Page 170 of Sugar & Shadows

Her phone may have died. She’s always on it.

Harper:

This isn’t like her. I gave her a battery bank so she could keep her phone charged.

Laurie:

I just called her and it goes straight to voicemail. I’m worried.

My throat was painfully tight. Where could she have gone? Maplewood was a small town, and most stores were already closed because of the snow.

Maybe she was avoiding me. But even that didn’t fit. Not after our talk. She was far more likely to show up here and yell at me. I’d walked around for a full week with a shiner from the last time.

My phone dinged again, and I unlocked it with a shaky finger.

Meg:

Fuck.

I think I might know.

As the dots on the screen appeared and disappeared, I held my breath. Then my phone rang.

“She’s doing something stupid,” Meg blurted as I brought the device to my ear. “Don’t freak out.”

“It’s way too late for that,” I yelled.

“It’s a long story, but we’ve been looking into the Will McManus murder and putting together some pieces. I found some things in corporate files after a very light and totally ethical email hack. I may have also gotten my hands on some metadata from municipal records and GPS fleet logs⁠—”

“Meg,” I growled. “Get to the point, please. Where is she?”

“Right, sorry.” She blew out a breath. “I’ll spare you the corporate espionage backstory.” She typed quickly, then said, “She’s probably headed up to McManus Ridge. The property where the maple co-op storage facility used to be located. We discovered pings in that area from vehicles and recent electrical use. The new working theory is that Will McManus was murdered there.”

My muscles froze as my stomach dropped. Shit. She was in danger. Alarm bells went off in my head.

“She thinks Will may have hid evidence there.”

“Evidence?” I croaked. “Evidence of what? You sent her to an abandoned property off an unpaved road to look for evidence in a snowstorm?”

“I did not send her,” she said, her tone annoyingly calm. “You know Sabrina.”

“You know Sabrina,” I growled, “and you know that’s exactly what she would do.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, fuck.”

The typing ramped up. It sounded like she was punching the keyboard. “I can pull telemetry.”

“What?”

“Her car,” she hissed.

“You can track her car?”

“I can track anything if I care enough. And I’m pulling it up right—” She gasped. “Oh no.”

“What?” I could barely breathe.