Chapter 3 #2
He went to his own room, showered, brushed his teeth, and then went to check on Tyler again.
His son was settled in bed, and Rad stood for a moment in the doorway of his room, watching him in the dim light.
Tyler was already fast asleep, one arm flung over his face, the other tangled in the blanket in a way that reminded Rad painfully of himself at that age.
Tyler had never had any trouble falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
His eyes fell on the bedside lamp that was still on.
When they were in New York, Tyler couldn’t sleep without it.
He would have terrible nightmares that made him scream himself awake if the room was in complete darkness.
That’s why the bulb in the lamp was as dim as they could get it.
But since they had been here, his son didn’t mind Rad coming in to turn it off once he was asleep.
Rad quietly walked into the room, switched off the bedside lamp, and eased the door nearly closed.
Then he went to check for his father, but Holt’s room was still empty.
That didn’t surprise him, but it did add another small weight to an already overloaded night. His father would still be out there somewhere, trying to figure out what the heck was going on in Sandpiper Shores.
Rad thought about calling him, but he knew it would not be answered if his father was buried in paperwork, so he headed back to his own room.
The bracelet sat where he had left it, sealed inside its evidence bag on top of the dresser beside the smartwatch.
Rad stopped.
Even through the plastic, it looked delicate and expensive. White gold with a fine chain. It was feminine, stylish without being gaudy. He stared at it for a long moment. Something about it felt familiar.
It was not familiar enough to land, but it was enough to bother him.
Rad changed for bed and turned off the light. When he climbed beneath the covers, exhaustion should have taken him quickly. Instead, his mind kept moving.
His mind moved to Margo in the hallway of Teacups, thanking him for finding her.
Then it moved to June’s hand on his arm in the car and to Tyler saying danger felt different here because people came together.
Then his thoughts went to another puzzle that had taunted him earlier: Willa is only thirty-seven.
June had told him that she and his father had been divorced for roughly thirty-eight years.
Rad rolled onto his back and lifted his hands behind his head as he stared at the ceiling in the darkness and let the math circle him again.
If his father and June had been divorced nearly thirty-eight years…
And Willa was only thirty-seven…
Something else June had told him rushed back into his mind:
My husband had an accident that left him unable to father children.
I was lucky to be blessed with a daughter like Willa.
Was he reading too much into what she had said and the way her words had seemed careful, almost rehearsed?
His eyes widened as the thought hit him again.
No.
Rad gave his head a slight shake.
Or maybe yes.
A possibility was taking shape, but before he could hold on to it, another thought cut clean across it when a memory hit him of a day at the beach a few weeks ago.
He closed his eyes, trying to picture the moment.
There was a flash of sun on the water.
Voices on the beach.
Tyler laughing.
Andy had been trying too hard to spike a volleyball.
Margo was in a pale sundress, her hair tied up, laughing as she tried to help Andy with his volleyball.
Then Ace had joined them with his easy grin, while Sienna Morrison hung possessively on his arm.
That’s it.
Rad’s eyes flew open.
He flung the covers back and got out of bed so fast he nearly knocked his knee against the bedframe. He crossed the room in three strides and switched on the lamp.
The bracelet gleamed faintly in the evidence bag.
He picked it up.
A week before all this had truly spiraled, they had all been on the beach. Tyler, Andy, Ace, Margo, and him. The volleyball had come to an abrupt halt when Sienna had thrown up her arms to hit the ball, and her bracelet had flown loose.
His eyes dropped to the bracelet again.
This bracelet.
He could see it now as clearly as if it were happening in front of him. Sienna, who for the first time since he had met her had seemed relaxed and laughing, had suddenly become frantic the moment she realized her bracelet was gone.
Suddenly, they had all been scrambling to find it in the sand. It had been found, but the happy beach moment had vanished, and Sienna had demanded that she and Ace leave.
Rad’s heart jolted as he looked at the bracelet in his hand, which he was now sure belonged to Sienna Morrison.
And it had been found wedged beneath the faulty cooker in Teacups’ kitchen.
His pulse started to pick up.
This didn’t prove anything on its own. Sienna could have been in Teacups at any time.
She could have wandered into the kitchen for any number of innocent reasons, though most customers didn’t.
But Sienna and Margo had both grown up here in Sandpiper Shores.
Sienna could have gone into the kitchen to see Margo, and it could have fallen off then.
There were a lot of possible explanations for how the bracelet had gotten there.
But in a town where fires, hidden evidence, suspicious accidents, and carefully maintained lies were stacking up like dry timber, nothing like this could be ignored.
He lowered the evidence bag carefully back onto the dresser.
Then he stood there in the quiet room, looking at it while the lighthouse beam swept silently through the window curtains and across the floor.
His eyes moved to the smartwatch, and he wondered if it was Dr. Vernon’s.
June seemed to think it was, and if Judy had been taken from that parking area, it made sense that her kidnapper would have removed anything that could track her.
They had left her laptop and phone in Dr. Vernon’s room at the inn.
There were just too many threads here, and there was information he was sure he didn’t have, information his father was keeping from him.
Rad knew that even June had not told him everything.
She had neatly told them what she and his father would have revealed if they had been at a press conference.
Things they could know, and not the darker truths that lurked behind those words.
Rad drew in a long breath and let it out slowly.
Tomorrow was going to be interesting.
Especially as he would have to get the police chief’s daughter in for questioning.
That was going to be fun.
His jaw clenched, and he shook his head.
Rad yawned. His eyelids suddenly felt heavy as the exhaustion finally caught up with him. He climbed back into bed and turned off the lamp again. As his mind spun through the information, it slowly began to clear as he drifted off to sleep, being coaxed into dreamland by the smiling face of Margo.