Love You Madly(3)

“Would Darcy have tried to reach out to her? Maybe decide to visit her and have some long-awaited confrontation. A reunion    ?”

“No. Darcy has never wanted to have anything to do with that woman. Not since she—she left.”

Something Meredith understood too well. Darcy and Meredith were of the same opinion on this score. If someone didn’t want you, then to hell with them. Lesson learned. Because loving someone was a risk—it left you vulnerable. Better not to let anyone in until you were sure they weren’t going to hurt you.

Or leave.

She worked to keep her voice casual. “Even if she wanted to contact her mother, I’m not sure she would know how. As for her stepfather—my former husband—they were sort of close up until recently.” When her third and last husband decided to take up with a girl just barely older than Darcy. “I called him, but he hadn’t heard from her. Not since graduation.”

“Have a picture?”

She opened her mouth to let Travis know he could at least follow the rules of common courtesy and follow his requests with a please or thank-you. But just as quickly she snapped it shut. Focus.

This was about Darcy.

She took out her wallet and opened it. “This was taken last month. Her high school graduation.”

The picture was of both Meredith and Darcy together, her daughter’s clear face bright with excitement and optimism, although Meredith could almost see the frustration clouding her daughter’s eyes from an argument they had that very morning. The same argument they’d been having since Darcy told her she wanted to go to a school as far across the United States as she could find to get away from her. Okay, maybe she hadn’t said those exact words, but that was what it had felt like to Meredith.

She slid the photo across the table to him. If he saw any distress in her face, he didn’t comment, much to her relief. He held the photo up and stared at it.#p#分页标题#e#

“Since that picture was taken, Darcy got a haircut, added highlights. Even started wearing some makeup, bought new clothes…”

His green eyes had been focused on the photo, but now raised to meet hers. “And you’re sure there wasn’t a boyfriend?”

“No, definitely not.” But she shifted a bit uncomfortably under that searching gaze. Sure, she and Darcy didn’t exactly confide all the details of their lives to each other, but Meredith would know if her daughter was seeing someone. “She’s leaving for college next month. Wellesley College. I think she wanted to change things up, look a little more mature. Lord knows I’ve always told her she really should wear her hair in a more becoming…” She trailed off again. They had always argued about that point. It was almost like Darcy was purposefully trying to look her worst, just to test her.

It all seemed really unimportant now.

She took a deep breath and stared at her hands. If she— No. When she got her daughter back, she promised herself she would be more supportive. More understanding. Even if Darcy wanted to put two thousand miles between them. Just…let her come back.

Travis tucked the photo in his front pocket. “You last saw her at six last night. Anything unusual happen? Did she say anything?”

This was where she’d seen the light of understanding in the police officer’s eyes earlier change to skepticism. But if she was going to get Darcy home, she had to tell him everything. “We may have…argued a little.”

Sure enough, a brow shot up and he sat a little farther back in his seat as he waited for her to expand.

“It wasn’t a big deal. I don’t particularly care for the woman she was babysitting for and had voiced some frustration. That’s all. It wasn’t a new argument and nothing that would send my daughter running away. She’s not hotheaded like that.”

“So let me make sure I understand everything. The girl’s mother abandoned her when she was a kid, her dad died, and you’re basically all she has.” He said that in a way that was almost insulting but she stayed silent. “Her stepfather hasn’t seen her in weeks. You insist she doesn’t have a boyfriend even though she’s been lying to you about hanging out with her best friend the past couple of weeks, so you really don’t have any idea where or who she’s been with. And then the two of you got into an argument last night and now she’s missing. I don’t know. Sounds like a girl who would have a lot of reasons to want to leave for a couple of days. Blow off some steam.”

The worst thing about what he’d just recounted to her was…he was totally right. Except for the part where Darcy would ever take off without leaving some word.