Page 108 of Must Have Been Love

“She looks familiar,” I say, my voice thin.

“You’ve seen her?” Hudson asks.

“Sir, please let us do our job,” the detective tells him. “Where have you seen this woman?” he asks me.

And then I remember. An older, elegant woman was a few tables down from where we were eating. “She was at the bar today. She had a drink and was sitting out on the deck near us.”

“Are you certain?” the detective asks.

“Yes.” I nod. “I remember noticing her. She was very well dressed.” I look at the detective. “That’s good, isn’t it?” I ask him. “If she’s with somebody who loves her? That means she’s safe.”

“She’s not safe,” Hudson says. “She’s with two people who made the last few years a misery. They didn’t let me see her. I had to fight them. I might never get her back.” He shakes his head.

Autumn shoots me another sympathetic look. But I have to look away. I can’t take sympathy from her, I just can’t.

Mylene and her staff arrive, carrying trays of coffees and cookies that they hand out to the policemen who take them gratefully. I can see Eileen standing on her porch, her arms folded as she watches.

“Is there anything we can do?” I ask the detective. “There has to be something.”

He shakes his head and looks at his phone again, then calls over another detective. The two of them talk quietly for a moment, before they turn to Hudson.

“Can we talk over here?” the older detective says to him.

Hudson nods and follows them over. Parker sits down heavily on the wall, drinking one of the coffees Mylene brought over. And Autumn walks over to me, still holding Barney’s leash.

“He doesn’t mean it,” she says. “He’s just stressed, that’s all. We all know this isn’t your fault. It’s not like Ayda hasn’t run off before.”

I’d forgotten about that. The way she’d disappeared from Autumn’s care and arrived in the bar the day after I arrived on the island.

“Itismy fault though. I should have kept an eye on her. I promised.”

“You did. You thought she was following you. It’s not like she’s a chatterbox and you would have noticed the silence. I’ve been there. One moment she’s there, the next she’s gone.”

“What if her grandmother refuses to give her back?” I whisper.

“They’ll make her,” Autumn says stubbornly. But we both know it’s harder than that. It took so long for Hudson to get her back last time. And it damaged his daughter so much.

I swallow down the nausea that’s threatening to rise up.

Hudson walks over, still not meeting my gaze. “They have a lead. They’ve found her car,” he says quietly.

Autumn snaps her head up. “Where?”

“Thirty miles away. Near an English tea shop of all places. They think she’s inside with Ayda. They’re sending officers there right now. I’m heading over to the mainland.”

“I’ll come with you,” Autumn says.

He nods.

“And Skyler,” she adds.

But he shakes his head. “No, they said just family,” he says firmly.

I think it’s those words that finally break me.

Just family.

“I’ll take Parker and Barney home,” I say to Autumn. “He’s too sick to drive.”

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