Page 12 of Run for Her Life
Zoe screamed and whirled around, her heart in her knees. The girl was gone.
As Zoe caught her breath, she leaned against the sink. Emily had been an echo buried deep inside her. But now that echo was fighting to make itself heard.
Zoe recoiled from the waves of unease rolling off Lisa. The sheriff stomped across a yard littered with stagnant pools of rainwater toward a colonial-style house with blue-trimmed windows. A house Zoe didn’t expect to see in Pineview Falls.
“She’s pissed,” Aiden whispered from Zoe’s side. She fixed her collar. “Does that bother you?”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “I have more important things to worry about.”
Lisa knocked on the door and looped her thumbs through her belt. She shifted from foot to foot. Zoe was chewing her lip, bracing herself for the difficult conversation while Aiden stood stoic like a statue. But then she saw his knee bobbing.
A weak smile curled up her lip. He was human after all.
The door opened with a jerk. Annabelle’s husband, Trevor, appeared with a scruffy jaw, flannel shirt, and eyes rimmed with dark circles. He hadn’t slept in days. It took him exactly one second to look at their faces before his knees gave out. A scream escaped him like his soul was trying to leave his body.
Aiden and Lisa swooped down to help him while Zoe remained rooted to the spot. As she watched Annabelle’s husband fall apart and weep on the floor, she recalled her reaction to finding her mother dead in the bathtub. An image she would never forget. How brave she was to shed no tears,to sit on the floor in absolute silence, staring at Rachel’s body before spurring into action to clean up the crime scene.
“I’m sorry…” Trevor slowly got to his feet, leaning against the door and wiping his nose. “Shit. I… oh God.” A baby’s cry came from inside the house. “Come inside. Damn it. It’s Markus…” Zoe followed him inside with Aiden and Lisa.
Zoe instantly sensed a woman’s touch in the house—from the plush rugs and matching throw pillows to the wall-mounted coat hook and decorative organizer bins. And she noticed her glaring absence. Dirty diapers overflowing in the bin, tissue boxes strewn around, and moldy takeout boxes.
“I’m sorry. I have to feed him.” Trevor picked up a crying baby from the crib and handed him to Lisa. “Hold him for a second.”
Lisa held the baby like a football, blinking at him. A sadness crossed her face.
“We have questions, Mr. Stevens,” Zoe said as Trevor quickly moved around the kitchen with jerky, unsure movements. “When was the last time you spoke to your wife?”
“I don’t know. When did I make the call? Three days ago? Yeah, yeah. I called her end of the day and she said she was running late.” He rubbed his temples. “And then she didn’t come back.”
“What was her behavior like in the last few days? Was she stressed or distracted?” Aiden prodded.
The baby’s cries grated against Zoe’s ears. “May I take him?”
“Sure.”
Zoe took the baby from Lisa and held him close to her chest, feeling his drool and fat tears staining her shirt. From the corner of her eye, she saw Lisa’s unsure but eager hand reach out before curling back into her pocket.
His eyes darted as he chased a memory. “She was stressed about work. More than usual.”
“Did she talk to you about it? Mention anyone in particular from work?” Aiden asked.
He shrugged. “Not really. She was working on some big project for the company. It was a high-pressure situation. But that was it. She didn’t mention anything. To be honest, we didn’t talk much about work.”
Rain pattered on the window, rivulets racing down the glass. The view of the cars in the parking lot was distorted. Clarity and boundaries dissolving and colors bleeding away.
Claustrophobic and incessant. The damned rainy weather of Washington.
Aiden’s shoulder brushed against hers, sending a jolt of energy through her body.
“How did you know where to find her?” Trevor asked. “You found her in the woods?”
A whisper of breath caught inside Zoe’s throat as she thought of the envelope that had found its way to her desk. “We’re not able to share much at the moment,” she said softly. “Did Annabelle have other friends? Anyone she was close to?”
“No, she was too busy working.”
“And what did she do?” Aiden asked.
“She was a data scientist for Harrington Group.” He took the crying baby from Zoe and balanced him in the crook of his elbow to feed him the bottle. “Shit. Where’s his burp cloth?”
