his head. His dad suffers from depression, too.” She glanced back at the kitchenette. “I’m worried.”
Carly was, too.
She left them and headed to a coffee shop to craft plan C.
She bought a latte and took a seat at the bar facing the street. She stared into space for a good half hour before she finally admitted to herself that she didn’t have a plan C. She didn’t know what to do with this side of Victor. Social media was such a trap.
She sipped her coffee. She picked up her phone, pulled up Instagram, and in the search box, typed, Dr. Max Sheffington. The search results came up empty. She tried Tobias Sheffington III. Bingo. There weren’t many posts, but there were a couple of very cute pictures of a Labrador in goggles. And a diagram of the human brain with the caption The human brain is awesome. And a cartoon from the New Yorker that showed two surgeons leaning over a man with half his head sawed off. “It’s a no-brainer,” one said to the other.
She quietly giggled.
She was supposed to be crafting plan C, but she went to Facebook. She found a public page for Max’s courses. There were tabs for class notes and a meme with a mad scientist with googly eyes staring at an overflowing test tube, and a post from Max. “I get it. Axons are tough. Just wait until we get to the endoplasmic reticulum. Neuroscience humor! Are you ready for your axon guidance exam? Come see me if questions.”
She was smiling at the post when her phone suddenly vibrated awake. It was Gordon.
“Hi!” she said cheerfully. “How are—”
“Need you to come by this afternoon,” Gordon said gruffly, without greeting.
Carly suppressed a groan. “Ah . . . sure,” she said, her eye on her clock. She had some cold calls to make to Los Angeles this afternoon to drum up support for Victor. “Could it wait until tomorrow?”
“No, it cannot wait until tomorrow.”
She grimaced. “Can you give me a couple of hours? I’ve got a thing I’ve got to take care of.”
“Fine.”
“Can you give me a heads-up?” she asked.
“We’ll talk when you get here,” Gordon said, with all the charm of a rock.
“Okeydoke,” she chirped. So much for developing a plan C. Carly took one last look at Max’s Facebook page, then slid her phone into her bag.
She went home to let Baxter out, then headed over to Gordon’s lush, riverfront home. When she arrived, no one answered the front door. Carly went around to the side door, through which she often entered, and tapped on that door, peering into the massive kitchen. There was no sign of mean Alvira. But Alvira’s little Ford Fiesta was in the drive, and through the garage windows, she could see Gordon’s Maserati.
She figured they were probably out back. She stepped into the house. “Alvira? Gordon?”
No one responded.
Carly walked into the kitchen and put her bag on the kitchen bar, took out her phone, and texted Gordon to let him know she was here. There was no answer. A thought occurred to her—what if there had been an intruder? What if they were tied up or murdered or kidnapped? Because it didn’t make sense that both cars would be here, the doors open, and no one answering her or her text.
She walked into the living room. Huge picture windows overlooked the backyard, the pool, and the river below. Nothing out there but a giant yellow ducky float skimming along the surface of the pool, turning its strange pirouettes with the breeze.
As she stood there, peering out, she heard a sound from down the hall. “Of course,” she muttered. They were in his office and hadn’t heard her come in. With a laugh at her wild imagination, Carly walked across the carpeted living room and up the two marble steps to the entry. She turned into the long corridor that led to Gordon’s office when Gordon suddenly stepped out of a room. He was looking back over his shoulder, and paused to say something to someone in that room. He was laughing. And he was completely and utterly naked. Carly was so shocked she could not tear her eyes from the flabby paunch and penis dangling from a thatch of overgrown gray hair. She must have cried out with alarm, or maybe Gordon was the first to screech, because he did, and dove back into the room.
“Oh my God,” Carly said. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”