Page 69 of Deathtoll

“There could be a number of reasons why a person doesn’t answer their phone. Maybe she put it on mute. Or she could have forgotten it at a rest stop. Or it could have been stolen.”

Cirelli said all that so calmly, so reasonably, that Kate almost believed it.Almost.“But you’ll check into the phone and the car?”

“I’ll check. Are you at a safe location?”

“I’m at work. The police are on their way.”

“Good. This might have nothing to do with Asael, but let’s take all precautions. Let me see what I can do, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I have anything. If I find any indication that this is connected to Asael, I’m going to suggest that we take you into protective custody. Are you all right with that?”

Kate couldn’t think about herself, not right then. “Just find my sister, please.”

After hanging up with Cirelli, she tried Emma again. Then she canceled her afternoon appointments. Then she called her mother, because she didn’t know what else to do. “Any news? Did she call?”

“No. And she still won’t pick up either. Hold on I’m putting you on speaker. Oh God, if she was in an accident…Do you think we should call the police?”

“I just talked to Murph. He said he’d call the local police captain as soon as we hung up.”

“Good. He used to be one of them. They’ll pay attention to him.”

Kate didn’t tell her mother about the FBI or Asael. The assassin was such a far stretch. There had to be a simpler, more likely explanation for why Emma had gone silent.

For all Kate knew, Asael was still in Colorado, the other side of the country, stalking his latest assignment. Or the whole facial recognition hit could have been just a glitch. Cirelli had said it’d been a partial match. No, a partial match didn’t merit Kate giving her mother a heart attack.

She gripped her phone.

Don’t think the worst.

“Maybe she lost her phone at a rest stop. Or someone could have stolen it out of her back pocket while she was standing in line for coffee,” she repeated what the agent had told her. “You know how Emma gets. Head in the clouds, lost in thought. Or lost flirting with a handsome barista.”

“She’s right,” her father was saying in the background. “Don’t worry.”

Her mother drew a shuddering breath. “Of course. She’ll call any minute, tell us some wild story, then we’ll all laugh.” But she sounded very much as if she were crying.

“Listen to Dad. Try not to worry too much, all right? And—” Kate fell silent when someone rattled the doorknob.

“It’s Joe,” Joe said through the door. “Just wanted to let you know I’m back.”

“I have to go,” Kate told her mother. “The police are here. I’ll call you if I have any news. Love you, Mom. Love you, Dad!” she shouted so her father could hear.

“Oh, honey. You know how much we love you back.”

As soon as Kate hung up, she opened the door, and Joe stepped inside. “Murph says I have to have eyes on you at all times until he gets here.”

“Have you had a chance to have lunch? We have a cafeteria. I could walk you over.”

“Grabbed pizza at the station.” Joe walked into her treatment room and checked it thoroughly, as if Asael could be hiding under her massage table and she wouldn’t have noticed.

“Coffee?” She needed to keep busy.

“All tanked up.” He came back out. “Murph gave me a quick update as I was driving over. You think this Asael guy could have taken your sister?”

“It’s a very slim possibility, but it’s a possibility.” Kate grabbed a clean mug and popped a pod of decaf into the machine, just for the comfort of the scent and the feel of the warmth in her hands. “Or she could have lost her phone. Or she could have been in an accident.”

Maybe repeating those alternate explanations enough times would help her to believe them.

It didn’t.

“Not sure about the accident,” Joe said. “Caught an update from the captain on the radio just as I was coming in. State police say they had no accidents on Route 76 this morning involving a young woman.”