Seven Minutes to Noon Read Online Free PDF

was Tim.
    “I’m outside. I’ve been ringing the doorbell but I don’t think you heard it.”
    “I’ll be right there.” She flipped shut her phone.
    “Want me to go?” Mike began to shift himself off the bench, but she stopped him.
    “It’s okay,” she said calmly, though she felt anything but calm. Heart pounding, she walked up the stairs onto the tiny iron deck and passed through the kitchen, living room and into the hallway to get to the building’s foyer. In the half-moon window toward the top of the house’s front door, Alice saw Tim’s sharp profile, looking distractedly toward the street.
    She opened the door. Tim walked in and at first said nothing. Medium height, and lean from his weekend hours at the gym, he was dressed in one of the beautiful suits he always wore to work. His thick blond hair was wavy, tucked behind his ears; normally he kept it shorter than this. When he looked at Alice to speak, she saw, in the dimming evening light, that his skin was ashen despite his recent beach vacation.
    Tim sighed and lifted his eyes to Alice. For the first time in all their years, she saw how truly green they were. Just like Austin’s. Bright, lucid green.
    “They said to wait until morning, see if she comes home tonight.”
    “They?”
    “The police at the Seventy-sixth Precinct. I just came from there.”
    Alice didn’t know what to say. What about Ivy? This made no sense.
    “I’ll go back in the morning,” he said, “first thing. I thought it might be better if Austin stayed over here tonight.”
    “Sure,” Alice said. “But I don’t understand.”
    “I think it might make things worse if he comes home and she’s not there.” Tim’s eyes teared up. “Don’t you think so, Alice?”
    “I don’t really know what to think.”
    “Will you tell him I had to work late? He’s used to that. He won’t question it.”
    “But what do I say about Lauren?”
    Tim stood in front of her, clearly unable to offer advice. She felt her heart plunge through her body, into the floor, to the center of an ancient earth. Stepping forward, Alice took Tim in her arms. He held her fiercely, crying.
    And Alice knew. She just knew.
    Lauren was not coming home.

Chapter 4
    The next day a dark blue sedan eased up to the curb in front of Blue Shoes. Two people got out, a tall man with a gray-speckled buzz cut, and a young woman. Alice recognized Frannie immediately. Without putting a quarter into the meter, they crossed the sidewalk to the store. Frannie first, the man following. She pulled open the door, which tinkled to announce the arrival of a customer, and he walked in behind her. She stood there looking around at the posh, renovated space.
    “So this is your place,” Frannie said. “When I heard Alice Halpern and Maggie Blue, I wasn’t sure.”
    Alice came around the counter, glad for a diversion from the troubling morning. Maggie stayed behind the counter, distracting herself with receipts, having joined Alice on her alternate Saturday shift. They had spent all morning worrying about Lauren. Making incessant, unanswered calls to her cell phone. Unraveling possibilities until they were depleted. Finally, they had walked the neighborhood, posting MISSING signs they had made at the store and printed on bright yellow paper.
    MISSING
    Lauren Barnet
    36 years old, long brown hair, pale blue eyes,
red birthmark on back of neck. 8 1 / 2 MOS. PREGNANT.
Last seen on Carroll St. leaving P.S. 58
Friday, Sept. 8, at 8:45 a.m.
Please call with any information.
    Just above her name, a photo of Lauren smiled beneath the paper’s yellow haze.
    After posting a hundred signs, Alice and Maggie had returned to the store, unsure of what to do next.
    “It’s our place,” Alice told Frannie. “Like it?”
    Frannie glanced down at her worn black sneakers and shrugged her shoulders. “I guess shoes aren’t really my thing. It’s strange. I don’t even recognize this place and I’ve been coming here my whole life. I