Chapter Five
Mira was packing up to go home from school Thursday afternoon when Shayla slipped into the classroom and shut the door behind her. “I was hoping you were still here,” she said. “Do you have a minute to talk?”
“Of course.”
Shayla collapsed into a student desk on the front row. She wore a denim skirt and a red knit top, the color vibrant against her dark skin. But her face was pinched. “Is something wrong?” Mira asked.
“What do you think of Mitch?” Shayla asked.
Mira blinked. She hadn’t really thought much about the coach. “I don’t really know him,” she said.
“But you think he’s a nice guy, right?”
“Uh, sure.” She studied her friend more closely. “Is someone saying Mitch isn’t a nice guy?”
Shayla shook her head, then nibbled her thumbnail. “It’s just, you know. He’s a coach. Some people might mistake him for a dumb jock.”
“But you don’t think he’s a dumb jock, do you?”
“No.” Shayla sat up straighter. “He’s really smart, but he’s not the type to show off, you know? I mean, he didn’t go to an Ivy League school or anything, but he’s incredibly well-read and he knows a lot about a lot of different things. He’s the technology teacher, too.”
Mira suppressed a smile. “It sounds like you’ve spent a lot of time talking to him.”
“I have. He’s so easy to talk to. Yesterday we stood in the parking lot for over an hour after school let out, talking about, well, everything.”
“Has he asked you out?” Mira asked.
Shayla flushed. “I think he wants to, but every time it feels like he’s getting close, I change the subject.”
“Why would you do that? You like him, don’t you?”
“I do, but…” Her voice trailed away.
“But what?” Mira asked.
Shayla groaned. “My family. They’re kind of snobs. They aren’t impressed unless someone has a string of degrees after their name. And he’s white. They would never say anything, but I know that would bother them, too. But it doesn’t matter to me. I don’t think it matters to him, either.”
“Why don’t you go out with him and see where things go from there?” Mira asked. “You might find out he has horrible table manners or something like that that turns you off.”
“I doubt that.” Shayla’s smile was dreamy.
“We sat together at lunch once and I didn’t notice anything off-putting about his table manners.
And he’s so kind and patient. Did you know he takes care of his elderly father?
I mean, he supports his dad and they live together.
Mitch said his dad made some bad decisions when he was younger so that he needs Mitch’s help now.
But Mitch never talks like he resents it or anything.
That says so much about his character, don’t you think? ”
“It does,” Mira said. “So the next time you think he’s about to ask you out, let him. And say yes.”
Her smile faded. “I’ve probably already scared him off.”
“Then you ask him out,” Mira said.
Shayla laughed. “Maybe I will.”
A knock on the door made them both start. “Come in,” Mira called.
Mitch Anders opened the door. “There you are,” he said to Shayla. “I’ve been looking for you.”
Shayla smoothed a hand over her hair. “What can I do for you, Mitch?” she asked.
He glanced at Mira. “I just heard a boy has been kidnapped.”
“What?” Mira stared, trying to organize her frantic thoughts. “Who was kidnapped?”
“Bryce Atkinson. Molly Atkinson’s youngest boy.”
“Oh my gosh!” Shayla gripped the edge of the desk with both hands. “His sister, Ariana, is a sophomore.”
The image of the slight strawberry blonde flashed in Mira’s mind. “Ariana Atkinson is in my Spanish I class,” she said. “How old is Bryce?”
“I don’t know,” Mitch said. “My dad called with the news, but he didn’t have a lot of details. He said the sheriff has called search and rescue to help look for him.”
“How did your dad know about this?” Mira asked.
“He has a police scanner he listens to all the time.” Mitch grimaced. “He can tell you everything going on in this town.”
“Bryce is eleven, I think,” Shayla said. “But he looks younger. He’s small for his age. A sweet kid. I can’t believe this is happening.”
“What else did your dad tell you?” Mira asked Mitch.
“Dad said the boy was walking home from school, like he does every day, with his friend Max Eckert. Max went into the coffee shop to buy a snack. Bryce waited outside and somebody must have grabbed him. Pamela Jenkins was coming out of the bank two blocks down and she saw a white SUV stop. She heard a yelp, and the car sped off. When Max came out of the coffee shop, Bryce was nowhere to be seen.”
“Your dad heard all of that on the police scanner?” Mira asked.
Mitch shook his head. “Not exactly. But our neighbor is one of the 911 dispatchers, so he walked over and talked to her. She called a friend, who it turned out had talked to Pamela, and she passed on the details to my dad.”
How much had the story changed during this game of telephone? Mira wondered.
“I just checked the local Facebook page and it’s on there, too.” Shayla looked up from her phone.
Mira’s stomach churned. This was worse than when David had disappeared. Back then, when they first heard the boy was missing, everyone assumed he had stopped to play and lost track of time. Or maybe he’d even run away. They didn’t have the experience to believe he’d been abducted and murdered.
“His poor family,” Shayla said.
“You say search and rescue is looking for him?” Mira asked.
“Yes.” Shayla studied her phone again. “Someone else posted about seeing a boy running away from the highway up by Galloway Basin. The description of the boy sounded like Bryce, so I guess the sheriff sent search and rescue up there to check it out.”
“I should go check on my dad,” Mitch said. “He sounded pretty shook up when he called. I just thought you’d want to know about the missing boy.”
Shayla stood. “I should go, too,” she said. “I’ll walk with you to the parking lot.” She glanced at Mira. “If you’ll be okay?”
“I’ll be fine. Go.” Mira waved her away.
Alone, she stared at her half-empty backpack and the stack of student tests she needed to take home and grade.
But the news of another child victim had left her stuck to her chair.
What had she been doing when the announcement came that David was missing?
She couldn’t remember. The next day she had gone with some other teachers to volunteer to help search for him.
The next day—or maybe the next?—she had attended a candlelight vigil organized by the family’s church.
The child’s disappearance—and the discovery that he had been murdered—had been a tragedy that brought strangers together.
At first everyone was focused on taking care of the family and monitoring the news and social media feeds for any updates about the murderer.
But after a while, when the crime remained unsolved, people returned to their regular lives. David wasn’t forgotten, exactly, but memory of the tragedy faded.
Someone here in Eagle Mountain remembered it, though. And had decided to connect Mira with it. Nothing about that made sense to her.
She picked up her phone and thought about texting Carter. To say what? Be careful? Good luck?
Instead, she slid the phone into her pack, along with the papers that needed grading.
She found her keys and headed to the rental car—a small red sedan—that her auto insurance company had provided while they determined whether they would pay for her Toyota to be repaired or declare it totaled.
When David had disappeared, she had gathered with friends and family.
With Shayla busy with Mitch, she was keenly aware of how alone she was.
How much of that was circumstance, and how much her own fault for always keeping people—men—at arm’s length?
“We’re looking for Bryce Atkinson, age eleven,” Danny told the assembled volunteers. “Four feet three inches tall, eighty pounds. Blond hair, blue eyes. He’s wearing a blue Eagle Mountain Raptors T-shirt, blue jeans and white-and-gray tennis shoes. He may have a blue backpack.”
“How do we know this report of a boy running from a car in this area is even accurate?” Dalton asked.
“We don’t,” Danny said. “But we have to assume that a boy might be out there who needs our help until we learn otherwise.”
Sheriff Travis Walker came to stand beside Danny and the volunteers fell silent.
“I’ve spoken with Bryce’s father,” the sheriff said.
“He tells me Bryce hiked up here with the family last summer. Bryce is in Scouts and likes the outdoors. His dad thinks he would look for a trail and head down, toward town. But if he’s afraid of a pursuer, he would hide, so be sure to search any caves and rock crevices that might be big enough to conceal a child. ”
“Do you think the kidnapper is up here, too?” a woman farther back in the crowd asked.
“The only other car in the parking area when we arrived—a bright blue Jeep—belonged to a couple of hikers,” the sheriff said. “They didn’t see anything or meet up with anyone else on the trail. If the kidnapper was here, I think they’re gone now.”
They divided into groups of three and set out to sweep the section of the map they were assigned.
They moved slowly, a few feet apart, striving to look under every shrub and behind every large rock and in every hole, and over every ledge.
In addition to Bryce himself, they searched for any sign he had been here—small footprints, torn pieces of clothing, or any kind of distress signal he might have fashioned.
Carter tried to put himself in Bryce’s shoes. If a person he didn’t know grabbed him and forced him into a car, what would he do? Had the kidnapper tied up the boy? Or knocked him out? Then what?
“Why would someone bring a kid all the way up here?” he asked fellow volunteer Vince Shepherd.