Jenna hung up the phone on the corner of Sylvia’s desk. “I grounded Dom’s water taxi. No planes can come in or out without Ben’s permission, and the marinas are shut down. No boats in or out.”

“I have my volunteers and the few officers we have split between searching and watching the obvious ways off the island,” Ben said. “More officers are on the way, but we need to move now.”

That sounded positive but Connor feared it wouldn’t be enough. Despite being a small island, Whitaker had too much water and land to cover. Too much land where no one lived and other patches where people did but didn’t take to strangers.

“Are we saying this marshal killed Owen?” Jenna asked.

Ben studied a map of the island they’d tacked up on Sylvia’s wall. It wasn’t recent but it could give them a lead. “We don’t know that.”

“We can assume.” Connor didn’t think it was a leap to get there.

Ben turned and faced the one other person in the room. Daria sat in the chair across the desk from Jenna. He brought her in because with everyone else out looking for Maddie and Evan, and warning residents, either they moved to babysitting duty or they dumped her in a jail cell. Connor preferred the latter but Ben insisted she might help.

“Someone has been feeding you information,” Ben said to her. “That’s why you started all of this. The PI, the case files, coming here. You believed Maddie until the moment you didn’t, and someone wanted it that way.”

“Yes. I started getting emails. They claimed to be from someone in the prosecutor’s office and talked about Maddie being in on the financial scam. There were suggestions she was Grant’s partner and played me. That she walked away with a pile of cash and her freedom.” Her voice no longer held a defensive edge. The verbal battle she’d unleashed when she got to Whitaker was gone. She didn’t talk about things Maddie had done or cast blame. She sat there looking as confused and unsure as the rest of them.

Those emotions were nothing compared to the battle waging inside of Connor. It took all of his energy not to let his mind wander to the worst-case scenario. He would not be too late this time. They would get to her and stop whatever Evan had planned. There was no other answer.

A part of Connor still hoped Evan’s only need was escape. That he was using Maddie’s knowledge of the island for passage and holding her as a shield. But that didn’t explain the notes or trying to break into her house or Owen. No reasonable explanation covered all of those. And he refused to give the unreasonable reasons any space in his brain. Letting his mind go there spelled disaster.