Heartbreak Bay (Stillhouse Lake #5) - Rachel Caine Page 0,54
county, but I’m not going to change her mind, and I’m not interested in wasting my time.
“Well, Mrs. Gregg, it sure would help if you’d tell me something that could help me find Sheryl,” I say. “And anything might do that. Anything at all.”
“Would it? Really?” Her pale-brown eyes go wide behind her old-fashioned glasses. “I don’t know anything much except that her husband lit out on her some time ago. Damn shame when a man does that to an expectant mother, don’t you think? Abandoning her and the children?”
I can tell she’s poised for another back in my day lecture, so I head her off. “Absolutely,” I say firmly. “Damn shame. Did you see him go?”
“See him go? Well, I really don’t know, now, do I? I didn’t see no suitcases, but I did see him get in his truck and leave, and I don’t recall him ever coming back.”
“And Sheryl was home then?”
“Lordy, how would I remember a thing like that?” But she puts a finger to her lips and taps it thoughtfully. “Well, maybe that was the day she went for her doctor visit. I just don’t know. I don’t write it down, you know. And I’m not a snoop.”
“Of course not,” I lie smoothly. “You’re just interested in your neighbors. That’s normal.”
“It’s just being friendly,” she says. “Unlike these young folk. All they do is stare at the TV and their damn phones and such. Don’t even go out on the porch in the evenings like normal people. I just don’t know—”
What the world is coming to, I finish mentally, and jump in. “Do you know who Sheryl’s obstetrician would have been?”
“Only one around here,” she says. “Dr. Fowler, and he’s even older than I am, probably still pushing cod liver oil on those poor babies.” She makes a face. “Your mother ever make you take that stuff?”
“Past my time,” I tell her, and she pats my hand.
“Well, good for you, dear, good for you. Anyway, Dr. Fowler would be the only place she’d go if you’re asking about that.” She gives me a too-sharp look. “You know some folks ’round here think her husband didn’t just leave, don’t you? That it was something else?”
“Like what?”
She leans over the table, and her eyes are bright with interest. “Some say he was murdered.”
“No!”
“Well, that’s what I heard. Not that I’d know for sure, of course. But some folks say it sure was convenient how she got his money and house and car easy as pie. He weren’t wealthy or nothing, but she came here poor as country dirt, and now she’s got a roof over her head and a car to drive and money to spend.”
“You knew her when she first came?”
“Before she got married? She came in on the bus, just some rough little baggage. Got herself a job at that Sonic near the edge of town. That’s where she met Tommy Jarrett, and I guess that was all it took. Don’t know anything about her other than that, though. Maybe she was just down on her luck. I was born just before the Depression, did you know?”
“I didn’t,” I say, and I listen politely to her tales of growing up amid poverty even more desperate than it is today. I don’t know how much of it is true, but it doesn’t matter, and it makes her happy. I leave her my card, in case she thinks of anything else. Mrs. Gregg is nice enough, and a busybody is always useful.
I’m on my way out the door when, out of the blue, she says, “And you know about that man, don’t you?”
I turn to face her. “What man?” I feel my heartbeat kick up to a higher gear.
“The one in the white van, of course. Used to drive by her house quite regular. Always at night.”
“And did he stop at her house?”
“Never. But he always slowed down.” Mrs. Gregg looks very pleased with herself. I want to kiss her.
“Think hard. Did he stop at anyone else’s house that you know of?”
“Not on this block, no.”
“And you didn’t recognize him?”
She snorts. “Well, of course I did! You didn’t ask that.”
Jesus take the wheel. I force myself to be calm. “Okay, now I’m asking: Who was in the van?”
“Douglas Adam Prinker. Lives over on Adams, out near the old Dairy Queen, the one they closed down about ten years back.”
I take out my notebook and write all that down, along with white van and several exclamation points. “Thank