Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 99918 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99918 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
“What happened?” David asked.
“No idea. All they would say is that they had Chloe. I’ve gotta go pick her up.”
“I can ride with you,” Rob offered.
“Thanks, but no, I’ll pick up Teri. Can you close everything down for me?” Dylan was already across his office. Kim stood at his door, holding his jacket out for him. He took it with a quickly mumbled thank you as he headed toward the bank of elevators. He pushed the call button while working his phone. He’d missed six calls from the same local number, which he assumed to be the police station.
The panic inside him started to recede, slowly turning more to anger. What had his daughter gotten herself into? The elevator doors opened as he punched in Teri’s number, but he would wait to push send until he made it out of the underground parking garage.
He jogged the distance to his car and drove a little too quickly toward the exit. At the gate, he finally hit send on his phone as the overhead security device registered his car’s parking tag and automatically opened. His Bluetooth connected and the phone began to ring as he pulled out onto the Central Expressway service road. Luck was on his side, the thunderstorm had finally subsided. He absolutely didn’t have the patience for cautious drivers right now.
“Hey, you, I’m almost packed. You sure you don’t want Nanny Laura to come sooner…” Teri’s voice filled the silence of his car and Dylan cut her off in mid-sentence.
“Chloe’s been arrested.” His tone was hard and unyielding.
“What?” Teri asked, confusion clear in her voice.
“Teri, Chloe’s been arrested. They say she’s unharmed, but dammit, I knew she was too young to be left at that school. She’s lost her head.” He’d never wanted his oldest daughter to go off so far away from home. The University of Oklahoma was too far to keep a good eye on her. Visions of skipping class and partying all day and night filled his mind, because that was exactly what he’d done his freshman year of college. Hell, those freshman-year all-night parties were the precise reason for Chloe making her appearance in this world.
Thoughts of his daughter and unprotected sex had a serious scowl forming on his face, taking his already bad mood to a boiling point.
“Dylan, stop and just tell me what happened,” Teri said, her tone changing to that firm lawyer voice she used when he got this way.
“I don’t know, Teri. All they said was that she’s safe, and we need to get there. When I asked questions, they ended the call. Get ready. I’ll be by to pick you up in less than ten minutes. I’m making the loop around Northwest Highway now,” he answered, carefully navigating the still wet roads.
“I need to get Cate and Chad home. Should they ride with us to Norman?”
“Yeah, that’s the other thing. She’s at the Highland Park police station,” Dylan said, increasing the speed of his sports car until he took the Mockingbird exit.
“Why’s she in town?” Teri had just asked one of about the hundred questions he had running through his head on a continuous loop.
“I don’t know. I was hoping you might.” Norman, Oklahoma, to Dallas, Texas, was a three-hour drive. Chloe hadn’t come home last weekend because she had mid-terms this week. There was no reason for her to be home today. He held his tongue on the rant raging through his mind. He wanted to declare he’d been absolutely right when he’d disagreed with Chloe’s decision to attend OU last fall. She clearly wasn’t ready to make adult decisions.
“She didn’t say anything to me,” Teri said the words he’d been thinking. “You were right. I should’ve listened.”
That was all the encouragement he needed to state his case. “Damn straight, I was right. Now we’re picking her up from a police station. Will this be on her permanent record?”
“There’s no way to know at this point, but she has testing this week.” The panic was back in Teri’s voice. “I bet she’s scared to death.”
“She needs to be scared to death. Being held at the police station can’t be good,” Dylan replied. “No, she needs to be scared to death of me. We didn’t give her that car for her to be traveling back and forth between Oklahoma and here at any given moment. I bet a boy’s involved.”
“Calm down, Dylan. You’re gonna make this worse. Where are you?”
“I’m turning on our street.”
“I’m heading outside now.” He ended the call when he saw Teri jogging down the front steps toward the street. He came to an abrupt stop long enough to let her get inside before he was off again. Neither spoke as the seriousness of the moment settled in, alleviating some of the anger Dylan held on to. Thank god they lived close by. When they arrived at the police station, the parking lot was crowded with cars, something he wasn’t entirely certain was the norm for seven thirty on a Monday evening in this affluent community.
“They’re busy tonight,” Teri stated, worry in her voice as she watched the hustle and bustle through the passenger side window. “Look, it’s Holly and Jack. So Allison’s involved.”
Dylan eyed the couple closely before cutting his gaze across the parking lot to find the closest vacant spot. Holly and Jack were Allison’s parents.
“What happened?” Teri called out to the other couple, getting out of the car before he even had the gear in place.
“No idea. We were just told Allison was arrested. We didn’t know Chloe was involved.” Dylan could hear the frantic edge in Holly’s voice. Teri and Holly fell in step together and walked briskly toward the police station’s front doors.
“What was Allison doing tonight?” Dylan asked Jack as they walked toward the front doors at a slower pace.
“As far as we knew, she went to bed early to be rested for her mid-terms tomorrow.”
“I should’ve been suspicious,” Holly called out over her shoulder. Dylan shoved his hands in his jeans pocket and kept his mouth shut. He’d never been a big fan of Allison’s. She was a wild-child to the extreme and Holly and Jack fostered those beliefs in their daughter.