Boone’s jaw tightened. “How long ago?”
“Not long. I counted to one thousand.”
Lena drew in a shaky breath. Another rider, a bald man with wire-rim glasses, turned away and muttered something furious into the rain.
Boone kept his tone even. “Do you know your dad’s phone number?”
Emery nodded. Valerie made her memorize numbers in case of emergencies, though Emery suspected Valerie never expected her to use them this way.
One of the bikers, a younger woman named Tori, pulled out her phone. Boone let Emery recite the number. It rang once. Twice. Then voicemail.
Boone tried again.
Still nothing.
“Try the stepmother,” Lena said quietly.
Emery recited Valerie’s number.
This time, the call was declined instantly.
A visible ripple moved through the convoy.
Boone stood slowly, his expression darkening. “Call county dispatch.”
The bald man was already dialing.
Within minutes, two sheriff’s deputies were en route. Boone and Lena guided Emery beneath a portable awning one of the bikers had unpacked from a support truck farther back in the convoy. Someone handed her hot chocolate from a thermos. Someone else found a clean towel. Another biker knelt nearby and asked her about *Charlotte’s Web* in the most normal voice imaginable, as if she were simply waiting for a school bus instead of being rescued from a nightmare.
That was when Tori’s phone buzzed.
She looked down at the screen and frowned. “It’s from the stepmother.”
Boone held out his hand. Tori passed him the phone.
The text message was short.