Chapter Four

Ryker left the sheriff's department an hour after Harper. The search for Charlotte was paused until first light, and while the sheriff had sent another bulletin alerting all law enforcement agencies to be on the lookout for Kim, there was little hope of a response until the next day. Wherever Kim and Charlotte were, they were probably sleeping.

He was walking toward his truck when a man on the sidewalk called his name. He looked up and was surprised to see a gray-haired man hobbling toward him. The man moved quickly, despite the fact that one shoulder was hunched and he moved with an awkward, sideways gait. He stopped in front of Ryker and a nearby streetlight illuminated a weathered, deeply lined face. "Any news about your little girl?" the man asked.

Ryker shook his head. The man didn't look like a reporter. He wore dirty jeans and a red-checked flannel shirt with a rip in one sleeve. "I was one of the searchers today," the man said. "I wanted to do what I could to help."

"Thank you," Ryker said. "I appreciate it."

The man looked around them, at the deserted street, lined with silent and closed businesses. "It seems strange to be out here doing this again. I helped looked for your cousin, too."

Ryker stared. "What is your name?"

"Gary. Gary Langley." He held up a hand, the fingers knotted and twisted. "I'd offer to shake hands but I can't anymore. I had an accident at work just about a year after your cousin went missing, caused a lot of neurological damage. I've been on full disability ever since. But something like this, I like to get out and do what I can."

"Thanks." Ryker took a step back. "Is there something in particular you wanted?"

"No. I was just hoping for news. I hope you find her soon. It's terrible the things that can happen to a child these days."

He turned and shuffled away. Ryker stared after him. Had the man reminded him about Aiden on purpose, perhaps with the goal of unsettling him? If so, he had succeeded. Not that Aiden's disappearance and death had been far from his mind all day.

He shook his head and continued walking to his truck and drove home. His mother met him at the back door, eyes full of unasked questions. He shook his head. "No news."

"Nothing?" Wanda followed him into the kitchen. The room smelled of coffee and lemon dish detergent, the black granite countertops reflecting pools of overhead light. "I can't believe no one has seen her," Wanda said.

"I'm sure she's with Kim," Ryker said. "Harper Stanick came in and said she ran into a woman who fit Kim's description at Mo's last night. Kim had seen Harper with Charlotte in the ladies' room and asked what she was doing with her."

"Harper was with Charlotte in the ladies' room?" Wanda looked puzzled.

"I had to send Charlotte into the ladies' room by herself. She won't go into the men's room with me anymore, and it's not really appropriate, anyway. She couldn't reach the sink to wash her hands, so she asked Harper for help."

"We've told her not to talk to strangers."

"We've also told her how important it is to wash her hands. Anyway, I guess she figured Harper was trustworthy. And Harper brought her right out to me."

"How is Harper? I didn't know she was back in town." Unlike the Stanicks, Wanda had welcomed Harper into her home. While she hadn't been happy about the news that her son's not-yet-eighteen-year-old girlfriend was going to have a baby, she had adopted a positive attitude and promised to help as much as possible. When Harper had disappeared from their lives, Ryker had come to believe his mother had mourned almost as much as he had. After all, Harper's baby would have been her first grandchild.

"She's okay, I guess," he said. "She looks good. She's volunteering with search and rescue. I ran into her when I worked that accident Tuesday—the one with the baby in the car seat." Was that really only two days ago? It seemed a lifetime.

"You didn't say."

"Yeah, well." There were a lot of things he didn't tell his mom.

"What did Kim say to Harper?" Wanda asked.

"She wanted to know what she was doing with Charlotte. Then she said...she said I needed to do a better job of watching my kid." His voice cracked and he had to turn away. He didn't want to break down. Not just because he didn't want his mother to see him that way, but because he was afraid if he started sobbing, he wouldn't be able to stop. He had to keep it together. His parents needed him to do that. And Charlotte needed him, too. When she was found—and he had to believe she would be found—he was going to be there, not in a heap somewhere crying.

He felt something warm on his back. His mother's hand rubbing up and down, the way she had when he was a boy. "You're a good father," she said. "The best. Charlotte knows that. You didn't do anything wrong. This is all on Kim. To be honest, I'm relieved to know Kim is probably with her, instead of some stranger who might harm her."

He nodded. Instead of some stranger like the one who had harmed Aiden. He turned to face her again. Maybe the best way to get through this horror was to shift into cop mode. Focus on the job. "We put out an APB for Kim and Mick, and we're trying to find any vehicles registered to them. Maybe somebody will spot them."

"Somebody will spot them," his mother echoed. She stepped back. "I saved dinner for you. It's chicken soup. I thought that might be easiest to get down."

He shook his head. "I couldn't eat."

She opened her mouth and he knew she was going to urge him to eat, but she apparently thought better of it. "Then try to get some sleep," she said. "Tomorrow is going to be another long day."

R YKER SPENT A restless night, drifting to sleep, then waking to the remembrance that Charlotte was gone. He fought back thoughts of all the worst things that could happen to her, managing to doze again, only to come fully awake just after six to pale light showing behind the bedroom shades. He stared at that light and wondered if Charlotte was seeing it, too. Where was she? She was such a part of him now—how could he not know where she was?

But she wasn't in control of where she went—Kim and Mick were. And they were unknown to him. He tried to think of everything Kim had told him about Mick that might be relevant. When she left it had been all about Mick and what Mick wanted, and he didn't think that would change. Mick wanted to be free. He wanted to live by his own rules. He wanted to go somewhere and live off the land and look after himself. Kim was all in. They were going to create their own little paradise together.

And what about Charlotte? Kim had fallen silent for a long minute when Ryker had asked this question. "Once Mick and I get our place built, she can come see us," she said. "Until then, she might as well stay with you. We're probably going to be traveling around for a while, looking for the right place, and that's hard with a little kid."

"You would just abandon your daughter this way?" Ryker asked.

"I'm not abandoning her. I'll be back when I have a place for her."

"That's not going to happen," Ryker said. "If you turn your back on her now, she will never live with you again. I'll see to it."

He wanted to frighten her into doing the right thing. Not that he wanted her to stay with them. He had known months before this moment that their marriage was over. But Charlotte adored her mother, and she deserved to have two loving parents. He wasn't going to let Kim hurt their daughter this way.

But Kim wasn't frightened. She even had the nerve to smile. "Oh Ryker, I'm her mother," she said. "Of course she'll live with me again, when the time is right."

He had to leave the room then. The urge to lash out at Kim was so strong it frightened him. He went into Charlotte's nursery and held the baby until he heard Kim and Mick drive away.

Kim didn't contest the divorce or the custody arrangement. He lost touch with her and after a couple of years, he had begun to believe she was out of their lives for good.

But somehow she had found them here in Eagle Mountain. Did that mean she and Mick had established their homestead and she was claiming what she thought of as hers? Never mind that she was a stranger to Charlotte and didn't know anything about her, from what she liked to eat to her favorite books and what childhood illnesses she had suffered. What Kim wanted, Kim took.

He showered and shaved, and dressed in his uniform. Travis had told him he was on family leave until Charlotte was found but if he was going to spend the day at the sheriff's department, he wanted to look like he belonged there.

He was drinking his first cup of coffee when his phone rang. When he saw the sheriff's name on the screen, he scrambled to answer, his hands shaking. "The FBI is coming in this morning to interview you," Travis said. "They say they have some information but they wouldn't tell me on the phone what it was."

Right. It made sense to call in the feds for a child abduction. "I'll be right there," Ryker said.

His mother didn't say anything when he told her he had to go to a meeting at the sheriff's department, but she shoved a travel cup into his hand. "It's a smoothie with protein powder," she said. "Drink it even if you don't want to. You're no good to anyone if you don't eat."

He felt better after he drank the smoothie. Strong enough to face the feds, anyway. Travis was waiting in his office, pressed and polished as ever, though the shadows under his eyes suggested he hadn't slept much better than Ryker. Was he thinking about what it would be like to have one of his children taken?

Special Agents Guy Cussler and Adam Reno shook hands with Ryker when Travis introduced them, then the four men gathered around the conference table. "We've had a report of a couple with a little girl matching the descriptions of your daughter and Kimberly and Mick Davis at a campground just outside of Utah last night," Agent Cussler said. "Unfortunately, by the time authorities arrived at the campground this morning, they were gone. But we now know they've traveled into Utah, so we'll be pursuing the case from there."

"Do you know of any connection they have to anyone in Utah?" Agent Reno asked. "Relatives or friends?"

"Kim's mother is in Oregon and her father is dead," Ryker said. "She never mentioned siblings and I don't know her friends." He tried to rein in his frustration that law enforcement had been so close to apprehending Mick and Kim but hadn't been able to get to them in time. "I haven't seen Kim in three years. And I never knew Mick well. I met him exactly once, when he came to help my wife move out of our home. We didn't have much to say to each other." Only later had he run Mick's name through the police department database and seen his rap sheet. Knowing Kim had chosen a man like that over him had been one more knife to the gut.

"And you're absolutely sure you had no idea this was coming?" Agent Cussler asked. "Your wife hadn't made threats to you, or talked about regaining custody of your daughter?" Cussler sounded as if he couldn't believe this was even possible.

"I had not heard one word from my ex-wife in three years," Ryker said, struggling to keep his voice even. "Neither had Charlotte."

"So your ex-wife hadn't called or written to your daughter, maybe without your knowing?" Cussler continued.

"Charlotte is four," Ryker said. "She can't read yet, and she doesn't have a phone."

"The preschool said they never heard from Ms. Vernon," Agent Reno said. "They never saw anyone matching her description near the day care, either."

"We have a witness who saw a woman she believes was Kim Vernon at a local bar the night before Charlotte disappeared," Travis said.

"Yes, we read your report," Cussler said. "Are you sure of this witness's identification?"

"The description she gave sounded like Kim to me," Ryker said.

"People sometimes give reports like this in order to insert themselves into a case and gain a little of the spotlight," Cussler said.

"I know this woman and she's not like that," Ryker said. Or, he had known Harper once. She couldn't have changed that much.

Cussler nodded and made a check mark in his notebook. Did he have an actual to-do list in there?

"Are you sure about the identification from the witness in Utah?" Ryker asked.

"The description the man gave fit the one broadcast for your daughter, your ex-wife and her paramour," Cussler said. "Why? Do you think they wouldn't go to Utah?"

Ryker tried to recall if he had ever heard anyone use the word paramour before, then forced himself to address the question. He might not like Agent Cussler, but the man had a job to do and Ryker needed to help him do it. "They might go to Utah," he conceded. He glanced at the sheriff. "Kim said she and Mick wanted to move somewhere away from people and live off the land."

"There are people who come to Utah looking for a place like that," Reno said.

Ryker nodded. "But people try to do that here, too. You can still buy mining claims cheap. Or maybe they decided to just squat on a piece of land they thought was vacant and scrounge for what they needed to build a place."

"We've recently had an uptick in vandalism in the high country," Travis said. "Someone has been stealing building materials."

Ryker swiveled toward him. "Mick strikes me as the type who would think he shouldn't have to pay for building materials if people were careless enough to just leave them lying around. And maybe once they got here, and Kim realized how close she was to Charlotte, she decided to just...take her."

"An impulsive move," Travis said.

"Right. Because Kim was impulsive. She never liked to wait for anything she wanted."

Agents Cussler and Reno shook their heads. "It doesn't make sense for them to kidnap a child and then stay here," Cussler said.

"If they are here, why not just drive up there and arrest them?" Reno asked.

"Because there are thousands of acres of unoccupied wilderness in this county alone," Ryker said.

"There are a lot of places to hide," Travis added.

"Utah makes more sense." Cussler closed his notebook. "We'll be in touch if we have any more information."

Travis escorted the agents from the room, but he returned a few minutes later. "Do you really think your ex and her boyfriend are up there on some abandoned mining claim?" Travis asked.

"I don't know. It just...feels right." He forced himself to meet the sheriff's gaze. Travis had a reputation as a hard man, but all Ryker saw now was compassion. "I need to look for them," he said. "I'll take time off work to do it, if you want."

"You don't have to take time off," Travis said. "And we'll look with you. We know this county better than the feds, anyway. But I wasn't exaggerating when I said there are a lot of places to hide. It could take a while to find them."

Ryker stood, feeling stronger than he had in the last twenty-four hours. "I'll spend as long as it takes."