Page 70 of Our Little Secret

She drove. Fast. Like the madwoman she was.

With Neal hanging on for dear life.

Gideon’s text was a threat.Oh Jesus, if he hurt her daughter . . .Brooke’s teeth clamped together. She thought about Allison. About Penelope. She didn’t think Gideon was involved with their disappearance, but what did she really know about him?

Nothing.

She punched the gas through an amber light turning red, then screeched around a corner.

“Watch it!” Neal yelled. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“It’s just a feeling I have.”

“You’re acting like a crazy woman.”

They made it to the school in record time. Her SUV bounced into the parking lot near the gymnasium.

“This is nuts,” Neal said as Brooke slammed her Explorer into Park, threw open her door, and was out of the car in an instant. “Brooke! Wait! This is nuts! For the love of—”

She heard him cut the engine.

Let him think what he wanted. As she sprinted across the parking lot, she didn’t care that her husband thought she was going out of her mind. She didn’t care that her ankle was throbbing. She didn’t care that she looked like she’d gone stark raving mad.

Not when her daughter’s safety was at stake.

The security guard who had been posted at the gym door was nowhere to be seen. Good. But in his stead was a chaperone, a middle-aged, thickset woman with short hair and a fussy attitude, someone Brooke didn’t recognize. The woman looked up from her phone as Brooke ran up. “Hi,” she said. “Can I help you?”

Brooke barely broke stride. “I’m looking for my daughter.”

“Oh. No problem. Who is she?”

Brooke sped past her and into the gym.

“Wait! You there, wait! I need to see some ID. We’ve had some trouble here at the school. Hey! Hey!” she screamed, her voice barely audible over heavy bass and wailing guitars.

Frantic, her eyes scanning the crowd in the dark gym, Brooke pushed her way through couples on the dance floor and singles or knots of kids crowding around the perimeter. “Marilee!” she cried.

“Hey!” one deep voice yelled.

Another muttered, “What the fuck?”

She ignored them, her eyes scouring the ever-moving crowd as she searched for her daughter or anyone she recognized. “Marilee!” she yelled, spinning wildly, the faces beginning to blur, the scents of sweat, perfume, and a hint of smoke mingling.

Where was she? Where? She started to panic but fought the urge to freak out.

Somewhere, over the din, she recognized her husband’s voice. “Excuse me! Sorry—excuse me! Brooke! Stop!”

She didn’t. Nor did she see Marilee as she moved through the throng. But they were here. Surely. They had to be. And Nick was a couple of inches over six feet, so he should stick out in the crowd. But nowhere did she spy the tall kid with the mop of dark hair.

Heart hammering, she spied Zuri Davis, Andrea’s daughter, standing with a group of friends near one corner.

Brooke beelined to her daughter’s friend. “Zuri,” she said in a panic.

“Wha—oh.” The girl’s dark eyes rounded. “Mrs. Harmon?” The other kids, two girls and three boys, stopped their conversation. In fact, Brooke was vaguely aware of the music stopping and voices yelling behind her.

“Someone call security!” a woman—the chaperone—demanded, parting her way through the teenagers while kids backed away.

Brooke ignored her and caught Zuri by the arm. “Have you seen Marilee?”