“Yes, of course. Just tell me where to go and I’ll take you.”
8
CALLIOPE
In any other situation, I’d refuse. Getting into a car with Elijah for a non-work-related reason is probably one of the worst things I can do, but the call sends my thoughts into a chaotic mess, and I only have one goal.
Getting to my son.
“Please,” I say as my heart thunders rapidly in my chest. “I need to get here.” A quick tap on my phone screen with trembling fingers and I pull up the address. Elijah glances at it and nods.
“I’ve not been here long enough to know anywhere by heart, but I have GPS. Come on.” With a tilt of his head, he’s striding away on his long legs toward his car, and I hurry after him, trying to keep control of myself.
It’s one thing to get a concerning call about my son, but it’s quite another to get a call telling me that something might have happened to Mom as well.
The day I got the call about Dad is still painfully fresh in my mind, and it’s impossible to stop myself from jumping to the worst conclusion as I slide into the passenger seat of Elijah’s car.
Six, almost seven months ago now, I was at work when a flat, cold voice called to tell me there’d been an incident. I’d acted on the assumption that Mom had cut herself while cooking again or it was another carpentry accident with my dad, so I didn’t get to the hospital with the urgency the situation deserved.
He was gone by the time I arrived, and no reassurance from anyone could convince me that he was gone long before I got there.
I should have been faster.
I should have dropped everything immediately.
So that’s what I’m doing now.
Elijah drives with practiced precision down the busy streets, weaving us closer and closer to the blinking dot on his GPS. I can’t take my eyes off it, utterly transfixed and cursing every red light and stop sign that delays our journey by even a handful of seconds.
We don’t speak. He seems to understand that I’m far too tense and wound up to be capable of holding a conversation right now, but I take note of the details in his car.
A faded peach blossom air freshener dangles from the mirror. Hard candy wrappers overflow the cupholder between us, and with the way his jaw tics back and forth, it’s as if he’s sucking on an imaginary one and too polite to reach for a real one.
I should say something. Distract myself and him.
By the time I work up the courage, we’re pulling into the supermarket parking lot and Elijah screeches to a stop in front of the door.
“Thanks!” I call to him, not even sparing him a look as I fly out of his car and sprint toward the entrance.
What if it took me too long?
What if somethingawfulhas happened and I’m about to add another family member to the family plot?
My feet slip and slide on the ice outside and then again on the linoleum floor as I rush into the supermarket and grab the first staff member I spot. “Where are they?”
The young man stares at me with wide eyes, his mouth parting in alarm as he tries to step away from me. “What the hell, lady?”
“I got a call! Someone here called me and said there’d been an incident with my Mom and my son and that it was urgent that I get down here and I?—”
“Miss Locke?” A soft voice rises up from behind me and I spin around, freeing the man from my panicked clutches.
“Yes, that’s me.”
“If you could follow me, that would be great.”
“You have to tell me what happened!” I gasp, hurrying after her. “From the sound of the call… is everyone okay? What happened? Where’s my son?”
“He’s in the back office along with your mother,” the woman, Tabitha, going by her badge, says with a pleasant smile that immediately turns my panic into anger.
