Officer Monday returned to the patrol car to see about getting in touch with Daddy.

At one point, Mother broke away and started running up the street, insisting that the search go on and that we shouldn’t wait for additional assistance. We were wasting precious time. She had started toward someone’s front door when they rushed up to her. She was pulling her own hair and had to be forcibly restrained. The policewoman, Officer Denker, asked me for the name of our doctor.

“She has to be calmed down. She could hurt herself,” she told me.

I gave her Dr. Bloom’s name. Simon Adams stood off to the side now, looking too stunned to speak. I laughed to myself, imagining that he was thinking, What did I get myself into? I was surprised when Officer Monday came over to tell me they had located my father and that he was going to meet us at our house. I had thought for sure he was on some business trip miles and miles away.

We hadn’t had much contact with Daddy after the divorce had been finalized. Mother seemed to keep up with the news about him and his girlfriend. Apparently, from the last we were told, that romance had ended, and Daddy was living in an apartment by himself. We were supposed to go to dinner with him a week from now. Almost daily, Mother warned us that he would try to play on our sympathies.

“Poor him,” she said. “He’s alone again. But he’s always been alone. He prefers it, no matter what he tells you. He’s too selfish to be with anyone,” she assured us. “Don’t waste a tear on him.”

Mother had practically passed out by this time, emotionally exhausted. Officer Denker was with her in the rear of one of the patrol cars, commiserating. I had heard her tell Mother that she, too, had a teenage daughter. Mother looked at her and shook her head. Kaylee wasn’t simply a teenage daughter. Didn’t she understand? Kaylee and I were special.

Naturally, all the police activity in front of the movie theater had drawn a crowd. Anyone who showed up was questioned, but as I expected and hoped, no one knew anything. Two plainclothes detectives arrived, and I had to tell my story again. A Lieutenant Cowan asked the questions. He was older than Detective Simpson, who I didn’t think was much older than a college student. He was by far better-looking, with sort of rusty light-brown hair and greenish-brown eyes. Every time I answered one of Lieutenant Cowan’s questions, I looked at Detective Simpson to see his reaction. I even smiled at him once.

“We’ll need your sister’s computer,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “Your dad’s on his way, and your family doctor is coming to your home for your mother, so why don’t you ride back with us and keep telling us all you know, all you remember?”

“I’d better ask my mother,” I said, looking at the patrol car she was in.

“Better to just come along,” Lieutenant Cowan said. “She’s calmed a bit. They’ll start for your house.”

I shrugged and followed them to their car. Before I got in, I looked at Simon Adams. He appeared to be totally lost now and not sure if he should remain waiting.

“My mother’s date doesn’t know anything,” I told Detective Simpson. “Maybe you should tell him to go home. My father’s coming,” I added, implying that this might be a problem.

He looked at Simon and then at Lieutenant Cowan, who nodded.

“Get his name, address, and contact numbers,” Lieutenant Cowan told him.

I got into the backseat.

The patrol car taking my mother started to leave. When it pulled in front of us, I saw her spin around in the backseat and press her face to the rear window, looking as if she was clawing at it with her hands while she screamed. I looked down quickly, mostly embarrassed by her. Everyone will see how pathetic she is, but the good news is that most will feel sorry for me, I thought. Not only have I probably lost my sister, my other half, but my mother won’t be the same.

They’d be right about that. Mother was going to need me. She’d need me twice as much as she ever had, especially with Daddy not living with us. I’d have to be more like Kaylee sometimes, but that was all right, because I could go right back to being myself. Without Kaylee there, I could do many new things, and everything I wore would seem to be mine alone. There would be no one imitating me, duplicating me.

“Keep thinking about this,” Lieutenant Cowan said as we waited for Detective Simpson. “Every little detail that comes to mind will be helpful. Don’t think anything is too small to be important.”

“I really don’t know all that much,” I said. “I didn’t want my sister to continue corresponding with him, and she knew it, so she kept most of it from me.”

Detective Simpson got in.

“She told you his name, you said,” Lieutenant Cowan said as he pulled away from the curb.

“Bob Brukowski. But to be honest, I think she made it up,” I said. “She was afraid I might do a search or something and find out that he was a criminal.”

“You two are pretty close, though, right?” Detective Simpson asked.

“Two sisters couldn’t be any closer unless they were physically attached,” I said. “We never kept secrets from each other, but Kaylee was determined to be more of her own person, and I didn’t want to stand in her way.”

Neither spoke for a while.

“Did she ever print anything out from him to show you, or show you his picture? Maybe you know where that is?”

“No. Everything I knew she to

ld me. I never saw anything. She was possessive about her new relationship. It was the first real thing she had that I didn’t.”

“You didn’t share boyfriends,” Lieutenant Cowan said. I was silent. He turned back to glance at me. “Did you?”

Tags: V.C. Andrews The Mirror Sisters Suspense
Source: readsnovelonline.net