Barclay, Linwood - Find You First by Barclay Linwood

Author:Barclay, Linwood [Barclay, Linwood]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2021-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Thirty-Three

Springfield, MA

“What do you mean, something else might be going on?” Chloe asked Miles as he sat next to her in the Pacer.

Miles hesitated. He needed another moment to digest the information he’d received from Dorian. Could it be coincidence that three of the people he was hoping to connect with—Todd Cox, Jason Hamlin, and Katie Gleave—were missing or presumed dead? That they had gone missing, or died, in such a short period of time?

And all since Miles had started his hunt for them?

It was possible, he supposed. Bad things did happen to people. Houses caught on fire. Young people visiting foreign countries, where they were unfamiliar with local customs or the language, could find themselves in trouble. And there was a possible explanation for Todd’s disappearance: he was into something illegal and had made a run for it.

And yet.

Why was Todd’s trailer so spotlessly clean? Why had every trace of him been erased? Who’d been hiding under the bed? Not Todd. And who was the woman in the van that had screeched to a stop out on the main road?

He thought back to what Dorian had told him about Jason Hamlin. A house fire. The other students who lived there survived, but not Jason. Surely, eventually, his body would have been found among the ashes. So if he hadn’t been in the house when the fire broke out, where was he? What had happened to him?

“You gonna answer me or what?” Chloe asked.

Miles said, “I’m trying to put it together.”

“Put what together? I’m right here. What the fuck is going on?”

Slowly, he said, “The list, the nine people that I—Jesus, am I allowed to call them my children? Is that too … presumptuous?”

Miles, feeling overwhelmed, was losing his focus. This emotional tidal wave washing over him was making it increasingly difficult to direct his thoughts logically. It wasn’t that long ago that Miles could picture lines of computer code in his head like they were right there on a billboard, in front of him. Intricate, complex concepts were as easy to visualize as a sunset.

But now, all this information and events coming at him at once—finding Chloe, not finding Todd, news about the others on the list—was starting to feel like too much. Dorian’s call was like someone dumping onto the table several hundred pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and demanding they be put together in ten seconds.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he said, bending over, making his hands into fists and pressing them against his forehead.

“Miles?”

“I … need a minute,” he said.

He took his fists from his forehead and looked at Chloe.

“Can I call you that? Can I call you my child? Can I call you my daughter? Because … to be able to do that, to have the right to do that, don’t I have to be more than just a sperm donor?”

He was afraid he might cry. Fight this, he told himself. It’s a symptom. Don’t let it control you. Okay, one of your daughters is missing. Two of your sons are unaccounted for.

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