No One Needs to Know (21 page)

Duncan wondered how the man knew that he lived at home with his mother. He must have had someone ask at the restaurant—or maybe he’d had someone following him around. “I won’t tell,” he promised, scooting toward the door.

As he stepped outside, the man grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “What the hell? Aren’t you going to thank us for the lift?”

Duncan was so rattled, he dropped his bike helmet. “Thank you,” he murmured.

The man sneered, and gave him a little shove before he let go of his shirt. Duncan staggered back, away from the SUV. He regained his footing, and looked up in time to see the man ducking into the front seat. He shut the door, and the vehicle took off with a screech. A few pebbles from the road shot up and hit Duncan in the leg.

With the rain pelting him, he stood there in the middle of the lonely highway. He watched the SUV pull away, and felt as if he’d just cheated death.

Suddenly, the vehicle’s brake lights went on. He heard the engine roar as the SUV backed up at a high speed. The tires let out another squeal and the car abruptly stopped. Duncan watched the man hop out of the passenger side. Brandishing a shotgun, he marched toward him.

Paralyzed with fear, Duncan watched helplessly as the man raised the shotgun and pointed it at him. Duncan couldn’t move or even scream. The shot rang out.

He thought he was dead.

He heard a thump, and swiveled around to see a raccoon lying on the roadside. A pool of blood started to bloom under its furry body.

Duncan glanced back at the man.

“Why don’t you scrape that thing off the pavement, cook it, and serve it up to your customers at that piece-of-shit diner you work at?” he yelled. The man laughed, and then climbed back inside the SUV. With another squeal from the tires, the vehicle sped away.

His head shaking, Duncan watched the taillights disappear in the darkness.

He took a few deep breaths, but it didn’t do any good. He was still shaking. He managed to pick up his bike helmet. He turned and gazed at the dead raccoon. Clutching the bike helmet to his stomach, he started to walk along the roadside. The rain on his face mixed with his tears.

He wasn’t sure how far he was from his house. He guessed it was at least two or three miles. And he had no idea what he’d do about his moped. Maybe he’d take his mother’s car and go pick it up—if the bike was still there. It might be another hour or two before he could do that. He wasn’t certain.

Duncan wasn’t certain of anything—except that he’d never ever tell a soul about any of this.

C
HAPTER
F
IFTEEN

Tuesday, July 1, 12:32
P.M.

Seattle

“S
o is there anything safe to eat here—and vegan?” the short, pudgy twentysomething bleached-blond man asked. He had a cell phone mechanism on his ear, and wore black nail polish. He stood at the window of the food truck—one of several trucks, vans, and trailers parked in a lot by the beach at Golden Gardens in Ballard.

It was Laurie’s first day on the
7/7/70
set. The weather had cooperated beautifully with mild temperatures and an overcast sky—perfect for filming, she was told. They were shooting a scene with Paige Peyton and Shane White—as the doomed Elaina and Dirk—walking barefoot along the beach. A cameraman shot the scene from the top of a big crane attached to a small tractor on the sand. Crew members were holding up reflectors and microphone booms. About thirty people were standing near the shoreline, working on the “intimate” scene. Apparently, the small lapping waves were just loud enough to create problems for the soundman.

There was a wide clearing in some bushes between the beach and the parking lot. But Laurie hadn’t been able to see any of the filming from inside the food truck. All she could see were the other trucks, an open-sided tent, and the trip hazard, thick black power cables running along the pavement. Between the street and the parking lot, the security team kept scores of onlookers at bay, many of them with cell phone cameras out and ready.

Besides the food, Laurie’s main concern today was the very real possibility of having her photo end up on TV, in the newspaper, or online. She didn’t want Ryder or any of his clan finding out where she’d gone. The absurdity of hiding out on a movie set didn’t escape her.

Obviously, those onlookers behind the security barricade didn’t give a damn about the women in the food truck. They wanted to see Paige or Shane. A still photographer and a cameraman were recording all the onset activity for a
Making of 7/7/70
documentary that would end up on the DVD and Blu-ray. The only press person they let through was Dolly Ingersoll, the seventyish entertainment reporter for CNN. She was caustic, bitchy, and enormously popular. Apparently, she was writing her own book about the murders, and the making of the movie. Perhaps that was why she and her cameraman had acquired near-exclusive coverage of the film shoot. At least it seemed that way. They were all over the set. Fortunately, the women in the food truck didn’t seem to interest Dolly one iota.

From inside the truck, Laurie had caught fleeting glimpses of Dolly—as well as Paige and Shane on their way in or out of their trailers. She got reports and updates from Cheryl about everything happening on the set. Before the lunch rush, Cheryl had stepped out of the truck a few times, leaving Laurie alone to do the prep work for several minutes at a stretch. That had been fine with Laurie, giving her more room to move around inside the tiny, hot space for a while. So far, she and Cheryl had worked well together. They’d had a practice run the day before, parking the new food truck by South Lake Union to serve the Amazon lunch crowd. Laurie had felt as if she’d been thrown into rough waters to learn how to swim, but she’d survived. There had been four other food trucks competing for business, and Cheryl was pretty certain Grill Girl II had drawn the most customers.

As the lunch break on the film shoot drew near, Laurie and Cheryl had started cooking and wrapping up sandwiches and burgers to accommodate the rush. They’d tried to anticipate every potential problem. “I hear these film people are notoriously finicky. We’re talking food restrictions a-go-go,” Cheryl had declared. So they’d put three vegan items on the menu: a grilled portobello mushroom sandwich on gluten-free bread, a tofu wrap, and a spinach salad.

They’d also been briefed—by the laid-back, lanky, handsome production assistant, a Brit named Danny—on how to interact with the VIPs, specifically Paige Peyton. “You must never address her personally—unless she talks to you first,” Danny had warned them—in his British Received Pronunciation accent. “She has an assistant, this viperous, smug little toad with bleached-blond hair. You’ll know him when you see him. If you have anything to say to Paige—even if Paige is standing right there in front of you—say it through the obnoxious assistant. So it’s, ‘Would Ms. Peyton like a salad today—or perhaps a small child she’d like to boil in her cauldron and eat?’ Never talk to her directly.”

“Is it safe to look at her?” Cheryl had asked. “Or should we put special viewing boxes over our heads, like the ones you use when there’s a total solar eclipse?”

Danny’s description of Paige’s assistant was spot-on. Standing at the food truck’s order window, he seemed distracted by someone talking to him on that earpiece phone device.

Laurie started to tell him what was “safe” and vegan. “We have a grilled portobello mushroom—”

With annoyance, he dismissed what she was saying with a wave of his little hand. Then he held up his index finger to indicate she should shut up for a minute while he listened to whoever was on the phone. Laurie figured it was Paige—in her trailer. It didn’t seem to matter to the guy that people were waiting in line behind him.

“Ms. Peyton would like a salad,” he announced at last. “Do you think you could handle that?”

“Would Ms. Peyton prefer spinach or arugula?” Laurie asked.

“Spinach,” he said, taking out another mobile device and looking something up on it.

“Our vegan salad comes with sliced pears, sun-dried cranberries, red onion, toasted walnuts, and a tahini maple dressing,” she explained loudly, so that Paige could hear. “Would that be all right?”

Apparently, Paige heard, because her assistant nodded. “Forget the onions,” he said, not looking up from his mobile device. “Dressing on the side.”

“I’ll have it for you right away,” Laurie said. She turned toward the small salad station, and started loading up a recyclable container with spinach and the proper ingredients. “VIP,” she said to Cheryl, so her boss would know she had stopped everything to work on an order for a VIP. This was Cheryl’s cue to pick up the slack at the order window with the people waiting behind Paige’s assistant.

Laurie’s hands shook as she put the salad together. Though Paige sounded like a bitch and her assistant with the black fingernail polish was an absolute worm, it was still important to Laurie that she get the order right—even if it was just a salad. She didn’t want to disappoint Cheryl.

After those initial doubts during her first couple of days at La Hacienda, Laurie had finally settled in. She and Joey had even slept upstairs the night before last, and yes, she’d had Brian’s baseball bat at her bedside. But she’d slept soundly—and so had Joey.

His babysitters, the retired couple, Hank and Tammy Cassella, couldn’t have been nicer. Their place was baby-proofed from taking care of their grandson. They still had his crib and playpen. They’d invited her and Joey over to dinner on Sunday night. Tammy made an exceptional chicken marsala. Joey seemed to take an instant liking to them both—and vice versa.

Laurie had already applied to Lullaby League Daycare, which had a rating of four and a half stars (out of five) on Yelp. They didn’t ask for any background information on her, thank God—just Joey’s immunization and birth records. They’d assured her that once everything checked out Joey could start spending his days at Lullaby League. In the meantime, she had this kind neighbor couple looking after her son.

She’d already called the Cassellas twice today, and both times, they’d put Joey on the phone to babble cheerfully into it. All the while, she’d heard Tammy coaxing him, “Say hello to Mommy!” She knew Joey was in good hands.

It was all thanks to Cheryl—her new life, and this second chance.

Laurie didn’t want to let her down by screwing up a simple salad order for a very temperamental star. She filled two small containers with dressing, and made sure the lids were snapped on tight. She set them inside with the salad, closed the top, and put a rubber band around the container. She slipped three napkins and a plastic fork under the rubber band, and then returned to the window. She handed the container to Paige’s assistant. “Did you want anything for yourself?” she asked.

He barely glanced up from his mobile device. “From
here
?” he said. “
Please.
I don’t think so.”

“Well, let me know how Ms. Peyton likes that tahini dressing,” Laurie said.

“Oh, yes, I’ll make it a priority!” he said sarcastically. Then he wandered off, his mobile device in one hand, the salad in the other.

There was no time to ruminate over what a creep he was, because they still had crew members to feed. The good news was that a lot of people came back to say how much they liked the food. The director sent his assistant over for a second order of Cheryl’s Thai chicken wraps. He got the last two.

Things seemed to be winding down when Laurie noticed Paige storm out of her trailer. She looked even more angry-crazy with her big, teased-out mane of long red hair. She had facial tissues around the collar of her mod-print sixties blouse, and in her hand was the open salad container—the attached lid flopping up and down as she flounced toward the food truck.

Laurie glanced at Cheryl. “Oh, God, I don’t think Paige Peyton liked her salad . . .”

“What?”

Laurie turned toward the window again to see Paige barreling toward her.

“What the fuck is this?” Paige hissed. With a flick of her wrist she hurled the container’s contents at Laurie. Walnuts, pears, and dressing-soaked spinach leaves hit her in the face. “I told you, no walnuts! How stupid are you?”

Stunned, Laurie gaped at her. Her left eye was stinging, and she automatically started rubbing it. A bit of salad dressing must have gotten in there. She was too bewildered to say anything. But she wanted to scream,
Are you insane?

“What part of ‘no walnuts’ don’t you understand?” Paige yelled.

“Your assistant didn’t say a thing about holding the walnuts!” she argued, a tremor in her voice. With annoyance, she picked a piece of spinach off her forehead. “He said, ‘no onions and dressing on the side,’ that’s all. Maybe if he wasn’t on his iPad while he was talking to you and giving me the order—”

“We’re terribly sorry for the mistake, Ms. Peyton,” Cheryl cut in, gently pushing Laurie aside. “It won’t happen again. Is there something else we can prepare for you?”

“Forget it,” Paige snapped, throwing down the empty salad container. “Fuck it.” Then she spun on her heels and headed back toward her trailer.

The meltdown had gotten the attention of several crew members by the tent—as well as some of the onlookers on the other side of the lot. Among the witnesses there was an awkward, dumbfounded silence—and then a quiet murmuring. Finally, someone laughed, and everyone started chattering.

Laurie kept rubbing her eye. She couldn’t stop shaking. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered to Cheryl. “I gave that snotty creep the salad exactly the way he ordered it, I swear . . .”

Cheryl picked a walnut off her shoulder. “You don’t try to tell these people they’re wrong, not even when they are.” She rinsed out a dishtowel and handed it to her. Then she patted her on the back. “Like she couldn’t have just eaten around the damn walnuts . . .”

Laurie wiped off her face. She noticed salad dressing splattered on her apron. Fortunately, she had her hair in a ponytail today, so at least she wasn’t picking walnuts out of her hair.