Edisto Bullet by C. Hope Clark

Author:C. Hope Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BelleBooks, Inc.
Published: 2023-11-10T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

CALLIE TRIED NOT to reread Lily’s social media posts, to experience for a second time the negative almost tangible vibe coming off the com­puter screen, but she was part of Javier’s story, which made her part of Mark’s, which made her part of Callie’s. Lily’s followers hadn’t been ter­ribly active in defusing her quest for martyrdom before, and not enough dared to ask if she was okay. Some asked her to post lighter notions, but when she didn’t reply, they didn’t either.

Surely Lily had been watching. It’s what the hurting did; they measured who cared. She probably counted the responses, hurting at the dwindling lack of interaction. The last one was only a week after her last post.

How did I ever give someone the power to fuck me up this bad?

That was the last one. Two months ago.

The depth of this darkness made Callie fear the worst.

A horribly creepy finality sensation made her do an obituary search in South Carolina. She found nothing.

She went back and studied the profile information on all three social media sites. All basically blank. Very uncommon for a teenager. Callie scrolled back through the pictures. No mention of place. No symbols to judge from. No names of restaurants. No open list of followers as if she’d scrubbed her life clean of them, or made them private. Using a cou­ple of databases devoted to law enforcement, she could not find much more about Lily Harred other than an address in Blythewood—though not the one on Javier’s driver’s license—and a cell phone. Callie was unsure whether she’d graduated early last June or was supposed to this June . . . in two more months.

Callie hoped the girl bothered to graduate and reach a meaningful milestone . . . a positive one versus all the negative ones. She was so young and so in pain, without even a sibling to confide in. Social media made her seem so dark.

Unfortunately, this girl’s past made her so likely to be someone who’d seek retaliation for how life treated her.

Was she independent? Homeless? Dead under some Jane Doe name?

Callie backed out. Enough. Time to hunt for the mother.

Melissa’s social media, however, was non-existent. As an agent’s wife, she might have been leery of putting her family’s presence out there. As a crucified agent’s wife, she could’ve become reclusive. These days people condemned others for the pure joy of it, from what they ate to the color of their house, and with her family having been in the newspaper, Melissa Harred could’ve circled her wagons and removed herself from as much attention as possible.

Callie could imagine the scrutinization she’d experienced during that investigation, throughout the reporting coverage, then afterward with her husband in jail. One day a law enforcement patriot, the next a crim­inal who’d turned on his own, and shot his friend and partner. Might explain why Lily was so careful about not posting specifics in terms of people, places, and social activities. They’d learned to dodge the public eye.

Their lives had dried up and disappeared.

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