Page 59

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

B rooklynn could feel Forbes’s despair. It matched her own.

“Please.” She gripped his T-shirt, hating that he was there and not wanting to let him go. “Please go. Maybe you can get help.”

“From the murderers and thugs? I haven’t heard any sirens.”

Would they, though? With all the noise? From the basement?

Probably.

He shifted, and a spark of hope lit. Maybe he would actually leave.

But no.

He dropped to his bottom right beside her.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting comfortable.”

“No! Please…” But he wouldn’t leave. Of course he wouldn’t.

That wasn’t the kind of man he was.

The space was too small for his overlarge body, but he settled beside her, pulling in a deep breath.

“Air’s cleaner down here.” His voice was gruff with smoke damage.

He shifted to his butt, putting the soles of his shoes on the board.

It shifted.

His eyes widened. “Can you try again? To stand?”

She wouldn’t try. It was their only chance. “I’ll do it.”

He shimmied down so his back was pressed against the corner of the wall and the floor, his neck bent at a terrible angle. He pushed with both feet as hard as he could.

The board lifted off her.

She angled and twisted, leaning over him in the cramped space.

He closed his eyes, holding the board away.

Please, God. Help me. Pull me up.

And then she stood. Just like that.

He opened his eyes “Yes!” He let the board drop, scrambling up beside her. “Let’s get out of here.” He wrapped a wet sheet around her head and shoulders. “Can you walk?”

“I’ll figure it out.” She’d deal with the stupid ankle later. That was the least of her worries right now.

“Let’s go.” He took her hand and led the way over the charred remnants of furniture and under the smoking rafter.

At the bottom of the stairs that led to the door, he said, “They might still be out there.”

She readied the handgun she’d shoved in the pocket of her tracksuit and disengaged the safety. “Then we’ll deal with it.”

“The goal is my truck. Hopefully they left the keys in it.”

“Okay.”

He pulled her in for a quick hug, holding on extra tight. “God, protect us.”

“Amen.”

Gun in hand, he climbed the stairs, and she followed.

As he pushed open the door, he angled back toward her, just in case. Cool, humid air rushed in, and she filled her lungs, which led to a cough. Though the fire was loud, she feared she’d been heard.

No gunshots came.

Maybe Leo and his band of thugs had left after they started the fire.

Forbes got low and stepped outside.

Still, no sign that anybody was looking for them.

“Come on.”

She followed him onto the lawn, and they dashed toward the trees. A gunshot exploded in the darkness.

Forbes went down.

No!

She fell beside him, looking for the shooter. Where was he? Movement in the trees. A man looked back, and in the glow of the fire, she saw his face.

Owen.

Her sister’s boyfriend. Her friend’s nephew.

The man whose voice she’d recognized outside the library. Recognized but refused to believe.

Their eyes met, and though he could’ve shot her, he didn’t. He turned and ran.

Another figure bolted from behind the house to the tree line, a woman with a messy bun.

Who in the world…?

Forbes grunted, and Brooklynn turned her focus to him “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I-I think.”

“You have to move.” Sirens sounded, distant, but still she looked toward the driveway, hoping someone would come, someone would help.

A figure stood there, silhouetted by the fire.

She blinked. It couldn’t be. It couldn’t.

The woman raised her weapon, aimed straight at Brooklynn. But Lois wouldn’t shoot her. How could she?—?

The crack of a rifle, and the woman jerked back, then collapsed.

Brooklynn’s head snapped around. What…? Who’d shot her?

She had no idea.

Before Forbes could voice the obvious question, she said, “We need to get out of the open.” They might as well have giant targets on their heads, though it seemed they had a guardian angel somewhere looking out for them.

“No, you?—”

“Now, Forbes, or we’ll both be killed.”

He grunted again but rose to a crouch, then started moving toward the cover of the woods. He supported his right arm with his left.

Following, she kept her weapon ready, just in case.

Considering all the threats she’d seen and failed to fire at… A commando she was not.

The screech of tires had her turning as a car careened away, down the driveway and onto the road, turning opposite Shadow Cove and all the emergency vehicles surely on the way.

Not ten feet into the woods, Forbes collapsed on the dirt and fallen leaves.

She kneeled beside him. “You all right?”

“Can’t go farther.”

“That’s okay. That’s okay. This is far enough.” She prayed it was, anyway. As long as the bad guys were leaving and the good guys were coming.

But Owen?

Lois?

How were they among the bad guys? She couldn’t fathom it.

Blood seeped from a bullet hole high on Forbes’s shoulder. She set her gun aside, then took off her jacket and pressed it against the wound, trying to staunch the flow.

She knew very little about how to treat injuries. Her polyester clothes weren’t exactly absorbent. Maybe her socks would be better?

Gross, but better.

She sat on the cold ground, ripped off a sneaker, then pulled off her cotton sock, which she pressed against the bloody wound.

Forbes sucked in air.

“Sorry. I’m sorry. I’m just?—”

“It’s okay, sweetheart. You’re doing?—”

A snap deeper in the woods cut him off.

Brooklynn looked up as a man emerged from behind a tree.

Leo Taggart lifted his gun and aimed at her. “I really wish you’d just minded your own business.”

She glanced at her weapon. It was right there, inches from her fingertips.

“Go ahead,” he said. “It would be better for me if it was in your hand. Of course, it will be by the time anybody gets here. I’ll tell them I didn’t recognize you, that you aimed, and I fired, just like I’m trained to do. Nobody will doubt me.”

He must’ve climbed through the cave. He must’ve been waiting for them, knowing that, if the burned house hadn’t taken them, they’d eventually show themselves.

“They know. We told the state police everything.”

“The ramblings of two amateur detectives—and no evidence? I won’t be charged.”

She hated to think it, but he was probably right. “You’re going to kill the woman your son loves?”

“You don’t love him, though. Never did. Once you’re dead and buried, at least he’ll be able to move on. Never could figure out why he was so obsessed with you.” A cold glint filled his eyes.

She was going to die.

Forbes lurched up in front of her.

The crack of a gunshot.

“No!” Her scream seemed to come from far away. She wasn’t hit, but Forbes…

Leo fell forward, landing face down in the dirt.

What happened?

Who…who’d shot him?

A woman emerged from the darkness behind where the chief of police had stood a moment before.

It was the woman with the bun. She stepped nearer, gun aimed at Leo. She reached down and grabbed his weapon, then lifted her gaze. It fixed on Forbes.

Maybe this was the state police officer Brooklynn had talked to earlier? She couldn’t imagine who else it could be. She said, “Lori? It’s me. Brooklynn.”

But the woman acted as if she hadn’t heard.

She never took her eyes off Forbes.