“Well, I have a posse now,” I grin.
“I’m the Sheriff around here. If anybody has a posse, it’s me,” he points out.
“Alright. I have a gang. An entourage?” He rolls his eyes and chuckles. “You don’t want to be a part of my entourage?”
“I have to go to work. I love you.”
“A squad? A crew? How about a retinue?”
“You don’t get to play any more of Xavier’s middle of the night games,” he says, heading for the door.
“Oh, but Can You Figure Out What Obscure Word That Has Some Vague Connection to What We’re Talking About I’m Thinking Of is fun,” I say.
“Bye, have a good day,” he calls out from the door frame.
“Love you,” I call after him as he shuts the door.
Curling one leg up under me, I pick up my notebook and stare at the list of notes again. Something has to be here. I’m just missing it.
Chapter Thirty-Four
“You don’t think that this letter could actually be referencing Julia, do you?” Eric asks.
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “I don’t think it’s that easy. Besides, it doesn’t link up. She disappeared from the city, not some narrow road in the snow. And this person is obviously known to be missing. It says people didn’t know she was there until they knew she wasn’t. Meaning, they became aware of her sudden absence. They found something.”
“Probably pieces of the coat,” he says.
“Right. I mentioned that the person writing the letter only has pieces of their coat left, so I figure that means there were some at the scene. Which is likely how they knew that was where this person went missing. The fact that friends and family knew this person was missing from that area once they realized they weren’t there means this road is close to something. It’s familiar. It’s near their house or their church or their school or something, where they would be on the road on a regular basis. It’s not just some random spot.”
“Do you think the snowplow is significant?”
“I’ve been trying to figure that out, too. I think all of it significant. But that doesn’t mean that everything is exactly as it seems. Talking about the snow drift very well could have just been a way to throw me off. Rather than actually being about the snowplow, it could have been to emphasize the narrowness of the road. To suggest that this wouldn’t be an area where most people would expect a snowplow to be. Which makes me wonder if it was actually a Department of Transportation snowplow, like one that’s sent out by city or town, or if it might have been a private one.”
“That’s a good thought. That could narrow the area.”
“What about cemeteries?” I ask.
“What about them?”
“The angel. We’ve been thinking about a church, but there are angels in cemeteries, right? That’s why the ones that Gran had seem a little creepy. Some of them look like they belong on a grave. Could the person have gone missing walking along a road to visit a new grave? Maybe they had just placed an angel?” I suggest.
“I’ll look into it,” he says. “I’ll let you know if I find anything.”
“I will, too. Give Bellamy a hug for me. Is she doing okay?” I ask.
“She’s doing fine. Trying to have some different cravings. All the sudden all she wants to eat is fried eggs and buttered toast.”
I make a face. “That sounds delicious, but it doesn’t sound like anything she would ever eat.”
“I have never known her to eat a fried egg until now,” he says. “But seriously I have bought like three dozen in the last week and a half.”
I laugh. “Well, that’ll be a fun story to tell the baby. Let me know if she needs anything.”
“We will,” he says.
I end the call and think about that for a second. I never would have thought of Eric as the type of guy who would have used ‘we’ so freely. He’s dated women before, and even had a couple of serious relationships. But there was always a certain distance. Like he remained very confidently individual and independent from the relationship.
But not with Bellamy. They’re both still individual people, and I don’t feel like they have melded into one homogeneous creature or anything. But being together has definitely changed something in both of them. Just like with me and Sam.
It’s such a sign of how far our lives have come in the last few years. Before a horrific serial child abduction case brought me back to Sherwood and led me back to Sam, it was the three of us. Bellamy and Eric clashed far more than they got along. They didn’t really start communicating with each other until my assignment in Feathered Nest.
Now our group has changed and grown, and we’re looking ahead to things like marriage and parenthood. I’ve always felt like I had to grow up fast after my mother’s murder. But now I suddenly feel like an adult in a totally different way.
I figured I already felt like an adult and very well should, considering I tipped over to the other side of thirty and should consider myself grown by now. But it’s completely different when I’m looking at it from the path toward these major milestones.
I don’t realize how time has slipped by until Sam gets home.
“Have you been sitting there all day?” he asks.
I look around, noticing the sun has set and the empty glass I was going to bring back into the kitchen when I got up to do something else is still sitting beside me.
“I guess I have,” I say.
“Have you eaten or anything?” he asks.
“I had breakfast. I got up for a snack once,” I say.
“Let me order some Chinese,” he says.
I shake my head. “No. We just had pizza. I can’t let you go back to your bachelor days eating nothing but take out all the time. I’ll get up and make
