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“What happened?”
Doc Tuttle frowned. “Mrs. Coffee broadsided you. God rest her soul.”
Don shuddered. “She’s dead?”
“On impact.”
“Dear God,” Don whispered, and closed his eyes.
Tuttle patted his knee.
“Get some rest. Barring unforeseen complications, you’re going to be fine. I’ll be back to check on you when I make rounds in the morning.”
Moments later Don was alone, but rest was impossible.
Mrs. Coffee was dead, and he had been party to that, even if it hadn’t been his fault. And he had denied his son a thousand times over because of a grandiose ego and a coldhearted refusal to nurture another man’s child.
His head hurt.
His body hurt.
His heart hurt.
God help him, but he should have been the one to die.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
It began to rain again in the night. Tate heard it first on the roof and then blowing against the windows, and groaned. Dear God, this whole section of the state was going to wash away if it didn’t stop. The river had been predicted to crest sometime in the night, and now that prediction no longer held true.
The wind rattling the trailer sounded like rocks in a can. Either that or it was Jonesy’s ghosts. Whichever, it still made him antsy, and the agent in him would never be able to go back to sleep until he did a recon of the place, just to be sure.
He picked up his handgun and left his bedroom, using the intermittent flashes of lightning and the night-light in the kitchen to light the way.
Once he reached the living room he stood at the window in the dark, waiting for the flashes to scan the area. The security light at the edge of the street was out. He frowned, certain it had been on every other night, and chalked it up to the lightning shorting out the wiring. After checking the door, the dead bolt and the security chain to make sure they were secure, he rechecked the windows, then the back door.
All was well.
Cameron came out of his bedroom on his way to the bathroom and saw Tate standing in the hall.
“Everything okay?”
Tate nodded. “Just antsy about what this new rainfall will do. In the wake of the copycat, I’m wondering if the killer will take advantage of it to pull the attention back to him. It’s crucial for him to establish himself as top dog.”
“I know.”
Cameron went into the bathroom as Tate headed for the kitchen. He couldn’t sleep. Hopefully Quantico would have some new stats for them by morning and they would finally have some facts to work with.
He heard the door shut as Cameron went back to bed and was thinking about getting a snack when the door opened again. He thought it was Cameron and then heard Nola’s voice.
He found her standing in the open door to her room, wearing that LSU T-shirt and a pair of panties, and she’d taken down the braid in her hair. It hung around her shoulders and down her back like a dark veil. After thinking about ghosts earlier, her appearance and her silence were slightly eerie.
“Honey, is everything all right?”
She answered, but in a monotone.
“Mama said run.”
“Nola?”