A local family is desperately searching for their 20-year-old son, who didn’t return to his Martha Lake-area home following a trip to Central Washington earlier this week.

Nic Williams, a 2017 Lynnwood High School graduate, was last seen leaving a Leavenworth restaurant after lunch with friends Tuesday, Aug. 6, according to his father, Scott Williams.

Nic, the middle child of Scott Williams and his wife Adina, has been living at home while he attends UW Bothell, where he is studying finance. Nic drove his silver 2007 Mitsubishi Eclipse to Chelan Sunday to attend a surprise birthday/graduation celebration for a friend, and was planning to return home Tuesday, his father said.

Friends of Nic told Scott Williams that after Nic met them for lunch in Leavenworth Tuesday, he turned down Icicle Creek Road instead of returning to the main highway. Since there was a gas station on that road, “they figured he must be getting gas,” Scott Williams said.

“We don’t know if he continued down that road or if he stopped to get gas and came home,” Scott Williams said.

All his parents know at this point is that Nic didn’t return to the family home, and calls to his cell phone are going to voice mail, indicating the phone battery is likely dead. So on Wednesday, Nic’s parents filed a missing persons report with the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office. On Wednesday night, the couple drove to Leavenworth to look around for his car and also met with the Chelan County Sheriff’s Office, Scott Williams said. Then, the couple drove over Blewett Pass to Yakima because Nic had joked with his father that he might take a detour on the way home to get a hamburger at Yakima’s Miner’s restaurant.

A restaurant employee at Miner’s even checked surveillance video for the time frame that Nic Williams may have visited, but didn’t see him on the video, Scott Williams said.

So now, the case is back in the hands of the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office. Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman Courtney O’Keefe confirmed that the office has received a missing persons report on Nic Williams, but didn’t have any more details on the case as of Friday morning.

According to Scott Williams, because his son is legally an adult, a search warrant had to be issued to ping his cell phone, to determine the last location that his phone signal touched a cell tower. The hope is that information will help authorities “narrow a search grid,” Williams said.

Describing Nic as “a good kid,” Scott Williams said that he and his wife are “stunned” that he would go missing and are doing all they can to find him.

“We have family and friends scouring the state,” he added.

Nic Williams is described as 6-foot-3 and thin. His car license plate is BFM5818. Anyone with information can either call 911 or the non-emergency number at 425-407-3999.

Publisher’s note: Scott Williams is also a sports reporter/photographer for My Edmonds News/MLTnews/Lynnwood Today.