Chapter 4
THREE DAYS LATER
RAVEN
“Please, Barry, just…meet with me.” I try to keep the desperation from my voice, just like I have been since the moment this call connected and during every call I’ve had with him since I first managed to track him down.
If he hears even a hint of my anxiety, he may shut this down even harder than he already has attempted to.
“I’ll come to you, so you don’t even have to leave your house. ”
Crossing my fingers of my free hand like a damn middle schooler, I pace my apartment, praying he at least gives me a chance to change his mind in person. If he ends the call without at least leaving me that opening, I’m royally fucked.
“I already told you, Miss Perry, I’m not saying a fuckin’ word.” His voice has that same quiver of fear as everyone I’ve spoken with over the past few months. “I value my life too much.”
I squeeze my eyes closed, tightening my grip on my phone, trying to think of any way possible that I can get through to him short of screaming at the man that he’s the only one who can potentially help and that he needs to grow a set and step up and do what’s right.
Unfortunately, I’ve already let my slight annoyance enter my voice, and keeping anything more at bay while I’m talking to this man is absolutely necessary…
because he’s important. Potentially the most important source I’ve tracked down so far.
Because I need him. Because he’s the type of source who could push this story so far beyond the limits of what I had imagined when I started it.
I need what he knows.
And that’s proving harder than I contemplated to secure.
If Willow were here, she could talk Barry off the ledge and into doing anything she asked because of her sweet, caring nature that lulls people into a sense of security and makes them believe every word she says.
I don’t possess that skill.
I’ve never been particularly good at comforting people. My style is more bull-in-a-china-shop than soft and gentle reassurance. Getting sources to talk can be a crapshoot on any story, but on one this big, I knew it would be an uphill battle. I just never expected it to be Everest…
It’s time to dig deep and find some way to get through to him. “I know you’re scared—”
“Damn right, I’m scared!” He practically screams into the phone, loud enough that I have to pull it away from my ear. “You don’t know what these people are capable of.”
I flinch, my stomach churning with the memories. “Unfortunately, I do. All too well.”
“Then you know why I can’t say anything. You know why I have to keep my mouth shut.”
He doesn’t leave any room for argument, but I’ve never been one to back down from a challenge.
It’s gotten me this far in life, and while many people would see me in this small town in the Blue Ridge Mountains that doesn’t even have a newspaper anymore as nothing to brag about for someone who prides themselves on being an investigative reporter, what McBride Mountain has offered me is something very few others in my role have.
Freedom.
When the paper closed, I had a momentary panic attack thinking my career was dead in the water unless I wanted to leave home and head to Asheville or somewhere else that might have other journalistic opportunities, but what it really did was free me to write about whatever I want without a boss controlling my ideas and words.
Any major newspaper along the East Coast would have shot down this story from the get-go, either too afraid to run it, or confident I could never back up the accusations with any verifiable evidence.
That evidence—or at least, a very big part of it—is on the other end of this line, and I have to reel him in or risk losing him and this story forever.
Maybe playing nice and placating Barry isn’t the right approach. Maybe what he really needs is Raven Fucking Perry pushing him in the right direction.
“You know what ends up happening when people keep their mouths shut, Barry? Bad men get away with very bad things.”
A frustrated sigh that matches my own feelings floats through the line, but he doesn’t say anything. His silence gives me the opening I need to know he’s at least listening.
“It’s not that I don’t understand your reservation, Barry. Believe me, I do. And I sympathize with it, but what you know could make such a huge difference. It could change everything.”
“Which is exactly why I’ve been in hiding for so long. Because I have no intention of ever having my life anywhere near the hands of those people again. I barely got away with it the last time…”
“But you did. And now, everything you suffered could be for a reason. A purpose.”
“I’m sorry, but no, Miss Perry. That is my final decision on this.”
My story is slipping away.
I can physically feel it sliding from my grasp.
He’s the one who would have given credence to what I’ve been writing about, who would confirm all the research I’ve done over the past couple of months, who could validate all the rumors and substantiate innuendos I can’t print without some sort of corroboration.
He is that corroboration.
Letting him get away means giving up this story.
“Please let me come to you to talk in person. Just for a few minutes. If you still want to say no after that, you’ll never hear from me again.”
This time, I hold my breath as the seconds tick by without his response.
Come on. Come on. Come on, Barry.
Do the right thing.
He releases a resigned sigh. “I’ll give you ten minutes, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to tell you anything.”
But it’s a start.
It’s a foot in the door.
A possibility.
That’s all I can ask for at this point.
“I’m fourish hours away. I can leave first thing tomorrow morning.”
“I’ll be here.”
He ends the call abruptly, but there isn’t anything left to say.
It takes a second for my victory to click. I toss my phone onto the counter and fist pump.
“Yes, yes, yes!”
My cry echoes through my living room, sounding a little deranged…but I don’t even care.
After months of searching for Barry using every resource I have, making hundreds of desperate calls, calling in dozens of favors to track him down, I finally have it—the last piece to the puzzle.
All I have to do is convince him to talk.
And when I’m sitting across from him, when I explain what I’m doing and how important it is, he’ll understand and he’ll cave. I have to believe that.
I snag my phone again and dial a familiar number.
He answers on the second ring. “Miss Perry, I hope you’re not calling to have the same conversation we’ve been having for weeks.”
I scowl, even though the man on the other end can’t see it. He knows exactly what I look like when I’m annoyed because he’s been on the receiving end of it many times over the last few months. “I just want you to know that I have Barry Laird.”
The line goes deathly quiet. “What do you mean, ‘you have him’?”
“I found him.”
He mutters something unintelligible under his breath that sounds an awful lot like a string of curse words. “How the hell did you manage that? We’ve been looking for him for two years.”
I grin. “I know. I’m just very good at my job.”
“Apparently.”
“I’m going to meet with him tomorrow, and I’m going to convince him to talk.”
Just saying those words has me almost believing I’ll succeed.
“Miss Perry, we’ve already discussed this. When the hornets are sleeping, you don’t fucking poke the nest.”
“But are they really sleeping?” I let the question permeate the air over the phone line for a moment before I continue.
“We both know they’re not; they’re just regrouping, to reengage, to attack, to sting and cause pain wherever they can, to sink their poison into everything and everyone they touch.
Including the people I love and this mountain. ”
A heavy sigh hits my ears. “You know I appreciate your tenacity, Miss Perry, I always have, and your…discretion in this matter. But I had hoped you would understand how important it is to let sleeping dogs lie.”
“Well, these dogs have rabies, are sleeping with one eye open, and their teeth are bared.”
“Beautiful analogy, I can tell you’re a writer.”
I snort. “I’ll let you know what I find out from Laird…”
Hopefully, it will be exactly what I need and what the man on the other end of line does, too. If I’m right, and Barry opens up to me tomorrow, it will change everything. This is so much bigger than just McBride Mountain…
“It’s a dangerous game you’re playing, Miss Perry.”
His warning raises goosebumps on my skin and sends a shiver down my spine. “I know that. A deadly one. Believe me, I’m well the fuck aware.”
“Then leave it alone.” There’s a plea in his voice. “They’ll get what’s coming to them eventually.”
“Will they?” I walk to the windows of my apartment that overlook Main Street and stare down at our tiny town on the mountain—the families walking along the sidewalks, the children playing in the park, happy people completely oblivious to how easily it could all evaporate in a hail of gunfire.
I lean my forehead against the glass. “McBride Mountain is a quiet place, a safe place, the type of town where no one locks their doors because they don’t need to, where everyone has each other’s backs and looks out for each other. All that changed that night.”
He releases another sigh. “I know it did. All of us changed that night.”
“I have to do something to fix it.”
“It isn’t yours to fix.”
I pull away from the glass, my body tensing with his words. “Then who else is going to do it? Who else is going to put things back the way they’re supposed to be? You sure haven’t.”
He’s quiet for a moment.
And…fuck…
I may have gone too far in flat-out calling him out like that, but my frustration with the entire situation reached a boiling point long ago. The pot is no longer big enough to keep it from spilling over.
“Miss Perry, the more you pick and probe, the worse it will end up…”
“Maybe. Or maybe I’ll drown all the hornets and put the rabid dogs down.”