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“Thanks.” I hadn’t wanted to bother Mason, but I was fairly confident that he’d want to know what was going on.
Sirens wailed in the distance. “The sheriff should be coming by any minute.”
“Good. I’m still twenty minutes away. When the film shoot wraps up for the night, the rest of the team will swing by and help with the search. Keep us posted,” Lincoln said.
“Will do.” I ended the call and shoved the phone back into my pocket, relieved when I saw a squad car approach.
* * *
The sheriff put out an APB for the white van along with a notification that the abductor Benjamin Ryan should be considered armed and dangerous with a hostage.
I needed Aiden to do his magic with the computer, hacking into every record and account that Ben had to locate where he might have taken Ariella.
Lincoln pulled into the lot and parked his truck. He hurried over. “Any news?”
“Nothing yet,” I said as we hovered around the squad car.
“Does she have her phone with her?” Lincoln asked.
“If she does, it’s off, and the battery has been pulled from the device. It’s not pinging a signal when we try to access her phone.” We had tried everything conventional. “Ben isn’t the kind of guy to hold her for ransom.”
Sheriff Nelson cleared his throat. “What makes you say that?”
“I did a background run on Ariella when she first moved here, for work,” I said, clarifying that I hadn’t done it for any other reason. I wasn’t a creep. We’d been hired to look into her past for Blue Sky Resort. “That’s how I found out her relation to Ben Ryan.”
Rubbing the back of my neck, I still didn’t like Ben, and that was before he’d abducted his ex-wife. He’d allegedly stolen money from hundreds of other unsuspecting individuals including me.
“The same Ben Ryan who was arrested and convicted of fraud?” Sheriff Nelson asked.
News traveled far and fast.
“Yeah, but he was released.”
“On good behavior? What’d he serve, a year?”
“I doubt it. Something about new evidence and the charges being dropped. The conviction was overturned.”
I hadn’t read the specifics yet. I’d been busy with a toddler at home, and she stole the majority of my time when I wasn’t at work.
“Hold on,” he said as he answered his phone and stepped away for a moment.
I wanted to chase after him, find out what was being discussed, but what good would that do? “How’s Harper?” Lincoln asked.
“She’s fine. She’s filming a scene,” I said, gesturing toward the set. She was the last person on my mind right now.
Sheriff Nelson strode over to us. “We have a possible location. His phone may be off, but he used his credit card. He just checked into Blue Sky Resort.”
Seriously?
Could he be any more of an idiot? At least that meant they hadn’t traveled far.
“I’m calling for backup,” the sheriff said, “and we’re going in lights and sirens off. You want to ride with me or bring your truck?”
“I’ll ride with you.” I didn’t want to admit that I didn’t have the keys to my truck. I’d given them to Ariella earlier that morning. It was information the sheriff didn’t need to have, but there’d be questions if I drove her car to the resort.
“Let us know what happens,” Lincoln said. He patted me on the back before strolling onto the set.
I jumped into the passenger side of the squad car, and the sheriff jetted us out of the lot and onto the main road toward the resort.