If I stop moving, I’ll start thinking.
Mom is already up. She doesn’t sleep much when someone she loves is hurting. She just becomes a lighthouse.
She’s at the stove now, flipping something in a pan that smells of bacon and stubbornness. Her hair is in a braid, cheeks pink from the heat.
“You’re up,” she says without turning.
“Haven’t been down,” I mutter.
That gets her to look. Her eyes sharpen, scanning my face the same way she used to check our knees for scrapes when we were kids.
“You eat?” she asks.
“No.”
She sets the spatula down with more force than necessary. “Sit.”
“Mom—”
“Dallas.” One word. That’s all it takes.
I sit at the table, a man obeying an order he didn’t agree to. She slides a plate in front of me. Eggs, bacon, toast. Food that tastes of home and guilt because I don’t deserve how steady she is.
“Eat,” she says.
I pick up the fork. My hand trembles.
Mom’s mouth tightens. “Any word?”
I shake my head, throat too tight to answer.
The kitchen is quiet except for the pan sizzling and the old clock ticking on the wall. That clock has been counting down my life for years. Counting the seconds since Belinda. Counting the minutes since Faith left Buckhorn the first time. Counting the hours since she disappeared last night.
“We’re going to find her,” Mom insists. “You know we will.”
I chew a piece of toast. It tastes of sawdust.
The back door opens, and cold air rushes in, followed by Boone’s big frame filling the doorway, carrying the whole outside world with him. His eyes land on me and go soft in a way that makes my chest crack.
“Morning,” he says.
Behind him, Nash stomps snow off his boots, and Clay follows, jaw tight, eyes stormy.
“We’re not waiting,” Boone says, and I know he’s not talking about chores.
Nash tosses his gloves on the counter. “I already called Jet and Laura. Jet’s got people checking cameras on Main. Laura’s got her diner regulars working as if it’s a damn FBI task force. Martha Lou’s already made a list. She loves a list.”
Clay is quiet. “I drove the south county roads before sunrise. Nothing.”
The wordnothinghits me.
I keep eating because Mom’s watching and Boone will make it a thing if I don’t, but my stomach is a knot. Every swallow is pushing food through fear.
Boone pulls out a chair and sits across from me, forearms on the table. “Tell us exactly what you remember. From last night. From the moment you left her mom’s house.”
“I already did,” I mutter.
“Tell us again,” Clay says.
