Little Girl Lost (Georgiana Germaine Book 1) Read online

“I understand. I’m sorry.”

  My mind was spinning, my fingers shaking. I yanked the bedside drawer all the way out and sprinkled its contents over the bed. I picked through it and tossed everything to the side. I still didn’t find what I was after. “Where are my freaking keys?”

  Harvey bent over the bed, scanning the items I’d dumped out. “I know you’re upset, but please stop for a minute. Take a breath and calm down.”

  I ran a hand through my hair and exhaled a long breath. “We don’t have a minute. You know we don’t. Every second we sit here doing nothing is time against us, until we’re out of time and we’ve lost her forever. You know the statistics.”

  “This is different. Don’t think of Lark as a statistic. She’s family. We’ll find her. I know we will.”

  He placed a hand on my shoulder, and I melted into his arms. A tear rolled down my cheek. I swatted it away, shocked my emotions were spilling all over me.

  I hadn’t shed a tear since the day I packed up and left Cambria.

  “Let it out now,” he said. “It’s all right. I know how you’re feeling, honey. What’s happened to Lark has reopened an old wound inside you. Do you understand now why I tried to ease into it?”

  “I get it,” I said. “Just don’t tell me everything is going to work out.”

  “I won’t.”

  “And don’t talk about Fallon. Not today.”

  “Didn’t plan on it.”

  I broke from his embrace, and he reached out, lifting a set of keys from a bowl on the counter. “These what you’re after?”

  I stared at the keys dangling off his finger. They had been in plain sight the entire time. I felt like an idiot. I needed to get it together. I’d be useless in my search for Lark otherwise.

  “Yeah, thanks,” I said. “I’m organized. It’s just ...”

  “You don’t need to explain. You’re in shock. Let’s sit for a few minutes, and I’ll fill you in on what I know.”

  I popped two ibuprofen tablets into my mouth, swallowed them with some water, and sat down. Luka jumped into my lap and stared into my eyes like he sensed the recent shift in my behavior. I reminisced back to the day my ex brought him home as a surprise several years ago after he spotted him at the local pound. The dog was so skinny when Liam opened the crate and he’d ambled on out, the scrawniest Samoyed I’d ever seen. The first time we locked eyes, he cocked his head and looked up at me like he knew he was safe. He’d remained by my side ever since.

  Harvey drummed his fingers on the table. “Your sister went out of town last night.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m sure you’ve heard about the fire burning in Santa Barbara.”

  I nodded. “The paper I read last time I was in town said one hundred thirty acres have burned so far.”

  “It’s up to one hundred seventy now and shows no signs of stopping. It’s devastating, to say the least. Your sister went with the news crew to report on it. Jack stayed home to look after Lark. They had a barbecue and invited one of the families on the block to join them.”

  “Which family?”

  “Mitch and Holly Porter. They have a kid. Ethan’s his name, I think. He’s Lark’s age, and they’re in the same class together at school.”

  “How long did the Porters stay?”

  “About two hours. They went home at half past seven to put their son to bed and said Jack was doing the same with Lark. At around eight thirty, Hattie Shingler, Jack’s next-door neighbor, said Jack was milling around the back yard. She thought he was cleaning the pool.”

  “Why?”

  “All the outside lights were switched on, and she could see the metal pole sticking up over the fence. She got in bed, started reading, and several minutes later, she thought she heard Jack talking to someone.”

  “A man or a woman?”

  “A man. She didn’t think much of it until she heard a loud popping noise.”

  “What time?”

  “Would have been around nine. She kept reading and then thought what she’d heard sounded like a gunshot, so she walked to the living room. She peered out the window and saw a man in the front yard.”

  “What was he doing?”

  “Jogging past her house.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “His head was covered with a hoodie, so she didn’t see his face.”

  “Then how can she be sure it was a man then, and not a woman?”

  “He was tall and had a large build.”

  “Did she notice anything else?”

  “Just what he was wearing—the hoodie, jeans, and a pair of running shoes.”

  I flung my hands in the air. “Fantastic, so he could be any tall male in the world.”

  “Hattie found it odd because there’d never been many late-night joggers in the neighborhood. And because of the hoodie, her mind went into overdrive. She thought he may have robbed one of the houses on the street.”

  “Robbed a house and jogged away without a bag of loot?”

  Harvey leaned back and shrugged. “I’m just telling you what she said.”

  “I know you are. Sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude. What happened after she saw him?”

  “At twenty past nine, she called the police dispatch and reported the suspicious man she’d seen. We sent an officer to check it out.”

  “Which one?”

  “Higgins.”

  Higgins was just about one of the laziest cops I’d ever known.

  “The street was quiet when Higgins arrived,” Harvey said. “He saw nothing suspicious.”

  “Of course, he didn’t. Higgins couldn’t tell the difference between a thief, a killer, or a jogger if they were in a lineup with the weapons they used from the crime they’d just committed.”

  “I get it,” he said. “Higgins and your ex are good friends. He may be on the slow side, but he’s not a bad guy.”

  He was a bad cop, though.

  “Let me guess. Higgins thought Hattie was paranoid, and he tried to assure her everything was fine.”

  Harvey stared out the window at nothing, which was all the answer I needed.

  “Well, yeah, he thought it didn’t warrant further investigation at the time, and he told Hattie he’d follow up the next day. She was infuriated. She ran to Jack’s door and pounded on it. When he didn’t answer, she went around back and found Jack floating in the pool.”

  “I assume he was already dead?”

  Harvey nodded. “I’d just rolled into bed when I got the call. Couldn’t believe it when Higgins gave me the address. I made him repeat it twice. I thought it had to be wrong. Your mother was asleep beside me, and I couldn’t bring myself to tell her what was going on. I decided it would be best to get more information before I broke it to her.”

  When my father died, my mother changed, temporarily. For a time, she was open and vulnerable. She leaned on Harvey. She looked to him to heal the hole my father’s passing left in her heart. She mourned my father, and Harvey was a strong, loving shoulder for her to lean on. The more she leaned, the more endearing he became. Friendship turned to love—a different kind of love than she’d shared with my father, but love all the same.

  “I assume she knows now, right?” I asked.

  “She does.”

  “How is she?”

  “A wreck. She’s not eating. Neither is your sister.”

  I didn’t want to picture it, to imagine the pair of them standing together, hand in hand, disheartened and in pain. It was too much to process. For now, it would be shelved, shoved into the dark recesses of my mind where all of my unwanted feelings and emotions went when they needed to hide. It was easier, and it was how I functioned in a state of absolute dysfunction.

  I could do it.

  Or maybe I couldn’t.

  It didn’t matter.

  I would do it, for Lark.

  “What happened after you found out Jack was dead?” I asked.

  “I called Crowe and Hunter, and they met me there.” />
  Lilia Hunter was a decent police officer. She was sharp and committed. Silas Crowe was the county coroner. He was also the biggest sweet-talker in town.

  “What did you find when you got to the house?” I asked.

  “We fished Jack out of the pool and saw he’d taken a bullet to the chest. Looks like he’d been shot at close range. I’ll know more after Crowe looks him over.”

  “One bullet killed him?”

  Harvey nodded. “Looks like it. We secured the scene and then searched the house. There was no sign of Lark anywhere.”

  “She ran.”

  “She ... what?”

  “Ran from the house. She must have seen him, the man who shot Jack. She ran down the street, and his killer chased after her. When Hattie looked out the window, I’d guess Lark had already sprinted past, and Hattie saw the man running after her.”

  He raised a brow. “How do you know?”

  “Just a speculation.”

  He folded his arms. My nonchalant response hadn’t worked.

  “You’ve been having those dreams of yours again, haven’t you?”

  I’d kept my dreams, the ones that meant something more than the average dream, to myself for my own protection for the simple reason most people weren’t comfortable hearing things they couldn’t explain. The unfamiliar made people feel raw and exposed like unraveled yarn. It removed their safety net. Most people were content living as sheep, following the leader. To live any other way created an unwanted, uncomfortable disruption.

  Six years earlier, I’d worked a homicide case where a woman named Loretta Cox had been battered and left for dead in a movie theater parking lot. When we looked into her life, we didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. She had a loving husband, a great job, and a vast group of supportive friends. Her death was unwarranted. It didn’t add up.

  A few months into the case, I had a dream where I saw the woman in court, serving jury duty for a murder trial. When the votes were cast on whether or not to convict the man who stood accused of the crime, Loretta had been the deciding vote, and she’d voted to convict. After the trial, she was naïve enough to share what she’d done with others. Word got out, and the son of the convicted man heard she’d been boasting about being the deciding vote, and he killed her.

  When I’d approached Harvey with my thoughts on why she was killed, he thought it seemed unlikely. I pursued it anyway, and it turned out my suspicions were true. He was baffled to discover I had been right, and he pressed me on how I could have known, given the lack of evidence to support it. It was then I confided in him about the odd dreams I had from time to time, and I was surprised when he said he believed me.

  I pulled out of the memory and focused on Harvey. “I had a strange dream last night. I’m not sure what to make of it yet.”

  “What did you see?”

  “Not much. Hattie’s description of the man is similar to what I saw, though. The man’s running shoes were dark blue with an orange stripe down the side, and I believe they had a Nike logo.”

  “Huh, interesting,” he said. “I need you back, working with me on this. After you left, I bumped Hunter up to detective. It was a mistake.”

  “She’s a hard worker.”

  “Yeah, she is. She never struggled as a cop, but she does as a detective. Not sure why. Maybe it’s the pressure of standing in your shadow. I mean, she’s good, but she’s half the detective you are.”

  “I’ll come back. I’ll help you. I’d do anything for my family.”

  The moment the words left my mouth, I felt like a hypocrite. I’d turned my back on them when I left town. I’d abandoned them at a time when they were struggling. But I’d struggled too. No matter how much they didn’t understand my reasons for leaving, it was something I needed—something I still needed. One more day spent in Cambria, and I would have suffocated.

  I saw it, but they couldn’t.

  “I’ll work the investigation until it’s solved,” I said, “no matter how long it takes. I’m not saying I’m back for good, but I will get to the bottom of why Jack was killed, and I will find Lark.”

  Harvey headed back to town, and I stood in front of the mirror, assessing my current look. In a few short hours, I’d be thrust back into the throes of my dysfunctional family, and my current appearance lacked in many areas. I had large bags under my eyes, and my violet, shaggy, uneven pixie cut made it obvious I’d been taking scissors to my own hair for some time now. The boxed dye I’d used to color it was about six weeks overdue for a refresher, and my dark roots were showing.

  I rummaged around the bathroom cabinet for a brush and did my best to smooth out my mangy edges. They didn’t cooperate, and I lacked the time or desire to fuss with my hair more than I already had.

  “A hat it is, then,” I said.

  I pulled a bin out from beneath my bed and opened it. It contained items I hadn’t dressed in since I’d started living life in a mobile home. The musty smell didn’t help either. I pulled out a black cloche hat with a white ribbon around its brim and patted it down, shaking the dust free. The hat was vintage and from the ‘20s, the era I was sure I was meant to have been born in. It was a thrift-shop find I’d discovered in an old antique store in New York. Paired with white, wide-leg pants, a tank top, and a long wrap, I may not have smelled presentable, but I looked it.

  I turned toward Luka for further approval.

  “What do you think? Am I fit to return to the land of the living?”

  He wagged his tail.

  It was approval enough.

  I hooked the Airstream to the back of the Jeep and drove out. My thoughts turned to Phoebe and the last time we’d seen each other. I’d turned to leave, and she’d picked a thick, plastic cup off the table and hurled it at me, shocked when she hit the bull’s-eye on the back of my head.

  “I ... I never thought it would hit you,” she’d said. “I was aiming for your back.”

  I’d shot an irritated glare at her and kept on walking.

  “Fine!” she’d said. “Run away if you want. It doesn’t solve anything. It won’t make things better.”

  She was wrong.

  It had forced me to be alone, to face what I needed to face.

  It hadn’t been easy, but it needed to be done.

  I arrived at my mother’s home and found several members of my family had circled the wagons and gathered in support of my sister. I parked curbside and scanned the vehicles I recognized to see who was there. The group included Harvey, my mother, my sister, my brothers Nathan and Paul, and my father’s sister Laura.

  Aunt Laura and Paul were sitting in the front yard on lawn chairs. He was smoking a joint, and she was drinking a Coke. I opened the car door, and Paul glanced in my direction. He shot out of his chair and went inside, which I found odd. Of all my siblings, we’d been the closest.

  Upon seeing Luka, my aunt Laura set her glass down, spread her arms to the side, and said, “Get over here, you rascal.”

  Luka accommodated her request by springing off the ground and into her lap.

  My aunt laughed, kissed the top of Luka’s head, and said, “I’ve missed you so much.”

  They bonded for a minute, then she told Luka to get down, and she stood. She walked toward me, and we embraced.

  “How are ya, kiddo?” she asked.

  “I’m okay, I guess,” I said. “You?”

  “I was great before this whole mess happened. Your mother’s an absolute wreck, which is doing your sister no favors. Phoebe will be relieved to know you’re here.”

  “I hope so. We didn’t part on good terms when I saw her last.”

  She patted my hand. “Trust me, I don’t care what Phoebe says or how mad she pretends to be sometimes. You’re her safe place, and she knows it. She does better when you’re around. She’s a lot more ... well, like herself.”

  “I suppose I should go inside, then.”

  She nodded. “Best steer clear of Paul for now, mmm...kay?”

  “Wh
y did he take off when I got here?”

  “Seems he’s having relationship troubles.”

  “With Tasha? What happened?”

  “I’m not sure. She seemed fine earlier, and then Harvey got here and told everyone you were coming. Tasha poured herself a strong drink, and the last time I checked, she’d finished the first bottle, moved on to a second, and talked your mom into joining her.

  I’d never had any problems with Tasha before. I could make no sense of why the news of me coming home had been a trigger.

  “Tasha’s drunk? It isn’t even noon,” I said. “I thought Paul and Tasha had a solid relationship.”

  “Times change. People do too. I’ve learned to expect the unexpected nowadays. Way I see it, it’s the only way to live. Who knows what happened? We’re all going through a stressful time right now. Everyone deals with it in their own way.”

  A stressful time?

  From what I’d learned about Tasha over the past five years, she seemed like a decent person. She came with Paul to family events and attempted to fit in. I found her difficult to hold a conversation with because her interest in life in general was limited. I thought she was rather blah. She had few opinions other than her lack of interest in kids, which she refused to have with Paul, even though she’d been open to it before their marriage.

  “What makes you think Paul and Tasha are having marital issues?” I asked.

  “Paul alluded to the possibility of a breakup right before you arrived.”

  “Did he give a reason?”

  She shook her head. “He’s a man of few words, that one. Your brother Nathan, on the other hand, doesn’t ever seem to know when to keep his trap shut. It’s a foot-in-mouth disease he gets from your mother, the queen of exaggeration. Not you, though. You’re like your father.”

  It was the reason why I suspected I was my aunt’s favorite.

  Whenever she looked at me, she saw him, the brother she’d lost.

  “Maybe we should go easy on the sarcasm today,” I said.

  She studied my face and said, “I’m sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  She hadn’t. Paul springing from his chair like a potato launching out of a rocket and retreating to the house without uttering a word—that bothered me.