Read Online You Can Run by Norah McClintock - Free Book Online Page A

responsible for Trisha running away.
    He squeezed my hand. “Come on. Let’s get you home.”
    We zipped home in Dad’s black Porsche with the sound system blaring vintage rock ‘n’ roll. My father played AC/DC at ear-splitting volume all the way. My mother would not have approved. She’s more of a Celine Dion kind of person.
    Â 
    . . .
    My mother was coming out the side door when we pulled into the driveway. She had a bulging black garbage bag in one hand. She turned and looked at my father’s Porsche. He switched off the engine.
    â€œDad,” I said. I gave him a pleading look. What I really meant was, “Don’t. Don’t get out of the car. Don’t try to go into the house. Don’t do anything that will bug Mom.” But I don’t think he heard me. He flung open the car door and stepped out onto the driveway. I hurried out the passenger side.
    My father grinned at my mother. “Patti,” he said, “you look fabulous.”
    I waited for her to correct him the way she does every time he calls her anything but Patricia. Instead, she looked at him with blue eyes that seemed warm, even affectionate, although I knew I must be misreading her. She said, “Hi, Mac.” She looked at him, really looked at him, instead of dismissing him the way she usually does. She gazed at him for so long that I checked him out too, to see if she was seeing something that I hadn’t noticed. But no, it was the same old Mac Hunter—a tall guy with thick dark hair speckled with just a touch of gray. A good-looking guy with dimples when he grinned. A guy who was fit and trim for his age. There was no paunch on my father. He worked out at the gym four or five times a week and ran a 10K regularly. Women were always looking him over, checking out his left hand for a wedding band—which, of course, he didn’t wear.
    My father reacted to my mother’s non-frigid greeting the same way that I did. His grin slipped a little. He took a step toward her. When she didn’t retreat or tell him to back off, his expression grew serious.
    â€œIs everything okay, Patti?” he said.
    She shook her head, not to say no, but as if she were coming out of some kind of daydream.
    â€œOf course,” she said. “Why wouldn’t it be?” She looked at me. “Do you have homework, Robyn?” I nodded. “Then you’d better come in and do it. It’s getting late.” She looked at my father again. “Good night, Mac,” she said. She walked up the path to the front door and went inside.
    My father turned to me. “What’s going on with your mother?”
    â€œNothing as far as I know,” I said. I tried to sound as if I meant it. My mother would never have forgiven me if I’d told him about her and Ted’s little break from each other. “Long day, I guess.”
    My father stared up at the house. “I know she doesn’t like you to talk about her with me,” he said. “But if something’s wrong, if she needs help, anything, tell her. . . .” He stopped and turned to me. “Tell her she can count on me. No strings attached. Okay, Robbie?”
    I told him okay. He stood in the driveway a little longer, leaning toward the house like a flower leaning toward the sun. Then he got back in the car, revved the engine, and backed down the driveway.

S ome days I go with the flow. Don’t fight it. Let it happen. Whatever.
    Other days I have a plan. Goals. Today was one of those days. Today I was going to do the favor that I had promised my father. I was going to find out what, if anything, Kenny Merchant knew about Trisha Carnegie. Specifically, I was going to find out if he knew where she was or why she had run away. My father was most interested in the former. I wanted the answer to the latter because, no matter what my father had said, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was the one who had pushed