Never Tell Them, N.L. Hinkens [unputdownable books txt] 📗

bag with the spare house key. Good old Celia, dependable as the day was long. Unexpected tears stung her eyes. It was so unfair that Celia had been denied the chance to meet her grandchild. It wasn’t that Sonia didn’t believe Ray had been telling the truth about his abusive childhood, but she couldn’t help feeling there was more to the story.

She pushed the key into the lock and jiggled it until it turned. Inhaling a shallow breath, she stepped inside the house and cast a glance around, not knowing exactly what she expected to find. Apart from the moving boxes, there was nothing to indicate that Ray and Henry were living here. As she’d observed through the windows, the place looked just like Celia had left it. The same faded landscape prints hung askew on the walls, the same rose-colored glass dish sat on the console table in the hallway, the same frayed runner covered the worn, walnut floor. Steeling herself to see this through, she padded down the hallway and tentatively pushed open the door to the guest bedroom. She would gather up what she needed for Henry first, and then take a gander around the rest of the house.

Frowning, she took in the quilted mauve Jacquard duvet and antique dresser topped by a pair of dusty, glass candlesticks—trying to make sense of it. Granted, Ray had only been living here a relatively short time, but why had he not made any attempt to transform the space into a child’s room? Opening the closet door, she peered in at Celia’s collection of winter coats, wrinkling her nose at the pungent odor of mothballs. Evidently, Ray hadn’t been able to bring himself to go through his mother’s belongings. One-by-one, she pulled open the dresser drawers, but there was no sign of Henry’s clothes anywhere.

Eying the cardboard boxes at the bottom of the bed, she made her way over to them. Maybe Ray hadn’t unpacked his son’s things. The first box she opened was chockfull of books—none of them children’s books. She carefully closed the flaps back up and checked the remaining boxes, which contained mostly files and office equipment. Lifting out one of the folders, she flicked through it, glancing at the magazine articles inside. This must be some of Ray’s work. It seemed odd that he hadn’t set up his office yet.

Feeling increasingly uneasy, she reached for a Target bag peeking out from behind one of the boxes. She dumped the contents out on the bed and stared at the items in bewilderment. Was this the extent of Henry’s wardrobe: four pairs of pants, six long-sleeved tops, two pairs of pajamas, a ten-pack of superhero underwear and several pairs of socks?

Fear fingered its way up her spine as she eyed the receipt. Why was all of Henry’s clothing brand new with tags?

8

Sonia hurriedly stuffed Henry’s clothing back into the plastic bag, her mind racing to make sense of what she’d discovered. Half-dreading what she might come upon next, she reached for another bag peeking out from beneath the bed and rooted around inside it. An Avengers toothbrush, a tube of Crest Kid's Cavity Protection Toothpaste, Velcro Spiderman tennis shoes, a pair of jeans, and a familiar-looking blue T-shirt. Frowning, she pulled it out and examined it more closely. Henry had worn it to dinner at her house—she remembered him dribbling ice cream all over the baby dinosaur on the front of it. It had evidently been washed since, so why hadn’t Ray put it away in the closet or a drawer, afterward? What was the logic in putting it back in a Target bag and shoving it under the bed? These weren’t the actions of someone who was moving in—more like the behavior of someone who was prepared to pick up and leave at a moment’s notice.

She slid an unsettled gaze around the guest room, a disturbing thought pushing to the forefront of her mind. Had Ray been lying to her about his wife? What if Henry’s mother wasn’t dead at all? Could Ray have abducted his son in the throes of a nasty divorce? It wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility. Kids were abducted by non-custodial parents all the time. Considering how much Henry missed his mother, and how unattached he was to his father, the shoe seemed to fit. It would also explain why Ray had arrived at Celia’s house with none of Henry’s clothes or toys, other than what he’d purchased in a Target shopping spree. Gritting her teeth, Sonia got to her feet with a new resolve. She could justify snooping around if it meant rescuing an abducted child. The first thing she needed to figure out was whether Ray’s wife was really dead.

Her chilled skin prickled as she pushed open the door to Celia’s old bedroom, half-expecting a larger-than-life Ray to step out from the shadows and accost her, even though logic assured her she’d left him lying in a hospital bed. She inhaled a ragged breath as she picked her way across the floor. Celia’s pink, fluffy slippers jutted out from beneath the unmade bed. A pile of miscellaneous coins and crumpled receipts sat atop the oak nightstand, next to a laptop. She lifted the lid and took a quick peek, but, as she’d suspected, it was password protected. Heart hammering, she reached for the receipts and uncurled them one-by-one: innocuous supplies from a local hardware store, a receipt for gas, and a coupon from a local pizza restaurant—nothing of consequence.

Next, she opened the drawer in the nightstand and poked around inside it. Like most of the other items in the room, the contents of the drawer had Celia’s stamp all over them; a crocheted coaster, a scented sleep mask, a book of poems by Robert Frost—even a birthday card Jessica had made for her two years ago. Sonia grimaced as she closed the drawer, realizing too late that she should have worn gloves. She ran a critical eye over the