Last Girl Ghosted(38)

Matthew was handy, and he’d taught Bailey how to do things—like change a tire, fix a running toilet, unclog a drain. Bailey didn’t always pay attention, his mind on other things like video games and soccer and the weird feelings he had about certain girls who used to be his friends with whom he’d played hide-and-seek and caught toads in the creek behind his house, but who now smelled like flowers and wore lip gloss. But sometimes he did pay attention to his dad’s instruction, because he liked to understand how things worked, little everyday mysteries solved.

He got his father’s toolbox and went to the kitchen. The pipe under the sink had a dip. If the ring went down the drain while his mother was doing the dishes that morning, there was a chance it was still sitting there. He turned off the water to the sink, got the wrench, and removed the pipe. He dumped the contents into his hand, while Ellie and Mom looked on hopefully. There, in a revolting glob of soapy grime, was his mother’s diamond ring.

She sobbed as he handed it back to her. It wasn’t the ring. It wasn’t its cost or its value. It was her husband, his father, and her love for him, and their history and their memories, and the way she cherished that glittering symbol of Matthew’s love. His father could have bought her another ring, but there was no way to replace that one, how it held all the energy of their life together. Bailey was a kid, just sixteen years old, and he was confused about the world and people and himself a vast majority of the time. But he saw that, what the ring meant, and understood it with a shining clarity. Some things were not just things, not just dead material items with a dollar value and nothing more. Some things were like people. And everything, everyone, had to be somewhere.

And ever since that day, Bailey Kirk didn’t like questions without answers. He didn’t like items that were lost and could not be found. Because whether you were aware of it or not, there was always an answer. One indisputable truth about what happened and why. And the lost, they were always somewhere. There was no sucking vortex in the world where rings and watches and keys and people fell through and were removed from existence. The world, and the spaces contained within, were finite. There were only so many places to go. Only so many things that might have happened.

People weren’t things, and when they went missing, there were more layers, more possibilities. Inanimate objects didn’t conspire to stay gone or hide from those searching for them. An object didn’t have a reason for leaving its life behind. But still, the number of possibilities were finite.

He kept a picture of Mia Thorpe in the visor over the drivers’ seat of his truck, and he reached for it now.

There were other missing women that he was concerned about. But Henry Thorpe was his client. And Mia was the precious child that he had lost. And there was a certain energy to that. Bailey was connected to Mia through Henry’s grief. There was a gossamer strand from her being to his, a spider-silk tether that he could shorten millimeter by millimeter until they were face-to-face.

He moved the truck and found a spot up the block and across the street from Wren Greenwood’s home, her stoop and lower level windows visible. He put his seat slightly back, and settled in, watching.

Time wound on and he dozed off a couple of times, startling awake, but he wasn’t worried that she had left. That house, cozy, with an understated luxury, was her nest. He was betting she didn’t leave unless she had good reason—work or friends or love. And he’d left her with food for thought. He’d be willing to bet that she’d spend the rest of the night on her laptop—searching for answers about Mia Thorpe and the man they had in common.

Adam Harper.

Raife Mannes.

Also, possibly Timothy Johnston.

Maybe Cliff Jensen.

A ghost in the machine. Maybe a con, a thief. Maybe a killer. Bailey had never seen him in the flesh; the guy was always one step ahead—which had Bailey wondering about a couple of things. All he was to Bailey was a series of digital images, the one thing that three missing women had in common. The one person. The women had lots of things in common—traumatic pasts, a certain amount of wealth, a willingness to look for love online. They were all fragile in some ways. He thought of Mia as someone who had been broken by grief, glued herself back together, only to be shattered again.

There was a pattern to all of this, something that connected them all, some missing piece that would lead him where he needed to go. But the pieces floated, never quite clicking. It was confounding. The client was desperate. His boss, who he called X, just to be a dork, had checked in earlier that day.

“So where are we with this?” Nora wanted to know. It was her firm, founded by her and her partner Diana. Both of them came to the work from careers in the FBI, moving into the private sector for the money and the freedom it allowed them. They were both badass—killers on the range, technical wizards. Diana knew kung fu; she bested him at the gym time and again. Nora was a relentless interrogator. He didn’t bother trying to bullshit her. Ever. Nora Turner and Diana Ives; he’d worked for them for almost ten years.

She knew where he was with this. Nowhere. He diligently filed his daily reports via their encrypted website.

“I need a few more days,” he told her. “I have a lead. Maybe.”

She was quiet for a moment; she was probably reading his report as they spoke. “This Wren Greenwood? Not her name. But okay. What does she know?”

“I don’t think she knows anything.”