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  “I’ll have it ready by noon,” Gloria said, hoping she sounded firm enough to end the discussion. Wanda took several rapid breaths, as though hyperventilating. Gloria felt sorry for the interruptions this morning. First there was the call to Tracy setting up a lunch date for today, then her mother’s call.

  “I really wanted to see it before Charlie came in,” Wanda said, tearing the foil off a piece of spearmint, then wadding the gum into a ball and shoving it into her mouth.

  “Okay, okay. I’ll have it ready by eleven forty-five.”

  Wanda tossed the foil into Gloria’s garbage pail, her jaw muscles working. “I’m beginning to hate this job. Everyone wants their stuff yesterday.” Gloria heard the gum snap between Wanda’s teeth. “And forget the help—sassy upstarts who think they know it all and spend too much time on the phone. I swear, one of these days I’m just gonna up and sell this place. You just see if I don’t.”

  Gloria watched Wanda disappear into the press room, probably to give Paul an earful. Then she turned to her computer and pounded the keyboard. She had only one hour to get Charlie Axlerod’s brainstorm on paper. Then she had to pick Tracy up for lunch and didn’t want to be late. It had been hard enough getting Tracy to agree to go. And ever since bumping into her by Hoolahan’s, Gloria had known it was more important than ever to reestablish their friendship.

  Cutter was about to tell Sadie Bellows to just leave the folders on his desk and he’d file them himself, but she was already bent over the bottom drawer of the file cabinet. With a quick ticking of a violet fingernail, she flipped through the files until she found the proper place, then jammed in the folder. Then she slammed the drawer so hard his dartboard fell off the wall and nearly landed on her head.

  “You all right?” he said, rising from his chair but not moving from the spot. He didn’t want to get too close. All morning she had banged drawers, rustled papers, and stomped around in her lavender spikes. Now, as she turned to him, he could see he had said the wrong thing.

  “No, I’m not all right.”

  Cutter held his breath.

  “The whole place is talking about it. You could at least have had the decency to tell me. Though I can hardly believe you’d give that little twerp a second glance.” Sadie’s heels tapped loudly across the tile floor, giving Cutter the impression she wished it were his head. “How do you think that makes me feel? You and that twerp?”

  He thought about it a minute and realized he was clueless. He had no idea what Sadie’s thoughts were about anything. They had never spent much time in conversation. But it surprised him a little to think she might be hurt.

  “How long has this been going on, anyway?”

  Cutter looked at Sadie and frowned. Her demanding attitude annoyed him. He picked up a dart and fought the urge to tell her so. He supposed he should make some concession to a woman he had slept with. But he’d always found it strange that once he had gone that final step, a woman always made certain assumptions—the most erroneous one being that he cared for her.

  “Well, how long?” Sadie tapped her left foot impatiently.

  “I hardly think I have to explain anything to you.” The look on Sadie’s face told Cutter he had devastated her.

  “Well … I assumed … that is … I thought we had something special. That you cared.”

  What he knew about women could fit into a shot glass.

  “Does this mean we’re through?”

  Cutter looked into his secretary’s bewildered eyes. “Sadie, it means whatever you want it to mean.” He might as well have taken his letter opener and plunged it into her carotid artery.

  “You … you never walked down Main Street holding my hand. And it would have been nice. If you had. Just once.”

  Cutter watched her walk to the door, her hips moving in that melodic way that could drive a man crazy.

  “Consider this my two weeks’ notice.”

  Now he was really stunned. He watched her close the office door without a word. What had she expected? A trip to the altar? A house outside town? She was a diversion. It had never occurred to him that she felt differently, or if it had, he’d pushed it out of his mind. And it had never occurred to him that he could hurt her deeply.

  When it comes to women, Press, you’re a real dunce.

  No wonder Gloria hated him. Well, not hate. Not anymore. She was softening on that score. She had been kind to him last night. Kinder than he deserved. But that was because she was kind. While he was a downright brute.

  Just ask Sadie.

  Well, what could anyone expect? With a mother like Virginia Press? What kind of role model was she anyway? How could a man learn anything good from a woman like that?

  C’mon, Press, you going to blame Virginia for everything?

  “You bet I am.”

  Gloria pushed impatiently on the doorbell and listened to parts of the 1812 Overture for the sixth time. She had been leaning on the bell for five minutes. She was sure Tracy was inside, from the noises coming from the small opening in the upstairs window. Finally, Gloria backed away from the door, then down the two steps of the front stoop and almost halfway into the yard. From this vantage point, she could clearly see the open window with the navy Ralph Lauren curtains fluttering ever so slightly on the sides.

  “Tracy!” No answer. “Tracy!” Gloria picked up a small pebble and tossed it like she used to do when she was younger. The pebble missed the window and landed in the gutter along the roof line. She looked around for another one. They were easy enough to find amid the dying sod interspersed with large patches of dirt. She chose a small stone close to her foot and dug it out with her fingers. Then she brushed it off and hurled it at the window. It made a loud clinking noise when it connected, and Gloria feared she had broken the glass. She squinted up through the sun and was relieved to see that the window was still intact. “Tracy!” Now why would Tracy ask to meet here, then not answer the door? “Tracy!”

  “All right! I’m coming!” A pair of hands raised the window; then a tangle of red hair appeared.

  “We had a lunch date, remember?”

  “Yeah … right … sorry … I was just lying down.”

  “What’s the matter? You’re not sick, are you?”

  “No … just tired. This night job’s killing me. By the time I get home and change and … oh, whatever … Be down in a sec.”

  Gloria walked back to the front door and waited. When it finally opened, she was startled by what the daylight revealed. Dark circles cupped Tracy’s eyes like athlete’s grease, and her skin had the look of jaundice. It was obvious she was neither eating nor sleeping well. And there was something else. She looked like she had aged five years.

  “Why don’t you just quit that job?” Gloria said, entering the foyer.

  “Because it pays the bills.”

  “There are better jobs, especially with your background.” Gloria followed Tracy to the kitchen. Dishes cluttered the sink, and a crusted pan, which someone had obviously used to make an omelet earlier, was on the stove. “You can do better than bartending.”

  Tracy opened the refrigerator and pulled out a container of orange juice. “I always thought I was going places. You know? I thought someday I’d be in charge of Medical Data’s telemarketing department.”

  Gloria stuffed down the nagging reminder that she was the reason Tracy had lost her job. The thing about guilt was that once it grabbed hold, it took something a lot bigger to make it let go. “I hear there’s a Chase Bank opening in New Canterbury. Maybe you could get a job there?”

  “Doing what?”

  “Telemarketing. Calling people to see if they’d like to open an account.” Gloria shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. I guess I’m just talking out of my hat.” She watched Tracy gulp down an eight-ounce glass of juice. “But I do know this: you can do better than bartending.”

  Tracy dropped the plastic glass into the sink. “Mind if we skip lunch? I’m just not up to it. I’m not even hungry. I thought I’d feel
better by now, but my head’s still splitting from a hangover.”

  “See, that’s another thing. If you were in telemarketing, you wouldn’t come home from work with a hangover.”

  “You’re such a simpleton, Gloria.” Tracy stepped over one of her sneakers, then kicked the other one out of the way. “You make everything sound easy.”

  As Gloria followed Tracy to the living room, she noticed that her friend’s gray sweats hardly concealed how thin she was. “Why don’t we go job hunting?” Gloria sat on the ottoman while Tracy plopped on the nearby couch. “We’ll collect all the Four-Towns newspapers and start looking. There’s got to be something in there for you.”

  Tracy’s left arm dangled off the side of the couch, forcing her hand to rest on the woefully outdated and worn brown shag carpet. “I don’t know … Nicky’s working on something for us. He’s been thinking of leaving this crummy town and getting a brand-new start. Says he has a cousin in Vegas who can get me a job too.”

  “Vegas?”

  “Did you think I wanted to stay in this jerk town the rest of my life? And when I go, it’ll be for good. I’m not coming back.”

  Gloria knew that was a rebuke. Tracy never had understood why Gloria had returned to Appleton. And there was no point in trying to explain it. “Nick Cervantes isn’t the kind of guy I’d go pinning my future on. I mean, what job could his cousin get you? Cocktail waitress?”

  “Oh, excuse me!” Tracy lunged upright, her expression fierce, the one that years ago had earned her the nickname Fire and Ice. “Just because Nicky isn’t rich like that monkey of yours doesn’t mean you have the right to look down your nose.”

  “I’m not looking down my nose. I just don’t want you to sell yourself so cheaply—”

  “Sell myself? Oh, look who’s talking. The girl who couldn’t stand Cutter Press is suddenly making nice with him? What’s that all about, huh? A million bucks, maybe? Did it finally occur to you that you could be rich? That you wouldn’t have to worry anymore about paying rent for a crummy apartment? I mean, you think there’s anyone left in Appleton that doesn’t know Cutter bought you Clive’s car? Now who’s selling herself?”

  “It’s not like that at all.”

  “Oh, puh-leeze.”

  “No, I mean it. You’ve got it all wrong. The night you saw us, I … we … Cutter and I were discussing his mother. You know she hasn’t been feeling well, and I was … concerned.”

  “That old windbag? Everyone knows her shenanigans. Virginia Press is gonna outlive us all. You wait and see. Besides, you needed to hold hands while discussing her?”

  Gloria started to open her mouth, then stopped. No explanation was possible without violating her promise. “It’s not what you think” was all she could say.

  “Yeah … well, maybe the job in Vegas is not what you think, either.”

  Gloria sighed. There had to be some way to keep Tracy from getting any more involved with Nick Cervantes. She’d have to think of something, and fast.

  By the time Charlie Axlerod came into the print shop and made some last-minute changes to his board game, and by the time Gloria incorporated those changes and then drove the final proof down to the Chamber of Commerce at the other end of Main Street, it was pushing three o’clock. Paul was supposed to have started printing the game almost two hours ago.

  Wanda was a bundle of nerves. Even chewing three packs of spearmint hadn’t helped. But her misplaced anxiety had found an easy target, and she’d yelled at Paul a good ten minutes over his failure to order a new plate cylinder for the Ryobi. “Now you tell me?” she had screamed. “This is the busiest time of year! What if that old thing doesn’t hold until the Apple Festival is over! What will happen to our business?”

  Wanda had yelled so loud, Gloria had worried she would blow an artery. These days Wanda was strung tighter than Grandma Quinn’s clothesline. Another week and the Apple Festival would be over. Both she and Paul were counting the days.

  Gloria stepped out of the Chamber of Commerce building carrying the proof with Charlie Axlerod’s signature, wondering if she should just call the okay in to Wanda or drive back. The streets were clogged with tourists, and by the time she got out of her parking spot, which was around the corner, and made her way down Main, a good twenty minutes could pass. The picture of Wanda’s red-apple face, wormed by bulging veins, made Gloria decide to call it in.

  She was about to go back into the Chamber building and ask Charlie if she could use his phone when someone grabbed the proof from her hand. She looked around in surprise. The sidewalk was thick with people. A group of senior citizens were crowding past her. Behind them were a man and woman pushing twins. In front of her was a cluster of young Asians, speaking what sounded like Japanese and licking ice-cream cones from Tad’s.

  She saw a man dash across the street, then stop on the sidewalk and face her. He was dressed in black leather, and one gloved hand waved a paper in the air. There was a smile on his face. It took only a second for Gloria to recognize him. Some foolish impulse made her walk over. As she did, he tossed the paper into the garbage can by the curb and waited.

  “Who are you?” she said when she reached him. “What do you want?” She had never been this close to him before. He looked younger than she’d originally thought, with freckles and the beginnings of a sandy beard. His shoulder-length light-brown hair was pulled back into a ponytail. He wore a small silver nose ring through the skin that separated his right and left nostrils. It reminded her of a picture of a bull she had seen in a magazine.

  “What do you want?” she repeated.

  “Ever see the movie Chinatown?”

  Gloria remained mute, not moving a muscle.

  The young man leaned closer. “Guess not.” He smiled, showing two chipped teeth. “Well, there was this nosy detective that wouldn’t mind his business, and somebody had to teach him a lesson. You know what happened?” He opened his leather jacket and pulled something from an inner pocket—something metallic, black, and deeply grooved. He held it in his hand until a group of people passed. Then, using his shoulder and arm as a shield against unwanted onlookers, he pressed the spring latch to flip out a long, double-sided blade. “He got one of these stuck up his nose, and it didn’t feel good.”

  Gloria gasped and backed away, bumping into the garbage can. She could feel her heart pound in her throat. If only J.P. were close by.

  “You got a detective snooping where he’s not supposed to. You call him off, or you’ll both get this.” The man in leather flicked his wrist, moving the switchblade in a quick slashing motion before it disappeared again into his jacket. “You’ve been warned, lady. Now I’m not responsible for what happens if you don’t listen.” Then he walked away.

  Gloria felt blood rush to her head, heard the sound of her heart roaring in her ears like surf, as she stepped off the curb and raced for the Chamber of Commerce to use Charlie Axlerod’s phone—not to call Wanda, but to call Sheriff J.P. Gordon.

  Gloria was exhausted. She had spent the last two hours giving J.P. a blow-by-blow description of the man in leather, as well as repeating his every word. Forty-five times. J.P. had issued an APB and had ordered his deputy to fish out Charlie Axlerod’s board game from the garbage can and dust it for prints, in spite of the fact that Gloria had told him the man wore gloves. Both efforts, so far, had produced nothing.

  Then she’d had to go back to the print shop with the crumpled game and a lame excuse about why she was so late, then listen to Wanda have a hissy fit. Now, instead of heading for home like she wanted, Gloria was heading for Grandma Quinn’s. She dreaded her visit because it would be confrontational, but Sam Hidel had called just before her Chamber of Commerce excursion, and his call left her no choice. Her anger still simmered below the surface.

  Why was Mother so difficult?

  She just had to put this issue to bed, once and for all. Especially in light of this new, dangerous situation. She needed her mind free, her head clear. She just couldn’t conc
entrate on Grandma, Mother, Tracy, Virginia Press, Cutter, and this stalker all at the same time.

  Oh, Jesus, I know I’m not alone in this, but right now I sure do feel like it.

  Gloria walked into the kitchen just as Grandma Quinn pulled a tray of cookies from the oven and listened to her singing “How Great Thou Art” at the top of her lungs. She waited until Grandma had the tray safely positioned on the stovetop before declaring herself. “Hey, Grandma!”

  Hannah Quinn spun around like a dervish. For her size and age, she still moved well. “Oh … hello there, pumpkin.”

  Well, at least Grandma was wearing her hearing aid like she’d promised. Gloria took a seat at the kitchen table and resisted the urge to mention anything about Grandma’s door being unlocked. Right now she had bigger fish to fry.

  “You’re just in time to sample my new cookies. I call them ‘chocola.’ It’s a chocolate chip recipe mixed with granola cereal. I was getting tired of baking the same thing. Thought I’d try something new.” Grandma used a spatula to put one of the hot cookies on a small plate and brought it over to the table. Then she went to the refrigerator, hauled out a gallon of whole milk, and poured Gloria a glass.

  “It’s a wonder I was never fat, with all the cookies and milk you shoved down me.”

  Grandma laughed and pulled out one of the other kitchen chairs and sat down. “So what’s the trouble?”

  Gloria’s heart sank. Had someone told Grandma about the incident with the stalker? She didn’t want her to worry. But since she and J.P. had agreed to keep a lid on this whole stalking thing for the sake of the Apple Festival, she couldn’t imagine how anyone would know. “Who said there was trouble?”