Chapter Four
Jessica sat in Faith’s apartment surrounded by people she knew, people who had become her friends over the past two years, and felt like she’d been split into two.
There was the woman who’d lived a life working in this bookstore, participating in this book club, embodying Jessica Smith and trying to be happy with that even if she’d known her entire past was a mystery.
And then there was this other part, where she felt like she was floating above it. Someone else. Someone who knew things just out of reach.
It must be Ellis’s fault. Because he stood in the corner, tall and broad and intimidating, illuminated by the soft white glow of Christmas lights Faith had up everywhere. His eyes only ever left her to glance out the window into the dark outside.
Everyone was being too nice. Even Albennie. Like they knew. But it didn’t make sense because Zach and Ellis had said they wouldn’t. But they knew something, because everyone was treating her like fragile glass even while they pretended to have a little holiday party.
And something about that started to…mesh up with what Faith had said down in the store. Faith said she knew what it was like to be in danger, to be a target. And Albennie had been kidnapped last year. There were all these women who trusted Zach Simmons and his little Hope Town.
Were they all the same? Targets of something? Did they all know who she was, while she was in the dark? She wanted to demand answers, but everything kept happening too fast.
Deputy Morris arrived, and Jessica had to change clothes with her. They weren’t exactly the same size. Heather was a little smaller, but they had about the same color hair, and with some heeled boots and a hood pulled up over her face, there’d be no reason for anyone to know she wasn’t Jessica.
“Now, I just need your keys, then I’ll walk over to your place. You’ll just sit tight until Zach gives you guys the signal.”
Jessica hesitated, but Heather was patient and encouraging and eventually Jessica handed over her keys. After Heather was gone for a while, Gard Fairhurst got a text from Zach that it was time to move on to the next step.
She and Ellis would get into his truck with him and Lia, his girlfriend, and head to his house in Bent. Step one. Jessica didn’t want to, but everyone seemed ready and willing to do Zach’s bidding.
So when the word came, everyone hopped into action. Coats and shoes and bags. Down the stairs from Faith’s apartment to the parking area in the back. In the shuffle of bodies, hat pulled low, Jessica was nudged into the back of a truck. Ellis scooted into the seat next to her.
“We’ll make sure there’s no tail,” Gard said, getting behind the wheel. “When we get to my house, we’ll all go inside and then I’ll take you guys out the back to a waiting car.”
Lia turned around in her seat, gave Jessica a bolstering smile. “It’s all worked out. We’re going to make sure you’re safe.”
Jessica tried to smile kindly at her friend, but this all felt so…overly complicated and…big. Really, really big, like that little envelope with not even her name had death-threat implications.
“This sounds like a lot of people knowing,” Jessica said, quietly under her breath.
“But only pieces,” Ellis responded, just as quietly. “And everyone is police or military or former. It’s better to complicate things, to create a few dead ends.”
She looked at him in the dim light of the back of the truck. “Why?”
His gaze met hers. His words were serious and shut her up. “To keep you safe.”
Because even if she didn’t understand any of this it was clear. Everyone thought she was in some kind of grave danger.
And everyone was going to try to keep her safe. She tried to hold on to that, believe that. But the only thing she could really think about was that name she’d signed this morning, what Ellis had almost called her.
Mrs. Sutton on that envelope.
And the complete blank slate that was her past before Hope Town.
THEY MADE IT to Fairhurst’s house and everyone got out of the truck like any two couples might heading inside for a nightcap. Except Ellis kept his hands deep in his pockets and away from Jessica.
There hadn’t been a tail, and there’d be no real reason to surveil this random deputy’s house over in Bent, but Ellis had worked with Zach to take every precaution.
So they did. Fairhurst showed them out the back, and they crossed his yard and his backyard neighbor’s to the street over where a big, black truck waited.
Cam Delaney greeted them and explained the next steps. A drive to a ranch and the man who owned the cabin, who’d drive them to it.
He agreed with what Jessica had said back in the truck. It felt like too many people knowing. Ellis had argued that with Zach, but Zach had held firm.
This community—Hope Town, my family and friends, Bent County—works together.
Ellis understood teamwork. Even going undercover like he had with the FBI required an extreme level of teamwork, but it was separate from all his personal relationships.
This felt sticky because Jessica was friends with Fairhurst’s girlfriend—who was a bakery owner, not a cop.
Cam Delaney might be Zach’s security business partner, but he was related by marriage to the guy who owned the cabin and would drive them up.
What might these people say, and to the wrong people?
And yet, he’d gone along with Zach’s plans. Why had he done that? Riding in the truck with the taciturn rancher Cam had introduced them to as Noah Carson, Ellis couldn’t help but question everything.
The truck rolled to a stop in absolute pitch-black—the headlights of the truck the only sense of any kind of light, and only barely illuminating the shadow of a cabin.
“Grab the flashlight in the glove compartment and I’ll show you around,” Noah said, killing the engine and getting out of the truck.
Ellis did as he was instructed, then got out. He flipped on the light, then helped Jessica out of the truck and into the deep, eerie dark. Carefully, he followed the light in Noah’s hand up to the cabin.
It really was a tiny cabin up on a mountain in the middle of truly godforsaken nowhere. Ellis had gotten used to the small-town life, he liked to think. He’d spent some time in a small town when he’d been young, before his dad had died, before Mom had remarried.
But this was…more than wilderness, more than isolation. Not that he couldn’t hack it. He’d trained for any and every situation.
But he had some concerns about his suburb-raised wife.
Still, Noah opened the door, flicked on the lights, and they stepped inside the cabin behind him.
It wasn’t so bad inside. The furniture was covered, but there was furniture.
There was even a little undecorated fake Christmas tree in the corner.
Pictures on the walls, pretty curtains drawn against the night.
Not the worst place he’d ever hidden out, that was for sure.
“There’s plenty of supplies, Wi-Fi. Electricity, plumbing all work just fine.
There’s a UTV in the stables you’ll be able to see from the porch in the daylight.
Gassed up and keys in.” There were also some hidden places in the walls, and a cellar.
Noah showed them how to access it all, just in case.
After, he showed them how to use the security system. It wasn’t as involved as Ellis might like, but there were some motion detectors and alarms.
Ellis thanked Noah for the ride, for the use of the small, rustic cabin in the middle of absolutely nowhere. He closed the door behind the rancher, locked it.
He knew he should say something to Jessica, but he hadn’t found the words yet. He hadn’t found his equilibrium yet.
The two of them in an isolated cabin, waiting for safety.
Recipe for disaster, emotionally at least. But it would keep her safe. He’d weather a million more disasters to keep her safe.
Then Jessica dropped her own little bomb. “Who’s Kirsten?”