Free Where I Lost Her by T. Greenwood Page A

black bangs are speckled with dandruff.
    â€œFrom the little girl?” the woman insists. “Did she leave anything behind?”
    I have no idea how she knows I was the one who found her, that she is mine. It renders me speechless, and I shake my head, no, no .
    â€œI saw you on the news,” she says, answering my unasked question.
    Of course. How stupid of me.
    She clutches a tattered hanky. And I wonder if this is some odd talisman she carries, or perhaps just some sort of prop. Then she sneezes loudly, violently into it, and I realize that it’s neither. “Allergies,” she explains.
    â€œLieutenant?” I say, shaking my head as if to clear it. “I was hoping I could talk to you for a minute?” I am trying to be polite, trying the honey-versus-vinegar approach with this particular fly.
    â€œSure, what is it?”
    â€œHas anyone called in about her yet? Her mom and dad?” I ask.
    He looks at me and shakes his head. “No MPR,” he says.
    Every time he speaks to me, he seems increasingly more leery and frustrated.
    â€œWe’ll keep looking, but if a report of a missing kid doesn’t come in soon, if we don’t pick up on something, we’re going to have to assume the report was false.”
    â€œFalse?”
    â€œThat you were mistaken, ma’am. About what you saw.”
    â€œI saw her,” I say. “Jesus.”
    I look around for support. For someone to help me out. But Jake is in the car, nose buried in a manuscript.
    â€œ They believe me,” I say, motioning to the crowd of people in the road, to the army of horses and neighbors and even to the psychic who is still blowing her nose. “If you give up on this, they’ll be furious with you. With the entire police department.”
    â€œOr,” he says. “They will be furious with you . Out-of-towner getting the locals upset with a false report.” He is threatening me.
    â€œI’m from here,” I repeat. “I grew up here. This is my home too.”
    â€œWell,” he says snidely. “Welcome home.”
    I look to the group of neighbors in the road as though they will rally behind me. As if I can summon them, evoke an uprising with a single glance. But they are strangers. They don’t know me. To them I am just some flatlander. What they care about is the little girl. She is one of them, she belongs to them now.
    I remember why I came then, but just as I’m about to tell him about the guy in the landscaping truck, the radio at his hip goes off.
    Again, the muffled scratchy voices speak in code.
    â€œExcuse me,” he says before I get a chance to speak, and he walks away, leaving me with the psychic.
    â€œI see water,” she says, her eyes closed.
    I roll my eyes. I see water too. There’s a freaking lake right in front of us.
    â€œThere’s so much red,” she says ominously, eyes fluttering. And then her eyes shoot open wide. “ Underground .”
    â€œI’m sorry,” I say. “I need to go.”
    Andrews is sitting inside his cruiser now, speaking into his radio. I think about interrupting, tapping on his glass. But I can already imagine how pissed off he’d be at me for disturbing him. Better to stay on his good side. I’ll just come back later. I’m pretty sure the guy in the truck didn’t see anything anyway. She’d already slipped into the woods by the time he blew past me.
    I walk back to the car. Jake has stopped reading the manuscript he brought with him and is thumbing through Charlie’s file. He’s got at least a half a dozen editors who are vying for Charlie’s book. It could be the biggest deal he’s made in his career. He barely notices as I get in the passenger side and sit down. My presence barely registers. Sometimes, lately, I feel like I am only a ghost.

D espite the crowd forming by the woods, the formal volunteer search has not begun yet. Devin has