I swallow hard, staring down at my phone. “Can you try calling them?”
Nate doesn’t hesitate. He pulls out his phone and dials one of their numbers while I watch him carefully, searching his face for any indication that I’m wrong and everything is okay. My stomach sinks when his brows pull together.
He slowly lowers his phone and looks at the screen with confusion.
“That’s weird,” he says quietly. “I got the same thing.”
Fuck. “Try Julius.”
He nods and immediately dials again. I already know what’s going to happen before he even brings the phone away from his ear.
Nothing. Nothing happens. It’s all the same.
“What the fuck is going on?”
The panic I’ve been trying to hold back finally starts pushing its way through. I stand up from the chair and begin pacing the room, unable to sit still. My thoughts are moving faster than I can process them, every possible scenario racing through my mind until I can barely breathe.
Nate gets up and walks over to me.
“Hey, hey, hey. Maddie, it’s okay,” he says, his voice calm and steady. “I’m sure they’re fine. They’re probably somewhere with no service, or maybe their phones died. There’s no reason to freak out yet.”
“Nate, I have a bad feeling.” My voice cracks, and I hate how scared I sound. “They’ve been gone too long, and neither of their phones are working. What if my stalker got to them?”
Nate doesn’t immediately answer.
Instead, he looks at me with the kind of sympathy that tells me he understands why I’m afraid. He can see the fear in my eyes, the panic I’m trying desperately to keep under control. Tears begin to gather along my lashes, threatening to spill over, and I force myself to take a deep breath.
Something is wrong. I know it is.
I look back down at my phone, hoping somehow there will be a message waiting for me. Some kind of reassurance. Anything.
But there’s nothing.
Just my empty home screen staring back at me, taunting me with every second that passes.
I look at Nate, silently begging him to fix this and tell me I’m wrong. To tell me that Miles is okay and Julius is okay and thatthis feeling twisting painfully in my chest is nothing more than fear.
His eyes flicker toward Hudson, who is still asleep, before returning to me.
Then he nods.
“Let’s go,” he says.
The tears finally escape.
“We’ll find them.”
We get into Nate’s car and start driving toward the closest smoothie place we can find on the map. It’s only fifteen minutes away, and somehow that makes everything feel worse, because if Miles and Julius were fine, they would have been back already.
The entire drive, I keep calling them. Over and over again, I don’t care how many times I hear their voicemails. I don’t care how hopeless it feels. I just need one of them to answer. I need Miles to tell me he’s okay, and I need Julius to tell me everything is fine. But neither of them are answering, and with every unanswered call, the panic inside me grows stronger.
From the front seat, Nate glances down at his phone before quickly answering it. “Sir?”
He’s silent for a second before his expression hardens. “No… I don't know where he went.”
A beat of silence and then, “I've been trying to reach him too.”
My stomach twists. Who’s he talking to?
