Come and Find Me A Novel of Suspense - By Hallie Ephron Page 0,56

not a minute longer. And if the police don’t get on the stick fast enough, I’m coming up there to find you myself.”

“You have reached your destination,” announced the robotic, British-accented female voice on Ashley’s GPS. The screen told her it was 11:50 A.M. She was ten minutes early. The drive had been easy, any remaining rush-hour traffic having dissipated by midmorning. The sky had gone from clear to overcast.

WELCOME TO MILL VILLAGE announced a cheery sign. Diana was stopped in traffic bunched up at the one stoplight in the center of town. The borders of the Hummer’s broad windshield framed her surroundings. There was the town green with storefronts surrounding it. The gazebo. The center of Mill Village was exactly like the town green in OtherWorld, where GROB had transported her after they’d been attacked on the beach.

She checked her rear- and sideview mirrors. GROB had to be here, somewhere. In a parked car. Inside one of the businesses lined up along the street. Walking on the town green. Was he dressed like his avatar, as she was like hers?

An elderly couple strolled by, the woman in a summery straw hat and white parka and the man in starched tan trousers and windbreaker. They stopped in front of Tweets, a pet store, and looked in at a person-size birdcage in which a bright green parrot hopped about. They both carried umbrellas, and Diana smiled to herself, imagining the bird checking them out: a pair of winter birds that had returned prematurely to New England.

A man strode down the sidewalk toward her, a knitted cap pulled down over his forehead and a plaid muffler around his face. GROB? Diana gripped the steering wheel and her heart lurched. She ducked down as he hurried past without even glancing at the Hummer. She watched, breathless, as he ducked into what looked like a luncheonette.

Diana sat forward and unstuck her T-shirt from her sweat-slicked back. She tried to swallow. She’d taken a pill before leaving Ashley’s apartment. She didn’t want to think about what she’d be feeling if she hadn’t.

A car behind her tooted. The light had changed.

Diana continued slowly up the block, looking for a place to park. Finally she pulled into the lot of a motel. Its black sign with RITZ in bold white letters outlined in neon tubing welcomed cars to a deserted parking lot. The proprietor must have had a flare for irony because the place looked a whole lot more like the Bates Motel than the Ritz-Carlton. Diana didn’t need anyone to cue the scary music.

“Turn around when possible.” It took her a moment to realize that the GPS had picked that moment to put in its oar. It told her she’d overshot her destination, and that it was now 11:58.

She turned off the GPS and slipped it into her jacket pocket. Then she waited for a break in the traffic, pulled out, and drove back the way she’d come in. She found a parking spot in front of the luncheonette. Painted in yellow letters across the plate glass, it said THE SUNNY SIDE UP. As she watched, unseen hands pulled from the window a sign advertising Full Breakfast for $3.99 and replaced it with one advertising Meatloaf Plate for $6.99.

Now what? She was here, but where was GROB? He’d never find her behind the Hummer’s dark tinted windows. She rolled down her window an inch. Chilly air seeped in. No matter what the calendar said, this late March felt wintry.

Across the street a woman wearing a short puffy jacket, a long skirt, and boots biked across the town green. Its empty gazebo was large enough to double as a bandstand. The structure was set, like a wedding-cake topper, on a little rise at the center of the grass with six footpaths radiating out from it. It offered a perfect vantage point, an unobstructed view of the storefronts and houses and, more important, GROB could see her.

Diana zipped her jacket and turned up its collar. In her rearview mirror, her dark-rimmed eyes looked back at her, wide and frightened. She found the sunglasses in her jacket pocket and put them on. Ran her fingers through those blond curls. Ashley wasn’t the only one who found her new hair jarring.

She pictured Nadia getting out of the Hummer. Crossing the street and walking decisively across the green, and stepping into the shadow of the gazebo. She could do it too. Diana grabbed Daniel’s walking stick before opening the car door