Remember, Chase. Remember your purpose.
He was getting nowhere. He finished his beer, tossed a five on the table. The lights of Nashville beckoned him. He decided to go for a stroll.
Music blared from speakers on every street corner. There were lines around the block to several bars: Legends Corner, Tootsies. Drunk girls weaved on too-high platforms and too-short skirts, arms around one another. Bridal parties crowded the sidewalks, none of them looking at all happy. He didn’t understand that. Wasn’t a wedding supposed to be a dream? Or had women these days gotten so entitled, so ferociously into themselves, that even the fun parts of the process were misery? Were they simply marrying because it was expected?
Was that what happened with Aubrey and Josh?
She’d told him they’d been childhood sweethearts. That she worked two jobs so Josh could go to medical school. He couldn’t help but think Hamilton was a total idiot. Clearly he’d gotten greedy somewhere along the way. He’d been up to no good.
“Watch out, asshole!”
Two drunk girls had weaved into his path, bumping his arm, spitting their vitriol his way instead of apologizing. He almost retorted, but the face of the one on the left was green, and he figured he would be safer just stepping away rather than getting puked on. He liked his Italian leather loafers, thank you very much.
The heaving mass of humanity on the Saturday night streets was endlessly fascinating. He parked himself on the rooftop of Rippy’s, ordered a barbecue sandwich and a beer, and watched.
And thought about innocence, and curly blond hair spilling carelessly across a white pillow, and his next moves.
CHAPTER 18
Aubrey
Five Years Ago
“9-1-1, what is your emergency?”
Stay cool, Aubrey. Don’t get hysterical.
“My husband has gone missing.”
Aubrey felt rather than heard the sigh on the other end of the line.
“How long has he been gone, ma’am?”
“It’s been a little over four hours since anyone has seen him.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but we can’t take a report until he’s been gone for twenty-four hours.”
“No, you have to listen to me. We were in a car accident this afternoon. He seemed fine, but he could have some sort of medical issue that we weren’t aware of. He’s a doctor. Please. Something is wrong. I can feel it.”
“Ma’am, our policy—”
“Fuck your policy. This is my husband we’re talking about.”
Aubrey heard the woman’s sharp “Ma’am!” before Arlo wrenched the phone from her ear.
“My name is Arlo Tonturian. I am a friend of the missing man, and I’m also a lawyer here in town. Josh Hamilton is supposed to be the best man at his best friend’s wedding tomorrow. He never showed up to the bachelor party, despite arriving on the premises of the hotel where the party was located four hours ago. We fear there has been foul play. We would appreciate being able to speak to a detective immediately.”
Arlo gave Aubrey the thumbs-up, his brown eyes soft but insistent. Aubrey mouthed a thank-you, sat on the floor with her arms wrapped around her legs, listening with half an ear.
She and Arlo had looked everywhere in the hotel for Josh. He’d vanished into thin air. No one seemed to remember seeing him. Without some sort of warrant, the hotel security people weren’t willing to look at their videotapes. Everyone—the hotel staff, their security—seemed to think Josh had just left her. Walked away after giving her a kiss, off into the sunset. They were all acting like this was nothing, that he’d probably snuck off to meet someone, a lover, perhaps, not expecting people to be looking for him. She didn’t even know how to combat that sort of idiocy. All she could do was tell them, over and over, Josh wouldn’t do that. She knew it, deep down. He was loyal to the core.
Especially since that day when she’d seen him at Starbucks, talking to a fellow med student, a pretty girl with shiny blond hair, straight as a whip, who laughed with her head thrown back and touched Josh’s hand, making him smile widely, and lost her ever-loving mind at him when he got home. In the face of her rage, he’d assured her they were just friends, he hadn’t been doing anything, he’d never loved anyone but her.
He never had. She knew that was true.
Arlo bent down to her, squeezed her shoulder gently. “I think they’re going to help. They want to know what he was wearing. Do you remember?”
She thought back to the moment she walked down the stairs at the house, Josh’s wide smile floating into her mind. She fought back tears.
“White button-down, khakis, Topsiders, dark brown with a white sole.”
“His exact height?”
“Six foot one. He weighs one seventy-five now.”
“Okay.” Arlo relayed the information, along with brown hair, blue eyes. He listened for a moment, looked at Aubrey. “Any scars? I know he doesn’t have any tattoos.”