exposed (Twisted Cedar Mysteries Book 3) Read Online Free PDF Page B

with Dougal standing beside her, his hand on her shoulder. Jamie was at the fridge, probably trying to find something to prepare for dinner, while Cory stood next to her, looking lost.
    “Charlotte, we can’t find Chester’s iPad.”
    “It wasn’t in his room? He always leaves it there, usually under his pillow, or sometimes in the bathroom, on the counter. Did you check the bathroom?”
    “We’ve looked everywhere , ma’am.” Tanya nodded. “Unless your house has a secret hiding place somewhere?”
    “Not that I know of. And I’ve lived here all my life.”
    Cory spoke then, her voice so quiet Wade could hardly hear her.
    “He took it to school.”
    “Did you say Chester took his iPad to school, Cory?” Wade repeated, to be sure.
    “Yes.”
    “Really?” Charlotte sounded surprised, so Wade inferred Chester wasn’t in the habit of disobeying her rules.
    To test this theory he asked, “Had Chester done this before? Taken the iPad when he wasn’t supposed to?”
    Her expression solemn, Cory gave a negative head shake. “This was the first time. And he made me promise not to tell.”
    Wade and Charlotte had already quizzed Cory on her brother’s disappearance, and she hadn’t said a word about the iPad. Wade had to make sure she understood this was no time to put loyalty to her brother ahead of his safety.
    “We need to find your brother, so it’s important you tell us everything you know. Was there anything else your brother asked you to keep secret today?”
    Cory glanced from him, to Charlotte, and then to Jamie, before saying, in the same quiet voice, “No.”
    Jamie put down the head of lettuce she’d removed from the fridge, and then took Cory’s hand. “Are you sure, honey? Try to think of anything that was unusual about today. You never know what little thing might help us find your brother.”
    “Does it have to be today?”
    Jamie glanced up at Wade, her eyes quickening with hope, then back at Cory. “It can be anything Chester told you, at any time.”
    Cory swallowed then said, “After our first day at school, Chester was really mad. The kids in our class kept calling Dad a jailbird.” She ducked her head shyly.
    “That was mean.” Jamie gave her a hug. “You must have been upset.”
    “I tried to ignore them. But Chester got mad. That night he told me...he said...”
    Cory paused long enough to glance up at her audience. Seeing everyone in the room focused intently on her, she dropped her gaze again, then whispered in Jamie’s ear.
    Jamie gave her another hug. “You did the right thing to tell me this, honey.”
    Then Jamie turned to the others. “He told Cory he wanted to run away.”
    * * *
    At nine p.m. Wade was back at the sheriff’s office, setting up the conference room as a central command post for the investigation. So far they’d come up with not a shred of evidence—not one single witness, either—to suggest where Chester had gone after school let out.
    Thanks to his sister’s sudden forthcoming attitude, they knew there was a high probability the boy was a voluntary runaway, which, for many reasons was reassuring. But not totally.
    Twisted Cedars was a town locked between the powerful Pacific Ocean on one side, and the wilderness of the Cascade Mountains on the other. There were plenty of dangers inherent to both to keep Wade up all night.
    Say the boy was hiding in the forest around the Librarian Cottage, for instance. Bears, wolves, cougars...all of those presented dangers. If the boy stayed away from the rivers, he’d risk dehydration. If he didn’t, he could unknowingly infect himself with dangerous bacteria that would cause vomiting and diarrhea, which would hasten the process of dehydration.
    Or he could be swept away by the current, which in many cases was much more powerful underneath the water than it appeared on the surface.
    One wall of the conference room was covered with a huge bulletin board, and on this Wade pinned a photograph of Chester above