Love on a Summer Night (26 page)

She watched him through the glass pane in the office door as the principal started talking again. “My understanding is he asked to go to the washroom, and
 
approximately fifteen minutes passed before it was noticed that he didn’t return.”

She spun around. “Aren’t they supposed to go with a buddy?”

He shifted uncomfortably. “Yes.”

“So that didn’t happen?”

“Mrs. Davidson, I am so sorry—”

“I don’t give a fuck if you are
sorry
. That didn’t happen?”

His voice shook and at any other time, she’d have cared about his obvious pain. “It was an oversight.”

The first police officer returned to the office. “We’ll need some recent pictures…”

The next twenty minutes passed in a blur. A fire truck arrived, then more police. She was holding it together okay until Dean Foster strode in. He was in uniform, and everyone else looked his way, but he didn’t stop and talk to anyone. Instead he bee lined to her, concern written all over his face, and at the sight of someone familiar, something inside her chest cracked open.

“I’ve got you,” he said roughly as she clung to him. “We’re going to find him.”

“He packed some extra stuff in his backpack,” she choked out. “I didn’t realize it this morning, but it was heavy.”

“Okay. Okay.” He squeezed her shoulder and lifted her chin with the tip of his finger. “Zander’s brother is the best Search and Rescue organizer I’ve ever met. They’ve already set up a command centre and they’re gathering teams together. Can you think of anywhere Eric might want to go?”

She shook her head, trying to shake away the panic. She couldn’t think. “He likes hiking.” Her mind flashed with a memory from the morning. She’d gone to put a granola bar in Eric’s lunch box and there weren’t any left. “He took some snacks from the kitchen, I think. They were missing this morning and I didn’t think anything of it….”

“No, you wouldn’t. But it’s good that you’re remembering that now. There are snowmobile trails that run behind the school and out of town. We’ll start there. And I’m going to be right here, right by your side, and any time you remember anything, you just tell me. Doesn’t matter how random it is, got it?”

She nodded numbly.

“I tried to reach Zander,” he continued. “His phone keeps going to voice mail.”

Another bubble of pain rolled through her chest and lodged in her throat. “He’s in the air. He’s flying home for the weekend.”

“Did Eric know that?”

She shook her head.

“Could he have overheard something?”

No. They’d only texted about it. “It was a last minute plan.”

Dean pulled out his phone and fired off a message to someone. “We’ll get a hold of him. When and where does he land?”

“Umm…” She closed her eyes. “He’s got a connection in Calgary. He’s probably going to land soon.”
 

Someone came up behind Dean and handed him a coffee, which he pressed into her hands. “Drink this.”

“I don’t—”

“I’m also going to make you eat things from time to time.” He guided her to a pair of stiff plastic chairs and sat them both down. He gave her a serious look that part-terrified, part-reassured her. “If Eric’s taken off on a little adventure, it might take us all day to find him. You’re going to need your strength. It’s my job to make sure that you keep it.”

She took a sip of coffee.

“And I want you to go home. I’m going with you, but right now there’s a constable standing guard there, and if Eric makes his way home, it’s better that he finds you than a policeman.”

“I want to join the search party.” She was losing her voice, and it came out in a rough whisper. Maybe he hadn’t heard her. “Dean?”

He shook his head. “Not yet. Let’s let the S&R teams do their thing.”

He held out his hand and guided her outside. He wanted to take her back to her place in the cruiser, but that was ridiculous. It was a few blocks, and she’d driven her car here.

Reluctantly he agreed to follow her, and she had a few moments of stunned, surreal silence as she drove home. There was a cruiser in her driveway so she parked on the road and stumbled out.

It was cold, she suddenly realized.

She’d left the house without a coat or her purse.

Dean met her in the middle of her lawn and pushed her up the stairs and past the uniform standing guard at her front door. She hadn’t locked up—was pretty sure she hadn’t even closed the door, although the police officer must have done that when he showed up.
 

“Thank you,” she whispered as she passed. She wasn’t feeling very grateful for anything, but the ingrained reaction took care of itself.

She didn’t realize her phone was ringing until Dean stopped her and reached for her hand. He held it up in front of her.

Zander.

“He’s just landing in Calgary,” she whispered.

Dean looked at the screen. “Can I…”

She nodded, then shook her head. “No. I’ll tell him.”

She took a deep breath, but it didn’t help her be brave after she answered.

“Zander…” Her voice broke into a dozen pieces as she interrupted his greeting. “Eric’s missing.”

— TWENTY-ONE —

Z
ANDER landed at the Kitchener airport five-and-a-half painful hours later. Radio-silence had never been more torturous. He’d stayed on the phone with Faith until he boarded the plane and they pulled away from the gate.

Dean had promised to get good news to him through the airline if he could, so when he landed and had heard nothing, he was in beast mode and not in a mood to deal with a rental car company dick-around or anything else. As he sprinted down the hallway toward the arrivals door he read through the text messages spilling in. Update after update that said the same thing. No news.

And a message from each of his siblings, letting him know that their mother was waiting for him on the other side of the sliding doors in the arrival lounge.

Her face pinched in worry as she waved him down. She handed him the keys to her compact SUV as soon as he reached her. “Everyone else is searching,” she said, but he already knew that. His brothers, Dani…everyone would be looking for Eric. “I know you were going to get a rental, but this was something I could do, and I thought it best you weren’t alone for the drive.”

“It’s fine, thank you,” he said roughly. He appreciated the gesture, but nothing changed the fact that he wasn’t there and he couldn’t get over that feeling of uselessness.

He let his mother hug him, but he was moving them toward the exit at the same time. No time for comfort. No time for words.

“I’m parked in the priority pickup up row.” Her words whipped from her mouth as she spun, following him.

His pulse thudded with unhappy restraint as he tried not to run—his mother wouldn’t be able to keep up. “Any update beyond no update?”

Sometimes text messages were slow to filter in, and he was desperate for good news.

“Nothing yet.”

“Who’s with Faith?”

“Still Dean, I think. He doesn’t plan to leave her side until you arrive.”

He dialled Tom.
 

His brother answered on the first ring, out of breath. “You landed?”

Zander grunted an answer and hit the unlock button on the key fob. He gestured for his mother to get in. He threw his bag in the backseat and turned on the car as he started talking. “It’s been dark for an hour, Tom. How many teams have shown up?”

“Anyone who knows what they’re doing is here, and we’ve got a hundred volunteers out as well. We’ll find him.” Tom gave him an update on the search. Volunteers had been combing the fields and forest behind the school, and as more people joined the search, they were moving down the highway, on either side. “I’m nearly at Greta’s. That’s where we’ve set up a command post.”

“Faith’s still at home?”

“Yeah. Better that she’s not at the nerve centre.”

In case of bad news.
“We’re hitting the road. Ma’s got my phone. I want updates every half hour. I’ll be there as soon as humanly possible.”

“Drive safe.”

That was a relative concept for Zander at the moment. Be mindful of the safety of others? Always. His mother was a passenger. Other vehicles and pedestrians didn’t know he was racing for his life here.

But he knew back roads where speed limits didn’t matter. He knew which highways were less populous than others.

He knew how to get to the tip of the peninsula faster than anyone else, and he was going to push himself to the limit to make that happen.

His mother let him drive in silence for a while. A half hour, at least, because Tom called with a terse, no-news update.

After she disconnected the call, she reached for something at her feet and quietly handed over a chocolate cookie.

And hot tears pricked the back of his eyelids. He grit his teeth. “Why cookies?” She always made them. Always had. She was a dragon lady in so many ways, but she’d always made them cookies when other mothers might have insisted on healthier snacks instead.

She didn’t answer right away, and when she did, her voice was uncharacteristically thoughtful. Anne Minelli was tough as nails and could do—did do—anything she set her mind to. She never set her mind to being soft and gentle.
 

“Because life is hard.” The last word wobbled off her tongue. Harder than ever today. But he was strong enough to hear it. “And the cookies always made you boys happy.” She took a deep, steadying breath. “Sometimes you would get so lost in your imaginary adventures. Dani would happily sit with me in the kitchen, but the only time I’d see your faces was when I’d pull something sweet out of the oven.”

Something started to pulse in Zander’s mind. He frowned into the darkness. What had just triggered that? “What did you say?”

“Sometimes you boys would be so lost in your adventures—”

His spy base.

“Call Tom back.” He told her the password to his phone and tried hard not to grab it from her hands.

“What is it?” she asked as she moved her fingers over the screen.
 

The dialling was faint at first, then she hit the speaker phone button and it was loud. Jarring.
Answer, damn it.

“Zander?” Tom’s voice filled the interior of the car.

“There’s a path somewhere between the playground and Faith’s house. I don’t know which direction. Can you send me a picture of the search grid?”

“Hang on. Pull over, man.”

Zander jammed his foot against the gas and sped up instead.

— —
 

Faith perched on the edge of her couch. Someone had wrapped a blanket around her because she’d been shivering. Someone else had offered her a sedative and gotten a growly refusal for their effort.

Every few minutes, she replayed the call from the school in her head. Snapshots flashed in front of her eyes. Stumbling to the car, leaving the front door flapping open behind her.

Dean showing up while she was at the school, holding her to his chest while she sobbed into his uniform.

Zander calling. She desperately wanted to talk to him again, but he was driving and the last thing he needed to hear while speeding through the night was her being hysterical.

He’d sent proxies to take care of her, anyway. His best friend was now on the other side of her living room, listening to yet another phone call. He had two phones on him, and his police radio. She kept listening to the crackle, hoping to decipher something, but he kept the volume low enough that she couldn’t make out the words.

Dean glanced up, and when he saw her eyes on him, he hung up the phone and moved toward her.

“Who was that?” she asked hoarsely.

“I was just listening in to the command centre. Tom had me on speaker phone.” He dropped to his knees in front of her. “We’re going to find him. He’s wearing warm winter clothes, and he packed food. He’s a smart kid. Focus on that.”

That damn heavy backpack. She should have opened it up and asked him about it. She replayed their morning. How distracted she’d been. How weak her goodbye was. Did he know she loved him and missed him? Where had he gone and
why?

Dean patted her knee and stood up.

She looked out the window at the darkness. She should be out there, looking. Maybe if Dean took a call again, she could excuse herself to the bathroom and sneak out.

A phone rang. Through the muzziness in her head it sounded far away, but Dean was lifting his hand to his ear. “What is it?” His eyebrows shot up. “Right. I’ll ask her.”

She was already on her feet. “Ask me what?”

“Did you and Eric go for a hike a few weeks ago? On a day that you met Dani in the park?”

She shook her head woodenly. That was the day she’d made up with Zander. They’d come straight home from the playground.

“Tom, she’s saying they didn’t.” He listened for a minute, his jaw flexed, then looked her way again. “He doesn’t see any marked trails between here and the park, but they’re taking a team into the woods now.”

That sounded terrifying. “Why there?”

He gave her a long, steady look. “Zander thinks Eric’s spy base might be in there. Get your coat on. Remember how I said you needed to be brave and strong and wait until it was time? Now it’s time.”

Time does funny things when you’re in the middle of a trauma. Faith remembered that from the night Greg died. Speed up. Slow down. Freeze on a moment and then zoom past others like they were nothing, just fragments in the wind. She was zipping up her jacket, then she was in Dean’s cruiser. Mittens and hat were on, but she didn’t remember grabbing them.

They didn’t go far, just around the corner.

An awful, ugly, heaviness settled in her gut. She started to cry as he pulled to a stop behind a Fire and Rescue SUV. In the brush at the side of the road, she could see flashlights moving.

“There’s an unmarked path here,” Dean said quietly as he closed her door behind her. “Have you ever been down it? Tom says it snakes in a bunch of directions.”

She started to shake her head, but maybe…

With a gasp, she took off running through the snow-covered grass. Scrabbly twigs slapped at her face as she ran into the brush, and she couldn’t really see anything, but she knew where she was going.