Project: Runaway Bride

If Lily had never walked into his office, he’d be a happier man today, that was for damn sure. She’d brought him The Case That Wouldn’t End and led him straight down the path to personal misery.

He didn’t say that aloud, of course, and didn’t tell Glenn to send them away. Instead, he said, “Send them up” and spent the few minutes before their arrival tamping down his temper and schooling his features. When the door to his office opened and the two sisters bustled in, he was the epitome of calm professionalism.

The two women, on the other hand, were a whirlwind of yellow taffeta, blond hair and tear-streaked faces. They let out twin huffs of relief that they’d finally reached him after numerous attempts and flopped into the guest chairs directly in front of his desk.

“Thank God,” Lily sighed at the same time Zoe muttered, “It’s about time.”

Reid’s lips twitched at the younger sister’s cheekiness, but he kept his expression blank.

“Ladies,” he greeted them in a clipped voice.

It was the weekend, for heaven’s sake. There was nothing so pressing in Lily’s ongoing design theft case that they needed to show up at his office on a Saturday, and he didn’t want them thinking this sort of behavior should be repeated.

And didn’t they have a wedding to attend in their fluffy, over-the-top bridesmaid gowns? Their sister’s wedding, to be specific.

“This is rather unorthodox. Is there something I can do for you?”

“Help!” they exclaimed at exactly the same time. They weren’t twins, Reid knew, but damned if they couldn’t pass as mirror images when they acted like this.

Taking the lead, Lily leaned forward slightly. “You have to help us,” she said again. “I know it’s a weekend. I know you’ve probably had it up to your eyeballs with us by now.”

Boy, she’d hit the nail on the head with that one.

“But we don’t know what else to do.”

“About what?” he asked calmly.

“She’s missing!” This from Zoe, whose eyes were wide and glistening.

Reid’s own eyes narrowed. A niggle of foreboding began to tickle at the nape of his neck. “Who?”

“Juliet,” Lily supplied. Her voice had evened out a bit, as though she was growing calmer now that she knew she had the ear of a private investigator. Especially one who’d had dealings with their family before.

Reid didn’t know how much Juliet’s sisters knew about her involvement with him. Did they know about the affair? Had Juliet confided in them? Or had they turned to him simply because of who he was and the work he’d done for them in the past?

Taking a deep breath, Lily continued. “Juliet disappeared from the church. From her wedding. We don’t know what happened. She was in her gown. Her hair and makeup were done. I checked on her and told her everything was ready to go, and then she was just...gone. She never came out, even though we were all waiting for her at the back of the church.”

She dropped her gaze, plucking at the folds of her fluffy yellow skirt. “I went to check on her again,” Lily said softly, “but she wasn’t there.”

Tears lined her lower lashes as she raised her gaze to his. “There was no note, no hint of what might have happened to her.”

Reid’s stomach clenched. “Do you think she ran away?”

He didn’t let himself hope for that, at least not on a personal level. He’d been down that road before and ended up deeply disappointed. But if she hadn’t run off on her own, the other possibilities were too frightening to contemplate.

“We don’t know,” Lily responded.

“What about the fiancé?” He wasn’t going to use the bastard’s name. And God help him if the jerk had done anything to Juliet. Reid would hunt him down and rip him limb from limb.

Zoe tilted her head. “What about him?”

“Has he disappeared, too?”

Both women shook their heads.

“No. He’s still at the church,” Lily told him. “Or maybe he’s gone to our loft or back to his hotel by now, I don’t know.”

A slow wave of relief washed through him. “So they didn’t run off together?” he asked, just to be sure. “Maybe they decided to elope instead, and she ran home to grab an overnight bag.”

Zoe snorted. “Definitely not. Not after all of the time and money that went into planning the wedding. Our parents and his would kill them.”

“She’s right,” Lily agreed. “If they were going to do something like that, they’d have done it weeks ago.”

Reid nodded, the wheels in his head whirling with other possibilities. “Do you think she was abducted in any way? Taken against her will?”

“Oh, my God!” Zoe wailed, while the tears spilled over the edge of Lily’s lashes.

“We certainly hope not,” she said carefully, holding it together moderately better than her younger sister. “We didn’t see or hear anything, and there were no signs of a struggle. At least not that we could tell.”

“No overturned furniture? A piece of her gown that might have caught on something and torn off?”

Zoe whimpered behind the hands that covered her face. They were tough questions, Reid knew, but if they wanted him to help, he had to have the answers.

“No, nothing like that,” Lily replied weakly.

He inclined his head. “Provided she left of her own volition, do you have any idea why she took off or where she’d go?”

“No. Why would any woman run away on her wedding day? Away from the church after she’s dressed and ready and everyone’s waiting for her?”

Reid had the kernel of an idea why, but couldn’t let it cloud his mind as he focused on the job at hand. Not after the way she’d done an about-face with him not so long ago.

Normally, he’d recommend that the family of a missing person call the police and file a report. In this case, however, he suspected he would have a better chance of tracking down Juliet Zaccaro on his own. He certainly had access to better resources than the authorities, as well as an edge they would never have—a previous personal relationship with the subject.

“I take it you want me to find her,” he remarked.

Recovered from her earlier show of emotion, Zoe rolled her eyes at him. “We wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

He ignored the sharpness of her tone, responding with an edge of his own. “For real this time, right? Not like the time she asked me to find you.”

He raised a brow, his comment clearly directed at Lily, who blushed.

“Yes,” she answered evenly. “She really is missing, and we really do need you to find her. Please.”

“I’ll need more information from you and your family. Possibly permission to search your loft and access Juliet’s personal areas and assorted accounts. Banking, phone, computer, et cetera.”

“Of course. Anything that will help you find her.”

Despite his reluctance to get more deeply involved with the Zaccaro clan or go running after a woman who had already chosen another man over him, Reid found that he couldn’t deny their request.