The Missing Dough(76)

I knew in my heart that this particular group would never perform together again, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her that. “Sounds great,” I said.

As Maddy and I walked to the pizzeria, I asked, “Was it really that bad?”

“No. Once I got the hang of it, it wasn’t too tough at all. Did you two have a nice comfy ride up front?”

“It was fine,” I said. I wasn’t about to tell her how special it had really been. “Now, let’s open the pizzeria back up. I’ll make ’em in back, and you serve ’em out front. How does that sound?”

“Like it’s where we belong,” she said with a laugh.

We didn’t hear a word from Greg or Josh for quite some time, and I kept checking my cell phone to make sure that it was working. Fortunately, we were pretty busy, but every now and then Maddy would come back and ask, “Have you heard anything yet?”

I’d just shake my head and try not to worry about the possible danger I’d put them both in. It was amazing how responsible I felt for the two grown men. If anything happened to either one of them, I’d never be able to forgive myself.

“Should we call them?” Maddy asked the last time she came in.

“We have to show them that we trust them,” I said. “Let’s give them a little more time.”

I was about to break down and call them anyway when Josh finally showed up first. Maddy followed close on his heels all the way back to the kitchen. “I couldn’t wait to find out what he had to say, and he wouldn’t tell me a thing unless you could hear it, too,” she explained.

“You’ve got three minutes until this sandwich is ready to deliver,” I said.

She looked at Josh and said, “Then you’d better talk fast.”

He shrugged. “Okay, but it’s not all that much. After they split up, I followed Samantha, just like you asked me to do.”

“Where did she go first?” I asked.

“She headed straight for an Internet café in town. Samantha spent about a half an hour there, and then she went back to her apartment in Cow Spots and didn’t budge an inch.”

“But that was over two hours ago,” I said. “What did you do after that? Were you just waiting outside of her apartment the whole time?”

“Actually, I went back to Grayson’s Corners.”

“Why did you do that?” Maddy asked.

“I wanted to check the browser history on the computer she was on,” Josh admitted.

“You can do that after she’s signed off? Didn’t she clear it when she left?” I asked.

“She could have, but most folks probably wouldn’t be able to find it. Then again, I’m not most people.” He pulled a few pages of a computer printout out of his back pocket and handed them to me as he added, “Nobody else had been on the computer she was using, so I was able to call this up.”

I read the pages, with Maddy looking over my shoulder. “It’s a one-way ticket to London,” I said.

“Look when she’s leaving.” Josh said.

“She’s going tomorrow?” I asked. “How can she leave so soon?”

“She was willing to pay a premium price for the ticket,” Josh said. “I’ve got a feeling that she’s not coming back anytime soon.”

I glanced over at the oven and saw that the sandwich was ready. As I cut it and put it in on a plate, I said, “Maddy, you need to serve this while it’s hot.”

“Don’t say anything until I get back,” she said.

“There’s nothing else to tell,” Josh said. “The second I found this, I came straight here.” He handed Maddy her keys. “Thanks for letting me borrow your car.”

“I was happy to,” she said and then took the food.

After she had left, Josh asked, “Does that mean I’m finished for the night?”

I laughed as I threw his apron at him. “Sorry, but we need you here now. Go ahead and give Maddy a hand out front, okay?”

“You bet,” he said.

Before he left, I said, “You did a nice job, Josh.”

“Thanks.”

There was something I needed to know, but I wasn’t sure if I should ask him. Finally, I decided that the suspense of not knowing would be the hardest of all. “Are you going to tell your dad about this?”

“Should I?” he asked as he tied the back of his apron.

I thought about it and began to wonder what the right thing to do was in this situation. A part of me wanted to keep this a secret between us, but how would Kevin feel when he found out that his son might have been withholding valuable information from him when he still had the chance to do something about it? “Call him and tell him what you know,” I said.