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As they were climbing in the car, Ryker said, “I don’t appreciate what they’re doing if it doesn’t produce anything. Fuck. We have to locate Oakley now. I have my juniors doing the calendar calls and the like, but I have a few cases to put my energy into, and I don’t know if I can split my attention. I’ve sent in continuances and hope that flies for now.”
“Something will give soon. I’ve got my guys scouring the community in places most of society doesn’t want to know about. Sharlee and Kaden are going deep, and we will find her. This is the type of thing people talk about.”
“I’m grateful for all you’re doing. I’m just maxing out on my ability to be civil.”
“Understood.”
As the days turned into another week, Ryker was taking sleeping pills to fall asleep. “Shit, next I’ll need pills to sleep, to give me an appetite, to wake me up, and help me shit. I’m falling apart.”
Kaden updated everyone on their progress. “I’ve been checking street and business CCTV. The cameras were blocked and put on a loop, but it came off too soon. About ten minutes before Oakley came out, I could finally see a woman leaving her office. She arrived in the garage; her body language was angry, so probably her client.”
“The woman stopped to speak to someone in a van parked next to Oakley’s car. Then, nothing for fourteen minutes, then we see the back end of the van as it is in the process of completing its turn out of the garage.”
Ryker’s thoughts swirled like a whirlwind as they split up to pursue their respective leads. He had spent the previous days wondering if Oakley was really just taking a break, or had something more sinister happened? The uncertainty had turned to absolute certainty that something bad had happened to his girl. The reality that she may never come back gnawed at him relentlessly.
He recalled the warmth of Oakley’s touch and how her laughter made his heart soar. He pictured her tender smile and how her eyes sparkled when they were together. They’d come too far to lose what they had waited so long to find. Sharlee called him a half an hour later, bringing him back to the moment.
“Burner phones, both of them.”
Ryker put it on speaker for Jac and Garrett to hear. “So, not real,” said Jac.
“Not real. None of it.”
“Fuck! Someone is playing a cat-and-mouse game with us. Do they have Bella too? Should we tell the police?”
Garrett reasoned, “They know they can’t find her and that she is Oakley’s best friend. They know she hasn’t shown up to work, either.”
Jac stood. “We will find her, and if Bella is with her, find her too. But we do need to examine the possibility that she might not be with Oakley or knows where Oakley is and is riding under the radar for some reason. Charlotte, delve into Bella’s background. Regroup meeting first thing in the morning.”
“My juniors have all the cases and are continuing the big one I can’t do right now. I’m all yours. Put me to work, or I’ll go mad.”
“Got it.”
“Oakley,” Ryker whispered into the night, the wind picking up around him as if to carry his words to her. “I won’t rest until I find you, baby girl.”
The next morning, on his way to Jac’s office, Ryker took a detour and arrived at Oakley’s office, hoping for any sign of progress. But the space remained dark and empty, frozen in time like the moment she went missing. The meeting they had this morning was brief.
Kaden represented the IT group today. “We are working on watching the CCTV trying to figure out which car might have been the one that Oakley left in. Also, trying to get a clear enough image for facial recognition on the woman patient.”
The next morning, Ryker went back and opened up her office just to feel near Oakley. He sat at her desk and gazed out the window, watching the world go on as if nothing had changed. But for Ryker, everything was different now. The light had gone out of his world, and all that was left was the desperate need to find Oakley again.
His phone buzzed, and Ryker saw it was Sharlee. He answered immediately. “Did you find something?”
“We may have caught a break,” Sharlee said. “There’s footage of a black sedan in the parking lot around the time Oakley went missing. No clear shots of the license plate yet, but it’s more than we had before. It left after the van.”
Ryker’s heart raced. “That’s great news. See if you can enhance the footage and run the vehicle through any databases. We have to identify who was driving that car.”
“On it. I’ll let you know as soon as we have something.” Sharlee hung up, and Ryker smiled for the first time since Oakley disappeared.
They were getting closer. He could feel it. Ryker left Oakley’s office, eager to check in with Jac’s team and review the case from every angle.
But when he arrived at his car, Ryker froze in shock. There, on the front seat of Oakley’s car, was a single white rose and his business card. No note, no explanation—just a chilling message meant for his eyes only. Oakley had said she wanted white roses at their wedding because he loved a pure white rose. To him, it signified starting over, fresh, new. What the fuck?
His blood ran cold as the truth dawned on him. Whoever took Oakley knew precisely where to find him, and they were watching his every move. Since the police had verified his alibi by his home security cameras and then later with Monroe and Garrett, his office, and the events afterward, they had ruled him out as a suspect in about an hour. But spending time alone was tearing at his sanity.
He called Jac and let him know. Jac said, “Don’t touch anything. Take pictures from outside. I’m calling Linton.”
Linton arrived with another officer and a forensic guy. “Tell me what you’re doing here, Ryker, and how you found this.”
