Busted (Promise Harbor Wedding) - By Sydney Somers Page 0,40
not hearing more from her?”
“She left all her things here,” Mrs. Brewster hurried to add. “She left wearing that ridiculous bridesmaid outfit, with nothing else except her purse.”
Hayley nodded. “I can see how that would be worrying. But…” She paused, not wanting to give the two of them another reason to be disappointed.
“But,” Mrs. Brewster prompted, plenty of fire still left in her.
“But Greta was always sort of impulsive. As I recall.” Memories of Josh’s younger sister were vague at best, but she could have sworn Greta had disappeared once or twice when they were teenagers, only to turn up unharmed. “Couldn’t it be she just decided to go visit someone? Or take a couple days to decompress?”
Mrs. Brewster frowned and turned away.
“She just got divorced,” Mr. Ralston put in. “She didn’t tell Sophie.”
A fact Mrs. Brewster didn’t appear to appreciate, and after the wedding fail yesterday, finding out her daughter was keeping something from her wouldn’t have helped any.
Mrs. Brewster’s disapproving looks were legendary, and had undoubtedly kept more than a few students in line over the years. Would they have kept Greta from confiding in her mother about any plans after the wedding?
Careful not to make any assumptions about the nature of Mrs. Brewster’s and Greta’s relationship, Hayley closed her notebook. “Well, that could be a reason for her to want to take some time off to think, couldn’t it? I mean, if I were to come up with a reason for her to take off, having her marriage break up would be a good one.”
Regardless of their relationship, Mrs. Brewster was worried about her daughter, worried enough she’d asked specifically for Hayley, knowing how close she was to the man who’d ruined Josh’s wedding day.
“That’s true, but she could also have had an accident. Or worse. I just want to make sure she’s all right.” Mrs. Brewster’s voice wavered.
“I understand. Has Greta’s ex-husband heard from her?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Is there any reason to believe it was a bad breakup?”
“If you’re implying that he could be involved in her disappearance—”
“I’m just trying to cover all the bases, Mrs. Brewster. If you’ll give me his name and number, I can give him a call and see if there are any other places Greta might have gone that he knows of.”
“Of course.” Mrs. Brewster wrote the information down and handed it to Hayley.
“In the meantime I’ll check the accident reports and do a little calling around to make sure no unidentified accident victims have shown up at any of the hospitals in the area.” She offered a reassuring smile. “For what it’s worth, we probably would have heard about anything like that by now. That fact that we haven’t is really good news.”
Mrs. Brewster wasn’t impressed by that, and Hayley sensed her former teacher might already regret that she’d asked for her help.
“That’s good,” Mr. Ralston put in, trying to smooth over the rising tension. “That’s great. Thank you.”
“I’ll let you know what I find out.” She stood. “If you should hear anything from Greta…”
Surprised she made it to the door without either of them asking if she knew where Gavin was, Hayley stepped out into the sunlight. In the brief time she’d been inside, the air in the truck had heated to a stifling level, and she rolled the window down.
Once she made some calls and ruled out Greta being involved in an accident, she could head back to the house, assuming no other problems came up. But with unsolved robbery cases piling up, Jackson in town and Gavin, Allie and now Greta all AWOL, the odds of a quiet afternoon working on renovations were slim to none.
Jackson stood in the doorway to Coach’s den for ten minutes, unable to move all the way into the room. A fine layer of dust covered the surface of his desk. The old man hadn’t been here in a while and, if the doctors were to be believed, wouldn’t be coming home again.
Knowing the ache in his stomach wouldn’t get any better, Jackson crossed the threshold. Two steps into the room and he felt like he was invading Coach’s personal space. The sensation that any minute Coach would appear in the door and bark at Jackson for snooping followed him as he moved around.
Trophies covered the tops of bookcases and the thick window ledges. Banners and certificates covered two walls, leaving the television Coach had put in when his