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As though it might give me an explanation or some answers, I looked back at the closed door to the room. I found nothing there, returned my attention to Jake, and asked, “What about her? What’s going on? Do you know why she seems so out of sorts right now?”
He let out a frustrated sigh. “Yeah.”
“What is it?” I pressed him, feeling myself growing more and more tense with each second that passed. He knew something about her, something that was obviously of great concern, and getting the information out of him was beginning to feel a lot like pulling teeth.
“I saw it this morning,” he started. “Ellery’s not originally from Steel Ridge.”
“Okay. What does that have to do with anything? And what did you see this morning?” I questioned him.
There was an extended pause before he revealed, “Her face was plastered all over the news this morning.”
I was already feeling incredibly tense, but at Jake’s declaration, my body went rigid. “What do you mean? Why?”
“She went missing not quite a week ago from a shopping mall in West Virginia,” Jake shared. “Avalon just told me that Ellery came in here this morning wanting private classes and weapons training.”
Ellery went missing not even a week ago. Her face was on the news this morning. It seemed impossible, and yet, I knew Jake wouldn’t be telling me this if he weren’t absolutely certain.
Then again, I wasn’t sure why I was struggling to believe it when I saw the look that had been on her face and the desperation in her voice this morning.
Even knowing he was telling the truth, I begged, “Please tell me you’re joking.”
“I wish I was.”
There was no missing the sympathetic tone in my friend’s voice. Sure, we might have given each other a hard time and joked around with each other regularly, but the bottom line was that when it came to our job and the people we worked with, we took it all very seriously.
“Do we know what, or who, she’s running from?” I asked him.
“I can’t say for sure, because the reports made it seem as though they weren’t sure what happened to her. It’s uncertain to them if she left willingly or if she was coerced in some way,” he answered.
Something about the look on his face told me that there was more to this than he had shared. “What is it?” I pressed. “What are you not telling me? Do you have a theory about why she’s here?”
Jake clenched his jaw and nodded his head. “Yeah.”
“And?”
“I get the feeling she wanted to get away from a guy they interviewed about her disappearance,” he replied.
I probably could have guessed that much, even if the thought of her being in a situation where she believed that was necessary didn’t sit well with me. “Okay. Do we know anything about him? Can we get one of the guys on it? Have one of them do a little digging to see what we’re dealing with here? I mean, maybe Ellery was being proactive by leaving, realizing she was in some kind of danger. But if we could pinpoint exactly who the guy is, we might be able to find out what he wants from her.”
“We could certainly do that, but I think you’ll get more by just talking to her,” he reasoned.
“How?”
Jake hesitated again.
That’s when I knew that I wasn’t going to like whatever he had to say.
“Because the guy they interviewed that gives me all the wrong vibes about this situation is Ellery’s husband.”
In an instant, something painful clenched in my gut and tightened in my chest.
She was married. Ellery was married.
There was no question in my mind that her husband was the man she was trying to get away from. I just needed to figure out why.
“Talk to Leo,” I ordered. “Tell him to find out everything he can on this guy.”
Leo worked in our private investigation unit. He was brilliant at what he did and had gut instincts like nobody I’d ever met. If someone could learn anything about why Ellery left her home, I had full faith in Leo to get the job done.
