After she got the job as Artist-in-Residence, Nola would spend every morning going over the nightly blotter reports from military bases and government facilities. Combing through them, she’d pick the most interesting one and race to paint it. It was the best benefit of the job: she got to choose where she went.
Usually, a 7C1—a simple burglary—wouldn’t catch her attention. But when she looked at the report and spotted Mint’s name as one of the investigators . . . what else was Nola supposed to do?
This was her chance. For so long, she didn’t want to pry, didn’t want to disrupt her little girl’s world. But now . . . she had a chance to see her—or at least see Mint—up close. At the very least, she’d get to meet the man who was raising her daughter. She double-checked the location. Barely two hours away. How could she not check it out? Just to get even the smallest piece of info about the little girl she’d left behind. On that day, it wasn’t dumb luck that brought Nola to Grandma’s Pantry. It was something far more personal.
Back when she was enlisted, Army psychiatrists would say that Sergeant First Class Nola Brown was incapable of forming attachments—incapable of loving herself or anyone else—because of early neglect. They were wrong.
“I’d like to go now,” Nola insisted, turning away from the glass window and heading up the hospital hallway.
104
Elmswood, Pennsylvania
Today
By the time Waggs left, a crescent moon was winking from the sky.
“Seriously, I owe all of you beers,” she called to the four cops trailing behind her as she stepped onto the Mints’ manicured lawn.
Two of the cops were already on their radios, calling details back to headquarters as they headed to their cars.
Nola was gone, her car nowhere in sight. It didn’t stop Waggs from scanning the cul-de-sac, with its waiting ambulance, two police cars, and a chubby neighbor standing there with a baby stroller, pretending to walk his equally chubby English bulldog, but really just gawking.
“Give them some privacy,” Waggs barked at Stroller Man.
For half a second, the man reached for his phone.
“Take that phone out. Watch what happens,” Waggs added.
Making a face, the man picked up his bulldog, put him in the stroller, and disappeared up the block. There was no baby in it. It was just for the dog.
Waggs glanced down at her phone. Her last text was fifteen minutes ago, to Zig: Where r u?
Still no reply. She tapped her keypad twice, texting him a quick ?? as if two question marks would up the ante. Still nothing. Heading to her own car, she was staring down at her phone as she slid inside.
“Nola, you think I don’t see you there?” Waggs asked, glancing in the rearview.
Behind her in the back seat, Nola’s pointy features looked even more pronounced in the dark.
“I didn’t think you were the dramatic type,” Waggs added, “but driving your car around the block so everyone thinks you’re gone, then walking back here to surprise me in mine—that’s a lotta extra steps.”
“How’s Mrs. Mint?”
“I’m not your chauffeur. Get in the front.”
Nola sat there, stubborn as ever.
“Front. Seat,” Waggs growled in a tone Nola hadn’t heard before.
Grudgingly, Nola elbowed open the back door, stepped outside, then opened the front door and slid into the passenger seat. The way Waggs had parked, Mint’s house and the heart of the cul-de-sac were behind them. Smart, Nola thought. If things went south and anyone ran, Waggs was ready to give chase.
With a tug, Nola pulled the door shut, never taking her eyes off the ambulance in the rearview—or the cops, whose headlights blinked to life.