by Karen Rose
“So what did you do?”
“The only thing I could do,” she replied without skipping a beat. “I told her that Sasha had a librarian girlfriend.”
He laughed. “You’re evil.”
“I know.” She gave his hand a squeeze and was quiet for a few moments. “Did you get that age progression from your friend in Philly?” she finally asked.
“Yes.” Tino had come through with a sketch that exactly captured the sad eyes of the girl Gideon had once known. “I printed twenty copies on my printer when I went home to pack a bag and get my map.” He’d intended to take her with him, but when he’d called Irina after leaving the morgue, she’d told him that Daisy had fallen asleep. He’d take her to his house when they got back.
“What will you do if no one at the bus station remembers her?”
“Ask around in some of the other towns around Redding. Redding was the closest large town, but there are a number of smaller towns within and just outside the radius I drew around Mt. Shasta. Someone in a smaller town might be more likely to remember her. I’ve been to most of them, asking in general about Eden and specifically about the man who’d go for supplies, but I figured that the guy probably went to Redding for our supplies because nobody knew anything. But I didn’t have a photo of Eileen then, so it’s worth trying again.”
“Or they might even remember one of the other men with the Eden tattoo.”
He nodded. “I thought of that, too. I made copies of the tattoo photos.” He saw the sign for Redding and put on his turn signal. A glance in his rearview showed the Chevy sedan to be exiting as well. Except when he turned right at the end of the exit ramp, the sedan turned left. Good. “If no one at the bus station remembers her, I’ll check the pawn shops to see if the locket was pawned or purchased.”
“If she pawned it, she might still be alive,” Daisy murmured. “God, I hope so.”
Gideon’s chest ached because even though he hoped so, too, he didn’t think the odds were very good. “If the pawn shops are a bust, then we can start on the other towns.”
REDDING, CALIFORNIA
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 11:20 P.M.
It had been a risk, turning left at the end of the Redding exit. The Fed had tried a few times to get behind him, to get his license plate number, but he’d managed to keep him from succeeding. It wouldn’t matter if he had, though. The plates had never been reported stolen. He’d made sure of that.
The plates—and the car—belonged to one of last year’s guests, a woman from a small town in southeastern California who he’d met in a Vegas casino. She’d been playing slots, something she admitted to always wanting to do. She was on her bucket-list tour. Had just quit her job as a professor and had embarked on what was to have been a two-year trip around the world. All alone. She was craving the privacy, the ability to be accountable to no one. She’d been the perfect guest. No one had come looking for her. No one ever would.
So he’d kept up the payments on her car’s registration, and voilà, he’d had the perfect car to use whenever he wished to be someone else. As he had today.
Hooking a quick U-turn, he went in search of the black Toyota Camry. They’d been on the road for three hours and it was getting quite late. He hoped that the first place the Fed would stop would be one of the exit’s many gas stations or fast-food places—
Or motels. Because there it was, coming to a stop under the awning of a moderately priced motel. The Fed got out and went around to help the woman he recognized as Daisy, holding her hand as she got out of the car. And continued to hold her hand as they went inside.
The Fed was holding her hand. And she was letting him.
He pushed the annoyance aside because he was certain the two hadn’t come to Redding to simply bang one out. The Fed had a home. In Rocklin. So if they just wanted to be alone, they could have driven twenty minutes from the Sokolov house in Granite Bay, not nearly three hours to Redding.
Something was up. Something important.
He waited impatiently because they’d left the car under the awning. After ten freaking minutes, Reynolds came out alone and parked the Toyota.
He considered using the gun under his seat to take care of the Fed there and then, but hesitated too long. Reynolds went in through a side door using his key card.
It seemed they were turned in for the night. Together. The two of them.
They could be here to see Trish’s family, he allowed. That would make sense. Except Trish had had no family in her contacts list.
His gut was telling him that this trip was important.
Of course, his gut also told him to kill Sydney, but he obviously hadn’t listened to it.
And see where it got you? You’re dancing like her puppet on a string. And you came all this way, had a shot at the Fed, but you wussed out. Pussy. Now Daisy is sleeping with him. Or not sleeping.
He blew out an angry breath, furious with himself. He’d wait until morning, to see where they went from here. And when he got a shot at the Fed, he’d take it. Then Daisy would be alone again. She’d talk to him about radio and maybe even get him a job.
Which was ridiculous. He didn’t want a job in radio. He needed to keep the job he had.
Oh. Shit. He was supposed to fly to New York City tomorrow with Hank.
Panic seized his already roiling gut and he had to force himself to calm down. He’d . . . call in sick. That’s what he’d do. Hank did it sometimes.
Not when he’s afraid of being fired.
No, no, no. He had dirt on the old man, he reminded himself. All those photos of him, both with his women and his drug-smuggling clients. Photos that would keep him from getting the ax. Not that he should have had to stoop to such extremes. The company had been promised to him. So many times.
He needed the company. He needed the planes. Flying was the reason he’d never been caught. Why he’d never even been a blip on law enforcement’s radar. Anywhere.
But he had the pictures. He had the proof. He wasn’t going to lose his job. He could take a goddamn sick day. He’d never called in sick before. He was allowed.
He eyed his gas gauge. He was nearing empty. Since it appeared the Fed and Daisy were down for the night, he’d fill up, get some coffee and snacks, then come back here and wait.
REDDING, CALIFORNIA
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 11:35 P.M.
Daisy left the hotel room’s bathroom, her spine stiff with uncertainty. She’d known on some level that going to Redding meant spending the night. She’d even known, on that same level, that it meant staying in a hotel room and that Gideon wouldn’t let her out of his sight.
She hadn’t thought about the logistics past that and she should have. Especially given what had happened between them on her sofa this morning, which now seemed like a lifetime ago.
She was in shock from finding Trish. From losing Trish. She got that. Still . . . She looked down at the plain shorts and camisole set that Sasha had packed in her overnight bag. The clothes belonged to Zoya, the youngest Sokolov, but fit pretty well since she and Zoya were about the same size.
It would have been nice to have worn something prettier for Gideon. Not that anything would happen tonight. It was presumptuous of her to think so. Especially since she still hadn’t picked up any protection. On the other hand, the room was a small suite, with a bedroom and a separate sitting room and kitchenette. But just one bed.
Her heart pounded harder when she rounded the corner to see the bed. The one bed. It looked huge and looming, its only occupant a snoring Brutus.
But then her pounding heart skittered in her chest when she saw him.
Gideon leaned into the window, arms crossed over his chest, his forehead pressed against the glass. He’d changed into black sweatpants and a gray T-shirt that stretched tight across broad shoulders that were stiff but seemed to sag at the same time. He looked as exh
austed as she felt.
Without overthinking it, she went to him, wrapping her arms around his waist. She pressed her cheek into his back and felt his muscles flex slightly as his arms released the hold he had on himself, dropping to cover hers.
“Is something new wrong?” she asked quietly.
“No.” He laced their fingers together over his hard stomach. “I was just thinking about your sister. Which made me think of mine.”
“Mercy,” she murmured. “Will you tell me about her?”
He sighed. “She . . . doesn’t hate me.”
That was a curious way to begin, she thought and waited for him to say more. “But?” she prompted when he remained silent.
“But she resents me.”
“Like Carrie and I resented Taylor?”
“Something like that. She doesn’t want to. She tried not to. But she can’t help it. So she left.”
He sounded so bleak, so very hopeless. She squeezed his middle tighter. “Where did she go?”
“Lots of places. But she ended up in New Orleans.”
“Do you see her?”
“Last time was two years ago. I . . . well, I lied. I told her I had business there, but I really just went to see her. She looked . . . better.” The last word was a hoarse whisper that broke her heart.
“Better than what?” Daisy whispered back.
“She didn’t get away from the community until she was thirteen.”
An indirect answer to her question, but she understood. “You told me that. It means she was married for a whole year. Did her husband hurt her?”
“Yes.” Another hoarse whisper. “Badly. She also almost died.”
Daisy swallowed hard. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. You don’t owe me quid pro quo, Gideon.”
He shuddered. “I don’t want to tell you.” He straightened and moved away from the window. “But I need to. Not all of it. Some of it . . . I can’t.”
She took a step back, releasing him to sit on the edge of the bed. “Tell me what you can,” she said, scooping Brutus from the bed and settling the dog on her lap.
He unexpectedly slid to the floor, his back against the bed, his shoulder against her thigh. Holding Brutus with one hand, she gently toyed with Gideon’s hair with the other, admiring how the light caught the threads of silver among the inky black.
“My mother left me at the bus station,” he said abruptly.
“Because Mercy was only nine years old and needed her.” Daisy kept her voice soft. “Not because she didn’t love you.”
“I know that,” he bit out, his vehemence startling.
Okay. So I put my foot in that. Shutting up now. “Sorry,” she murmured.
“No.” He sighed. “I get tense when I think about this and when I talk about Mercy. See, my mother went back for Mercy, but I don’t know if she understood what life was going to be like—for her or for Mercy—when she returned. Or maybe she did, I don’t know.”
“She was punished.”
“Yes.” There was an eternity of misery in that one little word. “Pastor knew that she’d smuggled me out, but before he could punish her, her husband gave her an alibi.”
“He protected her.”
Gideon’s laugh was bitter. “Not exactly. He was forced to pay Ephraim Burton restitution because I’d stabbed him in the eye. My mother was the payment.”
Daisy’s eyes filled with hot tears. “Oh, Gideon.”
“My mother’s husband took on another wife and my mother was transferred to Burton.”
Daisy continued petting his hair, not knowing what to say. The guilt he carried was so very obvious in that moment.
“The man who drove the truck . . . he’d gotten his payment also. Several times on the way to Redding and, I presume, on the way back.”
Daisy couldn’t swallow back her gasp. “In front of you?”
His shoulders moved in a sad parody of a shrug. “I was nearly dead. I guess he figured it didn’t matter.”
“Wasn’t he . . . well, wasn’t he worried about getting in trouble for smuggling you?”
“I never knew what was going on with that guy. He left the compound every week, so he could have run, but he never did. And he kind of did what he wanted, when he wanted. I always wondered what he’d had on the leaders.”
“You think he had incriminating information on them?”
“Yes. Something strong enough to give him the plum job of driving wherever he went for supplies every week. Whatever it was, he wasn’t punished for smuggling me out. Mercy told me that much. And she said no one else got out between her escape and mine. I’ve hoped others were able to get away. I even searched for lockets and similar tattoos but found nothing. Not until you found Eileen’s locket.”
“How did Mercy get out?”
“My mother got Mercy out. I’m not sure what she used to bribe the truck driver again, but she and Mercy made it to the bus station just like I had. Mercy was in bad shape and our mother wouldn’t leave her. She insisted on being left behind. Started to scream and raise a fuss. I guess she was hoping someone would help her.”
“Nobody did.”
“No. The truck driver shot her.”
Daisy couldn’t contain the cry that escaped her throat. “No. In front of Mercy?”
Gideon stared straight ahead at the dingy beige wall. “He shot Mercy, too.”
Daisy couldn’t speak. She just stroked his hair with one hand and wiped tears from her face with the other.
“He took my mother’s body back with him,” he went on stonily. “He left Mercy there. She nearly bled out. They airlifted her to UC Davis, just like they’d done me. A nurse noticed her lockets and remembered my tattoo.”
“Wait. Lockets?”
He nodded once. “Somehow Mercy had my mother’s locket, too. She was found with her locket and my mother’s hidden in her clothes. I asked her how their chains were cut, but she always shakes her head and refuses to answer me.”
“Her trauma runs deep,” Daisy murmured, then shifted the conversation when he shuddered. “Was Irina the nurse who noticed her lockets?”
“No, but the nurse was a friend of hers. By the time news got to Irina, Mercy was in foster care. I got to her as soon as I could. She’d gone mute, wouldn’t speak to anyone. But the foster mother told me that Mercy had been found at the Redding bus station. I begged Mercy to tell me where our mother was, but she just stared at me, her eyes so empty. And then I knew. I asked her if Mama was dead. She nodded.”
“What did you do?”
“Rafe carried me out. I was . . . a mess. He’d driven me there. I made him promise that he wouldn’t tell anyone. Mercy had been through enough. I didn’t want everyone else to know what had been done to her. I didn’t want anyone to know she’d suffered because of me.”
“Did you think Irina and Karl would stop loving you?”
He sucked in a harsh breath. “Rafe promised me and kept my secret to this day. Irina knows I found Mercy, but she thinks the foster family adopted her and moved away.”
He hadn’t answered her question about the Sokolovs loving him, which was an answer nonetheless. An answer that broke Daisy’s heart in two. She wished she had words of comfort, but she had none that wouldn’t sound wrong or condescending. “You said she ended up in New Orleans. What happened to her between the time you found her in foster care and today?”
“She stayed in foster care until she was eighteen, but she only agreed to see me a few times. Once she’d aged out of the system, she went to Houston.”
“Where your mother had come from.”
He nodded. “I think she wanted answers. I know she met our grandparents, but I don’t know what she said to them, if anything. I had no interest in seeing them again. But between Houston and New Orleans was a string of towns. I’d get a p
ostcard every so often from a different place saying she was alive. No calls, texts, or e-mails. Only the postcard. I never even knew her cell phone number. I’d try to track her down to wherever the card had been postmarked, but I’d always miss her. When I got the card from New Orleans, I tracked her down immediately. Lurked outside the address I’d found until she came home. She wasn’t happy to see me. She agreed to meet me for dinner and finally gave me her cell number if I promised to only use it in an emergency. Otherwise, we’ve had no contact.”
“Why does Mercy resent you so much?”
“I think it was because our mother suffered after getting me out. And Mercy suffered, too. She was treated terribly by whoever she’d been married to.”
“You don’t know?”
“She wouldn’t tell me. To this day. She won’t talk about it.”
“What happened to Mercy’s locket?”
“She said she put it in her bank’s safe-deposit box. Along with our mother’s. I’m not sure how she got Mama’s locket. She’s never told me. I’ve never seen either locket.”
Because Mercy resented him. Oh, Gideon. Daisy slid off the bed to the floor beside him, then straddled him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I’m sorry.”
He held on to her with a ferocity that stole her breath, burying his face into the curve of her shoulder. “I wish I could go back and change it. I wish I could go back and not stab Ephraim Burton in the eye.”
Her heart hurt for him. “He would’ve killed you, Gideon.”
He went very still. “There have been times that I wish that he had.”
No. No, no, no. She held him tighter. “Recently?”
He nuzzled her gently. “No.”
She let out a breath. She wanted to tell him that it wasn’t his fault, that he’d only been a child, fighting for his own life. Fighting not to be raped. Just like I fought Thursday night.
She wanted to tell him that if anyone was to “blame,” it was his mother for allowing them to be taken to a cult to begin with. But his mother had been little more than a child herself.
