list. “Next are the bridesmaids, followed by Mena as the maid of honor.” I took my spot behind Violet, wishing I could walk next to Peter so that I could get him to open up to me some more. “Finally, before Elle’s big entrance, we have the flower girl and the ring bearer.”
The little girl with the brunette curls took her spot, but Jackson, the ring bearer, was nowhere to be found.
“Jackson?” Amanda called her son, frustrated. “Jackson!” As she spun around, looking around the grounds, her frustration quickly melted into concern. “Jackson, where are you!”
“Jackson!” Peter called nervously. He stepped out of the line, looking from left to right, as we all were doing now.
“I thought he was with you!” Amanda exclaimed accusingly.
“You’re the one who told him to go stand by Elle!” Peter shook his head. “Look, blaming each other isn’t going to find him. Let’s split up. He couldn’t have gotten far.”
“We’ll search the east side of the property,” Elle volunteered herself and Luke.
“I’ll look in the gardens,” Violet added.
“Suzanne and I will search the west end, near the river.” Candy and Suzanne—the woman formerly known as the officiant—took off.
“Oh God, the river!” Amanda shrieked.
My panic rose right along with hers. We may not see eye-to-eye on most things, but when it came to Jackson, our feelings were aligned. That little boy meant the world to the both of us; the one bond we shared. “He wouldn’t have gone near the river,” I said to assuage my own fears more than anything. “Jackson hates the water.”
“Mena’s right.” Peter put his hand on Amanda’s shoulders, giving me an appreciative smile. “You know how much the kid hates baths.” Amanda nodded, wiping away her tears with the back of her hand.
In my peripheral vision, I spotted a figure approaching. Phineas. He must have heard the commotion. “Why don’t you two search the south end of the property? Phineas and I will take the north,” I proposed, just as he reached our group.
Peter nodded, guiding a distraught Amanda down the cobblestones, calling out for Jackson with each footstep.
“What’s going on?” Phineas asked, concerned.
“Jackson’s missing.”
“What? Oh no!” He looked around as though only his eyes could detect what the rest of ours had missed. By this point, everyone had scattered in opposite directions, aside from Tom, who sat on a bench near one of the gardens. “If I hadn’t been focused on my damn phone—”
“What? You would have seen him? There was an entire group of us and not a single person noticed him slipping away. You can’t blame yourself.” I turned around, scanning the various outbuildings, most of which were already being searched, before turning back around to face Phineas.
“We’ll find him.” His thumb brushed my cheek, wiping away a tear I hadn’t realized had fallen.
I nodded, doing my best to keep it together as I followed Phineas back up the walkway. Frantic calls for Jackson surrounded us like mockingbirds, each call imitating the other, more frantic that its predecessor. We took a sharp turn down a path consisting of loose stones. Along that path stood a small tool shed. When we came upon it, Phineas threw its doors open, scanning the contents inside. Something told me Jackson wouldn’t be in there, just as something told me he wouldn’t be responding to anyone calling his name, even though I was positive that wherever he was, he probably heard our calls. He was a smart boy, and his disappearance was his own doing. He was upset, scared, and much like Peter, wanted to deal with his feelings on his own terms.
Wait. He was scared. Scared. That’s it!
“I get scared sometimes, too, but I deal with it.”
“What do you do to help you not feel so scared?”
“I find some place to hide where I can be by myself. My nana has a tree house in her backyard. I go there. It’s up high and no one ever thinks to look there.”
That seemingly innocuous conversation happened so long ago, yet it was jam-packed with clues now. “Oh my God.” My eyes widened.
“What?” Phineas asked, looking around. “What is it? Do you see him?”
“No, but I think I might have an idea where he may be. I-I have to find Karen Hargrove.”
Without providing any sort of an explanation to Phineas, I sprinted off in the direction of the farmhouse, pushing my tiny legs to their limit.
“Mena, wait!” Phineas called behind me, but I was on a mission and waiting wasn’t an option.
Thistles scraped my