Page 3 of Her Final Hours

He wasn’t one for being heavy-handed, but with all that had occurred in High Peaks since losing Lena and his brother Luke, it had given him good reason to be concerned. Then, of course, there was the fact that this wasn’t the first time he’d had trouble with Mia.

Noah rose, scooping up his phone and calling the martial arts school that Mia had enrolled in several months ago. She’d blindsided him when she asked to join. It was only a month after Lena’s death. Noah had taken martial arts as a child and knew the benefits for the mind and body. So, he agreed. Even more so when she said she would pay for it with the money she’d made from babysitting.

He’d attended her first class to get a feel for it.

After that, her friend would collect her by car, and they were usually back by six-thirty. She’d rolled in ten or twenty minutes late a few times, but nowhere as long as this, and she constantly texted or phoned. That’s what struck him as odd. Noah stepped out onto his balcony that overlooked High Peaks Lake. He still hadn’t gotten his head around the fact that he was living in one of the most desired houses on the lake. A five-million-dollar waterfront property owned by a private LLC that he came to find out was co-owned by Luther Ashford — head of a powerful family that also owned the Ashford Royale Casino. Now he was living in it, rent-free. With work and the kids consuming most of his time, he’d yet to dig deeper into the Ashford family or find out what his father’s tie was to them.

A cold breeze bit at his ears.

The phone rang a few times and then was answered by a peppy kid. “Peaks Martial Arts!”

“Hi, um, is… Allan Mansfield there?”

“Yeah, hold on.” The phone was muffled. He heard him call out.

A second later, the phone changed hands as an out-of-breath middle-aged man came on the line. “Allan here.”

“Oh hey, Al, you might not remember me. Noah Sutherland. I came in a few months ago to enroll my daughter in classes.”

“Sutherland. Ah, right. The cop.”

“That’s right. Is Mia still there?”

“Your daughter?”

“Mia. Yeah.”

“No. I haven’t seen her in months.”

“What?”

“I thought she would have told you. After that class, she returned a day later to say she decided it wasn’t for her and asked if she could get those checks.” He’d seen her write out checks for the first three months.

Noah heard him tapping a keyboard.

“Here we go. I issued a refund the day after.”

“Is that so?” His eyebrow arched.

“But hey, if she’s considering returning, we would love to have her.”

“Appreciate that.” He hung up and stood there for a moment longer, trying to make heads or tails of the situation. He paced and then decided to take matters into his own hands. He slid open the French doors and returned to the kitchen’s warmth.

“Any luck?” Gretchen asked with a mouthful of food.

“No.” His eyes darted to Ethan, who looked a little sheepish. His head was down. He glanced up for but a second, then averted his eyes down again.

“Where is she, Ethan?” he asked tiredly.

“Um?” he responded. “What?”

If he knew anything about the two of them, it was that they were stuck together like glue. They might have been good at hiding things from their parents but from each other — nope. That bond only deepened after the death of theirmother. His fourteen-year-old son had become like Mia’s shadow. He was rarely out of her sight for but a few minutes.

“Mia.”

“I thought you said she’s taking martial arts?” Gretchen asked.

“That’s what I thought. Seems not. She hasn’t been there since the day I took her.”