Chapter Seven
As they drove back to the resort, the skies had opened up to a torrential downpour, blurring the world as if Lila were looking through tears. She wasn’t. She refused to cry. Refused to panic, shake, blame, scream, fight, or cry. She would not cry.
And Gabe, of course, went to work. Driving through the rain, he instantly set Chessie up as the point person working the phones at the house with his parents, Nino, and Poppy. Everyone else in the family, plus Luke and a few of his security team, had gone on an organized search of the grounds and beach.
Oh God. The beach. Would Rafe go there alone? Why would he leave? Everyone was so focused on finding him, they’d yet to get the whole story on why or when or how he left. That was the answer to finding Rafe, Lila knew.
“Get Poppy on the phone,” she said suddenly to Gabe and Chessie, who was on speaker.
Gabe threw her a look, no doubt thinking like she was. “And Nino,” he added.
Chessie didn’t hesitate. “Of course. Hang on.”
While they waited, the phone on the console between them, Gabe reached over and gave Lila’s hand a squeeze. “The Rossis and Angelinos are on this,” he said. “You couldn’t have a better search team.”
She nodded, staring ahead. “Why would he leave, Gabe?”
“Have you met that kid?”
“He doesn’t act out for the fun or attention,” she said. “Yes, he’s a handful. Yes, he’s a risk-taker. Yes, he’s daring and fearless and five years old. But he doesn’t do things to get attention. He does them for a reason. What would be his reason for sneaking out of the house in a thunderstorm?”
“The rings,” Gabe said without hesitation. “He must think he knows where they are.”
“I am here,” Poppy said, her Jamaican accent broken by a hitch in her voice. She was crying, Lila knew. And if she was crying, Nino must be heaving great big Italian sobs and throwing his hands in the air.
“I am, too,” Nino said, surprisingly cool in this situation. “They won’t let me go out and look for my own great-grandson. Gabriel, tell them I can look for my own great-grandson!”
“Calm down, old man. We need you right where you are. I know Chessie said Mom was the last one to see him, but all we know is he went to the bathroom and disappeared. So do you think he sneaked out on the pool deck and left?”
“What do you mean ‘we think’?” Poppy asked. “The boy went to the bathroom, and there’s a door to the pool, and every single person in this family who was here was in the living room. Do you think he was kidnapped?” Her voice rose with a whine.
“And you can see the whole pool deck from the living room,” Gabe said, ignoring the suggestion.
“Which means he intentionally hid from sight,” Lila added. “He wasn’t exploring or curious or trying to freak everyone out. He had a destination. Where? Were you talking about the lost rings before he left?”
“No, sir,” Poppy assured him. “Your parents and Chessie and Mal and little Lita were playing Candy Land to help cheer up Rafe because his arm hurt so badly.”
Lila closed her eyes, immediately gutted by the thought of how much that poor child had been through today, guilt pressing down. Not that she could control her dreams. Or had had any idea those dreams were bad mojo.
“What else? What were they talking about in the living room?”
“Who had Plumpy,” Nino said.
“Was Rafe losing the game?” Gabe asked, tapping the brakes and swerving suddenly as they came up on an unexpected puddle from the deluge.
“He doesn’t care if he loses!” Nino insisted, always the first to defend Rafe no matter what he did. “That wouldn’t make that child run away in the rain.”
He was right, Lila thought. “What else was going on?” she asked. “Think, you guys.”
“Nino was cookin’,” Poppy continued. “I was in the kitchen emptying the dishwasher.”
“What were you talking about?” Lila urged.
“Mister Luke called to say he was sending someone to get the golf cart because of the storm. The resort puts them all away when the rain is bad. No mention of the rings, I promise.”
Lila gnawed on her lip, trying to think like Rafe would.
“He’d been in the golf cart,” Gabe said suddenly. “I totally forgot that. When we got to the villa this morning, he ran to the golf cart parked there and sat in the front seat and pretended to drive. Remember, Nino?”
“I do, but as soon as we called him, he jumped right out like a good boy,” Nino said.
“But maybe he lost the rings there,” Lila suggested, leaning forward. “We never checked when we were looking for them. Did you?” she asked Gabe.
He shook his head.
“Then that’s where he went,” Lila said. “To the golf cart garage.”
Which wasn’t a garage at all, but a large overhang in the resort parking lot where the half-dozen golf carts were charged or stored when not in use. The whole area was a mess of construction now as they built a retention pond and expanded the parking lot.
“We’re pulling up to the resort now,” Gabe said, accelerating through another puddle. “We’ll go right there.”
“Some of the carts are being used to search for Rafe,” Chessie called out, obviously still nearby the phone and listening to every word. “So if he went there, they’d have seen him.”
Maybe, maybe not.
“What’s he wearing again?” Gabe asked.
“Blue shirt, shorts, sneakers,” Lila answered as another bolt of lightning cut through the sky, followed almost immediately by thunder. “Hurry, Gabe!” The storm was directly over Barefoot Bay now, making Lila’s heart thump against her ribs.
Her baby boy was out in a deadly storm. With a broken arm. Trying to find the rings he lost because his heart was in the right place. She blinked against tears. She would not cry.
Gabe pushed the GTO to its limit, spitting rooster tails of water. “All this rain will flood that construction area.” He threw her a look, his eyes a reflection of the pain burning in her chest. “If that little son of a bitch falls in…”
She closed her eyes, picturing the section of the resort as they barreled closer to the main entrance. Flash flooding in the parking lot had been such a problem this year that management had opted to build a retention pond at the far end of the lot. But they’d just dug it out, and right now, it was little more than a deep and muddy ditch, or probably a small pond, with all this rain.
Gabe whipped the car into the parking lot, headed straight for the yellow and white striped awning, as far away as it could be. Gripping the seat, Lila leaned forward, peering through the thumping windshield wipers, which were essentially useless in this downpour.
Lightning flashed again, a bolt clearly visible in front of them, making Lila shriek and cover her mouth as she realized they’d almost been hit.
“We have to get to him!” she ground out.
Gabe, silent, undaunted, powered through the lot, slamming on the brakes so hard the car fishtailed wildly. He ripped off his seat belt and shoved the car into park.
“Stay here!” He threw open the door and leaped out into the rain before Lila could even voice her argument. Stay here? Was he out of his mind?
She unlatched her seat belt almost as fast as he had and opened the door, instantly soaked. She didn’t care.
“Rafe!” she yelled, spitting and blinking against the rain.
Gabe was already running toward the covered area where the carts were parked.
As she caught up to him, she saw one of the carts lurch forward. “Rafe!” she screamed again.
“Mummy!” His little voice was barely audible in the downpour. But she heard it. “It’s stuck! My foot is stuck!”
He was stuck? Or the gas pedal was? Gabe moved in front of her in a blur just as another white-hot bolt of lightning cracked not fifty feet away, blinding and vicious, making every hair on Lila’s body stand.
Ahead of her, Gabe was thrown to the right from the impact of the bolt hitting the ground.
She heard Rafe scream again, the metallic smell of ozone and fear nearly suffocating her as she ran. The only thing she could see was the roof of one golf cart headed straight toward a fifteen-foot mudslide.
In a matter of seconds, Rafe could die.