Wife by Design

“And if she tried, my brother would tell her that they had to ask permission first. I know they think they’re in love and that they give each other courage to do things they might not normally do, but the one thing we can count on with both of them is that they don’t break rules.”

He didn’t mean to hold the floor. But after seventeen years of living and breathing Darin, he knew his brother.

“If we waste time assuming they’re fine and together, we’re letting the danger they’re in escalate.”

He did agree with one point: Darin and Kara were most likely together. The thought didn’t relieve him at all.

Darin wouldn’t have just wandered off with Kara. Which meant that something had happened…

Lynn dropped her cell phone back into her pocket and walked up to stand beside Grant. She leaned into him and said, “I spoke with Maddie and her parents. I spoke to her mother and father individually so they didn’t repeat to each other what was going on in front of Maddie. They are definitely together. At the strip mall on Mountain View. They’re bringing her back immediately. They aren’t telling Maddie that either Darin or Kara are missing. Her mother, Martha, did say that Kara was upset when Maddie left her at class. She wanted to go shopping, too. Maddie started to get upset at leaving her that way, so her parents each put an arm around her and rushed her out.”

She looked at Grant. “Maddie’s dance teacher said that she saw Kara walking behind Maddie and thought they were together.”

“Kara never walks behind Maddie,” Lila blurted out before Grant could.

“Maddie either holds her hand, or lets Kara run in front of her where she can see her,” he added. Though now that he thought about it… “Ever since Kara almost fell into a service hole I had opened, Maddie has clung to the little girl’s hand anytime they’re outside.”

An image of Darin walking beside Maddie on the sidewalk outside, his head held high, took his voice away.

He recalled his older brother’s laugh when Maddie had belched loudly at the dinner table the other night.

Grant swallowed back tears.

They’d find him. And he’d keep him under lock and key after they did. No more relaxing, leaving Darin to walk by himself anywhere. No more…

“Wait.” Lynn’s weight against him grew a little heavier. Standing with her, shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, he gladly withstood whatever she had to give him. “They weren’t outside yet,” she was saying, her gaze darting around from one of the serious expressions in the room to another. “Kara was walking behind Maddie inside the day care. The dance teacher is new. She thought Kara was going with Maddie. She didn’t seem to know that every child has to be physically signed out before any of the children are released.”

“She knew,” Lila said. “I’ll take care of that. But could this mean that Kara did walk out of the day care behind Maddie?” she said aloud what Grant was thinking.

“It sounds like it,” Smith said. “We need to know how Maddie and her parents exited the premises.”

Lynn already knew. And told them.

Did this mean that Darin wasn’t with Kara? That the little girl was out in the world somewhere, wandering the streets by herself?

“Maybe she followed them and when they took off in their car without her, she couldn’t get back inside the locked facility.”

“She could still be out there…” Lynn said, and the detectives dispatched a flurry of officers to comb the area.

Lila followed them to the door. “I’m going to go talk to the women and children gathering in the rec hall. We don’t want panic to ensue.”

The managing director left, her expression calm but solemn. Grant wondered how these women did what they did day after day. Week after week.

The constant dangers and emotional and physical traumas would drive him over the edge.

Hell, he couldn’t even keep him and Darin together.

* * *

SHE WAS GOING to fly out of her skin and burst into a million pieces that would never be able to be put back together.

Lynn knew the thought was crazy. And she couldn’t stop it. Leaning against Grant, she listened while the detectives dispersed to perform their various duties, all revolving around finding Kara. It had been less than half an hour since she’d discovered her missing.