Locke 2 (Blackwater Boys #4)

Seven

Kali

I t was a cool autumn day when my world was flipped on its head. I was taking Dahlia out for her potty break. It was an early Saturday morning. I’d slept in a little bit. I was still in my jammies, my eyes pinned to Dahlia’s movements. I was trying to assess if she was slowing down due to the cold or because she was getting worse. Luckily, she had a spring in her step, and I relaxed.

I was kneeling, feeding her a treat when the backdoor burst open, and the screen door literally fell off its hinges. Hal didn’t even glimpse at it as he rushed down the steps and strode to me. I looked up at him, eyes squinting up at him as he stood with the sun at his back. In shorts and his sleep shirt, he was squeezing his phone hard in one hand, his hair in all directions.

“There are all these posts,” he said in a rush. “Linking the news station, begging everyone in Georgewel to keep an eye out for a little boy. I think…it says he goes to your school, Kari.”

My chest tightened. Alarmed, I asked, “What boy?”

Yet a sinking feeling settled into the pit of my belly. I had a feeling…and I hoped I was wrong.

He turned the phone to me, showing me the screen. “A boy named Lenny McClane. Do you recognize him?”

Even though I somehow expected it, the shock was swift. I fell on my ass as though I’d been shoved. My eyes widened as I took the phone from him and stared down at a picture of Lenny. He looked a lot younger than he was now. But the face was still the same: the dark eyes and lifeless expression. I scrolled up, reading the post put up by his desperate aunt, who was pleading with the public to keep an eye out for him as he disappeared with his mother, and she had been behaving erratically the last time they were seen.

“He’s in my class,” I whispered.

“Oh, my God, Kari.” He let out a long breath. “He was last seen yesterday afternoon. He played with his friends and then he went home, but when the aunt came around this morning, they were gone.”

Gone where? Dahlia crawled into my lap, burrowing her head into my stomach. I idly stroked her, my thoughts a mess. “I saw him yesterday.”

“Was he okay?”

I shrugged. “I mean, he was the same: quiet and withdrawn.”

“Did his mom pick him up?”

I scratched my head, thinking of him waiting at the classroom door for his mom. She’d been really late. Then again, she was always late. “She picked him up, yeah.”

“What was she like?”

I looked up at him, catching his intense look. I frowned. This was the journalist side of Hal coming through. His tone of voice and expression changed like a flip of a switch. I sort of felt like his next scoop more than anything, and I didn’t want to feel that way.

I slowly stood up, shaking the grass blades from my pants. Dahlia was pressed against my chest, her breathing a little laboured than usual. “She was drunk and slurring. Again, nothing out of the ordinary.”

He took in the information, nodding. Another question was at the tip of his tongue. Before he could ask it, I handed him back his phone and hurried back inside.