Emma’s hackles rose at the way Steph said it. But jumbled with the instinct to defend her son was a flutter of nerves. She hadn’t been aware that Zeb and Freya were friends either. More than friends? They seemed such different teenagers: Freya social and sporty; Zeb more introverted, creative, obsessed with obscure bands and Marvel films.

“I’ve no idea,” she admitted.

George cleared his throat. “Could you contact your son, Miss Brighton?”

“Yes,” Steph said, that wildness back in her eyes. “Call him.”

Where was her phone? As Emma scanned the room she saw her sketchbook still open on the table. She prayed Steph wouldn’t recognize her own hair clasp among the drawings. And the windows around the edges of the page—Emma couldn’t stop sketching windows.

Spotting her phone on the sofa, she grabbed it and pulled up her recently dialed list, dominated by Zeb’s name. After weeks of longing to talk to him, she wasn’t sure she wanted him to answer this time, with Steph and George staring. Her mind raced as the phone rang: Zeb and Freya? Zeb and Freya?

“No answer,” she said, hanging up.

“Please keep trying him,” George said. “Could you supply us with a phone number and current address for him too?”

Emma nodded, her palms moist as she tore out a page of her sketchbook to write them down. Steph’s traumatized face made her maternal anxieties surge to the surface with renewed force. She should never have let Zeb go. Should have fought harder. How to Be a Better Parent, the book that had come through their door was called, with a mother and an adolescent boy on its cover. Emma had kept seeing that cover ever since, likening the boy to a younger Zeb, paranoia overtaking sense.

Did the book contain any advice that might have helped either Steph or herself hold on to their children?

Steph extended her hand and it took Emma a moment to realize she was asking for the photo strip back. For a second she felt territorial: It featured both their kids, so why should Steph get to make demands? But she was being ridiculous: They were Freya’s pictures. And perhaps they were evidence now. A shiver zipped through her. Evidence of what?

—

Left alone, Emma dialed Zeb’s number three more times, anxiety soaring again when there was still no response. She sent him a text: Need to speak to you, Z. It’s urgent.