Page 132 of Everything She Feared

After three rings she answered.

“Hey, Sonya. Ryan Gardner.”

“Hi, Ryan! I was going to contact you. The response to your episode was wild. We set a few records.”

“That’s great. The reason I’m calling is to ask your help reaching one of the callers.”

“We’ll help if we can.”

“She’s the one who claimed Magda was dead.”

“Yeah, I remember that.”

“Right, Lynn from Chicago—she called right after the woman from Mexico. I see you record episodes, but do you have caller ID, or some way for me to reach this Lynn? I’d like to talk to her.”

“I’m not sure about all that. It’s sort of technical. We know people use false names, or block their calls at their end. But Owen is our IT support expert for the show. Let me see if he can get a number or something for her. It shouldn’t take long.”

60

Seattle, Washington

At her deskin headquarters, Pierce smiled at Ethan on her phone as they talked over FaceTime.

“So how did things go with Arlee at school today?”

“He wasn’t in class.”

“Oh.”

“Mom, I forgot. At Amber’s party, I met this kid, Rayne, and he let me play with his Nintendo Switch. It’s so cool. Can I get one?”

“We’ll see. Can I say hi to Dad?”

“Okay.” Ethan turned his phone to Webb at the wheel of his pickup. She heard Ethan whispering, “Tell her about Nintendo, Dad.”

“Not now, buddy. Hey, hon,” Webb said. “Going to make it home for supper?”

“Not sure. I’ll let you know later.”

“Alright, maybe pizza, maybe chili? We’ll letcha go.” Webb waved.

Ethan turned the phone back to himself.

“Think about Nintendo. Love you, Mom, bye.”

“Love you guys.”

Hanging up, she glanced at their photo in the new frame on her desk. The wisp of a thought about the birdwatcher lady stirred, but Pierce failed to grasp it, distracted by Benton’s arrival. He had told Acker he had a dentist’s appointment, but Pierce knew otherwise. He’d taken his wife to another specialist.

“How’d it go, Carl?”

“Still waiting on some results, but this new doctor’s optimistic.”

“Hey, that’s something.”

“What’s up here? Did Lyle’s experiment work?”

“Well, we—”

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