Chapter Sixty
Xavier
The phone vibrates once against the workbench. Ruby. I pick it up before it can ring again. “Yeah.”
There’s no greeting on the other end, just her breath, too fast, too shallow. “Xavier–” It breaks on my name. “Something’s wrong.”
I’m already moving. My heart is lodged in my throat, making it hard to get words out. “What happened?”
“I…. I went out to feed them and the gate….” She sucks in a breath. “It’s open. Some of the piglets are gone. Samson’s outside the pen. He won’t move. He’s just. He’s looking at the trees.”
My hand is on the truck door before she finishes. “Stay where you are.”
“I am, I just….” Another breath. “I don’t see them. I don’t….”
“I’m coming.” I hang up, don’t wait for a response.
The shop door bangs open behind me as I head for the truck. I don’t bother pulling it closed.
“Dad–” I call over my shoulder, already halfway out the door. “I’m heading out. Don’t know when I’ll be back.”
No answer. Doesn’t matter.
The engine turns over hard, gravel spitting as I back out faster than I should.
Storm debris litters the road: branches, scattered trash, standing water that pulls at the tires when I hit it too fast. I don’t slow down.
Gate open. Piglets gone. Samson out.
Why didn’t I look at the pen before I left? Why? Because I was being too much of a pussy to stick around. I wanted to get away before she woke up and started asking questions. Questions I don’t have answers to.
Her car is in the drive when I pull in. She’s in the yard. “Ruby.”
She turns fast, relief hitting her face and not settling. “They’re gone. Some of them are gone, I counted, I–”
“I’ve got you.” I close the distance, hands on her shoulders, grounding. She’s shaking. “We’ll find them. Slow down.”
Her breath stutters. She nods, but her eyes are already moving past me, back toward the tree line.
“He’s still out there.” She tips her head toward the hill. “He won’t come back, and I didn’t want to risk going out there alone.”
Thank God she didn’t decide to do everything herself this once. I follow her line of sight. Samson stands exactly where she said, broad, planted, facing the trees like he’s guarding something or waiting for it to come back.
I release her. “Stay by the fence.”
“I’m coming with you.”
“Stay.” The word comes out sharp, but I don’t know what I’m walking into. Someone watching. Waiting. Butchered piglets.
“Fine.” Her response comes out sounding more relieved than I expected.
I move toward Samson, keeping my steps even, not pushing him. “Hey,” I say, low. “Easy.”
He shifts his weight when I get close, not aggressive but alert. He watches me, then flicks his attention back toward the trees.
“Yeah,” I mutter. The hair along his spine is raised. “I know. I don’t like it either.”
I crouch, scanning the ground before I get to him. What is that? My gaze narrows to the scuffed leaves and grass. There, near his front hooves, are small, scattered bits. Feed. Different from what’s in the trough.
Drier. Lighter. Spread unevenly like it was dropped, not poured. The piglets are tucked farther along the tree line, half-hidden in brush, pressed close together.
My shoulders go tight. “Ruby….” I don’t take my eyes off the ground. “Don’t come closer yet.”
“Why?”
“Just…. Hold on.” I shift my weight from one foot to the other. It’s not a straight line, but it leads, faint, broken, toward the trees. Led and not wandered.
I straighten, scanning over Samson. He appears fine—no foaming of the mouth. No disorientation. Alert. Feed, not poison. “Come here.”
She’s beside me in seconds anyway, ignoring the distance I asked for. “What is it? Did you find them?”
“Look.” I point to the spot near Samson’s front hooves.
She squints. “That’s just–”
“Feed,” I finish. “Not from your bin.”
Her expression shifts. “Shit. He didn’t wander off. Someone lured them out here.” Her arms wrap around herself. “While we were….”
I don’t let that thought finish. “Let’s get them back in first.”
She nods, tight. It takes a few minutes to retrieve them, but once we have them, Samson falls in behind us, not taking his attention off the yard until we’re back inside the pen.
The gate hangs wrong when I reach it. “You didn’t move this when you came outside?”
“No.” She shakes her head. “I didn’t move anything.” Her hands rub up and down her arms as if she can replace the chill that’s gone through her by scrubbing.
I fix it, securing it tighter than it was before. “Count them again.”
She does, voice quieter now. “They’re all here.”
“Good.” I step back, scanning the ground outside the pen this time.
There. Indentations. Faint. Pressed into the softened earth from the storm. Then, nothing. The line cuts off where the dirt’s been disturbed, scuffed over just enough to blur the shape. Not erased but altered so they can’t be made out.
“There are the marks.”
She’s still watching the piglets. “What?”
I point. “In the grass. I’m assuming those aren’t yours?”
She steps closer, following where I’m indicating. “I didn’t come through there.”
I straighten, giving the fence one last look before stepping back. “They wanted you to know they could get in.”
“Fucking asshole. It’s one thing to mess with me, but another to put my animals in jeopardy.” Her arms tighten around herself again. Her head jerks up. “The cameras. We should’ve caught them on camera.”
“Let’s go inside.”
She doesn’t hesitate or argue.
It only takes a moment for us to get inside the house, and then I’m at the table, flipping the laptop open, pulling up the camera feeds. “You didn’t check these yet?”
“No. When I got up, I went straight outside.”
I don’t look at her as the screens load. A different kind of tension settling heavy around us. When she noticed I was gone, she’d avoided the kitchen the same as I did.
Focus on the cameras. Front yard. Driveway. Back door. Side fence. Everything looks the same. “Let’s see who in the fuck messed with Samson and the piglets.”