'She wouldn't have cold feet': Fiancé's heartbreaking plea
Stephanie Scott was busily making the final preparations for her upcoming wedding and honeymoon when she vanished from a central New South Wales town three days ago.
Family and friends of the popular Leeton High School teacher say her sudden disappearance is particularly out of character given how excited she was about her upcoming wedding to partner of five years Aaron Leeson-Woolley.
Mr Leeson-Woolley said he had not heard from his fiancé since Saturday when they made plans to go out for dinner on Sunday night.
She never arrived to the appointment.
“We were arranging dinner on the Sunday night. She was happy to cook, but I said: "No we'll go out for dinner”,” Mr Leeson-Woolley said.
“We were just talking about what we needed to do. There was no indication anything was amiss.
'The last words she said to me were: "I love you. Goodnight”.”
"I know that she wouldn't have cold feet," Aaron told 7News reporter Ashlea Brown.
The pair met as children playing soccer in Canowindra, family say.
Stephanie’s sister Kim told the Daily Mail the bride-to-be had spent Saturday shopping for groomsmen cufflinks and a bikini for her honeymoon after months of excited preparations for the wedding, planned for this Saturday.
Kim told the Daily Mail her sister would not just run away.
“It's really hard for Aaron to hear that, obviously it's three days she's been missing,” Kim said.
“Our sister Robyn spoke to her for 55 minutes on the phone on Saturday night about how excited she is about marrying him.
“She wants to get married and wants to be there.”
Police have now asked the public to be on the lookout for the woman, who was last seen at her workplace on Myrtle Street, Leeton, at about 11am on Sunday.
Her car, a red Mazda 3 with number plates reading BZ-19-CD, is also missing.
A police helicopter is being sent to assist in the search for the 26-year-old.
Stephanie's parents also plan to hire a helicopter to join the desperate search for their daughter.
In a new development, her family have learnt Ms Scott sent an email just after noon on Sunday to a bus company confirming transport for guests on her wedding day.
That extends the time from when Ms Scott was last heard from.
Her family fear her disappearance has something to do with "her car or foul play".
"It is the worst thing I have ever been through. You can't eat and you can't sleep," mother Merrilyn Scott told AAP on Wednesday.
"I think today, if we don't find her today ... you can't let yourself think about it but you do."
As friends and community members turned out in Leeton to search surrounding roads, her parents began organising a helicopter to search from the sky.
"It's cold and we are running out of days," Mrs Scott said.
She said while the area was flat, there were a lot of irrigation ditches, creeks and crossings.
Mrs Scott said her daughter had no plans after she visited the school on Sunday, where she had been making sure her work would be covered during her honeymoon in Tahiti.
"She normally messages a lot but he didn't really think anything sinister had happened," Mrs Scott said.
"Everything was pointing towards the wedding."
Ms Scott's sister, Kim Scott, put out a call on Facebook on Wednesday for help with a ground search.
"Please anyone available or who can make themselves available," she wrote.
"Get yourselves to Leeton and the surrounding areas and check those roads."
