Hold Tight (2008) by Coben Harlan

Author:Coben, Harlan [Coben, Harlan]
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-01-13T03:03:10.218000+00:00

"I guess so, yes."

Chapter 23.

TIA opened the door before Betsy Hill had a chance to knock and asked without preamble: "Do you know where Adam is?"

The question startled Betsy Hill. Her eyes widened and she stopped. She saw Tia's face and quickly shook her head. "No," she said, "I have no idea."

"Then why are you here?"

Betsy Hill shook her head. "Adam is missing?"

"Yes."

Betsy's face lost color. Tia could only imagine what horrible memory this was conjuring up. Hadn't Tia thought before about how similar this whole thing was to what happened to Spencer?

"Tia?"

"Yes."

"Did you check the high school roof?"

Where Spencer was found.

There was no argument, no more discussion. Tia called out to Jill that she'd be right back--Jill would soon be old enough to leave alone for brief spells and it couldn't be helped--and then both women ran toward Betsy Hill's car.

Betsy drove. Tia sat frozen in the front passenger seat. They had driven two blocks when Betsy said, "I talked to Adam yesterday."

Tia heard the words, but they didn't fully reach her. "What?"

"Do you know about the memorial they did for Spencer on MySpace?"

Tia tried to swim through the haze, pay attention. The memorial site on MySpace. She remembered hearing about it a few months ago.

"Yes."

"There was a new picture on it."

"I don't understand."

"It was taken right before Spencer died."

"I thought he was alone the night he died," Tia said.

"So did I."

"I'm still not following."

"I think," Betsy Hill said, "that Adam was with Spencer that night."

Tia turned to face her. Betsy Hill had her eyes on the road. "And you talked to him about this yesterday?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"In the lot after school."

Tia remembered the instant messages with CeeJay8115:

What's wrong?

His mother approached me after school.

Tia asked, "Why didn't you come to me?"

"Because I didn't want to hear your explanation, Tia," Betsy said. There was an edge in her voice now. "I wanted to hear Adam's."

The high school, a sprawling edifice of numbing brick, loomed in the distance. Betsy had barely come to a stop when Tia was already out the door and sprinting toward the brick building. Spencer's body, she remembered, had been found on one of the lower roofs, a well-known smoking hangout from way back when. There was a ledge by a window. The kids would hop up there and scale a gutter.

"Wait," Betsy Hill called out.

But Tia was almost there. It was Saturday, but there were still plenty of cars in the lots. All SUVs and minivans. There were kids' baseball games and soccer clinics. Parents stood on the sidelines clutching Starbucks cups, gabbing on cell phones, snapping photos with long-range lenses, fiddling with BlackBerrys. Tia had never liked going to Adam's sporting events because as much as she didn't want to, she ended up caring too much. She loathed those pushy parents who lived and breathed their child's athletic prowess-- found them both petty and pitiful--and wanted to be nothing like them. But when she watched her own son compete, she felt so much, worried so about Adam's happiness, that his highs and lows wore her down.

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