Page 117 of Fortune's Control
He picked it up. “Out of state.”
“Send it to voicemail for me, will you?”
He did, and it rang again almost immediately.
“You need to get a call blocker.”
I didn’t get enough calls to warrant one. Less than a half-dozen people called, and most saw me every day. “Answer it for me.”
Detective Moore wasn’t one for niceties. “You at home?”
“Where is my wife?”
“She’s not with you?”
Unease pricked me. “I wouldn’t ask if she were here, would I?”
“Sandy Cooper’s killer may be in Fortune’s Creek.”
I swerved off the road, causing Jack to grab the steering wheel and right the vehicle.
“He has her. He took Lilah.” My voice failed, and I couldn’t explain further. I slammed on the brakes, almost missing thelong driveway.
*****
Aiden’s red truck rested farther from the front door than where he usually parked it. I checked the hood. “It’s warm. They aren’t here.”
Or maybe the killer ambushed them, and all I’d find were two bodies.
I refused to go there. Lilah and Aiden needed me, and that’s where my focus belonged. Years of training took hold, and I wallowed in it, choosing its coldness over any threatening panic.
“How do you know?” Jack asked.
“She’d be here to greet me. We always do that when the other comes home.” I’d be busy kissing her again.
“How are we playing this?”
I wanted to toss caution to the wind and barge in. We needed speed more than we needed any discussion. “You take the back, and I’ll enter from the front. Get a knife from the kitchen.”
“What about you?”
Lilah wasn’t inside. Her presence transformed our house, enveloping it in warmth and affection, but the outside walls had returned to their sterile, white appearance. “I don’t need one. Phones at the ready.” I checked mine and realized Detective Moore was still on the line, screaming for an update. “Come to my house.” I hung up without giving him a chance to respond.
“Meet you in the middle.” Jack gripped my arm and left.
One of the newly installed cameras wasmissing. Glass shards from an outside light lay on the ground. A quick peek through the nearest window revealed nothing unusual, and no voices leaked outside.
The door wasn’t closed tight, either. Lilah checked and double-checked locked doors ever since the night Pirate went missing. I turned the knob and stepped inside to find an empty foyer. Dirt created a partial footprint on the wood floor.
I cleared the first guest bedroom, checking the closet and bed, and found no one. Next came the front sitting room, Sophie’s most disliked room.
“Aiden.” I sprinted the few steps to where his body lay on the floor.
A phone rested on his chest, with another in his loose grasp. Blood soaked his light gray shirt, with more around his ears and along his hairline. I called his name one more time, but his eyes stayed shut.
“Jack! Get down here!”
Grabbing the small knife from my front pocket, I sliced the bottom of Aiden’s shirt, cutting through the cotton to avoid further harm, and assessed his wound.
