Let Me Call You Sweetheart

96

It took Kerry twenty-five minutes to drive to Old Tappan. Every turn of the wheel seemed interminable. Robin, brave little Robin, who always tried to hide how disappointed she was when Bob sloughed her off, who today had so successfully hidden how scared she was-it had finally become too much for her. I never should have left her with anyone else, Kerry thought. Even Jonathan and Grace.

Even Jonathan and Grace.

Jonathan had sounded so odd on the phone, Kerry thought.

From now on, I’ll take care of my baby, Kerry vowed.

The momma and the baby-there it was again, that phrase stuck in her mind.

She was entering Old Tappan. Only a few minutes more now.

Robin had seemed so pleased at the prospect of being with Grace and Jonathan and of going through the photo albums.

The photo albums.

Kerry was driving past the last house before reaching Jonathan’s. She was turning into the driveway. Almost unconsciously she realized that the sensor lights did not go on.

The photo albums.

The flower-and-bud pin.

She had seen it before.

On Grace.

Years ago, when Kerry first started to work for Jonathan. Grace used to wear her jewelry then. Many pictures in the album showed her wearing it. Grace had joked when Kerry admired that pin. She’d called it “the momma and the baby.”

Suzanne Reardon was wearing Grace’s pin in that newspaper picture! That must mean… Jonathan? Could he have given it to her?

She remembered now that Grace had told her that she had asked Jonathan to put all her jewelry in the safe-deposit box. “I can’t put it on without help, and I can’t get it off without help, and I would only worry about it if it were still in the house.”

I told Jonathan I was going in to see Dr. Smith, Kerry realized. Last night, after I came home, I told Jonathan I thought Smith would crack, she said to herself. Oh my God! He must have shot Smith.

Kerry stopped the car. She was in front of the handsome limestone residence. She pushed the driver’s-side door open and rushed up the steps.

Robin was with a murderer.

Kerry did not hear the faint pealing of the car telephone as she pressed her finger on the doorbell.