Alex stands. Sadness wafts off her. She brushes her dark hair out of her face. And her expression transitions to one of business. I recognize that move. When the emotion gets tough, focus on steps forward.

“You said they mirrored her accounts?” she asks me.

“Yes. You can see everything on the portal. Erik sent you a link.”

“I’m going to go check everything. See if I can figure out where she went.”

“I have a team doing that.”

“I know. But they don’t know Sophia. Her passport. Do you have it?”

Jack gets up and opens a cabinet door. Behind the door is a small fireproof safe. He unlocks it and lifts a navy passport.

“It’s here. She knows where I keep it, so if she wanted it, she could have accessed it,” Jack says.

“This doesn’t make sense.” Jack leans against the office wall and stares down at his feet. “I mean, you can disagree about a curfew, but you don’t run away.”

“Did you ever hit her?” Jack’s head snaps up. Agonized. Distraught. He hates hearing that question as much as I hate asking it.

“Never. Not once. She’s never been spanked. Cassie was completely against it.” He shakes his head, gazing out over the horizon. “When I said we had disagreements, I didn’t mean like that. The Sullivans don’t yell. We are reserved. We discuss. And I can promise you, I would never lift a hand to my daughter. Ever. I wasn’t a great dad. Not until Cassandra died. But when she came to live with me, I stopped business travel. Hell, that first year, I barely worked. I stepped down as CEO so I could be here for her transition. I mean, Cassandra’s death…it knocked us both off our feet. The next year, I returned to work. Spent a ton of time locked away in the office.” He looks directly at me. Solemn. Meditative. “Clearly, she was unhappy. But I never hit her.”

“Had to ask.” It’s an awful question, but an important one. One I’m sure the SDPD has already asked, but I needed to see his reaction. “My team is combing through her online life, but so far, we haven’t come up with any leads. We suspect she had a burner phone or some alternative electronic device she was using.”

“Why?”

“I think it’s unlikely she left here to go for a walk alone on the beach. She had to have been meeting up with someone.”

“She could have coordinated at school, right? You know, the old-fashioned way? Spoke to someone?”

“True. Although all her close friends from school are still at home and seem concerned.”

“I feel so helpless.” The back of Jack’s head thuds against the wall. He doesn’t flinch.

“I think it’s time to put it all over the news,” I tell him. “Have the world searching for her.”

“No.” He stares me down, jaw flexed. “No. Absolutely not. It’s clear she ran on her own volition. You put that in front of the media, they’re all over it. Not just now, but for the rest of her life. They’ll be hounding her, looking for a juicy story about a rich girl gone astray. No. Way.”