Harry felt the color drain out of him. Wes Carter was the son of his dearest friends and former colleagues. Harry had been at the hospital while Fiona gave birth to him, had babysat for the Carters more than once, and he loved Wes like his own.
He was trained to be a man of action, thinking quickly on his feet. But all of a sudden, his brain felt like mud.
Ruth, however, wasn't similarly deterred. "I'll send Jo to do a door knock, see if any of the neighbors have seen anything. Ros should go 'round to the houses of some of his friends in case he's there. I can call the library and the arcade and places around town to see if he's shown up anywhere. I'm sure Zaf would lend a hand if we need."
Harry was about to tell her yes, go do all of those things, which he would have instructed anyway if he'd been able, but they were interrupted again. Adam Carter burst through the door, shouting for Harry.
Both Harry and Ruth left his office and went out to see to Adam. He was a wreck, though no one was surprised.
"Let me help, Harry. I can help. Let me do something," he begged.
Ruth put a gentle hand on Adam's arm. "You're not a police officer, Adam."
"I used to be! I can be useful!" he insisted. His voice was hoarse with emotion, and his eyes were wild and filled with unshed tears.
"You can't," Harry replied firmly.
Ruth glanced at her boss, reading his face, and turned back to Adam, griping his forearm a bit harder. "You can't act as a cop right now. Your little boy is missing. You're a panicked father, and you can't be rational right now. And no one expects you to be. But you do have a panicked wife at home who shouldn't be left alone." She paused as Jo walked back into the station. "Adam, you stay here with Harry, I'm going to talk to Jo, and she's going to go back home with you, alright?"
Adam nodded numbly, responding well to Ruth's calm but decisive tone. She pulled Jo off to the side and explained the situation and instructed her to speak to Adam and Fiona together and try to get the facts of the matter—when did they figure out Wes was missing, how long could he have been gone, do they think he ran off or could someone have taken him?
"Jo, you call me when you know anything, alright? I'm going to get ahold of Ros and send her to investigate more around town, talk to friends and things."
"Of course," the younger woman replied. She was focused, ready to use her training for what it was meant for. "Shall I just give you the notes from the vandalism for now?"
Ruth sighed slightly, "Yes, as sorry as I am about Malcolm's flower boxes, we've got to put it aside until that little boy is back in his mother's arms. And just to warn you Jo, when you get there, Fiona called in earlier and she's an absolute mess."
Jo nodded, steeling herself. She spoke softly to Adam and led him out of the station and back to his house.
Harry and Ruth were once again left alone. "I was able to get him talking a bit," Harry told her. "There's no reason at the moment to believe there's been any kidnapping. Adam is under the impression that Wes has run away. But he and Fiona already called the homes of all his schoolmates and no one's seen him. That's when Fiona reported him missing."
"Right. That's good. Eliminates possibilities. I'll send Ros to the neighbors and then call his teacher. Maybe she's got an idea where he could have gone." Ruth rushed back to her desk to get started with her tasks.
Harry returned to his office, making a few calls of his own. First to Towers, since the Mayor should be alerted when a child went missing. After all, theirs was a very small town where nothing really bad ever happened, but Mayor Towers wouldn't take kindly to being out of the loop when anything of note went on.
His next call was to Malcolm, hoping his friend could once again hack into the limited surveillance cameras around town to see if any of them caught Wes going anywhere. Malcolm would get right on it and call back if he got anything.
Ruth entered his office again. "Ros is on the door knock as we speak. I spoke to Wes's teacher, and she told me he's been very sullen at school lately, much quieter than usual and not joining in with the sport during lunchtime. Other than that, she didn't have any information of use," she informed him.
Harry nodded. "Thank you, Ruth. Let me know if anything else comes up."
She turned to leave but paused. "You're close with him, Harry. Do you have any thoughts where Wes might be?"
He scrubbed his face with one hand. "I honestly have no idea. A week ago, I'd have never thought Wes would be the type of kid to run away. He's always been a good boy, really sweet and minded his manners and followed the rules."
She nodded. "That's the impression I've gotten from the time I've spent with him. Though on Saturday, he wasn't in his usual happy mood. But that was after you had to leave from his cricket lesson. He was probably just missing you; you know how children get."
"We didn't have the most productive lesson. Poor boy kept getting frustrated when he couldn't get the right batting technique." It also didn't help that Harry had completely abandoned the poor boy in order to avoid Ruth. Christ, he didn't need to be reminded of why he was avoiding Ruth.
A brief silence passed between them before Ruth broke it. "I suppose now we just wait?"
"Unfortunately, there isn't much else we can do now," Harry replied.
"I'm going to make some tea."
Harry would have suggested something stronger, but they needed to keep their wits about them. He didn't stop Ruth when she hurried out of his office and into the kitchen to start the kettle.
Ten minutes later, the shatter of something breaking echoed through the station. Harry leapt out of his chair to see what was the matter. "Ruth? Are you alright?"
She seemed to have dropped the tray with the teacups on it, luckily unfilled. But instead of cleaning them up, Ruth was standing stock still with wide eyes. "I know where he is."
"You do?"
"I was thinking about what you said, about the cricket. The park. Harry, I'd bet anything you'll find Wes at the cricket pitch."
At her words, everything slipped into place. Everyone had been far too emotional to put the pieces together. Ruth had been able to see the forest through the trees. "I'm going right now. Wait for me before you inform the rest, just in case he isn't there."
When Harry turned to leave, Ruth reached out to stop him. "Wait." He turned to her with a questioning look in his eyes. "He's been gone a while, and he might be hungry. Give him this." Ruth grabbed a chocolate granola bar out of the station's stash.
Harry took the wrapped snack from her, and their fingers brushed. For an instant, the entire world froze. It had been days since he'd felt her touch, and with all that had happened and the stress of the evening, the softness of her fingers stopped his heart.
But then the instant was gone, and Harry was off to bring their boy home. He walked quickly down the dark streets of town way off to the park. It was the only park in town, so it was quite large. A jungle gym was off to one side for the children to play, and a small building housing locker rooms and restrooms was on the other. In between were the sport fields for rugby, cricket, and football. And sure enough, sitting right in the center of the dark cricket pitch, was a small boy with blonde hair. His bat was on the ground beside him, and he was rolling a cricket ball on the ground in front of him.
Harry sent a quick message to Ruth. Found him. Call off the search. I'll bring him back to Adam and Fiona.
Thank goodness! came her immediate reply.
"Bit of late night training?"
Wes looked up at the sound of Harry's voice and watched him approach. "Didn't think anyone would notice me gone," the boy replied.
Harry sat down across from Wes, choosing to wait before addressing that remark. He passed the granola bar from his pocket. "Hungry?"
Wes nodded and ripped open the wrapper.
While the boy ate, Harry asked, "Why would you think that no one would notice you gone?"
"Dad's too busy with his other teams to help train me. I'm not good enough to play with my mates at school. Mum doesn't care about sport. And you didn't want to stay to help me on the weekend." Wes picked up the ball and hit the dirt with it for emphasis of his frustration.
"You've felt a bit ignored lately, is that it?"
Wes nodded.
Harry tried not to let the guilt of his own complicity in such feelings get in the way of being there for the boy now. "Ruth came by to see you, I heard, but you didn't want to talk to her."
"She doesn't like sport either."
"There are more things in life than just sport, Wes," Harry pointed out. "Ruth likes books, and you enjoy reading. I know she'd love to talk to you about stories you both know or tell you about all her travels or anything else. And I bet if you wanted to talk to her about how hard you're working with your cricket, she'd listen."
"Why Ruth?"
"Because she likes you a lot, and she was very upset when she found out you'd run away. Your parents called your friends' houses and when none of them knew where you were, your mum called the station. Ruth answered the phone, and she sent everyone out looking for you."
"How come you came to get me? You're the boss, you're supposed to stay at your desk."
Harry couldn't help but smile. "Everyone else was busy looking other places. And besides, I had a feeling I might be part of the reason you were upset, and I wanted to apologize. I shouldn't have rushed out like that on Saturday. I'm afraid I got too caught up in awful grownup things. But I promise, Wes, you're much more important than any of that. I should have remembered."
Wes's face fell again, to Harry's dismay. "So you did forget about me."
"No, not at all." Harry paused, thinking of a way to explain this so an eight-year-old would understand. "It's sort of like when you know you're supposed to go to bed early so you can get a proper night's sleep, but you stay up playing video games. You might have fun in the moment, but the next day you're tired and you can't do anything properly. I should have been spending time with you, but instead the grownup things that aren't as important distracted me. I made a mistake, and I am very sorry."
Little Wes searched Harry's face for a moment and then must have decided he was being sincere. "I guess I've got to go home now."
"Yes, your parents have been very worried. They'll want to see you."
They stood up and gathered Wes's things before beginning the walk back to the Carter house. "Wes, can you promise me that you won't run off like this again? I don't think any of us could take the stress for a second time."
"I'm sorry I worried everyone, Uncle Harry."
"I know you are," he replied softly, ruffling the lad's hair. "And I'm sorry we all made you feel like you had to run away. Tell you what, if your parents say it's alright, I'll come over tomorrow after you finish your homework and we can get back to that batting lesson."
Wes smiled. "Yeah, alright."
Back at the station, Ruth had finally gotten everything reasonably sorted. After receiving Harry's text messages, she immediately called Jo to tell her Harry was bringing Wes home so she could inform Adam and Fiona. Ruth then told Ros that the search was off, telling the detective the report could wait till the morning so she could go home. Dmitri wouldn't be starting the night shift for another hour or so, and Ruth had plenty of work to do compiling the report on Wes Carter, so she stayed. She also called the Mayor on Harry's behalf, knowing how Harry tended to get grumpy after talking to Towers; anything she could do to help out.
Harry finally returned to the station after delivering Wes back to his parents. She smiled softly as he entered. "All's well that ends well?"
"Mmm," he agreed. "Why are you still here? It's horribly late."
Ruth listed off the things she'd done, talking to Jo and Ros and Towers and Malcolm. "And now I'm getting started on the official report. I'll add in notes from Ros and Jo tomorrow, but I figured I could compile everything else now."
"You already changed the case status from 'open' to 'pending closure'?"
"Yes, I did that first thing after I got your message. The report should be ready for your signature tomorrow evening, and then we can officially close out," Ruth told him, feeling a bit proud of her organizational skills.
"Ruth, would you like to have dinner with me sometime?"
She snorted a small laugh. "Well, that's quite a conversation shift."
"Less so than you'd think. Wes told me he ran away because he'd been feeling ignored, and I'd been a part of that. I don't want to spend my life putting off things that are important with the people who matter to me," he explained.
Ruth watched him closely, trying to pick up on the minute details of his body language that betrayed his nervousness at asking her out. It was thoroughly endearing.
She was quiet too long, however, and Harry began to babble. "I was hoping the French bistro might be nice, perhaps on Wednesday? I like eating there, and I might go on my own, actually, if you don't want to join me."
"You won't have to," she interrupted. "Go on your own, I mean. I'd love to have dinner with you."
"You would?"
"Very much."
Harry opened his mouth but closed it again very quickly, trying desperately to contain the excited grin that threatened to burst out on his face. "Good. That's good," he replied simply.
