Chapter 28
Chapter
Twenty-Eight
Austin watched Wren and Marlowe walk away.
Neither sister looked back until they reached the corner. Then they both did. And they grinned.
Nora saw them this time and sighed. “Oh, for heaven’s sake.”
Austin glanced at her. “Something I should know?”
“Sisters . . .” she muttered with the shake of her head. “They’re just seeing things that they want to see.”
Austin didn’t ask.
He couldn’t remember the last time Dad had asked him whether he was seeing anyone.
There had been someone in Baltimore last year, but his dad hadn’t known about her.
She’d wanted to meet his father, and Austin had kept putting it off.
Eventually, she told him the problem wasn’t meeting his father.
It was that Austin always said they could talk about the important things later. They’d broken up that spring.
A gust of wind shook loose several orange leaves from the maple above them. Nora moved aside as they drifted onto the sidewalk between them.
Austin turned back to her and studied the shadows beneath her eyes. “How did the rest of the night go?”
“Quiet, thankfully.” She tucked both hands around her cup. “Christian went back to bed and stayed there. Mom slept through everything, so she has no idea.”
“That’s probably for the best.”
“She would have panicked.”
“Understandably.”
Nora glanced at the street. “I checked the doors to the house about twelve times after you left.”
Concern tightened his chest. He hated that she was having to live like this. “Did you sleep at all?”
She shrugged. “Enough.”
“That’s not very specific.”
“You’re very demanding before coffee.”
He lifted a shoulder. “Occupational hazard.”
“You say that a lot.”
“Only because it’s true.”
Her mouth curved again. Austin liked making her smile.
He pushed the thought aside. He’d spent years coming in second to his father’s cases: missed holidays, unanswered calls, promises that began with once I find him.
Falling for a Loveless daughter would mean that case never let Austin go either.
He couldn’t let that happen.
Nora’s gaze wandered to a group of volunteers crossing the square. “Shelby texted me this morning. She plans to join the search.”
His eyebrows shot up. “After having surgery?”
“I tried to talk her out of it. She’s coming anyway—whether her incision agrees is another matter.”
Austin understood. If his child were missing, a recent surgery wouldn’t have kept him home either.
Nora glanced toward the lake. “You picked a beautiful weekend to be here, considering everything else that’s happened.”
“The tourists gave that away.”
“The leaves too, I hope.”
He followed her gaze toward the fog lingering over the water. The lake and the surrounding mountains looked almost peaceful from here, as if children didn’t disappear and men weren’t found dead along hiking trails.
“Fog Lake is beautiful,” Austin said. “I didn’t expect that.”
Nora turned toward him. “You thought we all lived in some creepy town surrounded by fog and murder?”
“Basically.”
“That’s offensive.”
“Am I entirely wrong?”
She considered the question before sighing. “Unfortunately, no, you’re not.”
The fellowship hall at the church was already overflowing with volunteers when Nora and Austin arrived.
Cars covered the church lot and lined both shoulders of the road.
Four-wheelers waited in the grass beside pickup trucks loaded with coolers and cases of bottled water.
Inside, conversations overlapped with chairs scraping against the floor.
The room smelled like coffee, damp jackets, and sausage biscuits.
Nora had expected a crowd. She hadn’t expected nearly three hundred people.
But she wasn’t surprised either. Fog Lake residents knew how to show up for one another when it mattered.
Sign-up sheets covered tables near the entrance. Orange flagging tape had been bundled beside stacks of maps, and handwritten signs directed volunteers toward their search assignments.
Everywhere Nora looked, she recognized someone. People from church. Former patients. Teachers she’d had in school. Even Zack was here.
Men who had searched these same woods ten years ago while her family waited for news about Christian.
The sight pressed against her chest.
Austin stopped beside her and scanned the room.
His gaze moved over the exits, the volunteers, and the large county map taped to the far wall.
Special Agent Prine stood beside it with Luke and Boone Wilder.
Between owning the camp store and working as a wilderness guide, Luke’s brother knew the surrounding mountains better than almost anyone.
Nearby, Fire Chief Ryan Philips passed out radios while two firefighters loaded emergency supplies into backpacks.
“You okay?” Austin asked.
Nora realized she’d stopped walking. “I’m fine.”
His expression said he didn’t believe her, but he didn’t push.
Marlowe appeared through the crowd carrying two orange vests. “There you are. I was beginning to think you’d changed your minds.”
“We were three minutes behind you.” Nora cast her a playfully exasperated look.
“A lot can happen in three minutes.” With a grin, Marlowe handed her a vest, then held the other toward Austin. “Wendell put us in Grid Seven.”
Nora pulled the vest over her sweater. “Where’s Wren?”
“Getting water with Nash.” Marlowe nodded toward the refreshment table.
A man carrying a clipboard intercepted them before they could move farther into the room.
“There you girls are.” Wendell Weathers glanced at Austin before looking back at Nora. “I want you all to be careful out there.”
“We will be,” Nora said.
Wendell marked something on his clipboard. “Your family holding up?”
“As well as we can.”
“We’re praying for all of you.” He gave her arm a quick squeeze before someone called his name from the registration table. Wendell lifted his clipboard in acknowledgment and stepped away.
Austin watched him leave. “Friend of yours?”
“Mason’s grandfather.” Nora watched Wendell disappear into the crowd.
“He owns a construction company and runs the church’s home-repair ministry.
I’ve called him more times than I can count when one of my patients needed a wheelchair ramp or safety rails they couldn’t afford. Wendell always found a way to help.”
“So he’s a friend.”
Nora considered the word then nodded. “Yes. I suppose he is. I’ve known him most of my life. Brother Wendell runs half the church whether anyone officially asks him to or not.”
Static crackled over the portable speaker near the county map. Prine stepped forward with a microphone, and the conversations around them began to fade.
“We have one priority today,” she started. “Bring Preston Dawson home.”