Chapter 13 Thriller #2
“Summer, you and Thad check the park,” Ashley yelled from her window, then froze as she realized what she was asking.
Quickly I answered, knowing my feelings about Thaddeus weren’t important right now. “That’s fine. We can check Patriots Park, the library, and Main Street.”
“And we’ll check all the schools on Broadway and their playgrounds,” Henry said, then gestured for Ashley to drive off.
Wasting no time, I ran after Thaddeus. After pulling the passenger side of his truck open, I climbed in before slamming the door a bit harder than I meant to.
He took off as I clicked my seat belt into place.
Normally, I’d remark on his speed, but I understood the urgency.
My eyes briefly trailed to Thaddeus’ side of the car, and I saw the worry etched on his face.
Deep creases were set in his forehead, and he clenched his jaw so tight I thought it’d break.
We were all terrified, and rightly so. When it came to situations like this, you had to run by the clock.
At the corner as he waited for a break in traffic to turn, the silence was deafening.
The engine was abnormally quiet, and the radio was off.
My sharp and uneven breathing was all I heard.
Next to me, Thaddeus gripped the steering wheel tightly.
Through pinched lips, he ordered, “Keep an eye on that side of the street. I’ll do this side. ”
Within seconds, I plastered my face to the window, wondering how Thaddeus planned to drive and study everything that passed his driver’s side window.
Now wasn’t the time to ask questions. I scanned the houses and the paths between each as the car strolled down the street.
Heart beating hard in my chest, I prayed I’d spot a familiar little boy and tried not to imagine what might happen if I didn’t.
I saw no signs of him.
“We should check Patriots Park first,” I said, my voice cracking. “Maybe Wylie’s there.”
I wasn’t particularly close to the boy, but he was a kid, and they loved parks.
“That’s where we’re going,” Thaddeus muttered, low and tense. “Keep your eyes on the street. I don’t want to drive past him.”
“I know how important this is, Thaddeus!” I snapped.
His eyes flicked to me briefly but hot enough to sting. Then he exhaled, ran a hand through his hair, and shook his head. Friction flooded the car. Anxiety bounced between us.
With my eyes back on the sidewalk, I felt a sudden chill. Thaddeus often cracked the windows in his car to enjoy the fall weather. Realizing I’d forgotten to grab a jacket, I wrapped my arms around myself.
Thaddeus must have noticed and carefully used one hand to reach in the back seat, grab his jacket, and shove it toward me without a word.
“I’m fine,” I muttered.
“Just take it.”
I bit my lip. The warmth of the jacket called to me, weighing on my lap as I sorted through the clashing thoughts in my mind.
I didn’t want to owe him anything, not even warmth, but I had to consider the situation.
Time was everything, and did I really want to be shivering while I needed to be focused on finding a vulnerable child?
I took the jacket and pushed my arms through it.
It was way oversized. Like wearing your boyfriend’s hoodie.
A brief flashback to the fall days when I used to steal his hoodies struck me.
I’d curl up on the couch, smirking when he strolled in naked from the waist up, discovering me, the so-called clothes snatcher.
This time, fuzzy feelings didn’t fuel the offering.
But it did bring a warmth that I suspected wasn’t only from the jacket’s thick material.
It smelled of Creed Aventus cologne, the same brand he wore years ago.
I gave him a bottle on his birthday, and after that he never went a day without spraying it on.
As we waited eagerly for a red light to change, I took one last whiff before returning my mind to the pressing matter at hand. Wylie.
Thaddeus and I sat together, silently united in fear over the lost boy.
Seconds passed as I sat rigid in the passenger seat.
Of all the people I could have been paired with for this, of all the people I could have leaned on in this unbearable moment, it had to be him.
If it were anyone else, I could have let the fear show.
I could have cried, or screamed, or reached for their hand just to feel a human connection through the panic.
But not with Thad. Not when I had once tried to kill him.
Not when I still couldn’t look at him without remembering all the ways he had wronged me.
Still, as the silence stretched between us and the weight of Wylie being missing pressed heavier on my chest, a thought snuck in uninvited.
What if it were our baby? The one growing inside me right now.
What if it were ours that had vanished? The idea gutted me.
And worse, what would Thaddeus do if it were his child missing?
I knew the answer instantly. He would tear the world apart.
He would burn it all down to find them. And in that terrifying, sobering moment, I understood something I had not wanted to admit.
No matter what I felt about him, no matter how deep the anger or how long the resentment, this baby tied us together in a way I could not undo.
We would both fight to keep him or her safe.
We would both bleed for them. And that meant I could not afford to harm Thaddeus. I can’t kill him!
Unable to take it anymore, I said my worst fear out loud. “What if something happened to him?”
I looked at Thaddeus. Not the hard angles or the tension in his neck. Just his eyes. And for the first time in a long time, I saw something I hadn’t expected.
He was just as scared as I was.
“He’s fine,” he said gruffly, even though his breaking voice betrayed his lack of confidence. “We’re gonna find him.”
I bit my lip hard. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have said that.”
Thaddeus looked straight ahead at the road. “He has to be fine. Henry will never forgive himself if he lost his son.”
Leaning forward, I placed my elbow on my knees, scanning the face, hair color, and body type of everybody the car passed on my side of the street.
Nervously, I tapped my finger on the dashboard.
I couldn’t sit still, and Patriots Park felt too far away, even though it was less than one mile from us.
Unable to help it, I stared back over at Thaddeus, the father of my unborn child.
Wylie wasn’t his son, and he’d only known the child for a few weeks, yet he gripped the steering wheel so tight his knuckles were white.
Beads of sweat gathered at his temple, and another slid down his face.
He kept checking his side window, scanning the sidewalks, then snapped his eyes forward to make sure we didn’t crash.
Thaddeus jerked the wheel and cut across two empty lanes. We’d finally arrived at the park. His tires screeched as we pulled into the parking lot. Thaddeus pressed the button to shut off the engine and jumped out of the truck. My door slammed behind me as I sprinted after him.
“Wylie?”
“Wylie!”
We searched the whole area. Behind the benches, trees, and the playground area.
No Wylie.
Thaddeus’s eyes had darkened now, and I knew what he was thinking. Wasting little time in exchanging words, he ran in the direction of the library. Yanking open the heavy door, Thaddeus waited for me to walk in, then we broke the one cardinal rule in the library. Being quiet.
“Wylie?”
“Wylie!”
Fear gripped me when I realized he wasn’t there either.
Thaddeus ran out of the library; I followed behind him.
I swallowed hard as my hands shook, and my heart pounded louder than my feet slamming against the pavement.
I couldn’t believe he wasn’t here. I had my money on finding Wylie at the first place we checked, or at least already having received a call to say he’d been found by one of the others.
I ran my hand through my hair in panic. Seemed I wasn’t the only one.
Frozen, I stood on the corner of the sidewalk watching Thaddeus move through the crowd, clearly unraveling.
From one pedestrian to the next, he abruptly jumped in front of them, giving each no other option but to stop, then shoved his phone in their faces.
Thaddeus’s hand was shaking so badly I could see it from here.
“Have you seen this boy? He’s missing. Please take another look.”
Each person shook their head no before Thaddeus ran to stop another one. This has seriously wrecked him. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him this frantic. The desperation in his voice was unnerving. Each time I heard him ask the questions, my heart broke a little more.
He just wants to know that Wylie is safe. I could see it in his eyes, hear it in the waver in his voice. Thaddeus Fitzgerald charged down the sidewalk, suit wrinkled, hair a mess, begging strangers for help.
Few men in his position would go to these lengths for another man’s child.
Friend or otherwise. He could easily afford to send Aston to scout the town while he sipped scotch in his mini-mansion.
He didn’t have to be on the streets getting his thousand-dollar suit beat up, sweating as he searched for a missing boy.
But he was. And that spoke volumes about the character hidden beneath his cold, chiseled surface. He wouldn’t stop until Wylie was back with Ashley and Henry, and neither would I.
In a flash, the unfeeling jerk who’d ignored my pain and pleas as he sought his revenge had disappeared.
Instead, before me was the Thad I once loved.
A man who’d go out of his way to protect others from pain.
Seconds passed as I stared at the human version of Thaddeus, who looked ready to tear Tarrytown up brick by brick to find Wylie.
The monster was gone. The mask had dropped.
He was human again. He was the Thaddeus I’d fallen in love with, not the monster who’d killed my father.
“Thaddeus!” I yelled, but he didn’t hear me calling. He continued down the street, grabbing the arms of strangers so they would stop. Then held them in place as he spoke.
“Have you seen this boy today?”
“No,” a man said and tried to leave.
Thaddeus yanked the man closer. “The least you can do is fucking look at it properly. How do you know you haven’t seen him?”
The man’s face went white, and his eyes widened in a jolt of recognition, and I saw the moment he realized who Thaddeus was. The man few people in Tarrytown still called a monster.
I hurried over to Thaddeus’s side and spoke gently. “I’m sorry. Our friend’s son is missing, and we’re scared.”
The man recognized me too. I could tell from the way he looked at me. He nodded and reached for Thaddeus’s phone, giving the photo a proper once-over. “I’m sorry. I haven’t seen him.”
Thaddeus yanked his device back and blocked the path of the next pedestrian.
“Thanks,” I told the man and noticed he didn’t walk away.
He looked from me to Thaddeus again. “Guess time heals all wounds. Surprised to see you two working together.”
Typically, I’d take time to wonder what the hell he was on about, but all I could focus on was one burning question: Were we running out of time? Was Wylie in danger? I unlocked my phone, found a photo of Wylie, and grabbed a few pedestrians Thaddeus missed.
As I shoved my phone into a few confused but concerned faces, I was unable to forget about the caring man holding himself together by a thread as he searched for a missing child.
For years, I’d thought all the warmth and compassion had drained from Thaddeus when his mother died.
That whatever had made him a soft, kind human had been snuffed out and buried alongside her.
Right now, watching him, frantic and heart in pieces on the crowded sidewalk, I realized I’d been wrong.
There was still a heart in him.
It just turned on for the people Thaddeus couldn’t afford to lose. The last time I saw Thaddeus so disoriented was the night his mother died.