Mountain Challenge (Mont Blanc Rescue #9)

Chapter 16

16

Ry

P ick up. Please pick up.

Something had happened, and Ry had no idea what it was.

One moment Isla had been there. He’d stopped for a second to speak with Yvette, who’d invited him to a surprise party she was planning for Alex. He’d looked up to see Isla—the new, frozen look on her face had filled Ry with concern, but there had been no chance to ask her about it. By the time he’d said goodbye to Yvette, Isla had disappeared.

He’d waited for a few minutes, hoping she’d gone to the bathroom, though the humming in his veins told him that’s not what happened. When he called her phone, it rang six times, then went on to voice mail. He waited a minute, then tried again. Relax. Nobody has ever disappeared from Brevent. Except Isla, just now. Leaving the tray of food on the table, Ry went back to the snow. His board was there, propped against the side of the building where they’d left it, but Isla’s board was gone.

Panic seized him, then. He quickly pulled out his phone.

“Vincent,” Ry said as soon as Vincent picked up the phone. “Did you call Isla? Has anything happened in the case?”

“Hey. Ry.” Vincent sounded like he was chewing. “Nothing new, man, other than what I told you yesterday.” The silence on the line grew heavy. “Uh, listen, man, I heard about what happened. I’m sorry.” Great, so everybody knew about it already. Made sense. The gendarmerie was a small family. “I hope it’ll be sorted out soon. You know you can count on me.”

Ry did know. He knew he could count on all his teammates. But suddenly, his trouble at work seemed much less important. He looked around once more, as if that would make Isla appear.

“Thanks, man. Sorry to interrupt your lunch.” He ended the call. He still had a few calls to make. There might be no cause for alarm. Something might have come up, and she’d had to leave. Without saying anything? That made no sense.

He googled the number for the tattoo studio. Maybe there’d been an emergency. Not that he could figure out what kind of emergency a tattoo studio could have.

“Alchemy Tattoo,” a man’s voice answered. Alain, Ry reminded himself.

“Hi Alain, This is Ry Harrison. We met a few days ago.”

“I remember. Isla’s not here, she’s taking the morning off.” No mention of having called her back for any reason.

“Everything’s okay there?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Alain asked suspiciously. His tone grew protective. “Is Isla okay?”

Ry saw no reason to lie to him. “We were snowboarding together in Brevent, but she suddenly left.”

“Uh …” Now there was embarrassment in the young man’s voice.

“Yeah, I know how that sounds. I just want to make sure she’s okay. Could you save my number and call me if you see her?”

There was a moment of unbearable silence. “I’ll do that.”

“Thank you.”

Ry disconnected and made his way back to the telecabine, keeping an eye out for Isla’s green suit. There was no point in asking the attendants if they’d seen a woman of Isla’s description walk by, so he didn’t bother.

On the way down, he saw the family of chamoix that had impressed Isla so much. He pulled up the phone and called her, but once again the call went straight to voice mail.

Shit . He didn’t know what was going on, but he had to make sure she was okay.