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The door is locked, but Gwen is right behind me pulling a set of keys from her pocket and opening the door. We both enter to see the dog hasn’t been fed. Her bed is made, but it hasn’t been slept in. A knot forms in my throat as I scan the small apartment. No signs of dinner, no dishes in the sink or on the drying rack.
“She hasn’t been here.”
“Oh, God!” Gwen clutches her stomach, dropping against the wall. “Not her. Not my girl.”
“Stop it,” I bark. “We have to keep calm. When was the last time you saw her?”
“The day you sent her to get my gun.” Her eyes flash to mine. “Which I still don’t have back.”
“You’ll get it back.” Anger is in my voice, in my veins. It’s the only way to fight the growing fear. “The last time I saw her was at Little Sunbeam Park yesterday afternoon with Edward. She obviously came back here after that.”
My phone is out, and I see an hour has passed. “I’ve got to pick up my son from church.”
I start for the door, and she grabs my arm. “What can I do?” Panic is in her voice, and I look around the room.
“Take care of Edward.” I put my hand on her arm, calming my tone. “Give me your number, and I’ll text you when I’ve found her.”
Her lips tighten, and for whatever reason, she’s struggling with this simple request. This simple olive branch.
“You love her.”
My chin pulls back, and I hesitate.Fuck it. “Yes.”
“You’ll search until you find her? You won’t give up?”
Pressure is in my chest at her words. I don’t like this line of thought. We have to stay positive. We’re going to find her riding back to the courthouse with a box of donuts, and she’s going to smile her cute smile and ask if I’m being over protective again.
A sliver of fear pierces my insides at the thought. “Give me your number.”
She finally relents, and when she passes my phone back to me, I’m out the door, jogging down the steps and heading to the church.
* * *
Owen ison the lawn playing with Ryan, and I decide to wait and see if Piper knows anything when my brother strolls out the door.
“Hey, bro! What are you doing at church?”
“Picking up Owen.” My tone is clipped, and his smile fades when he reads my expression.
“Is something wrong?”
“I don’t know. Nothing, probably. Britt wasn’t at work this morning, and when I went to her building to check on her, her bike wasn’t there.”
“She didn’t text me.” His voice is urgent, and my eyes snap to him.
“What was that?”
“I ran into her at the park yesterday looking like she was about to cry, so I invited her to Stone Cold. We had a few drinks, and she took off on her bike headed home. I told her to text me when she got there, but she didn’t. I figured she just forgot.”
I’m jogging to my truck while he’s still speaking. “Watch Owen for me.”
Silence fills the cab, and I grip the steering wheel as I fly up the narrow road in the direction of my family’s distillery, straining my eyes as I scan the shoulders. A bad taste is in my mouth. I need any shred of hope I can find.
If she had an accident, she’d have used her phone to call for help—unless her phone was broken.
If someone hit her, I want to believe they’d have done the right thing and reported it. I want to believe they’d have done the better thing and taken her to get help. But what happened to Annemarie burns in my memory. It tightens my lungs, making breathing difficult.
My knuckles are white, and my eyes ache from searching. I’m halfway to the distillery when it all goes to shit. My stomach drops, and I pull to the side of the road with a squeal of tires.
