My stomach twisted.
“Any luck?” Mom asked from across the yard. The spacewas decorated, but somehow, the decorations deepened my dread.
Sam was gone. He’d crawled out my window and disappeared.
“Not yet,” I called, trying to keep my voice bright.
All brightness was gone by the time the party started. Mom had woken Tommy up at ten-thirty, reassuring me Sam had probably just forgotten about the early start time. But when everyone turned up at the door and he still wasn’t there, I started to panic.
“When’s the last time you heard from him?” Conrad demanded.
He was grilling me like a cop or firefighter, but I appreciated that he was taking my concern seriously.
“Last night,” I whispered. “Around ten-thirty.”
Tommy frowned, but luckily his still sleepy and slightly bewildered brain wasn’t up for doing the math.
“Where was he going? What was he wearing?”
“Con,” Kit said. “What is he, a perp?”
“No,” Conrad said, sounding irritated. “Of course not. But if he’s missing, we need to be able to find him.”
I knew his irritation wasn’t at Kit. More than likely it was because of Chip, who was just sitting there uselessly, throwing a ball up and down in the air.
“You could at least throw Henry’s ball to Henry,” Kit snapped at him now.
He looked hurt, like he didn’t know why she was annoyed.
But I was still too thrown by Conrad’s words.
Missing?
The idea that Sam was a missing person was terrifying. But so was the other possibility.
That he’d done what he always did. Taken off, running for the hills when things get tough.
That little voice in my head was like a knife to my chest.
But I couldn’t reconcile it with the man I knew.
The one I’d fallen in love with.
As Kit looked at me with an expression that was this close to tears—for me, I knew—I knew she was thinking he ran. How could she not? She didn’t know his whole story.
Mom had an anxious expression on her face, though she was trying to hide it.
We were quiet over brunch, which made me feel like shit, because this was supposed to be Tommy’s birthday. But even Tommy just pushed his waffles around his plate with eyes staring at nothing.
“Honey, I’m so sorry,” I said to him. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me. “We’ll have another party, I promise.”
He blinked. “It’s fine. I just… I didn’t think he’d do something like this.”
“He wouldn’t,” I said, my voice loud enough that everyone startled. I didn’t care.
Henry started whimpering. Mom picked him up and carried him over to the little play area we’d set up for him.
“Tommy, you wanna come play with Henry with me?” Archie asked.
