“But someone does. Knox knows, doesn’t he?”
The brilliant doctor didn’t have a clue. Some things in life had no explanation. Some people lived without accountability. Knox was one of them.
“He tracks her phone. She doesn’t have a chip inserted into her neck or anything like that. If he were concerned about her whereabouts, then he would have had her followed. She took a plane to Portland for a funeral. He called me after she left, wondering why she was still in Omaha. I told him she forgot her phone.”
“You lied?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She needed time alone without anyone following her, and I didn’t want Knox thinking she went AWOL.”
“I have to find her.”
“You won’t.”
“Then you find her.”
Jackson shrugged. “I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
Luke glanced around the room. “Look through her stuff. Find a clue to where she might be. Maybe she went somewhere with him before he died and she’s gone back there to feel close to him. Maybe she said something to his family at the funeral. Maybe—”
“Stop with the fucking maybes. I spent years anticipating the behaviors of other people, guessing their next move, where they would be, where they might go. But she’s not predictable like that. She could be in Maine or Florida, Indiana, Alaska … hell she could be staying at your fucking hotel for all we know. She’s carrying cash, nothing to track.”
“Call Knox. Tell him she’s gone AWOL. Make him find her.”
Luke had lost it. He wasn’t hearing anything Jackson said. “Sure. And if by some miracle he finds her reading a book on the beach in the Keys, he’s going to be fucking pissed for the wasted man hours and so is she.”
“She’s not on a goddamn beach in the Keys. Something’s wrong!”
“How do you know? Huh? How the hell can you possibly know something is wrong?”
Luke dropped his head, clenching his hair. “I just … know.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Day
The below average January temperature greeted Jessica with a maddening gust to her hair as she emerged from the building. The number of women in her self-defense class nearly doubled from the previous weeks. The holidays sucked the life out of attendance.
“Mrs. Jones?”
She turned around, wrestling with her ponytail whipping her face like a fly on a horse. Luke stood leaning against the passenger’s door to the GTO with Jones shoved into the backseat. Her fiancé looked GQ handsome in his black wool coat with the collar up protecting his neck from the frigid wind.
“Mrs. Jones? Really? Not until next weekend.” She walked into his waiting arms and just like that she was home.
“I’m just trying it out in public. Seeing how it sounds when I holler it in the middle of the busy sidewalk.”
She clenched his lapels, looking up with complete adoration. “And how does it sound?”
“Incredible. Didn’t you see those people looking around like a celebrity had been spotted or the queen was in town?”
“I must have missed that.” Suspicion pulled at her eyebrows.
“Are you getting cold feet?”
She slid into the car as he held open the door. “No, my socks are a wool/cotton blend.”
He looked at her with his typical I-don’t-want-to-grin-but-I-am smile as he fastened his seat belt. “The wedding. Are you getting cold feet about the wedding?”
“Nope.” She twisted her body, petting Jones on his chest.
“Are you sure?”
“I swear.”
Luke laughed as he started the car. “You swear, huh?”
“Yep. I swear on my uncle’s grave I’m not getting cold feet over marrying you.”
He pulled away from the curb. “That’s not very comforting.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You don’t have an uncle. Your dad’s an only child and your mom has a younger sister who lives in Canada.”
“Exactly, I’ve only seen my aunt once in my life. She basically divorced the family when she moved to Vancouver with her rich lover. My mom didn’t even send her an invitation to the wedding. Fucking Cathy got an invite, but not my aunt, which is fine. I don’t really want either one of them there. But in my dreams I had this amazing uncle who was a NASCAR driver and he let me drive his car around the track as fast as I wanted and whenever I wanted. When I was younger he took me for ice cream—twist cones dipped in chocolate. He tragically died after winning Daytona. An RV in the parking lot backed over him. So when I say I swear on my uncle’s grave, it means a lot.”
Luke stared at the road ahead, taking a right into the parking garage. As soon as the car was nestled into its parking spot, he unlatched his seat belt and readjusted his body to face her. She’d seen that look on his face a million times. It was the one that said I love you, but you need help. You need an emergency session with Dr. Jones.
“I’m a little concerned that you’ve constructed this imaginary world with an uncle that never existed. I’ve always assumed you and your father had a good relationship, but this makes me question that. Is there something about your father that you’ve never told me?”