I was mulling over the menu at Thai-Thai For Now when my cell rang. I checked the caller ID, frowned and walked to a quiet corner of the bustling restaurant. Cole shadowed me, but I had given up on the expectation of privacy around him. “Justin. Hi. How was your trip?”
He wasted no time on pleasantries. “Have you heard from Maggie?”
“No.” I winced at the sudden weight of her forgotten phone in my back pocket. “But that’s my fault.”
“Your fault how?”
“We had a girls’ day out yesterday, a late birthday thing, and she ended up staying over last night. She left her phone in the downstairs bathroom this morning, and I meant to drop it by the school, but I got sidetracked.”
“We were due at my parents for dinner twenty minutes ago.” Crickets sang in the background. He must be standing on their back porch. “She didn’t come home from work today.”
“Have you checked with Pilar? Was the big K4/K5 powwow this week or last week?” I tapped the menu against my knee. “Those ladies get competitive with their monthly hall themes. Could she be holed up in her classroom with her Cricut?”
“That was last week,” he said with the conviction of a man invested in his partner’s life. “This isn’t like her, Luce. Maggie would have called if she was going to run late.”
A kernel of ice budded in my heart. “What do you need?”
“I’m not sure.” A door closed, and the nature sounds hushed. “Where are you?”
“I’m in town.” I ignored Cole when he crowded me. “I’m ten minutes from the school. Less than that if I drive instead of walk. Want me to go bang on some doors?”
“I don’t want to put you out.” His frustration only galvanized me. “Are you sure you don’t mind?”
“Maggie is my best friend.” I caught Cole’s eye and started walking. “Anything you need, I’m your girl.”
“Good. Okay. Thanks.” He exhaled softly. “You check the school. I’ll make some calls. I’ll start with Pilar and work my way down to her parents.”
“Keep calm. I’ll touch base with you within the hour.” Justin ended the call sounding less harried. “Looks like I have one more stop to make.” I found Cole lurking behind me. “This is where we say goodnight.”
There existed within me a wellspring of clinical detachment I could access during emergencies. Once I tapped into that place of cool logic, it shut down my fear and panic and squeamishness. It allowed me to function with a clear head and postpone the emotional fallout until later. Now, for Maggie’s sake, I grabbed hold of that Zen with both hands.
“Where do you need to go?” His gaze tagged the road leading to the school. He must have pieced together the location based on my end of the conversation. No one’s hearing was that acute. “I’ll take you.”
“You’ve done enough.” I took stock of my surroundings through that clear lens, and the worry retreated another few centimeters. Hannigan’s wasn’t that far, but Cole had already passed my keys off to Portia, and the spare had been lost to the depths of the couch months ago. “I can’t afford to pay you to babysit me. I’ll have to weather the revival of Wild Child Mania on my own.” As usual. “Might as well start now.”
“A man assaulted you earlier. You’re not going anywhere alone.” Dusk had fallen since we entered the restaurant, and a blanket of stars waited beyond the bruised clouds to roll across the sky. “You can’t afford to pay me enough not to babysit you if you’re dead set on walking.”
Red lights flashed in my periphery, and the SUV rolled back before Cole finished barking at me.
“Where do you two think you’re going?” Santiago glared at my empty hands. “And where is my order of kanom gui chai?”
“Your chive cakes will have to wait,” I informed him, then started walking.
“Cole. You’re not serious. Fuck.” He smacked his open palm against the door then pointed at me. “This SUV turns into a pumpkin at midnight, princess.” He looked at me, really saw me, as if he viewed me from the opposite end of that same frigid lens. A flicker of emotion I might have labeled as fear twisted his features before he dialed up his bravado to cover the slip. “You and your glass slippers better get clip-clopping if you want to make the deadline.”
“We’re walking.” Cole snapped his fingers. “Follow at a distance. Keep an eye out for—”
“Don’t tell me how to do my job.” He jabbed the button to raise the window with one hand and cranked up the radio with the other. Through the glass he mouthed, Tick tock.
“Are we walking?” Cole swept his gaze over me, searching for whatever Santiago had glimpsed, but he didn’t flinch away from what he saw. “Or should I call him back?”
I set out down the sidewalk, the ice in my chest expanding and contracting like a living, breathing thing, and I didn’t check to see if he followed.
Five minutes later, Cole gripped my hand to stop me. He crossed to the next cement square and squatted over a dark spill on the sidewalk. He faced away from me, but his back expanded as though he were drawing air deep into his lungs.
“This is where the Claremont girl vanished,” I said in case he didn’t recognize the area. Passing on the ride with Santiago meant we ended up walking the exact path she had taken that fateful day. Perhaps the decision had been a subconscious one on my part, meant as a goodbye since she was no longer mine to find. “She was last seen by a classmate who lives in the Dunleavy Apartment Complex.”
The brick buildings hunched together across the street, about fifteen minutes away if you stuck to the sidewalk.
“This is fresh blood.” Another shift of his broad shoulders, one I caught on the edge of my vision. Had he dipped his fingers in the liquid to test viscosity? Scented it to be sure maybe? I shifted my weight forward, and caught the glitter of moisture on his fingers. I rocked back on my heels, shook my head. He must have used a wet wipe, cleaned his hands. It’s not like he would have licked his fingers. “Who do you want to call?”
“How sure are you someone needs calling?” The yellow beam of the SUV hit me across the cheek. “We can’t know it’s human.”
The noise he made in the back of his throat disagreed with me, but I wasn’t ready for what it might mean. Fresh blood near where the Claremont girl had been taken. Fresh blood on a path Maggie walked daily, which she had no reason to stroll at night. None.
A fresh wave of soothing coolness yanked me back from the precipice and focused my mind.
“I need to get to the school.” I stepped into the road and around him. “Can Santiago call . . . ?”
“Are you determined to make honest men of us all?” A wisp of humor laced his words.
I couldn’t find it in me to crack a smile. Not until I had laid eyes on Maggie. Not until this ice block in my chest thawed.
Cole stood and gestured the SUV to the curb. He crossed to Santiago, who lowered his window, and they exchanged words that resulted in Santiago piercing me with a scowl I was starting to recognize as his default expression around me.
“He’s calling the police,” Cole informed me. “He’ll wait here for them to preserve the scene.”
A jerky nod was all the thanks I could offer before my feet wrested control of my body away from me, and I broke into a steady jog aimed at the kindergarten wing of the John W. Rosen Elementary School. Most of the classrooms sat dark and empty, but a few lights gave me hope. I coasted to a stop at the rear doors leading to the parking lot where the buses lined up and pounded my fist against the locked metal door. No one answered. I jumped a chain-link fence that cordoned off a cluster of air-conditioning units and approached one of the lit windows. I banged on the glass until a sour-faced man frowned down at me. He cranked the window open a fraction and pursed his lips.
“Hi there. I’m Luce Boudreau with the Canton Police Department.” I pasted on a winning smile I didn’t feel. Swallowed by Cole’s enormous shirt, I must have looked more like a kid than a cop. “I’m also a friend of Maggie Stevens.”
“Jeremy Hendricks,” he answered with reluctance. “I’m one of the first-grade teachers. Is there something I can help you with, officer?”
“Maggie didn’t come home from work today. Her fiancé became concerned when she broke dinner plans with him and called me. I was hoping you could let me in to check her classroom. I want to make sure she didn’t lose track of the time.”
“Maggie left hours ago.” His expression softened a touch. “One of the other teachers—Robert Martin—backed over a stray. Maggie was walking to her car and saw it all. She scooped up the dog, and Robert drove her to Rice Animal Hospital.”
Hope, that most useless of emotions, closed tight fingers around my throat. The blood on the sidewalk . . . Maybe the dog had run from them after being injured. Cole could be wrong about it being human. Except the staff parking lot wasn’t on that stretch of road. There were a few spots, yes, but Maggie didn’t often park at the curb. The walk was too far for the spiky heels she loved wearing.
“Thanks for your help.” I pulled out my wallet, thumbed one of my business cards and passed it to him. “Call if you think of anything else or if you see her before I do.”
“I hope you find her soon.” He accepted the paper rectangle through the slit and tucked it into his front shirt pocket. “Maggie’s got a big heart. She’s a favorite around here. I can’t keep my kids from popping back into her classroom for hugs.”
“One last question.” I couched it as an afterthought. “Robert Martin. Do you have a number where I can reach him?”
“No. Sorry. He teaches three grades ahead of me. Our paths don’t cross often.”
“Okay.” I waved. “Thanks.”
I was slower going over the fence this time. Cole offered me his hand, but I swung my legs and jumped without assistance. We’d had a fence three times this height as part of the obstacle course at the academy. Chain link I liked. Plenty of hand and footholds. It was the wooden privacy fences that got you.
“Do you want a lift out to the animal hospital?” Cole fell in step beside me. “We can use my SUV and Santiago can catch a ride from one of the others.”
“Let me call Justin first.” I dialed him. “Hey, did you have any luck?”
“No one’s seen her.” Metal clanged in the background. Had he thrown a pan in the sink? “People don’t vanish into thin air.”
I rolled in my lips to keep the cop in me from admitting that sometimes, yeah, they did. Instead I passed on what Mr. Hendricks had said about the dog and the emergency trip to the vet. “Has she ever mentioned Robert Martin to you?”
“The name doesn’t sound familiar, but I know the other K5 teachers best.” He pushed out a sigh. “You know what a softie Maggie is. She would have jumped into a car with Freddy Krueger if it meant saving an injured animal.”
“Rice Animal Hospital closes at five.” Dad and I had used the same clinic for his ancient lab, Yeller, until she passed from old age. “The closest emergency vet is about forty-five minutes away.” Also a fact I knew thanks to Yeller and her tendency to eat pennies. I held out my phone, checked the time. “It’s eight o’clock now.”
During the school year, it wasn’t unusual for Maggie to stay well past the three-oh-five bell. She sanitized the classroom, commiserated with the other teachers or babysat stragglers whose parents couldn’t pick up their little ones on time due to their work schedules. Say she left at five, her usual, then the forty-five-minute drive there and back plus the time required for the vet to tend the dog framed up a reasonable window of time. But my heart pounded so hard it threatened to bruise my ribs. I couldn’t shake the sensation of impending doom.
Justin must have been running the same mental calculations as me, because he interrupted my thoughts. “This could all be a big mix up.” His punch of relief nauseated me, because it hit me square in the gut for an altogether different reason. “She might be on her way home.”
Maybe. I hoped so. But why hadn’t she borrowed a phone and left Justin a message warning him she would run late? There might not have been time in the moment, but after? Martin must have a cell. Who didn’t these days? Say his battery was dead and they were too frantic to charge it during the drive. Okay, well, the clinic had a landline phone. No battery required. No spotty coverage worries. No reason for her not to pick it up and dial home.
I scuffed my toe on the concrete. “Maybe.”
“Thanks for your help, Luce. I’ll call when she arrives.”
Please let her arrive.
“You told him the truth.” Cole dipped his chin, watching me tuck away my phone. “It’s not your fault people hear what they want.”
“Speaking of hearing, what big ears you have, Grandma. The better to stalk me with, I presume?” He didn’t take the bait, so I massaged my forehead. “I want to check the lot before I go.”
He swept out his arm indicating I should lead the way. I crossed the grassy lawn and strolled under the awning until we reached the parking lot. Maggie’s sunshine-yellow Prius sat beneath her favorite tree.
“I don’t like this.” I circled the car but didn’t touch it even to test the door handle so fingerprints could be lifted if necessary. “Maggie forgets things, but she isn’t thoughtless. She would have called if her plans changed. Why not borrow a phone to call Justin or use the one in the main office?”
“I can trace Robert Martin,” Cole offered.
“That’s okay.” I rolled my head on my neck. “I’ll run him down at the station. Tomorrow, I guess.”
“I’m right here.”
“Kind of hard to miss you.” I glanced over at him. “You’re like a baby mountain that got tired of where it was planted and invested in a nice pair of boots to go adventuring.”
“That’s not what I meant.” He anchored his hands at his hips. “I have resources at my disposal. Why not use them?”
“I have my own resources, but thanks.” I patted his elbow. “I’ve already told you I can’t afford you.” I cocked my head at him. “I’m not even sure why you want to help. Where’s the angle?”
He didn’t protest having one, which assured me I would cut myself on his one day soon.
“Can I request one last favor?” He nodded that I could, and I trespassed on his hospitality. “Can you drop me off at the station?”
“You’re going to file a missing person report.”
“Yes.” The prospect drained me until I had no energy left to contemplate what this might mean. “Justin is going to realize she may not be coming home soon. I can’t give him much, but I can give him this. The quicker the report is filed, the sooner the search can begin and the sooner I can access full departmental resources to help locate her.”
“I’ll drop you off and ask Miller to get your keys from Portia. He can bring the Bronco around for you.”
“That would be perfect.” I cut a path for the SUV, which had been joined by a cruiser. The ripple of the lightbar, usually a welcoming beacon, locked my knees, and I lost all motivation to walk the rest of the way. Once I spoke to another cop about Maggie, it was real. She became a file on someone’s desk, a stack of papers to flip through. “This is one time I wouldn’t mind ducking out on the cops.”
“Let me see what I can do.” Phone in hand, he started texting. “This will only take a minute.”
Sensing his dismissal, I drifted a short distance away and began pacing. I had counted on the ride to the station to digest what this meant. Canton was a small town. The fact Maggie worked at the same school as Angel Claremont’s little sister had meant nothing. Until Justin’s call. Until the blood on the sidewalk. I prayed the latter got dismissed as part of the dog incident, but what if it didn’t? What did that mean for Maggie?
A horn honking snapped me from my thoughts. I don’t know how long I’d been standing on the curb, but Cole had already made himself comfortable in a black SUV identical to the one up the road. Thom sat behind the wheel of this one, and he finger-waved at me.
I got in beside Cole in order to avoid Thom, but he tracked my progress and grinned like the Cheshire Cat, all bright teeth, when I opened the door.
“You smell nice.” He sniffed the air. “Cole’s scent is all over you.”
Fire zinged up my spine, thawing me further, but I kept the heat out of my cheeks. “Um, thank you?”
He nodded his satisfaction, then faced forward and made a U-turn to avoid the lightshow up ahead. I was dreading the ribbing I’d get entering the station dressed in Cole’s shirt when Thom wrenched the wheel hard to his left. My head cracked against the window to my right, and my ears rang. Fireworks rocketed behind my eyelids, and the world exploded in a shower of agony as the vehicle screeched to a stop. Everything hurt. Nothing worked. My eyelids kept slipping lower and lower.
“No . . . hospitals,” I murmured. “I won’t go back. I won’t . . . ”
A bellow rose from the seat beside me. More of that harsh language flowed between the front seat and the back. But I was having trouble focusing, their conversation half English and half unknown, too fluid for me to cup in my hands.
Briiiiiiing.
That damn ringtone followed me into oblivion.