Chapter 2

The sun had gone down by the time Marley reached Colorado Springs. To her delight, the city had already decorated the streets and the streetlights with Christmas decor. Some businesses had huge red bows on their doors, while others had opted for wreaths or colorful blinking lights around their windows and roofs. All they needed was a little snow and it would be a Christmas wonderland.

Although it was already dark, it wasn’t late, so she stopped at a supermarket to grab a few things to take home and was going down the deli aisle when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Before she could turn around, the hand had slid all the way down her back to her hips.

Horrified at the familiarity, she turned, saw who it was, and shoved him backward, shouting without caring who was listening.

“Jared Bedford! What’s wrong with you? Get your hands off me!”

Jared took a step back and held up his hands. “Don’t be so touchy, Bug. We’ve been friends all our lives. I was just trying to say hello.”

“Friends? We have never been friends, and you have no concept of boundaries. I put up with this all through high school to keep my father from going to jail for breaking your neck, but no more! If you ever put your hands on me like that again, you’ll be sorry.”

There was a crowd of shoppers gathering, but Jared wasn’t backing down. He shoved a hand through his straw-colored hair, then narrowed his eyes down to green slits.

“What are you going to do? Your daddy’s dead, and I’m not scared of you.”

Marley was in shock. This was the most blatant act of crossing a line he’d ever pulled. Suddenly, she was afraid, but she couldn’t let him see it. Instead, she leaned forward and lowered her voice just enough so that he was the only one who could hear her.

“You mistake my size for helplessness. I don’t need my daddy to pull the trigger on that shotgun I keep loaded at the lodge. If you ever put your hands on me like that again, I will make you sorry.”

The grin froze on Jared’s face. He glared at her for a few moments and then made a quick pivot and strode off. When he did, the crowd dispersed, but it was a frightening, embarrassing homecoming she hadn’t expected. And now she was going to go back to that big empty lodge alone, and Jared Bedford likely knew it.

She quickly finished her shopping, loaded up her car, and drove out of the parking lot, then circled a couple of blocks to make sure he wasn’t following her before leaving the city. After that, she headed up the mountain, while paying close attention to the dark road behind her, watching for headlights. And when she saw the Corbett Lodge sign, she quickly took the turn and drove onto her property.

The drive was barely a hundred yards up into the woods, and the security lights lit the way as she pulled around back into her garage. The lights came on inside the moment the door went up, and even as she was getting out of the car, the doors were going back down.

She exhaled slowly, releasing the tension she’d been feeling.

It was like being tucked into bed.

She was home.

The routine of putting up groceries, unpacking her suitcase, bringing in the canned goods she’d been given, and storing her new recipes were enough of a distraction that she forgot about Jared.

She began thinking of the man from the wreck. Was he healing, or was he succumbing to injuries she didn’t know he’d had? The thought of spinal injuries exacerbated by being moved had been on her mind, but she also knew he would have drowned if she had not moved him.

She ran upstairs to see the renovations and was delighted by the changes. The hardwood floors were gleaming. The new tile in the bathrooms looked elegant, and the walls in the guest rooms had been freshly painted with a color called pale sage.

It fit the ambiance of the lodge so well. Now all she had to do was put the rooms back together again, but not tonight. That was something for another day.

She went through the lodge, checking to see that all the doors and windows were locked, and the public bathrooms were empty, and that everything was in its place. Then she set the security alarm and went to work, putting her dirty clothes in the hotel washing machine and carrying her empty bags up to the attic.

Her stomach growled as she was descending the stairs, and she realized she hadn’t eaten since morning. She’d been gone so long that there was nothing to eat in the fridge without cooking, so she opted for popcorn and a can of soda, took them to the family quarters at the back of the lodge, and locked herself in for the night.

It felt wonderful to finally crawl into her own bed, but when she fell asleep, she dreamed of the wreck again, and of the man. And in the dream, when she cut him free from the seat belt, the flooded ditch suddenly became a river, and they both fell into the water. The last thing she saw was his dark head face down in the water, being swept out of her grasp.

She woke up sobbing. It was almost 6:00 a.m. as she threw back the covers and showered and dressed, ready to do anything to forget the nightmare.

***

Trey Austin was released from the hospital the same morning that Marley woke up at home. He was leaving with bruised ribs, sore muscles, and staples in his forehead. For now, the recurring headaches had precluded a flight home, so he had rented a car, and it and the rental agent were waiting for him just outside the lobby entrance when they wheeled him out.

The orderly loaded up his bags into the SUV, and the rental agent handed over the keys.

“Safe travels,” he said. “Just contact our office in Phoenix when you’re ready to turn it in, and they’ll pick it up at your residence.”

“Many thanks,” Trey said, and then slid behind the wheel.

There was a moment right after he started the engine, when he first put his hands on the steering wheel, that he felt a brief spurt of anxiety, remembering being inside a rolling car and thinking, Is this the day I die? But the moment quickly passed. Grateful to be back on his feet and with a set of wheels beneath him again, he set the GPS and drove away.

He knew his energy level was going to be slow and low, so he paced his travel accordingly. Once he hit the interstate, travel went smoothly, and it was mostly just a long, straight shot to Phoenix, but he was tired. He stopped midway and stayed the night in a motel in Amarillo, Texas, just off the interstate.

The room was ordinary but clean, and he was tired and hungry. After he ate, he came back to the room and went through his luggage, elated to see everything in the suitcase dry and intact, including his laptop. When he went through his duffel bag, he found the little shoe again, still safely tucked into an evidence bag—still muddy with scratches and nicks in the leather at the toe.

He kept looking at it inside the bag, wondering why the toe would be so scratched, and then flashed on what they’d told him about her down on her knees in the gravel, keeping the rain off his face. If it did that to her shoes, what must her knees have looked like? He had a lump in his throat as he put it back down and continued digging through the bag.

He’d already found his cell phone and charger while he was in the hospital, but he hadn’t gone through anything else. Now, he was seeing how thorough Deputy Stone had been in recovering his things from the wreck. He’d even had the foresight to grab the remote control to his garage that had been clipped to a visor, along with everything that had been in the console and the glove box. His thoughtfulness in gathering up Trey’s belongings had not gone unnoticed.

He went to bed that night exhausted and hurting, then slept fitfully, dreaming about the wreck and the woman’s voice telling him over and over to hang on, that help was coming.

He woke before daylight, grabbed some coffee and doughnuts from the free breakfast at the motel, and was back on the interstate just as the sun was coming up behind him. He stopped twice. Once for fuel. Once to stretch his legs, and for food and water so he could take his meds. He needed the pain pills, but he couldn’t take them on an empty stomach.

His phone dinged now and then, signaling text messages, weather alerts, Amber Alerts, and twice with alerts that the interstate lanes ahead were blocked off to one lane as highway patrols and tow trucks were clearing wrecks. Even the thought of another wreck made him break out in a cold sweat.

***

It had been dark for hours when Trey passed the Phoenix city limit sign, but he was back on home ground, driving beneath streetlights already festooned with Christmas decor and within the familiarity of his surroundings. He shuddered, thinking how close he’d come to never seeing another Christmas.

By the time he reached the gated community where he lived, he was as exhausted as he’d ever been. He opened the garage door with his remote and drove inside. Moving on autopilot, he dragged his bags into the house and down the hall to his bedroom, adjusting the thermostat in the hall as he went.

Everything looked the same—his big four-poster bed, the reading area near the window. He could tell the furniture had been polished, a sign that the cleaning service had been here, even when he was not. But it didn’t feel the same. He didn’t feel the same. For the first time in his life, he’d faced death and come out on the other side, thanks to a tiny angel who’d performed a small miracle on her own to save him.

He stripped, showered, then crawled into bed. He’d used up his last bit of energy just getting his things inside the house, and when his head hit the pillow, he rolled over and passed out.

***

It was the grinding sound of the trash truck that woke him the next morning. He thought about rolling over and going back to sleep, but he was hurting too much to relax. He had to get food so he could take the pain relievers and made himself get up.

After he’d shaved and dressed in a pair of sweats and an old black T-shirt with a Phoenix Suns logo on the front, he made coffee and toast. He found a near-empty jar of strawberry preserves and scooped out what was left onto his toast. The food settled his stomach. He popped the pills and then went back to lie down.

As his head pain abated, he drifted back off to sleep into a recurring nightmare he had every time he was sick, or in pain.

The maids were whispering in the hall.

Trey heard the voices, but he couldn’t make out the words, and then someone shouted, and the door to his bedroom flew inward, hitting the wall with such a thud that his little night-light lamp fell off the dresser, shattering into a million pieces.

“My light! My light!” Trey cried, and leaped out of bed.

Before anyone could stop him, he’d run across the glass.

The pain was so startling that he froze, and the look on his father’s face was so threatening, he was afraid to cry out.

“Who put that lamp back up? I told you to get rid of it. He’s ten years old! He’s too big to need to sleep with a damn light!” Anders shouted. “Tend to his feet. Someone clean up this mess!”

Trey was frozen in place, pretending he couldn’t feel the broken bits pushing deeper into his flesh.

“I did it, Daddy. I put the light back up,” Trey whispered.

“After I told you not to?”

“But, Daddy, it was just a light. I need the light.”

“No! You don’t need the light. You’re an Austin! You need to be tough!”

“I am tough, Daddy. My feet are bleeding but I’m not crying. I like the light, because I need to see.”

Anders opened his mouth, and then stopped and looked at the blood pooling beneath his son’s feet and walked out of the room.

Trey woke with a gasp as the memory of that pain was still fading in his head, then rolled out of bed. He glanced at the clock. It was nearing noon. He’d been asleep for hours.

He went to the bathroom to wash his face, hoping to wash away that dream. Even after all these years, he still remembered parts of the aftermath. The trip to the ER in the middle of the night. The nanny had gone with him in the ambulance. The trip home just before daybreak in the family limo with both feet swathed in bandages. It took the better part of two weeks before he could walk without pain. And by the end of the month, he was on his way to boarding school.

He looked up at himself in the mirror as beads of water were still clinging to his face. The child he’d been had turned into this man. Some days he thought he got who he was. Other days, he accepted that he was as close to a hermit as a man could be, with no desire to change his stripes.

He frowned at his reflection, then turned away, dried his face, and left the room. His bags were still against the wall in his bedroom, so he plopped them onto his bed and began sorting through the clothes as he unpacked.

One pile for laundry.

Another pile to go to the cleaners.

He set the little red shoe, still in the evidence bag, on his reading table and then carried the laundry to the utility room. The familiarity of his own things in his own house felt like luxuries, and as he continued the business of laundry, the nightmare passed.

Careful of the staples in his head and the bruising on his chest and ribs, he finally sat down to order food through DoorDash, made some coffee, then opened his laptop to check email. He hadn’t checked it since the wreck because reading made his headaches worse, but that was then and this was now, and it was time to get back to business.

He had four emails from his literary agent, Meredith Bernstein, all relating to needing a delivery date for his new contract. And when he hadn’t answered the first, Meredith had followed up over a period of days with three more emails, each a little more urgent, until the last which was dated earlier this morning.

Trey! Respond or I’m calling the police to make a welfare check on you!

He smiled, knowing she meant it, and began typing a response. Meredith didn’t mess around.

M—

Had a wreck in Arkansas. Spent three days in the hospital, then took me a couple of days to drive home. I just arrived home late last night. I’m okay. Regarding the new contract, let’s do a next-year delivery date of November first. That gives me the rest of this month to heal and nine months to finish the novel.

The next email he opened was from his mother, Gloria. It was nearly ten days old.

Trey darling. It’s snowing huge feather-size flakes. The ski slopes are wonderful. Dad and I had dinner with some royals last night. Such fun!

Mom

Trey read it twice, telling himself not to make a thing out of the fact that she hadn’t followed up to check on him for not responding, or even asked what he was doing for the holidays. He knew he was looking for something between the lines of what she’d said, but it wasn’t there.

He sent a reply as random as her message.

Have fun. Don’t break anything.

Trey

After that, he went through the rest of the email, deleting spam and paying bills that had come due.

The positive part of his job as a writer was that the only person who knew his identity was Meredith, and she was sworn to secrecy.

The world knew his work by the pen name Chapel Hill, and that’s the way he intended to keep it. He didn’t correspond with readers. He didn’t appear at conferences. The identity of Chapel Hill was as mysterious as the mysteries he wrote, and oddly enough, the fact that no one knew his true identity boosted his sales.

When DoorDash arrived, he retrieved his food and carried it to the kitchen, turned on the TV for the sound of other voices, took the pain meds, and ate in silence. He was gathering up the food containers when his cell phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID, turned off the TV, and then answered.

“Hey, Meredith. I swear I’m okay.”

“Oh my God! Why didn’t you call me? Who was with you? Where are your parents?”

“You couldn’t have done anything. Nobody was with me. They’re in Lucerne, watching it snow and dining with royalty.”

He heard a delicate snort and grinned as Meredith unloaded on him.

“Did you even call them? You didn’t, did you? You need a keeper!” she muttered.

“Of course, I didn’t call them. They sent me off to boarding school when I was ten. I’ve been doctoring my own wounds and fighting my own battles ever since, except for the time when I first signed with you and got mugged in New York. You came to the hospital to check on me.”

Her voice softened. “Well, of course I would. And I’m sorry, just the same. How did you wreck? Were you hit by another car?”

“No, just missed getting struck by lightning though,” he said, and proceeded to tell her the story, all the way down to the little shoe he’d brought home with him.

“That’s not random. She was there because you needed her to be,” Meredith said.

“I’m not as fanciful as you, but after all that happened, I tend to agree with you,” he said. “If she hadn’t found me, I would have drowned, hanging upside down in my car. It would have been a very ignominious death. One most unworthy of the grisly mysteries I write.”

Meredith groaned. “Do not say that, even in jest. You’re my favorite client, but don’t tell.”

He sighed. “Thank you for being a friend.”

“You’re welcome. You can send me a box of See’s Candy and I won’t send you a Christmas fruitcake.”

Trey laughed. “Deal.”

She hung up.

He was still smiling as he finished cleaning up, then locked the house, set the security alarm, and went to lie back down. The silence made his life seem even more empty, so he turned on the TV, then closed his eyes and fell asleep.

***

For Marley, coming back to the renovated guest rooms was a bit like moving into a new home. Before she left, she and Wanda had packed everything away. The first thing she’d done when she began stirring was to run up to the attic and get the wreath they always hung on the front door. They weren’t going to be open for business, but this was also her home, and Christmas was her favorite time of year. She got it and the door hanger and then took them both downstairs, got a folding chair from the office, and then carried everything to the front door. Being short had its drawbacks, and hanging a wreath on a big door without a ladder was one of them. The folding chair would have to do.

Once she had it hanging, she stepped back on the porch to see if it was centered. Satisfied with the pine boughs and the pine cones tucked within, she fiddled with the big red bow at the bottom, then straightened the tiny red cardinal that had been perching on the same sprig of pine for the past five years and called it done.

After returning the chair to the office, she headed upstairs to begin unpacking and sorting, laying aside some things to donate that no longer fit with the new decor, and making a list of what needed to be replaced.

Officially, the lodge would reopen on New Year’s Day. But Christmas dinner was held here for her close friends and people on the mountain who had nowhere else to go. It was the grandest time, and she was already thinking about gifts.

The lodge also held an annual New Year’s Eve party. It was tradition in the area, and people made reservations months in advance to make sure they were on the guest list. With a guest limit of one hundred and fifty to stay within the fire code of the premises, it was first come, first served.

The lodge also had a dozen rooms to rent, and they were all booked for the night as well, so there was a lot for her to do before reopening.

Jack and Wanda Wallis were Marley’s lifesavers, and the nearest thing to a family she had left. They were working at the lodge when her parents, Dan and Lisa Corbett, were running it and before Marley was born. Years later, when Dan and Lisa were killed in a car wreck, the Wallises became the backbone of the lodge, leaving Marley to come to grips with her grief.

Even now, four years later, her parents’ absence had left a huge hole in Marley’s heart. She missed the sound of their voices. Her dad’s booming laugh. Her mother’s tender touch.

There was no one left in Marley’s life to remind her of her childhood foibles or to bring her homemade butterscotch pudding when she was sick. Marley had become an orphan at the age of twenty-four, and some days, the burden of this lodge seemed insurmountable. But on other days, she knew it was the lodge that had saved her.

It had given her a purpose, and with that, had come a deep-ingrained knowing that, if this place was to survive a fourth generation of existence, she was the only one who could make that happen.

While she’d been gone, Jack had been on-site every day, happily wrangling the work crews. This morning she’d sent a text to let them know she was home, and she was still upstairs moving boxes when she heard Jack call out.

“Hey, Bug! Where are you?”

She had been Ladybug to her family and friends since she’d taken her first steps, and over the years that got shortened to Bug. Now she answered to that name as readily as she did to Marley.

She ran out into the hall. “Up here!”

“We thought you might need some help,” Wanda said as they shed their coats and started up the stairs.

“And you thought right! I missed you,” she said as she hugged them both.

Jack gave her a pat on the back. “We missed you, too, honey. So, what do you need me to do first?”

“Help me get boxes into the right bedrooms. They’re labeled according to room numbers, and then after that, would you please get the fire going in the great room? Oh, and keep a watch out for Craig. He’s on his way with a delivery of firewood. And you do not help him unload. He’s bringing help. You just show him where it goes. And if you see Jared Bedford anywhere on the property, let me know. He hassled me in the supermarket last night. Felt me up in the deli aisle and laughed about it when I had a fit, and made innuendoes about me being alone since Daddy died, and what was I going to do about it.”

Anger washed all over Jack’s face, and then he remembered Bedford had been part of the renovation work crew, which added a whole other layer of concern.

“I’m going to have myself a talk with that man,” he muttered.

“No need. I told him I kept the shotgun loaded at the lodge and I would have no problem using it,” Marley muttered.

“Oh my God,” Wanda said. “You should have called the police.”

“And said what? That Jared Bedford put his hands on my butt, and I threatened to shoot him for it? I think he just likes to harass me. We’re just going to pretend the creep doesn’t exist and carry on,” she said.

Jack didn’t argue, but he didn’t like it. He took off up the hall without another word, leaving Marley and Wanda on their own.

Marley tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “The rooms look so good. We need to change all the bedspreads. I ordered them before I left. Do you know if they came?”

“Well, there are twelve large boxes in that little storage room across from the public bathrooms, so I’m guessing that it’s them. We can donate the old ones! But first, the dust covers need to come off the beds. We have twelve rooms to put back together. If you have other stuff you need to do, I can do everything but change out the spreads. I’ll have to wait until Jack can carry them up here for me,” Wanda said.

Marley hesitated. “I do need to confirm the wholesale delivery today and pay some bills, and then I’ll get the dolly and bring up the boxes in the guest elevator.”

“Then go do what you need to do. We knew you’d be overwhelmed with all that needed to be done, and we got tired looking at each other.”

Marley laughed. “Whatever the reason, I’m glad you’re here,” she said, and headed downstairs on the run.

“Slow down, girl!” Wanda shouted.

“Yes, ma’am,” Marley said, and not only slowed her steps, but used the handrail as she went.

Jack and Wanda had been married for more years than she was old, but they were still so funny and cute together. It made her long for a relationship like that, but it had been six years since she’d had any semblance of one. Once her father died, her quest to save the lodge and keep it solvent had taken over every aspect of her life, and in her heart, Jack and Wanda had replaced the family she’d lost.

She went to her office and began double-checking orders, paying bills, and fielding phone calls. It was business as usual. She could hear Wanda singing, “I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus,” and smiled.

A short while later, she heard Jack come thumping down the stairs and start banging around the fireplace.

The lodge was alive again. The only downside to her life was the recurring nightmares about the dark-haired man from the wreck.

Every night, she either dreamed she was trying to save him, or that he’d gotten lost and she was trying to find him. The obsession was weird. She didn’t even know his name, but she’d formed some kind of a bond with him for the time she’d been with him.

Part of her thought it was because she’d been the only one responsible for keeping him alive until help arrived, and maybe she was still holding on to that feeling. It wasn’t healthy. It didn’t make sense. But she didn’t know how to turn it off.

***

A couple of days after Trey was home, he checked in with his regular doctor, who was properly horrified at what Trey had experienced. After checking the healing wound on his forehead, he contacted the hospital in Arkansas and asked for all the records to be sent to him, then sent Trey home with orders to keep his social life low-key and to come back in a few days to get the staples out.

Word about the wreck was also beginning to spread within Trey’s small social circle. The first time Trey walked into his favorite coffee shop, the little barista who usually served him saw the staples and freaked.

“What happened to you?” she cried.

He touched the staples and shrugged. “It was only a matter of time. My brains fell out, and as you can see, it only took four staples to tuck them back in, which doesn’t say much for the size of my intelligence.”

She shook her head, frowning as she made his usual order. “That’s not funny, Trey.”

“You’re right. I sure wasn’t laughing at the time. I had a wreck and I’m healing just fine.”

She set his coffee on the counter and waved away his money. “This one’s on me.”

He lifted the coffee cup as if to toast her. “Thank you,” he said, and left the coffee shop with a smile on his face.

Later that same day, his insurance agent sent a Christmas poinsettia to the house and followed up with a call, informing Trey that they had totaled his car and he’d be receiving a check for the value. That meant he needed to turn in the rental car and go car shopping—something he certainly hadn’t planned on doing, but stomping through dealerships wasn’t on his preferred list of things to do, so he sat down with his laptop and started researching vehicles. He knew what he didn’t want. Now he had to see what they had on hand that suited his style and needs.

It had to be an SUV or the like. With four-wheel drive. And leather seats. And all the bells and whistles of communication, including a GPS tracker. He was always alone, and this wreck had brought home the dangers of no one knowing where he was or how to find him.

He had a running list of possibilities and the locations in the city, and decided to keep the rental car until he’d done his shopping. And then he saw a van pull up into his driveway and remembered today was the day for his cleaning service. He got up to let them in, but when he opened the door, they came in carrying food in covered containers.

“What’s all this?” he asked as the trio of women from TLC Cleaning surrounded him.

“We heard about your accident,” Tessa said.

“We brought food. Enchiladas and homemade tamales,” Leslie added.

“I brought cake. Tres leche. Your favorite,” Connie said as they swept past him and put the food on the kitchen island.

“You three are my favorites! The ultimate TLC trio. Thank you so much!”

“You’re welcome. Go sit. We’re going to clean now,” Connie said.

Since they were about to get down to business, Trey grabbed a cold drink from the refrigerator and went back to his laptop, happy with the sound of people in the background and thinking about the meal he’d be having tonight.

A couple of nights later, some of the guys from his gym stopped by with two six-packs of beer, on the pretext of wanting to hear about the wreck. But they soon tuned in to the Sports Channel and then proceeded to drink most of it themselves.

Finally, their designated driver herded them out, leaving Trey with a lot of pats on the back and best wishes. He was glad they’d come, but even happier they were gone. He’d done all the male bonding moments he cared to do in college, but in an odd way, their friendship still validated him. All the while, that muddy shoe was still in the evidence bag on top of his dresser, reminding him of the valiant little soul who’d saved him.

***

The day he went to the doctor’s office to have the staples removed, he hadn’t thought much about the procedure. He pulled staples out of papers every day. Surely, it was no big deal.

Only he was wrong. It wasn’t excruciating, but it also wasn’t particularly pleasant, but it was over, and their absence seemed to finalize the end of his ordeal.

When he got home, he went into his bedroom to change clothes and, as he did, glanced at the shoe again. The urge to actually hold it in his hands was so strong that he carried it to the kitchen and, for the first time, took it out of the bag.

Once he did, the need to clean it followed, which he did carefully, almost reverently. Now it sat on top of his dresser as a memento of the event. A small, red leather shoe, missing the person it belonged to.

It sat there for a day before the unsettled feeling returned. He knew he was never going to be satisfied until he’d seen her face-to-face, and the only way that could happen was if he could find her.

His first instinct was to just tell the story and get it out to the general public. Even if she didn’t see it, maybe she’d told someone about the wreck and they would see it, and they would notify her, and—

That’s where his imagination ended. He sighed. He didn’t know what would happen after that. It would be up to her to respond, but he’d never know if he didn’t try.

He took a picture of the shoe. Titled the story, “Searching for Cinderella,” and then told of the wreck, his rescue, how brave she was, and how diligently she waited for help to come while sheltering him from the storm. He told of how the little shoe was left behind, and how desperately he wanted to meet the woman who’d saved his life. At first, he’d thought about not posting his name and picture, but if he didn’t, people would likely assume it was a guy trying to lure innocent women into his grasp. So, he posted a snapshot of himself with the fresh scar on his forehead, and the directions as to how to contact him via an email address he set up especially for this project, then posted it to every social media site he belonged to.

After that, all he could do was wait and hope his parents stayed in Europe and didn’t see it. In every scenario that went through his mind regarding their reactions, none of them were good.

***

To his surprise, the story went viral, and before long it was being shared on other sites and was picked up by newspapers and more than one national news outlet, and that’s when the responses began to pour in.

Trey was inundated with wannabe Cinderellas, and lying Cinderellas, and offers to be his Cinderella if he couldn’t find the real one. But none of them rang true, and no matter how many pictures he looked at, and how many stories they spun, none of them looked right, or had the right answers to his questions. He wasn’t giving up, but he was beginning to fear that she just didn’t want to be found, because the entire nation had become involved in the quest.

Newspapers were running the story, “Searching for Cinderella.”

A famous shoe company offered a lifetime supply of their shoes to the real Cinderella, should she ever be found.

And every night when Trey went to bed, he dreamed of her voice, saying… Hang on, honey. Hang on…help is coming!