28. Grant
TWENTY-EIGHT
GRANT
The call from Jessika was the last straw.
I spent most of my life learning how to control my temper. Prison taught me that. Recovery taught me that. Every day I stayed clean was another lesson in walking away from violence when violence felt easier.
But this?
This was different.
Some bastard had taken Nova.
Kidnapped her.
Not for money. Not by accident. They took Jessika's daughter because she'd seen something she wasn't supposed to see. A kid. A teenager who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now she was paying for it, and so was Jessika.
My hands tightened around the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white.
I couldn't even begin to imagine what I would do if I got my hands on the people responsible. The thoughts running through my head weren't fit for daylight. The only thing keeping me from completely losing it was the fact that Nova needed to be found alive.
That had to come first.
Jessika had done the smartest thing she could have done under the circumstances. She'd managed to get photographs of the men involved. Faces. Vehicles. Something tangible. Something law enforcement could use.
It wasn't much, but it was a start.
I drove faster than I should have, the old pickup rattling beneath me as the miles disappeared under the tires. Every red light felt personal. Every slow driver felt like an obstacle standing between me and where I needed to be.
My phone sat on the passenger seat beside me. I kept glancing at it, hoping for another call. Hoping someone had found Nova. Hoping this nightmare would somehow end before it got worse.
But the phone stayed silent.
The closer I got to Jessika's place, the harder my chest felt. I knew exactly what she was going through. Fear. Helplessness. The kind of panic that crawls into your bones and refuses to leave.
She needed someone right now.
Not tomorrow.
Not after the police finished paperwork.
Right now.
And whether she realized it or not, I was already all in.
Nova wasn't my daughter, but that didn't matter.
She was Jessika's.
And if there was one thing I knew with absolute certainty, it was that nobody was going to take something from Jessika and get away with it.
Not while I was breathing.
By the time I turned onto her road, dusk had settled over Briar Ridge. The sky was painted in deep shades of orange and purple, but I barely noticed it. My entire focus was on the house sitting at the end of the gravel drive.
The porch light was on.
I spotted Jessika before I even parked.
She was standing outside, arms wrapped around herself, pacing near the front steps. From a distance I could see she was unraveling. She'd always been strong, stubborn as hell, the kind of woman who carried the weight of the world without asking for help.
Tonight, she looked broken.
I killed the engine and stepped out of the truck.
The moment she saw me, her shoulders dropped.
Not because things were okay.
Not because Nova had been found.
But because she wasn't alone anymore.
I crossed the yard without saying a word. There wasn't anything I could say that would make this better. No magic sentence was going to bring her daughter home.
When I reached her, she threw her arms around me.
I caught her immediately.
She was shaking.
Actually shaking.
I wrapped my arms around her and held on while she buried her face against my chest. For a second, I thought she might completely fall apart.
"She's going to be okay," I told her, even though I wasn't sure if I believed it myself. "We're going to find her."
Her fingers twisted into the back of my shirt.
"What if we don't?" she whispered.
The fear in her voice nearly destroyed me.
I pulled back just enough to look her in the eyes.
"We will."
The words came out harder than I intended.
Not hopeful.
Certain.
A promise.
Because if the police couldn't find Nova, then I'd find her myself.
Every addict has something that keeps them sober.
For years, mine had simply been survival.
Now?
Standing there with Jessika in my arms, I realized I had something else.
Someone else.
And whoever took Nova had just made the biggest mistake of their lives.
Because they hadn't just taken Jessika's daughter.
They'd declared war on everyone who loved her.
The sheriff's deputies arrived twenty minutes later.
The photos Jessika had taken were spread across the kitchen table. Every face. Every vehicle. Every detail.
I stood over them, studying each image until my eyes burned.
Something felt familiar.
I couldn't place it at first.
Then I saw it.
A faded logo on the side of a white cargo van.
A red horse head.
My stomach dropped.
I knew that van.
"Jessika," I said.
She looked up instantly.
"I've seen this vehicle before."
The room went silent.
"Where?" the sheriff asked.
I pointed at the photo.
"Old feed warehouse on County Road Twelve."
The sheriff's eyes narrowed.
"You sure?"
"Positive."
The warehouse had been abandoned for years. Kids occasionally snuck out there to drink beer and raise hell.
The kind of place nobody paid attention to.
The kind of place someone would hide a kid.
The sheriff immediately started making calls.
Backup.
State police.
Search teams.
I didn't wait.
The second they started organizing, I was back in my truck.
"Grant!" Jessika yelled from the porch.
I stopped.
She ran toward me, tears shining in her eyes.
"Please bring my baby home."
The words nearly broke me.
I cupped her face.
"I will."
Then I climbed into the truck and drove.
Fast.
Too fast.
The warehouse sat nearly twenty miles outside town. Darkness had swallowed the roads by the time I reached it.
I killed my headlights a quarter mile away.
No sense announcing I was coming.
The building appeared through the trees like a giant shadow.
Quiet.
Too quiet.
I grabbed the flashlight from behind the seat and started walking.
Every step felt heavier than the last. Every step felt like forever.
The old addict part of me wanted adrenaline.
Wanted chaos.
Wanted violence.
The man I'd become wanted Nova alive.
That was all that mattered.
I slipped through a broken side door.
The warehouse smelled like mold, rust, and old grain.
My flashlight cut through the darkness.
Empty machinery.
Stacks of rotten pallets.
Broken windows.
Nothing.
Then I heard it.
A muffled sound.
A cry.
My heart nearly stopped.
"Nova?"
Silence.
Then—
"Grant?"
Her voice.
Weak.
Terrified.
Alive.
I ran.
The sound led me toward a back office.
The door had been chained shut from the outside.
I yanked the chain loose and threw the door open.
Nova sat on the floor.
Her wrists were zip-tied.
Her cheeks stained with tears.
The second she saw me, she burst into sobs.
"Oh my God."
I dropped to my knees beside her.
"Hey, hey, you're okay."
My hands shook as I cut the restraints.
The moment she was free, she launched herself at me.
I held her so tight I was afraid she'd disappear if I let go.
"They said they were coming back," she cried.
"They're not."
I stood and pulled her behind me.
The sound of sirens echoed in the distance.
The cavalry was finally arriving.
But we weren't waiting.
I got Nova outside and into the truck just as deputies flooded the property.
The sheriff met me halfway.
"You found her."
I looked back at the truck.
Nova was wrapped in my jacket, trembling but safe.
"Yeah."
The sheriff nodded once.
"Good work."
I didn't feel victorious.
I felt relieved.
Exhausted.
Grateful.
The drive back to town felt longer than the drive out.
Nova barely spoke.
She just held onto my hand from the passenger seat the entire way.
When we finally turned into Jessika's driveway, I saw her.
Standing under the porch light.
Waiting.
Praying.
The second she spotted the truck, she ran.
I barely had time to park before Nova jumped out.
"Mom!"
Jessika let out a sound I'll never forget.
Half sob.
Half scream.
She wrapped Nova in her arms and dropped to her knees in the gravel.
Both of them crying.
Both of them holding on like they never wanted to let go.
I stood there watching.
For the first time all night, I could breathe.
Nova was home.
Jessika looked up at me over her daughter's shoulder.
Tears streamed down her face.
Neither of us said anything.
We didn't have to.
The look in her eyes said everything.
Thank you.
I nodded once.
Then I walked toward them.
Toward the family I'd never expected to find.
Toward the people who somehow felt like home.
And for the first time in a very long time, the darkness chasing me didn't seem quite so close.
Not tonight.
Tonight, Nova was safe.
Tonight, Jessika could sleep.
And tonight, I finally had something worth fighting for.
The call with Brian Holt goes for an hour and forty minutes.
I'm not on it, it’s Jessika's contact, Jessika's arena, but she put me on audio so I can hear, and I sit at the kitchen table across from her with coffee going cold between my hands and listen to her build the case.
She's extraordinary.
I've watched her manage things, the ranch, her father, Nova, the investigation, with that particular controlled competence that reads to people as always-on-top-of-it.
But this is different. This is her native territory, and it shows.
She knows exactly when to stop talking. She knows which facts need to lead and which need to follow.
She knows when Holt is persuaded and when he needs something else.
By the end, he asked to receive the documents and journals for preliminary review.
"He wants to move," she says after the call, looking at me across the table. "He said preliminary review takes a week, but if it's what it looks like, the AG's office will open an inquiry."
"And Holcomb?"
"He can't warn Holcomb without exposing himself," she says. "That's the structure of it, once we file formally, it goes into a system that Collins and the sheriff can't touch."
"Collins is going to know," I say.
“Yes, he will.”
“That’s okay if he knows.”
“What if he goes after Morgan?”
“Not on Vance land. He’s safe there.”
“Morgan needs a clinic to go to for treatment.”
“Agreed. I’ll call them today.”
She nods. Puts the legal pad on the table. Looks at it for a moment.
"This is going to work," she says. Not triumphant. Just factual. Like she's assessed the evidence and reached a conclusion.
"Yeah," I say.
"And then—" She looks at me. "Then we figure out what normal looks like."
"For the ranch."
"And—" She pauses. "For whatever this is."
I look at her across the table.
"Whatever this is," I say.
She almost smiles.
Then she reaches across the table and takes my hand and holds it, and we sit in the morning kitchen with the case building around us and the particular feeling of something being close to not over, not resolved, but close to something like solid ground.
"I'm scared of losing you," she says. Very quietly.
I look at her.
"I'm here," I say.
"People leave."
"I know." I pause. "I've been left. And I've done the leaving." I hold her gaze. "I'm not in a hurry to do either again."
She looks at me for a long moment.
"Okay," she says.
"Okay," I say.
We hold hands across the table for a while. The morning comes in through the kitchen windows. The horses are moving in the pasture. Somewhere down the hall, Presley is waking up.
"There's a community college in Whitmore County," she says. "They have a social services program. A man who knows what you know, who’s lived it, they pay for guest lecturers and they're always looking for people with direct experience.”
"Jessika—"
"I'm not managing you," she says. "I'm just—" She pauses. "I see you. And I don't want the county to be the only lens through which anyone sees you."
I sit with that.
"I'll think about it," I say.
She nods. Doesn't push.
That, I think, that is exactly the thing. She pushes and then she stops. She sees and then she gives you room with what she's seen.
"Tonight," I say. "If it's okay, I’d like to just, stay. Not about the investigation. Just be here."
She looks at me.
"Yes," she says. Like it's the easiest thing.
"Yes," I agree.