Kimmie lost track of how many times she’d checked in on Pip in the living room while Meg was out shopping. The moment her sister said goodbye, Kimmie realized she should have asked Meg to pick up a few cheap matchbox cars, but she felt too silly to chase her down in the garage and add one more item to her list.
Kimmie had no idea what Pip could do here to occupy his time besides watching movies, but they’d think of something. Anchorage wasn’t quite as cold as Glennallen. Maybe she and her brother could spend some time outside. The neighborhood was quiet. Kimmie could get used to living here.
If she had to.
Hopefully, the arrangement would be temporary. As soon as Kimmie found a job, she’d start looking for a place of her own. Meg’s house felt more like a museum on display than a home where a kid would be free to run and jump and play. If Pip ever did any of those things.
She’d felt her brother’s forehead on at least five different occasions in the past hour. How long was Meg going to take grabbing a few snacks and toiletries? Then again, Anchorage wasn’t like Glennallen with its one grocery store. From Meg’s home, it took at least a quarter of an hour just to get off the hillside. Driving to downtown Anchorage would probably take an hour if you ran into traffic.
But there were advantages to living in a city, advantages that Kimmie was prepared to seize. On the drive to her sister’s, they’d passed two different storefronts with speech therapy signs. Pip would be in good hands. And hopefully Kimmie would find a job soon.
A door slammed. Kimmie turned around. “Hello?”
She checked the garage, but her sister wasn’t home yet.
“Is someone here?” She hurried to the living room, where Pip was wrapped in blankets watching Cars. She checked his forehead once again out of habit. At least his fever was going down. “Do you need anything, Buster?” she asked. “Do you have to use the bathroom?” She glanced around, wondering if he’d wandered off in search of a toilet, but from what she could tell, he hadn’t moved since the last time she checked on him.
Maybe she was hearing things.
She eyed the front door. It was still locked. Which was generally a good sign, but only if you weren’t trapped in a house with doors that closed on their own.
And a floor that creaked like someone was walking right behind her.
“Dwayne?” Kimmie’s voice was shaky and uncertain. Even if someone had been in the next room, they probably wouldn’t have heard her. She peeked out the front window to see if there were any cars in the driveway. But how could anyone get past that big iron gate?
Another sound, this one from the level above. Something moved upstairs. Suddenly, Kimmie’s lungs started to seize up. What if it was Chuck? How hard would it be to find Meg’s home address? He knew where Kimmie was, and he was coming after her. That had to be it.
She shoved her hand into her pants pocket, where Taylor’s business card was crumpled from all the times she’d handled it. She had no idea what kind of long-distance rates Meg got on her landline, but whatever it was, she and Dwayne could afford it. Kimmie hurried to the kitchen, and her fingers shook while she dialed the number.
“Hello, this is Taylor.” He sounded so casual. So happy.
She wet her lips and tried to steady her voice. “Hi. It’s Kimmie. I’m at my sister’s.”
“Oh, yeah.” From his jocular tone, Kimmie could almost see Taylor’s warm smile. “You calling to give me her address? I’m on the road still, so I won’t be able to write it down.”
Kimmie’s neck tingled with the vague sense she was being watched. She lowered her voice and took the phone closer to the hallway where she could keep an eye on her brother. Pip hadn’t moved. So what was making all that noise?
“Kimmie? You still there?”
“Yeah,” she whispered.
Taylor chuckled. “Good. I thought you had cut out on me for a minute. Reception’s not great around here. Mind if I call you back in a little bit? We’re about an hour still from the airport.”
“I think someone’s in the house.”
Taylor paused, and when he spoke his voice was deadly serious. “You’re at your sister’s?”
“Yeah. She went to get some groceries, but I think I heard a noise upstairs.”
A staticky noise garbled his words when he asked, “What kind of noise?”
“A door shutting. Someone making the floor creak.” She held her breath, waiting for Taylor to tell her that all Anchorage mansions creaked, that they all had drafts that could blow doors shut unexpectedly. She wished she could look at him right now, wished she could borrow a little of the strength she always managed to find when he was nearby.
“Given everything you’ve gone through, you can’t be too careful,” he said, his voice taking on a mechanical quality. “I think you should …” His next words were even more garbled.
“What?” She gripped the phone, straining to make sense of his words through the static. “Taylor? Are you there?”
Her sister’s phone beeped in her ear. She’d lost the call.