Page 18 of Into the Dark, We Go

"May I ask why you thought your relatives had any connection to her beyond her store?"

I let out a small sigh, "It’s all we had."

"So, you have something else now?" he pressed, catching onto the past tense.

He still wasn’t saying why he’d called to meet. I pressed my palms down on the table, weary of the cat-and-mouse game. Maybe I had made a mistake coming here alone and not letting Mitchell handle it.

"We might. Look, can we stop playing this ‘no, you tell me first’ game? Why did you call me here?"

I handed him the crinkled Post-It note with Lucas’s scribbles on it. "That’s all we’ve got. Plus, a photo with a similar symbol on a tree. See, I’ve nothing to hide."

He looked amused by my agitated tone, but his brow furrowed as soon as he saw the note. "Slow down a bit. What is this?"

"I’ve no idea," I replied. "It was in Lucas’s things. And Mitch and June’s sister had a picture on her phone of something similar but carved into a tree. Do you know what it is?"

He slowly shook his head, tracing the lines on the paper. "No. Do you have the photo?"

"Yes. But seriously, your turn."

He paused, then revealed, "Mary Flynn was my mother."

"Oh," I exhaled in surprise. "Why didn’t you… Wait, ‘was’?"

"She passed away. Two years ago"

"Passed away? Not missing?" I clarified, ensuring I gathered as much information as possible from him.

He gave a tight nod and then pointed at my empty glass. "You want another one?"

I thought for a second, then agreed. While Nick ordered, I finally had the chance to take a good look at him. When we visited his house, I was too nervous and distracted, but now I could see him clearly. He appeared younger than I had initially thought, likely in his late twenties rather than early thirties. From behind the blurry glass door, he had looked like Lucas for a second due to his height and similar build. But that was where the resemblance ended. Lucas had blond hair and gray eyes. Nick’s hair and eyes were dark brown. Lucas had no tattoos, while this guy’s right arm was covered in ink, intricate, intertwining patterns that crawled upward and disappearedbeneath his rolled-up sleeve. I forced myself not to stare too long, so I didn’t get a chance to decipher the designs.

He set our drinks down and changed the subject without warning, tipping his chin toward my university hoodie.

"What do you study?"

"Psychology," I said, caught off guard by the sudden shift. "But I dropped out last year."

"How come?" He took a long swig of beer.

It felt like the reason for our meeting was making him nervous, despite his relaxed demeanor. Maybe that was why he kept falling back on small talk instead of getting to the point of why he’d called me. His calm exterior was betrayed only by the subtle tapping of his fingers against the glass.

"The whole boyfriend disappearance thing, mostly," I said, trying to downplay it. "What about you?"

"Biology," he replied, then added for some reason, "I went to school in Oregon. Practically grew up there."

"I thought your mom lived here."

"She did for as long as I can remember. But she sent me to boarding school in Oregon, and I stayed there until a couple of years ago."

"What made you move back home?"

"Different reasons. My mom’s death. And things didn’t work out with my ex, so I thought I needed a change."

"Did it help?"

"Kind of. I didn’t plan on staying here that long, though."

"I’m sorry to ask, but what happened to your mom?" I asked, trying to steer the conversation back on track. After all, that’s why we were here.