And Don't Look Back by Rebecca Barrow

Author:Rebecca Barrow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books
Published: 2023-10-03T00:00:00+00:00

23

Sloane drives them back, only five minutes late to the salon. “See you later,” Harlow says when she hops out of the car, except her voice lilts up at the end, like it’s a question, like she’s hoping: See you later, maybe?

“Text me,” Sloane says. “So you can come over and we can play salon.”

“Yeah,” Harlow says. “Sure.”

She leaves before Sloane can see the flush on her cheeks, hurrying back to her own car in the parking lot. She gets in and is about to start driving back to Severn House when she remembers the excuse she gave Christina for leaving and decides to get the groceries she promised.

She drives to the store she visited the other day and is drawing up a list in her head—more bread, fresh milk, maybe some kind of real food and ingredients so Christina doesn’t think she can’t take care of herself—when her phone rings.

She stills when she sees it’s an unknown number. There are only a handful of people she would even expect to call—Sloane, now Christina, maybe Marcy Sheffield—since she tossed her old SIM card with all her contacts from before. And unknown numbers were definitely a no on her mom’s list—only answer when it’s someone you recognize, in case whoever’s on the other end can somehow trace you right to your exact location. Except now it doesn’t really matter, does it? Harlow has brought herself back to the place her mom was determined to leave, so if someone wants to find her, she’s sitting prey.

Harlow takes a deep breath and puts the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

“Hi,” a deep voice on the other end says. “I’m looking for Harlow Ford?”

Harlow’s pulse kicks up a notch. “Who’s asking?”

“This is Vincent Harris,” the voice says. “Marcy Sheffield spoke to me and asked me to reach out to you. I believe you’re looking for information on your grandmother’s disappearance.”

Her pulse settles some. Marcy said she was going to talk to old colleagues—clearly she didn’t waste any time. “Yeah, I’m Harlow,” she says, and it makes her uncomfortable down to her bones to be handing out her name over the phone so easily, but she supposes it doesn’t really matter anymore. Enough people know her now—Sloane, Ruby, Adelaide, Marcy—that she can’t hide, not in the way she’s used to. “So. You’re like, a cop, then?”

Vincent laughs, an infectious sound, and Harlow tries to build a picture of this man in her head: a beat cop in his late fifties, maybe early sixties now, close to retirement, who has spent his entire career fielding petty crimes in Crescent Ridge. Or maybe he actually is what Harlow thought Marcy was, a yes-man who rose through the ranks to get to power, spending his money on sharp suits and shiny watches. “Actually, no,” he says. “I am not now nor have I ever been a cop. I’m a private investigator. I worked alongside the investigation.”

Harlow’s defenses go right back up. “Private investigator?” she says sharply. “So someone paid you to look into the case?”

“No,” Vincent says, his tone attempting reassurance.

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