The call connected before Ethan could say my name.
“Mrs.
Olivia?” a man answered.
I kept my eyes on my husband.
“Yes,” I said.
“The vehicle just left the house.
Pearl-white SUV.
My sister-in-law is driving it.”
Ethan’s expression changed instantly.
Until that second, he had still been trying to understand what I knew.
Now he understood that whatever game he thought he had been playing alone had another player.
He stepped toward me.
“Who are you calling?”
I moved away from him and continued speaking into the phone.
“She’s heading toward the mountains.
Please make sure she doesn’t get that far.”
His hand shot toward his pocket.
His phone.
I knew exactly who he wanted to call.
Tiffany.
“Don’t,” I said.
He stopped.
That single word frightened him more than screaming ever could have.
For years Ethan had known me as the wife who explained herself.
The wife who smoothed things over.
The wife who apologized when his mother insulted me because keeping peace felt easier than creating another family argument.
That woman had disappeared at 3:07 that morning.
“Olivia,” he said carefully, “what is going on?”
I almost admired the performance.
His eyebrows pulled together.
His voice softened.
He looked like a concerned husband standing in his own kitchen while his unreasonable wife behaved strangely.
Then his phone began ringing.
Tiffany.
He stared at the screen.
I stared at him.
“Answer it,” I said.
He hesitated before putting the call on speaker.
“What?”
Tiffany sounded furious.
“Why is a police car behind us?”
Ethan’s knees nearly buckled.
Shane’s voice sounded somewhere beside her.
“They’re flashing us.
Pull over.”
“Ethan?” Tiffany demanded.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing,” he snapped too quickly.
“Just pull over.”
The line went dead.
Sharon came rushing from the kitchen carrying a dish towel.
“Police? What police?”
I slipped my phone into my pocket.
“They’re stopping Tiffany before she reaches the mountain roads.”
Sharon stared at me.
“Why?”
