“Make sure she doesn’t go back?” Sadie repeated. “Back where?”
“That’s all I’m saying,” Joe said, but Sadie didn’t believe him. He wanted to talk. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have said so much already.
As she reviewed everything he’d told her, she realized he hadn’t known about the box until she’d told him about it. Granted, he could be pretending, but she didn’t think so—there was something very solid about Joe once he didn’t feel threatened.
So, if Joe hadn’t known about the box, then he wasn’t the one who burned it, which meant there was someone else involved in this very strange game. Were the people who burned the box the same people Joe was running from?
“What?” Joe asked, interrupting Sadie’s thoughts. “What are you thinking about?”
She looked up from the table where she’d been staring and met his eyes. She quickly scanned the immediate surroundings in search of something she could improvise as the topic of her thoughts since she wasn’t about to tell him the truth. Her search ended at his plate of food. “Coleslaw,” she said quickly.
“Coleslaw?” Joe repeated.
“There’s this little Cajun restaurant in Fort Collins—that’s the largest city near where I live, about an hour away from Garrison—that serves this amazing coleslaw. It’s a little spicy, but a little sweet, too. Nothing in it but cabbage and the dressing. And they serve key lime pie—the official pie of Florida.”
“I thought the state pie was pecan pie,” he answered. “Pecans grow all over the place.”
Sadie shook her head. “That might be so, but key limes are so very Florida, and you can find pecans in other states. In fact, it’s the state nut of Alabama so if they ever lay claim to a pie, it will probably be pecan.”
He blinked at her, encouraging her to convince him that she was an expert on things like this.
“There are only two other states with state pies, you know. Vermont has apple pie, even though Johnny Appleseed is buried in Indiana, which happens to be the other state with an official pie—sugar cream. Massachusetts has Boston cream pie, but it’s not really pie at all, it’s cake. Then of course Louisiana has Natchitoches, but it’s a meat pie so I don’t really count that one either. Key lime pie is definitely Florida’s official state pie.”
“Ri-ight,” Joe said, looking at her with a bland expression. “It’s good to know the politicians don’t have enough social issues to deal with and can therefore focus on things like state pies.”
“It’s pie, Joe,” Sadie said. “One must not be cynical about pie.”
Joe shrugged and went back to his food.
Sadie sighed wistfully. “I was really looking forward to enjoying some key lime pie during my trip, but, well, things haven’t gone so well.”
“We could always stop at the Key West Key Lime Pie Company on our way to the Speedway,” Joe said, wiping his mouth. “I remember hearing they make the best key lime pie in the state—assuming they’re still here in Miami. They’ve got a lot of stores in Key West, but they used to have one here in Miami too.”
“That would be wonderful,” Sadie said, forgetting for a moment that she was a prisoner. She smiled at the anticipation of dessert. A good slice of pie would see her through any difficult times ahead, she was sure.
He lifted his spork, pointing it at her. “But I still think the state pie should be pecan,” he said with emphasis, but as he shook his spork at her, he knocked his biscuit off his plate. It rolled off the tabletop and disappeared.
Joe swore.
“Don’t swear,” Sadie reprimanded him before bending down to see where the biscuit had landed.
“But it’s been on the ground, now,” Joe said from the other side of the table.
“Haven’t you ever heard of the ten-second rule?” she answered, spotting the biscuit a few inches past her feet. She reached down, her entire back under the table, and picked it up, not sure that she’d eat it either. At home there was no question about it, but at a public park with bugs and pets and things? She was just beginning to straighten when she heard a thud, a groan, and another thud from above the table. She startled, hitting her head on the bottom of the table, and then inhaled sharply as Joe slid off the bench and landed in a crumpled heap at her feet.
Chapter 26
For one full second Sadie stared at Joe’s body. His ponytail had pulled loose slightly, leaving his hair disheveled, and his mouth hung open, eleven herbs and spices not yet wiped away from his lips. The spork lay a few inches away. Then Sadie’s eyes moved past Joe to see a pair of denim-clad legs standing behind the bench where Joe had been sitting. Hoping Joe’s attacker hadn’t seen her, Sadie stayed where she was, bent in half with her torso and head under the table. The fantasy was shattered when the newcomer spoke.
“Ya okay, lady?”
Monty?
Sadie emerged from under the table to see Monty standing across from her, looking at her with concern. She looked between him and the place where Joe had been sitting. “What have you done?” Sadie asked, breathless as she attempted to make sense of what had just happened.
Monty didn’t seem to hear the dismay in her tone. Instead he smiled broadly, his white teeth once again looking luminescent against his skin. He pointed a finger at Joe. “I know trouble when I see it, lady, and dis boy be trouble.”
“But . . . but you . . . what did you do?”
Monty held up a short, black stick that Sadie recognized as a billy club—police officers in old movies often swung them back and forth as they walked down the streets, whistling. “You hit him with that?”
“Sho’ did,” Monty said, flipping the billy club around before catching it under his armpit and holding it against his side. He knew how to handle that stick. Sadie bent down to look at Joe again. He was out cold.
When she sat up again, she put her elbows on the picnic table and covered her face with both hands. She was in so much trouble.
“Wha’ d’ mattah?” Monty asked.
Sadie spread her fingers wide enough to look up at him. He wasn’t smiling anymore. “I promised him I wouldn’t try to escape,” Sadie said. “And he’s the only person who knows something I need to know.”
Monty’s eyes flicked to the body under the table. “I taught you wer’ in trouble. You done sen’ me dat text but den lef.”
“I know, I know,” Sadie said, lowering her hands and trying to think of what to do next. “And I appreciate you coming to my rescue; it’s just that I’m in even more trouble now.”
“Why?”
Could she really not tell him now that he was involved? In a few sentences she explained how she’d made a deal with Joe in order to help Eric get the information he needed. When she finished, Monty looked down at Joe, who still wasn’t moving and simply said, “Oh.”
“You didn’t kill him, did you?” Sadie asked, finally standing up and coming around the table. If Joe was dead she would really be in a pickle.
“’Course not,” Monty scoffed. “I jus hit ’im in de back o’ de head, but den ’e done hit ’is head on de table when ’e fell too.” He seemed a little concerned but then looked at Sadie and repaired his expression. “’E be okay in a minute.”
Sadie wasn’t so sure. She’d been knocked unconscious before, but had been out only a few seconds. Even then she’d had a terrible headache, and it had taken a little while for her brain to work correctly again. She crouched down and put two fingers against Joe’s neck. He had a strong pulse, and being this close to him, she could see that he was still breathing. Good.
“Can we get him out from there?” she asked. He had basically fallen under the table, but his left arm was at an awkward angle under his body and it seemed weird to leave him in such an odd position.
“Sho’,” Monty said, and Sadie stepped aside so he could drag Joe out from under the table. Sadie looked around to see if anyone was watching them. Joe had picked their location well; there wasn’t anyone close by. They were still in a public park, howe
ver, which meant that sooner or later someone was going to wonder why an unconscious man was lying next to a picnic table. Monty pulled him a few feet from the table and let him fall on the grass. Joe’s head rolled to the side. Maybe people would think he was asleep.
“He is going to be so mad when he wakes up,” Sadie said, thinking about her promise not to mess things up and how she could explain what had happened when he regained consciousness. She’d felt like she’d been gaining his trust, but surely that was ruined now.
“Well, den let’s go,” Monty said. He grabbed Sadie’s arm, but she resisted. Why did everyone have to grab her arm?
“I can’t just leave him here,” Sadie said. Joe was supposed to give Eric the information he needed to find Megan. She heard laughter and looked up to see a young couple walking their dog on the other side of the trees. Luckily they didn’t notice the drama unfolding, but it was one more reminder why Sadie couldn’t stay here. She thought briefly about having Monty pick up Joe and take him to the cab with them, but what if someone saw them carrying a body to the car? And then her thoughts turned in a new direction. Joe had been unconscious for two whole minutes. What if he was really hurt? What if he didn’t just end up with a headache? He might need a doctor.
“I need my phone,” she said, bending down and checking Joe’s pockets—delicately—until she found what felt like keys in his front left pocket. She reached in only as far as she had to in order to grab the keys, then looked up at Monty. “Can you stay with him for a minute?” she said. “My phone is in his car.”
Monty looked around, obviously concerned about someone seeing them, but finally nodded.
“I’ll hurry,” she said, running for the car without waiting for his answer. When she was a few feet away, she pushed the unlock button twice and immediately opened the back door on the driver’s side where Joe had so rudely thrown her purse, which was still upside down on the seat. Shaking her head in annoyance, she picked it up and a stack of papers caught her eye. But at the same moment, her phone rang.
After a quick glance at Monty, who was walking in a slow circle around the table with his hands in his pockets—Sadie could barely make out Joe’s body in the shadows—she turned back to the car and quickly dug her phone out of her purse. It was Gayle. Confident in her ability to multitask, Sadie answered the call and held it against one ear while picking up the papers with her other hand. She gave herself twenty seconds to skim the papers and talk to Gayle.
“You’re all right,” Gayle said with relief. “I got nervous when you didn’t call. Is everything okay?”
At the top of the papers was a seal that read University of Miami Hospital. Why did Joe have hospital admission forms?
“Everything’s fine,” Sadie said, distracted. The patient’s name on the form was Liliana Miriam Montez. She was twenty-nine years old.
“So, what’s happening?” Gayle asked. “How’s Eric?”
Eric’s name broke her out of her distraction as regret washed over her again. He was either worried sick or incredibly angry right now. Maybe both. While she was tempted to share her burden with Gayle, it seemed impossible to explain. Things were completely different than she’d imagined they would be since the last time she’d spoken with Gayle.
“Well, it’s complicated,” Sadie finally said.
“Really?” Gayle’s tone was brimming with intrigue.
“I’ll have to tell you about it later,” Sadie said, forcing her thoughts away from Eric and back to the name on the hospital forms—Liliana Miriam Montez. Was this woman Joe’s wife? He hadn’t been wearing a wedding ring. Could Liliana be his sister?
“I called Pete.”
Suddenly Gayle had Sadie’s full attention again. “Oh?” she said as evenly as she could manage. “How did that go?”
“Okay, I guess,” Gayle said. “I think he might need more time than you thought, though. He mostly asked me about you. He said he’d stopped by your house this morning, but you weren’t home.”
“He stopped by?” Sadie repeated, a hopeful flutter tickling her heart. She’d been so sure when she left Garrison that Eric was the direction her heart was leading her. Now she wasn’t so sure. Was Pete unsure too? “Did he say why he was looking for me?”
“No,” Gayle said, sounding a little disappointed. “I mean, we talked about going to the Renaissance dinner—he’s going to call me back when he checks his schedule—but he seemed more concerned about where you were.”
The word “concern” sparked a whole slew of them in Sadie’s mind. “You didn’t tell him I’d come here, did you?” Sadie asked in a panic. Would Gayle throw Sadie under the bus in hopes of bettering her chances with Pete?
“Of course not,” Gayle said, allowing Sadie to exhale. “But the conversation as a whole just didn’t bode well for eternal bliss between him and me, ya know?”
“I’m sure that’s not it,” she said, though the feelings competing inside her chest were confusing. “He can be difficult to read sometimes.”
“Yeah, maybe that’s it,” Gayle said. “So, what are you doing right now? Was Eric glad to see you?”
“Um, yes,” Sadie said, answering the last question instead of the first one. “But I need to go—can I call you later?”
“I guess,” Gayle said. “Oh, and I finished cleaning the trailer.”
“Oh, right.” She’d forgotten all about the trailer. “Thank you. I’m sorry, Gayle, but I really do need to go.”
“Okay,” Gayle said. “But don’t leave me hangin’. Call me as soon as you can.”
“I will,” Sadie said and hung up the phone. Pete had stopped by? She shook her head. No time to think about that, never mind that if Pete knew where she was and why she’d come, he wouldn’t be stopping by ever again.
Sadie went back to the paperwork, scanning all the details she could find. She froze when she read that Liliana had been admitted to Labor and Delivery yesterday. Liliana was pregnant? Why would Joe be running around town if a woman important to him had just had a baby? He said he needed the money to leave. What about this woman? What about the baby?
Gayle and Pete were suddenly of very little consequence. She read through the form again, aware that Monty was waiting for her and that she was taking a lot longer than she should be. At the bottom of the second page was Liliana’s signature. Sadie barely glanced at it at first, nearly convinced she was being silly to think these papers were important, but then something stood out and she gave it a second look. Well, a first look, since she hadn’t really looked at it before. It was just a signature, in swirling letters. What had drawn her eye?
Wait.
Her eyes went to the M at the front of the middle and last name. Something was familiar, and instantly Sadie had a flashback of the gas station receipt she’d glanced at when she’d been pawing through the box at Eric’s house. Megan had signed the receipt with a typical signature except for the swirly M at the front of her name. Sadie had never seen anyone get that creative with the letter M, which is why she’d noted it in the first place. The M in Miriam and Montez were exactly like the M on Megan’s gas receipt.
A rush of adrenaline ran through her veins as Joe’s words filtered back to her. “She’s safe,” he’d said. “For now.”
Megan was Liliana Montez—and she was having—or had already had—a baby.
Chapter 27
Sadie paused for only a moment, and then began scouring the car. This was Joe’s car, so it had to have important information in it. Information the police would need. She opened her purse and threw the GPS device into it; she could look up those coordinates Joe had given Eric and the police. There were a few receipts in the middle console and she stuffed those in her purse as well. A briefcase or planner would have been nice, but she didn’t find anything like that. Even the trunk was empty except for the basic roadside necessities. She slammed it closed and jumped at the sound it made—louder than she’d expected it to be.
“Deep breaths,” she told herself. Her nerves
were getting the better of her so she consciously slowed down her movements and stopped trying to rush.
She moved to the front seat for a final look, but she had already taken everything of interest. Finally, after having spent way too much time on this—Monty had to be freaking out by now—she reached to close the driver’s side door when she saw a piece of paper wedged between the middle console and the driver’s seat. She leaned back into the car, pulled out the paper, then shut all the doors. She scanned the paper on her way back to Monty. She was only halfway there when she froze in her tracks. The paper was an itinerary—a flight plan for a reservation made online.
“Paris?” Sadie said. The flight left from Miami tomorrow morning, stopped over in New York, and then continued on to Paris. The itinerary was for one person by the name of Hugo Montez.
Montez? Like Liliana Montez?
Was Joe’s real name Hugo? And was Hugo Megan’s husband?
“You’re back.”
Sadie looked up, having forgotten all about Monty for a minute. She started walking toward him again. She folded the paper and shoved it into the side pocket of her purse; she’d already zipped up the fuller-than-ever interior. “I’m sorry that took so long,” she said, shaking her head. “I got . . . distracted.”
There was no time for any more distractions now, though. During the search of the car, Sadie had made some decisions, and she needed to follow through with them.
“I need his phone,” Sadie said when she reached Monty. She put her heavy purse on the picnic table and moved toward Joe, who didn’t seem to have moved at all other than his head being a bit more to the side. It couldn’t be good that he’d been unconscious this long. She thought back to Eric’s explanation of Layla’s injury, how he’d said it hadn’t been a serious accident, but it had been enough. Monty stepped in front of her and shook his head before kneeling down in her place. Such a gentleman.
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