The place was packed, but I didn’t see Lily or Bailey anywhere. I was getting worried and I went back up to Not Bailey and tapped her on the shoulder. “Excuse me. Can you do me a favor?”
She smiled, “Sure. What?”
“Can you go into the ladies’ room and see if my sister and her friend are in there?”
“Oh, sure.”
I followed her over to the small hallway where the bathrooms were. Most Starbucks have gender-neutral bathrooms these days, but this one had a throwback ladies’ room, too.
“What are their names?” she asked.
“Lily. Lily and Bailey.”
“Pretty names. Okay, hang on, I’ll be right back.”
Instinctively I checked my phone before I remembered that it was dead. One minute later she came out and shook her head. “Unless your sister is an old Asian woman, she’s not in there.”
Dammit. Where could they be? “Okay, thank you for checking.”
I decided to charge my phone. Maybe they sent a text message about where they would be. I plugged in a nearby outlet and looked around at the people hugging and crying, reuniting with loved ones. There were still so many questions about what happened tonight. What was the explosion at the waterfront? Was it the Las Balas compound? If so, who did it? Was it related to the event at the concert? Was there really a shooter, and if so, where did he or she go? Was anyone actually shot? What was the motive?
Despite all of that, there was only one question I cared about getting the answer to. Where was Lily?
Twenty-Eight
Paige
I hated to have to tell my mom that we’d lied to her, but there was no way around it. “Mom, I didn’t go to the concert with Bailey.”
“What? Yes you did. You picked her up this afternoon.”
“I know. But, Bailey went with a friend.”
“A friend? What friend? Was it a boy?” My poor mom sounded confused.
“No, it was a girl. Her name is Lily. I met her and we had dinner together.” It seemed like a month ago that we’d gone to La Passarelli.
“Why would your sister lie about going to a concert with a girlfriend? Is she a lesbian?”
“God, Mom!” I swear, that woman is stuck in 1978. “She didn’t want you to know because Lily lives in La Playa and she thought you would be judgy about it.”
There was silence on the other end of the phone and I could hear my dad in the background. “Is everything all right? Are the girls okay?” he asked.
“So you’re telling me that you dropped Bailey off at the La Playa Convention Center with some girl you just met tonight and now you don’t know where she is?” my mom continued.
I decided to leave out the part about the guy from the motorcycle gang that dropped them off instead of me and just said, “Pretty much, yes.”
“That’s it. We’re coming down.”
“Mom, I’m not even home. I’m looking for Bailey.”
“This is not up for discussion, Paige. Bailey is still my child and your father and I are coming down.”
I knew the tone of her voice meant she was serious and there was nothing I could say that would dissuade her. “Do you still have a key?” They’d insisted on having a spare key to my place “in case of emergency.” Looks like they were right to do it. This was definitely an emergency.
“Yes. We’ll be there within the hour.”
“Okay. I’m almost to the convention center now. I’ll let you know what I find out.”
