Page 41 of Bitter Falls

We’ve gone about four miles by my odometer when my phone rings. I put it on speaker. “Hey, you’ve got Gwen,” I say. I’m not surprised it’s J. B.

My boss says, “I’m texting you the number he called. It’s a burner phone, though. It’s going to take time to get the data on location from my source; it’s an, ah, extralegal use of legal software. Technically okay, if you squint, but she doesn’t want to get caught doing it either. Not without a warrant.”

“I’m on the pastor,” I tell her. “He knows something. It’s possible he’ll lead me to her.” I tell her in quick sentences about what I’ve learned from Remy’s parents and about the mysterious Carol. I’m still behind the pastor’s car, shielded by two vehicles between us. He drives cautiously and obeys the speed limits. Useful, for my purposes.

“Is it remotely possible this kid ran away with Carol? That he’s living with her and somehow keeping her safe?”

“I don’t know,” I tell her. “But it’s more than we had. I’ll be in touch, I think the pastor’s coming to a destination.”

He is, but it’s his home; I recognize the car parked in the small driveway as another that had been in the church parking lot—the son’s ride, most likely. That one has a bumper sticker that says UNDERGODsurrounded by the red and blue of an American flag. Makes it extra easy to spot. I park and watch a moment, in case there’s something interesting to see, but there isn’t. Through the handy picture window into the dining room I can see food being set out. Three place settings, so Carol isn’t hiding here.

Something’s making my breath come faster, sweat prickle hot on the back of my neck, and for a second or two I don’t even know what it is.

Then I blink, and I see a house of similar lines superimposed over this one. A normal house on a normal street. A broken exterior wall to the garage with a wrecked vehicle jutting out of it.

My normal house. My normal street in a normal Kansas town.

And a dead girl hanging from a wire gallows in the exposed garage, the day all that ended. All those years spent in that house, living next to a monster, not knowing what was going on under the same roof. Making dinner. Setting the table, just as this woman’s doing.

I flinch and gasp and close my eyes. I have coping mechanisms for these flashbacks, and I use them, slowing my racing heartbeat and gearing myself down from the blind horror and panic that never, ever quit being fresh. I press my shaking hands down on my thighs.Past is past. Put yourself here, now. Feel the air. Take in the smells. Listen. Behere.

The overwhelming sense of being trapped slowly fades. Panic recedes. And when I look again, it isn’t my house, it isn’t my dining room, and the three people sitting down at that table are not my family. There isn’t horror hiding behind that wall, or if there is, it’s not mine to endure.

I check my text messages. J. B. has sent me the number that Pastor Wallace called. I know I should wait for J. B. to get that tracking data; it might—might—send me in the right direction. Or, if he’s told the young woman to run, I might lose her altogether.

On balance, I feel a real and urgent need toact.So I dial the number. Roll the dice.

A woman answers. “Hello?” She sounds young and tentative, and also worried.

“Don’t hang up,” I say. “I’m a friend, Carol. I know you’re afraid. Let me help you.”

I half expect her to hang up, but she seems to hesitate. Then she says, “You’re the one the pastor talked about.” She has an accent, but it isn’t from Tennessee. Sounds more northern states to me. Maybe even as far as Maine or Vermont. “The detective?”

“Yes,” I tell her. “My name is Gwen Proctor. And I can help, if you’re in trouble.”

“I don’t think you understand,” she says. “Nobody can help me.”

“Maybe I can.”

“He’ll never let that happen.”

“Who’she?”

“Doesn’t matter,” she says. She sounds quiet now. Resigned. “I’m sorry, but I can’t help you. I got out. I can’t ever get free. I thought I could, but...it’s never going to work.” I squeeze my eyes shut and listen desperately for any environmental clues. I hear a babble of voices in the background. An indistinct PA announcement. A metallic squeal.

I sense she’s about to cut me off, and I quickly say, “Carol, can you tell me what happened to Remy? Where he is?”

Silence. Silence for so long that I think the call’s dropped and she’s vanished into the air. But then she says, “Remy’s with the saints.”

Click.

But I heard enough. I can guess where she is.

She’s at the bus station.

14

GWEN

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