Page 6 of Sol
Trent -- Search terms
Four years later
“She’s off-grid.We ran the usual searches, but they came up with nothing. No active bank accounts. No social media. We know in the last six months she’s been to Peru, Japan, and Italy. The last passport scan was Spain, so we’re launching a search there. Still, we don’t know where she is.” Hernandez, the private investigator, sounded awed. He was retired JAG Corps and a family friend, so it took a lot to impress him. But Dani wasimpressive.
“Then why did I hire you for a skip trace?” I snarled into the phone, pent-up irritation making me forget my manners. “Fucking do your job. This is sofrustrating.”
“I know, Trent. I’ve never had anyone so slippery. She has a large bank account in the United States that she nevertouches.”
I knew what thatwas.
He continued, “We think she’s operating on a cash basis and buys burnerphones.”
“Yeah, no shit,” I said. “If she wanted to be found, she would be.” I just fucking wished she’d check her email, but I knew from Degan she only did that once a month or so when she had good Wi-Fi and when she felt like sorting through hundreds ofmessages.
I’d sent her a generic email asking her to get in touch with me, but she hadn’t responded. The news I had to give her wasn’t what I wanted to put in an email anyway. No, I’d tell her in person. The only honorable way to doit.
I stared at my childhood bedroom ceiling. “What’s the nextstep?”
“Through my network, I know people. We have men on the ground in Spain right now. She may have been teaching at a language school inSalamanca.”
Putting the phone on speaker, I opened up my laptop and Googled, “Danika Anderson Salamanca.” As always, when I hit enter, my heart leapt that maybe, just maybe this time I’d findher.
Nope.
Nothing.
The hits weren’t her or they were stale as the air in an unused broomcloset.
Fuck.
If a world record existed for number of times Googling her name in a week, I definitely held it. But I found nothing but oldlinks.
I wasn’t a man of internet searchterms.
Action. I wantedaction.
“Just find her,okay?”
She didn’t know what had happened. I’d handled all the paperwork. With my parents listed as next of kin, the army had done its duty. Now it was up to me to domine.
* * *
Two days later,I leaned against the back of the hard woodenbench.
My Class A’s didn’t fit me anymore, but I hadn’t had time to get alterations done or get a bigger size, and honestly it was the last thing on my mind. I’d gained twenty pounds of muscle since I last wore this jacket, and the fabric stretched across my back, around my biceps, binding me in my place in the church pew. No way could I lift up my arms even if I tried. Sweat soaked my back despite the air conditioning assaulting my face. The black tie choked my throat, but I couldn’t loosen it until this wasover.
While this was pretty much the definition of hell, I had to be here for him. To say goodbye to himagain.
Although I’d flown home with him and made all the arrangements, and I knew we hadn’t been able to tell her, I still arrived an hour early on the wispy hope that she’d somehow got the message. This was crazy. I knew the army hadn’t delivered the mandatory death notice to her because she was overseas and the army required a stateside address. Instead, it had been given to my parents, freaking out my mom on the sight of two uniformed soldiers walking up her steps within four hours of the news of his death. When my mom saw me come home, I thought she’d never let mego.
I’d scanned the full room when I walked in, but my heart dropped to my shiny black shoes. So many people present, all in black, honoring the local hero. Everyone here except the one person who should behere.
No haphazard mane of wild, blond hair caught my eye in the rows of bowed heads beforeme.
NoDani.
With a painful sigh, I sat back. I didn’t know why I kept scouring the audience, seeking her tiny body, expecting to see her perched like a delicate house finch about to take flight. It was because sheshouldbe here, even if she abhorredtradition.
