Dating is Murder Read Online Free PDF Page B

old are you, Emma?”
    “Two and three-quarters.”
    “Two and eleven-twelfths, if you want to get technical,” Maizie said. “Santa brought you to me.” We trooped single-file through a laundry room and hallway to a staircase. I wanted to study details, but with Mr. Snuggles setting the pace and the two blond Quinns flanking me, there was no dawdling. I had an impression of mahogany, Oriental rugs, and lemon oil.
    “Beautiful house,” I said, on the landing.
    “Thanks,” Maizie said. “We love it. Bought at the bottom of the market, and we’ve put a lot into it over the years. Horrible commute, but I tell my husband he’ll have better luck moving his office building than moving me. One more flight up,” she said, as Mr. Snuggles raced down the second-floor hallway. Emma barreled after him, calling, “Loo-pay, Loo-pay, alla myna engine!” From a distant room, a vacuum cleaner switched off. Maizie led me to what looked like a closet, closed with a hook-and-eye latch up high, out of reach of small fingers. This turned out to be the door to another stairway.
    The third floor was an attic room, wallpapered and wood floored and charming.
    Annika wasn’t a slob, but she was no neatnik either. Under the multicolored quilt, the bed was made, but it was the work of an amateur. Books filled the bookshelves, in English and German, along with a collection of videos and DVDs—every genre from
Blade Runner
to
The Parent Trap.
Framed pictures covered a dresser and snapshots overlapped each other on a bulletin board. On the walls were posters: Albert Einstein, Eminem, Keanu Reeves. Maizie opened the door to a cedar-paneled walk-in closet filled with clothes, shoes, suitcases, and the miscellany of a young woman’s life. The suitcases were old and somber, with the look of hand-me-downs, the clothes bright and cheap, built to disintegrate in a year or two.
    “We stayed out of here, except for Lupe, once a week for cleaning, so I can’t say if anything’s missing.” Maizie raised shades and cranked open windows. “I came in last night. I didn’t see a passport, but she always carried that in her purse. Which isn’t here, of course.”
    She seemed to assume that no female would leave the house without a purse. I remembered Annika’s suddenly, a red patent leather shoulder bag.
    “What about that?” I pointed to a computer, hooked up to a small printer. “She wouldn’t leave that behind.”
    Maizie squinted at it. “You don’t think so?”
    “No. She’d been saving up for it forever.”
    “It does look brand-new.” Maizie switched on a Tiffany lamp to get a better look. “I’m afraid my husband is the computer person here. And Emma. It’s scary how quickly children pick up technology. Are these expensive?”
    “Expensive enough.”
    “I guess anything’s expensive on a hundred forty a week. It’s a selling point, how cheap au pairs are, but it’s embarrassing to pay someone so little.” Maizie perched on the edge of the bed, as if afraid to get comfortable, not having been invited. “You know, she’s due to go home next month, so I can’t understand why she’d leave early. The agency imposes a financial penalty if they don’t finish out the year, and she’s very frugal.”
    “It’s true,” I said, still startled by the small salary. “Have you called her mother?”
    “Oh, God.” Maizie looked at me and glanced away. “I don’t have the heart for it. What do I say? I spoke to her once last summer; it’s painful. Her English is bad and my toddler knows more German than I do.” What she’d done, she said, was call the au pair liaison, a woman named Glenda, who’d notified the agency. They, in turn, would contact Mrs. Glück, using someone who spoke German. “I’m sure she’s heard from Annika by now. They’re very close.”
    “You don’t think something happened to Annika?” I asked.
    “Such as—?”
    “I don’t know, whatever happens to people who disappear. Kidnapping, or . .