best after Harry

“Yeah,” Will said. “So I left a message with Dresden’s service and came back to Chicago. The apartment door was broken, maybe kicked in. The place was a wreck.” He swallowed. “She was gone. And I couldn’t pick up a trail. I went to Harry’s place, but . . . There was still smoke coming up from what was left. Then I came here.”
I nodded slowly. Then I asked, “Why?”
He blinked and looked at me as if I’d broken out into a musical number. “Seriously?”
“Yeah.”
“He always told us that if we ever needed him but couldn’t find him, we were supposed to go to you. That you were the person in this city who could help us better than anyone else.”
I stared at him for a minute. Then I said, “Yeah. I can just see him saying that.” I shook my head. “And never bothering to mention it to me.”
I’ll give Will credit—he was obviously terrified, but he managed to try a joke. “He probably thought you were formidable enough without the confidence boost from something like that.”
“Like I need his approval to be confident,” I muttered. I studied Will for a moment. I knew him well enough to know there was something off in his behavior. He was too quiet. Will wasn’t the sort of man to sit at a table fiddling with his napkin when his wife was missing and quite possibly in danger. He was terrified, frightened to such a degree that it was nearly paralytic. I recognized the look.
I’d seen it in the mirror often enough.
“What aren’t you telling me, Will?” I asked quietly.
He closed his eyes and shivered as a tear tracked down each cheek.
“Georgia’s pregnant,” he whispered. “Seven months.”


Side Jobs, Aftermath, Page 344