Page 57 of Carry on Wayward Son

Jace and I exchanged a brief look. Another name to run down.

“Did you see him again that night?” I asked. “After he gave you the note?”

She considered the question. “Once. Before the storm really hit. He was talking to someone I didn’t recognize. Older—well dressed for a beach party, which is what caught my eye. He looked like he didn’t belong there.” She shook her head. “It was dark. I only saw them for a second. That’s honestly all I have.”

“You said older,” Jace prompted. “Older like college age or full adult?”

Lauren considered. “Not, like, our parents’ age. But maybe not college either? Twenties possibly, but I really didn’t pay that close attention.

Did the note come from Shane? Or from this mystery man? Or from someone else entirely?

The door to the office swung open without warning. A heavyset man in shelter scrubs backed through it, pulling a large wire transport crate on a dolly, the kind built for big dogs. Inside, a massive, agitated Rottweiler threw himself against the wire with the focused intensity of an animal that had decided the crate was the problem and he intended to solve it. He hit the side hard enough to shift the whole thing on the dolly, the crash of metal against metal filling the small space.

The sound cut through me like a blade.

Not the dog. Not the man. The crate.

The specific dimensions of it, the wire grid, the way the animal inside pressed against it with his whole weight. Something in my nervous system that had nothing to do with rational thought registered the size and the shape and sent me, without my permission, somewhere I hadn’t been in a long time. My memory supplied the scent of metal and closed space with complete clarity. The dark of corners where the light didn’t reach. The sound of a door being unlocked and a monster coming down the stairs.

Twenty-Nine

JACE

The color drained from Layla’s face all at once, exactly as it had last night when she’d said, Because I was there.

“Sorry, sorry!” The guy steering the crate was already maneuvering back through the door, the massive dog throwing himself against the cage in panicked fury.

And Layla sat still as a marble statue, eyes glassy, Koa pressed against her legs, making that noise that was meant to bring her back from wherever she’d gone. Because she sure as shit wasn’t here.

The door shut, and the sounds of the rest of the shelter muffled back to white noise.

I didn’t dare let myself go down the rabbit hole of wondering what about that scenario had set her off and sent her back. None of the options were good. But this was at least her third anxiety attack in as many days, and I knew she’d absolutely hate anyone else being aware of that.

I stood up. “Lauren, you’ve given us a lot to work with. We’ll be in touch if we have more questions.”

If she thought my declaration was abrupt, she said nothing as she glanced between us. “Of course. Anything I can do.”

I extended my hand to Layla, not sure if she’d take it under the circumstances. “Let’s go.”

She blinked, coming back through layers of memory enough to focus on me. “I’m fine.”

“I know. Come on.”

Her fingers curled around mine.

I hadn’t expected that. She was a woman who managed every point of contact, who set the terms of everything, who’d spent years building careful distance around exactly this kind of need, and she reached up and took my hand without hesitation. The warmth of her fingers closing around mine shot straight through me, and something stuttered in my chest.

Focus on the mission, Hollingsworth. Extraction.

I tightened my grip around hers and walked us out, Koa sticking tight to her other side.

At the truck, she got in without a word. I kept my mouth shut as I drove, because she didn’t need noise on top of whatever she was working through, and because the things running through my own head needed room.

I’d gone through the missing persons files we had access to the night before. Not a professional deep dive, just the files Madden had compiled and what was publicly available, looking for anything that might connect to what Layla had told us. I hadn’t found her. No runaway from the foster system fitting her description, from anywhere up the coast, in the right window of time. Which didn’t mean she wasn’t there. It meant either the record didn’t exist, which was entirely possible for a girl nobody was looking for, or the name she was using now wasn’t the name she’d had then.

That was the piece that kept sitting at a slight angle in my mind. Not suspicion. She’d been in that hold and knew things she couldn’t have known any other way. The trauma was unquestionably real, and I didn’t doubt any of it. But last night she’d described herself as a foster care runaway who’d been in the system when she was taken. That didn’t fit with a father who loved her enough to train all his kids to protect themselves. A sister she was close to. A brother. Possibly people she’d chosen, after the fact. Adopted after she got out, different name, possibly even a different first name. Under the circumstances, who wouldn’t rebuild themselves entirely from the ground up?

It was a logical explanation. It fit. I just hadn’t quite settled it in my mind yet because there were pieces missing. I didn’t have those pieces yet, and I wouldn’t until she was ready to give them, because pushing wasn’t what she needed.