Page 196

I glance across the street again, searching faces.

Nobody looks familiar.

Hope can be cruel that way. After enough searching, every dark-haired woman becomes a possibility.

Laurel presses her lips together and starts walking again before I can say anything.

The next address gets us nowhere, but a volunteer at a nearby shelter studies Maggie's photo and offers a new suggestion.

"You should try the community resource center a few blocks over," she says. "A lot of women stop there when they're looking for support."

It's the best lead we've had all afternoon, so we head there immediately.

The building sits on a tree-lined street that looks much like every other street we've visited today. By now I've learned that important places rarely announce themselves.

Inside, a woman behind the reception desk takes Maggie's photo.

The reaction is immediate. "Oh."

Laurel and I exchange a glance.

My pulse jumps.

"You recognize her?" Laurel asks.

The woman nods. "Yeah. She's been here."

Every nerve in my body wakes up.

Laurel steps closer to the desk. "When?"

The woman opens her mouth to answer, then pauses. Her attention shifts toward the hallway behind her before drifting toward a nearby office.

When she looks back at us, her expression has changed. "Actually..."

She trails off and turns toward the front windows.

A familiar feeling crawls up my spine.

I've felt it before fights, before emergencies, before the instant when a situation turns into an entirely different situation.

The woman raises a hand and points. "Isn't that her?"

Laurel spins toward the glass. Her entire body locks as she stares through the front windows, tears flooding her eyes before she even seems aware of them.

"Oh, shit," she whispers.

I follow her gaze.

Across the street, beneath a bus shelter, a woman stands with her hands buried inside the pockets of a dark hoodie while rain rattles across the plastic roof above her.

I don't recognize her.

Laurel does.

The sound that leaves her throat tells me everything.

Then she's gone, sprinting through the front doors before I can even call her name.