Page 97 of A River of Crows

“It’s not that I don’t want to. It’s hard to explain. I should have talked to you about this before now.”

“And I should have considered it from your side.” She began buttoning her shirt. “Let’s stop feeling bad and go watch a funny movie.”

Dylan didn’t move from the bed.

“Come on. Really, it’s fine.”

He exhaled. “There’s something else that’s been bugging me. The other night you said you’d gotten sick and weren’t up to hanging out.”

“Yeah.”

“Then why did Noah come over?”

Sloan froze. “How did you know that?”

“Caroline told me. I think she was trying to make me jealous.” He stood. “Should I be?”

Sloan’s heart thudded against her chest. Her mom had been awake. What all had she heard? “No. There’s no reason to be jealous.”

Dylan rocked back on his heels, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “I’m trying not to assume the worst.”

“There’s really nothing to worry about there. Noah’s just helping me look into some stuff about Ridge.”

“So, you felt up to talking to him about Ridge, but you won’t talk to me?”

Sloan tapped her fingers against her jeans. “It’s complicated. Intimacy is hard for me too. I mean, not this kind,” she motioned to the bed, “but the sharing stuff.”

Dylan swallowed. “But it’s easy with Noah?”

“That’s not what I meant. He’s a detective and has access to the information I need. That’s the only reason I told him.” It wasn’t the entire truth, but it was hard to explain her and Noah’s shared history, their shared history with Ridge. She wanted to talk to Dylan, but it didn’t come as naturally.

“Okay.” Dylan managed a small smile. “Let’s just forget about intimacy of all kinds for tonight and go see about that movie.”

“What did you find out?” Sloan asked Noah when he called the following night.

“Vince worked at LSU for less than a year,” Noah said. “They left Baton Rouge late in August of 1989, and it looks like they spent the rest of the year in El Paso. In 1990, Vince began working as a math professor at New Mexico Junior College. He retired in 2004, but they still live in Hobbs, New Mexico.”

Sloan stepped outside to the back porch. “But he moved to Baton Rouge to be a dean. Why would he trade a dean’s job for a professor’s?”

“Change of pace?”

“Or he was running,” Sloan said. “Ridge made a comment that they were supposed to bring him back.” The gas station, Sloan realized. “I remember this night at a gas station. Mom said we were leaving Mallowater. We packed and waited there. Waited all night for someone that didn’t come. That was when Mom lost it. They were supposed to bring him back.”

“Calm down, Sloan. We aren’t sure this was your mother’s idea.”

“Ridge said it was.”

Sloan heard papers shuffling. “Kidnapped children sometimes eventually take the side of their captors,” Noah explained. “We can assume they were hiding him out for a while, homeschooling maybe. There was no record of your brother until 1992, when a Ridge Turner was registered for school. He attended Hobbs schools from ninth-twelfth grade.”

“Ridge Turner? They changed his name?”

“Likely got him a new identity altogether,” Noah said.

“How do you do that? How does no one question a ninth grader just popping into existence?”

“Possibly black-market papers. But there are a few other ways too.”

“Vince and Libby didn’t change their names?” Sloan asked.