Lie in Plain Sight by Maggie Barbieri Page A

way, and Maeve was hard-pressed to remember a time she had last been here. Neither of the girls had had play dates out here, and Maeve certainly didn’t have any friends for whom she would have made this schlep on a regular basis. She opened her trunk as a white-coated chef hurried out to relieve her of her haul and send her on her way. The “help” weren’t seen here; that was clear.
    Maeve pulled out onto the street and parked the car, taking a minute to meander through the neighborhood, wondering if she should have been more upset about the yard closing, the sudden development of homes cropping up out of a gorgeous landscape that sat high on a hill and overlooked a body of water that was also unknown to her. Metal canoes dotted its shore, leading her to believe that it fed into the reservoir, a place where only county-sanctioned watercraft could be launched. The view from above was spectacular; Charles Connors had been sitting on a prime piece of real estate and had sold the land for a small fortune, she guessed, incurring the wrath of the local environmentalists and longtime locals who would have preferred the jobs and the industry to the development of large, impressive homes.
    Farringville was a place that appreciated its history and wanted to preserve it. The upcoming Founders Day celebration was a testament to that.
    After she returned to the store, having been gone longer than she should have, Maeve had one of those off days, the kind where every fondant turned to cement, every sauce broke, every batter was wrong. She started over on the fondant, taking care to add water when necessary, just a little bit, so that it didn’t tear when she tried to form a nice ball to wrap in plastic, thinking that with time and care, anything could change for the better. She just had to have patience, take her time, take things into her own hands. It had been in the back of her mind, she realized, the thought of a missing young girl. It wasn’t about clearing her name. It was a new mission, a new reason to engage. She had done it the year before when she had found Evelyn, missing to her for many years, but whose whereabouts had been no secret to her father and his best friend; it would have been a hell of a lot easier if they had both been honest with her, but that was water under the bridge. The fact remained that she knew she had the chops to do what the Farringville Police Department couldn’t, and she started thinking, as she stared at the plastic-wrapped fondant, about what those steps would be.
    She would find her.
    Using whatever means necessary.
    In the front of the store, Maeve could hear a male voice extolling the virtues of her cupcakes, how his birthday had been “the best ever” because his father had brought him some of Maeve’s treats. Maeve heard something unusual, something almost foreign, as well and realized it was the sound of Heather laughing. She peeked through the window in the kitchen door and saw Mark Messer, Kurt’s son and one of her regular DPW customers, leaning on the counter, talking to Heather, making the girl laugh at whatever he was saying. In front of him was a large cup of coffee and half a doughnut, the other half of which he offered to Maeve’s daughter, who took it and nibbled at it while they chatted.
    Things could change with time. The relaxed girl eating the doughnut at the counter was evidence of that.

 
    CHAPTER 12
    â€œIt’s always a nice day when I get to see my old friend,” he said, strolling into the coffee shop on Broadway later that afternoon.
    Rodney Poole always characterized their relationship as one of friendship; Maeve thought it might be a bit more complicated than that. But there was something about his easy nature—the one that hid the dark truth about who he was and what he was capable of—that made it easy for her to pretend that what they were doing was what old friends did. Meet for coffee. Catch up on