As much as he wanted to be, Luke couldn’t be too angry with the detectives. He knew they were just doing their jobs and trying to get a vicious killer off the streets. If their positions were reversed, he would be doing the same thing they were. But by accusing him of the murders they were hurting Summer, and he hated seeing her in pain. Her happiness meant much more to him than his own.
The door opened, and he mentally prepared himself for another round of questioning. But when he looked at Detective Dawson who stood in the open doorway, the expression on the man’s face had him panicking.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
The detective hesitated. “It’s Summer.”
“Summer?” His panic ratcheted up several notches. “What happened to her?”
“She was drugged …”
Luke was now panicking so much he could barely think. “Drugged? Where is she? Is she in the hospital? Is she all right?”
Detective Dawson averted his gaze, then deliberately returned it to him. “She’s gone.”
Gone?
The word echoed in his head.
“Gone how?” he asked, not wanting to let the obvious sink in.
“She's missing. Hope Frasier and Chance Zieglar too.”
He heard the detective’s words, but they weren’t making any sense. Luke didn’twantthem to make any sense.
“Nick arrived at Hope and Chance’s new house,” Detective Dawson was saying. “The lights were off, when he got inside, he found Aggie passed out on the sofa in the lounge room. He searched the rest of the house, but it was empty. Aggie appeared to have been drugged, and there were cups on the lounge room floor. When paramedics took Aggie to the hospital they ran a drug test on her. She had been given Rohypnol. CSU also found remnants of the drug in the empty mugs.”
Luke just stared at him.
This had to be a nightmare, right?
He had been at the station for hours, perhaps he had fallen asleep, and his worst fears had decided to manifest themselves in his dreams.
“Who took her?”
“We don’t know.”
Anger took hold of him, pushing aside the fear and panic, and he jumped to his feet. He wasn't sitting around here while Summer was missing. He had to find her. She needed him.
“Where do you think you're going?” Detective Dawson moved to block the door.
“To look for Summer.”
“We have people looking for her.”
“You can't even find who was shooting at her house. How are you going to find her?” he demanded. He didn’t trust these cops as far as he could throw them.
“We’ll find her.”
He didn’t believe that. He made a move to leave the room, but once again the detective stopped him.
“Luke, you can't go,” Detective Dawson said quietly. “You're still our main suspect in the Nursery Rhyme murders. We’re working on an arrest warrant. You can't go anywhere right now.”
“I'm innocent,” he growled. He didn’t want to debate this while Summer was in danger.
“Maybe.” For the first time, Luke saw a hint of doubt in the cop’s light brown eyes. “But whether you are or you aren’t, I believe you care about Summer, and I know this is hard, but wewillfind her.”
He said it so confidently that Luke almost believed it. “How? How are you going to find her?”