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8:15 p.m. Doe: Yes.
8:18 p.m. Me: If you need to talk afterward, call or message me.
8:20 p.m. Doe: I will.
FRIDAY
11:34 a.m. Me: How was your appointment?
3:12 p.m. Me: Hello?
6:05 p.m. Me: Doe. Is everything okay?
8:32 p.m. Me: Message me when you get this.
I look down at my phone with a frown, rereading the few messages between Doe and me. My last message was sent three hours ago. I haven’t heard from her since last night, and I don’t like it. I’ve tried my best to leave her alone, to give her time to get used to her new home, but she looked so sad when she left with Mr. Stewart that I wanted to make sure she was doing well. Doe’s never been a person of many words, even in person, so her texts have been short.
Betsy, who’s lying on the couch beside me, lifts her head when I release a frustrated sigh.
“S’alright, girl,” I murmur, running my hand along her back.
I debate with myself on if I should just call her and hope she picks up. This is torture not being with her and seeing for myself how well she’s doing. She can say she’s fine all day long, but that doesn’t mean it’s true.
Instead of giving in to my need to hear her voice, I get up from the couch and go to my bathroom. After turning on the shower, I strip down and step under the hot spray, letting it relax my tense muscles.
An image of Doe comes to mind as I rest my hands against the shower wall and hang my head. She’s always on my mind, and I have no idea how to get her out. She’s become an obsession, almost as bad as Aislin. The need to find out more about her, where she was when she disappeared, what happened to her, and now, what made her believe she had no choice but to hurt herself, consumes me. I don’t like being this fixated, but my mind won’t let it rest.
I growl and throw my fist against the tiled wall. My eyes pinpoint on the now cracked tile. Why can’t I get her out of my fucking head? No matter how many times I ask myself this, no answer appears.
To keep myself from going insane, I make plans to stop by Mr. Stewart’s house tomorrow if I don’t hear from Doe before then. I just need to check on her one more time, and then I’ll work at extracting her from my mind. I’m sure she’ll probably always have a place there, but I need to let her go and return my focus to Aislin’s case. I haven’t forgotten about her—there’s no way I ever could—but my concentration has been on Doe so much lately that I’ve lost track of what’s most important.
Twisting the dial to turn off the shower, I get out, grab a towel, and roughly dry my body. I’m just pulling a shirt over my head when there’s a loud pounding on my door. I look down at my watch to check the time. 12:05. Who in the fuck is knocking on my door this late?
Being the detective that I am, I grab my revolver from my nightstand and walk quietly down my hallway. My finger stays on the safety switch, ready to flip it if need be as I approach the door. It’s never a bad thing to be cautious; that’s been engraved in me since the police academy.
I peek through the peephole in my door then release a sigh at who I find on the other side. Flipping the lock, I pull open the door.
“What are you doing here this late?” I ask the two men in front of me.
Tavers pushes past me and a bout of irritation slides inside me. I’m already on edge from not hearing from Doe.
“Where’s your phone?” Captain Morgan asks, stepping inside behind Tavers.
My eyes move to the small device I left on the table in the living room.
“I was in the shower,” I grunt. “Why? What’s going on?”
Captain’s eyes move to Tavers then back to me. “There was a mistake in the DNA analysis we got back for Rebecca.”
My body tenses. “What in the fuck do you mean?”
“They were mixed up with another sample.”
Captain’s eyes move back to Tavers. They share a look, and it has my blood freezing in my veins.
“What are you saying exactly? Are you telling me we sent Doe off with a man who’s not her uncle, and he willingly took her knowing this?”
A growl escapes my lips when Captain looks back at Tavers. Something is definitely not right here, and it pisses me right the fuck off that they aren’t telling me what it is.
