One More Day Read Online Free PDF Page A

owies?”
    He shook his head solemnly. She’d forgotten those juxtapositions, the silly words with the serious faces.
    â€œAre you hungry?”
    He nodded. She carried him downstairs into the kitchen. Everything was clean. So anxious for distraction, she and John took every chance to do anything that needed to be done. They stayed busy, eternally busy.
    â€œJuice?” he asked.
    She swallowed hard. There was no juice in the house. John had removed it all: the organic juice boxes, the squeezable applesauce that cost a fortune, the mini carrots packaged with ranch dip. He’d found her sobbing over them, the refrigerator door open, and taken them away the next day, as if that would help. It hadn’t. She’d merely moved her tears to the grocery store. She could avoid the baby food aisle, but the toddler foods, the preferences, were hidden everywhere.
    â€œChocolate milk?” she offered brightly.
    â€œChock milk! Get me chock milk!”
    She smiled and got out the chocolate John kept for his ice cream, swirled it in a glass of milk, and found a straw. She held it up to the light, bent it, marveling over it. How long had it been since anyone in her house had used a straw? Fifteen months. She put Ben in the big chair, his booster seat long gone. Where had it gone? She didn’t remember its disappearance. John, the thief of her memories.
    His chubby hands on the glass, the still tiny shells of his nails. Who had trimmed his nails? Who had taken such exquisite care of him? A woman , she thought suddenly. A mother. Someone who wanted a child. Why had they been thinking all this time it had to have been a man?
    â€œDaddy,” he said, looking up from his glass.
    â€œDaddy,” she repeated. Of course. Of course! How selfish she was being! John needed to see this, needed to have his moment too!
    She dug her cell phone out of her purse in the foyer, dialed John’s number. He picked up right away, trained, ever alert.
    â€œCan you come home right away?”
    â€œWhat’s wrong?”
    â€œIt’s…hard to explain.”
    â€œWell, can you try?”
    â€œBen is here.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œHe was here when I got back.”
    â€œWhere? Here where?”
    â€œIn his crib.”
    â€œWhat? Was there a note, a message? How did they get in?”
    â€œI don’t think they… I mean… Well, I don’t know.”
    â€œDid you check the windows and doors?”
    â€œNo—”
    â€œDid you call Detective Nolan?”
    â€œJohn, aren’t you going to ask how he is?”
    A sharp intake of guilty breath. A pause. She heard people in the background. A restaurant, a store? Where was he? Out in the field, meeting a client? The world going on without their son in it, without her in it.
    John swallowed hard, as if eating the question. He felt terribly guilty, hearing his wife state the obvious. Why weren’t those the first words out of his mouth? In the restaurant lobby, his face turned red with shame, and he turned away from his clients, who were chatting merrily at the bar, nursing the beers he had just paid for, lest they see his face. They already knew his son was missing; everyone knew. But not everyone wanted to talk about every detail.
    â€œWell, I assumed you would have said—”
    â€œHe’s fine. It’s just that—”
    â€œThank God. Well, you hang tight, and I’ll call Nolan right away.”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œNo?”
    â€œJohn, there’s something…I can’t quite explain.”
    â€œI would say there’s a lot we can’t explain. How did they get in? Where did they keep him? Is he talking more? Has he told you anything? You have to remember every word, Carrie, every word he says. Write it down. Take careful notes.”
    â€œJohn, don’t call Nolan. You have to see him first.”
    â€œWhat? No, no, God, what if they’re watching you? What if they followed