Right or wrong, Millie had listened.
As she sliced into another apple, her thoughts drifted, unbidden, to her car. It sat in the garage, out of sight, keys somewhere in the house. She wasn’t even sure where Caleb had put them after Max had moved the vehicle that first night.
Could she find them without having to ask?
Could she leave before anything else happened?
The thought took hold, insistent and desperate.
Maybe she should go. Pack her things, grab Biscuit, and disappear before whoever killed that man came back. Before Garrick?—
She stopped mid-slice, the knife hovering above the apple.
Garrick.
The calendar. The search. The stupid, reckless moment she’d logged into his account.
Her stomach twisted.
She’d been so focused on whether Garrick had found her that she hadn’t stopped to fully consider whether her more recent actions might have led him here.
What if that login had triggered something? What if his tech people had traced the IP address? What if he knew exactly where she was and had sent someone to?—
No.
She tried to force the thought away, but it clung stubbornly to the edges of her mind.
She couldn’t keep this to herself anymore.
Earlier, she’d considered telling the sheriff. But she hadn’t. She’d been too embarrassed. Fear of judgment or condemnation had stopped her.
She’d been wrong, though. She couldn’t keep this to herself.
If there was even a chance—any chance—that her actions had put people here in danger, Caleb—and the sheriff—needed to know.
chapter
thirty
Millie set the knife down.While the sheriff and Valentina wrapped up their conversation, Millie went to the office looking for Caleb.
He wasn’t there. Naomi was instead.
She knocked at the door, and Naomi looked up. “Yes?”
“I need to talk to Caleb.” Millie’s voice came out steadier than she expected, but the weight behind it was unmistakable. “I thought he was in here.”
“He just slipped out the back door.”
“Do you know where he is?”
Naomi studied Millie’s face, her expression unreadable.
Then something shifted in her gaze—recognition, maybe. Understanding.
“He slipped out the back door to go to the kennel,” she said. “He didn’t want to interrupt the sheriff.”
Millie pointed to the hallway. “Can I . . . ?”
