Page 32 of The Lovely and the Lost
“How many are there?” It took me a few seconds to realize that I was the one who’d asked the question. I forced myself to elaborate, each word hard-won. “How many people have gone missing from Hunter’s Point?”
The shopkeeper must have seen something in the sheriff’s face—or in Mrs. Anthony’s or mine—because he intervened before the sheriff could answer. “I get people in here asking about missing loved ones from time to time,” he said, taking control of the situation. “But that doesn’t mean those people are really missing. If a person wants to start over, if they want to disappear—a national park isn’t a bad place to do it.”
The sheriff let the lot of us chew on that for several seconds. “Some people don’t want to be found,” he said evenly. “Others set off without a real idea of where they’re going. A person who enters the park from Hunter’s Point might not be planning to come back the same way. My office takes reports, but we’re not responsible for every Tom, Dick, or Harry who passes through.”
“And Bella?” Jude took the words straight from my pounding, bloody heart. “Are you responsible for her?”
Mrs. Anthony drew in a ragged breath.
“Does your grandfather know you’re here?” the sheriff asked Jude pointedly. “Or, for that matter, your mother?”
Silver trotted over to Jude and plopped down at his feet, as if to declare that therewasan adult keeping tabs on the three of us, thank you very much. I half expected the sheriff to reach for her, the way he’d tried to grab Saskia.
“Sheriff Rawlins is right.” Mrs. Anthony straightened her spine and focused on the three of us. “I appreciate the moral support, but this isn’t something I want kids mixed up in. Given the circumstances, I doubt your family would feel any different.”
Ourfamilywas out there looking for her daughter right now.
“Would this be an appropriate time to mention the Freedom of Information Act?” Free adopted her most wide-eyed, innocent expression. “Because I’m pretty sure that as a law enforcement agency, the local sheriff’s office can only withhold government records in accordance with a small number of exceptions that don’t seem to apply to Mrs. Anthony’s request.”
If any of the adults in this room had known Free, they would have realized that telling her to stay out of something was as good as sending her an engraved invitation to dive right in.
“Is she right?” Mrs. Anthony turned back to the sheriff. “Do you have a legal obligation to give me those reports?”
“Not if disclosure would endanger the lives of civilians or interfere with enforcement proceedings.”
“Which would only be the case,” Free interjected sweetly, “if the files were part of an ongoing investigation. But since you can hardly be held responsible for every Tom, Dick, or Harry who passes through…”
A sixth sense warned me against pushing the sheriff further.
“Darn kids these days,” Jude declared, diverting the man’s attention from Free before I could. “With their internet access and detail-oriented interest in the criminal justice system!”
Take one step toward them,I told the sheriff silently, keyed in to his every move.Just one step, and I’ll—
Jude bumped my hip with his own. I got a handle on myself, then bumped back.
“You’re welcome to file a request for those records with my office,” the sheriff told Bella’s mother. When she excused herself to do just that, the sheriff zeroed in on Jude, Free, and me.
Just one step, Sheriff.
Fortunately, for his sake, he decided not to take his frustrations out on my friends. “Kira,” he said pleasantly, “could I have a word?”
Jude cleared his throat to get my attention. When that didn’t work, he bumped me again. I bumped back. If the sheriff had chosen to go after Free or Jude, I might have lost it. But he hadn’t, and I didn’t need Jude to spell out what my gut was already screaming: The sheriff had targeted me for a reason, like a predator picking off the weakest member of the herd.
Girl is not weak.I didn’t push the thought away. I let the human part of my brain recede, until I could hear the part that wasotherloud and clear.Girl doesn’t need protection.
Girl survives.
“Stay,” I told Silver, knowing that my fellow Miscreants would realize I wasn’t just talking to the dog.
I let the sheriff lead me away from the group and ended up with my back to the wall. Maybe I should have felt cornered—maybe he was hoping I would—but there was a comfort in knowing that I couldn’t be attacked from behind.
Cady always said, if someone wanted to show you who they were—let them.
“Your adoptive mother is an incredible woman.” The sheriff put emphasis on the wordadoptive, but unfortunately for him, whatever point he was trying to make was lost on me. My instincts were more focused on the way he stood, the distribution of weight between his feet.
“Given what you did for Bella today, it appears that you and Cady have that much in common.” He shifted his weight forward, toward me, intomyspace. “But if Gabriel Cortez is the one who put you and your friends up to that little stunt with Bella’s mother just now, then you and Cady also have something else in common, and that’s incredibly bad judgment in the opposite sex.”
The ridiculousness of the sheriff’s statement allowed me to tamp down on the desire to invadehisspace. Gabriel hadn’t put me up to anything, and my judgment about the opposite sex wasn’t goodorbad. It was nonexistent.