Chapter 370: The Missing 17-Year-Old Girl

Chapter 370: Chapter 370: The Missing 17-Year-Old Girl

Sawyer noticed Renee Jennings’s gaze, pursed his lips, and explained, "I was just thinking... what if Sweetie remembers what happened when she was little..."

"Exactly." Renee Jennings nodded in agreement. "We can’t pass up any opportunity."

Sawyer lowered his gaze and gave a wry smile. "Honestly, I can’t think of any other way."

Renee Jennings was silent for a few seconds before saying softly, "If you don’t mind, I could mention it during my next live stream?"

Hearing this, Sawyer’s eyes suddenly lit up. "Could you really?" he asked, pleasantly surprised.

’Renee Jennings’s live streams get so much traffic. Maybe Sweetie is one of her followers?’

"Of course." Renee Jennings’s lips curved into a smile.

Sawyer said gratefully, "Renee, I’ll be counting on you then! Thank you so much!"

Renee Jennings raised an eyebrow slightly. "Don’t mention it. We’re friends."

Sawyer’s eyes sparkled as he looked at her. He asked cautiously, "We... are friends?"

"Aren’t we?"

"That’s great!" Sawyer cheered, his joy at that moment indescribable.

**

Renee Jennings stayed at Sawyer’s place for the night and didn’t get back to Eastgate Villa until the next morning.

Her cats and dogs hadn’t seen her for a day, and the moment she returned, they all rushed over for cuddles.

Blueberry told her, "Mary came looking for you last night, but when she heard you weren’t coming home, she left."

Hearing this, Renee Jennings’s slender brows furrowed slightly. A strange sense of unease flickered through her.

"Did Mary say anything else?"

"She didn’t tell me anything. She just seemed really anxious and flew off quickly."

Meanwhile, the police department received a report: a seventeen-year-old girl had been gone from home for over twenty-four hours, and out of contact for nineteen.

The family was at the station, weeping and begging the police on their knees to help find their daughter.

In the conference room, Kyle Morgan wore a grave expression. "The girl’s name is Sherry Zane. She’s a first-year high school student, a day student..."

"Yesterday afternoon, she left school early, claiming she felt unwell, but she never went home. Her parents only realized she was missing when they came home from work that evening."

The LED screen in the conference room displayed the chat history between Sherry Zane and her mother.

Yesterday afternoon, after Mrs. Zane heard from the homeroom teacher that Sherry had left school sick, she immediately tried to video call her on WeChat.

Sherry Zane rejected the call and sent a text message that read, "I’m already on my way home."

Mrs. Zane asked her what was wrong, and she said she had a stomachache.

Mrs. Zane had a meeting to prepare for at the time, so she assumed it was just period cramps and told her daughter to message her when she got home.

When her meeting ended in the evening, Mrs. Zane opened WeChat but saw no message from her daughter. She tried video calling her again.

This time, the call wasn’t rejected; it just went unanswered.

Figuring her daughter might be resting, Mrs. Zane didn’t try again and went back to her work.

But when she got home late that night, she stood at her daughter’s bedroom door and knocked for a long time, but there was no response from inside.

Mrs. Zane pushed the door open and flipped on the light, only to find the room completely empty.

Mrs. Zane’s heart sank, and she immediately called her husband.

The two of them went out that night to look for Sherry Zane, but they were like headless chickens, with no idea where to even begin searching.

After discussing it, the couple decided to call the police.

The image on the LED screen changed to surveillance footage. In the video, Sherry Zane was walking down a street with her backpack on.

"She doesn’t look like she’s doing well," Zachary Conway said with a frown. "Her head is down the whole time."

Levi Hollis added, "She looks like she has something heavy on her mind. Too much academic pressure?"

Kyle Morgan replied, "I asked Sherry Zane’s parents. They said that while her grades are in the lower-middle range of her class, they’ve never pressured her or forced her to study."

"Then it’s probably not academic pressure."

The surveillance footage switched to another location. Sherry Zane was turning into an alley.

Kyle Morgan’s brow furrowed. "The camera feed ends here. The tech division is tracking her phone’s location and looking into her WeChat history now."

"Are there any other leads besides that?" Henry Stark spoke up.

Kyle Morgan shook his head. "No other breakthroughs for now."

Henry Stark mulled it over for a few seconds, then stood up. "Let’s go to the school and ask around."

The group arrived at Sherry Zane’s high school. It was Friday, and the students’ faces were beaming with excitement, likely because the two-day weekend was about to begin.

But upon seeing the police arrive, their expressions turned to curiosity.

Henry Stark’s group went straight to the homeroom teacher’s office and had her call in a few students for questioning.

Sherry Zane had a quiet and reserved personality, and with her average grades, she had almost no presence in the class.

The homeroom teacher called in a few class officers, but their assessment of Sherry Zane was much the same, and they all said they didn’t know her well.

As Henry Stark and the others were leaving the school and getting into their police car, they received a call from Renee Jennings.

"Henry, are you at the station?"

"No, we’re on a case," Henry Stark asked. "What’s wrong?"

Renee Jennings, sitting in her car, said in a serious tone, "Mary found a girl acting strangely last night. She seemed to be locked up somewhere, but I wasn’t home, so I only just found out."

Henry Stark’s dark brows drew together. "We received a report today about a missing seventeen-year-old girl."

"What a coincidence." Renee Jennings glanced at Mary in the passenger seat. "I’m having Mary lead me to the location now."

"Okay," Henry Stark said in a low voice. "Share your location. We’ll head over to meet you."

"Alright." Renee Jennings hung up, enabled location sharing in their WeChat group, and then drove away from Villa No. 8.

Mary sat in the passenger seat, pointing the way with a wing while chirping, "Renee, is this really serious?"

"A little," Renee Jennings said softly. "What did you see that girl doing in the abandoned building yesterday?"

Mary replied, "The girl was sitting in a corner. She looked really scared. At first, this bird thought she was locked in, but the door could clearly be pushed open. She didn’t leave, though. It was so weird."

"That is weird." Renee Jennings frowned, unable to figure out why she would do that.

’Could this be the same girl Henry and his team are looking for?’

Half an hour later, Renee Jennings’s car came to a stop.

Mary told her, "You can’t drive any further in. Renee, you’ll have to get out and walk."

"Alright." Renee Jennings got out of the car and scanned her surroundings.

The area seemed to be a stretch of abandoned factories. She could see several faded signs.

Mary flapped her wings, circling beside her. "Renee, are we going in?"

"Let’s wait," Renee Jennings said. "Wait for a few of my colleagues to arrive."

She glanced down at her phone screen. Henry Stark and his team were very close.

Five minutes later, a police car slowly pulled up.

Henry Stark and Kyle Morgan got out and walked over to her.

Renee Jennings looked up at Mary. "You can lead the way now."

The three humans and one bird weaved between the factory buildings, finally stopping in front of a two-story structure.

After carefully examining it, Mary said to Renee Jennings, "Renee, the human girl is in here."