Page 68 of Lost and Found

“Two days ago?” Her eyes bulged. “How is that possible?”

“Where was the card stolen from?” Wes asked, sidestepping her confusion about the timing.

It didn’t line up exactly with when they’d decided to make the trip. She’d been talking to Jennifer Yang, but they hadn’t made any decisions. Her devices were compromised. Nothing else made sense.

“DC, near the Smithsonians. A tourist didn’t even realize the card was missing.”

“I’d like it a lot better if it had been purchased off the dark web.”

“Same,” Dean agreed.

Bailey didn’t see their logic. “Why?”

“Proximity. Familiarity.” Wes pursed his lips as he sifted through the information. “This was planned and executed by someone local who knows what they’re doing.”

“Yes,” Dean agreed. “That’s how I would describe it as well.”

“Why follow us to New Jersey? They could have grabbed everything from my office or home while I’ve been gone.”

“To see if you uncovered something new from the past,” Dean said. “But I don’t know how that could be time-sensitive unless Jennifer Yang knew who killed Caitie and decided today was the day to fess up.”

Nodding, Wes stroked his chin. “The only other reason is to scare you. That’s a lot of work. The stolen credit card, the car rental, driving to New Jersey—it’s a lot of effort to harass you.”

“You guys really think that Jennifer and I know something, but we haven’t realized it?”

“Yeah.”

“Yes.”

Hearing that she knew an important detail without realizing it felt like pulling a perennial weed, only for it to erupt again. She couldn’t get rid of it. “I don’t know who killed her.”

“The killer thinks you do.” He lifted his shoulders. “Kimbra and Angus know you’re traveling. They have the means to hire someone.”

She scowled. “You’re putting Ryan back on your ridiculous suspect list again?”

“I never took him off.”

Dean didn’t jump in. The quiet loomed as she waited for either man to add a caveat to Ryan’s inclusion as a suspect. “Both of you think that?”

The seconds crawled by.

“All right,” Dean broke the silence. “I’m going to reach out to Viv and get her two cents.”

Wes ended the call and gave her a look far too close to pity for Bailey to be comfortable with. “Forget that you were married to Ryan—”

“I can’t.”

He settled back, calm amid her storm. “If you were looking at this from a completely unemotional vantage point, you would tell me that Angus and Kimbra Cosgrove have the resources to do whatever it takes to keep their dead son’s name out of the spotlight. They’re obsessed with their family legacy.”

“Having the resources doesn’t mean it was Ryan.” Wes and Dean didn’t know how broken Ryan was over Caitie’s death. They didn’t see the pain of a man who wished he could go back in time, and, God, she wished it too. She’d give up everything—everything except Matt—to change the past.

“There could be things you don’t know about him,” Wes gently offered. “People don’t know everything about their spouses.”

“We did.”

He released a long breath and stared out the window. His jaw ticked. His unfocused stare pooled in her stomach, building her trepidation.

She inched closer until they both looked out onto the parking lot. A gaggle of teenage lacrosse players was loading into two white vans. The world kept turning while she was stuck digging through the past. “What is it?”