The hairs on the back of Cassie’s neck rose. She sensed both occupants of the Toyota were staring at her, following her with their shaded eyes, not moving their heads, not saying a word.
Cassie checked the park and her heart sank. The nanny and kids had almost disappeared through a far entrance, the jogger long gone, the woman who’d been feeding the birds already driving away.
Stop it. It’s no big deal. Weren’t you just doing the same thing? Sitting in your car, observing everyone else. The park is a public place, for crying out loud.
Still, she felt uneasy as she headed back toward her car.
As she did a door clicked open and the woman stepped out of the SUV.
She was slim. Attractive. With thick black hair cut at an angle, her oversize sunglasses hiding her face. She raised a hand. “Cassie?” she called and her voice was vaguely familiar. “Cassie Kramer?” Two inches shorter than Cassie, she walked purposely across the spaces separating their vehicles. Before she said, “Whitney Stone,” Cassie recognized the reporter.
And her heart nosedived.
She braced herself.
Whitney Stone was smiling, white teeth flashing above a pointed chin, her arm outstretched as if she and Cassie were long-lost friends or at the very least acquaintances.
Cassie ignored the friendly hand reaching for hers and saw the tiny tightening of the corners of Whitney Stone’s mouth. In her free hand was a microphone. “I’m the producer and reporter for Justice: Stone Cold.”
Cassie didn’t need to know what the reporter wanted. She could guess because the subject of interest never changed: Allie. Always Allie. Interest in Cassie was limited to the fact that she was Allie Kramer’s sister and, of course, Jenna Hughes’s daughter. Now that Allie was missing, even Jenna had become an adjunct to the real matter of interest, the “story.”
From the corner of her eye Cassie witnessed the guy in the passenger seat toss his cigarette out the window, climb out of the SUV, and, while crushing the smoldering butt with his shoe, head their way. A bruiser in jeans and a black T-shirt, with huge biceps, receding hairline, and a swagger, he w
as carrying a shoulder camera as if it weighed nothing.
“I’d like a few minutes with you,” Whitney was saying as her companion hoisted his camera to his shoulder. “We’re doing a series on the mystery surrounding Allie Kramer’s disappearance.”
“No, thanks.” Cassie was firm.
Whitney Stone barreled on, “Since you’re Allie Kramer’s sister and are rumored to be the last person to see her before she vanished, I think your input is necessary.”
“Not interested.” Cassie started moving toward her car.
Whitney offered that well-practiced smile again as she eased between Cassie and her car. “I’d just like to talk to you about your sister. It could be helpful, I think, in finding her.” Whitney Stone was scrambling now. “I know you want to know what happened to her and together we could—”
“I said I wasn’t interested and I’m not.” By now Cassie had angled to her car but she saw that the cameraman had positioned his camera so that it was focused on her, its red light a beacon warning that he was filming. Bastard!
“The public wants to know—”
“About Allie? Yeah, I know, but I have nothing to say.” She was aware of the cameraman, moving in closer, focusing on her face. “Don’t,” she warned him.
“Nothing?” Whitney repeated as a gust of wind kicked up, pushing a bit of trash across the parking lot and causing Whitney’s sleek hair to ruffle. “You don’t want to say anything to the public, to find a way to locate your sister?”
Cassie ignored the barb with an effort and kept walking.
“Come on, you two were close at least at one time, that’s what I’m told.”
“Who told you that?” Cassie blurted while trying and failing to hold her tongue. She was tired and cranky from lack of sleep and she didn’t need Whitney Stone’s questions or her innuendos.
“Common knowledge.”
Was it? Cassie didn’t think so and there was something smarmy about Whitney that really got under her skin. And wasn’t she based out of Portland? Cassie thought she’d heard that from someone, a producer who had worked on her show. “Why are you in LA?” she asked. And then she got it, everything that wasn’t making sense fell easily into place. “Oh, God, no. You’re here at this park because of me. You found out that I . . .” She was going to say “checked out of the hospital,” but caught herself. Instead she swung her arm in a wide arc to include herself, her car, and the park in general. “How did you know I’d be here?” When Whitney wasn’t quick with an answer, Cassie guessed the answer. “You followed me here? To California? You . . . what? Flew down here? Staked out my place?” Her mind was running now, imagining how the reporter had located her at this random park.
Again she was met with righteous silence, as if Whitney Friggin’ Stone had the right to invade and stomp on her privacy. “I can’t believe it,” Cassie whispered, stunned. It hadn’t been Holly Dennison she’d felt eyeing her at the airport at all. It was the woman standing before her, microphone in hand. Damn! And that silver SUV she’d caught a glimpse of in her rearview mirror? Hadn’t it been identical to the Toyota 4Runner parked a stone’s throw from her own car?
“I called,” Whitney said.
“I got your messages,” Cassie shot back, “but I thought you were in Portland.”