He had hired investigators, contacted hospitals, visited county offices, and spent nights in cheap motels after following rumors that turned out to be nothing. He had searched Phoenix, Tucson, Albuquerque, Las Vegas, and small towns whose names he had forgotten almost as quickly as he had arrived.
He had questioned people who claimed to know Mara.
Some had lied for money.
Some had lied because they wanted to help.
Others had genuinely believed they had seen her, only to discover that grief could make a stranger's face resemble the person you missed most.
Every lead had ended the same way.
Nothing.
Eventually, his friends stopped asking whether he had found anything. They learned to recognize the look on his face whenever his phone rang late at night.
Colton had never stopped searching.
He had simply learned how to keep searching without letting anyone see what it cost him.
Now a little girl stood beside his booth and told him that her mother had the same tattoo as his missing sister.
He placed the coffee mug on the table very carefully.
“What is your name?”
“Lila.”
“That's a pretty name.”
She didn't smile.
“Thank you.”
“How old are you, Lila?”
“Six.”
“Are you here with your mom?”
She nodded.
“Where is she?”
The little girl glanced toward the hallway leading to the restrooms.
“She's not here right now.”
Colton felt his heart begin to beat harder.
“What does your mom look like?”
Lila studied him as though she were deciding whether he deserved an answer.
“Brown hair. Blue eyes. She has a little scar here.”
She touched the skin near her left eyebrow.
Colton stopped breathing for a moment.
Mara had a scar in exactly that place.
She had gotten it when she was nine, falling from the low stone wall behind their grandmother's orchard. Colton had been supposed to catch her. Instead, he had watched her tumble into the weeds, where she split her eyebrow on a broken piece of pottery.
Their father had been furious.
Their grandmother had cleaned the wound.
Colton had spent the rest of the day sitting beside Mara's bed, convinced that he had somehow failed at the one job that mattered.
Mara had forgiven him before dinner.
She had even given him half of her chocolate bar.
“What's your mother's name?” he asked.
Lila opened her mouth.
A man's voice cut through the diner.
“Lila.”
The girl flinched.
Colton looked up.
A man in his early forties had emerged from the restroom hallway. He wore dark jeans, a gray button-down shirt, and a brown jacket that looked expensive without being flashy. His hair was neatly trimmed, and his face had the controlled expression of someone who had spent years practicing how not to reveal what he was thinking.
Colton had noticed him earlier.
The man had been sitting alone in the booth across the aisle, barely touching his food. He had checked his phone several times and looked toward the entrance whenever the bell above the door rang.
Colton had assumed he was waiting for someone.
Now the man crossed the diner with quick, measured steps.
“I told you to stay in the booth.”
Lila hugged her rabbit more tightly.
“I was just talking.”
“I can see that.”
The man's eyes moved to Colton.
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then the man reached for the child's shoulder.
Colton caught his wrist.
He did not squeeze hard enough to hurt him. He simply stopped the movement.
The man looked down at Colton's hand.
“Let go.”
“Who are you?”
“Someone who doesn't appreciate strangers questioning children.”
“Then you should probably stop frightening her.”
A silence spread through the nearest booths.
The waitress, a broad-shouldered woman in her fifties named Carla, paused beside the counter with a coffeepot in her hand.
Two truck drivers near the window stopped talking.
Lila took a small step backward.
Not toward the man.
Toward Colton.
The movement was almost invisible, but Colton saw it.
So did the man.
His jaw tightened.
“Lila, come here.”
She shook her head.
“I want to stay.”
“Now.”
Colton released the man's wrist and stood.
He was six feet three, broad through the shoulders, with the weathered hands of a mechanic and the quiet physical confidence of someone who had spent much of his life around motorcycles, tools, and men who mistook aggression for strength.
The other man was not small, but Colton had several inches on him.
More importantly, Colton had no intention of allowing a frightened child to be dragged away before he understood why she was afraid.
“I'm going to ask you one question,” Colton said. “And I suggest you answer it honestly.”
The man gave a humorless smile.
“You don't get to interrogate me.”
“Who is her mother?”
“That's none of your business.”
“It became my business when she told me her mother has my sister's tattoo.”
The man's expression changed.
Only for an instant.
But Colton saw the fear behind his eyes.
The man's name, he would soon learn, was Darren Cole.