Chapter 430
Cadence was headed back into the building when I was walking out. I hadn’t needed anyone’s help to find her. I just sort of knew where she was. I wished that would work for Brandon right now.
Before she could even say anything to me, I sent her the picture of Dax’s text and said, “Take a look at this.”
I watched Cadence’s face scrunch up as she read over it at least once. She was puzzled, and I couldn’t blame her. It was pretty far-fetched to think someone could send a text from inside a portal. “When did he send that?” she asked, her face still scrunched. “Before the portal opened, I guess?”
“Look at the time. She received it at 7:00 AM our time. When I talked to her, she was all confused, wondering how in the world what he was saying could possibly be true.”
Cadence stared at me for a long time before scratching her head, shrugging, and saying, “I don’t understand either.” I realized she was holding my phone, not hers, and grabbed it out of her hand. “Have you heard from Brandon?”
I checked it quickly and was disappointed to see I had not. “No.” I’m sure he wouldn’t have considered texting me from inside a portal. It just seemed ridiculous. “But if Dax’s text really came from inside of the portal....”
She interrupted me. “Maybe he sent it before, and for some reason, it wasn’t delivered until after he was taken.”
That seemed even stupider to me than the idea that he sent it from inside the portal. ”I don’t know. Why would he be apologizing and saying he didn’t know where he was?”
Cadence shrugged. “Good question. West Virginia is God’s country, but it’s not like wherever they are now.”
“Cadence, I think... there’s a chance this came from inside, and if so, we might be able to communicate with them, which theoretically would make it a lot easier to get them out.”
“How, though, Cass?” I could see she was growing frustrated. “I mean, here, I’ll text Aaron right now.” She pulled out her phone and started typing furiously. “’Hey, babe! So you got sucked into a portal. Man, that stinks! Hope you’re having a good time!’”
I used my levitation powers to grab the phone out of her hands. “Don’t send that! Is that really what you want him to hear from you? What if I’m right?”
“Fine. You text Brandon and let me know if he answers. Believe me, I hope you’re right, but I think if they could use their phones, they’d be calling us already. Did Tara try texting him back?”
I let out a loud sigh. “Yeah, she got a message failure every time she tried to send it. She set it up to keep trying until it goes through.” I deleted the message Cadence had been typing to Aaron and handed her phone back to her. Seriously, what if that message had gone through? Who knows what he would’ve thought.
Cadence seemed a little less irritated and a little more sympathetic now. “Well, if it goes through, let me know. In the meantime, I have to get Daniel and his team to LAX to intercept Stewart, see if Job and others have come up with anything, and find someone who can read Scottish Gaelic.” She stepped around me and headed back toward the conference room.
I followed. I knew Christian was gone now, that he’d gone back to headquarters with Hannah. It had flickered across my IAC earlier, while I was meditating. “You told me to do that.”
She turned around and looked at me. “And you did?”
“Yeah, duh,” I replied, rolling my eyes and walking right past her.
Cadence caught up to me. “Who did you find?”
“You’ll just have to wait and see.” She made that face at me again, so I changed the subject. “Did you talk to Amanda?”
“I did. She’s really upset, but she’s going to fly to KC so she can be there when we find out what we need to do to get them back.”
I appreciated my sister’s positive attitude. “She’s gotta be beside herself.”
“She didn’t take it well.” We were almost to the conference room now. “I spoke to Mom and Dad, too. They’re going to handle the wedding guests. I told them to go ahead and postpone it, but I had no idea what to tell them to say to the guests. They can’t really tell anyone the truth, and I don’t want anyone to think Aaron and I are having problems.”
My stomach turned over, I felt so bad for my big sis. “I’m sure mom will think of something. Most people won’t be too nosy if she just tells them it’s been delayed for a bit.”
“I hope so.” She started to reach for the door handle, but instead she turned and embraced me, and we just held onto each other for a long moment, trying to use each other’s strengths to clear our heads and get ourselves together.
Eventually, Cadence let go. “Ready?”
“Ready.”
Job, Trina, and Oswald were gathered around the 3D model, pointing and talking about different possibilities, but they grew quiet when we walked in. I hoped they weren’t afraid of me or thinking I might have another episode where I shredded someone’s face. What I did to Christian was a long time coming; it was honestly something I had wanted to do for months. None of them could make me that mad in just a few minutes—not likely, anyway.
Trina had a laptop in front of her, and it seemed like she must’ve found something important.
“What’s going on?” Cadence asked, taking in their dispositions.
“We found something interesting in the background of Alex’s recording. We think you should take a listen to it.”
I swallowed hard, not wanting to see Alex fade to black, but if it was something that might be able to help us figure out what had happened and how to get them back, I was ready for it.
