Ominous (Private 13)

Noelle rolled her eyes and summoned the waiter with a flick of her hand. “I’ll have the salmon and they’ll both have the heaviest pasta you’ve got on the menu.”

“What?” I said, lifting the phone to my ear as it began to ring. “Why?”

Noelle crunched on a cube of ice and sighed. “Because maybe if I can lull you guys into a food coma, I can prevent this thing from happening.”

“Somehow I can’t see Eliza and Catherine shopping for candles inside a Pottery Barn,” I said as we stepped through the huge glass doors, out of the frigid cold and into the warm, airy shop on Fifth Avenue.

“Yeah, well, it’s the one place you can always guarantee they’ll have white candles,” Noelle said, standing next to me. She sighed and shook her head. “I still can’t believe we’re doing this.”

“Come on,” Ivy said, breezing by with an empty wire shopping basket dangling from her arm. “They usually keep the candles in back.”

Heaving another sigh, Noelle followed after Ivy and Goran trailed her, his head swiveling slowly from right to left as if it were on a timer. Noelle pulled out her iPhone to check her messages as she skirted a couple of little kids chasing each other with pillows. Sam and I tried to catch up, but a woman in a wheelchair cut me off and stopped in the middle of the aisle to inspect a mahogany desk. Glancing at Noelle’s retreating back, I hooked a right and started to go around a table full of plates and napkins, when I spotted a silver clock on a shelf, shaped like an old-school airplane. The face of the clock was the front of the plane, and the hands were the propellers. My father would love it. And after my conversation with Noelle’s dad the night before, I’d been feeling a lot of guilt about my dad, as if just talking to Mr. Lange were a betrayal.

I picked up the clock and checked the price. There was a red slash through the bar code on the sticker and the scrawled note 1/2 off! Sweet. I always had a hard time finding gifts for my dad that weren’t Pirates-, Penguins-, or Steelers-related.

Sam turned so that a middle-aged guy could get by us, and I felt suddenly uncomfortable. It was weird, being shadowed by someone I’d barely talked to.

“What do you think of this?” I asked, holding it up.

He frowned, surprised. “It’s a plane clock.”

I blinked. “Yeah …?”

“Why would you want a clock made out of a plane?” he asked, his brow knitting.

“Because it’s cute,” I replied.

“Never understand what people will spend their money on around here,” he said under his breath, shaking his head and looking off toward the door.

My face burned, but I chose to ignore him. Glancing around the side of the towering display, I saw Noelle and Ivy pause near the back of the store. I grabbed one of the boxed clocks off the highest shelf, then went to join my friends. Actually, I probably shouldn’t have left those two alone for as long as I already had. Knowing them, they were probably fighting over whether we should get twelve-inch tapers or nine. A crowd of female shoppers in fur coats skirted right past me, one of them elbowing me aside as if I wasn’t even there, and I bit my tongue. I stood on my toes to try to see over their shoulders as they walked toward the stairs to the second floor. I spotted the candle section, but Noelle and Ivy were suddenly nowhere in sight.

I paused near a basket of white votives and looked around. Where had they disappeared to?

Then, suddenly, my heart lurched. Had they actually disappeared?

But you didn’t dream about Noelle and Ivy going missing, a little voice in my head told me.

Then I scoffed, unable to believe my inner voice thought that was a logical argument.

Sam had stopped at the end of the aisle, but he didn’t seem perturbed that the others were gone. I supposed that as long as I was safe, he was doing his job. I scanned the store again, flipping my hair over my shoulder, trying to look casual. I didn’t see Noelle’s tall frame or Ivy’s dark hair anywhere. All we were supposed to do was buy some candles. What were they doing? Browsing the linens section?

I tucked the plane under my arm and took off, walking the aisles at the back of the store one by one. Every time I came to a corner I told myself they’d be around the next one, but they never were. When I got to the kitchen section I paused to take a breath, and felt a sudden, foreboding tingle down the back of my spine.

Someone was watching me.

“Everything okay?” Sam asked,

I jumped and nearly knocked over a precarious stack of heavy white dinnerware.

“Yeah. I’m fine. I just … Where did they go?”

“Hang on,” Sam said. He lifted his hand to his mouth and spoke into his wrist. “G? What’s your twenty?”

He lowered his arms and waited. And waited some more. Then he took a few steps away from me and tried again. “G? Please respond.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone slip into the next aisle. Slim frame, long dark hair, dark skin. My heart leapt to my throat. I took a tentative step away from the wall and peeked between two shelves. The girl’s back was to me, but I could see most of her profile. She wore her hair in a low ponytail, and colorful earrings dangled against her sharp cheekbones.

Sabine.