Page 38 of Caged

“I feel like I’d have a pet name for my wife.”

But not Catie.I’d learned the hard, bloody way not to call her by that particular nickname.

Maxwell chose not to respond, instead giving me some talking points and asking me if I wanted to take the lead.

I did. We hadn’t formed a lifelong friendship or anything, but I felt like I’d connected with Darling.

“Thanks for meeting with us again,” I said when he answered the door.

“No problem, I’ll do whatever I can to get Wendy back.”

“We appreciate your time and will keep this brief,” Maxwell said.

“Have you found anything yet?”

“Not yet, but we have some leads,” I answered as he led us to the kitchen.

Instead of sitting, I stopped at the refrigerator and pointed at the Quick Wash business card. “Do you use the Quick Wash?”

“No, I did some work on one of their company vans. Why?”

“What about Wendy?”

“I suggested them when she spilled something on her favorite dress. But I don’t know if she used them.”

He played with his finger, where his wedding ring used to be.

Maxwell noticed it too.

“Do you think they have something to do with Wendy’s disappearance?”

Interesting he made the connection before we mentioned it.

“We have reason to believe she was there recently, so we’re checking it out.”

He nodded and looked at the business card while playing with his finger.

“Have you ever been to the room behind the cleaners?” I asked.

Maxwell and I had talked about how to handle Darling, and had agreed to take it slow and lead up to the secret room. Instead, I charged out of the gate with it. His reaction told me everything I wanted to know.

His head snapped up as he asked, “How do you, I mean, no, what room?”

“Mr. Darling, you obviously know about it. The sooner you tell us, the better,” I hadn’t meant to come off as the bad-cop half of the team, but since I had, I went with it.

“We’re not here to accuse you of anything, we just want to find Wendy,” Maxwell played the good cop without missing a beat.

“I want that too, but-” he said.

“But you don’t want to tell us you’ve been gambling?”Maxwell is going to kill me.

“I. I.” He hung his head. “No.”

“It’s okay. Like I said, we’re not here to accuse you of anything, and we understand things can get out of control,” Maxwell soothed him. “Do you owe them money?”

“Yes,” he finally admitted. “Do you think that’s why they took Wendy?”

“We don’t know if they’re involved,” Maxwell answered.

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