Page 96 of Our Little Secret

“No!” Marilee screamed as Brooke fished in her purse for a pack of tissues and handed the entire package to her daughter.

“Then talk.”

“Okay,” Marilee finally said angrily. She plucked out a Kleenex, dabbed at her eyes, and blew her nose. “Alli’s okay.”

“Where is she?”

Silence.

“Marilee, where is she?” Brooke demanded. “And how do you know?”

Her daughter looked up at the ceiling of the car. “She’s hiding,” she whispered, sniffing and fighting back more tears. “Somewhere. Swore us all to secrecy, okay? I don’t know where, so don’t ask me. But her father . . .” She sniffed again. “He was trying to get custody, and her mom was saying all sorts of things about him. Lies. That he like . . . touched her or whatever, and it’s not true, but she didn’t know what to do and so she’s hiding.”

“Where?”

“I—I don’t know.”

“Where?” she said again.

“I said I don’t know! She’s—she’s with a cousin, I think.” Some of the fire had left her and her shoulders slumped, as if she were totally defeated.

“And Penelope?”

“Don’t know. No one does.” She slid her mother a glance. She looked frail and scared and oh so young. “It’s the truth. No one that I know has any idea.”

“Okay. I’m calling Elyse. Right now. She’ll want to talk to you.” As a bicycle whizzed by, she found Elyse Carelli’s number and punched it in. The phone was answered after one ring.

“Hello?” Elyse answered breathlessly.

“Hey, Elyse, this is Brooke Harmon, Marilee’s mother,” Brooke said, her gaze pinned on her daughter. “Marilee thinks she may know where Allison is.”

CHAPTER 22

Brooke heard a gasp on the other end of the wireless call. “What? Marileeknows? Oh my God, I can’t believe it!” Elyse Carelli’s voice cracked. “For the love of God, where is she?”

Glancing at her daughter, who seemed to want to melt into the floorboards, Brooke said, “Allison may be with a cousin.”

“What? A cousin? No way? Like Diane?” Elyse’s voice faded, as if she’d turned away from the phone. “Tony!” she yelled. “Tony! Get the hell in here! Marilee Harmon says Allison is with Diane.”

“What?” a male voice said faintly. Then, more clearly, “Diane? Are you shittin’ me? We talked to her! That little liar—”

“No!” Marilee cut in, shaking her head violently as she heard the conversation. “It’s . . . it’s . . . a guy cousin, I think. And that’s . . . that’s all I know.”

“Did you hear that?” Brooke asked. “Marilee said she thinks it’s a male cousin.”

“Yeah, but she doesn’t have any boy cousins. All girls . . .” Elyse muttered, her voice drifting off. “Oh fuck, is she talking about Robert?” she said on a gasp. “Holy shit! Tony! We need to check with Robert ASAP—no, better yet, go there! You drive over there. Just show the fuck up! That little son of a—oooh!”

Marilee slunk down further in her seat.

“And Allison. Why would she do this to us?” Elyse’s voice was clogged, as if she were fighting sobs. “Why would she put us through this? I thought . . . I mean I was almost sure that she was . . . that I would never see her again!”

“Tell them everything you know,” Brooke instructed her daughter as she put the phone on speaker.

Haltingly, shooting daggers at her mother with her eyes, Marilee repeated what she’d told Brooke a few minutes earlier amid gasps and expletives from the other side of the connection. She heard Tony say, “I’m going over there right now!” just before a door slammed, while Elyse started crying in earnest.

By the time the call was over, Marilee, pale as death, cowered against the window, where her heart drawing was disappearing. “Can we just go now?”

“I guess.” Brooke put the car into gear and pulled away from the curb.