“What was it like?”
“Short, like a boy’s, and she’d had it lightened—you know, the way some of these actresses are wearing it now. I guess it should have made her look younger, but thinking back, it didn’t, it kind of made her . . .” His words dried up, as if he’d realized he was about to say something he shouldn’t. Finally, he added, “She didn’t seem unhappy. I mean, she didn’t act like someone who needed to run away.”
Finn picked up the photo. “I know. Thanks for your help.”
As he walked out of the shop, the female assistant said, “I hope you find her!”
He raised his hand in an acknowledging wave but didn’t turn, and nor did he visit any of the other stores.
Hailey’s new identity had been planned carefully. She was at that fluid age anyway, when girls could morph into women with a change of clothes and the wrong make-up, but she’d judged it perfectly in only seeking to make herself a few years older: a student, a recognizable type. Like the assistants in the store, people would see the clothes, the hairstyle, the attitude, and it would never occur to them that they were looking at someone who was fifteen.
Fifteen no longer even seemed so very young. He’d been thinking of the Hailey he knew—albeit less well than perhaps he should have—a girl who still seemed like a child in his memory. No doubt her parents thought of her the same way, and yet Finn’s visit to Fate had made him see that she was on the cusp of adulthood. Maybe she wasn’t streetwise, something Debbie had insisted upon, but even if that were true, it wouldn’t stop her from acting streetwise.
He walked back, letting the chill and the late-afternoon sun work through him. He thought of Adrienne a couple of times and took his phone out, but put it back without calling her. It was pointless trying to speak to her when he still didn’t know why she’d left.
It didn’t help that he’d thought everything had been okay between them—routine, perhaps, which was understandable after four years, but still okay. Now, looking back, he felt how Debbie and Ethan Portman had to be increasingly feeling about their own lives, that he’d completely failed to see the warning signs, that he’d taken her love and her very presence for granted.
In a sense, though, Finn had more in common with Hailey than her parents, because he knew at some instinctive level that it was he who’d run away, not Adrienne. He’d been running away from his own past—that was the clichéd and comforting lie he told himself—but he’d run from her in the process.
As he neared home, he started to think about Hailey again, about the news he had to pass on to her parents. Superficially it was less than encouraging, and he could see that it would come as another blow to them. Not only had their daughter planned to run away, she’d made herself older.
The most innocent explanation was that she’d wanted to avoid suspicion as she traveled alone across Europe. More likely, she’d done it because the “friends” she claimed to be staying with were older themselves and she wanted to fit in with them, to match the persona she’d probably created online. For all the talk in the media of grooming and child exploitation, it was probably that simple.
Yet, strangely, even as his interest in the disappearance of Hailey Portman should have been waning, even as he should have been dismissing her as a spoiled and selfish kid, he actually found himself more intrigued. It was almost like the frisson he felt when he started working on a new book, the sense that this familiar story contained some deeper mystery, if only he could peel back the layers and find it.
Chapter Four
He stood outside their apartment for a moment, listening. It was so quiet he assumed Ethan wasn’t back, but when Finn knocked, it was Ethan who opened the door. For a moment there was a look of hostile confusion on Ethan’s face, so much so that Finn wondered if Debbie had told her husband about his involvement.
His expression uncoiled, though, and he stood back as he said, “Hey, Finn, we really appreciate this. Come in.”
Finn stepped into the apartment, but wondered now if Debbie had oversold the help he was offering.
“Any luck with the embassy?”
Ethan shook his head as he closed the door, saying quietly, “Not really, but Debbie called me about the passport while I was there and they said something about putting a watch on it.”
“Good—well, that’s something.” He didn’t want to say what he was really thinking, that it meant nothing, that Hailey was most likely still in Europe, that she’d taken the passport in the full knowledge that she’d almost certainly never have it checked.
“Come through to the living room. Debbie’s just lying down for a little while.”