“Gabe,” she whispered into the quiet room. “Please be okay. Please be okay. Please…”
Chapter Sixteen
Gabe practically took the corner to the bungalow on two wheels, tires shrieking as he jerked the truck into the narrow driveway.
His heart had only picked up more speed the faster he drove from the airport, but when he saw the little house sitting there like nothing was wrong, his heartbeat hit a brutal pace.
His instincts told him Felicity wasn’t inside.
He barely remembered to put the truck in park before he bolted toward the front door. The lock had a code, and he punched it in from memory.
He stormed in. “Felicity!”
The place smelled like her shampoo and their bags sat by the door.
“Felicity!”
She didn’t answer.
He raced through the rooms, only to find exactly what he knew he would.
She was gone.
Then he saw the slip of paper on the counter. In three strides, he snatched it up.
Gabe,
Andrew called. Said he has some of Henry’s books for me. I took an Uber to his house. Back soon.
–Felicity
Around her name, she had doodled the little wreath that matched her stamp. Only this time, instead of leaves, the wreath was linked with tiny hearts.
His vision blacked.
She’d gone to the Alder mansion. Alone.
Terror and rage tangled together in a white-hot current.
He stuffed the note in his pocket and was already moving to the door when his phone vibrated. Carson.
He answered on the first ring, running for the door. “She’s gone.” The words were ash in his mouth. “She left a note. She went to the nephew’s house thinking she was looking at books. I’m going now.” He leaped behind the wheel of the truck and backed out at mock speed.
“I’ll get the PD. Bring her out alive, Marine.”
“I will. Then I’ll hunt him down and carry him out in a body bag,” he snarled.
He drove on muscle memory and fury, weaving through traffic, barely seeing the city. All he could picture was Felicity in that big old house, alone with a man who had nothing to lose.
His hands tightened on the wheel until his knuckles went bloodless. “Hold on, bookshop. Just hold on.”
When he skidded up to the mansion, he drove right through the yard to the front porch. Every nerve was going haywire, but like a switch flipped, he calmed the noise. The sound of a dog barking faintly down the street cut off. The noise of a car engine silenced.
He didn’t go for the front door but circled through the side yard. The back of the house had a small patio with a pair of French doors. He stuck close to the wall, on the lookout for security cameras, pausing under a window, listening.
No voices or footsteps. He moved to the French doors but only saw a room filled with plants.
He rounded to the front again, stepped up to the door and pressed the lever to open it. It was locked.
