Page 68 of No Broken Promises

But we aren’t. We’re standing on the edge of Parker’s property, right up against the tree line.

Daisy moves, her body pulling away from mine.

“What is it?”

She kneels down on her front haunches, her nose pointing into the grass.

Just like that, I see it, the small piece of metal sticking straight up, reflecting the early morning light just enough to stand out against the ground.

“Fuck.”

If Daisy hadn’t been with me, I’d have missed it.

“Is there anything else?”

She gets up, rooting around in the grass and then sniffs the air and sneezes.

“Shit.”

Daisy lost his scent.

We are still close enough to the house that they’ll hear me, so I don’t bother using my radio or phone. Instead, I turn around, cup my hands over my mouth, and shout at the top of my lungs, “I found something!”

I crouch down, pull out my phone, and take a few pictures of the medal and its location. Then I use one of the gloves I grabbed in my cruiser to pick up Danny’s Purple Heart medal.

Turning it over and over in my hand, I try to remember the last time I saw it. After the winter concert, Parker gave him the medal… and Nox slept with it every single night.

“What the fuck happened?”

I turn to stare up at the house behind me, ignoring Dom’s question as he runs over, and my eyes catch on Artie’s back door.

“Son of a bitch.”

27

PARKER

Remy paces in front of me, refusing to let me leave the second interview room at Birch Police Department, and his rage is palpable.

“I’m gonna fuckin’ murder Artie Sims.” He runs a hand through his short hair, tugging at the ends before turning to face me with misery in his eyes. “If he hurt Nox, I will destroy him.” The violence lying there catches me by surprise, but it shouldn’t have.

Remy is already pissed that he can’t be in on the interrogation of Artie. However, both Chief Townsend and Jake were adamant that he can’t interfere with the investigation.

That left Dom performing the interrogation alone while we are banished to this interview room to wait for an update.

An update on my missing son.

That thought echoes through every fiber of my being, making it almost impossible to breathe. It’s only by sheer force of will that I’m even standing up.

But we have to find Nox.

We have to.

Artie didn’t even complain when they took him into custody. If anything, he looked happy to be escorted out of his house.

And that fact right there is the strangest piece of information.

He didn’t even look surprised to hear Nox was missing.

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