“Did he speak with the police?”
“Yes. They told him a Damariscotta bank was robbed at gunpoint. They have reason to believe the perpetrator is from Newcastle and is heading back home. They’re sorry for the inconvenience, but they have to protect their citizens.”
“That’s noble of them.”
“Yeah. Interesting side note—the perp they described looked a lot like you. Tall. Muscular. Blond.”
“Yeah. Interesting,” he replied. “What else did the trucker find out?”
“The guy might be traveling with a woman, and if anyone sees them, they’re armed and dangerous, so the local authorities should be called and no contact should be made.”
“So I’ve got an entire town looking for me.”
“Doubtful. I’ve been in Newcastle for a few weeks, and the nightlife there is dead. The people sitting on this road tonight are truckers or travelers. Most of them are anyway. I’m sure there are outliers. If there are three dozen cars, maybe one or two will be from Newcastle. Tops that’s a few townspeople.”
“Plus the police officers who are conducting the search, and they’re the only ones we need to worry about,” he pointed out. “I’m glad I went with my gut and called Wren for backup rather than the local PD. Maybe you can get badge numbers and names when you reach the blockade.”
“If I ever do. At the rate traffic is moving, my next birthday could come and go before I reach the front of the line.”
“Your birthday isn’t until March,” he said.
“My point exactly.”
“I’d rather have you here well before then, but at least the blockade clarifies some things.”
“Like the fact that I don’t like sitting in traffic?” she grumbled.
“Like the fact that the local police have a couple of officers who are working for The Organization.”
“Or The Organization has a couple of operatives who are really good at pretending to be cops. That happens, Sam. I’ve read dozens of stories about ordinary citizens being duped by wolves in cops’ clothing.”
“I’m not sure which scenario I think is more likely.”
“Don’t use your brainpower trying to figure it out. Wren is already on it. I called her an hour ago. She’s been trying to reach local authorities to ask about the blockade. The dispatcher assured her that the sheriff would contact her shortly, but she hasn’t heard from him. I think she’s decided to try the state police. They might be able to verify or refute the armed robber story.”
“It’s going to be interesting to see what the sheriff says about this. If he’s avoiding Wren’s call, he’s going to have to explain why. If the dispatcher didn’t pass along the message, that’s an entirely different situation.”
“Either way, I think it’s safe to assume someone at the police department is working for The Organization. The way I see it... Hold on.” She paused. “Looks like there’s a state police cruiser coming up at the rear of the line. Lights flashing, but no siren. He’s riding the left shoulder. I’d better go before he sees me on my phone and gives me a ticket. See you as soon as I can get there.” She said the last in a quick rush of words and then broke the connection.
He tucked the phone away, uneasy for reasons he couldn’t put his finger on. The blockade was more intriguing than worrisome, and Honor could hold her own in any situation. He and Ella had been sitting in the shadows of the abandoned building for a couple hours. He hadn’t seen or heard a car go by. There’d been no movement at the edges of the lot, no shadows sliding along the pavement where everything should be still. He should feel safer than he had in hours, but his skin was crawling, the hair on his arms standing up. He shifted, pulling out his Glock and checking the chamber. He didn’t expect to have to use it again, but he wanted to make sure it was loaded and ready. Just in case.
“Is everything okay?” Ella asked, her voice thick with sleep.
“On the surface, things look great,” he responded honestly, because keeping information from her wouldn’t help either of them.
“But?”
“That doesn’t mean much.” He tucked his gun away, scanning the scraggly lot beside the abandoned gas station. There was an old church building beside that—grayish wood-plank siding and boarded-up windows, an old playground in what had probably once been the churchyard. A copse of trees butted up against the back of all three properties and wrapped around the side of the lot he and Ella were sitting in. He eyed the trees, the buildings, the empty lot littered with bits and pieces of people’s lives. Bags. Bottles. Papers. Even a shoe.
Nothing moved, but he felt watched.
“I heard you talking about a blockade,” Ella said. “Is that something we need to worry about?”
“No.” Another honest answer. “One of my coworkers ran into one on the way here. Otherwise, she’d have been here an hour and a half ago. Aside from the holdup, it shouldn’t cause us any trouble.”
“An hour and a half? How long have we been here? I guess I fell asleep at some point.”
“A couple of hours.” He scanned the darkness, adrenaline pumping through him. Something was off. He couldn’t put his finger on what, but he felt it in the hard quick pulse of his blood.
“That must be some blockade. Are they looking for us?”
“It seems that way.”
“Are we looking for something?”
“What?”
“You’re watching through the window like you’re expecting trouble.”
“I’m always expecting trouble, Ella. It comes with the job.”
“Good to know. At least one of us is prepared for whatever dangerous thing is about to jump out from behind a tree or a building,” she muttered, leaning her forehead against her window and staring out into the darkness.
“I take it your job doesn’t put you in these kinds of situations often?”
She snorted. “Often? I’m a non-fiction writer. My job is about as dangerous as buttering a slice of bread. I am woefully unprepared for this.”
“If it helps, most people are. And most don’t handle themselves as well as you have.”
“It doesn’t, but thanks for the effort on my behalf.”
He’d have laughed at that, but his nerves were humming, his mind shouting that he’d better stay focused. He eyed the empty lot again, then the building they were parked near. The brick facade was spray painted with symbols and words, the ground littered with leaves and trash. His view of the lot on Ella’s side of the gas station was blocked by trees. If he were sneaking up on the Chevy, he’d be coming from that direction.
A shadow moved at the corner of the building. Not a person. Just a quick shift from gray to black where nothing had been moving before.
He grabbed Ella’s arms, yanking her down forcefully.
The window she’d been leaning on exploded, blunt pieces of glass showering her hair and face, a bullet whizzing by so close to Sam’s face he could feel its heat.
He pulled out his gun reflexively. No thought to whether he should. No second-guessing the decision.
“Stay in the truck and stay down until I tell you differently,” he commanded as he opened the door and stepped out of the Chevy, the body of the truck between him and the place where the shadow had moved. He saw nothing, but he knew the perp was there, hanging around the corner of the building, trying to get a good shot off without being seen.
“FBI,” Sam yelled. “Drop your weapon and come out with your hands up.”
“Sure, right. That’s what I’m going to do,” a man responded, stepping around the side of the building, strutting like a bantam rooster—cocky attitude as clear as the gun he was carrying.
“Put the weapon down and step away from it,” Sam commanded.
“No problem.” He placed the weapon on the ground, his gaze darting past Sam to a point just behind him.
Sam whirled around and saw a second gunman stepping around the far side of the building.
Gun in hand.
Aimed straight at Sam’s chest.
Sam fired.
The gunman flew back, the gun dropping to the ground and skittering across the pavement.
Sam swung back around, aimed his firearm at the first perp. The guy was edging toward his gun, all his cockiness suddenly gone.
“Move again, and you’re dead,” Sam said.
“I haven’t done a thing to you, man. Let me go, and we’ll forget this happened. Neither of has to get hurt.”
“The only one in danger of getting hurt is you. On the ground, spread-eagle.”
“You wouldn’t shoot an unarmed man,” the guy responded, gesturing toward the gun that lay a few feet away.
“Try me.” But he didn’t want to shoot. He wanted to take the guy in for questioning. He might be a low-level member of The Organization, but Sam had no doubt he was on the payroll. “Down on the ground. Now!”
The gunman complied, dropping onto his stomach, his arms and legs spread, fingers splayed, the gun just out of reach of his arms. He looked like a scrawny kid, his jeans baggy. No jacket. Longish hair. Kid or not, apparently this wasn’t the first time he’d been arrested.
“Good choice,” Sam said as he stepped around the Chevy.
“Yeah. I make lots of them,” the guy muttered, and then he sprang up and took off, racing around the side of the building and out of the line of fire.
FOUR
Ella stayed down.
Just like she’d been told.
Minutes ticked by. Five. Ten. She counted the passing seconds, and she waited. Still. Quiet.
Cold air whipped in through the shattered windows, and she shivered. She could freeze to death before Sam returned, but she still didn’t dare raise her head and look around.
Shots had been fired. One that had shattered the window she’d been leaning against. Another that she thought had come from Sam’s gun.
She hoped it had.
He could be lying on the pavement, bleeding to death while she sat in the truck. She’d heard him speaking after the second shot was fired. She was certain of that. He’d shouted orders, someone had responded. She’d heard feet slapping against pavement, and then...
Nothing but leaves skittering across the asphalt and wind rushing through the trees. She’d had no idea what had happened, so she’d stayed where she was, but she couldn’t stay forever. And if Sam had been hurt, if he needed help and she was sitting around waiting for the next command, she’d never forgive herself.
Clouds had rolled in. She could see them through the broken back window, white-gray against the night sky. The moon was hidden, the night somehow darker, the skittering leaves and rustling trees a reminder that Ella was alone—a sitting duck in an abandoned gas station.
“Sam?” she whispered.
He didn’t answer, and she had the horrible feeling that he was gone for good. That he’d run after someone or toward something and gotten injured.
Or worse—killed by someone who was really after Ella.
The Organization?
That’s what Sam seemed to think. That, somehow, she’d become the crime ring’s target. She’d asked dozens of people hundreds of questions since she’d arrived in Maine, so it was possible he was right. She needed to go to the state police, tell them what had happened and let them deal with things.
Sure, Sam said he was with the FBI and that they were investigating in the area. She’d heard tidbits of his conversations with coworkers, and she could believe he was on the up-and-up, but he was gone, and she was alone, and she couldn’t stay put forever.
“Sam?” she tried again. Still no response.
Rain began to fall, splattering against the roof of the truck and dripping in through the open windows.
She eased up. Cautiously. Glanced around.
A man lay on the pavement a hundred yards away. Motionless. Her heart jumped, and she opened the door, was out in the rain running toward him before she realized it wasn’t Sam. That the body was too narrow, the clothes wrong.
She stopped a few feet away.
“Hello?” she said. “Are you okay?”
But, of course, she knew he wasn’t. Blood stained the pavement around him, the amount so large, she didn’t think he could have survived the loss. She felt for a pulse anyway, touching the man’s jugular and then his wrist. His skin was already cool.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured, wondering if he had a family, wondering how many hearts would be broken because he’d died.
Sorry that he tried to kill you and Sam and wound up dead?
That’s what Ruby would have said. She had plenty of compassion for people who wanted to change their lives. She’d devoted her career to fighting drug addiction, to helping men, women and teens who wanted to break their habits and move toward recovery, but she had no patience for people who habitually made bad choices.
People like Ruby’s mother.
A drug addict, Andrea McIntire had been more interested in her next high than in her only child. She’d been willing to lie and steal to get what she craved, and she hadn’t been at all concerned about making sure her daughter went to school in clean clothes or had food to eat.
Ruby had been in and out of foster care three times before a savvy social worker realized that Andrea had family who might be able to help. By the time Ruby moved in with Rosemary, she was tough, street-smart and impatient. Ella had been eight, still reeling from the deaths of both her parents, living in a giant farmhouse that creaked when it settled at night.
She’d been terrified.
Ruby had been brave.
They’d bonded that first year. Despite the age gap and the vast difference in their backgrounds, they’d connected.
Up until she’d received the news that Ruby had died of a drug overdose, Ella had thought they’d shared everything with one another—secrets, dreams, triumphs, disappointments.
Now, she wasn’t sure.
She’d found Ruby’s journals at the apartment, and she’d been poring through them. She’d known a lot about her cousin, but she hadn’t known that she was a wonderful writer. She hadn’t known how easily she understood the nature of the people she worked with. She hadn’t known that Ruby felt responsible for every client’s relapse, or that she worried about not helping enough.
Ella turned away from the covered body, passing the handgun the deceased must have dropped. She knew nothing about firearms, and she didn’t pick it up. She walked back to the Chevy but didn’t get inside.
She’d hidden away for long enough.
She wasn’t the same terrified kid she’d been after her parents died. She wasn’t the wounded and traumatized woman she’d been three years ago. She might not have Ruby’s natural toughness, but she knew how to fight and how to survive.
She rounded the vehicle.
A gun lay near the building. Other than that, there was no sign that anyone had been there.
She had a choice—stick around or leave.
She knew what Sam would want her to do, but Sam was gone, and she had no idea if he’d return.
She crossed the empty lot, icy rain sliding down her head and into the collar of her shirt. She needed to look for help, but having her clothes soaked through on a night this cold was almost as dangerous as sitting in the truck waiting to be killed.
She thought about breaking into the gas station store and waiting there until the rain stopped, but the people who were after her were looking for the truck. They’d found it once. They could find it again. The church seemed like a better option, and she headed there, staying close to the tree line that bordered the abandoned lots. She still felt exposed and vulnerable, every quiet noise making her pulse jump.
She reached the churchyard and
darted across it, pounding up the steps that led to the back door of the building. It was locked, the windows on either side boarded up from the inside.
She bounded down the steps again, racing around to the front of the building. Like the back door, the front was locked, the portico that covered it leaning to the side, the rotting roof offering little shelter from the now pouring rain.
There were two windows on the front of the building. Both closed and boarded up from the inside. The glass was intact, but she tried both windows anyway. If she could open them, she might be able to knock down the plywood.
Both were locked. She could break them, but a broken window would be a neon sign to anyone looking for her.
She rounded the building again, eyeing windows that were just above head level. An old oil tank sat under one of them, rusted but sturdy to the touch. This side of the church faced an empty lot. Beyond that, the gas station stood like an ancient sentinel—old and faded against the landscape.
Her skin crawled, and she climbed onto the tank, the metal giving slightly beneath her weight. She was shoulder level with the window. No barriers beyond the glass. She could see the dark interior of the church, the outline of wooden pews.
“Please let this be open, Lord. Please,” she prayed as she touched the cold glass. She pushed upward, felt the window shift. It inched up slowly, stiff from years of being closed. She pushed harder, forcing the swollen window jambs along the frame.
Two inches, three inches. Four.
A sound drifted into her consciousness. Not pattering rain or rustling leaves. A quiet rumble that made her heart jump. A car. Somewhere nearby. She shoved at the window again, frantic to get inside and out of sight.
The rumble grew louder, and she could hear the splash of tires on wet pavement.
Please, Lord. Please.
The window gave a little more, opening almost enough for her to climb through. She glanced over her shoulder, her mouth dry with fear.
A car rounded the corner of the gas station building, moving slowly, its headlights gleaming on wet pavement.
She shoved harder, forcing the window up, shoving her shoulders through the opening. Her jacket caught on something and she slid out of it, falling headfirst onto the church floor.
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