Chapter One #2
On the way to Tracy’s, Sam texted Freddie, Gonzo and Archie to let them know what was going on.
Malone is calling in Missing Persons, who’ll take the lead on his orders, but I want to help, and there’s not much I can do being a relative.
I’m so sorry to ask you to give up a Saturday evening, but there’ve been some concerns with him recently that have me truly worried.
We’re going to relocate Tracy’s family to Celia’s so CSU can process Tracy’s house.
I’m on the way to Celia’s, they answered one after the other.
Thank you all so very much.
Anything for you, Freddie said.
The other two put exclamation marks on Freddie’s text.
“Freddie, Gonzo and Archie are coming to help,” she told Nick.
“That’s good of them.”
“Yeah, for sure.”
They knew there was nothing she wouldn’t do for them either.
It was how they rolled. Her entire team had recently stood by her side when she was under attack from two colleagues who blamed her for everything that’d ever gone wrong in their lives.
Thankfully, former Sergeant Ramsey and former Officer Offenbach were now locked up and facing charges that should keep them in prison for the rest of their lives.
Chief of Police Joe Farnsworth had put out a message informing his entire four-thousand-member department that there’d be zero tolerance for lawlessness going forward and that the union had agreed to work with him to weed out the bad apples.
There were a lot of them, and Sam was relieved to see two of the rottenest ones gone for good from their ranks.
Not to mention the death of disgraced former Deputy Chief Paul Conklin, who’d taken his own life when he was implicated in yet another crime, the first being the shooting of Sam’s late father, a case that had gone unsolved for four long years while Conklin had known all along who’d shot Skip—and why.
This time, they found out he’d tried to discredit Sam and Skip by feeding dirt on her to Offenbach and Ramsey, who’d paid him for it.
It’d been an exhausting few years for the Metropolitan Police Department, and Sam was still processing the fallout from the most recent situation in which Offenbach had sent armed drones toward the Easter Egg Roll at the White House, among other egregious crimes.
And now her young nephew was missing, her sister and brother-in-law were in a panic, and they’d be looking to her to find him and fix this for them. She’d do as much as she possibly could without crossing the lines Captain Malone had drawn. But she was as tired as she’d been in a long, long time.
Nick gave her hand a squeeze. “You know it’s okay to defer to others to handle this if you don’t have it in you right now.”
Of course he knew she was maxed out. He always knew. “Yes, I do.”
“You were looking forward to a little break after closing that nightmare of a case with Offenbach and Ramsey.”
“I have to help find Ethan. How could I do anything else while he’s missing? But I just have to wonder when the hell my family is going to catch a break.”
“It’s been a lot. No question.”
While still in high school, Brooke had been attacked and raped at a party in which other teens had been murdered. Sam’s dad had died in October, her brother-in-law Spencer in February and now her nephew was missing. Enough already.
She sent a message to Dr. Trulo, the department psychiatrist. My nephew Ethan, who recently began seeing your daughter for therapy, is missing.
If she has any info that might be helpful, we’d appreciate hearing from her.
I’m not sure what the ethics are on this when the patient is a minor. Anything you can do… Thank you.
Her phone rang a second later with a call from the doctor.
“Hey, I’m sending Christi a text as we speak. I’ll let you know what I hear. What else can I do?”
“That’s it for now. Thank you for jumping right on it.”
“Of course. Call if there’s anything else I can do.”
“I will. Thanks, Doc.”
“I’ll be praying for your nephew and family.”
“Appreciate it.”
Sam closed her flip phone. “Dr. Trulo’s daughter is a therapist and was seeing Ethan. He’s asking if she has any insight. He said he’d pray for Ethan and our family.”
“That’s nice of him.”
“What does it say about me that praying is the last thing I think to do when things go sideways?”
“Your first impulse is more about taking action yourself than asking the Almighty to handle things.”
“I almost envy people who have that kind of faith, how they can turn it all over to God, or whoever they worship, and know it’ll work out the way it’s meant to.”
“You’re too service-oriented to leave the details to anyone else.”
“Is that your way of saying I’m a heathen?”
“I never used that word.”
“I have a knot in my stomach, worrying about where Ethan is and what this’ll turn out to be about.”
“Let’s hope it’s all a big misunderstanding.”
Sam hoped against hope it was, but her gut was telling her something much bigger than that was going on, and she wouldn’t rest until she figured out what it was and helped to get her nephew home safely.