The Babysitter Murders - By Janet Ruth Young Page 0,26

no.” Dani squeezes her hands. She still has that up-in-the-air feeling.

“Did you tell Mrs. Draper you want to harm Alex?”

“I don’t want to harm Alex. But I had these pictures in my mind. So I told Mrs. Alex I should leave. I didn’t even want to come today. I wanted to quit. I did just quit babysitting and I wanted to leave, except that she told me to wait.”

He closes his notebook, seeming to have decided something.

“I see no intent to commit a crime here. I’m going to pop upstairs and tell Mrs. Draper. She seems pretty shaken up. Wait here; want a few more words with you.” He goes to the stairs, swinging 91

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his broad shoulders. He does a little skip on the bottom step that suggests to Dani her situation is not serious.

Almost over, she thinks. A few more words and I’m free. A little awkwardness, that’s all, and a promise to never see the Alexes again. I can handle that. I can find plenty of ways to fill my time.

Sergeant Mason returns with his radio in hand. “Do you live with your parents?”

“With my mom.”

“Beth Solomon, the real estate broker, right? How much does she know about this?”

“Nothing. I tried to tell her, but she didn’t understand.”

“Is she home right now?”

“She could be home. She’s been painting the house.”

“I think we should get you home and make sure she knows what’s going on.”

“May I go home alone and tell her?” Dani asks. “I think I would rather handle this myself.”

He smiles without showing his teeth—a little sarcastic or smug, patronizing, as Gordy would say. “Why don’t we give you a ride home to see if she’s there? I’d like to talk with your mom and get this straightened out. Dot all the i’s.”

“But I’m not arrested?”

“No. Unless there’s something you haven’t told me, you haven’t committed any crime.”

“So the siren won’t be on or the lights flashing? That would freak my mom out.”

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“Nope. It’ll look like we’re giving you a ride home.”

“All right, then. Can I get my pack from the living room?”

Dani sees no sign of Alex or Mrs. Alex, so she doesn’t say good-bye. Good-bye forever. They seem as far inside as you can get, like the house is a chambered nautilus and they’ve spiraled to the innermost point. She wants to tell them both that she hopes they’ll be able to find a good sitter. If Mrs. Alex had listened to her before, they might have found someone by now. Grammy will probably have to fill in for a while.

Dani walks to the cruiser. She’s aware of cars slowing down to rubberneck. She wonders if Mrs. Alex has called friends or neighbors, and what she may have told them. Dani wonders about calling Beth to warn her what’s about to happen.

She squeezes the handle of the passenger door but finds it locked.

Sergeant Mason is behind her. “Here you go, dear,” he says, opening the door to the backseat. Dani laughs—of course she’ll ride in back. She slides in. A Plexiglas window separates front seats from the back, like a taxi.

The passenger seat is for Officer Pinto, who climbs in next but doesn’t look at her. He squints and shakes his head at Mason as they pull out. Maybe Mrs. Alex told him something terrible, something Mrs. Alex believed but wasn’t true.

Dani taps the glass and Officer Pinto slides a panel open. The Plexiglas makes her feel like a perp, like they might be afraid of her. Pinto looks angry. Maybe they’re doing that thing from the 93

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movies, where they take two roles. Good cop, bad cop.

“Are you going to tell my mother what I told Alex’s mom?”

she asks the friendly cop.

He speaks into the rearview mirror. “She should know what’s going on, don’t you think?”

Officer Pinto exhales through his lower teeth: Sssss. This makes Dani nervous. He must be Malcolm’s father or uncle. They have the same last name and the same blue-black hair, except he has a bald spot she can see from the backseat. She hopes that all this will end without Malcolm finding out. She hopes there is a law that grants confidentiality to people who are just driven home and not arrested.

“Mom’s going to be surprised,” Dani says.

“I imagine so,” Mason replies. “You say you didn’t confide in her about any of this?”

“I tried to talk to