Free Shadow Image by Martin J Smith Page B

matching lunchbox.
    Christensen tested the weight of Taylor’s pack. “What’s
in
there, buddy?”
    â€œRocks.”
    The phone rang. “Let the machine pick up,” Christensen said, but too late.
    â€œThis is Annie speaking,” she said. His daughter nodded, shrugged, and handed him the phone with a scowl. “It’s not for me.”
    Christensen jammed the phone between his shoulder and his ear. “Hello?”
    â€œYes, uh, I—geez, I was expecting just to leave a message on Brenna’s home answering machine.”
    Christensen paused, struck by the odd sensation of
déjà vu.
He recognized the man’s voice, so familiar, so recent, but couldn’t match it to a face. “She’s not in right now,” he said, “but you can probably reach her at her office.”
    â€œNo, I know that. I just—” The caller hesitated.
    â€œOr I can take a message,” Christensen said. He grabbed the Post-its from the table.
    â€œThis is, uh, a reporter friend of hers.” Bingo. Myron Levin. “I need to talk to her as soon as possible.”
    Nothing made sense. This was the same toad who’d just ambushed Brenna outside her office five minutes earlier, no question. Why was he calling here? “Like I said,” Christensen said, “if you call her office—”
    â€œI left a message there, too, but, uh, just tell her I really need to talk to her.”
    Christensen could see the kids through the open front door, waiting for him by the Explorer. “May I say who’s calling?” he baited.
    â€œMyron. She’ll know. Tell her it’s about an interview with Enrique Chembergo.”
    Christensen scribbled quickly, but stalled at the name. “You’re going to have to spell that one for me.”
    Levin spelled the name, then said, “Just say the gardener. She’ll know.”
    â€œAnd you want to line up an interview with this person?”
    â€œNo, no,” Levin said. “I already talked to him. So just tell her that. Tell her he knows what happened, but not why. Actually, since I’ve got you on the line, any chance you could get that message to her, like, now? Her secretary just took my name and number, but I’ve got some information I really think she might need.”
    â€œI’ll do my best,” Christensen said. “Where can she reach you?” He wrote down Levin’s cell phone and pager numbers, then read them back to make sure he had them right. Through the front door, he could see the kids drawing faces in the accumulated dirt on his car.
    â€œAppreciate the help,” Levin said.
    â€œListen, is there a problem—” The line clicked and went silent, leaving Christensen with his mouth open and, for some reason, the hair on his arms standing on end. “Hello?”
    Despite the rush, he listened until the dial tone returned. He wasn’t sure why.

Chapter 9
    Christensen steered the Explorer through the flock of minivans gathered in front of the Westminster-Stanton School and wheeled into an open spot near the first-grade classrooms. He kissed a hugely embarrassed Annie good-bye in front of a swarm of fellow third-graders and walked Taylor to room 14, where his second-grade teacher, Mrs. Gehrls, seemed to think it perfectly reasonable for a 48-pound transfer student to arrive with a backpack of apparently equal weight. They watched the boy struggle out of the straps and hang the load in the cupboard.
    â€œRocks,” Christensen said.
    The teacher nodded sagely. “I see.”
    He expected tears, or at least trembling hesitation. Taylor could be fragile. When they told him they intended to become a family, Brenna said the prospect brought on three days of relentless anxiety and nausea. He was doing well in his school in Mount Lebanon, even had a few friends, and the idea of changing homes and schools at the same time really threw him. But now, as