Page 2 of Off-Limits Love
Hours later, Finn rolled to a stop outside his house, feeling more than a little out of sorts after watching Elias propose to Quinley.
In the last six months, Elias had been more like his old self, more the soft-hearted, laidback kid Finn remembered from before their parents’ deaths. It was good to see the change after so many years watching Elias lock himself away from anything and anyone that might cause him to feel too much. To risk the pain of being left behind again.
He was happy for his twin. Jealous, too. He’d embarrassed himself horribly at the grant dinner last year and again tonight when he’d tried to converse with the beautiful woman who’d approached him. Yet another example of him being cursed to be alone.
Finn got out of his truck, the screech of its salt-corroded hinges combining with that of a woman’s scream.
He thought he imagined it at first or that the sound had come from one of his farm animals, but he scanned the area in the sudden stillness and silence that followed.
The scream came again, the terror and fear in it chilling his blood.
He traced the sound to his neighbor’s home and ran in that direction. Sam was a crotchety old man who lived alone, but that scream had definitely come from the direction of Sam’s house.
The woman’s scream prompted disgruntled murmurs from the miniature donkey and other animals he had yet to put away in the barn for the night, but Finn ignored them for now and vaulted over the wood fence separating their properties.
He kept going, hoping the noise of him clamoring through the brush along the fence line would scare away any snakes that might be underfoot in the pine needles.
The woman’s scream came yet again, higher pitched and desperate, but he couldn’t make out what she said. Possibly a name?
He spied her standing in front of Sam’s worn, small home, whirling round and round as though desperately looking for something, panic etched on her heart-shaped face.
He slowed to a stop in front of her, panting for breath as he watched her eyes widen in alarm at his sudden appearance.
The woman’s entire body trembled, and tears flooded her eyes and glittered as she stared at him. “My daughter. She’s gone. Emi! Emi, where are you!”
Finn turned and listened carefully, straining to hear any rustling or cries over the sound of his heart thumping loud in his ears. Nothing. He didn’t hear anything but the distant traffic from the nearby road leading to the island and sirens rapidly approaching.
Police lights flashed, and in seconds, two patrol cars arrived with a crunch of sand and gravel and dust, rolling to a stop behind the car parked beside Sam’s old truck.
Finn froze at the sight and noise, watching as uniformed officers emerged, their headlights and the flashing lights blinding him and sending his mind ricocheting back to that night so long ago. To the waning evening sky and being trapped in the car with his parents after the accident. How the police lights had hurt his eyes when they’d arrived. He’d screamed at his parents to say something, to talk to him, staring into his mother’s lifeless eyes all the while.
Finn sweated from his run and lunge over the fence, stress and panic sliding through his body as that night and this one blended together like misshapen globs of paint spilled from buckets.
“You reported a missing child?” one of the cops asked.
“Yes, my daughter, Emi. She’s four.”
“You the father?” the cop asked Finn.
He stared at the man, frozen in that space between past and present, as the woman spoke.
“No, he’s not. I screamed for Emi, and he came running out of the woods. I don’t know him,” the woman said.
Four more police officers now joined them as the drive filled with vehicles and flashing lights, and Finn felt all of them staring at him like he was a pervert on the prowl. His head whirled as anxiety filled him, and his throat locked up as tight as the rest of the muscles in his body.
“You’re not exactly dressed for a walk,” the cop said, eyeing Finn’s dress clothes and shoes. “What were you doing in the woods?”
Finn blinked at the man and opened his mouth but struggled to find the words. Frustration roared through him, upping his blood pressure. “Sh-she…” It was all he could get out, and he cursed silently.
“What’s your name, buddy? You got any ID on you?”
Finn released a breath and opened his mouth again, searching the police officer’s faces to find one he recognized. He knew a lot of the local force but not all of them. “F-f-f??—”
“Come on, dude. We don’t have time for this,” the officer said. “Do you know where her little girl is? What were you doing in the woods?”
Finn fisted his hands at his impairment and shook his head in an adamant no. The cop snorted.
“Let’s see some ID. Now. You got any weapons on you?”
