Five Days in Summer

dribble of juice off his chin and put the carton back in the fridge. There wasn’t much in there to eat.
    Seemed like he could use some groceries. Maybe he’d try that big new Super Stop & Shop across from the Mashpee Commons. If Emily Parker shopped there, it was good enough for him.

Chapter 4
    The police station coffee had fried Will’s nerves, and now, as he drove up 151 to the Mashpee rotary, he had to take yawning breaths to keep steady. He gripped the steering wheel so hard his palms burned. Sweat trickled down his back and bled a wet stripe down his shirt. Emily had to be somewhere, didn’t she? She didn’t go shopping, then vaporize. Did she? He counted four deep breaths as he waited at the red light intersecting the Mashpee Commons and the new shopping center just across the street. The kids would be waking up by now. He hoped Sarah could pull herself together. He would check in on them later, reassure them. At the green arrow, he turned left and drove past a yellow clapboard drive-through bank, a liquor store and a high-end kitchen design center. Just around the corner was the Stop & Shop. People ambled from the parking lot into the store, and out with their overstuffed carts, as if it was a normal early morning. He envied them the simplicity of their shopping. Just yesterday, Emily had been one of them. She had gone into the store, and come out; that much he knew.
    He drove into the parking lot. It was just past seven and there weren’t too many cars. Most were clusteredin the prime spots by the front of the store. There was one car, just one, parked far at the other end of the lot. He could see from here that it was white, like theirs. He drove closer. A white Volvo station wagon. Like theirs. Closer. A 9VL. Like theirs. As he pulled up behind it, he saw their New York license plate and read their number.
    He parked the SUV and jumped out. He walked around the station wagon, trying every door; each was locked. Drops from last night’s rain clung to the white paint. The sun was inching up the early-morning sky, and before long the car would be dry.
    In the backseat he saw Maxi’s baby seat, stained from juice bottles and snacks. The black-and-white beanbag cat he’d given her earlier in the summer was slumped over one armrest. The pink thread that had been the mouth had been snagged out. One blue eye had been browned over with chocolate. On the middle part of the seat were two small Ziploc bags with the dregs of a popcorn snack. There was another Ziploc filled with Sam’s holographic Pokemon cards; he carried them around in case he met new kids at the playground or the store or the ice cream parlor or any of the countless places Emily took them. In the net bag strapped to the back of the driver’s seat was a paperback of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which David had finished reading on the drive up to the Cape a few weeks ago. In the cup holder next to the driver’s seat was a half-drunk bottle of spring water, fogged on the inside.
    He could see that her keys were not in the ignition. He used his own keys to open the driver’s-side door so he could check around her seat and was hit by a stench of ruined food. The groceries. They were still in the car.
    The back hatch lifted effortlessly on its hydraulichinges. The smell was worse here, where the food was piled. A gallon of milk had soured in the heat, cheese had putrefied and pink ice cream had oozed out of an overturned bag onto the camel-colored upholstery. The smell was nauseating, and the implication of the smell was worse. He swallowed hard and stepped back. His instinct was to take all the food and dump it into the nearest trash. But would it be evidence? Evidence of her having been here, if nothing else.
    He surveyed the area around the car, bending down to see under the chassis. There was nothing there, not a drip of oil, no keys, no stranger to capture and maul in revenge. Under the car was only the wet shadow of a rainy night that had passed.
    Hunched by the ground, Will heard a car drive up and park in a spot nearby. He stood and saw the driver’s door open on a brown sedan. John Geary stepped out and Will wasn’t that surprised; a retired cop, trying to keep busy. He was creased and rumpled, half bald with a halo of curly white weeds in need of a trim. Though he wore a wedding ring, no one had bothered to tell him to change his pants, which were stained around the pockets.
    “So you found it.” Geary approached the