Page 81 of Riff

“Was she here? Where is she?” I asked, hearing the borderline fucking hysterical hitch in my voice.

“Vienna isn’t here,” she said, waving around the room. But something about her posture said she wouldn’t give me more.

“Was she here?”

“I can’t—“

“Respectfully, Doc,” I cut her off, the alarm bells in my head going off too loudly to watch my tone, “we both know you can’t pull that confidentiality shit with me. She’s not even your patient on paper. So cut the crap. Was she here? I need to know. I think… something feels wrong.”

Either intimidated by my position in this town, or responding to the desperation in my voice, Dr. Swift took a deep breath. “She was here, yes.”

“When? How long ago?”

“Ten minutes, maybe? I saw her walking back toward the clubhouse,” she said.

No.

No, if she’d been on her way back to the clubhouse, I would have seen her. Especially if it was just ten minutes ago. There was nowhere she could have disappeared to, not without her wallet to buy anything. And that was on the dresser in my bedroom along with her cell phone.

Panic, raw and undiluted, spread through my system.

“Riff…” she called as I rushed back out of her office, reaching for my own phone blindly, stabbing my finger into my brother’s contact.

“What’s—“

“Vienna is missing. She was at her therapist, but then she was walking home, and she’s… nowhere.”

“Okay,” Raff said, tone serious but calm. “Maybe she is just browsing—“

“Browsing what?” I cut him off. “The fucking grocery store? There’s nothing in this goddamn town to browse.”

“Okay, alright. We’re coming,” he said, and I could hear the flurry of movement in the clubhouse.

This couldn’t be fucking happening.

I couldn’t lose her after just fucking finding her.

I ended the call when I heard the roar of the bike engines firing up, knowing they were all of five minutes away.

“Hey,” I called to some random man walking down the street. “Did you see a woman? Small? Redhead? Wearing an oversized jacket with bison on it?”

“No, man, sorry,” he said, shaking his head.

Rook arrived first, flying off his bike, and reaching for his keys to Nyx’s studio. “I’m plugged into the town’s traffic cameras,” he said, anxious to get to the computer and get us something useful to work with as everyone else fanned out through town, some on foot, the others on their bikes or, in the women’s cases, their cars.

There were only so many places she could be.

It was a small fucking town.

And I just… stood there.

Too panicked to move, adrenaline surging through my system stronger than I’d ever experienced before. It was a rushing feeling in my veins, a shaky sensation in my organs, and a tightness around my throat that was making me feel more lightheaded with each passing second.

“Riff!” Rook’s voice called, making my heart surge up into my throat as I whipped around to face him, finding his gaze frantic, his hair messy from running his hands through it.

“What? Did you see her?”

“Maroon van cut her off in the alley,” he said, pointing. “It blocked the camera. But she was there before the van pulled out, and she was gone after.”

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