Page 28 of The Kidnapped

“Do you want something else instead? Have my Coke,” she offered, pushing the soda she’d ordered over to Hollis. “Caffeine with no bitterness. I’m not drinking the thing anyway. I’m too nervous.”

“I’m okay,” Hollis told her.

“Are you?” Raleigh asked. “We seem to talk about me a lot. I know you’re worried about your dad and the possibility of a trial. Have you decided if you’re going to help him?”

“Not yet. I’m leaning toward no, but I’m not sure if that’s out of revenge or not.”

“I think you’re entitled to a little revenge, Hollis.”

“Revenge is what got me kidnapped to begin with.”

“What do you mean?”

“He says he took me because my mom was trying to keep me away from him, but I know that’s not true. The court made the decision. My mom went along with it because she was worried about his drinking, but the judge was the one who gave him supervised visits. He blamed her, though, and he took me to spite her. I know he loved me, too, but I don’t think he was motivated by love. How could he have been? If he had been, I would have lived with my mom, and he would’ve gotten help for his problem. Or, at least, a job and a decent place to live with me. That would have been love.”

“You’re right,” Raleigh agreed. “Why are you leaning toward not helping if not for revenge?”

“I talked to my mom. She said she’d be okay with me helping, but it just feels like a betrayal to me, and I haven’t been able to figure out how to square it in my mind. Help him – hurt her. That’s all I keep thinking.”

“I don’t know this for a fact because I can’t, but if Eden knew her father and he’d taken her, I’d understand if she wanted to help him. I’d want to kill him, obviously, but I wouldn’t expect her to feel the same way, especially if he basically brainwashed her and also took care of her for years.”

“She’s here,” Hollis said, looking up at the glass door to the diner as someone opened it.

Raleigh recognized the woman, too. She had done her own research on Lieutenant Dylan Easton. She knew better than to get her hopes up. But Dylan had closed some pretty big cases, as Hollis had obviously noticed, too. The biggest was a serial strangler who had murdered thirteen women. The FBI had been on this guy, but he’d killed someone in Dylan’s jurisdiction, and the case had been cold for years when she’d found a lead, chased it down, and got the guy. He was now awaiting trial, and Dylan, apparently, was awaiting a promotion.

“Lieutenant Easton,” Raleigh said loudly, waving a little.

Dylan looked over and nodded. She was wearing what Raleigh now referred to as cop clothes. Her badge was on her hip. Her gun was in its holster on the other one. She had gray slacks and black boots she could run in. She also had a gray jacket and a white button-down under it. On her left hand was a simple wedding band, but other than that, she wore no jewelry. She had these dark, serious eyes and hair to match, but her hair was also shorter than in the most recent picture of her Raleigh had seen. Dylan looked like someone who meant business, and Raleigh needed that right now.

“Raleigh Leonard?” Dylan asked when she approached the booth.

“Yes, that’s me. This is my friend, Hollis. I hope it’s okay that I brought her. I needed moral support.”

“Sure,” Dylan replied, holding out her hand for Raleigh to shake and then Hollis. “And I should confess that I recognize you both. I looked you up before I agreed to help, and Kenna mentioned you, Hollis.”

“I told her I’d be coming with Raleigh,” Hollis replied.

Then, Hollis placed an arm on the back of the torn vinyl booth behind Raleigh. They’d sat on the same side of the booth in order to give Dylan the other side when she arrived. Raleigh recognized Hollis’s move as a protective one and maybe a comforting one, too. She smiled a little at how kind Hollis was to her. Even though she had her own things to work through right now, this woman still took the time to come with Raleigh tonight.

“Sorry, it’s so late. I wanted Hollis here, but her mom is sick, and she tries to spend all the time with her that she can, so we usually meet up once she’s asleep for the night.”

“It’s okay. I just got off shift,” Dylan said, sitting down on the other side of the booth. “My wife picked me up and is now probably buying no groceries at the store so that she has an excuse for us to order in tonight. There’s this new soup-and-salad place, like, ten minutes from the house that she’s been obsessed with recently. I can only eat so many types of soup and salad before I want a burger, you know?” Dylan smiled and rolled her eyes. “Anyway… She’s picking me up when she’s done since my car is in the shop, so I don’t know exactly how much time I have now, but I’m happy to start the conversation and talk next steps from there.”

“I don’t know where to begin,” Raleigh said, moving a little closer to Hollis, feeling uncertain.

“Well, I read the file, and Kenna gave me the research her show’s done and the episode itself, but I haven’t gone through that stuff yet. I’d like to hear from you, in your own words, about what happened.”

“Start at the day she went missing?” Raleigh asked.

“Let’s back up even further. How about you start the week before?”

“Why?”

“Because someone took your daughter so quickly, no one even noticed. No one saw them. Something like that isn’t impulsive. It takes at least some planning. That means they might have been around, and you didn’t notice.”

“The FBI already asked me this. I told them that no one had been–”

“I know,” Dylan interrupted softly. “They asked the same questions, so this probably feels like I’m going to do the same things they did. And I might – I can’t guarantee anything – but this helps me. Every set of eyes, every mind out there looking for Eden, makes it more likely that we’ll get her home.”

---