Page 143 of Running to You

“Not much. Did you?”

He shrugged and shot Sam a look.

Before she could ask, Grant stood and gave her a side hug. “Glad you’re safe.”

Jon rose with the rest of them, but he didn’t move from his spot on the far side of the table, just dipped his head. “Good to see you again, Eliza.”

“How did you guys get up here so early?” she asked.

Sam chuckled. “It’s not exactly early.” He pulled out a chair for her, one facing the window and the spectacular view. Tree-covered mountains boasting every shade of green imaginable, broken up by hints of red, orange, and yellow.

Would she have her son back by autumn? Would she be with him to experience the spectacular New England foliage?

“You all right?” Sam asked.

“Yeah, yeah.” She sat, and the rest of the men did as well. The table was covered with half-empty cups of coffee and glasses of water, not to mention stacks of paper and four laptops, all open.

While she’d slept, they’d been working on finding her mother and her son. The thought brought tears to her eyes.

She was so tired of crying. And being afraid. And being in pain. Her arm ached from where Gil had manhandled her two days before. Her hip throbbed from getting tossed into a trunk like a bag of bark mulch. Her wrist still ached from the previous Friday night.

But none of the physical pain rivaled the ache in her heart. She wanted her son back. And her mom safe. And everything to be okay.

Sam poured coffee from a carafe on the table into a clean cup and moved the bowls of sugar packets and creamer close. Then he slid a napkin-covered plate close. “I saved you a biscuit from breakfast.”

“Thank you.” She reached for a sugar packet and tore the top. “I’m in desperate need of caffeine, so maybe this is a dumb question.” She focused on Grant. “How is it you’re here already?”

Grant sent Sam a sardonic look. “He called me. About six hours ago.”

She snapped her gaze to the man beside her. “You didn’t.”

He shrugged. “We needed to make plans.”

“You told them about Levi?”

Before he could answer, Michael said, “Woke me before dawn. I think he’d have bought cigars if there’d been a store open.”

Sam might’ve looked a little embarrassed, but he shrugged. “It’s kind of big news. Haven’t told anybody else yet, just these guys. I’m hoping to introduce him to everybody at the anniversary party. What a present that’ll be.”

She remembered her conversation with Grant and looked his way now. Sam’s younger brother wore a slight smile. Apparently, he didn’t mind that his and Summer’s news might not be the biggest surprise of the day.

“We have to get him back first,” Eliza said.

Sam’s expression shifted to grim determination. “We’re working on that.”

“And?”

“We’re still trying to narrow down where they might be. There’re a lot of options in the area where his phone pinged. Houses and neighborhoods and strip malls. Not to mention vacation homes and—”

“Unless you can get a better location on him,” Jon said, “we’ll have to check them off one by one.”

“But it would have to be a place he’s connected with, right?” Eliza shifted her gaze from Jon to Sam. “Don’t you think?”

“Why do you say that?” Sam asked.

“He didn’t just randomly pick central Maine. There has to be a reason he went there and not…well, anywhere else.”

“I’ve been trying to figure that out,” Jon said. “From my research, Keller grew up in Massachusetts.”