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“It’s my fault,” she breathed, gathering her courage. “All my fault.”
“What is?”
“Cody,” she choked out, pressing the back of her hand to her lips and looking up at Chase. “He’s missing.”
“Missing? What do you mean?”
“Just that. He got on the bus around seven-thirty this morning and no one’s seen him since.”
“You’re sure?” Sitting on the arm of the sofa, his blue eyes scanning her white, pinched face, he placed his large hand on her shoulder and her fear infected him. Dani wasn’t a woman who panicked easily. Usually strong, now she was scared to death.
“I’ve called everyone, looked everywhere,” she said, standing, pacing and wringing her hands.
“Wait a minute. Slow down and back up,” he insisted, taking hold of her and sitting her back on the couc
h. “Now why don’t you start at the beginning. Cody got on the bus to go to school—then what happened?”
Slowly, in a slightly broken voice, she told him every last detail of the search for her son.
“You should have come to me.”
“I—I couldn’t. I didn’t know where you were and . . . well, you know how it is with Caleb. I did call him and he said he’d get word to you.”
“He didn’t bother.”
“Figures.” Dani sniffed.
“You haven’t heard from Blake?”
Dani shook her head and sighed. “Nothing.”
Pacing the length of the house, Chase tried to unscramble his jumbled thoughts while his suspicion increased. Chase didn’t trust coincidence and there were just too many coincidences in Dani’s life right now. “I wonder if this has anything to do with Jenna Peterson taking off?”
“I don’t see how. Jenna had an argument with Caleb and Cody . . . Cody’s probably run off with his father. They could be in North Dakota by now, or Idaho . . . or Canada. I wouldn’t put it past Blake to take him out of the country.”
“But why, Dani?” Chase asked, his thick brows pulled over his eyes as he strode purposefully into the kitchen, rummaged in Dani’s cupboards, found a dusty old bottle of Scotch and poured them each a stiff drink. He carried the glasses in one hand and the bottle in the other as he came back into the living room and snapped on one of the table lamps.
“Why did Blake take Cody?” she repeated. “To be with his son, of course.”
“I don’t think so.” Chase handed Dani a glass. “Drink it.” When she started to protest, he set the bottle on the table and wrapped her fingers around the glass. “Just this once, Dani, don’t argue.”
“But Cody’s got to be with Blake—they’re both missing.”
“You think.” Chase downed his drink in one swallow and poured himself another. His knuckles whitened around the glass as he frowned into the amber liquid. “Y’know . . . there are just too damned many twists of fate around here to suit me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Don’t you think it’s odd that Jenna Peterson, a woman who’s worked for Caleb for years, took off about the same time that Blake blew into town?”
“But Blake’s been writing Cody for months—”
“And don’t you think it’s just a damned sight too convenient that both Blake and the boy are missing—right after we confronted Caleb Johnson with the fact that we know he’s done everything from poison your water to low-ball you on the land to get you to sell out to him.”
Dani sipped from her drink and a chill ran down her spine. “You’re trying to tell me that Caleb’s behind Cody’s disappearance.”
“I’m saying that I don’t trust him and that things are happening too fast to be just a matter of fate.” He glanced out the window to the gathering storm. “You’re the one who put the idea into my head, y’know. You said it yourself: You were tired of being manipulated. I think it’s about time to set a few things straight with my ‘partner.’” He finished his drink and set the glass on the table with a thud. “Get your coat. This time when we talk to Johnson, we’re going to get some answers—straight answers!”
* * *
