A 25-year-old mother texted her family on September 13 to say she was going to travel with her friend, who was driving a truck and died in a terrible crash in North Carolina. However, only one body was found in the crash.

Since then, though, there have been no signs of the woman, leaving her family, including her 5- and 6-year-old sons, with more questions than answers.

“I miss her so much,” Krista Stated. Her children miss her. We hope and pray that we’ll find answers and closure.”

Taylor’s aunt from her mother’s side, Shelly Payton, also talked to Oxygen.com about how hard it has been for Taylor’s family in the months since she went missing.

“It broke us,” Payton said. “We’re not sure if we should be sad about her or keep looking for her.”

Taylor, who lived in Oak Hall, Virginia, which is on the Delmarva Peninsula and about 100 miles north of Norfolk, told her family that she was going to travel with a 51-year-old man named Danny McNeal. People close to Taylor said they thought the two were friends and that it wasn’t the first time Taylor went with McNeal.

The Accomack County Sheriff’s Office had said before that Taylor didn’t own a car.

People who care about her think that McNeal, who drives a truck, picked Taylor up from her home in Oak Hall and took her north to Delaware to drop off some frozen chicken. In the afternoon, they went back south to the Eastern Shore of Virginia.

Around 8 p.m., Taylor’s family said, police in Northampton County stopped McNeal’s tractor-trailer, which they said was illegally parked in Exmore, Virginia, about 30 miles south of Oak Hall.

At that time, Alyssa was in the truck. “On the cop’s body camera footage, we could hear her voice,” Payton told Oxygen.com. “At the time, Danny wasn’t in the truck. He had gone to a friend’s house.”

Payton said that she watched a video of the officer talking to Alyssa for a few minutes before McNeal came back.

“Danny went to the truck, and the officer gave Danny a warning and let him go,” Payton said. “The police officer said he saw them drive away because he waited with his flashing lights on to make sure they got on the road safely.”

But at around 2:00 a.m. on September 14, just hours after Exmore Police were said to have talked to McNeal and his dog, McNeal and his dog were killed in a fiery crash while driving south on Interstate 85 in Hillsborough, North Carolina, which is more than 250 miles from Exmore.

WRAL, an NBC Raleigh affiliate, said that a post-mortem examination showed that “acute ethanol intoxication” was a factor in the crash, which damaged an overpass and closed the road for days. According to the autopsy results given to Oxygen.com, McNeal’s blood alcohol level was.32%. According to studies from the University of Notre Dame, this is the same as having alcohol poisoning or losing consciousness.

Experts said McNeal died because of his injuries before the fire got to him.

“Krista called me on the phone on September 20,” Payton told Oxygen.com. “She was very upset and said she had read on Facebook that Danny had died in an accident. Then she told me that Alyssa had gone with him on the truck on September 13, and she hadn’t heard anything from her since.

People who care about Taylor think it’s possible that McNeal’s missing mother was also in the crash. However, a crash scene investigation and McNeal’s autopsy both say that there was only one body at the scene.

The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Raleigh said, “Only one set of human remains could be identified at the scene and during the autopsy.”

The same postmortem findings say that investigators watched surveillance footage that showed McNeal buying alcohol at a convenience store and “travelling with another person” before the crash.

No one knows who was with McNeal, and Oxygen.com tried to get in touch with multiple law enforcement agencies about the case but got no response.

Payton said that her sister, Krista, was on her way from Florida when she heard about the crash. The worried mother is said to have stopped at a wrecking yard in North Carolina, which is where McNeal’s truck was taken.

Payton says that is where she found her daughter’s blanket.

“She called me in a panic, yelling that her blanket was in the rubble,” Payton Stated.

After a few days, Taylor’s family went to the crash site and found an earring in a nearby storm drain and a flip-flop shoe that they thought belonged to Taylor.

Payton said, “We stayed there for a week and talked to different people to try to find out more.” “The North Carolina Highway Patrol told us that they are 99.9% sure that she wasn’t in the truck when it crashed. We couldn’t do anything.”

Taylor’s mother, Krista, told Oxygen.com that she has accepted the idea that her daughter died in the crash.

Krista said, “I believe with all my heart that my daughter was in that crash and died.” “Since then, she hasn’t talked to anyone.”

Payton, on the other hand, thinks that something could have been done wrong. She says that, right before the accident, McNeal was on the phone with his girlfriend for three hours.

Payton told Oxygen.com, “I have to be honest and say that I have my doubts now.” “Just about everything needs to be looked at, in my opinion.”

The family says they are getting more and more upset because police haven’t returned their calls about the missing 25-year-old.

Payton told Oxygen.com, “It was heartbreaking. We had a family gathering before Christmas, and it wasn’t the same without her.” “Why isn’t my mom here?” asked her oldest son. We all had to try hard not to cry. Even more so my sister.”

Even though Alyssa Taylor’s last known location could be in more than one state, her family says that the FBI is not helping with the investigation. In Virginia, the investigating agency would have to ask the federal government for help.

Christopher Knox, a public information officer for the North Carolina Highway Patrol, told the Raleigh News & Observer that the agency has finished its investigation into the crash and given the results to the Sheriff’s Office.

“As a law enforcement agency, I want everyone to know what our role is in this,” Knox said. “We are with the Highway Patrol. We are working with everyone we can to find this young woman, but our part of the investigation is about the accident. What happened at the scene of that accident is what our agency does. We talk to everyone we can to try to figure out what happened, and we’re happy to help investigators, the family, or anyone else in the future, but that’s not what we do.

Anyone with information can call 1-757-787-1131 or 1-757-824-5666 to get in touch with the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office. The family also wants people to join their “Help Us Find Alyssa Taylor” Facebook page.