Page 43 of The Perfect People

“Am I?” he replied, as if he genuinely hadn’t been expecting the question. “I guess it’s because you look really familiar to me, and I can’t quite place where from.”

“That’s no excuse,” she said, taking a step closer into his personal space. “You need to stop. Don’t you know that it’s rude and creepy to stare at young women? I mean, what are you, thirty?”

“I’m twenty-seven actually,” he said. “Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to weird you out. I was so focused on trying to figure out why I know you that it didn’t occur to me that it might come across the wrong way.”

“Is everything okay here?” Melina asked, coming over. She put her hand on Hannah’s wrist gently and gave a little squeeze of support. “Is this guy bothering you?”

“I don’t know,” Hannah said, taking Melina’s hand in hers and squeezing back. “Are you?”

The guy suddenly snapped his fingers.

“I know how I recognize you now,” he said, a wave of relief flooding across his face. “You’re Jessie Hunt’s little sister, right?”

“So what?” Hannah said, a little shiver forming at the base of her spine.

“It’s just that I know her, I mean kind of,” he said. “It’s a little complicated to explain but your sister really helped me out of a jam once. The next time you talk to her, will you tell her that Andy Gelman says ‘hi’ and ‘thanks again’?”

“Why didn’t you just tell her yourself?” Hannah wanted to know.

“Well, at the time she helped me, I was a little out of it, and then I left the country for a while,” he said. “But you’re right, I should reach out to her to let her know how much I appreciate what she did for me. Maybe I’ll look her up.”

“Great,” Hannah said, “and in the meantime, you’ll quit boring a hole in the back of my head with your eyes?”

“Scout’s honor,” he said, holding up his fingers.

“You satisfied?” Melina asked, sounding dubious.

“We’ll see,” Hannah said as they turned and headed back to the table. Once they were out of earshot, she leaned over and whispered in Melina’s ear, “Thanks for having my back.”

“Of course. Glad I didn’t have to cut him.”

Hannah fought back a giggle. The truth was that she was fairly confident that Andy Gelman wasn’t a serious threat to her well-being. He seemed more clueless than dangerous. But all the same, once she sat back down, she readjusted her chair so she could keep tabs on him, just in case.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

First Coastal Credit Union was deathly quiet.

Jessie didn’t consider it a huge surprise. The branch normally closed at 3 p.m. on Saturdays and they were walking in at 2:47 on the Saturday of a holiday weekend.

She didn’t see Cyril Currie when they first entered the building so Susannah went to speak to the branch manager, a fifty-something man in a sports jacket and Hawaiian shirt with patchy gray hair. While she did, Jessie looked around.

There were actually more tellers in the branch than customers. Including them, the manager that Susannah was speaking to now, and the banking associate who was clearly playing some kind of game on her desk computer, the joint was definitelynothopping. And yet there was no sign of Currie.

Jessie walked over to the personal banking area, wondering if he might be hiding in a cubicle behind one of the partitions. She heard the faint squeak of a distant door being opened as the bank manager replied to Susannah’s whispered question with a painfully loud, “I think Cyril’s in the restroom.”

Jessie cringed, first at his booming voice, and then at the possibility that popped into her head: what if the squeak she’d just heard was the men’s restroom door opening as Cyril Currie came out? She spun around just in time to see the back foot of someone disappear down a hall out of sight, followed by a soft beep and that same squeak a second time. Quickly, she joined Susannah and the manager.

“Is the men’s room over there?” she asked, pointing to where she’s seen the foot hurry off.

“Yes,” he answered, startled by the unexpected question from a second interrogator.

“This is Jessie Hunt,” Susannah said. “She’s my partner. Jessie, this is Mr. Tranter, the branch manager.”

“Nice to meet you,” he said.

“You too,” Jessie replied, before quickly moving on. “Do you need a key card to access the restroom?”

“Yes,” he said.

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