63. Hawk
Istared at the back of the door, listening as her piece-of-shit car rattled to life and pulled away, before I allowed myself to breathe again.
“Motherfucker,” I snarled into the empty house, my anger finally escaping now that Wren had left.
This whole thing was going to shit, and I needed to get a handle on things before I lost control and lost my girls.
Because they were mine, even if neither of them was fully on board yet.
Pushing off the counter, I checked the time, noting that Charlie would be arriving any minute for the dinner that was not going to happen. Between the forgotten lunch, and the now abandoned dinner, it wasn’t looking good for meals around here.
Wren clearly didn’t want my help locating Cooper, but there was a buzzing feeling under my skin that didn’t seem to want to go away. I felt useless, and that was something I really hated feeling. Staring around the kitchen, I noticed a roll of aluminum foil on the counter. Tearing off a strip, I covered the still-warm casserole—but not before snagging a single forkful that had me groaning at how good it was—and slid it into the fridge for later.
Once that was done, I looked around again, the realization that I was alone in Wren’s house settling over me.
My first instinct was to snoop. Through her room, her closet.
Her underwear drawer.
When I’d gone down on her earlier, she’d been wearing the cutest pair of plain black cotton panties. Something about the simplicity of them was just so completely Wren.
That didn’t mean I wasn’t picturing her in a sexy lace number with a thong tucked between her perfect cheeks.
Fuck.
Chastising myself for being a fuckin’ creep, I pushed aside all thoughts of Wren’s panties and focused again on the fact that Cooper was missing and Wren was concerned.
Thinking back to my own childhood, there had been plenty of occasions where I’d snuck out under my mom’s nose, but I’d never been a teen girl in a vulnerable headspace, either.
Still restless, I wandered down the hall, casting a longing look at the door that I assumed was Wren’s and instead stepping back into Cooper’s room.
When I’d first come in here, I’d been distracted by Wren’s panic, not really able to take in the wonder that was Cooper’s personal space. Her bed was against the far wall, the open window directly above it. The walls were painted a smoky gray color, the bedding a deep navy blue, with the covers tossed haphazardly back over the bed in a hasty attempt to make it.
It was simple and clean and not at all what I would have expected a teen girl’s room to look like. On the opposite wall, there was a desk with a computer that looked pretty intense. I knew she mentioned gaming, but I never anticipated this level of dedication. I had absolutely no idea what I was looking at, but I knew it was impressive.
I wondered what she’d say if I let her pick out her dream gaming computer...
Shit, no. That’s exactly what Wren said she didn’t want me to do. Buy Cooper’s affection.
But fuck, I had more money than I knew what to do with. And really, how much could one computer cost?
Taking out my phone, I snapped a photo of her setup, wanting to be able to talk to someone about what I could do to help her improve it, when a photo on the wall above the dual monitors caught my eye.
The photo showed Cooper and a friend—the church girl, most likely—smiling and posing the way kids did when they take selfies. She looked a bit younger, if I had to guess. Maybe a year or two. They were sitting in the grass next to what appeared to be a small lake.
She looked happy, far different from the surly, angry girl I had met earlier. My heart ached to see the smile that reaching her eyes, wondering if I would ever get a chance to see her smile like that for me.
Blowing out a breath, I looked around the room, noticing for the first time that there were several other photos all taped up on the walls and even around the mirror. Each photo featured Cooper and her friend, and almost all of them appeared to be taken near that same lake.
I paused, considering. The photos had all been taken on different days, if the change in outfits was any indication, so she must have returned to the same location over and over. It would make sense that if she needed somewhere to go when she was freaking out, she’d go to a place that made her happy like she was in those photos.
But where the hell was the lake?
Whipping out my phone, I opened the maps app.
“Of fucking course,” I snarled when the screen showed me that there were no fewer than four bodies of water that could be considered a lake within walking distance of Wren and Cooper’s place. “It couldn’t have been easy, could it?”
I thought about calling Wren, asking for a little clarification, but I realized I still didn’t even have her fucking number.
“Christ, get your shit together, Jameson,” I chastised myself as I looked up at the ceiling in exasperation. Which was when I realized that Cooper also had posters on the ceiling above her bed.
“You have got to be kidding me,” I muttered, narrowing my eyes at the guys from The Gun Show where they smiled down at the bed my daughter slept in. “Those bozos?”
I’d met the guys a while back, and while they were good kids, they were still rock stars, and that meant I knew exactly what kind of shit they got up to.
The same shit I had, which was nothing good at all.
Reminding myself that having a poster didn’t mean shit, I turned my attention back to the map, zooming in on the different lakes and looking for some sort of clue that would lead me to finding Cooper.
One of the lakes had a fishing pier, another was close to a church. I didn’t know which church Cooper’s friend went to, but if it was the one on the lake, then Wren already had it covered.
The third lake was smaller, but farther from the house than the others and practically right in the middle of town. Not exactly the kind of place someone went when they wanted to get away.
The final option was the largest, long and narrow and nestled in what looked like a thick forest, not too far from the house to be impossible to walk to, but far enough from things to offer a feeling of privacy and solitude.
It was also right next to the only high school in town.
“Bingo,” I said, marking the location on my map and tucking my phone away as a knock came at the door. “I’m coming, baby girl.”
When I opened the front door, Charlie stood there, flowers in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.
“What the fuck, man?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him. “You tryin’ to move in on Wren?”
“What?” His eyes widened as he stood there, staring blankly at me. “Why would you think that?”
“Because you showed up at her place for dinner like it’s your third date or some shit.”
“It’s called basic decorum, Hawk.” He sighed, eyes rolling. “It’s the kind of thing you do when someone invites you over. You bring a small gift to your host.” Shaking his head, he looked at me like I was an errant child. “Christ, Hawk. Don’t you know your Emily Post?”
“Who?”
“Emily—You know what? Never mind. Where’s Wren?”
Still not entirely comfortable with the idea of someone who wasn’t me bringing flowers to Wren, I reached for the items he was holding and set them on the stool just inside the door.
“Come on,” I said, stepping out onto the porch. “I’ll tell you on the way.”