Chapter Forty
Forty
Leanne jogged up to the farmhouse, scanning the dusky shadows. It was nightfall, and the last of the day’s light had nearly faded. She spied a truck up ahead, near the tree by the trailer.
Liam Moriarty’s truck.
The screen door of the farmhouse slapped open, and Leanne halted, reaching for her weapon. A shadowy figure sprinted down the steps.
“Stop!”
He turned toward her voice, and Leanne strode forward, aiming her gun.
Sean Moriarty. She’d know those wide shoulders and that shaved head anywhere.
He rested his hands on his hips and watched her approach him.
“He’s got Izzy.”
She halted. “What? Who does?”
“Justin. He took her off in his truck.” Sean nodded at the house. “I just talked to Harlow Carr.”
“But why would—”
“I know where they went.” Sean moved for his pickup.
“Stop.”
Leanne stepped closer, still pointing her weapon at him.
“I know where they are,” he growled. “Don’t waste time.”
Leanne stopped in front of him, studying his lean face in the dim light. His gray eyes looked intense, and the tendons of his neck bulged.
“Hands against the truck.”
“Are you fucking kidding? We don’t have time.”
“Hands against the truck!”
Shaking his head, he turned and put his hands on the roof of the pickup.
Leanne did a quick pat down and came up with a pistol tucked in the back of his jeans beneath his shirt. She didn’t know what Sean was up to, coming over here armed, but it couldn’t be good.
He glared over his shoulder. “You done?”
She tucked the gun into the back of her own jeans and then holstered her service weapon. “Let’s go.”
Sean jogged around the front of the pickup, and Leanne swung open the passenger door with a creak. As she got inside, she glanced around the truck cab for any other weapons. Fast-food cups littered the floor and the truck smelled of tobacco spit.
“What are you doing out here?” she asked him.
He didn’t answer, just fired up the engine and shot. He shoved it into drive and lurched forward on the bumpy road.
“Where’s he taking her?” she asked. “Did you see him?”
“No.”
Leanne pulled out her phone and called dispatch. She relayed her name and location and urgently requested assistance. Then she hung up and called Duncan. No answer.
“Goddamn it!”
She tapped out a text and sent it, then turned to Sean.
“Where is he taking her?” she asked again.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know? You said you—”
“I don’t know for sure,” he told her. “But I think the mine.”
Leanne’s stomach plummeted. “The mine? Like, the abandoned mercury mine?”
“Yeah.”
“Where is that?” She whipped out her phone and pulled up a satellite map. “Why would he take her there?”
Sean sent her a sideways glance, and Leanne’s blood turned to ice.
Did he think Izzy was dead?
Sweet Lord, was he dumping a body?
Leanne’s phone chimed. Duncan.
“Why did you—”
“Get to Carr Farms, ASAP!” she told him. “He’s got Izzy.”
“What?”
“Did you listen to my message? Izzy’s car is out here, and she’s not in it. I’m with Sean Moriarty, and he thinks he knows where Justin’s taking her.”
Silence as Duncan absorbed this.
“We’re moving west, I repeat west, on an interior road”—she twisted in her seat and looked out the back window—“heading away from the house that’s on the property. You copy?”
“Did you say you’re with Sean Moriarty?”
“Yes.” She glanced at him. “He’s familiar with the area. Call it in, all right? I already did, but it’ll help to hear from both of us.”
Nothing.
“Duncan?”
“Roger that. Be careful.”
Leanne hung up and looked at Sean behind the wheel. The glow from the dashboard lights reflected off his shaved head. He looked intense. Focused. The vein at his temple pulsed.
He looked enraged.
Leanne gazed ahead as the twin headlight beams bounced over rocks and cacti. They weren’t even on a road now. They were driving through a field, mowing down plants.
“Why are we—”
“Shortcut,” he snapped, seeming to read her mind.
Leanne stared ahead as fear settled over her. She closed her eyes and thought of that cold water bottle in Izzy’s car. If only she’d gotten here ten minutes sooner.
The truck bounced as they curved left, making an arc around a weathered wooden windmill. Sean seemed to know his way around here.
What else did he know?
She studied his profile in the dimness, the angle of his nose and the hard set of his jaw. A prison tattoo peeked up from his collar, another reminder of all the years he’d spent behind bars, time he would never get back.
“Justin did it,” Leanne said.
She watched his face, needing to see how he’d react.
Nothing at all. Which told her he knew.
“When did you figure it out?”
“I had fifteen years.” He glanced at her. “That’s a lot of hours to fill.”
She looked ahead as they bounced and pitched over the rugged terrain. Fifteen years, stolen from him. Did he blame Justin? Her father? Cops in general?
And did he want revenge?
“Why’d you come out here with a gun?” she asked.
No answer. He just stared ahead.
“Why would you risk your freedom after all this time?”
Still nothing.
“You need to let the police handle it,” she told him. “Don’t do something stupid. You need to stay out of the way.”
Again, nothing, but the air between them was electric with tension.
Leanne rested her hand on her holster and at the same time felt the weight of Sean’s pistol against the small of her back.
It was surreal that she was here, in a truck with a man she had demonized for her entire adult life.
How many times had she wanted to confront him, to yell and scream and vent all her hatred at the person whose heinous act had caused so much suffering for so many people she knew?
That long-ago summer had been an earthquake.
A bomb blast. Pick your disaster. It had marked the beginning of the end for her family.
The murder of Hannah Rawls was the moment everything fell apart.
It was the moment her parents’ marriage started to crack and her little brother went into a tailspin.
It was the moment Leanne’s life was upended, the moment she lost her innocence and her footing and her faith.
Did she want it back again? No. Those things were bound to go sometime. Anything resembling optimism was a liability for someone on her chosen career path. But still, she’d been angry. Bitter. Furious at Sean Moriarty and everything that his one fateful act had cost them all.
For all these years, she’d blamed him. Part of her still did, even though logic told her she was wrong, and she needed to trust him.
Trust him.
Trust Sean Moriarty.
The thought alone made her eye start to twitch. In this pivotal moment, she was putting her trust in a man she’d hated for years, who no doubt hated her right back.
He glanced at her. “What?”
She looked out the window. “I hope to hell you know where you’re going.” She shook her head. “You better not be driving us off a cliff.”
· · ·
Izzy glanced around, trying to get her bearings. It was dark now, and the only light came from the headlight beams, which stretched across an endless field of scrub brush. Where were they?
“Come on.”
“Where are we—”
“Move.” He shoved her shoulder blade, and she tripped to the ground, then scrambled to her feet.
“Faster.”
Izzy’s heart squeezed as she stumbled forward into the darkness.
In her path were weeds and cactus plants, and she stepped around them as she tried to come up with a plan.
Then the truck’s headlights went off, and everything became pitch dark.
She slid her hand into her pocket and tapped at her phone, hoping she could maybe call someone.
Behind her, a flashlight switched on.
“Hey,” he said, wrenching her arm back. He pried the phone from her fingers and stared at it a moment before swiping at the screen, powering it off.
Killing her last hope of calling for help.
“Justin, please. Could you just—”
“Go! Now!”
She turned around and moved forward, picking her way through the field.
The beam of his flashlight lit up weeds and plants, casting haphazard shadows across the dirt.
She glanced up at the sky. It was dark, not even a moon yet to see by.
And never in her life had she felt the vastness of the land until right this moment.
It was huge. And empty. She could run and scream, and no one would hear her, way out here.
They probably wouldn’t even hear a gunshot.
“Stop.”
She halted, glancing around. There was nothing and no one, just shadows and scrub trees.
She was isolated. She turned to face him, shielding her eyes against the glare of the flashlight.
“Please. Justin.” She stepped toward him. “Let me go. I promise I won’t tell anyone—”
“Shut the fuck up.” The light jerked sideways. “Over there. Go.” The light jerked again. “Go.”
She turned. But all she saw was a big black hole, like a cave.
“I don’t understand. What—”
“Now!”
Pain jolted through her as he kicked her hip, sending her into the abyss.