Her Final Words

by Brianna Labuskes

  “The parents said they just woke up one morning to a note that she was heading to Nevada.” Hicks shook his head. “Didn’t say why Nevada.”

  That was a weird enough quirk that it made the note seem more real. Not LA or New York, but Nevada. If she were forging a note from a sixteen-year-old girl, she wouldn’t have thought to put that.

  “No signs of foul play?”

  “You’d think I’d mention that had there been,” Hicks said, the brusqueness from yesterday morning back, a burr in his tone that had been sanded down without her even realizing it.

  “You think I’m wasting my time with this?”

  He didn’t say anything for a bit, just passed a man on a tractor with a wave before turning down a dirt road. The house was small, in the distance. Driveways were long around here.

  “I used to ride bulls,” Hicks said. “You’d get thrown all the time.”

  Lucy nodded, already seeing where this was going. She was no stranger to rodeos.

  “One time, I was facing down a mean sonabitch, and everything about him said he was going to come in hard on the right. That I should roll left,” Hicks continued.

  He was quiet again until he parked in front of a house that was almost the mirror image of the Cooks’. He leaned his elbow on the wheel to look at her from beneath the brim of his hat. His eyes were hidden. “Everything said I should roll left.”

  “You rolled right.”

  “Gut instinct,” Hicks said. “The mean bastard was feinting. If I’d gone left, I’d have ended up with two thousand pounds of pissed-off asshole on my chest.”

  “Gut instinct,” she echoed.

  He shifted again, staring out the windshield. Shrugged once. “I get it.”

  “You think I’m wasting my time,” she said again, this time not a question.

  Hicks lifted his chin so that he could meet her eyes. “I think you shouldn’t care what I think.”

  If it were only that easy.

  She got out of the truck just as Frank Thomas hurried down the steps of his front porch.

  Frank was a wiry, twitchy man with a full, untamed beard and a missing tooth. He blinked too much and couldn’t seem to remain still, shifting his weight forward and back, side to side.

  On someone else his behavior might have pinged her radar as suspicious, but Lucy got the impression he was just a nervous soul.

  And there was nothing calculated about the way he led them through the rooms of the somewhat small rancher, pointing out pictures and bronze trophies and framed paper certificates—all Molly’s. The note Hicks had mentioned was taped to the front of the fridge. It was brief and handwritten, feminine if Lucy was relying on stereotypes, but that could be faked easily enough.

  Bottom line was that it all checked out. Frank Thomas painted a convincing picture of a man whose child had run away, a man who hadn’t quite accepted that she was gone, who would probably keep the shrine to her long after everyone else forgot she used to live there.

  Maybe he was a good actor. But logic said otherwise. Logic said this was exactly what it looked like, coincidences be damned.

  “Would I be able to check her room a bit?” Lucy asked. It didn’t even feel like testing her luck. He’d been so open with the rest of it.

  He nodded, weathered cheeks red, eyes damp, those bird arms up and hugging his chest. A pitiful sight, a believable sight.

  “Had you noticed a change in her behavior before she left, Mr. Thomas?” Lucy asked as she followed him to a nice little bedroom just next to the main one. It was decorated in light purples and ivory, a flower pattern that was much more pleasant than Eliza’s stark decor.

  “No, nothing. Nothing. She was always a good girl.” Frank had stopped at the doorway, letting them go in but not following.

  Lucy thought about what Annie had said. Troubled. “Was she . . . ?” Lucy glanced at Hicks for help with the right word, but his attention was caught by the books on the bedside table. “Courting? With someone?”

  Frank’s voice went raspy, a little high. “None of that, none of that.”

  Lucy nodded and continued toward the desk. It was the answer she’d been expecting. It was unlikely Molly would have told her father she was seeing someone, especially if the person was outside the Church.

  The top of the desk was empty of any clutter, just one mug filled with pencils and a math workbook that had been left open, some of the answers filled in. Odd that it was half-finished if Molly had been planning on leaving.

  Lucy opened the left-hand drawer.

  There, beneath several other textbooks, was a slim purple diary, the kind that had a cheap lock that could be broken easily, the key already slotted in place.

  After putting on a latex glove, Lucy grabbed the edge of the journal, shifting it free from the pile. She laid it on the desk, then used one of the pencils to flip open the cover.

  The inscription at the front was in solid block writing. Different from the note on the fridge.

  “Property of Molly Shannon Thomas. Keep out.”

  Lucy smiled at how very teenage girl it was. She lifted a few of the pages, scanning them quickly. It was painfully mundane—details about her day, what she ate, whom she talked to. Eliza’s name cropped up over and over again, but even those mentions revolved around seeing the girl at service or stopping by the diner for a soda. On paper, Molly Thomas led a very boring, devout life.

  Lucy spared a second to wonder if that was the diary’s purpose. Sitting in the drawer, key in the lock—it was all but begging someone to snoop.

  Teenage girls were a lot cleverer than people gave them credit for.

  “Mr. Thomas?”

  “Hmm?” Frank finally stepped into the room, but there was a hesitancy in his movements, like he was pushing through some unseen barrier to cross the threshold.

  “Would you say you’re familiar with your daughter’s handwriting?”

  “Maybe?”

  “Is this her normal style?” Lucy stepped aside so he could get a better look.

  He studied it for a minute, then hummed low in his throat. “It’s a little messier than her essays and such.”

  “Do you by any chance have one of those on hand?”

  Frank scuttled backward, looking grateful to have a mission. “Maybe in the den. I’ll go check.”

  Once he left, Hicks crossed the room to her. “What’s up?”

  She tapped the pages. “The handwriting doesn’t look like the note.”

  His eyebrows dipped in consideration. “Yeah. Maybe.”

  While they waited for Frank to return, Lucy continued reading, though the rest proved just as tame as the first part. By the time she finally got through about two-thirds of the thing, it took a second for Lucy to notice she was staring at blank pages. Once she realized she’d gone too far, she thumbed back to find the last entry she must have blown right past.

  Hicks saw it first.

  In that second, she didn’t even know what it was, but she felt the change in his posture, tension that had been flipped on that hadn’t been there before. Lucy half turned, trying to catch his eye, but his attention was locked on the page she’d just landed on, a muscle fluttering where his jaw hinged.

  “Hicks,” she said, after she’d glanced down to see what had caused the reaction. “Why does our runaway have your deputy’s name and phone number as the last thing she wrote in her diary?”

  There was a beat of silence, and then Hicks shook his head. “I don’t know.” His face was set, expressionless. A mask she was learning he wore when he was thrown by something. “But I guess it’s time for you to meet Zoey.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  ELIZA COOK

  Two weeks earlier

  Noah was curled tight against the passenger side door, his face bathed in the yellow glow from the passing headlights.

  Eliza wanted to place a hand on his shoulder, to be an anchor, a comforting warmth, but she didn’t dare wake him yet. They still had fifteen more minutes before t
hey got to the clinic, and Eliza wanted to let Noah sleep as long as possible.

  The truck that had just passed them grew smaller in the rearview mirror. Eliza had learned to keep a paranoid eye on the road behind her. Just in case.

  She’d borrowed Josiah’s truck again for the night without his knowledge, praying for the first time in months and asking for him not to notice the new mileage on his odometer. This was a bit more than a jaunt into town, and it would be difficult to explain.

  Noah snuffled in his sleep as she hit a pothole too hard, and she shushed him even as she slowed to better navigate the bumpy dirt path leading to the Indian Health Services clinic where Doho promised he’d be waiting.

  Eliza had met Dohosan Slade three summers back when his family had passed through Knox Hollow. It was just him, an older brother, and their mom, and Josiah had set them up with Scott Shaw, whose ranch hand had been sidelined with a broken leg.

  The friendship between her and Doho had been fast and easy and innocent. Both of them liked to fish and make knots and go searching in the woods for lost things. Both of them knew not to ask questions when the other grew silent, haunted by unspoken traumas that neither of them asked about.

  Against all odds they’d stayed in touch even after Doho and his family had moved north—through letters and the occasional email, if Eliza could get to the library in town to check hers.

  The truck’s clock told her she was twenty minutes late—it had taken longer than she’d expected to get Noah—and a pang of guilt followed in the wake of the realization. Doho was risking his beloved job for her, and this was how she repaid him.

  But there he was, leaning against the brick wall of the small building, waiting for her, hunched against the cold, the light from his phone an eerie beacon in the darkness. Probably playing Candy Crush. He was obsessed with it for reasons that defied logic.

  Eliza was out of the truck almost as soon as she’d braked to a stop, flying across the small distance into Doho’s arms.

  He caught her easily in an almost-desperate hug, burying his face in her hair as she tucked her own into the warmth of his neck. They swayed together, both just breathing each other in.

  It took a minute for her to realize she was trembling, but he didn’t mention it, just ran a big hand across her back, making the same kind of soothing nonsense noises she’d made to get Noah back to sleep.

  Finally, feeling silly, she pulled back to meet his eyes. Beneath his gentle smile was concern that she knew he wouldn’t voice.

  “I’m okay,” Eliza reassured in a way she wouldn’t for anyone else. Because he wouldn’t ask. Because he’d waited an extra twenty minutes in the cold for her.

  His nose scrunched up, just a little bit, and she thought it was because he could hear the lie and was trying not to call her out on it.

  She laughed a little, without humor. “As okay as I can be.”

  At that he smiled for real, but it was a complicated one, full of sadness along with affection. He rubbed his thumb along her cheekbone, his hand cupping her jaw, and she nuzzled into it.

  They weren’t like that. Never had been, never would be. Their friendship had taken priority, and neither had wanted it to be anything more. But they’d always been tactile, ignoring boundaries and propriety in favor of the comfort of a loved one’s touch. He’d told her one time that when things burned too bright and too hot, she would slip into his veins like ice, offering relief to the searing pain. In return, he warmed the coldness that beat at the center of her heart.

  “I need a favor,” Eliza said, finally stepping fully out of his embrace.

  Doho raised his eyebrows, a no duh look that was a go-to for him. He nodded back toward the clinic. “Yeah, I guessed.”

  “You know that test you ran for me last month?” Eliza asked, even though of course he knew. Of course, he would have put it together when she’d called him.

  He nodded, his eyes deep shadows she couldn’t read. Didn’t want to read.

  She pulled in a shaky breath and looked back toward the truck. “I need you to do it again,” she said. “But this time, it’s not for me.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  LUCY THORNE

  Saturday, 8:30 a.m.

  Hicks and Lucy didn’t even make it back to the sheriff’s office before they got a call from the coroner.

  “It’s not my fault,” Jackson said as soon as Hicks put him on speakerphone.

  Hicks’s confusion showed in the slight, soundless parting of his lips, but Lucy knew what had happened.

  “The body’s gone,” Lucy said. It wasn’t even a question.

  Jackson was possibly still talking, but Hicks hung up as soon as he heard the confirmation. He took a left, a sharp one since they’d already mostly passed the street, sending her crashing into the passenger side door.

  “Sorry,” Hicks threw out. It was surly, careless. Lucy didn’t care. Didn’t care about any of it other than that her victim’s body had gone missing.

  “Just drive.”

  Jackson was pacing in the parking lot, and Lucy didn’t wait until Hicks had come to a full stop before she was out of the truck. The momentum carried her across to Jackson. It carried them both up through some loose soil and plants to the brick wall.

  She kept her hands carefully in full view, away from her weapon. But despite her small stature, she knew how to intimidate, how to apply pressure to someone, to keep them unnerved and get them to actually answer her questions.

  His eyes were wide, his pupils dilated. The pulse at the base of his throat pounded erratically against the skin so hard that she could see it. “Shit.”

  “Who the hell did you tell?”

  “No one, no one, I swear it, honest,” Jackson babbled.

  Lucy pushed farther into his personal space, close enough to breathe in the coffee-laced, sour staleness of his exhale. “Bullshit.”

  “Look, okay, okay.” He shifted like he was going to hold his hands up, but she lifted her eyebrows. Rethink that move. He froze, the implied threat effective. “Look, Liam came by—”

  She cut in. “Liam?”

  “Noah Dawson’s father,” Hicks answered from behind. His voice was lazy and calm, a clear message that he wouldn’t be intervening on Jackson’s behalf. Just in case the coroner was thinking that would be an avenue for help.

  Jackson winced when she leaned more weight against him. “Continue.”

  “Liam was drunk—he gets that way sometimes.” It was said fast, so that the words tangled at their beginnings and ends. “He wanted to see Noah. I didn’t . . . I got him out of here.”

  “Liam?”

  “Yeah, I mean I keep some whiskey in my desk.” His cheeks went pink as if that was what he was going to get called on. “Poured him a glass, sure. But that’s it. That’s it.”

  “Then what?”

  “Walked him out, all the way out,” Jackson continued. “I tried taking his keys, but he started swinging at me.”

  “He drove off?”

  “Yes.” Jackson nodded. A little frantic, a little pleading. Mostly pathetic. “Then I locked down, as usual.”

  “And you didn’t see him hanging around at all?”

  “No. God, no,” Jackson said. “I wouldn’t. I didn’t tell him they were taking Noah. I didn’t.”

  Lucy didn’t believe that he hadn’t said something, but she also didn’t know if that mattered. If Liam had been sniffing around the place anyway, he’d probably already had it in mind that he’d be taking his son back.

  Regret slid down her throat like thick, salty mucus as she stepped back from Jackson.

  Even though she hadn’t touched him, he collapsed in on himself as if she’d been holding him pinned against the wall.

  She turned away from his huddled form and stalked back toward the truck. Hicks followed, and didn’t need to be told where to go after that. They left Jackson kneeling in the flower beds as they peeled out of the lot, heading toward the Dawsons’ place.

  A glanc
e at her phone showed three missed calls from Vaughn. The team that had come to take Noah’s body to Spokane had probably gone directly to her. Lucy was grateful she wouldn’t have to tell the woman herself, but she expected a reaming was waiting for her in her messages. But a very Vaughnesque reaming, full of pointed silences that spoke of Vaughn’s displeasure even from a distance. Not that Lucy blamed her for it. They’d been—she’d been—sloppy about the protection of Noah’s body.

  The truth was, in every way that mattered, that Lucy was working a case that was already closed. That had influenced her behavior, maybe to an extent she hadn’t even realized, scrubbing some of the urgency from the investigation, dulling some of her instincts, her responses.

  But her car had been vandalized and her victim was missing, and now she was pissed the hell off.

  She wouldn’t be sloppy again.

  Hicks was watching her as she slipped the phone back in her jacket pocket without returning Vaughn’s calls. But he didn’t say anything, and so they rode the twenty minutes in silence as her anger writhed, a spitting, defensive snake pulling back on itself, coiling before the strike.

  Darcy greeted them with a tilt to her chin that she hadn’t worn yesterday, an unspoken defiance that screamed her guilt more than anything else would have.

  “Where is he, Darcy?” Lucy asked, though she knew it was hopeless at this point. She thought about Annie Tate’s rumors, the ones that hinted Darcy Dawson was unstable long before Noah had gone missing.

  “Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Darcy said, straight-faced to a fault. She wanted them to know, and she wanted them not to be able to do a goddamn thing about it. This was such a different woman from the broken one of yesterday that Lucy almost couldn’t make them fit into one person.

  “This is obstruction, Darcy,” Lucy tried. It wouldn’t do any good. These people weren’t scared of the law.

  Satisfaction hid in the slight curve of her lips. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Darcy . . .” It was Hicks who stepped forward, who seemed like he was going to try his own brand of persuasion then.