Her breathing came in short bursts, as if she had to remember to inhale. The brisk morning air felt tainted with gloom, the heaviness pressing down on her as she kept her eyes pinned on the tent, resisted the pull into the past. She started to run, as if she could leave the memories, the sensation of panic behind. But she knew the emotions had settled inside her chest another early morning twenty years ago.
She skidded to a stop at the edge of their campsite, her toes damp from the early-morning moisture. Four cloth folding chairs, water bottles stored in holders, the gooey remnants of the foil-wrapped s’mores lay amid wadded-up sleeping bags peeking out from the zippered tent flap.
An odd keening erupted into the air and only as Allie turned in a slow circle, did she realize the sound came from her. She covered her mouth. Haunting little-girl whispers and giggles echoed through time and sent chills racing down her spine. “Not again. Oh, God, please, not again.” She bent double, her stomach rolling as she dropped down to the ground. “This can’t be happening.” The date. What was the date?
“Dr. Hollister!” Deputy Sutherland, along with a handful of deputies, followed the same path she’d taken moments before. “Dr. Hollister, are you all right?” He hurried over and grabbed her by the arms to haul her to her feet.
“No.” His demanding question pierced the fog in her brain. Now wasn’t the time to break down. Now wasn’t the time to lose control. She needed to get a hold of herself. Disconnect. Separate herself from the nightmare unfolding around her. Hope, she told herself. Hope was all that mattered. And yet... “Is there any sign of Hope?”
“No, ma’am.” An officer who introduced himself as Deputy Fletcher shook his head. “We’re about to expand the search. My officers already went through this area—”
“She won’t be here.” Allie shook her head and only then did she see the concern on the older deputy’s face. “She’s gone.”
“Gone? You mean you think she went down to the river?”
“No, that’s not what I mean.” She took a step back, focused on the tent.
And the solitary plant situated on the ground.
Violets.
Allie walked forward, knees wobbling. Every impulse coursing through her urged her to discount the pot and spilling flowers. A coincidence, she told herself, but as she, Eden and Simone had learned in the last few months, there were no coincidences.
She took a shaky step forward and then another.
Every cell in Allie’s body screamed out as she remembered that night, the following days before their friend’s strangled body had been found.
In a field of violets.
Allie touched a hand to the hollow of her throat. “Chloe.”
“Hope,” Deputy Sutherland corrected. “Dr. Hollister, if you think we need to be searching elsewhere—”
Allie shook her head, got to her feet and pulled out her cell phone. She pointed at the deputy while it rang. “You need to get your team back here, but no one should touch anything. Not a thing, do you understand?” Allie’s hands shook. When the deputy didn’t move, she shot into command mode. “I think we’re standing in a crime scene. I’m a special consultant with the Sacramento PD, Deputy. I also work extensively with the FBI, so believe me when I tell you you’ll want to do as I suggest. Now.”
“Ma’am.” The hostility was expected; clearly he wouldn’t appreciate being told what to do in his own jurisdiction. “What exactly is going on?”
Allie held up her hand to silence him. “Lieutenant Santos? It’s Allie Hollister.”
“Allie?” The shock on the other end of the phone didn’t surprise her, nor did the distinctive sound of rustling sheets and murmured voices. “Hang on. We had a late night with the kids.”
Allie pressed her lips tight and wrapped her free arm around her waist.
“Ma’am?” Deputy Sutherland’s tone strained to the point of snapping. “Would you please tell me what’s going on?”
“Hope didn’t run away,” Allie whispered. She returned her attention to the potted plant, resisting the pull once again to fall solidly into a past she’d been trying to climb out of for two decades.
“Allie?” Lieutenant Santos came back on the line. “This can’t be good news if you’re calling me before seven on a Sunday. What’s going on?”
“You need to get Cole and Jack and get up to—” she recited the Vandermonts’ address, grateful that she could request two detectives who were friends “—as soon as you can. One of my patients, who was staying overnight at a friend’s house, went missing in the last few hours.”
“That’s out of our jurisdiction, Allie. As much as I’d like to help—”
“Hope Kellan is nine years old. She was camping with her three best friends. Now she’s missing.” Allie’s eyes burned. “But this isn’t just about Hope.” She took a deep breath and uttered the words that would turn her nightmare into reality. “It’s about Chloe Evans.”
Max Kellan missed a lot of things about Florida. Late-night boat parties, fire-emblazoned sunsets, that ocean-tinted smell that wafted along the shoreline after a summer rainstorm. Humidity? That obnoxious gift of nature didn’t come close to making his list, not when it meant his morning jog required a before-sunrise start time. Too bad that in the weeks since he’d moved to the upscale suburb of Sacramento, California, he’d been unable to reprogram his brain to allow for mid-to late-morning runs.
His feet pounded in familiar 7:00 a.m. rhythm as he focused on his breathing, felt the cool morning air wicking away the sweat building on his face and arms. His lungs burned in that familiar five-mile, pressing-himself-too-far kind of way.
Pushing his limits, embracing the aches and pains, forcing himself to feel reminded him he was still alive.
Having spent most of his thirty-three years on the strict, self-imposed routine that acted partly as life-preserver, Max didn’t feel inclined to abandon the regime. Yep. He’d had more than enough change to even think about ditching his schedule. Working out cleared his head, helped keep it clear. It had been a rotten six months. Max ducked his head in a useless effort of avoiding the wave of depression that threatened him. Near as he could tell, the only good thing to come out of the last year was his brother’s suggestion he make a fresh start of things.
Leave it to Joe to tell him the truth: that he’d wallowed too long. It was time to get up off the mat and fight back. But what to fight for? That was the question. What did an ex-firefighter do when he walked away from everything he knew? Come out to California, obviously. Plenty of space for him to live his life, Joe had said. A life on his own terms for a change.
With strings attached, of course.
Max grinned. As if he’d ever call his brilliant, beautiful, willful niece Hope a string. He’d been crazy about her from the day she was born. She was his video-chatting buddy, his email pal; they even competed against each other in that online game about birds destroying pigs. The few weeks during the summer she’d come out to visit him were what he looked forward to most. It didn’t matter how bad a day he’d had—seeing Hope’s face, hearing her voice, put everything in perspective. And now he got to see her every day.
If moving out here made his niece smile again—even a little—what was packing up his shattered life compared to that? The visible change in Hope since her parents’ less-than-amicable separation physically hurt