Page 99 of The Kidnapped

Raleigh laughed softly and walked to the bed.

“Couldn’t sleep.”

“Hollis?” Olivia asked.

“She’s asleep. I’ve been tossing and turning for a while, and I was waking her up, so I thought I’d come talk to you.”

“Thank you for not saying that you wanted to check on me,” Olivia said, sounding so much better tonight than she had recently. “I’m getting tired of everyone checking on me. It’ll be nice to talk to someone.”

“She just worries,” Raleigh said of Hollis.

“And I worry about both of you, so fill me in.”

Raleigh’s heart warmed at the thought of Hollis’s mom worrying about her when she already had so much to worry about. Olivia had been asleep when they’d gotten back from the station, but when Raleigh had gone home to unpack, start laundry, and pack new clothes in a bag to return to Hollis’s for the night, Hollis had told her mom the basics. Truthfully, Raleigh hadn’t needed a new bag. She could’ve done laundry at Hollis’s place and borrowed anything she’d needed, but she’d wanted space. She hadn’t stayed long at her house, though, because twenty minutes in Eden’s room had brought on another round of full-on sobs, and the silence of the house just made her crave being back with Hollis and Olivia and the nurse who sometimes stopped to chat with them.

“No new updates,” Raleigh shared with Olivia now. “Well, Dylan texted that the cousin said she hadn’t seen or heard from the woman who might have taken Eden in five years. They weren’t a close family, I guess.”

“I’m sorry, honey,” Olivia replied. “What about the brother?”

“He’s out on a training thing. His commanding officer said he was out of reach for the next two days, at least, but that he’d try to get in touch with him, if possible, and have him call. If not, he’ll just have him call when he gets back.”

“They’ll find him, and he’ll tell you something that’ll help you find her,” Olivia said.

“I hope so. But if they’re not a close family, and he’s been over there for years now, he might not even know anything.”

“Let’s just pray that you’re wrong and I’m right, then,” Olivia replied. “Now, how are you doing?”

“I’ve been worse, but I’ve also been better,” Raleigh told her. “I just don’t know how you did this for so long.”

“Day by day,” Olivia replied.

“I tried that.” Raleigh sighed. “I even tried hour by hour and minute by minute until I just tracked them in my head, and it didn’t help. At first, it was one hundred and forty-two hours without my daughter, but then I tried the minutes, and those were way higher, so I went back to days. Those stretched so long, though; it seemed like an eternity to get through one.”

“I tried to focus on other things,” Olivia shared. “I’d spend weeks searching for the perfect birthday or Christmas gift for her. I didn’t know what she liked, so I’d just search in stores for hours. I’d look online much later, but at first, it was just me inside a toy or department store, walking up and down aisles, thinking about Hollis as if she were at home, waiting for me to cook dinner, and I were just getting a head start on finding her a gift. I think these fantasies and delusions helped a little. They took my mind off the fact that I didn’t know where she was for at least a while. Then,” Olivia paused and took a much-needed breath. “I’d sob in the car because I needed to let it out.”

“I think I’ve done more of the sobbing and less of everything else,” Raleigh replied. “But Hollis, she’s such a gift.”

“She is, isn’t she?” Olivia said with a smile.

“I don’t want you to think that I’m just saying that because she’s taking care of me right now. I’m so crazy about her beyond how she’s been there for me. She’s really funny when she lets it come out, and she–”

“I know.” Olivia patted her hand. “I know. I see you two together, so I know.”

“If I get Eden back, do you think Hollis and I will be okay?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“We haven’t talked about it; what happens if a four-year-old suddenly appears in our relationship.”

“Well, I think you should talk about it,” Olivia told her. “But Hollis knows that Eden will come first. She knows that you’ll need time to readjust and that things might be strained for a bit.”

“She does?”

“She and I actually talked about this before your first date.”

“You did?” Raleigh asked, surprised.

“She was nervous about asking you, and I was trying to convince her to go for it. Hollis didn’t want to get in the way of your search for Eden, so she thought it might be better to wait a while.”

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