Page 45 of Night Hawk
Erik looked up from his computer. Pong, sitting at his feet, lifted his head too. “I have information.” He turned his focus to Toni. “Sorry. It’s about Lisa, and it’s not good news. I’ll hook my computer to the TV and you can see it there.”
Pong whimpered and sat up as if he knew something bad was about to go down. He was likely picking up on the tension in Erik’s announcement.
“How about just cutting to the chase and giving us the details,” Drake said.
“I think it’s better if you read it.” His computer desktop image was mirrored on the screen, revealing a large photo of Pong. “This story I found is from 1987, long before the internet, but this newspaper scanned their files into their archive.” He clicked on his internet browser, and an article opened with the title,Virginia Girl Goes Missing on Lost Creek Vacation.
Toni gasped. “My sister?”
Clay tore his eyes from her face to read the article. Lisa disappeared from her grandparents’ home in a beach town not far from where they sat right now. Only twelve years old, she’d traveled with Andrew Martin from Virginia to Oregon to stay with her grandparents."
“I wonder why my mom and dad didn’t bring her here,” Toni muttered.
“The article doesn’t say that. But it does say on the third night of her visit she’d gone to bed, and in the morning, her grandparents found the bedroom empty, the window open, and no sign of forced entry.
The story contained a photo of Lisa, one of the grandparents, and one of Toni’s parents too.
Toni knelt on the floor by the TV and touched Lisa’s face on the screen. “She looks like me when I was younger, doesn’t she? Like the picture Dad had in his office of me and Mom.”
“Yes,” Clay said.
Toni moved her long slender fingers to her grandparents’ faces. “I’ve never even seen a picture of them. They died before I was born.”
“And look at my mom and dad,” she said. “They’re so young, but the pain in their eyes is excruciating.”
“Maybe they never told you about Lisa because they blamed your grandparents and didn’t want you to know that.”
“Maybe.” Her word was whispery soft, as if imagining how they’d made the decision to withhold something so very big from her. Or maybe she was wondering what life might’ve been like if her sister hadn’t disappeared.
“You should know,” Erik said as he continued to type. “Your grandparents are still alive.”
“They what?” She fired him a shocked look. “My parents lied about that too. Do you have an address for them?”
“Not yet, but I found additional articles,” Erik said. “They say Lisa was never found. The sheriff’s office uncovered very few leads and feared she’d gone out to the beach and drowned. But your parents never had her legally declared dead.”
Another gasp from Toni, and Clay wanted to slug his brother for being so matter-of-fact when she was so distraught. But then, there probably wasn’t a better way to give her such horrible news.
She looked at Erik, the pain in her eyes mirroring her parents anguish on the screen. “I want to read all the articles. Can you print them for me?”
“After I finish looking up your grandparents and set up our portable printer.”
“Thank you.” She turned back to the TV. Touched the faces again—one by one as if memorizing them. Clay couldn’t stand by any longer and do nothing to help her. He dropped down next to her. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Just be here with me,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “That’s all you can do.”
“Your grandparents still live in the same house as when Lisa disappeared,” Erik announced.
Toni grabbed Clay’s arm. “We have to go there. To see them. Question them.”
He took her hands and made strong eye contact to break through her sudden elation. “We’ll go. For sure. But it would be better if we got a complete picture of this abduction before meeting them.”
“But I want to see them.”
“I know you do, and I want that for you. I really do.” He squeezed her hands. “But I have to think of this from an investigative standpoint too. It wouldn’t be good to go over there just yet. You’re too emotional to see that now, so I need you to trust me and trust that I have your best interest at heart.”
Trust? Clay wanted Toni to trust him. But could she trust anyone with something so important? She’d learned over the years that trusting people involved a measure of risk. Just like trusting God did. She’d trusted her parents, and look where that had gotten her. And God? He knew about Lisa. Knew Toni didn’t have a clue, and so many years had passed.
Why didn’t you let me find out sooner? Why?
