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Nora
Nora pulled her old car back into the police station lot and hurriedly climbed out.
Doris looked up at the sound of the door opening, and her face fell. Nora could read her mind: oh, you again.
“I found his phone,” Nora said and was a little embarrassed by the excitement in her voice.
Doris surprised her by looking interested. “What do you mean? Found it where?”
“I found it in the middle of nowhere, in a field.”
Doris’s expression sobered. She nodded. “I’ll let Officer Pettiford know.” She turned toward the phone, spoke quietly into the receiver, and then turned back to Nora. “He’ll be right here.”
Nora had her doubts, but they were unfounded. Officer Pettiford did materialize in the lobby, introduced himself, and offered his hand. She was dismayed to see that he was the officer she’d almost stopped, the one who’d come in carrying a coffee. She accepted his handshake.
“Where did you find the phone exactly?”
She pulled her own phone out of her pocket and reopened the tracking app. As soon as she did, the map swept across the peninsula and showed her Levi’s phone was now at the police station. Embarrassed and scared Officer Pettiford would get bored and wander away, she hurried to swipe the map away from the phone’s current location and back to Clark Cove Road.
She was grateful that she managed to do this without complications.
He peered down at her phone. “Clark Cove Road. I haven’t been down there in a while. What’s out there?”
She shook her head quickly. “Not much. Some summer homes, but I found the phone in a field. Across the road from that field was another field. This means that he didn’t just wander off. This means something happened to him. Someone put his phone in that field—”
Officer Pettiford backed up a foot and held up one hand. “Not necessarily, ma’am. He could have dropped it.”
This was bull, and she thought he knew it.
“Does he know anyone who lives on that road?”
“I don’t think so. And I know he doesn’t know anyone who lives in that field.”
He nodded solemnly. “Okay. Hang on, let me get an evidence bag.” He vanished, and her brain spun to figure out why he would want or need an evidence bag. Then it hit her. The phone! Shoot, but she’d hardly looked at it yet. She woke his phone and typed in his password.
Except it wasn’t his password anymore. She nearly growled. She’d forced him to tell her his password, and he wasn’t allowed to change it. Yet he had disobeyed her, and now he might suffer because of it. Or had he changed it? Maybe someone else had changed it. Maybe the person who’d thrown it into the field had changed the password. But would Levi tell anyone else his password? Maybe under duress? She didn’t know. Shane. Would Shane know his password?
Officer Pettiford returned with a plastic bag. “Have you touched the phone?”
Of course she’d touched it. She was holding it now. She held it up to show him. “Of course. I picked it up off the ground.”
He nodded, and she sensed he was trying not to show his disappointment. “That’s all right. Without moving your hand, please drop it into the bag. We’ll try to find prints on it.”
She was an idiot. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Why had she gone ahead and smeared her own fingerprints all over the phone? “Sorry,” she said meekly. She dropped the phone into the bag. “It’s password protected.”
“That’s all right.” He closed the bag. “With your permission, we can get around that.”
“Of course. And when you do, can you read his recent text messages? That might tell you something.”
He gave her a smirk that suggested that of course, they would think of that.
“Sorry.” She suddenly felt so small and so tired that she wasn’t sure she was going to make it through the day. Maybe she’d melt into a puddle right there in the police station lobby. Or maybe she’d just vanish entirely. Like smoke.
He held a business card out to her. “I’ll call you the second we learn anything.”
She took it and avoided his eyes. “Thank you,” she mumbled. “What can I do now?”
“You can post his picture on social media. Ask for some shares.”
She wanted to kick herself. Why hadn’t she thought of that already?
“Other than that, there’s not much you can do. Try to get some rest. Maybe pray if you’re the praying type.” His body turned away, but he still looked at her. “We’ll find him, Mrs. Langford.”
How could he possibly know that? “Thank you, Officer.”
“Carl, please.”
She nodded and bit her lip. The tears had returned. She turned and walked out of the police station on stiff legs. It wasn’t until she was out in the rain that she wondered if she should have contacted a bigger police organization. Wouldn’t the State Police have better resources? They had officers, detectives even, with more experience. They had better technology, and she assumed, better forensics. They even had dogs. She almost turned around and asked about calling them in, or maybe even the FBI, but then she realized how much Officer Carl Pettiford wouldn’t like that suggestion. If the Carver Harbor Police needed help, they would call it in themselves, right?
Wouldn’t they?
She opened her social media app and checked for notifications. Her previous post had garnered a few comments, but nothing helpful. “Will call if I see him” and “Levi, call your mom. Don’t be a punk!” and “I’ll be praying.”
Praying. She’d take whatever help she could get, but she wasn’t confident that praying would help much. Then she remembered that her car had started after she’d prayed. Coincidence? Probably.
She spent too much time scrolling through pictures of Levi. She didn’t have many, and most of them were old. He didn’t like having his picture taken, and she didn’t like provoking his wrath. She wanted to find one that wouldn’t embarrass him, but finally decided that didn’t matter right now. She chose a recent one and posted it with the words: “Missing from Carver Harbor. Please share!” She hit “post” and then before the photo had uploaded, started trying to press “edit.” Finally, she was able to edit her post and she added her phone number along with, “Prayers appreciated.”
