Decay (Phoebe Reede: The Untold #3.2 Declan Reede: The Untold Story #6)

by Michelle Irwin

  While I was trying to sift through the information I had—trying to sort through the facts from the fiction and work out what jigsaw pieces fit together and how they slotted into place—Beau started to talk. He spun a story that started with Phoebe’s win in the car at Bathurst—her debut as a second driver in the lead ProV8 car up on the mountain—but ended with an argument about me. An argument about the things that had ultimately sent her to the USA—my control of a team and my willingness to let her be a driver for that team.

  I tried to follow the story, but with everything else circling in my head, it was difficult. The question of how the fuck Beau and Max would have ever had reason to talk spun through me.

  “She turned off her phone,” he continued his story. “I tried all night to get her back so we could sort it out. Sometime ’round three in the mornin’ for me, I finally got through, but it wasn’t Phoebe who answered the phone. It was Max.”

  And one chunk of the puzzle locked into place. “Jesus Christ.”

  “He said that Phoebe was out with a friend, that they’d be drinkin’ and partyin’. He tol’ me he didn’t expect her to come home ’til she’d had her fun. He made it clear that she was out to find a man. That he was used to her bein’ free with her love, and that she knew he’d wait for her at home.”

  The heartbreak in the guy’s voice was clear. It reminded me of the pain Alyssa had suffered at Morgan’s hands when he’d interfered in our lives on my behalf. “That fucking little bastard. He’s just like his father. You can’t tell me that you seriously believed that about Phoebe, though?”

  Surely if he knew her even half as well as he claimed, he’d know she didn’t love easily, especially not with her trust issues and health concerns. There was a time, when she was on the cusp of leaving school, where she’d sworn that she would never get married because she didn’t want to hurt anyone when things went wrong. It didn’t matter how much Alyssa and I tried to convince her that it wouldn’t matter if she found the right person, she’d declared she would never fall in love.

  He hung his head. The muscles along his jaw were tight and his hands were clenched at his side. “Course not. At least, not until he told me the things they did and that she loved him most of all.”

  “He’s just a fucking kid,” I said, as much to remind myself not to kill him as to admonish Beau for thinking that Phoebe could be free and easy.

  “I know that now!” He practically growled the words as he spun around to face me. His breathing was heavy when he continued, “But when ya got a guy ya don’t know from Adam tellin’ ya about the birthmark near your girlfriend’s—”

  His eyes widened and he cut off before he could finish the sentence, but I didn’t need him to finish it. I knew about the birthmark—a little love-heart shaped one on the front of her hip. How could I not? I’d bathed her often enough when she was still little. Seen her run through the house nude when she was a child and found it hilarious to streak.

  Even though I’d known on some level that the two of them had been intimate, hearing him admit to seeing her birthmark, to knowing it well enough to have it used against him by Max, twisted my stomach. It proved my little girl was well and truly grown up. She’d made some choices, and that included letting this man in—the one who’d ended up hurting her. Only, the way he looked at me, wide-eyed and fearful, as though he’d overstepped some invisible boundary, made me question how much truth was tied up in the hurt. He seemed to be hurting too—or he was a fucking good liar.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” he said after a moment. He swallowed hard, and stiffened his back. “I shouldn’t’ve said . . .” His gaze dropped to the floor.

  I couldn’t help the hard bark of laughter that left me. It was almost ironic that my biggest worry when she was younger was that some boy would eventually take her to bed, and now his admission to having seen my daughter naked was the least of my concerns. “God, I should smack you in the mouth for talking that way about my daughter.”

  “But ya ain’t gonna?” It looked like relief in his eye, and I was glad I could frighten him a little. It meant I had some control over the situation, even if it didn’t feel like it.

  “I’ve got more important things to worry about right now than whether or not you’ve slept with Phoebe, especially when we both know the answer to that question.”

  “Yes, sir. I understand.”

  I told him I’d wasted too much time already and needed to go to the police. It still pissed me off that no one else had even bothered, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. I finished by telling him I’d watch the footage from Phoebe’s interview alone. As earnest as his request had seemed, I couldn’t be certain there wasn’t something on the tape he didn’t want me to see. If he was in the room, it would be possible for him to distract me at the right times.

  After telling him I’d keep his request in mind as I watched the interview—if there was something on there he needed to see, I would pass it along—I stopped near the door. When I did, I wondered whether maybe there was some truth in his words. If there was, Phoebe would be pissed as fuck that I didn’t at least try to be friendly with him. I didn’t want to make her life harder when she came home, so I tried to be friendly—or at least whatever version of it I could afford to be. “Look, if we’re going to be forced together while we try to find Phoebe, you might as well call me Declan. I’ve never really been one for formalities.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  My lips twisted upward, until I realised he wasn’t just being a smartarse. With his sirs and straight back—manners that went well beyond what was polite back home—I had to wonder what he was hiding.

  “YOU TOLD US yourself she told you she was fixing to go away.”

  I stared at the cop sitting across from me with open contempt. After waiting almost an hour to get to see an officer to talk about Phoebe’s disappearance, I’d had to answer a raft of questions I barely had the answers to. All of that, only to be told that they couldn’t do much about her absence yet because she’d told each of us that she was going away for a while and would be in contact when she could. “She’s never been gone this long without contacting us.”

  “But you said she did contact you.”

  “Yes. Almost two weeks ago.”

  “She didn’t say how long she was going to be gone for though, did she? How do you know she isn’t still on her vacation? Two weeks isn’t a long time.”

  “You don’t understand,” I seethed. “You don’t know my daughter.”

  “But she has taken off before when she’s felt under pressure.”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose and took a moment to breathe so I didn’t let loose the string of vitriol spinning through my head. Why had I told him that? I’d answered every question as truthfully as possible, and now my answers were coming back to bite my fucking arse. “Never for this long. She has a medical condition, and I’m worried about her.”

  “I can put out a Be On the Lookout notice to hospitals and other stations, but other than that I’m afraid there isn’t a lot I can do. I’m sorry, but as I’ve explained, we can’t investigate every time someone needs to take a break from their life. My hands are tied.” His expression was apologetic, but that didn’t help. I didn’t want any fucking apologies, I wanted fucking answers.

  Standing, I slammed my hand against the table. “And as I’ve fucking told you, she wouldn’t take off for this long without some contact.”

  “But she made contact with you.”

  “Without more contact.”

  “We’re talking about a young adult.”

  I growled and leaned across the table. “We’re talking about my fucking daughter.”

  “I’m sorry. If anything turns up from the BOLO, we’ll call you, but I can’t do anything more. If you have any more reason to suspect that something untoward has happened to her, we’ll do what we can.”

  With another growl, I shoved myself away from the table. “This is bullshit!”

  I di
dn’t wait for more platitudes and “deepest regrets” before leaving the room and heading back out the way I’d come. The cop had all my information. I trusted him to at least follow up with the hospitals, but that didn’t make it easier to swallow the fact that they wouldn’t help find her.

  As soon as I got into the car, I called Richards Racing and confirmed with Mary-Lou that she’d received a package for me from the Racing Hub.

  Thank fuck for that.

  “Are you going to be back this afternoon to grab this package? I’ll be locking up in fifteen minutes.”

  I checked the time on the car dash and glanced at the traffic that had materialised around me. “I don’t think I’ll be back for at least an hour.”

  “I’ll make a note that you’ll collect this tomorrow then.”

  “No!” The promise of what might be in the interview had been dangled as a carrot, and I needed to see it more than I needed to do anything else. “Can’t you wait around for me to get there?”

  “I’m sorry. I have an appointment I need to get to.”

  “Fuck.” My fingers twitched around the steering wheel and my gaze darted around the bumper-to-bumper traffic, looking for any openings that might save me a few seconds of precious time.

  “Do you still have the security pass you received earlier?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Because it’s a management badge, you’ll be able to use that to access the after-hours entrances around the side.”

  “Can you please leave the package somewhere no one else will be able to get their hands on it? There might be something important in there.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll leave it in Mr Richards’s office.”

  I was about to hang up when another thought occurred to me. “What has Mr Richards said about the situation with Phoebe?”

  “Uh, I’m not sure—”

  I cut her off with a sigh. “You did speak to him about why I’m here, didn’t you?”

  “Well, yes, but he’s not too concerned. See we’ve had drivers not show in the past and—”

  “Fucking hell. It’s no wonder you lot needed a fucking bailout.” A niggle in the back of my head questioned whether maybe he knew something about Phoebe’s disappearance. Was that why he hadn’t insisted on finding out what the fuck was going on?

  “Would you like me to—”

  “No. I’ll contact him as soon as I have more information. If he doesn’t think it’s a concern, there’s no reason to interrupt the team’s race prep.”

  “Okay. Let me know if there is anything more I can do to help.”

  “No, that’s fine. Just make sure that package is safe.” There was nothing else I was able to trust her with. Even that task seemed too monumental for her.

  Once I’d hung up the phone, I turned on the radio and tried to lose myself in that. Without any particular rhythm, I tapped on the steering wheel with my fingers, trying to free the energy bustling around my body.

  When the radio did nothing to soothe the beast within me, I flicked it back off again before changing lanes for the fifth time in as many minutes. I hated being stuck in the grind this way. We were all practically stationary. The other drivers seemed less concerned with moving, and happier just to sit with their thumbs up their arses. I couldn’t relax though. I hated it all. Hated sitting in traffic when I needed to do something. I was certain that somewhere out there my baby was alone.

  Scared.

  Possibly hurt.

  Maybe even . . .

  “Fuck!” I lifted both hands off the wheel before smashing them back down against the leather, causing the horn to blast and the car to shake. Twisting my fingers around the grips and holding on tight, I shook the wheel. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!”

  I shouldn’t have been the one to come to the States. Alyssa would’ve been able to keep a calmer head. She’d have sweet-talked the police into doing something. I’d failed Phoebe before she was born, and now I was failing her again.

  The traffic crept forward agonizingly slowly. Trapped alone with nothing but my own thoughts, my mind spun so much that I started to get dizzy. I rested one hand against the window and tugged my hands through my hair. If the police weren’t going to get involved, what were our other options? I could only think of one—and I wasn’t sure I wanted to enact it yet. The media.

  Individually, the majority of the reporters I’d met were great. As a pack, the mentality and public opinion could swing easily to any extreme. A controlled release could get us a witness who didn’t understand what they’d seen was important. But release information too early, and we’d risk corporate sponsorships if it turned out Phoebe was just taking an unscheduled break.

  My phone lit up with a local number, and for a moment, I hoped it would be her. It wasn’t. It was her building’s superintendent calling to confirm our appointment in the morning.

  By the time I finally got back to Richards Racing, the car park was almost completely empty. The trucks that had been lined up along one side were gone, no doubt on their way back down to Florida. To where Phoebe should’ve been, celebrating what would have been a great result in her first race and preparing for the other events down that way later this week.

  Instead, she was missing.

  AWOL.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep breath.

  God, I needed a drink.

  Climbing from the car, I headed around to the door on the side of the building, where Mary-Lou had said it would be. I swiped my access card and let loose a relieved sigh when the light turned green and it let me in. Just inside the door, there was a bank of switches. Not wanting to fuck around, I flicked them all on and the area around me flooded with light.

  I headed straight to Dale’s office and found the parcel on his desk. There was a note resting inside the box that instructed me to let them know as soon as possible if there were any parts of the interview I wanted to exclude based on the clause in the contracts. Although I was relieved to know my request hadn’t raised any undue suspicion, the note made my mind tick over. What was on there?

  Apprehension closed around me. Was there something she said during the interview that they thought I would want to veto?

  As I pulled the hard drive out of the box, my heart beat faster. I set it down on the desk, knowing I couldn’t go any further without a drink. Preferably a double shot.

  From the little I knew of Dale Richards, I figured he was the sort to have something—anything—on hand to share a tipple when he was entertaining guests. If there was going to be any alcohol, it was going to be in one of the cupboards that lined the walls. Growing more desperate by the minute for something alcoholic to slake my thirst, I moved to search them one by one. Trinkets and photos covered the shelves between the cupboards, but I was blind to them all in my quest.

  A KNOCK SOUNDED behind me, and I spun.

  Beau stood in the doorway, his gaze dancing between me and the hard drive. It was like the interview on that drive was the only important thing to him. What was on there that he wanted to see so badly? Why couldn’t he wait like we’d discussed? “What the fuck do you want? Didn’t I tell you I’d think about what you asked?”

  I needed a fucking drink to deal with him. To deal with any of it. With that thought in mind, I started opening and closing the cupboards again—looking for any sign of something drinkable.

  “I wanted to find out whether ya had any luck with the police?”

  His question did nothing to calm the storm howling within me, and only served to remind me of the frustrations that I’d been facing all day. “Don’t ask. Arseholes won’t investigate or open a missing persons.”

  “What? Why not?” The right amount of disbelief coloured his tone to make me think he actually cared.

  I didn’t want to analyse it though, to try to sort through his statements and work out what was fact and what was fiction.

  I didn’t want to do anything except find a damn fucking drink.

  “Do you know if there’s anything to
drink in this goddamned place?”

  “Gimme a minute, I got somethin’ in my truck. There’re glasses in the lunchroom.” He bounded off like a little puppy, heading toward the door I’d come through.

  When he’d disappeared, I found my way back down to the lunchroom and found some tumblers in one of the cupboards. Figuring I couldn’t drink a man’s alcohol without giving him a chance to drink too, I grabbed two before heading back to Mr Richards’s office.

  I’d only just placed the tumblers on the desk when he walked back in sporting a decent-sized bottle of booze. The sight was a welcome one with the burn at the back of my throat. I recognised the signs of desperation that I’d contended with as a stupid kid. The alcoholism that had driven me to the brink of destruction. I recognised it, but didn’t give a shit that I was giving in to it. One drink wouldn’t hurt.

  I glanced at the hard drive in my hand. “I wanted to do this alone, but seeing as though you’re here and offering me some booze, you may as well watch this too.”

  He told me about a projector and screen in the meeting room. As he led the way, he asked about my conversation with the police again. I told him a little about the frustrations I’d encountered. He seemed as bemused by the inaction as I was.

  When we reached the meeting room, he put the bottle on the table and I set the glasses down beside it before handing him the hard drive to set up on the projector. Without waiting for him to offer, I grabbed the bottle of booze, said a silent thank you when I saw it was whiskey—even if Fireball was a brand I didn’t recognise. I free-poured a couple of shots, not wanting to go overboard when I still had to drive back to my hotel, but needing something more than just a sip.

  The instant I placed the bottle back on the table, I grabbed my glass and lifted the shot to my lips. It didn’t smell like the whiskey I was used to drinking, but I was beyond caring. I was stuck on the other side of the planet from most of my family, searching for my missing daughter, and about to watch the last television interview she’d filmed before she disappeared, all with a man who either had something to do with her disappearance or might have earned his way back into her heart—depending on who I believed. If anyone could get through that without a drink, they were a stronger person than I was.