Genie didn’t have the answer for that. Monica feared nobody did.
The chaos of the evening required Monica to be absolutelyon,but she didn’t have the wherewithal. Everywhere she went, she searched for Abigail; everywhere she existed, she wanted to throw up in fear.
All they knew upfront? Isabella had taken Abigail somewhere. Without word. Withoutpermission.
Henry was the one who dissuaded Monica from immediately calling the police.“We need to find out some things before we do that.”Monica didn’t understand. She wanted to wring necks, cry, and drive a kitchen knife into her stomach to make this heinous reality go away.
Then Eva agreed with her brother, and Monica soon understood why. The two Warren-born siblings were more formidable to the staff than any police officer could be.
“I promise I don’t know anything else!” a teary-eyed Genie claimed when she was interrogated in Henry’s office. “I told you everything I know!”
“This is insanity,” the driver said when Henry dragged him in from the garage, where he had missed most of the drama while servicing Monica’s car. “I was with you all weekend! Did someone take Abby? Who? Who took her?Lady Warren?Jesus…”
“I assure you that Lady Warren gave no inclination of going somewhere, let alone with Miss Abigail,” Elson claimed when Monica called him and told him to get his ass back home from whatever social club he visited that night. “Have you two called the police yet? Ireallysuggest you call the police, Mr. and Mrs. Warren. That woman hasn’t sat right with me the last few times she’s been here.”
There were only two other people who might have immediately known something.
“I swear it’s exactly as I said.” Matilda, who looked like she was on the verge of a heart attack, paced back and forth in her room when she returned at Monica’s bidding. “Isabellainsistedthat I take the weekend off. She even gave me a reservation at The Grand in town, because she thought I should ‘have some time to myself.’ Well, you know, it’s been a while since I was treated to something, so…”
She stopped. Henry urged her to continue. “Was my mother acting strange in any way?” He coughed his own words. “Besides the usual.”
Matilda shook her head until something dawned on her. “Friday night, when she gave me the weekend off, she did ask a couple of things about Abigail. Namely, she wanted to know where we keep all of her ‘lovely clothes’ and said it so she could dress her for church on Sunday. I showed her the closetacross the hall where we keep Abigail’s party dresses. She was delighted. I mean, Abigail…”
Monica latched onto this one piece of hope. “Abigail was with you?”
“Yes. She never left Isabella’s side. She even said that her grandmother had a surprise for her but didn’t know what yet.”
“Damnit, that tells us nothing!”
Henry rounded on his wife, his stance intimidating but his voice reassuring. “It tells us that there’s a chance my mother has simplyreally crossed a boundarybut isn’t up to anything nefarious. They might have gone to DisneyWorld for all we know.”
“Without telling us? Without telling anyone? Abigail has school tomorrow!”
“You know how my mother is! When I was Abigail’s age, we would sometimes abscond to places around the country that my mother thought were pertinent to my upbringing or because she wanted a photoshoot. She did the same thing to Eva, too. Ask her about that time our mother took her out of school for a week to tour France!”
Something about the reminder ofFrancegnawed at Monica’s mind, but she couldn’t see reason. Not until she found out where the fuck her daughter was!
The last person to interrogate was Gerald, but he was also nowhere to be found. Yet the staff confirmed that he had left Friday afternoon, shortly after everyone else. The rumor was that he had flown back to Montana early. While Henry called the local airfield to inquire about what the family plane had been up to, Monica marched into the main house, where she found Eva and Nadia sitting at the dining table with microwavable soup and crackers.Right… dinner.
“Any news?” Eva quickly asked.
“Not much. Only that your father left shortly after us on Friday, and that your mother has apparently taken Abigail… somewhere.”
“I keep trying to message and call her, but then I remember she left her phone here! That’s so unlike her. Unless…”
Nadia looked up from her soup. “She totally would, Eva. Your mother is a monster.”
“Yes, I know! A fucking righteous monster who would kidnap her own granddaughter!”
A new lump formed in Monica’s throat. “Kidnap?”
“I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have suggested it.”
“Monica.”
She turned at the sound of her husband’s voice. Henry hurried forward, phone in hand.
“What did you learn?”
