“I’m so glad you’re here,” Doris told her, wringing a white handkerchief between her hands. “Miss Elizabeth needs you.”

Colette entered the library and sat down on the ottoman at the older woman’s feet. “Can you tell me what happened?” she asked softly.

Elizabeth shook her head. “No one knows. Christian is missing, lost somewhere inside China. No one’s seen him.” She swallowed hard. “For the past week, no one’s heard from him. A whole week.”

“He got on the plane in Seattle, correct?”

Elizabeth nodded. “According to the airline, Christian landed in Beijing. That’s where the trail stops. As far as his office is aware, he was scheduled to change to a connecting plane there, but he never arrived in the other city. I’ve forgotten its name,” she added fretfully.

“How did you hear about this?” she asked.

“My nephew Elliott phoned. Christian’s father. Someone at Dempsey Imports called him. He phoned me right afterward.”

“What’s being done to find him?” Colette asked, her mind darting in several different directions. Surely there were ways of locating someone inside a foreign country.

“Elliott asked if anyone had contacted the U.S. embassy, and apparently that’s been done. The hospitals have all been checked, jails, hotels. Other places, as well. Nothing.”

“Do you know the name of the person your nephew talked to at Dempsey Imports?” Colette hated to be drilling some poor staffer, but she needed as many facts as she could get.

“I…don’t.”

“Do you mind if I use your phone?”

“Of course not. Anything. I just have to know Christian’s alive.”

It’d been almost five months since Colette had talked to anyone at Dempsey Imports. In fact, she’d gone out of her way to avoid contact with her former friends. But none of that mattered now.

Elizabeth pointed to the hallway. “There’s a phone in there.” For the first time the old woman’s expression was hopeful, as if Colette might discover something no one else had.

Colette found the phone and turned on the hallway light. She didn’t need to look up the number or the extension. Even after all these months, it was still as familiar as her own.

Two short rings. “Jenny Hilton.”

“Jenny, it’s Colette Blake.”

“Colette! Oh, my goodness, Colette!” Jenny exploded with surprise. “What happened? It’s like you disappeared off the face of the earth. Everyone’s been asking about you and I didn’t know what to tell them.”

“I got another job,” Colette said. She wanted to keep explanations to a minimum.

“Oh, my goodness, have you heard about Mr. Dempsey?”

Before Colette could respond, Jenny continued. “He’s somewhere in China. At least that’s what we think—no one knows for sure. It’s all kind of crazy around here at the moment.”

“I heard,” Colette said, hoping for more information. “What can you tell me?”

“Not much,” murmured Jenny. “His assistant’s been on the phone for three solid days. Apparently Mr. Dempsey’s father is flying to China to start a private search. From what I understand, Mr. Dempsey was making one of his routine trips to Zhongshan, the same one he’s made at least a dozen times.”

“Anything else?”

“Just that no one’s heard from him, either here or in China. Most of the time it’s perfectly safe for tourists there…But the strange part is that he was supposed to visit the manufacturer in Zhongshan and they had no record of him coming.”

“They weren’t expecting him, then?” she asked in confusion.

“Right. But we thought that’s where he was. Anyway, Mr. Dempsey’s father checked into his flight plans and discovered he landed in Beijing but had never made a reservation to continue on to Zhongshan.”

If Colette was frightened before, it couldn’t compare to what she felt now. Wherever Christian was inside China, she had to believe it was connected to the mess he’d become involved in. She’d pleaded with him to get out; unless he did, there could be no future for them. Colette had begun to suspect that Christian had heeded her words. He’d tried to get out—and his disappearance was her fault. He’d done this for her…

Colette bit her lip. Christian had gotten in deeper than he’d ever intended and now he was trapped. The men involved in operations like this weren’t the forgiving kind. Maybe it was too late to get out; maybe he knew too much. That seemed the only logical explanation.

“It’s weird, you know,” Jenny was saying.

“What do you mean?” Colette asked. “Weird, how?”

“There’ve been all kinds of government agents here the last couple of days.”

Colette closed her eyes and swallowed hard. “Do you have any idea what they were looking for?” Another thought hit her. Maybe Christian didn’t want to be found. Maybe his disappearance was all part of some escape plan to avoid prosecution in the States. It made sense, and yet Colette couldn’t make herself accept it. He’d told her he was coming back, asked her to wait. He would never have done that if he’d planned to disappear.

Jenny sighed. “The agents talked to several people but not to anyone I know well, otherwise I would’ve asked what it’s all about. As you can imagine, the office has been buzzing, but it’s hard to tell which rumors have any basis in truth and which don’t.”

“Would you phone me if you hear anything new?” Colette asked.

“I would if I had your number,” Jenny said tartly. “You never answered my question. How come you disappeared like that?”

“I…needed a change.”

“Of friends, too, it seems.”

“I’m sorry, Jenny, it was just…too much. Do you understand?”

“Why are you so interested in what happened to Mr. Dempsey?”

“I worked for him for five years. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Okay, okay. Give me a number where I can reach you.”

Colette rattled off her cell phone number. After thanking Jenny and agreeing to get together when this was all over, she replaced the receiver.

Elizabeth stood in the hallway, leaning against the wall. “What did you learn?” she asked.

Colette told her what little she knew, but she kept her own suspicions—and the part about the government agents—to herself.

Christian’s great-aunt seemed to be more in control of her emotions now. “I don’t suppose there’s anything we can do other than pray,” she said. She looked older and frailer.

“Let’s have a cup of tea,” Colette suggested. “My mother told me everything seems better after tea.”

Elizabeth favored her with a smile. “Your mother is a wise woman.”

“Yes, she is,” Colette said. “I’ve missed her very much since my parents moved to Colorado.”

Elizabeth headed back into the library. “I’d be honored if you’d consider me family,” she murmured after slowly lowering herself into her chair.

“Then I will,” Colette told her.

“Will you stay?” Elizabeth asked.

“Of course.”

“Until we know?” she added. “I don’t think my heart can deal with more bad news.”

“I’ll stay with you,” Colette promised. Her own heart couldn’t take any more bad news, either.

CHAPTER 33

Alix Townsend

Jordan’s parents had invited Alix and Jordan to a barbecue at their home on Sunday afternoon. Hoping to patch things up with her future mother-in-law, Alix had readily accepted. She made a bowl of potato salad and baked a rhubarb cake, one of Jordan’s favorites.

Alix looked forward to being part of the Turner family, which she’d always seen as a delightful bonus to marrying Jordan. It was invitations such as this backyard barbecue that she’d longed for as a child. If her parents had friends over it was so they could drink together. What food there was on those occasions came from a fast-food joint.

When the kids at school talked about camping trips and picnics, Alix had nothing to say. Not once in the entire time she was growing up had she walked through the woods or experienced a family outing.

Her fantasy family in the closet did all those things, though, and that was where Alix laughed and played and escaped.

Jordan picked her up before church and placed the salad in a cooler he’d brought in his trunk.

“That cake doesn’t happen to be rhubarb, does it?” he asked, eyeing the glass dish hopefully.

“It might.”

Grinning, he settled his arm around her shoulders. “You love me, don’t you?”

“I must,” she returned. He’d been teasing but she was entirely serious. She’d never been this happy, never known she could be. It still astonished her that this very special man could see past the gruff exterior she’d maintained a few years ago, when she was working at the video store. That was where they’d reconnected. She would be forever thankful for his persistence and his ability to recognize the real Alix Townsend beneath the spike-haired, leather-jacketed tough girl she’d been back then. Come to think of it, though, her appearance hadn’t changed that much….

Today, however, in deference to his parents, she wore a straight khaki skirt, plain white blouse and ballet-style flats.

After church, Jordan drove to his parents’ house in south Seattle. His father, Larry, was a pastor at the Free Methodist Church there. The parsonage was next door, a brick, single-family home built in the 1950s, long before either Jordan or Alix was born. The front lawn had recently been mowed and Alix could see a thin line of smoke spiraling from the backyard.

“Looks like Dad’s already got the barbecue going,” Jordan said as he led the way into the house. “Less work for me.” He didn’t knock, but opened the front door and walked in, calling out as he did. “Mom, Dad! We’re here.”

Susan came out of the kitchen, her face wreathed in a smile. She hugged each in turn, and Alix could tell that her welcome held nothing back.

“I brought a cake and a salad,” she told her, setting the cake on the table. Jordan put the cooler on the kitchen counter.

“Alix,” Susan said, “that wasn’t necessary. My heavens, your wedding’s next week! You must have a hundred things to do.”

“Oh, no, everything’s under control.” Or it was now that the wedding had been scaled down to just Jordan’s family and their own close friends. Alix loved the simplicity of it—especially compared to the five-act play, complete with sets, props and a cast of thousands that Jacqueline and Susan had tried to produce.

Jordan’s father came inside, and father and son exchanged hugs.

Alix liked the fact that her fiancé and his father had such a good relationship. When it came time to start their family, she knew Jordan would be a wonderful dad and his parents would be ideal grandparents. That was a comfort—although the thought of motherhood still scared her. She told herself repeatedly that it was something she didn’t need to worry about yet.