Missing (Everyday Heroes Book 6)

by Margaret Daley

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Epilogue

  Books in the EVERYDAY HEROES Series

  Books in the STRONG WOMEN, EXTRAORDINARY SITUATIONS Series

  About the Author

  MISSING

  Everyday Heroes Series Book Six

  Margaret Daley

  Missing

  Copyright © 2020 by Margaret Daley

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  All texts contained within this document are a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons (living or dead), is entirely coincidental.

  Chapter One

  Dr. Emma Reichs kicked off her high heels and plopped her purse and briefcase on her kitchen counter. Her tight muscles screamed the exhaustion she was trying to ignore. She padded toward her bedroom to change into comfortable clothes after a long day counseling young children and teens. She would be leaving soon to go to the Pals Center where she volunteered.

  Piper Nelson’s situation in her group sessions at the Pals Center had gnawed at Emma’s peace of mind the whole day—actually since the Tuesday meeting. Piper’s rapport with her mother reminded Emma of her own relationship with her mom as a teenager. Their family life fell apart when Emma’s dad died. She would talk with Piper tonight. Emma needed to somehow help Piper and Ada, Piper’s mother. The similarity between Emma and Piper was strong.

  Emma loved working with young patients who needed her and also volunteering at the Pals Organization to help economically and emotionally disadvantaged children from the ages of six through eighteen. But her stressful day was catching up with her.

  Releasing a long sigh, she sank onto her bed, too tired to change into the comfortable outfit she’d laid out that morning. Instead, she’d use the few minutes to rest and possibly come up with a strategy to help Piper.

  She closed her eyes and collapsed back onto her mattress, relishing the quiet…

  A ringing sound jerked her from a light sleep.

  Groggy, she fumbled for her phone in the pocket of her jacket, glanced at the screen, and quickly answered the call from Brody Taylor, the founder of Pals. She’d been resting twenty-five minutes! “I know I’m running late. I’ll be there soon.” She should never have shut her eyes.

  “I’ll let the girls know you’re running a little late.”

  “Thanks. I was delayed with my last patient.” Not to mention she’d fallen asleep.

  “I was just making sure. The girls were already asking where you were. You’re usually early.”

  “Is everyone there?”

  “Yes, except Piper. She hasn’t shown up yet.”

  Where was Piper? “Tell them I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Bye.” Good thing she didn’t live too far away from the Pals Center.

  She needed to find out why Piper wasn’t there.

  As though a burst of energy shot through her body, Emma stood, grabbed the casual clothes, and put them on. While she drove toward the rec center housed in Cimarron City High School’s old gym, she hoped that Piper would be there by the time she arrived. Emma prayed nothing was wrong with the teen, and yet she couldn’t shake the feeling something had happened.

  Piper was new to Pals, and Emma had sensed right away how much the kid needed the group. Her only parent was an alcoholic mother who barely managed to hold on to her job, let alone be there for Piper. In the past two months, the fourteen-year-old hadn’t missed the group session that met twice a week on Tuesday and Thursday. Emma hoped Piper wasn’t sick or decided not to attend the support group anymore, especially after what Piper had told her on Tuesday. The teen needed her help. If she didn’t attend today’s session, Emma would swing by Piper’s home to see if she was all right.

  During Tuesday’s session, Piper had seemed upset but, as usual, she’d remained quiet. When the session ended, Piper sought out Emma to confide in her.

  Piper had found her mother asleep Tuesday morning when she should have been at her job. The teen had tried to wake up her mom. After splashing water on her mother’s face and shaking her, Piper had finally awakened Ada five minutes later. Her mom insisted she’d had trouble getting to sleep, so she’d taken a sleeping pill her doctor had recently prescribed for her. But Piper told Emma her mom also reeked of alcohol. The teen knew pills and liquor could be a lethal combination and was worried.

  Emma’s grip tightened around the steering wheel. After the teen had told her what happened with her mom, Emma had wanted to move Piper to a more private place on Tuesday so she could help the teenager. But before she could tell Piper, the girl whirled around, mumbled, “Forget it,” and hurried from the building. Was that the reason she hadn’t come back to Pals?

  Emma wasn’t going to give up on the child. Her pain was palpable and struck a deep chord in Emma whose dad had been an alcoholic. As a child, like Piper, Emma had watched his downfall until he’d killed himself with liquor and pills. Emma had never wanted others to go through what she had with her father. Memories of the day her dad died flooded her mind. She shut them down. If she let them take over her thoughts, she wouldn’t be able to function as she should tonight.

  She parked in front of the center, rushed into the building, and nearly collided with Brody, a large muscular man with blue eyes that could mesmerize a person with their intensity. She looked away while he stepped to the side before she did.

  “Slow down,” he said with a smile, a dimple appearing in his cheek. “All the girls are waiting patiently, except Piper. She hasn’t shown up.”

  Emma frowned. “I’d hoped she’d been running late like me. I wanted to talk to her after the session.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  She stared into his blue eyes, the intensity that poured from him darkening their color to that of a storm-tossed sea. Something about Brody drew her to him. “Possibly. She’s concerned about her mother.”

  “Ah, that explains the anger I saw in her when she left the center on Tuesday. She slammed through the double doors as she left and ran a younger kid over. After making sure the child was okay, I tried to go after Piper, but she’d disappeared.” He raked his hand through his thick, short brown hair. “Are you going to stop by her place to see if she’s all right?”

  She nodded then started down the hall toward the room where the other girls were waiting. In the short time she’d been working at Pals, Brody must know that she would do what she needed to help the kids.

  Brody caught up with her. “I’ll go with you to the apartment.”

  Emma paused at the entrance to the room she used for her sessions. “I’ll be fine.”

  “She lives in a rough area, and I’d feel better if I went with you especially since it’ll be dark.” She started to say no, but he raised his hand, palm outward. “Do it for me. I’ll feel better.”

  When he grinned, lighting up his whole face, she couldn’t say no
. That was why the kids from the Harrison Apartment Complex, whose parents didn’t drive them to the center, walked to and from in a group. “Okay.”

  He sighed. “Good. I don’t want anyone working here to get hurt or, for that matter, the kids who come to Pals.”

  “Thanks.” She pulled open the door and entered the room. She’d only been working at Pals the past six months, and during that time, she’d become a friend to Brody, amazed at how dedicated he was in developing a program to help the children who needed a champion like him. Not only had he poured his own money into the foundation, he also did the same with his time.

  “Sorry I’m late.” Emma walked to her usual chair and scanned the faces of the fourteen teens sitting in a circle. Her gaze fell on the one seat empty. “Was Piper sick today?”

  “She was at school,” Melody, Piper’s friend who suggested she visit Pals a couple of months ago, said. “She told me she was attending tonight, but no one answered when we went by the apartment and rang the doorbell. We pounded on the door, too. I thought for some reason she decided to come here early.”

  “Yeah, we thought she’d be here because she was upset today on the school bus.” Another friend of Piper’s, Amber, chimed in.

  Possibly Piper and her mother were gone for some reason. Had she found her mom passed out again? Could Piper be at the hospital? “Were the lights on in the apartment?”

  “No, but it wasn’t dark outside.” Melody frowned. “Is something wrong?”

  Emma didn’t have a good feeling about this. She wanted to go immediately to the Harrison Apartments, but these sessions with the girls were important, a way for them to vent in a safe environment. She also recently set up a group for teenage boys, but the number of participants was only eight so far. She was trying to convince Brody to co-chair the meetings, but he kept insisting he didn’t have her knowledge and training. Yet, his advice to the young males at Pals was spot on whenever she saw him engaging with the guys as though he knew exactly what they were going through.

  At the halfway break, the girls didn’t have anything else to share. Most of the ones who were vocal remained in the room while the others walked into the hallway. Emma looked at each teen. Two of them stared at the floor while another chewed on her thumbnail.

  “Okay, tell me what’s really on your minds,” Emma said while Amber lifted her head and stared at her as though assessing Emma.

  Amber had been cautious from the first meeting she attended.

  “I’m here to help,” Emma said.

  Amber narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “Another girl in the apartment complex disappeared over the weekend. And now possibly Piper, too.”

  Was Piper gone? Had the other girl run away? Emma straightened in her chair, a chill encasing her. “Who went missing? Does she come to the center?”

  Christina darted her gaze from one teen to the next. “Maria. Don’t know her last name. She’s younger than us. I’ve never seen her here.”

  “Maria isn’t that young. She’s twelve,” Melody said.

  Emma rose and walked to the open door to close it. She motioned the girls who’d left the room to come back inside. “Does anyone know Maria?”

  Thirteen-year-old Nancy raised her hand then stared at the floor. Nancy was shy and didn’t say much. She’d only been attending a couple of weeks. “Last Friday, I tried to get Maria to come to Pals. She told me she would think about it, but I haven’t seen her since Friday.”

  Emma straightened. “Were the police called?”

  Nancy squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. “Yes. Her older brother, her guardian, said they had a fight on Saturday, and she got mad and left. He had to go to his job that night and thought Maria would come home then. Maria and her brother argue a lot since their mother died. But this time, Maria didn’t come home, and when he got to the apartment in the morning, he didn’t call the police right away. He waited until later that afternoon. He still thinks she ran away. She’s done it before, but she’s always returned usually within a day. Sometimes she comes to my apartment.” Her stiff posture wilted, and tears coursed down her face.

  Amber, who sat next to Nancy, slung her arm over Nancy’s shoulders.

  Nancy lifted her head. “I should’ve called the cops Sunday morning. I went looking for her. No one’s seen her.”

  “What’s her last name?” Emma asked.

  “Ramos,” the girls chorused.

  Emma didn’t have a good feeling about this missing teen. Could something have also happened to Piper? Her heartbeat pounded through her body. She needed to get to that apartment complex and find Piper. “All of you stay here until I get back. Then I’ll take you home in my car. I’ll see if Brody can drive some of you, too.”

  “We go as a group. We’ll be all right,” Amber said.

  “Humor me. At least tonight.”

  The girls mumbled among themselves before Amber nodded at Emma. “We will.”

  Emma’s stomach clenched. What was happening at those apartments?

  * * *

  Brody jumped up, aimed the basketball at the net, and let it go. It went through the hoop and broke the tied score. The buzzer went off, and the player who grabbed the ball stopped dribbling down the court.

  Brody’s teammates celebrated, high-fiving and pounding each other on the back, while his gaze went to Emma, who stood in the gym’s doorway. Her look of concern and urgency drew him across the floor.

  He planted himself in front of her. “What’s wrong?”

  “A girl went missing from the Harrison Apartments last weekend. She isn’t one of ours, but the girls don’t think anything’s being done about it. They’re worried that Piper might be connected to what happened to Maria. They’re concerned Maria isn’t a runaway like her guardian, her brother, said. Something else might be happening. I’m going there now to check on Piper and see if she knows anything about Maria.”

  “I’m driving. Give me time to tell Stan I’m leaving and to change clothes.”

  “Five minutes.” She placed her hand over her heart. “In here, I know something fishy is going on.”

  Brody summoned one of the guys playing basketball. “Ron, can you find Stan and ask him to come here?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Sir? That made Brody feel ten years older than his thirty-three years. But as he’d rushed to be ready in five minutes, he thought back to the rough journey that led him to what he was today. He’d been an Army Green Beret for eight years and had fought in tough places all over the world. He hadn’t wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps to become a wealthy defense lawyer. He disagreed with his father over the clients he’d represented. Brody hadn’t returned to Cimarron City until his father was murdered by one of his clients, who was arrested, tried, and sentenced to life in prison. He’d been unable to reconcile his differences with his dad and hoped opening the center with the inheritance left to him by the man would be a good use of the tainted money. Three years after his father’s death, Brody still had an emptiness deep inside.

  While Brody hurried to take a quick shower, then put on a fresh set of sweatpants and a long sleeve shirt, he shoved his emotions down.

  Stan entered the locker room. “What’s going on? Ron said I had to hurry.”

  Brody told him where he was going and why. “Emma will be with me. I wanted you to know in case something happens. I’d rather Emma not go, but she insists on going to Piper’s place. The girl lives at Harrison Apartments.”

  “Should I call the police?”

  “Not yet. It may be nothing. I don’t know what’s happening. If I need help, I’ll call Nick Davidson. He’ll bring the help we’ll need.”

  “Yeah, Nick would be good. He knows a lot of the teens here. His self-defense class is a big hit.”

  Brody agreed with Stan. Nick was a police detective and his fiancée, Dr. Sarah Collins, was a counselor who also helped with Pals by counseling some of the parents. Both Nick and Sarah would be needed if what mi
ght be occurring at the apartments was true.

  Stan grinned. “You better hurry if you want to catch up with Emma.”

  Brody exited the locker room and headed toward the main entrance where, hopefully, Emma would be waiting. The area was empty, and Brody glanced at his watch. One minute late. Surely, she would have waited. He increased his pace to a jog and glimpsed her as she strode toward her car in the parking lot.

  He pushed open the door. “Wait up, Emma.”

  She paused while he continued toward her. When he neared, she rounded the hood of her car, slipped in behind the steering wheel, and started the engine.

  Brody quickly yanked open the passenger door and hopped in as she began slowly backing out of the parking space. “When you say five minutes, you mean it.”

  “Yes, especially this time.” Emma pulled into the stream of traffic and drove toward their destination. “I asked the girls to stay at the center until we came back and drove them home. I hope you’ll help me. Will you?”

  Brody chuckled. “What would you do if I didn’t?”

  At a stoplight, she slanted him a narrow-eyed look. “Then I’d do it without your help.”

  He smiled. “Of course, I will. You know I wouldn’t say no. In fact, I think the guys should be driven back there, too, until we know what’s going on.”

  “That’s what I was thinking. You’re always there to help others.”

  He placed a call to Stan to tell him to keep the kids who walked to the center there until he got back to drive them. “Do you have Piper’s apartment number? I was so rushed to change my clothes and meet you that I didn’t have time to look it up.”

  “Yes.” Emma turned into the Harrison Apartments’ parking lot in front. The complex consisted of three buildings, each three stories tall, and a common area housing a playground that had seen better days.

  Brody found his next project. Although the lighting was dim, he could tell that most of the equipment was broken down and needed to be replaced. He might be able to involve the kids from the center in fixing up the playground. It would be a good way to have more children become a part of Pals. Half of the children who came to the center were from these apartments, but many more from the complex could benefit from his program.