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“Can you tell us which flight last left to head out west?” Hannah begged, and the woman refused.
She clearly still believed I was hurting Evelyn.
I turned away from the desk, completely at a loss. Was I going to head out west and scour every state for her? It just seemed impractical.
“Excuse me?” a teenager said, grabbing my attention.
I looked at her, and she looked nervous, and young. Maybe fourteen.
“Yes?” I answered.
I didn’t want to be rude, but I was kind of in the middle of a crisis.
“The girl you’re looking for. She was like a college student, right?”
“Yes!” I exclaimed, “Did you see her?”
She looked away from me, and towards a suitcase she’d left abandoned.
“Are you here alone?” I asked. “Where’s your family?”
“I don’t have any,” she said, “But I saw your girl.”
I took a closer look at the teenager, and she was clearly hungry. She had straightened, dyed black hair, was wearing eyeliner, and had a sunken look to her face I had seen on Evelyn when I first met her.
“Where was she?” I asked gently.
“I was behind her. She bought a ticket to Nevada. It was the first ticket out west.”
Nevada. I finally had a place to go.
“Did you happen to hear anything else? What she was doing out there?”
“Nah, just that she was going out west, but I remember thinking that she must have been cold. She wasn’t even wearing a winter coat—just a hoodie and jeans.”
I gritted my teeth, more worried for Evelyn than before. She clearly hadn’t been in the best state of mind when she left.
“Thank you,” I said. “Just one other thing—where are you headed?”
The girl looked deeply suspicious, but answered “Utah.”
I wanted to laugh. It was like I was meeting Evelyn on her way, but I prayed that this girl would have better luck than to meet a man like Garth.
I pulled out my wallet, and gave her all the cash in it. It was only a couple hundred dollars, but I hoped it was enough for the girl to get a start. She stared at the bills, mouth open.
“Thanks for your help - I hope Utah is good to you.”
I memorized her face, just in case anyone asked about a missing girl, but the look in her eyes said she was headed for better things. I grabbed Hannah from the ticket desk, and asked for two tickets to Nevada. The woman reluctantly sold them to us, but explained that we wouldn’t be able to travel until the storm was over.
I was irritated. I wanted to be in Nevada already. I needed to hold Evelyn, to make sure she was okay.
I booked us into an airport hotel, not wanting to make the trip home, and made phone calls while waiting for the storm to pass.
Chapter Nineteen
Evelyn
Igroaned, rolling off the mattress.
