Before Vinnie knew what was happening Marcella was in her face, her eyes filled with fury.

"You told her to go on that trip, didn't you?" She was accusing, stalking down the steps and dripping with malice. "You put her up to this."

Vie looked at her like she had sprouted a second head.

"No."

Vinnie's voice was small. She shook her head quickly and looked to the other ladies. Marcella was going on a rampage and even they looked concerned.

"What happened?" She added.

One of the other moms stepped up, her eyes brimming with unshed tears.

"The girls were supposed to come back last night, but they never showed."

"No call, just gone." another one added.

"And my daughter took money out of my purse. I didn't even think to look until today."

"Ladies," one of the officers called out, and he and his partner walked over to the group.

The officer was tall with dark sideburns and round belly, and his partner was silent next to him.

"We need to know a little bit more. Could there be a reason why they would leave and not come back? Were there any altercations in the home that could have led to this behavior?"

Altercations in the home.

Vinnie was frozen to the spot.

She would never imagine Stella running away, not even after what happened with her mom. She seemed fine by the time they had gotten home from the laundromat. Were things worse at home than she realized?

Marcella wasn't looking at the officer, but was glaring daggers at Vinnie. No one else seemed to notice.

"No, no altercations officer." Marcella lied through her teeth. She wasn't thinking straight.

The leading officer cleared his throat, turning towards Marcella. "I'm afraid we can't file a missing person's report until after the first 48 hours." He handed her his business card. "Give us a call on Tuesday if they don't come home."

He was calm and calculated. He was detached. He was just doing his job.

And then all hell broke loose.

"48 hours?-"
"My child is out there!-"
"They are missing! -"

The women were talking over each other in hysterics, and the officers were doing their best to calm them down but Vinnie wouldn't take her eyes off Marcella. She looked dangerous.

Marcella bided her time for the officers to eventually drive away before pouncing with another series of accusations.

"The girls must have planned this from the beginning."

"Marcella get a hold of yourself!" One of the other moms exclaimed. "What if they are hurt? And scared?"

"They've never been there before. Why would they -"

"No." Marcella wasn't accepting that option. "Will you just listen? Your daughter took your money. Stella stole my money too. Any money that I had stashed away is gone. They weren't planning on coming back."

Her calm and cold demeanor made everyone stop in their tracks. Vinnie couldn't recognize Marcella in the state she was in. She looked like a snake, ready to pounce on anyone who stood in her way.

"Marcella," One of the other mom's started, putting her hand up to her mouth. "Something must have happened. What happened?"

They were on to her. She wanted the other moms to feel angry about their daughters running away but it wasn't working.

"What did I do?" Marcella scoffed, putting her arms on her hips. "I didn't do anything! Stella is the one that started this. Better yet," Marcella turned to face Vinnie square on. "Why don't you ask this puta? She's the one that gave them the idea of going to that stupid beach town!"

"Careful Marcella." Vinnie whispered. She didn't want to fight, but Marcella stepped over the line.

She was in the middle of someone else's mess. Vinnie was not the confrontational type, but Marcella did call her a...oh no.

"You know what?" Vinnie contested, standing her ground. "Take some responsibility for this. Stella might be gone, but if she did run away she was running from you. Not me."

Vie didn't stick around to see Marcella's reaction and she was ready for the night to be over. The day was long and Vinnie was tired from her trip, and she couldn't begin to piece together the situation going on next door. She didn't have the energy for it.

She threw her weekend bag in the corner in her frustration and haphazardly stuffed the leftovers into the fridge before collapsing on her bed. She was looking up blankly, trying to process it.

None of it made sense.

She had a hard time staying asleep that night, her subconscious fighting with her the whole time.

It was about three in the morning when she startled awake from a terrible dream. It was hazy when she tried to recall what it was about but it left her mortified.

She remembered a beach filled with kids, and there was something...in the water? She couldn't remember.

Kids were splashing and scrambling to get out but they were trapped. They were being hunted and she could see parents on the beach calling for their kids but they were stuck in the sand. Vinnie made an attempt to get closer to the water, but her legs were heavy.

She couldn't do a thing about it.

When her eyes finally snapped open her heart was pounding and she was filled with terror and desperation. It was just a dream. She stumbled around in the dark, trying to regain control of her feelings. It wasn't real, none of it was real. But in the moment it felt so real.

With an audible exhale she sat up and rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand.

Vinnie thought for a while about Stella and her friends, alone in the middle of the night in a town where no one knew who they were. It was so dangerous, so stupid. What were they thinking? Her heart began to ache.

Eventually she found herself dozing off, staring blankly at the wall, but she did not wake up rested. It was going to be a long Monday.

It was going to be a two - er, three cup of coffee kind of morning.

The clicks and clatter of the keyboard were enough to keep her distracted. She needed the noise to keep herself out of her own head.

Rae and Betty could tell something was up. They didn't ask about it, no, but they knew Vinnie would come around. All of them had different ways of processing how they felt.

Betty usually was loud and up front about anything that was troubling her, and Rae was good at skating around what was the matter before eventually spitting it out, but they knew that if Vinnie wanted to talk about it she would take her time to digest it before explaining.

It could take hours or a day, or sometimes even a week. She would dwell on a problem and by the time she found words to describe it the situation could be far behind her. It was almost as if Vinnie put it off for long enough her problem would just go away.

But there was a nudging feeling in the back of her head that this wouldn't go away.

Deep in her belly Vinnie could tell that Stella wasn't going to come home. She was lost and alone with her friends in a strange place.

It was lunch time when Vinnie, Rae, and Betty were sitting on one of the picnic tables in the back that she decided to share with the group. She didn't know where to start. Her head was all jumbled.

"I think I'm going to take a day or two off." Vinnie stared blankly out towards the ocean.

She had a terrible gut feeling - a part of her felt responsible for Stella running away. Teenage rebellion was one thing, hell, she lived through it! But running away was an entirely different thing. Betty and Rae looked on patiently, urging her to continue.

"Over the weekend my neighbor's daughter went missing with a few of her friends."

"Missing?" Betty repeated, making sure she was hearing it right.

"What happened?" Rae added, pushing her lunch to the side. Her appetite was clearly curbed, and to be honest, Vinnie didn't have much of an appetite herself.

She told them about what happened - the big details at least. She talked to them about the fight and the night at the laundromat, recollecting the road trip, and how Marcella went berserk when Stella didn't come home.

"And you want to go find them?" Rae assumed.

Her eyebrows were knit in contemplation, not surprised by what Vinnie was getting at.

After her years of experience in the field she followed her intuition blindly. Rae knew what was swimming through Vinnie's head, and it was a dangerous hole to climb down.

"I need to try." Vinnie mustered up a reply.

This was her time to be strong, to have her Charlie's Angels moment.

She wouldn't, no, she couldn't afford to lose any time waiting on the authorities. It would take time to get each mom's statement, get approval to file the case, and wait for them to print out the missing person's flyers.

There were legal pitfalls in their way, and even though Vinnie wasn't thrilled to think of helping Marcella, she couldn't bear the thought of Stella getting hurt. With a newfound confidence she looked back up to Rae.

"I need to do this."

Betty sighed, shaking her head lightly. "Honey, what if they aren't even there? What if they never went to Santa Carla?"

It was an obvious question, and one that Vinnie hadn't thought about.

"She's right." Rae added, nodding her head in agreement. She pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose and looked over to Betty with a grim expression. "California is a big place, and they have a car. The girls could be anywhere by now."

Vinnie nodded, pursing her lips together. She knew that nothing about her plan was realistic.

"If I go out there and she's not there, at least I tried. My conscience will be clear." Vinnie explained, pushing around the food on her plate.

If she went out there and didn't find Stella she would be able to at least sleep at night.

"And if that doesn't work," Vinnie continued quickly, "then I can let the authorities do their job."

Rae let out a snort but covered it quickly with her hand. She knew that the likelihood of the police finding four missing girls in the same spot was unlikely at best.

There were a lot of young kids on the coast. A lot of runaways. Betty wasn't ignorant of it either. There was a lot of grey area with the law, and between California and Nevada she knew that if someone didn't want to be found there were ways to stay hidden.

"This burden should not be put on your shoulders, Vie." She added softly. She was taking a different approach. "It's not your fault that she left."

"And her decisions do not need to impact you." Rae agreed in solidarity with Betty, and they shared a common goal. It was to keep Vinnie safe.

"Whatever you are feeling towards this girl is not going to change the fact that she was running away from something, and it wasn't you." Rae articulated. "Even if you do find her, what will you do if she doesn't want to come home?"

Vinnie was holding her breath.

What would she do?

"I don't know, but I'd try to talk some sense into her." Vie didn't sound so sure.

"And?" Betty pried.

"And if I talk to her and she still doesn't want to come home at least I can say that I did all that I could. She's a kid, I can't just leave her out there on her own." Vinnie was passionate about it but she felt deflated.

She didn't even want to think about 16 and 17 year old girls on their own. It made her stomach twist in knots.

"What about her own mom? What is she doing about it?" Rae added, trying to get a view of every angle. Vinnie shrugged, frowning lightly.

She didn't think that Marcella would pack up her kids and go on a man hunt. She couldn't just drag her family halfway across the state and back.

"I doubt she's going to do anything. She was mad about it, clearly, but," Vinnie broke off, shaking her head. She wasn't doing this for Marcella. "I need to do something."

She leaned back on the bench, her hands curling under the seat to hold herself steady.

"Honey," Betty grabbed her attention with her sweet voice. "What do you have to gain from doing this?"

That was the golden question.

She knew that they would be critical of her motives. Whether or not Vinnie was a real detective, she knew Stella. That had to count for something.

"If I go out there and find her, that would mean more to me than anything." She whispered, her heart thumping quickly in her chest.

"If I find her, it would prove that I have what it takes to be something more than just this. You've both seen and lived such exciting lives. This is all I know. I live a simple life, a low risk life. Stella could be out there, scared and without a way home. I need to do this."

They listened intently, obviously torn by her words. Betty visibly showed her distress in the form of bouncing her leg and biting her lip.

Rae was in a state of speculation. It was hard to tell what was going through her head. They were both quietly taking in the new information.

Vinnie didn't know what else to say. Her mind was made up.

"Are you doing this for Stella? Or for you?" Rae implored, her tone begging for rational thinking.

"Both."

There was no hesitation.

Rae hummed lightly with the nod of her head.

"No, no, no. I don't like that look in your eye Rae." Betty scolded, but she was hushed quickly.

Rae was tapping her fingers against the table, leaving Vinnie and Betty confused and waiting. She let out a breathy exhale with a smirk. Whatever decision she had made, it came to fruition.

"It's probably not going to be as easy as you think, honey." The older detective sat up, her shoulders squared.

Rae looked like she was going into battle.

"You're going to need some help, Vie. I'm in."

Vinnie was floored. Her jaw visibly dropped with surprise, ears pricked up with heat, and she didn't know what to say. She let her grip slacken on the bench seat and her hands came up to her face in surprise.

Rae was already up and going, discarding her half eaten pastrami sandwich. She practically rushed inside, turning with a confused look when Vinnie didn't move a muscle. Rae pushed her glasses back up her nose haphazardly, waving at her to follow.

"Come on, honey. We've got work to do."

Scrambling to get up, Vinnie quickly threw the rest of her food and trash into her bag.

"Oh lord, not without me you aren't!" Betty added with the roll of her eyes, a halfhearted smirk covering her face. She wanted to be wrapped up in whatever shenanigans the others got themselves into.

Vie grinned back at Betty and they both followed the ex detective back into the office.

Vinnie worked in the department of death day in and day out, but maybe she could help save someone's life for a change.