Chapter 2
two
JO
Maverick’s tears have long since dried as I run my fingers through his thick, dark hair.
He’s asleep on my lap. Learning about the mother you’ll never get the chance to know from the perspective of the father you thought you knew was hard on him.
It was hard to read, even for me. I cried right along with him. His pain was palpable.
James detailed a teenage romance that you see in movies. He really loved Abigail. They were happy together. They were both overjoyed at the unplanned pregnancy, mapping out their future as a family. Then all that was stolen from them by the person closest to them.
“Sorry,” Mav mumbles. I remove my hand so he can turn to face me. His heartbroken eyes find mine, and I run my knuckles softly down his cheek.
“You don’t have anything to be sorry about.”
Mav smiles weakly. It’s moments like these, my knuckles grazing his stubble, the warmth of him against me, that I can pretend that his heart doesn’t belong to someone else. That he’s mine and we’re just having a normal afternoon at home.
I fell for Maverick so slowly, so gradually, that I didn’t notice until it was too late.
I see the looks I get from Willa and Harlow.
They’ve noticed. Sometimes I think Belle has noticed too, but she might be better at keeping her thoughts off her face.
They look at me with pity because they know just as I do, Maverick belongs to Ezra and that will never change.
Yet I’m still here, with the man I care too much for cuddled into my lap, breaking a heart he doesn’t even know belongs to him.
“What about this one?” Harlow asks. We’re in her and Cal’s hotel room. They have a concert in Vermont tonight. The band is at sound check and Cora is napping, which gives us the perfect opportunity to go over the submissions for our podcast.
I look over at the one she picked. It was submitted anonymously, which makes it harder for us to talk to families, since they’re usually not the ones that did the submission. And since the cases we go over on the podcast are all cold cases, the families are usually reluctant to bring up old scars.
“Another one from Maine already?” We already did Ezra’s case last year, and we were hoping to cover other states before going back and doing a state twice.
“I know, but read it,” Harlow insists.
“This isn’t a cold case. The victim was murdered,” I say as I scan the form.
“There’s no body.”
I turn to Harlow. “How do you know that?”
“I read the whole thing before I showed it to you.”
I roll my eyes and continue reading. She’s right.
A body was never found. Whoever submitted this insists the victim, Noelle Price, wouldn’t have just vanished.
They think it was her boyfriend. Some anonymous guy that called in to report her missing.
They’re not disagreeing with her potentially being dead.
It seems like the police and courts ruled her dead because it was easier.
She was in her twenties and living in a shelter.
The exact type of case that isn’t worth their time.
The attached police report accuses her of prostitution, with no evidence to back up that claim.
“How far is this from your hometown?” I ask.
“About an hour, but it’s away from the coast. There’s nothing up there except trees and hunters. It’s where people go to hunt bears during hunting season.”
“The police think she was able to prostitute for men living in the woods looking for bears?” I ask, already annoyed with the shoddy police work, and I really only have the bare bones.
Harlow smiles. She got me, and she knows it.
“Alright. We can do this one as long as we can find more than just a barely filled out police report. We’d also need someone to interview.”
“I knew you’d see it my way, Joey.”
I roll my eyes at her again. Harlow smiles smugly, not the least bit affected by my attitude.
“You know, if she was actually in the woods, she could’ve been eaten by a bear.”
Harlow snorts. “Unlikely, but even if that is the case, we can find out.”
“By asking the bear?”
Harlow narrows her eyes. “What’s going on with you?”
I blow out a breath and lean back on the couch.
“The Boston show is giving me trouble. The venue fought me until this morning over the extra security we want, which the security company is giving me a hard time about like it’s my fault.
On top of that, I have an assistant from some spoiled brat insisting on a meet and greet. ”
“The show in Boston is tomorrow night. They just got back to you today about it?”
“Yup.”
Harlow leans back into the couch with me. “What are you going to do about the meet and greet? That one doesn’t seem like a big deal. They do those after the show, anyway.”
I nod. “The tone just bothered me. Like this woman thinks she’s owed time with the band just because she has money. She wants to meet them by herself too. Not even with everyone else who also paid for the privilege.”
“That’s gross,” Harlow says. “Make her pay triple and donate it somewhere.”
“That’s actually a good idea,” I say, taking out my phone and emailing her.
“Maybe make sure she’s not one of Declan’s exes this time, too.”
I want to laugh, but considering the last time we had this type of email, it ended up being one of his exes. Harlow may have a point.
“You need an assistant.”
I laugh. “I am an assistant.”
Harlow shrugs. “An assistant to the assistant.”
“Let’s get back to the bear interview.”