Page 46 of Last Seen

Chapter Thirty-Two

Halley

Halley checks the Jeep as if she’s about to pilot a Cessna, paranoid but knowing she can’t chance it.

She walks around the entirety of the car, examining the bumpers and the wheel wells, looking in the back for anything amiss—anyone lurking—then gets in and reloads the pistol.

Noah might not like guns, but he was savvy enough about them to have unloaded it before handing her the bag.

She checks her purse for the letter from her sister, which is nestled in its spot, and plugs her phone into the car charger. It beeps with a new voicemail.

She can leave now. Go ... elsewhere and try to figure all of this out. She needs to puzzle out the letter. She should have done that first. Though it seems straightforward, she’s convinced whatever message lies inside might hold all the answers.

She puts the Jeep into gear and gives Noah a little wave. He watches her pull out of the parking space, shrugs and shakes his head as if acknowledging that he tried, then returns to the restaurant.

She hits the speaker on her phone to play the message.

“Halley, it’s Baird. We got a line on the woman from the feedstore video.

She’s FBI. Or was, she resigned two years ago.

Name is Kade. Donnata Kade. Has a former address near where you are.

What the hell she was doing in Marchburg messing with your Jeep is beyond me.

Get in touch when you can. I let the sheriff down there know about your visit, and I’ll also let him know about Kade. ”

So a retired FBI agent is poking around all this, now, too? One that lives here in Brockville? Boy, would Halley like to talk to her. She has to admit she is lost. Her sister’s disappearance seems more menacing by the hour, and now she doesn’t know what to do.

Should she go home to Marchburg? Death and destruction await her there, but she has Early, and Meredith for backup.

DC? Patch things up with Theo, or end them for good?

Stay here? Brockville in the daylight isn’t nearly as forbidding as nighttime.

And Noah really did seem like he wanted to help.

A second set of eyes on all this wouldn’t be a bad thing.

Nashville? See if being in the setting would help her remember exactly what happened that fateful day?

Damn it. Nothing feels right, so she turns to the infallible. Her brain says there are answers here. But her gut says to leave Brockville.

So that is what she’ll do. She’ll figure out whether to turn east or west once she gets to the highway. She can always come back. Maybe she’ll have more answers next time. Maybe whoever is playing games with her will be gone.

The sun peeks over her shoulder as she wends her way out of town, shining on her dash, showing all the dust and grime that’s built up since she last detailed her car.

The trees are vibrant under the morning dew, and this time, as she gets to the big sign on the edge of town, there is no police car waiting for her.

By now, there’s no way Cameron doesn’t know she’s pulling a runner. They really are letting her go.

With a huge sigh of relief, she follows the well-maintained road out of the valley, up, up, up the mountain, and five minutes later clears the last switchback.

Her ears pop. The sky is close. From this vantage point, she can see the misty blue ridges that make up the titular range spreading into the distance and looks down the valley at the town of Brockville below.

It seems so quaint. So unthreatening. She is tempted to stop and admire the scenery, but her desire to leave prevents her.

She has escaped, and she isn’t going to stop now.

She keeps the Jeep rolling, is five hundred feet down the back side of the crest of the hill when something catches her eye. It’s there, then gone, and she slams on the brakes when her brain processes what it was.

A boy. A young boy, maybe five, six years old. Wrapped in a blanket. On the side of the road.

She skids to a stop, looking over her shoulder, in the rearview. Nothing there.

She puts it in reverse and slowly, slowly, eases backward until she is at the spot where she saw ... something.

There is a flash of white retreating into the woods. It is low to the ground, and then it is gone, swallowed by the green trees that line the road.

Was it a deer? Did she have Noah’s story of his childhood in her head and her mind turned a young fawn into a young boy?

She puts down the passenger-side window and listens. Can’t hear anything over the engine. Turns it off.

Her heart, thundering in her chest. The shriek of a hawk. The wind whispering through the branches. A thin cry. A human cry.

“Damn.” She gets out of the car. Puts the gun in her waistband. Marches into the tall grass on the side of the road, listening carefully. The sobs are real and coming from the screen of trees fifty feet ahead.

“Little boy? Sweetie, you can come out. I won’t hurt you.”

The crying stops. She edges closer to the tree line.

She can see the corner of the white blanket now.

Do people camp around here? Is he homeless?

Has he managed to get himself here from Brockville?

It would be quite a hike, but if he was scared and desperate, she supposes that it’s not out of the question.

A twig snaps, and she halts. There he is. He’s even younger than she thought.

“Hi,” she says. “Are you lost?”

He shakes his head. He is dirty, as if he’s been out in the wilderness for weeks. His cobalt eyes are wide and frightened, the blanket around his thin shoulders grubby and worn. He looks at her briefly, then bursts away, bounding into the forest, and without thinking, she goes after him.

The trees grow closer together; the path is soon obscured.

She has to stop after only a few minutes.

What works for a small child is not going to work for her.

“Stay here. I’ll get help,” she calls, then hurries back toward the Jeep.

Just before she breaks from the trees, she hears a car’s engine, there and gone again. Darn it, just missed them.

She has to tell the sheriff about this child.

Halley makes her way to the road carefully but quickly. She will drive back to the town. Tell the sheriff about the kid, then be on her way again.

But as she approaches the Jeep, she sees that her right rear tire is flat.

She says several very bad words and examines the tire. There’s a cut in the wall. This is not a nail in the tread; it’s a three-inch slice. And worse, her spare is desecrated, too.

This is purposeful. This is sabotage.

Someone doesn’t want her leaving Brockville.

She looks around, but no one is visible.

A chill hammers through her, and she reaches for the door handle and leaps inside, locking the doors.

She will be damned if she’s going to stay here and wait for some crazed serial killer to snatch her.

She will limp the Jeep back to the interstate even if it means she’ll have to buy a new wheel instead of just replacing the tire.

But the Jeep won’t turn over. She tries again and again, frantic now, but it just clicks and glugs and revs. It won’t roar to life and get her the hell out of here.

Shit. Shit shit shit.

There is no one around. She scans the road, the trees. Puts the pistol in her lap, soothed by the fact that if someone comes at her, she will be able to stop them. Then she grabs her phone and dials 9-1-1.

A familiar greeting, one she seems to be hearing too much lately.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”

The words come out in a panicked rush. “My name is Halley James and my car has been disabled, and there was a little boy on the side of the road and he’s disappeared into the woods.

I’m about two miles out of Brockville, Tennessee, heading west. I don’t know the area so I can’t tell you exactly where I am. ”

“Okay. Slow down. You’re going to be fine. I’ll send Sheriff Brockton your way right now. You’re west, going toward the highway? Are you in a safe place?”

Sheriff Brockton. Brockville. Even the 9-1-1 dispatch is run out of the town. They really are self-sufficient.

She strokes the gun. “That’s correct. I’m locked in the car. It’s a Jeep Wrangler, white with black trim. Something’s wrong with the engine, and someone slashed my tires.” Damn it, there’s a quake in her voice. Fear is a powerful thing, and she doesn’t remember ever feeling quite so scared before.

Don’t lie. You know this feeling. You know it so well.

Red. Everything is so red.

“Run, Halley Bear. Run.”

Her mind flashes to the note stabbed to Kater’s chest. You’re next.

Am I next? Is it now? Am I about to die?

She’s hyperventilating. The 9-1-1 operator is saying soothing words. The sun is beating down mercilessly. The lost little boy is crying, crying, crying.

Theo’s words: “ You can’t leave me. I won’t let you. ”

Noah’s words: “ Stay. This is bigger than an hour’s conversation. ”

The stranger at home: “ You don’t remember me, do you? ”

Early’s confusion: “ I don’t know why Kade was messing with your Jeep. ”

Tammy Boone’s revelation: “ The circumstances were similar ... ”

Stop stop stop. “Stop!”

The squawk of the sheriff’s siren pulls her from the abyss. She fumbles the gun into her bag, feels an unfamiliar piece of paper inside. She pulls it out and unfolds it. There is one word on it, written in shaky letters: Help .

What the hell is this?

Brockton is almost to her door now. She shoves it back in the bag and puts her hand on the gun. Uses her left to wipe the tears away. She gets out of the Jeep.

Brockton’s swagger is gone; the concern on his face is clear.

“Miss James? What’s happening?”