Don't Say a Word - Barbara Freethy [38]
"Sarah," she said immediately, her mouth drawing into a tight line. "He used to talk to someone named Sarah on the phone late at night. Whenever I came in the room, he'd hang up. But sometimes I'd listen outside the door, and I'd hear him laughing or whispering."
A wave of uneasiness swept through him at that piece of information. "Do you know Sarah's last name?"
She gave a quick shake of her head. "I asked Charles, but he never answered me. He said she was an old friend, and I was paranoid. He always said I was paranoid, but I wasn't, Alex. I knew something was off with him before we separated. I knew he was lying to me. He was too evasive, too distracted, too secretive. When I asked him to trust me enough to tell me the truth, he couldn't. That's when I told him I wanted a divorce. It wasn't because I didn't love him. It was because I loved him too much."
Alex didn't want to get into a discussion of his parents' marriage. His own memory was not one of love', but of bitter discord about everything and anything. They'd fought, yelled, screamed at each other. Then his father would slink into the shadows, and his mother would slam her bedroom door. He had often wondered how they'd ever gotten together in the first place. But he had to admit he'd put the blame on his mother more than his father. He'd heard her yelling, but he'd never seen evidence of his father's secrecy.
"There are always two sides, Alex," she said softly now. "To every story."
He looked into her eyes, searching for truth and honesty, but deep down inside he still didn't trust her not to be exaggerating or even lying about the past. "I've got to run," he said. "Just don't talk to anyone else about Julia or that photo, all right?"
"Does this mean you won't be leaving town anytime soon?"
"Not until I get to the bottom of this mystery."
"Are you personally interested in Julia?"
"I barely know her," he prevaricated.
"She's a beautiful woman."
She was beautiful, and he hadn't been able to stop thinking about her since she'd showed up at his door on Friday. But he didn't intend to share that with his mother.
"You always loved that photo," Kate said with a speculative glint in her eye. "I caught you staring at it more than once after your father died. That little girl-she called out to you in some way."
"Because I didn't know why she was so important. And I still don't. But I'm going to find out."
The violin solo playing through her headphones was hauntingly beautiful, meant to soothe and relax. The tension in Julia's neck and shoulders had just begun to ease when the phone on her desk rang yet again. Since she'd returned home from her afternoon radio show, the phone had been ringing every fifteen minutes. It was always the same person, Christine Delaney, a reporter with the Tribune, who asked her to call back as soon as possible. She had no intention of calling her back. What would she say?
Julia slipped off her headphones in time to hear Christine's voice on the answering machine. She glanced away from the offending phone to meet Liz's annoyed glare. Her sister, wearing yoga pants and a sweatshirt, sat with her bare feet propped up on the coffee table, a bowl of ice cream on her lap, the television blaring reruns of Seinfeld.
"She's not going to stop calling until you call her back," Liz said, as she muted the television. "This is really annoying."
"And I should tell her what?"
"That you're not that girl."
"I need proof."
"Is that what you're looking for on the Internet?"
Julia stared at the computer screen in front of her. That's exactly what she was doing. She'd put in the few small clues her father had given her, hoping that somewhere there might be some information she could tie back to her mother.
Liz set her bowl down on the table, got up, and crossed the room to peer over Julia's shoulder. "You're looking