“So why tell me about this?” Wilde asked.
“I can’t be out here all the time,” she said. “I have court in the city. I have the TV appearances, obligations, stuff like that.”
“Okay.”
“And who would be better at tracking down a missing person than you?”
“Right.”
“And then there was that hair on the pillow.”
“Got it.”
“I haven’t been there for Matthew enough,” Hester said.
“He’s doing fine.”
“Except he thinks a girl who’s been missing from school is in serious danger.”
“Except that,” Wilde agreed.
When Tim made the turn, they both spotted Matthew walking away from the house. It was a teenage walk—head down, shoulders hunched protectively, feet scraping the ground, hands jammed aggressively deep into his jeans’ pockets. He had white AirPods in his ears and didn’t hear or see them until Tim nearly cut him off with the car. Matthew pulled out one of the earpieces.
Hester stepped out of the car first.
Matthew said, “Did you find Naomi?”
When he spotted Wilde getting out of the passenger door, Matthew frowned. “What the…?”
“I told him,” Hester said. “He won’t say anything.”
Matthew turned his attention back toward his grandmother. “Did you find Naomi?”
“I spoke to her father. He said she’s fine, that she’s visiting her mother.”
“But did you talk to her?”
“The mother?”
“Naomi.”
“Not yet, no.”
“Then maybe her dad is lying,” Matthew said.
Hester looked over at Wilde.
Wilde stepped toward him. “Why would you think that, Matthew?”
Matthew’s gaze darted everywhere but on theirs. “Could you just, uh, make sure she’s okay?”
It was Wilde who moved closer to the boy, not Hester. “Matthew, look at me.”
“I am.”
He wasn’t.
“Are you in trouble?” Wilde asked.
“What? No.”
“Talk to me then.”
Hester stayed back. Here was the main reason she worried so about this new relationship between Laila and Wilde. It wasn’t about David’s memory and the pain of him being forever gone—or at least, not only about that. Wilde was Matthew’s godfather. When David died, Wilde had been there. He answered the call, stepped up his role in Matthew’s life. He wasn’t a father or stepfather or anything like that. But Wilde was there, more as an involved uncle, and Hester and Laila had been grateful, believing, sexist as this might sound, that Matthew still needed a man in his life.
How would the romantic relationship between Laila and Wilde affect Matthew?
The boy wasn’t stupid. If Hester saw the signs in a few minutes, Matthew had to know about the romance too. So how was the boy handling his godfather shacking up some nights with his mother? What would happen to Matthew if the relationship went south? Were Laila and Wilde mature enough to make sure Matthew didn’t get hurt in the fallout—or were they being naïve in their thinking?
Matthew was taller than Wilde now. When the hell had that happened? Wilde put a hand on the boy’s shoulder and said, “Talk to me, Matthew.”
“I’m going to a party.”
“Okay.”
“At Crash’s house. Ryan, Trevor, Darla, Trish—they’ll all be there.”
Wilde waited.
“They’ve been picking on her more lately. On Naomi.” Matthew closed his eyes. “Supercruel stuff.”
Hester joined them. “Who has been picking on her?”
“The popular kids.”
“You?” Hester asked.
He kept his eyes on the ground.
Wilde said, “Matthew?”
Matthew’s voice, when he finally spoke, was soft. “No…” He hesitated. They waited. “But I let it happen. I didn’t do anything. I should have. Crash and Trevor and Darla played a prank on her. A mean one. And now…now she’s gone. That’s why I’m going to Crash’s party. To see if I can learn anything.”
“What kind of prank?” Hester asked.
“That’s all I know.”
A car driven by one teen with another riding shotgun pulled up to them. The driver honked the horn.
“I have to go,” Matthew said. “Please…just keep looking too, okay?”
“I’m having someone from my office trace down Naomi’s mother,” Hester said. “I’ll talk to her.”
Matthew nodded. “Thanks.”
“Is there anyone else we should talk to, Matthew? A friend of Naomi’s maybe?”
“She has no friends.”
“A teacher, a family member—”
He snapped his finger and his eyes lit up. “Miss O’Brien.”
Wilde said, “Ava O’Brien?”
Matthew nodded. “She’s, like, an assistant art teacher or something.”
“And you think—?” Hester asked.
The driver honked the horn again. Hester silenced it with a glare.
“I gotta go. I’m hoping to learn something at the party.”
“Learn what?” Hester asked.
But Matthew didn’t reply. He hopped into the backseat of the car. Wilde and Hester watched them drive away.
“You know this Miss O’Brien?” Hester asked Wilde.
“Yes.”
“Should I ask how?”
Wilde said nothing.
“That’s what I thought. Will she talk to you?”
“Yes.”
“Good.” When the car disappeared around the bend, Hester asked, “What do you think?”
“I think Matthew isn’t telling us everything.”
“Maybe Naomi’s mother calls me back. Maybe she lets me talk to Naomi.”
“Maybe,” Wilde said.
“But you don’t think so.”
“No, I don’t think so.”
They both turned and looked down the cul-de-sac toward the Crimstein homestead.
“I have to get back to the city to do my show,” Hester said.
“Uh-huh.”
“I don’t have time to get into this with Laila now.”
“Probably best,” Wilde said. “Do your show. I’ll talk to Laila, then I’ll talk to Ava O’Brien.”
Hester handed him a business card with her mobile number on it. “Stay in touch, Wilde.”
“You too, Hester.”
CHAPTER
SIX
When Laila answered the front door, she asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Then why are you using the front door?”
Wilde always came in through the back door. Always. He hiked through the woods that came up behind the Crimstein house. He’d been doing that since the days David sneaked him inside when they were little boys.
“Well?”
Laila had this passion and energy that turned her beauty into a living, breathing, pulsating entity. You couldn’t help but be drawn in, to watch, to want to be a part of it.