Hiding Place

by Meghan Holloway

  “The senator?”

  “The very one.”

  He made a noncommittal noise. “Powerful man, there. Wealthy. Connected.”

  “Not telling me anything I don’t know,” I said. “You’ll see what you can find out about her?”

  “I’m on the road right now. A high bond skip is headed down to Mexico. Not much to go on with your girl, but as soon as I get him taken care of, I’ll do some digging for you.”

  It might not be much to go on, but the man might as well have been a bloodhound. The only time his skills let me down was when I asked him to help me look for my girls. “Much appreciated, William.”

  I leaned back in the chair as I hung up the phone and rubbed my jaw before pulling my reading glasses from my pocket. They looked ridiculous, but they helped with the strain of reading on the computer screen and deciphering my own scrawled paperwork. A fingerprint smudged the right lens, and I breathed a ghost of fog across the glass and polished them with the tail of my shirt.

  I paused, struck by an idea. I tossed my glasses on the desk and strode down the hall. Ted Peters, the department’s evidence technician, was at his computer.

  “I need you to lift some prints for me and run them, see if there’s a match in the system.”

  “Sure. What kind of surface am I working with?”

  “The handle on the passenger’s side door of my truck.”

  The radio cued with a call from dispatch as soon as Peters finished lifting a thumb print from the door handle. The rest of the afternoon was spent dealing with a local rancher’s herd that broke a fence and wandered onto the interstate.

  The sun glinted off the Airstream when I arrived home. Frank hopped down from the truck and raced straight to a tennis ball left lying against the cinderblock stoop. I tossed the ball for him, and he took off after it.

  Frank caught sight of the white wolf at the edge of the woods before I did.

  She had appeared like a ghost in the darkness almost every night over the last two months. One evening when I was throwing a ball for Frank, she loped out of the forest. I automatically reached for my gun, leery as she approached my dog. They stood shoulder to shoulder for a moment, tails erect but no hackles raised or snarls. Frank broke the tension by dropping into a playful stance, and soon they were racing back and forth through the meadow.

  I had never seen anything like it. She never approached me, and I knew better than to leave food out for her. But she kept returning, and I kept looking for her.

  Keen to be chased, Frank snagged the ball and ran in a wide loop around and around the Airstream. The white wolf watched him for a moment and then trotted after him, her expression bemused by the barking poodle.

  They were an oddly matched pair. Both white, one playful and carefree, the other larger, rangier, and possessing that untamed edginess of a wild creature.

  Shaking my head at their antics, I turned and opened the front door. The smell caught at the back of my throat, choking me and freezing me in place for a moment.

  Vandalism had been commonplace in the first few years after Winona and Emma disappeared. At first, everyone speculated that Winona had grown tired of me and finally moved on to find someone who was more deserving of her.

  But my wife was not one for elaborate gestures or manipulation. She was blunt and straightforward. She would have told me she was leaving me. She loved this town, and she would never have put her friends or family through the agony of thinking something had happened to her. She would have packed her bags, made no secret of the fact, and gone to Maggie’s to sleep on her couch.

  I knew something was terribly wrong from the beginning. And by the second day she and Emma were missing, so did everyone else.

  I had been a shit husband and an even worse father. Everyone knew that. But soon, everyone also thought I killed my wife and daughter. I knew many still thought that.

  In the months following their disappearance, more often than not I came home to a ransacked trailer. The worst instance was walking in to find the blood of some slaughtered creature smeared on the floors and walls and poured across my bed. Even now, years later, after the warm spring sun had spent the day curled around the Airstream, I could smell that sickly sweet metallic odor.

  I went straight to the cabinets underneath the sink. I knocked a bottle of cleaner over when I reached for the air freshener, and it rolled on its side to the back of the cabinets. “Fucking hell,” I muttered, lowering myself to a knee to lean under the sink.

  I never would have spotted it had I not been stooped low to reach into the depths of the cabinet. The envelope was taped to the back side of the cabinet, close to the underside of the counter, behind the sink. The tape had been in place for so long that in pulling it free, a strip of the finish on the inside of the cabinets peeled off with it.

  There was no writing on the envelope, but my fingers shook as I peeled it open. There was no note within. I upended the envelope, and a USB flash drive fell into my palm.

  Frank’s alerting bark startled me. I dropped the flash drive back into the envelope and tucked it into my pocket before moving to the threshold. I was not surprised to see Maggie Silva’s old station wagon parking beside my truck. A glance around showed the white wolf was gone.

  “Come grab the crockpot,” she said as she climbed out of her vehicle. “I brought chili.”

  I hauled the oversized cookery inside and placed it on the counter, nudging the cabinet door shut as I plugged it into the outlet. I slipped my hand into my pocket, rubbing my thumb along the edge of the envelope containing the flash drive.

  The soft sound of Maggie’s voice as she spoke to Frank jarred me into action, and I grabbed two bottles of beer on the way outside. Maggie was kneeling next to the fire pit, building a fire. Louie, the Bichon Frise I had taken in several months ago, was at her side. The fluffy little dog’s owner was viciously murdered in January by the serial killer stalking Raven’s Gap. The loss had been difficult for the sensitive dog. I had no doubt dogs mourned. Grief was not an emotion confined to humanity. I thought I would keep him myself, but he was wary around men. He needed a lap to lie in and a gentle female presence in his life to match what he had before.

  When I broached the subject with her, Maggie had plucked the little dog from my arms so quickly I’d been left holding air before I realized she was already stroking his head and murmuring softly to him. It was the right decision. He looked happier than I had seen him since coaxing him out of hiding when I found him after his owner was reported missing.

  I collected the camp chair Maggie kept in her car and planted it beside my Adirondack.

  I took a seat, and Frank dropped the worn, soggy tennis ball at my feet, prancing back and forth until I lobbed it across the meadow for him. While I threw the ball, I watched Maggie out of the corner of my eye as she meticulously laid the kindling.

  “I wasn’t sure if Joan would be here,” she said, voice carefully casual. Her tone was blank, but she had an expressive face. I knew exactly how she felt about my long-term affair with the police chief’s wife.

  “Not tonight,” I said. She only showed up on my doorstep when her husband began using his fists. There was no set schedule. Sometimes she was in my bed several nights a week; other times it was a month before I saw her outside of the police department, where she worked the front desk. It always perplexed me that she came to me, of all men, for gentleness, but I gave it to her as best I could.

  When the fire was blazing against the darkening sky, Maggie straightened and dusted her hands off, sighing as she sank into the chair and stretched her feet toward the fire pit.

  I popped the top on a bottle and offered it to her, unable to resist returning the sweet smile she directed my way. She accepted it and leaned over to pick up Louie and deposit him on her lap.

  Panting and gnawing on his tennis ball, Frank settled under her outstretched legs. I leaned forward to stir the fire with a stick, waiting her out.

/>   I did not have to wait long.

  “William called me. He said he spoke with you today.”

  I glanced over my shoulder and watched the firelight play over her face but remained silent.

  “I’m sure it has not been lost on you that Faye and her boy are on the run from something, someone, and seeking shelter here.”

  “She tell you that?” I asked.

  “No, I don’t know the girl, though I would like to get her pancake recipe. She doesn’t need to tell me. I can see it on her face. What’s more, I can see it on her child’s face. Unless you were born and raised here, people only come to Raven’s Gap to forget.” She was staring into the fire, the flames dancing in her dark eyes. She turned her head and met my gaze. “Or to be forgotten.”

  I looked away and took a long pull of beer.

  “Don’t ruin that for her,” Maggie said softly. “You start digging around into a woman’s past when she’s finally found a hiding place she feels she’s safe in, you’re going to ruin things for her and for that little boy.”

  It was my turn to stare into the fire for a long moment. “We had a serial killer walking our streets for fifteen years. Three women had their lives snuffed out by him in a matter of weeks. Almost four. I want to know who is in this town and why. Especially if she is going to bring trouble here.”

  “Oh, bullshit. You’re not an altruistic man, Hector.” Maggie leaned into me and rested her head on my shoulder to soften her words. “And you’ve never given a rat’s ass about being a cop.”

  I hid a smile and worked the peeling edge of the bottle label with my thumb. She was not wrong. She had always seen me clearly, and even though she was my wife’s best friend and had likely heard the intimate details of our unhappy marriage, she never judged me.

  “Do you want to know what I think?”

  “I think you’re going to tell me whether I want you to or not,” I said.

  She chuckled. “I am.” She leaned away and waited until I turned my head and met her gaze. “I think you are a man who needs an obsession. The rodeo, your bitterness over losing that.” She paused and said on a whisper, “Jeff Roosevelt.” I stiffened, and she forged ahead. “Finding Winona and Emma has been what’s driven you for fifteen years.”

  “I’m still trying to find them,” I bit out. Frank stood at my tone, and Maggie leaned back into me, wrapping her arm around my shoulders.

  “I know you are. But that search went off course when they didn’t find Winona or Emma’s bodies with his other victims.”

  “There may be other victims buried elsewhere.”

  “There may be,” she said quietly. Then she voiced what had been swirling in my mind since I received the phone call from the coroner. “But now you have no way of finding them with that monster dead, and he may not be the one who…” Her voice trailed off. “What I’m saying is, now you’re lost. Floundering. You need something to latch onto.” She rested her head back on my shoulder. “I want you to be safe. I want you to be happy. I’ve spent a lot of years watching you not be. But…I want you to not get that girl and her little boy hurt just because they crossed your path when you needed something to focus on.”

  Had she been anyone else, I would have shrugged off her embrace and told her to fuck off. But she was Maggie. She had a big heart and a blunt, forthright manner that soothed me even when she pissed me off.

  I drained my beer, and we sat in silence. Frank lay back down and shifted so his chin was propped on my boot. Louie started to snore in Maggie’s lap. The fire ate at the wood, crackling and releasing sparks into the sky. Full night encroached beyond the gleam of the fire. The stars overhead were dense and brilliant.

  Finally, I said, “You done?”

  I felt her cheek move with a smile against my shoulder. “For now.”

  “You think that chili is ready? I’m starving.”

  “I’ll check on it and see.” She straightened. “No cheese, extra Fritos?”

  “You got it.”

  Her hand slid over my shoulder and squeezed the back of my neck before she placed Louie in my lap and stood. She opened the door to the Airstream, and the smell of the chili rolled out, fragrant and spicy. I hoped it covered the rank odor of old blood. I rubbed my thumb along the edges of the thumb drive in my pocket and stared into the darkness beyond the fire.

  five

  GRANT

  Iago eyed me suspiciously as I entered the small corral. The wild horse had come to me as part of a trainer incentive program after a roundup of mustangs from the Three Fingers Herd Management Area in Oregon.

  Winona Lewis was the first to encourage me to reach out to the BLM and rescue entire herds from the cramped pens they were contained in before slaughter. If ever someone was owed the title horse whisperer, that woman was. The first time I met her, one of my ranch hands had radioed in about a break in the fence along the state road.

  When I made it out to the state road, heart in my throat at the thought of an idiot tourist killing one of my Thoroughbreds in an accident because they were not paying attention, I saw her.

  She stood in the center of the road, long blue-black hair caught in a whirlwind around her. Her voice, low and soft, reached me on the wind as she spoke to Patton. He was my most unpredictable and cantankerous horse. He was too dangerous for anyone to handle but me. He would sooner kill a person than look at them. Truth was, I should have put him down years ago, but I had a soft spot for the mean brute. He pawed the pavement now.

  I knew better to call out and warn her. All I could do was watch.

  But instead of trampling the woman, he lowered his head and approached her slowly. A flick of his tail could have knocked me over when he nuzzled her hair.

  Looking back, I had probably fallen in love with her at the exact moment as my bastard of a horse.

  Shaking off memories, I focused on Iago. The mustang had been gathered and gelded last year. Once I gentled him, I would find him a home or keep him myself. Most of the wild horses I worked with ended up as ranch horses throughout the west. But I liked Iago’s spirit and had half a mind to keep him. He reminded me of Patton.

  It was our first day in the pen. He eyed me from across the corral, snorting and bobbing his head, hooves stamping the dirt. I did not bother with a halter or lead. I wanted him to judge his movements based on mine, and I wanted him to move freely around the pen.

  I walked slowly around the perimeter, and he side-stepped nervously, keeping the narrow expanse of trampled dirt between us. He was vocal the entire time, nervous and watchful. With a gust of air blown through his nostrils and a kick of his heels, he broke into a canter around the perimeter of the pen. I moved to the center, turning to keep pace with him. When he finally stopped, I adjusted my stance so I was not facing him but was instead turned sideways to him.

  I could see my visitor out of the corner of my eye as he approached the corral and draped his arms over the railing.

  “What have you found out?” I asked. Iago’s head went up at the sound of my voice.

  “Very little,” John Smith said. “Which intrigues me. She has a clean record, no run-ins with the law, not even a traffic ticket. Owns and operates The River Inn in Raven’s Gap, and very interestingly paid cash for the property.”

  “How much cash?”

  “Almost a neat million. Nine hundred ninety-eight thousand.”

  I began to walk slowly around the perimeter of the corral once more. With a huff, Iago echoed my movement, this time at a more sedate pace. “That is interesting.”

  “You’ll find this even more so. Faye Anders only began to exist five years ago.”

  six

  FAYE

  I rinsed the dye from my hair until the water in the sink ran clear and squeezed the excess moisture from the ends before I straightened. I grabbed the hand towel from the counter and rubbed it over my head.

  I had been using the cheap boxed dye for so long now I no longer grimaced when I
caught my reflection in the mirror. The black was stark, and it did not suit my pale, freckled coloring. My eyebrows and eyelashes were too pale, highlighting the unnatural tint of the black. I only attempted to dye my eyebrows once. The result was so appalling and ludicrous I never bothered again. The color struck me as garish, but I was no longer startled when I caught sight of it. The black hid the very memorable deep red of my natural hair color. That was all that mattered.

  I turned and started when I found Sam standing in the doorway watching me. “Good morning,” I said, offering him a smile.

  He did not return my smile. His brow was pinched, and the set of his mouth was troubled. He glanced over his shoulder at my bed. I followed his gaze, taking in the two suitcases I packed in the early morning hours after finally giving up on sleep.

  Sometimes I wondered how much he remembered. He had only been three years old. I doubted he could recall how many cheap motels with paper-thin walls we stayed at that year. I doubted he could recall the numerous cities and towns we sought shelter in or the nights we slept in the stolen car in a rest area parking lot. Every wail of a police siren, every CCTV camera had me clenching in fear, certain we would be found.

  At first, I thought we could stay on the East Coast, but Sam’s father had too many connections. As soon as I saw the TV special that twisted the story and cast everything in a far different light than reality, I knew we needed to get as far from New York City as we could. I left the stolen car in a Walmart parking lot in Maine and wiped it clean before stealing another one with a child’s car seat in the back and heading west.

  I did not think Sam remembered any of that, not in any clear detail. But I had no doubt the terror and uncertainty and anxiousness were imprinted in his memory. Just as I was certain my hand tight over his mouth as we hid under the bed listening to the screams in the other room and my tearful whisper that he must be quiet and not make a sound had fostered these ensuing years of silence.