what works with them; a slap on the head. They give men a bad name and we’re skating on thin ice as it is.”
Rocky had still not been able to find out Peter’s last name. Shelly, the receptionist at the Orono Animal Clinic said she never knew it, and she only met him once. When Liz started up with Peter, she left everyone behind.
Peter’s last name came from a surprising source. The Townsends called her to say that Peter had called them right after they got back to Providence. They also mentioned that their house had been broken into and they figured it was Peter. Jan said, “And the nerve of that guy. He called us the next day to see if we had Cooper. I told him he was one sorry son of a bitch and if he came anywhere near here, we’d call the police. He made like he was surprised and insulted.”
Rocky felt queasy. “Well maybe it wasn’t him who broke into your house. Could be a coincidence.” She pressed her lips together to keep from confessing.
“I think you’re right. The police said the same thing. They said the footprints were more like a young boy or a woman.”
Footprints. Rocky decided to throw her running shoes away the next day and get another pair in Portland. She froze and didn’t know what else to say.
Jan’s voice got softer. “How is the dog?”
“He hasn’t left my side except when his fan club is around. He’s pretty popular around here. Thank you for bringing him back.”
“I think Liz would like that. I’ve never been good with animals. That’s probably a sign of me being a defective human being, but I’ve got to be honest with you, dogs give me the creeps. Got bit by one when I was a kid. Eighteen stitches on my thigh. Liz wanted a dog from the time she could speak, but I was terrified of them.”
Rocky pictured Liz longing for the thing that most terrified her mother and she saw how mismatched the mother and daughter had been. And then she remembered that Jan had ostracized her own daughter and she wondered how she would live with that. Given all her options back then, Jan made a lousy choice.
“What made you decide to bring him back?” asked Rocky.
A long silence. Rocky waited, knowing that Jan was struggling with her emotions. “I made mistakes with Liz and I have to live with that. But you were right; she never would have hurt her dog. And he would have protected her at all costs. I can at least let Cooper live with someone who loves him. He deserves that.” Jan’s voice shook. “There’s something missing in the picture about her death and I wish I knew what it was.”
Rocky said, “I know what you mean. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Jan, did Peter say his last name?”
“I think he did. What the hell did he say it was? Ellis, yeah, like Ellis Island.”
“Thanks. Sorry to hear about the break-in,” said Rocky. She hoped that somewhere in the universe this counted as an apology.
Rocky waited for Peter’s return. She had never seen obsession dissipate quickly, not with the laser focus that Liz’s boyfriend had. Even a new relationship sometimes failed to dim the target. She locked her door at night and she never left Cooper alone. If she had to go places without him, she left him with Tess or Melissa.
And then there was the matter of Hill. She purchased her own archery equipment to replace what he had loaned her. She took Hill’s equipment back to him. She went to his house midmorning when she knew he’d be teaching. At the last minute, she left him a note. “My dog is back.”