Chapter Ten #2
“I think it’ll give him one less way to get to you,” Asa said. “And one more way for us to watch for how he tries.”
“Where?” she asked, suddenly aware of how small the island really was.
“There’s an off-season rental on the west bluff,” Asa said.
“Owned by a family that winters in Florida. Will’s used it before as a temporary shelter location.
No direct relation to you, no connection to me.
One way in from the road, a clean line of sight to the tree line.
It’s as close to a safehouse as we get out here. ”
“And you?” she asked, hating how vulnerable she sounded. “Where will you be?”
“Where do you think?”
She swallowed. “With me?”
“Unless you throw me out.”
A tear slipped down her cheek before she could stop it. “I don’t want to need anyone to stay alive.”
“That’s not weakness,” Asa said. “That’s just the truth. Nobody does this alone. Not long-term.”
She turned back to the window, blinking tears away.
The snow outside blurred into streaks of white and gray.
“Did you ever . . . blame me?” she asked quietly.
“For what happened to your father?” The question had sat in her chest for days, growing heavier by the hour.
It came out now that the barn had ripped her open and left everything raw.
“No,” he said immediately and passionately. “I blame him, Maya. The man who pulled the trigger.” He glanced at her again, eyes dark. “I never blamed the four-year-old who hid where she was told and tried not to breathe too loud.”
Her throat closed around a sob she refused to let out. Hearing this from the boy who had lost his father that night scraped against the lie in a way nothing else had. “I don’t even remember my mother’s face,” she whispered. “What kind of daughter forgets her mother?”
“The kind who survived something she was never meant to carry,” Asa said. “The mind makes trade-offs when it’s drowning. It holds onto whatever keeps you afloat and lets the rest sink for a while.”
She stared at his hands and the tiny scar on his right knuckle, which she’d noticed the first time he’d reached across a table for evidence photos.
“What if I never get it back?” she asked. “What if I never remember who she was?”
He drew in a slow breath. “Then we find out some other way. We’ll ask questions. Track records. We’ll talk to anyone who might have known her.”
Maya closed her eyes.
For a split second, a flash of something moved behind her eyelids. A woman’s hand, calloused but gentle, smoothing hair back from her forehead.
A whisper: “Hush, Maya. We’re almost safe.”
Then the barn. The hay. The rabbit’s fur against her cheek.
The sound of the door being forced open.
Pain knifed through her skull.
She gasped, pressing both hands against her temples.
“Maya?” Asa’s voice sharpened. “Talk to me. What did you see?”
“Just a hand,” she forced out. “A woman’s hand. My mom, I think. She said we were almost safe. She sounded scared, but sure. Then it skips to the barn. It’s like everything jumps straight to the barn.”
“Okay.” Asa’s voice remained calm, soothing. “That’s something. That’s more than you had an hour ago.”
“It hurts,” she whispered.
“I know. We don’t force it. We’re not dragging it out of you all at once.
” He glanced at the rearview mirror, then back at the road.
“When we get to the safehouse, you’re going to rest. Eat something.
JT can set up surveillance. I’ll check in with Will about tracking down the dispatcher from that night. ”
“The dispatcher?” she managed.
“She is our next link,” Asa said. “She made that call to my father. She must know something more. She and my father were friends. Perhaps he confided in her.”
The road curved, taking them away from the harbor lights and up toward the western bluffs. Houses grew sparser. Trees thicker. The storm seemed to quiet just a fraction here, as if the land itself was breaking the wind’s anger.
JT turned onto a narrow lane lined with bare branches and snow-laden hedges. At the end of it sat a small cottage—two stories, cedar siding, windows dark. A porch wrapped around one side. The chimney emitted weak puffs. Someone from the department must have come ahead to get the heat going.
“Looks like something you’d see on a postcard,” Maya murmured.
Asa smiled. “It is.”
JT pulled the SUV up front. He and Rachel climbed out, both scanning the surroundings with practiced ease. No sign of neighbors in immediate sight, just the suggestion of another roofline down the hill, lights off.
Will’s patrol car rolled past on the main road above, then turned around and took up a position where he could see both the lane and the cottage.
Asa stepped out and opened Maya’s door. “Come on. Let’s get you inside.”
She hesitated, her hand on the doorframe. “This doesn’t feel real,” her voice soft. “Safehouses and killers and twenty-five-year-old mysteries.”
“This is real, but so are the people standing between you and the man hunting you.”
She slid out, boots crunching on the shoveled path.
Rachel came over, her expression softening when she saw Maya’s face. “Let’s check out the food supply inside. I’ll make you something to eat before we let you curl up somewhere with a blanket.”
Maya managed a faint smile. “Is that in my Hope Island Securities agreement?”
“It is now.” Rachel squeezed her arm, then nodded toward the cottage.
Asa walked beside Maya. “Once you’re settled inside, I’ll join JT, and we’ll do a sweep outside, check locks and sight lines. I want to know every possible point of approach.”
Maya stepped onto the porch and glanced back once. The lane lay quiet, snow falling steadily. Will’s cruiser sat like a watchful guardian on the road. JT was already circling to the back of the house, his breath white in the air.
Asa met her eyes. “You’re not alone. No matter how much the past tries to tell you otherwise.”
She nodded and went inside with Rachel.
The welcoming warmth hit her, melting some of the chill from her bones. Someone had turned on lamps. Soft light pooled in the small living room, emphasizing a leather couch, a stone fireplace, and a narrow staircase leading up.
Rachel moved toward the tiny kitchen. “Will has used this safehouse before in another case we assisted him with. I remember where everything is. Mugs are in the cabinet above the sink. Blankets are in the chest by the window seat. I’ll make some coffee,” she said, nodding toward a bag of coffee near the coffee maker.
Maya hovered just inside the kitchen door, suddenly aware that this, too, could become a crime scene. Another place tainted by someone else’s sin.
Lord . . . The word rose in her mind before she could bury it.
Not a polished prayer, not some perfect verse.
Just a single, raw syllable. Please. I don’t even know what to ask.
Just . . . don’t let this be the end of me.
Or of Asa. Or of anyone trying to help. Don’t let fear win again.
Her throat burned. She ambled to the kitchen window and looked out.
Asa and JT walked the property line, dark shapes cutting against the white. JT said something while gesturing toward the trees around back.
“They’re locating possible angles of approach,” Rachel said as she glanced out the window. “Weak spots in the fence, line-of-sight advantages. Things like that.” She went back to fixing sandwiches.
They were building a net around her life. The realization made something loosen in her chest and tighten at the same time.
“Here.” Rachel handed her a mug a few minutes later. “It’s decaf coffee with a little sugar, and a little cream for dignity. Sit.”
Maya took the mug and wrapped her fingers around it to warm them. “What happens now?”
“Now?” Rachel said. “You drink that. You eat half a grilled cheese sandwich, and then you sleep. Asa will pace like a wolf outside your room at some point because he doesn’t know how to switch off.
JT will pretend he isn’t worried, then call his wife and complain that he’s missing dinner.
Will Kelly will run everyone ragged until we have a line on the dispatcher and whoever else your memories point to. ”
“That doesn’t sound very restful,” Maya said.
Rachel’s smile turned gentle. “Not for us. Besides, rest isn’t the same as nothing happening. Sometimes it’s just trusting someone else to move the next chess piece while you breathe.”
Maya stared down into the swirl of coffee. “What if my memories don’t come back? What if all I ever get are flashes that hurt and don’t help?”
Rachel stared at her for a long moment. “Then we solve this another way. With what we can see, prove, and uncover. Between you and me? I think you’re stronger than your fear. I think that little girl in the barn made it through for a reason, and I think she’s finally getting her voice back.”
Maya’s eyes stung. She took a sip of the coffee. Outside, Asa’s shadow passed the window again.
Maya tightened her grip on the mug. She was done letting him write her story. However much it hurt, she was going to remember.