Page 67

MILO

Before I go, I want to see Charlotte again.

I walk down the street with a backpack full of nothing but the essentials: a few stacks of money and a new identity. Driver’s license, Social Security card, US passport. Everything I need to ease off the grid and out of Boston for good. I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again, but this time feels different.

There was nothing keeping me in Cleveland. Or Des Moines. Or anywhere else I’ve hopped around. Boston, however, is a different story. A slightly more complicated one, too.

I come to a stop outside of Muffin Top. Of all the times I’ve walked into this bakery for a muffin and a cup of coffee, I never once knew that my daughter might have been upstairs. Or sitting at the table behind me with crayons and a juice box. I’ve seen a lot of weird shit, but I can honestly say that nothing has ever blown my mind quite as much as that fact.

I stand at the corner of the building by the alleyway and crane my neck around to look through the window. There’s about a dozen or so smiling, happy customers sitting at the tables. Men, women, a few kids, but not my kid.

“Can I help you, sir?”

I turn to see a short, plump woman in black standing behind me. “No, thank you,” I tell her.

She eases forward, her eyes shifting up and down. “Are you looking for somebody?” she asks.

“Yeah, a girl.”

“A girl?” she repeats.

I nod. “About four years old. Brown hair. Cute face. Have you seen one around here?”

She arches her blonde brows. “No…”

“Okay. Thanks, anyway.”

The woman takes a wide step around me and walks off into the bakery. I slink back to the corner and look in the windows, scanning the tables and chairs again for those colorful, familiar eyes.

Just one glance at my daughter and I’ll go. That’s all I ask.

“Hey, Milo.”

I jump and spin around to find Anna standing behind me in the alley. “Detective!” I choke on my gasp. “Hey. What, uh… What’s up?”

“What are you doing?” she asks.

“Just in the mood for a cupcake,” I say, playing it cool. “Thought I’d swing by on my lunch break.”

“Lunch break from what?”

I almost answer my taco truck, then I remember I don’t really have that anymore. She knows that. “Um…”

Anna crosses her arms and smiles. “My sister-in-law just told me about some weirdo standing around outside trying to kidnap little brown-haired girls.”

“I did not say that!” I pause. “Though I see now how it could be interpreted that way…”

She rolls her eyes.

“That was your sister-in-law?” I ask.

“Evey,” she says. “She owns the bar next door.”

I glance between the thick walls on either side of us. “The barmaid and the muffin man. That’s adorable.”

“What do you want?” she asks, her voice rock solid.

I let my smile drop. “I just wanted to see her.”