Chapter 15 - Lucas Disappeared
Every argument ended instantly.
“What do you mean gone?”
Natalie struggled to breathe.
“He left a note.”
Michael grabbed his coat.
“What does it say?”
I put the call on speaker.
Natalie read it.
I’m sorry everybody is fighting because of me.
I’m going somewhere nobody has to choose.
My stomach dropped.
Michael was already moving.
“Where would he go?”
“The park.”
“The arcade.”
“School.”
Natalie listed places.
Rachel called police.
I searched the nearby bus routes from my phone.
Then Emma called.
I almost ignored it because she was with a friend’s mother.
Something made me answer.
“Mom?”
“Emma, sweetheart, I’m busy.”
“Is Lucas okay?”
I froze.
“Why are you asking?”
“He messaged me.”
Everything stopped.
“What?”
Emma explained Michael had given Lucas her tablet username weeks earlier.
He never told me.
Neither child had messaged until that afternoon.
“What did he say?”
“He said sorry.”
“Then he asked if Grandpa Thomas’s old park was near our house.”
I looked at Michael.
His face changed.
“Maple Ridge.”
Thomas had taken Emma there when she was little.
Michael grabbed his keys.
We drove too fast without driving recklessly.
Snow from the previous week still clung to the grass.
The park was nearly empty.
Then Michael saw him.
Lucas sat on the lowest bleacher beside the baseball field.
His backpack rested between his feet.
Michael stopped twenty yards away.
For a moment, he could not move.
I touched his arm.
“Go.”
He approached slowly.
Lucas looked up.
Michael knelt in front of him.
We stayed back.
I could not hear the first words.
Then Lucas shouted.
“You keep lying!”
Michael’s shoulders folded.
“I know.”
“Grandma says Mom lies.”
“Mom says Grandma lies.”
“You said Claire knew.”
“She didn’t.”
“So you lied too!”
“Yes.”
Lucas began crying.
Michael did not defend himself.
He did not explain fear.
He did not blame Diane.
He simply said, “Yes.”
Then Lucas asked the question none of us expected.
“Did you not want me?”
Michael’s face broke.
He pulled Lucas into his arms.
“I wanted you the second I knew the truth.”
“I should have found out sooner.”
“I should have fought harder.”
“I should have questioned what I was told.”
“That is on me.”
“Not you.”
Lucas cried against his father.
I turned away.
Not because I wanted to give them privacy.
Because Emma’s earlier question returned to me.
Does he hate us?
No child should have carried the weight these adults kept handing them.
Natalie arrived five minutes later.
She ran to Lucas.
Then police confirmed he was safe.
Afterward, Michael walked toward me.
“I gave him Emma’s username.”
“I know.”
“I thought maybe someday—”
I raised my hand.
“Not today.”
He nodded.
That was when Rachel approached.
Her face was pale.
“Claire.”
“What?”
“There is something I have to tell you.”
I stared at her.
She looked at Michael.
Then back at me.
“I knew he gave Lucas Emma’s contact information.”
May you like
The betrayal shifted again.
This time, it came from my own sister.
