“We‘ll go to sleep first,” said George. He turned and took out a blanket from the cabinet and laid it on
the bed. The four children huddled together in Harold‘s room and slowly fell asleep.
The night sky outside the window slowly became brighter. Dawn emerged as the morning sun rose
slowly up in the sky. A new day had come.
Harold was the first to wake up.
He jumped out of his bed. “Mommy must be back!” He opened the door and rushed out. Unfortunately,
he only saw Colin downstairs. He was alone, cleaning the table.
“Papa Brown, is Mommy awake?” Colin raised his head. “Mr. and Mdm. Winters have not come home
since heading out last night.”
Harold‘s face turned pale. “Mommy isn‘t home yet...”
He turned around and rushed into the master bedroom. The blanket was neatly folded. There was no
sign of people sleeping on that bed. This meant that his parents had not come home last night. “Calm
down.” George said calmly, “I‘ll call Daddy.”
Duke‘s phone vibrated.
He was standing on the road in the misty morning. With his sunken eyes, he could not see the end of
the road.
He had been standing for a long time and his neck had grown a little stiff. He slowly put the phone to
his ear.
“Daddy, where are you and Mommy?”
“Be good and wait at home until we‘re back.”
Duke hung up and slowly moved his fingers. Last night, he had taken Adina‘s phone and looked for her.
He searched every nearby road, but he could not find her anywhere.
‘She must‘ve found a place where no one can find her.
‘She must‘ve desperately wanted to be alone. I’ll let her, then.‘ So, he stood on the path that led to their
house and waited for her. From one o‘clock to seven o‘clock in the morning, from night to dawn...
Adina did not show up.
He felt like he missed something as the ominous premonition feeling in his heart continued to grow. He
felt even colder as the winter breeze blew past him.
Duke looked for Adina once again. He noticed a few people walking past the road, but Adina was
nowhere to be found.
He tooka deep breath and made a call. “Send all the surveillance videos within ten miles of the
mansion to my mailbox.”
He did not return home. Instead, he went straight to his company. He turned on several computers and
watched the surveillance videos at the same time. He finally found Adina. A bus stopped in front of her,
and she got onto it with an indifferent expression. He pursed his lips and his fingers tapped on the
keyboard quickly. Soon, he hacked into the bus monitoring system and followed its route to find Adina.
The bus stopped at the suburb of Sea City. He saw Adina get off the bus and walk on the dark road
with dimly lit lights. She looked so skinny that a gust of wind could blow her over. The winter night was
so cold, yet she only wore a hooded down jacket. She looked even thinner in that outfit.
There was a surveillance camera every seventy feet. So, for every seventy feet that Adina walked,
Duke quickly switched to the next surveillance video.
He watched her walk down the road.
Suddenly, at four in the morning, a dazzling light gradually appeared on the east side. She continued to
walk toward it without a break in her steps.
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