You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone (2 page)

Briarwood Court was walking distance from shopping, restaurants, and the bus to downtown Seattle. Another plus about the location: it was a mere ten-minute drive to Luke's town house on Queen Anne Hill. She'd had her first date with him just a week after she and Spencer had moved into the apartment. She remembered thinking at the time that everything was finally going their way. She'd met a great guy, and she and Spencer had found a terrific place to live.

But with its own separate, outside entrance, the big windows and a designated uncovered parking spot, the apartment in Briarwood Court also made her and Spencer vulnerable to anyone who had it out for them.

They were still relatively new to the complex when somebody broke a headlight on her VW during the night. The car had been in its parking spot. As if a broken headlight weren't enough, the culprit had also scratched the driver's side with a key or a box cutter or something. Andrea reported it to the police and her insurance company. The police asked her if she had any idea who might have inflicted this damage on her car. She thought of Luke's wife, but quickly dismissed the notion as silly. She told the police she didn't have a clue who the perpetrator was.

Around this same time, Andrea experienced a surge in hang-ups on her cell phone—always from a
CALLER UNKNOWN,
according to the caller ID. Even when she answered, they hung up after a moment. It was as if they just wanted to hear her voice—or make certain she was home. She got one of those anonymous hang-ups at two in the morning; after that, Andrea switched off her phone before going to bed at night.

But she couldn't flick a switch and turn off the eerie feeling that someone was watching her whenever she set foot outside the apartment. Or maybe they were out there in the dark, studying her through the living room's big picture window. There weren't many streetlights on their block, so at night all she could see outside were some trees and the lights from the apartment building across the way. But she knew her every move was visible to anyone out there. In the darkened glass of the living room windows, she'd notice her own reflection in the room.

She imagined it was exactly how a stranger lurking outside saw her.

Andrea started closing the drapes once dusk settled. It made her feel closed in, and not all that much safer. But at least she knew no one could see her.

One morning, Spencer started off for school and almost stepped on a dead squirrel on their front stoop. And someone had trampled all over her newly planted flowers. Andrea talked to the manager, who seemed to think she was paranoid. She asked if the previous tenant had ever had a stalker—or any enemies. The manager said a quiet seventy-something widower had lived there for eight years before her. “And
he
never gave me any problems,” he added, scowling at her.

At least Spencer didn't think she was paranoid. In fact, he couldn't help wondering if someone in Seattle knew about him after all—and maybe this was a campaign to make him feel unwelcome.

Andrea tried to assure her nephew that it wasn't about him. He wasn't the one getting ten hang-ups on his cell phone every day.

Then about five weeks ago, Andrea heard from a friend and client, Sylvia Goethals in Washington, DC. Andrea had copyedited seven of Sylvia's travel books. At the time of Sylvia's call, Andrea had thought her friend was in India, researching her next book. But no, Sylvia was home: “Andie, I think you should know, some private detective came to my book signing at Barnes and Noble this afternoon, asking questions about you.”

“You're kidding,” Andrea murmured, bewildered. She stood at the living room window with the phone to her ear. It was early in the evening, and she hadn't closed the drapes yet. “What—what did he want? Did he mention who he was working for?”

“No, he wouldn't say who hired him,” Sylvia replied. “But that didn't stop this joker from asking a ton of questions about you. He was very clever about it. Unfortunately, I didn't have that good a turnout at the bookstore, so he started talking to me and I was a captive audience. He didn't say who he was at first. I thought he was looking for an editor when he asked about you. He must have Googled you and found your name in the acknowledgments section of one of my books. He knew we were friends. Anyway, when he started asking personal questions about you, that's when I put the brakes on . . .”

“Did he know about Spencer?” Andrea started pacing around the living room. “Did he give any indication?”

“Yes, he clearly knew. He even mentioned that he'd talked to some of the witnesses at the trial. Anyway, he gave me his business card, and I realized he was a private detective. He asked me about the men you've dated and if you had any long-term boyfriends. I told him if he was so curious, maybe he should ask you . . .”

Andrea wondered why in the world he'd asked about her love life. Until she'd met Luke, there had been just a few
short
-term boyfriends. Considering her family history, she'd always felt so grateful when a guy—any guy—wanted to go out with her. Usually, it took her a few dates for the blind gratitude to wear off. Then she'd realize the guy was totally wrong for her.

“Andie, are you still there?” her friend asked on the other end of the line.

“Yeah, sorry,” she murmured, moving to the window again. “What else did he ask about?”

“That was it,” Sylvia said. “Obviously, he realized I wasn't going to cooperate. I told him if he wasn't going to buy one of my books, he could move on . . .”

Andrea stared at her reflection in the darkened glass. She looked frightened and haggard. Her chestnut-colored hair was in a ponytail, and she wore a long-sleeve white T-shirt and jeans. Spencer was up in his room, tinkering with his portable keyboard. She'd been putting together one of her favorite “quick dinners” when Sylvia had called—Trader Joe's Mandarin Orange Chicken, to which she added fresh, steamed vegetables and rice.

Now she didn't have any appetite at all.

“Do you think he knew that we live in Seattle?” she asked.

“He seemed to, yeah,” Sylvia replied.

Andrea was about to turn away from the big window, but then she saw something on the other side of the glass—a small, white object hurtling right toward her. She wasn't sure what it was, but automatically stepped back. The thing—it must have been a rock—hit the glass with a loud snap.

Andrea let out a startled little scream, and almost dropped the phone.

The stone ricocheted off the window. Lightning-bolt splintered cracks shot out from the point of contact.

Spencer called down from upstairs, asking what had just happened. On the other end of the phone line, Sylvia wanted to know if she was all right.

Her heart racing, Andrea retreated all the way to the kitchen counter. She kept expecting another object— maybe a brick this time—to come crashing through the window. She heard a rumbling upstairs.

“Spencer, don't come down here!” she yelled. “And stay away from the windows!”

Her friend was still on the line. “For God's sake, what's going on? Are you okay?”

“Listen, I have to hang up and call the police,” she said, catching her breath. “Someone's been harassing us lately, and they—at least, I think it was them—they just threw a rock at our window. I'll call you back in a little while, Syl.”

“A little while” was an hour later, almost 10:30 for Sylvia on the East Coast. By then, Spencer had ventured down to the living room to join Andrea. The police had arrived—and left already. Andrea had told them about the other incidents: the vandalism to her car, the dead squirrel left on their front stoop, the trampled garden, and the countless hang-ups on her cell phone. The two cops responding to the 911 call had taken notes and given her a card with her “incident number” on it.

On the phone, she assured Sylvia that she and Spencer were okay. By that time she was so frayed she couldn't think straight. She kept wondering why this was happening. Who had she made so angry? No one in Seattle really knew her well enough to hate her. Was there a connection between the private detective asking questions about her and the harassment they'd endured—including tonight's episode?

She remembered her lunch conversation with Barbara James-Church at Café Lola:
“I don't think Evelyn is ready to give him up—not without a fight.”

Andrea couldn't quite picture Luke's chic wife vandalizing cars and tossing rocks at windows. If she was behind any of this, she would have had to hire some lowlife to do her dirty work for her. Suspecting Evelyn seemed like a knee-jerk reaction. She wondered if Luke's son was behind everything that had occurred. But it didn't make sense. His parents had split up long before she'd come into the picture. Besides, what about the private detective? She couldn't see a high school kid having the means to hire a private investigator.

When Luke phoned a little later that night, she told him what had happened. She didn't share with him any of her shaky theories as to who might be responsible. Luke wanted them to spend the night at his place, but Andrea refused to be bullied out of her apartment. So Luke came over. She put the Mandarin Orange Chicken back in the freezer, and they ordered a pizza from Zeek's. The three of them ate in front of
High Fidelity
on cable, and at one point, Andrea realized they were all laughing. And it was nice to sleep with him in her bed.

Things calmed down after that—for nearly two weeks. Andrea welcomed the peaceful lull. Even the anonymous calls had stopped. The living room window and the Volkswagen were repaired. She even planted some new perennials in the little garden. But that didn't mean she wasn't constantly looking over her shoulder, ready for the next “incident.”

She phoned Sylvia to find out more about this pushy private detective. But her friend didn't reply until two days later—by email—saying she was back in India. She didn't remember the investigator's name, but she was pretty sure she'd stuck his card in a drawer at home. She would be coming back to the states in three weeks, and could search for it then. “If it's an emergency, I can ask the building manager to let himself in and look around the apartment for the card,” Sylvia wrote. “But it might be a lost cause. Anyway, let me know what you'd like me to do. Meanwhile, here's hoping you haven't had any more broken windows or things of that sort . . .”

Andrea emailed her friend that it could wait until she was home again and settled in. “Everything's fine here for now” she wrote. “We're okay.” At the time, she felt as if she were jinxing things by putting that in writing.

Perhaps she had.

A few days later, while Spencer was at school, Andrea went out to run some errands. She was gone for just over an hour. Returning home with a bag of groceries from Safeway, she stepped through the front door and started to kick off her shoes. Then she noticed the footwear on the steps. The pairs were all mismatched, lined up alongside the wrong corresponding shoe. It was as if someone were playing a joke on her.

Or maybe they just wanted her to know they could get inside her place now.

Andrea set down the grocery bag and backed out the front door. She kept thinking the culprit might still be inside the apartment. She hurried toward the sidewalk in front of Briarwood Court. With a shaky hand, she grabbed her phone from her purse and called Spencer at school. They usually texted each other, but she couldn't really explain in a text what she needed to know. Fortunately, Spencer was between classes, and he picked up. He told her no, he hadn't messed around with their shoes before catching the bus that morning. He didn't know what she was talking about.

Andrea felt silly, calling the police because someone had rearranged their footwear on the stairs; nevertheless, she phoned them. She said she thought that someone had broken into the apartment and that they might still be in there. She gave them her incident number and waited outside until a patrol car showed up. The two cops went inside the apartment with her. No one was there. Nothing else had been disturbed. Nothing was damaged or missing. She sensed her credibility with them slipping after each room inspection. She pulled the quilt and the sheets off her bed, just to make sure the intruder hadn't slipped anything in there—like another dead squirrel. She was afraid they might have done something to her soap or shampoo, her eyedrops or her perfume. Anything that was open in the medicine chest, the kitchen cupboards or the refrigerator might be tainted.

The two cops recommended that she change her locks and have her home security system upgraded. When they asked if she had any idea who might be harassing her, she thought about Evelyn Shuler again. But she told them she didn't have a clue.

Once the police left, Andrea phoned Luke and admitted her suspicions that Evelyn may have been responsible for these strange, unsettling incidents. “I'm sorry,” she said. “It's an awful thing to say about someone who is still a very important person in your life. And I'm not accusing her. I'm just wondering. I can't think of anyone else who would do this—”

“Honey?” he interrupted.

“Luke, I'm sorry. I have absolutely no proof—”

“Andrea,” he interrupted again. “To tell you the truth, I wouldn't put it past her. I'm so sorry if she's the one who put you through this. I should have seen it earlier. But I have a history of blinding myself to some of the things Evelyn is capable of. I'll have a talk with her. She'll deny it until she's blue in the face and be furious with me. But I'll have a talk with her.”

This time, he insisted she and Spencer come stay with him—at least until all of this was resolved. Spencer could sleep in the guest room, where Damon stayed on alternate weekends. Luke pointed out that, at last, he'd actually have her sleeping in his bed. His room was far enough away from the guest room so she needn't feel self-conscious. Spencer was practically an adult. He knew the score. He knew they were involved. Luke told her, “After what he's been through, I don't think he'll be traumatized because we're sleeping together.”