Two days… Two days…

  I snapped the ring box in my hand closed, bringing the velvet up to my face. So many thoughts moved in my head, so many emotions spiking my heart. The muscle felt locked up in a vise, making it hard to breathe, hard to feel. I just wanted her back. I wanted her safe and I felt so blind. I’d gotten caught up, so busy in my life that I lost her somewhere along the line.

  I drew the empty box away, staring at it. I’d made a promise to her when I gave her the ring that used to be inside.

  A promise I’d always be there for her.

  My Gram brought food out to me while I sat on the balcony, again food I wouldn’t eat. That sucked because it was chicken fried stake. One of my favorites.

  I managed to smile at her, sliding the ring box into my pocket. I tried to ease it in so she wouldn’t see, but she noticed and the sadness along the creases of her eyes couldn’t be hidden. My Gram was strong, but all this was putting her through the ringer too. She loved Roxie. Roxie was easy to love.

  “I drew you a bath too, honey,” she said, setting my plate down on the table by the lounge I sat on. “When you’re done with that.”

  I nodded, staring out at the ocean. I said little words these days and she knew that. She understood that.

  Squeezing my leg, she said what she always did before leaving a room. That we’d find her. That I shouldn’t lose hope. Not yet.

  The words always ached as much as they helped.

  That day ended like the first two, an update from the police. They hadn’t found her, but they were looking. They were trying. That’s also the day I called it and contacted Mickey. He worked out a leave of absence for me with the team as requested. I didn’t know how long I’d be gone from the court, but I needed time, and working out the details hadn’t been a problem for him. He told me Kendrick would be rejoining the team this week tentatively providing his physical therapy continued to go well. At least the team got some good news that week.

  Another day went by, then another and that’s the day I almost broke down. That day was hard. I woke up aching. I woke up physically feeling pain searing throughout my entire body. I didn’t know why. That day wasn’t unlike any other. Perhaps, it all fell before me, my reality. I didn’t know.

  I got a call early that morning, a police check-in with no news. I thanked them for what they were doing, but couldn’t do much else than that. Gram popped in on me at dawn, knowing I’d be up. I never slept past five, waiting for calls. She said she would start breakfast for me, a breakfast she knew I wouldn’t eat but she did it anyway. I showered, joining her at the kitchen island when I got out. That’s usually where I “ate,” if anything.

  Aunt Robin came in, asking me how my morning was going. She asked that every morning. I told her fine with a smile. She drew me in a hug before she left, squeezing, and then heading off for a long day of cleaning like she always did. I didn’t think there was anything left to clean, but that didn’t stop her. It was her way of dealing with all this. This…

  I forked some eggs into my mouth to keep myself functioning, my mind from clouding. That’s when Gram turned from her skillet of flapjacks.

  “That Clare called for you while you were in the shower, honey,” she said from over her tiny shoulder.

  Clare called every day. Just to check in and stuff, but never so early.

  I wiped my mouth down with my napkin, excusing myself. I dialed her back from my bedroom, not expecting anything at all, so when she said three words I asked her to repeat herself. I didn’t think I heard her right. My mind couldn’t wrap around it.

  “I saw her,” she said again.

  I pushed my hand over my mouth. “You…” I breathed out, swallowing. “You what?”

  She laughed this time. She laughed and I knew it to be true. I could imagine she hadn’t laughed in days. I hadn’t. “I saw her, Griffin,” she repeated once again for me. “I saw her with my own eyes. Right here in town.”

  I sat down on the bed. My hand gripped in my hair, I let possibilities push into my head I’d been too afraid to. Because if they weren’t they shatter me entirely. She really was out there.

  And she really was okay.

  My stomach in knots, I tried to keep my hands from shaking. I couldn’t drop the phone right now. “Umm, wow. Wow. Okay.” I shook my head, shock not letting what I wanted to say come out correctly. “All right. Is she with you? Can I talk to her?” I never thought I’d be able to say those words and couldn’t prepare for the smile that overtook my face as I did.

  I was already getting up, heading out of the bedroom. I needed to make arrangements. Plane. A plane to get to her. Car keys to get to the airport.

  She really was okay. I was really about to see her.

  “She’s not with me, Griffin. That’s the thing. I saw her, but—”

  “What’s going on?”

  My gram crossed in front of me as I’d just made my way down the hall, and in all my joy, I squeezed her tiny body hard, nearly scaring the shit out of her I couldn’t imagine.

  “Griffin? What…?” she continued, eyes wide.

  I pulled back, my mind so overwhelmed how to tell her what I just found out, but I couldn’t form a correct sentence. The words came out jumbled, and by then, my aunt had made it into the room.

  “Boy?” she said, her hands on her hips. “What is going on?”

  I squeezed her now and she shrieked in surprise. I didn’t know when Gram figured out something was up, but she raised her hands, her tiny fists shaking. “It’s something good?” she said. She put her fingers to her mouth, a hope lining her eyes. “It’s something good?”

  Finally, I felt some words forming. I pointed to the phone. “It’s Clare. She said she’s seen Roxie. Right there in town. Where we both went to college.”

  The relief that swept both of their faces had to have matched my reaction only seconds ago. My gram scurried from the room. “I’m going to call your poppa.”

  “I’m going to call everyone else!” Aunt Robin fist pumped, pulling her phone out of her pocket. “Our baby girl is coming home!”

  Their baby girl. She really was a part of this family. To everyone not just me.

  “I’m going to get the rest of the details,” I told them, heading back to the bedroom to pack a bag.

  “Griffin? Griffin, you still there?” came Clare from my ear and I realized she’d gotten lost in the shuffle.

  “Sorry,” I said, laughing now. I was so relieved. “Yeah, I’m here. I’m just packing a bag. You said she’s not with you? Is she at a hotel or something?”

  “That’s what I was trying to tell you. I’m not sure where she’s staying.”

  That’s when I finally paused, my hands stopping over my sock drawer. My thoughts did too, not understanding what she meant.

  “What do you mean?” I asked her, and that’s when I thought back. She’d said she had seen her, but that’s all she said.

  She isn’t with Clare? Then where is she?

  “I mean, I don’t know where she’s staying,” she continued and I sat down, listening to her. “The whole thing is messed up. I don’t think she wants me to know she’s here.”

  Now, I was really confused. I lifted my hand. “Okay. You’re losing me. Why wouldn’t she want you to know? Start from the beginning.”

  “Okay. All right. Beginning. Destiny and I were out having coffee. At the place on the campus. You know, the one that’s real popular on Elm?”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I’d been many times. I didn’t see how this was relevant yet, but I told her to back track so I was staying with her.

  “Well, that’s when I saw her. Not at the coffee house but across the street at a convenience store. She had a bunch of bags. Groceries, I’m assuming she just bought, and she was putting them into the back of a really nice car. Black. A shiny Bentley. She had a hoodie on, the hood up, so I didn’t see her face. But it was her. I know it.”

  Closing my eyes, I tried to wrap my head around the fact that she gave me hope by the sighting of a mere hooded figure. I pushed my hand into my hair, not letting myself doubt her yet. “How do you know it was her if you didn’t see her face?”

  “Because of the hoodie. It had our roller derby team’s emblem on the chest, and a ‘RE’ on the back in pink.”

  Roxie Elbowa.

  At the description, I got up, heading to the closet I refused to get clothes from anymore only days prior. I went to her side, searching, and when that exact hoodie Clare described came up empty… When it came up empty…

  I squeezed my eyes. It really was her.

  “It’s her, Griffin,” Clare said in my ear, her thoughts matching exactly with mine. “It’s her. As soon as I knew, I ran outside, but I… I’m sorry. She was too quick. I got outside as she pulled away.”

  “That’s okay, Clare.” She’d gotten more than the police had. They’d sent people to our college campus days ago, officers heading to every place that I thought she could be and had no luck at all. “So she still hasn’t called you?” I continued. “You haven’t heard from her?”

  “Nope. That’s how I knew she didn’t want to see me. She’s here in town, but didn’t seek me out. She must want to be left alone or something.”

  Well I loved her dearly, but I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t stay away. I needed her safe, with me. “You said she got into a Bentley? Did you get a plate number or anything?” She could have rented it when she gotten there. Though with what money, I had no idea. As I said, she’d taken barely anything from her account.

  “No, I didn’t. I’m sorry. I was so thrown by seeing her I left my phone inside when I ran out.”

  Again, I assured her that was okay. We at least had something now. “So you saw her today?”

  “Yep. Just a moment ago. I ran back inside to call you.”

  She didn’t know how happy that made me. That someone had set eyes on her. “Do you think she may be staying with anyone from the team?”

  “Mmm, no. They would have told me. We don’t keep things like that from each other. Not when it someone’s safety, and none of them stayed here after college. Just me.”

  “Any other friends?” I asked, racking my brain. “Anyone’s she worked with or…”

  “No, no, Griffin. Roxie didn’t have a whole lot of friends. And she never had a job here as far as I knew. She spent a lot of time at her apartment.”

  What she said sent me to a dark place. Though these were things I pretty much knew, that didn’t make them easier to hear.

  “What about you?” she asked. “Any friends she made connected through you?”

  “No.” Not a one. Not a one, and slowly, I felt us slipping back to the beginning, to ground zero with no information. “I suppose she could be staying at a hotel without any help.”

  But she had no money. Not to rent a hotel, a Bentley. Hell, without money, even her groceries she couldn’t have afforded. With what little she took from her account, she maybe had just enough to get back to the Midwest, but outside of that nothing. Not without help anyway…

  Help. There was someone that would help her, and they’d help her to the ends. No holds barred. No questions asked.

  But would she take help from him?

  Taking that chance, I told Clare I’d call her back. I dialed a number right away for help, and as the phone rang, the confidence I had in where Roxie was grew tenfold. It grew because she had taken help from this source before.

  She’d done so for me.

  “Griffin?” came Mickey’s voice. “Hey. Any news on Roxie—”

  “I need you to get me someone’s number,” I said, feeling time was of the essence. Clare had just seen her. Time was of the essence and I couldn’t risk her running again. “It has to do with Roxie and I need it right away.”

  “Okay. Who?”

  I said his name. I took a chance.

  “Greg Peterson,” I told him. “He’s the chancellor at my old university. He was when I attended and I can imagine he still is.”

  “The chancellor? Peterson? Is he related to Roxie—”

  “I don’t care how you get the number or what favors you have to call in, but you need to get it. His address too if that’s possible.”

  He let out a breath into the phone. “Griff, son. I’ll try but…”

  “Mickey,” I stressed, gripping the phone. “I need to get it. Please.”

  He was silent, silent for too long, and I wondered if he’d actually help me out. But then, he did. In the next moment, he was off the phone, and in the one after that, I had a number.

  I had his number.

  I dialed the phone with bated breath, knowing it was all riding on this, this man I knew to be estranged to the woman I loved. The phone only rang once, answered so quickly.

  “Hello?” a voice said. It was a voice I’d heard before. One of age, one of depth.

  I sat to the bed again, bracing myself. “Yeah, um. Hello? Is this Greg Peterson?”

  “Speaking. How can I help you?”

  “Mr. Peterson, this is…” My heart raced for more reasons than one. Last time I talked to him, he was getting me off the hook for something that could have killed my career before it began and I didn’t forget that. It hung in the moment like a great weight. That didn’t matter now though. The only thing that mattered was her, Roxie. I dampened my mouth. “Mr. Peterson, this is Griffin. Griffin Chandler.”

  The line was only quiet for a moment.

  “Mr. Chandler. I’ve, uh…” he said letting out a breath into the phone. “I’ve been expecting this call.”

  He’d been expecting it?

  He’d been expecting.

  I closed my eyes tight. “She’s… She’s there, isn’t she? She’s with you. She’s there.”

  “She is, Mr. Chandler. She’s here and she’s safe.”

  She’s there. She’s safe.

  For the first time in days, I could breathe again.

  “Thank god,” I gasped, the emotions making me shaking. I stood, going to my bag again. “All right. I’m getting a bag together so I can catch the first flight down there. And I thank you so much for taking care of her.”

  Thinking about her, I went to her drawers first. She might want some things of her own for the trip back. For comfort.

  “Mr. Chandler—”

  “Can I talk to her?” I asked him, packing some of her personal items, a few of the clothes I knew she liked to wear the most.

  “Mr. Chandler—”

  “I know she might not want to, talk to me. I can imagine she told you what happened over here.”

  “She did and you’re right, but—”

  “Can you ask her anyway?” I requested, pausing with my hand in the bag. “I just need to hear her voice.”

  His breath he let out was a long one, and I didn’t know why, but it made my stomach clench, made it turn like I’d been on a spiraling roller coaster.

  He was quiet. Too quiet.

  I waited out the duration, giving him a moment even though my heart raced, the reason for which I didn’t know why. But then, he made it known. He gave me a reason to worry very quickly.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Chandler. Griffin, but you can’t come down here. My daughter isn’t leaving.”

  Slamming into a brick wall would have knocked the wind out of me less. It would have been less painful too.

  I let go of Roxie’s clothes, pulling my hand out of the bag. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, as I say. Roxanne won’t be going with you and you won’t be coming down here. Here is where she came. Here is where she wants to be. I’m sorry, but I’m respecting her wishes. I cannot allow you to come.”

  The shock melted into anger—quickly, and my jaw worked, the haze of red squeezing me in a thick cloud. I’d been through hell these last few days. Fucking hell, and this man wasn’t going to stand in my way now. Not when I was this close. No fucking way.

  I calculated my next response quickly, and it was only because this man was her dad that I decided on what I had to say next.

  “Mr. Peterson, I understand how you must feel. Roxie’s your daughter and you want to protect her. Believe me, I understand what it feels like to want to do that for her.”

  I took a moment to breathe, feeling my voice escalating beyond my control. Once I got it back, I spoke again. “But there’s something you don’t understand about the situation. There are deeper issues here. Issues that have to do with her well-being. She needs me right now.”

  “Does she need you, Mr. Chandler? Something tells me if she did, she wouldn’t have made her way here.”

  How dare he fuckin’ question me? When it was because of him she felt the way she did about herself? Him and that terrible woman he married and the kids she brought in that tortured Roxie on the day-to-day. Fucked up her confidence and…

  I worked my way out of the thoughts. I didn’t need to justify anything least alone to myself.

  “Now,” he continued, testing me more. “I’m going to let you go now. You know she’s safe, so you can sleep easy tonight—”

  “She’s depressed, Mr. Peterson.”

  He went quiet again, silent again.

  “She’s depressed,” I told him once more, stressing it on the last word. “And you? You’d be far removed to think you have nothing to do with it. You… You and your ex-wife. Her kids. Roxie is a shell of a person because of…” I couldn’t finish, the reality of my own words clouding me. He may have had a hand in Roxie’s past, but I dealt my own in regards to her future, the world I subjected her to. The fact ate away at me every breath I took, every passing moment.

  I should have fought for her harder.

  “That’s enough, Mr. Chandler,” pulled me out of my head, and back into reality with this man. “That’s enough. You heard what I said. You won’t be coming down here. Not without my permission and not without my daughter’s blessing which she hasn’t given.”

  My eyes narrowed. “With all due respect, sir, I don’t see how you can stop me.”

  “Oh, I can stop you. I can and I will. You come within fifty feet of my property, I will have you arrested. I don’t care who you think you are. You have no power here in my town and in my house. My daughter is an adult. She makes her own decisions and you cannot take her against her will. Now, respect her wishes and mine. Don’t be selfish. Stop making this about you and making things harder for her than they already are. And you know it’s hard for her, Griffin. You know that.”