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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 nodded. “Then someone tried to break into our house one night. Bethany came screaming into my room in the middle of the night that someone was climbing in her window. I called the police and they came out, but found nothing that indicated someone tried to get in. But there are bushes and mulch and—” She waved a hand. “It would be impossible to say if there was or wasn’t someone out there. The police blamed it on youthful pranks.” She rolled her eyes and shook her head.
“What else?” he probed.
“About a week later, she said she thought someone had followed her home from school. We live near the high school, so she walks to and from school. Only in the last few weeks I’ve had to start taking her and picking her up. She’s gotten so frightened that she’s refused to go to school unless I drive her.”
Mason started pacing again. “Did you report it?”
“Yes.”
He frowned. “And that’s it?”
Exasperated, Lacey stood and paced to the fireplace then back to her seat. “Yes—and no.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning I think there’s more to it.”