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CHAPTER SIX

CELINE

When I wake up the next morning, my head is pounding with an ache that tells me I’ve both slept too hard and simultaneously not gotten enough sleep.

I called the detective right after receiving that strange phone call, but there wasn’t much to be done about it. He said they’d see about getting the phone company to track it, but without any sort of threat or known crime, it’s likely he won’t get the request approved. He told me to contact him if there is another call and to try to keep them on the line as long as possible, to listen for any defining sounds that might give us a hint as to their location if it does have something to do with Tate. Then, with a metaphorical pat on the head, he sent me on my way to deal with another element of confusion in my already confusing situation.

I can hear the sounds of people talking down the hall and quickly realize it’s my parents speaking to the boys. I roll over and glance at the time. It’s just after six. I wasn’t expecting them here so early.

I pick up my phone, checking to see if the mysterious number called back, but there isn’t anything important on the screen. Just a few social media notifications that amount to nothing. I don’t have the energy to even open them.

Rubbing my eyes, I slip out of bed. The day already feels heavy. So heavy I’m half tempted to jump back into bed, wrap up in the covers, and dissolve.

But I can’t. Not only because I still have to pretend I have a shred of my life together for the boys’ sake but also because I haven’t yet let Margie know what is happening, and I’m scheduled for a shift at eight.

In the bathroom, I brush my teeth and study my face in the mirror. My eyes are red and puffy, both from crying and from lack of sleep, and my skin is practically gray. I look like someone who is rotting from the inside out, and I don’t feel far from it.

I can’t help thinking, somewhat bitterly, about how different this might be if the situation were reversed. Tate would be allowed to stay in bed all day and not a soul would judge him for it. But moms are not afforded the luxury of falling apart, even during the worst of times.

With a fresh set of clothes on and my hair pulled back in a loose ponytail at the nape of my neck, I only feel ninety-eight percent like garbage, which is an improvement, as I step out into the hallway.

Dad’s there, searching under the bench for a pair of shoes. He looks up as if he’s surprised to see me. “Morning, honey. I hope we didn’t wake you.” He stands up and slips a hand around my shoulders when I approach him. Leaning over, he kisses the side of my head.

“I didn’t sleep much,” I say, resting my head on his shoulder. “What are you guys doing here so early?”

He drops his hand from my shoulder, and we step apart. “We came to get the boys ready for school. Your mom thought we should take them and let you get some sleep if you could.” Bending back down as he apparently spots the match to the shoe he’d been looking for, he snags it, then heads into the living room.

“I wasn’t planning on sending them.”

Before he can respond, Mom sees us and darts out of the kitchen and into the living room to meet us. The boys are at the kitchen table, eating bowls of what I assume is oatmeal from the smell that has permeated the entire house.

“You didn’t wake her up. I told you not to wake her up,” Mom says, then looks at me before she gets an answer. “He didn’t wake you up, did he?”

“No,” we answer at the same time.

Mom huffs a breath and studies me. “We were trying to be quiet.”

“I know. I barely slept. I didn’t think you guys would be here so early.” My eyes flick toward the boys in the living room. “I wasn’t planning on sending them to school today.”

“I didn’t figure you were, but I think they should go.” She crosses her arms, lowering her voice even more. “Right now, all there is for them to do is worry. Going to school will distract them. Let them go until we know more.”

I swallow. She’s right. I know she’s right, but I also know if I let them out of my sight, there’s a chance I might not see them again. I let Tate walk away from me to go to work one time, and now, that may have been the last time I’ll ever see him.

How can I ever let the boys leave my sight again?

“It’s going to be okay,” Mom says softly. “Just…let’s let them be kids a bit longer.” Her voice is suddenly thick and strained, her eyes gleaming with tears. She thinks he’s gone. She thinks we’re just waiting for the news to arrive. Am I foolish for thinking he’s still alive? That he might still come home?

With a single glance at my boys at the kitchen table, I know she’s right. Last night I told them it was going to be okay. I told them their father was going to come home eventually. For now, they still believe me. They trust me.

If I’m wrong, I’ll never get that trust back. Never again will they so blindly take my word for anything. Until we know something for certain, I need to let their lives remain unchanged. Routine and consistency are the only things we have going for us right now.

“Yeah. Okay. You’re right.”

She huffs a breath of relief. “What can we do to help after we’ve dropped them off?”

“I’m going to his office,” I say. “Could you guys stay at the house in case he shows up? And get the boys from school for me?”

“Of course,” Mom says. “Is that really all you need?”

“Yeah, for now. It’s as far as I’ve gotten with my plan. I’m hoping I’ll know more once I talk to his boss.”

“Let me come with you,” Dad says. “You still don’t look like you need to be driving.”

“I’ll be fine,” I promise him. “Honestly. I just want to handle this alone. It’s a huge help to know you’ve got the boys.”

He looks hesitant but eventually agrees. “Whatever you need.”

I nod, making my way into the kitchen to tell the boys good morning.

“Morning, Mom,” Finley says. “I had the dream about the mice again.” Lately, Finley has been dreaming about mice coming into his bedroom in the night and climbing under the covers with him.

I pat his head, slipping into the chair next to him. “Morning, bud. Did you scare them away?”

“No, not this time. They were nice mice.” He shovels a spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth.

“There’s no such thing as nice mice, is there, Mom?” Ryker asks skeptically.

I shrug, too tired for conversations about mice personalities, but I push ahead anyway. “I don’t think mice are inherently bad. They’re just trying to survive, like the rest of us. We just don’t want them in our house.”

“Some people have pet mice,” Finley says.

“That’s true.” I pat the table and do my best to form a convincing smile. “Are you both ready for school?”

“What about Dad?” Ryker asks. “Will he be here when we get home?”

It takes me a second to form an answer that isn’t a lie, but also won’t destroy them. “I hope so,” I say finally. “But I don’t want you guys to worry about that, okay? I just want you to focus on having a good day and let Mommy deal with the rest of it.”

“I hope Dad gets home soon,” Finley says. “I want to tell him about my dream.”

“I hope so too, pumpkin.” I stand and pick up his empty bowl, kissing his cheek and then Ryker’s, and take their dishes to the sink. “You boys should get your shoes on, okay? Grandma and Grandpa will get you to school, and then I’ll see you this afternoon.”

Moments later, on their way out the door, Finley turns back to me, studying me with an incredulous expression.

“What is it, bud?”

He hesitates again. “When…um, when we get home today, you’ll be here, right?”

A ball of dough lodges in my throat as I drop to my knees in front of him. “Yes. Yes, Mommy will be here. I promise.” I squeeze him tight, blinking back tears. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too.” He hugs my neck, then slips away, taking my mom’s hand on the way to the car. I watch as they buckle the boys in and then disappear down the driveway with tears pouring down my cheeks. With Tate gone, everything feels more consequential. Dramatic. Real.

As if I’m saying goodbye to them forever just because they’ve left my sight.

I force the thought away— I’m being ridiculous. I’m not saying goodbye . They’ll be back this afternoon. I’m simply sending them to school so they aren’t subjected to the same turmoil and stress I will be dealing with today. And every day, for that matter, until we learn the truth about where Tate is and what is going on.

And that’s what I’ll be dedicating today to. But first I head back to our bedroom, where I find my phone and look up Margie’s number in my contacts. When her cell phone goes to a voicemail box that’s full, I assume she didn’t answer because she’s at the shop already and call that number instead.

“Thanks for calling The Bold Bean, this is Jerry. How can I help you?” comes the voice of one of the newest employees.

“Jerry, this is Celine Thompson. Is Margie there?”

“Well, howdy there, Celine.” For no apparent reason, while at work, the kid talks like he’s a sixty-year-old cowboy rather than a twenty-one-year-old skateboarder, but we’ve all learned to ignore it. “She sure is. Let me track ’er down for ya, okay? Just a second.”

Within literal seconds, Margie is on the line. “Celine? What’s going on? Are you coming in today?”

“No. I’m sorry, but I need to take the day off,” I tell her. “All the stuff with my husband and the police is still going on, and…” I come up with a lie on the spot. “I need to go down to the police station later and talk to them some more.”

“Do you need the whole day off?”

“Yes,” I say firmly. I’m the best employee she has, present moment excluded. The only one who has been there more than a year. I know there’s no chance she’s going to fire me or make me upset. “I’m not sure how long it’s going to take, and besides that, we have a lot going on. Actually, I think I’d better go ahead and take the week off. Tate’s missing, and I’m not really in a state to work.”

She doesn’t bother to hide her sigh, but eventually she says, “Whatever you need, honey. Just keep me updated, okay? I’ll cover what I can and have Sophie or Jerry pick up the rest. They need the hours anyway. But if you want to come back earlier, just let me know.”

“Right. I will. Okay, well, thanks.”

“Yep.” We haven’t even ended the call when I hear her saying, “What can I get for ya, honey?”

With that taken care of, I hurry to our closet and change into my clothes for the day. I’m going to get answers today, one way or another.

* * *

Less than an hour later, I pull up in front of Tate’s office. Morris Realty is a real estate firm that sits in the heart of downtown, in a building eight stories high and full of different businesses, all employing mostly men with perfectly coiffed hair and freshly whitened teeth.

Tate’s office is on the third floor, but when I enter, I’m stopped at the door by a guard who asks where I’m going and searches my bag. When he’s done and I’m cleared, I make my way up to the office and spot Dustin behind the large, circular desk in the center of the room.

His uneasy grin tells me he hasn’t forgotten our phone call from yesterday.

“Hi, Celine.” He stands, moving the headset mic away from in front of his mouth. “We weren’t expecting you. How are you?” He walks around the desk and stops in front of me with an empathetic stare. I like Dustin, really I do. He and his husband are the two people I always spend the most time talking to at the office parties. But at this exact moment? I want to claw his eyeballs out with my bare hands.

“I need to be let inside Tate’s office, please.”

He clasps his hands together in front of him. “Right. Sure.” Stepping back, he makes his way around the desk and grabs a set of keys from his top drawer, then leads the way down the hall. I’m surprised it’s this easy, honestly. “The police were here yesterday evening,” he tells me, almost conspiratorially.

“They were?” I try to sound shocked, hoping Dustin will tell me something Detective Monroe left out.

He nods, stopping at the door and sliding the key into the lock.

“Did they find anything?”

“I don’t think so.” He swings the door open. “They copied his hard drive or something techy like that and took a few pictures of his desk and some of the notebooks he had lying around, I guess with notes and stuff in them.” As I step into the office, he follows behind me, standing in the doorway. “Have they told you anything?”

I chew my bottom lip. “No, nothing at all. Which is why I’m here.” I stop behind his desk. “He really wasn’t here all week?”

He sticks his head out into the hallway at the sound of a voice, then turns back to meet my gaze. “Sorry, what?”

“Tate. You said he wasn’t here all week, right?”

He nods slowly. “Well, yeah. He said he was on vacation, that you guys were going to work on some projects around the house or something like that. He came in a few different times, but always left right after. I guess he was just picking something up.” His expression is full of guilt. “I hope it’s okay that I’m telling you this. I don’t want to get him into trouble. I’m sure there’s some explanation.”

“Right now, all I want to do is find my husband and make sure he’s okay,” I say simply. “I promise I’m not planning to rat you out. Whatever you tell me will stay between us.” I sink into the office chair and tug open one of the drawers. The top one is full of only pens, pencils, sticky notes, and breath mints. The second one is locked. I look at Dustin, who is staring back out into the hallway.

“Do you happen to have a key for these drawers?”

“Um…” He hesitates. “I do, but it’s locked in the key box, and I can’t get to it without a number two.”

I stare at him, not understanding.

He rushes to explain. “I’m a number one. The key box has two separate combos, and you need a one and a two to open it. Tim’s the only other person here right now, and we’re both ones. Everyone else is out. Kaira was here yesterday to open the drawers for the police, but she’s out on showings right now and Matt’s at a training.” He winces. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I say with a huff. When he glances back out into the hallway for a third time, I add, “You can go if you need to. I’ll let you know when I’m done in here.”

He winces. “I…actually, I can’t. Only employees are allowed in the offices, just because there’s client information on the computers and stuff, and well, I mean obviously I trust you and know you aren’t doing anything sketchy”—he gives a nervous laugh—“but I have to stay with you.”

“I can’t even get into anything.” I gesture toward the computer, which is locked. “I’m just looking to see if he left anything that could help me find him.” I tug at the next drawer, which is also locked.

Dustin gives a regretful, one-sided smile, but he doesn’t respond. Realizing he’s not going to leave, I pull at the next drawer, which is also locked, and then turn toward the other side of the L-shaped desk. Like its twin, this side’s top drawer is unlocked, but its contents are wholly unhelpful. Two protein bars, a stack of business cards, a blank notepad, a basket of paper clips, a stapler, and a single roll of tape are all that await me. The next two drawers are locked.

Thinking quickly, I grab a sheet of paper from his printer and a pencil and place it over the blank notepad, shading lightly across the paper to see if there’s an address or note that might point me in the right direction.

Dustin watches me intently, but to my disappointment, there are just a few notes jotted down that I’m able to make out.

4 beds

Comps for Odessa??

yard space + easy commute

210k

890k

Commission split?

Bathrooms

Two story—no go

None of it means anything suspicious to me.

With a sigh, I toss the paper into the trash can before reaching for the computer, cutting a glance at Dustin to see if he’s going to stop me. When he says nothing, I move the mouse to wake the screen and begin to run through Tate’s roster of passwords.

Our anniversary.

The boys’ birthdays.

His birthday.

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Each time, I’m met with the same error message.

Invalid credentials. Please try again.

“Did the police get into his computer?”

“I’m not really sure,” he says. “I wasn’t in here with them. Tim was. No one has his password, though, obviously, so if they did, they must’ve done some system override thing.”

I sigh, gathering my face in my hands. The last thing I need to do is fall apart right now, but that’s exactly what I feel is coming. “Is Tim with someone?” I ask.

“Uh…” Dustin’s eyes shift toward the door again. “His next meeting isn’t until ten.”

“That’s plenty of time.” I stand up and cross the room, marching out of the office on the way to see Tate’s boss. When I reach his door, he’s on the phone, his loud voice booming across the office, as muffled as a pilot’s voice before takeoff through the thick glass windows and closed door.

I knock softly, and when he eventually looks up, I wave.

His face visibly pales, and he says something into the phone before placing it down and standing up. Seconds later, he pulls the door open and stares at me. “Celine.” The word is an apology, though I have no idea what he’s apologizing for.

“I need you to tell me what you told the police about Tate.”

He steps back, running a hand over his flat stomach. “Please. Come inside.”

I do as he says, stepping into the office and taking a seat in front of his desk.

When he sits down in front of me, he smooths his hands out over the desk. “We’re all just so sorry to hear about this mess with Tate.”

“Dustin said he told you he was on vacation this week. And the detective on the case mentioned that you said he didn’t tell you about needing time off until last week.”

He nods, running a hand over his chin. “Yeah, yeah. That’s right. He mentioned you guys had some home projects you were hoping to get done and they couldn’t wait any longer.”

I rub my lips together. “But his phone showed he came here all week. That he was here all day Monday and Tuesday and then left around noon yesterday, just before the crash.”

Tim’s face falls slightly. “Well, I’m not sure what to say about that. I only know what I told the police, which is that I haven’t seen him since Friday.”

“Did he take trips like this often?”

“Vacations?”

I nod.

“No, just once a year. Every summer, like clockwork. This was the first time he’d asked for time off when the kids were in school. I just thought…well, everybody needs extra time off now and again, and he’s more than earned it. Plus, if you guys are fixing the place up to sell…” He gives a crooked grin that falls away quickly when I don’t return it.

Every summer, we spend a week at his parents’ beach house in Wilmington, NC. He hasn’t lied a single time. This isn’t common for him. So what changed? Why did he lie now? What is going on?

I keep going back to the text message, but his explanation made sense. I don’t want to believe he lied about that too, but now? What am I supposed to think? I have to question everything, doubt everything, and I hate it more than I can say.

I hate the person this situation is turning me into.

“Was he acting strangely?” I ask. “Did anything seem off about him?” These are the same questions I’ve been asking myself. The questions I desperately want answers to but can’t seem to find. Because as far as I could tell, aside from the weird “Tell her” text message, nothing about my husband’s behavior was off in the days or weeks leading up to his disappearance.

“No, nothing. He was his same old self, just like I told that detective. He’d been completely normal. No red flags.”

I fold my hands together. “Last week he told me he’d had an appraisal come in low on a project one of your investment clients had sunk quite a bit of money into. He was really nervous to tell her because he said she was one of your biggest clients. The buyer’s agent had texted him about telling the client their offer was going to change pretty drastically. I know it made him stressed out, and he was worried he’d lose their business. Do you know anything about that?”

His eyes drift around the room, clearly buying himself time to think, but eventually they find me again. “I can’t say that it rings a bell off the top of my head, but none of the guys keep me up to date on every project, so?—”

“It sounded like this would’ve been a major project.”

“I can’t say that I know about it, Celine. I’m sorry. I wish I did. That’s par for the course in this business. Tate knew how to handle the bad with the good, and I’m sure he made it work. But we both know Tate shouldn’t have been telling you clients’ business, anyway. Maybe it’s a little bit of a gray area we all tend to overlook when it’s harmless, but with all of this going on, I can’t tell you anything legally, even if I wanted to.”

“So you do know something?”

“I didn’t say that.” He checks his Apple Watch, then stands. “I have a meeting coming up that I need to prepare for. Listen, if I hear from Tate, you’ll be the first to know, okay? No one’s praying for his safe return more than we are.” He holds out his arm, gesturing toward the door. I’m half tempted to argue, but we both know I’m not going to get anywhere with his guard up.

Instead, I stand and meet his eyes. “Thanks for all your help, Tim. I really appreciate it.”

“No problem,” he tells me. “You guys are like family. You know that. Our thoughts and prayers are with you all, truly.” With that, he gestures again that I should leave, and I step out of his office just before he shuts the door.

Back in the lobby, I tell Dustin goodbye and head for the elevator, feeling deflated. I thought for sure I’d find something here, but the only thing I’ve learned so far is that the police have already been here, and that from what I can tell, Tate’s week off is his first that I haven’t known about. Either that or his coworkers are protecting him.

Hurried footsteps rush toward me as the elevator door opens, and before I can step inside, I turn around and see Dustin rushing toward me. “You dropped this.” He holds his hand out, and I reach for whatever it is, confused about what I might’ve dropped.

When he hands me a paper clip, my frown deepens.

“He brought his phone in every day,” he says, his voice so low I hardly hear it. “Brought it in and left it in his office. I found it on Monday and thought he forgot it, but then he did the same thing on Tuesday, and I brought it to him. He did it again yesterday, so I realized it was probably on purpose and left it alone.”

“What are you?—”

“You didn’t hear it from me.” He’s backing away before I can ask him to elaborate further. And with that bombshell, he’s gone.