By 10:45 Tuesday morning, Amber and Ann Marie had set up their table for the Job and Career Fair, which was due to begin at 11. Ann Marie had brought a white tablecloth covered in frolicking kittens, which they’d laid over the table they’d been assigned to. They had the Edgehill Fire Department to their right, and Lil Whiskers Daycare on the other. Businesses from all over Edgehill were represented at the fair—some offering summer job opportunities, while others offered internships. Students looking to enter the medical profession could sign up for volunteer programs.
The Here and Meow table was decorated with a handful of Amber’s toys—both the animated ones and a few of the smaller non-charmed ones that would serve as table decorations during the Hair Ball. As Amber and Ann Marie sat in their seats side by side behind the table, Amber took in the scene around her.
The fair was being held in the Edgehill High gym, tables ringing the outside edge of the shiny wooden floor of the basketball court. The place was filled with adults laying down tablecloths, neatly stacking flyers and business cards, and setting up clipboards to sign up for one thing or another. The din was already loud and the kids hadn’t even joined them yet. The sound of voices echoed around Amber, bouncing off the walls where the bleachers had been stacked away.
“So we’re going to need volunteers both for the 5k—to pass out water and also people to direct runners where to go to make sure no one veers off course—and for the Hair Ball,” Ann Marie explained. The clipboard in front of Amber was for the Hair Ball. “For the gala, we basically need as many people as we can get to pass out samples to the guests and to clean up. Glorified waitresses and busboys. The gala is so much bigger this year—I didn’t realize how many people we would need to help out.”
“Got it,” Amber said with a nod. “Have you had luck at the fair before? Seems like a great place to do it.”
“First year,” she said. “Getting a table here was Melanie’s idea. So was convincing the teachers to offer extra credit in exchange for helping out.”
With a slight smile, Amber nodded. “Sounds like Melanie.”
Ann Marie tapped the screen on her phone, which was lying behind a standing flyer holder, the clear plastic box stuffed with maps of the 5k path, each volunteer location marked with an X. “Ten minutes until showtime,” she said. “Thanks for doing this, by the way. I know Kim only asked you yesterday. I’m worried about her. Last minute isn’t how she does things. She’s got three of us to help and yet she keeps taking on more and more herself. I just have a feeling she’s going to crack soon.”
“We have to keep reminding her we’re here if she needs us. Maybe we can wear her down by being overly eager to help.”
“Speaking of! I heard we have a new finance chair,” said Ann Marie. “Kim said she got in contact with Francine Robins based on your recommendation and she said Francine is sharp as a tack. I wonder if she’s still seeing that hot cowboy …”
Amber laughed. “She’s not. She said he was just a distraction.”
“I couldn’t even get a guy like that to look at me, let alone allow me to use him as a plaything.”
“Same,” Amber agreed. “I guess Francine needed it; she’s been a bit of a wreck since the mayor fired her.”
“Yeah, sounds like Kim and Francine bonded over the whole unrequited love thing, too,” said Ann Marie. “They really hit it off.”
Amber cocked her head. “Kim has an unrequited love thing?”
Ann Marie quickly turned in her seat and rested her elbow on the back of it, then leaned toward Amber. “You’re kidding!”
“What?” Amber asked, leaning back a little.
“I thought she’d told everyone that story,” Ann Marie said. “Well, far be it from me to share that one. You’ll have to ask her yourself.”
Amber really needed to plan a girl’s night out with Kim and Ann Marie. She could have a social life here if she just tried a little harder.
Within a few minutes, kids started to pour into the gym. News must have gotten out about the extra credit, because by noon, they had over one hundred names spread across their two sign-up forms. Amber had even gotten an order for a custom animated toy from a young woman who wanted an elephant wearing a graduation cap. Amber was kicking herself for not thinking of a series of graduation-themed toys sooner.
When the flood of teens to their table had thinned out, Amber kept getting lost in the many ways she could animate the elephant. Could she charm it to use its trunk to take the cap off its head and wave it around before putting it back?
“Uh-oh,” Ann Marie muttered under her breath. “Incoming.”
Amber pulled herself out of her thoughts just as a very pretty young woman approached the table. She had dark brown hair, brown eyes, flawless skin, and a smile that looked completely staged.
“Hi, ladies,” she said cheerfully, holding out a hand to Amber.
Amber shot a curious look at Ann Marie as Amber shook the young woman’s hand. “Hi.”
“I already know Ann Marie, but I don’t think we’ve ever formally met,” she said. “I’m Dawn Newland.”
“As in Victor Newland’s daughter?” Amber asked.
Ann Marie muttered something else under her breath that Amber didn’t catch.
“That’s me!” she said, grinning that rehearsed smile again. And then Amber understood. It was a politician’s smile. A smile you wanted to trust but knew deep down you shouldn’t. “And you are?”
“Amber Blackwood.”
“Oh, right!” said Dawn. “You sell those little kitschy novelty toys, right?”
Amber decided not to dignify that with a response. Instead, she said, “Are you looking to volunteer? We’re nearly out of positions for the 5k, but we still have a few busser slots open for the gala.”
Dawn wrinkled her little button nose. “Actually, I wanted to find out if you’re the replacement for Ann Marie’s volunteer department assistant.”
“I’m just helping out today,” Amber said. “Keeping Chloe’s seat warm until she comes back.”
With a scoff, Dawn said, “Oh, c’mon, Amber. We both know Chloe isn’t coming back.”
Goose bumps rose on Amber’s arms, but she did her best to keep her voice neutral. “We do?”
“Uh … yeah,” Dawn said. “She ran off with that trashy older boyfriend of hers she was always talking to. I swear it’s a miracle she was passing any of her classes. All she ever did was talk to him on Scuttle. Johnny this and Johnny that. Sounds like her dad found out about it and Chloe decided she’d rather be with Johnny than deal with her psycho father, so she took off. She’ll show back up when the creep knocks her up and she needs money.”
Amber’s mouth dropped open.
Ann Marie gasped.
Dawn rolled her eyes. “Chloe Deidrick has been fooling everyone with her little wholesome act for ages. Just like her dad. You saw how he flipped out at the town hall meeting. Who wouldn’t want to get away from a guy with a temper like that? Even if it meant shacking up with a sleaze like Johnny.” She offered a dramatic shudder. “I’m the only one who can see through it. So if you want help, Ann Marie, from someone with an actual work ethic who won’t be on her phone every ten seconds, know you have the perfect candidate right here. You’ll have the most efficiently run volunteer program the Here and Meow has ever had, and I’ll have something that looks great on my résumé. Win-win.” She reached into the small purse slung over her shoulder and pulled out a baby pink business card, placing it in the middle of one of the clipboards where dozens of her classmates had filled in their names. “Call me,” she said, tapping the card twice with a pointer finger, its nail painted a light pink that matched her card. “You won’t regret it.”
She turned to leave but came up short when she almost careened into a man standing behind her. She groaned. “Ugh, what are you doing here, Alan?”
It was the same man from the day of Chloe’s search, and the one who had been watching Amber from across the patio at the Catty Melt. He hadn’t looked at Amber yet; his semi-disgusted expression was focused on the young woman in front of him. “I’m doing my job, Dawn.”
“I’d hardly call what you do a job,” she said, then walked away in a huff before he could reply.
Amber shot a horrified look at Ann Marie. “Well, she was a nightmare.”
“You have no idea,” Ann Marie said. “She and Chloe clearly don’t get along. Their dads are rivals, so they are too, I guess. At least the way Dawn sees it. Last I heard, both girls are in the running for Miss Here and Meow. Chloe was the front runner, but if she doesn’t come back before the gala, it looks like the title will go to Dawn.”
“Which I’m sure will also look great on her résumé?” Amber said.
A man cleared his throat, and Amber glanced up to meet the intense gaze of the man Edgar had said was most definitely a cop. She’d hoped that if she ignored him, he’d go away.
“Hello,” Ann Marie said, all smiles. “Can we help you with something?”
The intense cop stare he always aimed in Amber’s direction suddenly transformed as he turned to address Ann Marie. “Are these sign-ups only for high school seniors, or can an old man like me sign up too?” Like a chameleon, now he was charming, had a goofy self-deprecating air, and a smile that could light up a room.
Ann Marie flushed and tucked her hair behind her ears. “Of course,” she said, grinning. “We can use all the help we can get. Were you interested in volunteering for the 5k or the gala?”
His smile was wide as his gaze raked over Ann Marie’s upturned face. “What’s still open?” he asked. Then, with a sultry air, he said, “You can put me anywhere you want me.”
“All right,” Amber said, abruptly standing up, which seemed to snap Ann Marie out of her pheromone daze. “You,” she said, pointing at the chameleon, “come with me.”
He didn’t resist her command.
She stalked past the Lil Whiskers Daycare table and toward the side door she’d come in earlier. Just beyond the door was a locker-lined hallway that was nearly deserted when Amber slammed her way into it. When Amber turned around, she found the man a few feet away, the door closing behind him.
“Who are you?” she asked, arms crossed.
“Alan Peterson,” he said without hesitation.
It was such a plain name; it being real or made up seemed equally likely.
“Are you a private investigator?” she asked.
His mouth quirked up a fraction. “I need to work on my appearance if I’m that easy to spot. But, yeah, I am.”
“Hired by whom?”
“Not going to tell you that.”
“But it’s connected to Chloe’s disappearance?”
“Yes,” he said. “My client is desperate to find her, as I’m sure you are.”
“We all are,” she said.
“That’s what I mean,” he said. “Edgehill is definitely a town full of well-meaning people. You all hope you have something useful to tell the police … or a PI. Anything that will assist the professionals in finding her.” He paused for a long time, then slowly said, “It is strange, though …”
Amber tried not to take the bait, but she couldn’t help it. “What is?”
“You’re the one who found her phone,” he said. “It was a needle in a haystack and yet you found it as if you’d known exactly where it would be.”
Amber swallowed, heart thundering in her chest. How could he possibly know that? Who told him? The chief wouldn’t. But would Kim? Had he charmed the information out of her as he’d tried to do with Ann Marie? Had he overheard something? Had he been watching her in the woods when her magic had pulled her toward Chloe’s phone?
“Can I ask you something?” When Amber didn’t respond, he said, “What’s the … nature of your relationship with Chief Owen Brown?”
Her head reeled back. “Excuse me?”
He shrugged. “I just meant he’s relatively new to town, isn’t he? Do you think a big city cop has been a good fit for a place like Edgehill?”
That wasn’t at all what he’d meant and they both knew it.
When it was clear to him that Amber was done talking to him, he fished around in his back pocket and produced a business card which he held out to her between two fingers.
Normally, Amber would have refused the card and told him where to shove it. But seeing it between his fingers, seeing the contact the paper had with his skin, made her reach out and take it.
“Give me a ring if you hear anything interesting about Chloe, okay?” he asked, taking a couple of steps back. “I promise we’re on the same side here.”
Amber stayed rooted to the spot as she watched him walk down the hall, hands shoved into his pockets. He looked like your average dad taking a stroll through the halls. Someone passing him would likely assume he was here to pick up his kid—would assume he belonged here.
She looked down at the card in her hand. Alan Peterson, huh? Well, Alan, let’s see whose side you’re really on.