CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“She’s gonna be furious,” said Mike as they drove back to the property in Wyoming. “I can’t let her know I helped him get away.”
“I won’t tell her,” said George, “but I think he might have had help. I know it rained last night but it looked like other footsteps were there.”
“Maybe the fire department saw the flames from the houses and came out there. I haven’t heard news of anyone finding Jeremiah, so he must have gotten away.”
“What do we tell her about the missing munitions? It’s a lot that’s not accounted for. Someone either stole it or sold it.”
“We would have seen someone loading it into vehicles and we had alarms on the doors,” said Mike. “It must have been when they were bought, picked-up or delivered. Which means it was most likely one of my sons.”
“They’re not your sons, Mike,” said George. “None of them are ours and we need to be honest with ourselves about that.”
“I’m aware,” he send with a frown on his face. “I didn’t think Florence would ever stop taking boys. I was worried she was going to do something, you know, sexual to them at first. But no. She only wanted to beat them half to death.”
“We should have stopped her a long time ago. I don’t mind the rest of this, it’s making us more money than we ever dreamed of. But beating those boys just might land us in hot water.”
“What about Saylor? It’s not like she got quiet when she left,” said Mike with a glare.
“No. No, you’re right. She didn’t get quiet. I mean, she was for a while. We know that because no one came searching for us. But it’s obvious she went to Maggie’s sister for help.”
“Where does she live? We could go there,” said Mike excitedly. George knew he was only trying to postpone returning to his wife.
“I don’t even know. Nell would never give an address to Maggie and she never asked. They used to communicate quite a bit and then we moved to Nebraska. Nell got married and then had a nasty divorce but met a man soon after that. They’re married now.”
“What does he do for a living?” he asked.
“No clue. Nell never said anything other than she got remarried and she was happy. We didn’t know, until much later, that Saylor was emailing her a good bit. Had we known we would have stopped it.”
The two men were quiet for several miles, pulling into a rest stop for gas and food. They used the restroom, grabbed some pre-made sandwiches, chips, and other road snacks and then left the station.
Back in the car, they opened the sandwiches, getting situated before they took off again.
“You know, Mike, we could just turn in another direction and drive.” Mike stared at his friend. “No one would know. We’ve got cash. We can dump the truck, leave everything that we gathered in the back and just disappear. It’s obviously a lot easier than we thought.”
“B-but I’d be leaving the other boys to her. I can’t do that,” he said frowning at George.
“I get that,” he nodded. “We could get them. Take them with us.”
“What about your wife? She’s a good woman.”
“She’s a good woman, just not the woman I want. I’ve known that for a while. I should have let her go when I found out she couldn’t have kids.”
“We’ve made do,” said Mike. “Look at us. Seven boys.”
“Seven stolen boys,” said George. “I watched all those news stories when Saylor was taken and it nearly made me bring her back to her mother. I knew Maggie needed a child to dote on but I never once thought about the poor woman that I took the child from.”
“That’s why we changed our tactics,” said Mike. “If the girls we use get pregnant, we take the kids and bury the mothers.”
“Are you listening to yourself, Mike? You’re sounding like your wife. So easily destroying lives, killing young women, stealing babies.”
“What about you? Don’t act high and mighty with me, George. You’ve been a part of this as much as I have. When Florence mentioned the animals, you were all in on it. The big hunter! You thought it was amazing. And don’t pretend innocence. You’ve had your fun with some of those girls.”
George bit his tongue, knowing that Mike was right. Yes, he’d broken in a few girls in his day. Made sure they would cooperate. He had the pleasure of stripping them all and forcing them into the cotton nighties that Florence picked out for all of them.
“You’re right. I have no grounds to act like I’m innocent in any of this. And I’m not. I’m just saying we have enough money so that we could get your boys and get out. Make up something to Florence and leave again. A reason we have to go back to Nebraska.”
Mike was quiet for a long time and something inside of George shifted. He’d said too much, talked too much.
“You know what? Never mind. You’re right. This was the plan and we’ll stick to it.” Mike just nodded at him, staring straight ahead at the road.
“I think that might be best.”