turned wet emerald-green eyes on him, pleading. “She’s not answering her cell phone and she missed school yesterday….” She lifted her hands and swallowed. “I went to the police and they’re treating her as a runaway. No one else will do anything and I just don’t know what else to do. Please help me, Mason.”
Lacey bit her lip and stared up at the man as if he were her last hope. He still wore his reddish-blond hair in a military buzz cut. A hysterical laugh bubbled in her throat. Why had she even noticed that?
Focusing on his startling blue eyes, the same eyes she’d looked into every day for the past fifteen years, she decided that while she hated to come begging for his help, she’d do it for Bethany.
Where Bethany was concerned, the only thing that mattered was finding her. And if working with the man who’d broken her heart sixteen years ago meant she could bring her daughter home safely, she’d do it without a second thought.
What she hadn’t told Mason was that it wasn’t just Bethany that she needed help with. Since her daughter’s disappearance, she had felt watched. Like eyes followed her wherever she went. It was creepy and unsettling.
But nothing else had happened. So she’d started to wonder if it was all her imagination.
Bethany’s disappearance confirmed it wasn’t.
Even as she walked up the steps to Mason’s front porch, she had to resist looking back over her shoulder. She shuddered.
And just last night, she’d paced the house, praying, calling out to God and thought she heard someone at the door. Thinking it was Bethany, she’d flung it open and found a page from her old high school yearbook tacked to her door.
Confused, she’d pulled it down and stared out into the night. The hair on the nape of her neck had prickled, and a sense of foreboding had nearly overcome her.
One thing she knew for sure: someone was watching her. But who? Bethany’s possible kidnapper?
“Give me back my daughter!” she’d screamed. “Where is she?”
No one had answered.
But she’d felt the lingering eyes on her, watching from beyond, the malice, the—evil? Gulping, she’d shut the door and leaned against it, a hand to her throat. What was she going to do?
The answer had come to her—and not one she’d liked. She knew without a doubt that she had to go to Mason Stone. A man she’d vowed never to see again.
The man who’d broken her heart sixteen years ago.
Now looking into Mason’s expressionless face, she realized she might have made a mistake. She was surprised he’d let her in the door. How she found herself on his couch was anyone’s guess. But that didn’t matter. Her main focus was Bethany. She had to save her child.
No matter what their past contained. They’d simply have to deal with that later.
Mason stood, shoved his hands into the back pockets of his jeans and paced to the other end of the room, then back. “Why should I help you, Lacey?”
The question, while asked in a voice so low she had to strain to hear it, seemed to echo off the walls of the house and ricochet inside her brain.
“Because…because…”
“Because of our past? Just because we once meant something to each other doesn’t mean anything. When you decided to cheat on me with my best friend, you made it clear what you thought of our relationship.”
Shock bolted Lacey to her feet. “How dare you? How dare you? I never cheated on you! But just like now, you wouldn’t stop throwing around accusations long enough to listen!” She snatched another tissue from the box and headed for the door. “Well, I’m not the scared, intimidated little girl I was at eighteen years old. So, never mind. I was wrong. I can’t believe how wrong I was.”
“I saw you—Daniel said…” Mason sucked in a deep breath and turned away from her as she stomped for the exit. His low “Stop. Don’t go yet” froze her in her tracks.
Without facing him, she asked, “Why shouldn’t I?”
“Because you came to me for a reason,” he said, then sighed. “It seems the past isn’t as dead as I thought it was. I didn’t mean to…”
Keeping her voice frigid, she muttered, “Never mind. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is finding Bethany. Will you help me or not?”
Fingers wrapped around her upper arm and he swung her around to face him. “I don’t know yet. Sit back down. Please. Tell me about Bethany and why you think I can help you.”
Clamping down on the desire to hurtle her own accusations, she seated herself on the couch once more and took a deep breath. For Bethany, remember? You can do this for Bethany.
So, how much should she tell him?
All of it.
“I thought you could help me because being a marshal…isn’t that what you do for a living? Find people?”
He nodded. “Fugitives mostly.”
“But you have connections, you can—” She stopped, closed her eyes and sucked in a calming breath. She needed to keep her cool. “Bethany is a good kid.” Should she show him the picture? No, as soon as she did, he would know…. “She’s had an emotional and rocky couple of years as all teens do, but things had been getting better since we moved back here.”
He nodded, listening.
“Bethany wouldn’t just disappear like this. Not at this point in our lives. Not at all.” Her daughter might do a lot of things, but running away from home was definitely not one of them. “And not when I’ve just promised…” She bit her lip and looked away.
“Promised what?”
She straightened her shoulders. “Since I’ve promised to let her meet her father.”
His lips tightened and suspicion narrowed his eyes. “And who is her father?”
“He’s…” She sucked in a deep breath. She couldn’t just blurt it out. “I’ll get to that in a minute.” Oh Lord, I need your help and guidance on this. Right now, please.
Twisting the tissue between her fingers, she drew in another breath and looked him in the eye. “Some strange things have been happening lately. To Bethany. And I think they’re related to the car wreck that happened a couple of months ago.”
“What wreck?”
“It was during spring break back in April. Bethany’s best friend, Kayla Mahoney, was driving and she ran off the road, hit a tree and—” she pressed shaking fingers to her lips “—died.”
Mason’s sharply indrawn breath stabilized her. “Wait a minute, I think I heard about that.”
Lacey swiped a tear away. “Anyway, after the accident, Bethany was having trouble dealing with it. So, I looked into getting her some help. She started counseling with our pastor and seemed to be improving. And now this.” Through clenched teeth she gritted, “But no one seems to be interested in helping me!”
She fought the wave of tears as she looked at Mason.
He rubbed a hand over his face then caught her eye. “And you said weird things started happening after the wreck?”
“Yes.”
“Like what?”
“Bethany started acting very strange. She jumped at the slightest noise, refused to go out by herself, became my shadow if we went out together. It seemed she was constantly watching her back, but she adamantly refused to talk about it. She started losing weight, having nightmares. I thought she might be suffering from depression after everything that happened.”
“It would certainly be understandable.”
Lacey