The Perfect Outsider

by Loreth Anne White

  Hannah stared at them. Silence swelled, and the kitchen clock ticked.

  “This is really it?” Hannah said quietly.

  “It’s down to the wire now, Hannah.”

  “We can never come back after we pull something like this off—not while Samuel is still around.”

  June nodded.

  “Are you sure it’s that dire?”

  “Even Hawk Bledsoe said this whole place is set to blow,” Jesse said. “No one wants another Waco, but Samuel is apparently getting desperate, and who knows how far he will go to protect what he has?”

  Hannah sucked in a deep breath. “Okay…let’s do it.”

  Chapter 12

  June’s heart pounded as they burst out of the warehouse pushing Hannah on the gurney toward the waiting ambulance, Michael running at their side as he held on to Hannah’s hand.

  Jesse stepped out of the shadows behind the warehouse door. “Michael!” he whispered.

  Michael froze dead in his tracks at the sudden sight of his brother-in-law, shock, confusion, then fear crossing his face.

  “Quick, Michael, over here,” Jesse said in a harsh whisper.

  “Jesse? What…what are you doing here? Is Annie here?”

  “I need to talk to you about Annie, Michael—”

  “My purse!” Hannah suddenly screamed hysterically. “I left my purse inside. I need it. It has my money, medication, everything in it!”

  Ted shot a glance at June.

  “I—I’ve got to have my purse!”

  “Ted, can you go back and get it for her?” June leaned down and said calmly to Hannah, “Where is it? Can you tell him?”

  “It’s…by my desk in the accounting office at the back of the warehouse.”

  “Go,” June said briskly to Ted. “I’ll be fine getting her in by myself. We’ll be ready to roll as soon as you’re back.”

  He hesitated. “Go!” insisted June forcefully. “We might need whatever medication she has in there.”

  Relief washed through her as Ted turned and raced back into the building.

  “Quick.” She rapidly unstrapped Hannah and helped her off the stretcher. Taking her arm, they rushed toward the idling truck before Ted could return. To June’s shock Michael was sitting passively in the backseat with Jesse behind the wheel.

  June helped Hannah into the back so she could sit beside Michael and keep him calm. She flung herself into the passenger seat, slammed the door. “Go!”

  Jesse hit the gas and wheeled out of the warehouse parking lot, tires spinning on loose gravel. He headed for the road that would take them to Little Gulch.

  June turned around in her seat. Michael was crying softly in the back, murmuring Annie’s name. Hannah’s hand rested on his knee.

  “I told him about Annie,” Jesse said, eyes fixed on the road as they sped past the ranches, heading toward the mountains. The plan was to drive straight out to Little Gulch and leave Hannah there with her sister-in-law while a flight out to Wind River could be organized for her.

  June, Jesse and Michael would meanwhile tackle the long hike back to the cave house from Little Gulch. The hike would be too much for Hannah, and there was no point in bringing her unnecessarily all the way back to the safe house. Jesse had contacted his ranch manager, who would send a vehicle to welcome Hannah at the airstrip in Wind River.

  “He didn’t know about Annie and the fire?” June said.

  “No. I told him briefly what happened, and that I’d promised Annie I’d come get him. It was all such a shock he came peaceably.”

  “It’s going to be okay, Michael,” June said softly, turning around in her seat to hand him some tissues.

  Michael’s face was still as open and innocent as a young boy’s, his eyes large and filled with pain. Her heart went out to him. “I promise you it’s going to be all right.”

  “I—I didn’t know,” Michael sobbed. “I would’ve come if I’d known about the fire, if Jesse could have gotten hold of me—”

  “We didn’t have a contact number, Michael,” said Jesse.

  “S-Samuel t-told me it would be better not to have any contact until…I got a solid grasp on being the best me I could be. S-Samuel said family often tries to stop you from im-provement. They’re the gatekeepers, he said. They t-try to sabotage you.” He blew his nose. “I feel so bad, Jesse. I wasn’t even there for her memorial service.”

  “There’s nothing you could have done, Michael,” Jesse said, eyes still on the road, his shoulders tight. “I’ll tell you more about what happened when we get somewhere safe, but Annie made me vow to come find you, and I did. She wanted you safe. She understood what was happening here. And she will now rest in peace because you’re out of there.”

  “You did the right thing, Mickey,” Hannah said gently, putting her arm around the young man. “You’ll see. June’s right—it’s all going to be okay.”

  * * *

  They drove in silence, the ribbon of road undulating behind them as they left Cold Plains in the distance. Up ahead, along the distant horizon, there was a break in the cloud and sun streamed through onto the mountains.

  June reached out and placed her hand on Jesse’s knee.

  “Thank you,” she said quietly. “We make a good team.”

  He shot her a glance, unable to temper the light in his eyes, and a ghost of a smile curved his lips. “That’s what I kept trying to tell you,” he said.

  Jesse took one hand off the wheel, covered hers on his knee and realized the wedding band on her finger was gone.

  He felt a lump form in his throat, and emotion pricked behind his eyes. And he knew he’d won. He was going to take her home.

  Five days later…

  News of Mayor Rufus Kittridge’s arrest by the FBI spread like wildfire through town as Devotees flocked down to the municipal offices to watch in shock and horror as their avuncular mayor was handcuffed and frog-marched by agents in bulletproof vests toward a waiting federal vehicle.

  Samuel watched the whole thing from his window—the feds taking his mayor, his key militia leaders. His ace in the hole. Rage pounded through his blood—the effrontery of it, right there in the street below his own office window.

  He stilled suddenly as he saw another two federal agents marching Monica Pearl down the street toward the gleaming black SUVs. Monica wore a summer dress of modest length, patterned with small roses—Samuel knew the dress intimately. Her blond hair was tied back demurely and her pretty cheeks were flushed—he could see that even from here.

  People were gathering on sidewalks to watch, many of them Devotees who’d arrived early for the nightly seminar. And right then, as the bumbling agents put the handcuffed Monica into the black SUV and closed the door on her, the bells of the community center began to peal—calling his Devotees to the seminar.

  Hawk Bledsoe had orchestrated the whole thing for maximum effect, to undermine Samuel in the eyes of his Devotees. Before Hawk got into his own vehicle, he glanced up at Samuel’s window, catching his eyes.

  It was like a punch to his gut.

  The shameless, impudent boldness of it! The barefaced audacity—parading Rufus and Monica in front of the others like that, staging a production designed to undermine him, Samuel Grayson! It cut to the heart of his pride, his grasp on complete power. Now he was going to be forced to address this incident in his seminar tonight, and it was going to look as if he was covering something up.

  A knock sounded on his oak door.

  He swung around.

  It was his assistant, Jenny Smith. “I started the bells ringing, Samuel. You will be at your seminar tonight, won’t you?”

  “Why the hell not!” he barked, his face feeling hot. He hated that. He never showed loss of control in front of a loyal Devotee.

  He breathed in deep and then exhaled slowly, counting to three. He smiled warmly.

  “I apologize, Jenny. The arrest of Mayor Kittridge has come as a big surprise to us all—I’m still personally reeling from the shoc
k, but the seminar will go on as planned.”

  “They say he’s going to be charged with murder, of our own,” she whispered. “I even heard rumors he could be involved in the Cold Plains Five murders, and Monica Pearl, too… I just can’t believe—”

  “And so you shouldn’t,” said Samuel. “The FBI needs to show something for their efforts here, and this is simply a witch hunt.” Samuel placed his hand on Jenny’s shoulder.

  “In fact, it’s a sign we’re finally achieving our goals. Because the higher you go, Jenny,” he said affectionately, “the better you become, the more it threatens people who have not managed to improve their own lives.” His gaze held hers so she couldn’t escape, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything other than look at him, hear the authoritative but kind cadence of his voice, see the wisdom in his eyes.

  “You know you are successful when people like Agent Hawk Bledsoe move in like parasites. They will try to tear down what we have built, and, more than ever now, we must rally together during this trial.”

  Jenny smiled, nodded. “Thank you, Samuel.”

  The adoration in her eyes bolstered him.

  “Now go. And, Jenny,” Samuel called out behind her, “make sure the bell rings extra loud and extra long tonight. I shall be holding a very special address.”

  Samuel listened as the peals designed to resemble an old church bell—sonorous and uplifting and goose-bump inducing—resounded down the streets of Cold Plains, Wyoming, through his cleaned-up cowboy town, across the ranches and into the hills and forests where somewhere there was rumored to be a safe house he had yet to find.

  And outside, down in the streets, the doors of the black federal vehicles closed, and they drove off in a convoy with flashing lights as they took away Mayor Rufus Kittridge and Monica Pearl.

  * * *

  June came out of the room where she’d been counseling Michael.

  “How’s he doing?” Jesse said.

  She smiled. “Great. He’s a good kid, Jesse. He’s totally guileless and so easily manipulated, but the shock of actually seeing you in Cold Plains, and hearing about his older sister’s death at the same time, jolted him right out of whatever spell Samuel had him under. He’s going to be fine.”

  He touched her arm. “Come outside. I’ve got sundowners out on the patio.”

  The cave house was empty at the moment, apart from her, Jesse, Michael and Eager. Over the past five days June and Jesse had moved the others out to where they could access further counseling from EXIT and go on to new lives.

  “Michael needs a dog,” June said as she followed Jesse out onto the stone patio. “He’s thriving in the company of Eager—” She stilled suddenly at the sight before her.

  The sky was streaked with cirrus clouds that had been painted hot-pink and orange by the sinking sun. The air was warm and filled with the soft sound of birds.

  Jesse grinned. “See? I thought it might be nice to sit out here for a bit.”

  Her heart filled. She loved him more than she could imagine. But as she moved toward the stone table, she froze again, this time at a sound in the distance.

  “Did you hear that?”

  Jesse came up beside her and listened, the warm evening breeze ruffling his hair.

  “It’s Samuel’s bells,” he said.

  She nodded. “Sometimes when the air currents are just right you can hear them ringing all the way over here, summoning his flock to the community center.”

  “You think he’s worried?”

  “He has to be,” said June. “Hawk was going to do the arrests right before the seminar.” She looked at her watch. “If all went to plan, Rufus Kittridge and Monica Pearl should be in federal custody about now, thanks to the quick plea-bargain acceptance from both Lumpy Smithers and Molly Rigg.”

  “You’ve done good here, June.”

  “I’m not done yet. Samuel still has to go down.”

  “It’ll happen. Soon.” He put his arm around her shoulders and drew her close as they stood watching the clouds change color and the sky deepen to indigo—the same color as Jesse’s eyes, thought June. His eyes were the color of an early-evening sky. Up high above the forest, two eagles soared, watchful over the Wyoming hills and valleys.

  “Mostly,” he said, very quietly, “I want to thank you for saving my life, June, and for helping me honor my vow to Annie. I can move forward now.”

  “Did you love her, Jesse?”

  He was silent for a long while.

  “I stopped being able to love Annie some time ago,” he said quietly. “Maybe we weren’t even a good match to start with, but I like to believe we could have made a go of it, because when I make a promise, June, the commitment, it’s everything to me.”

  “I know,” she whispered as she leaned into him, enjoying the solid strength of his body, the fact she actually had someone to lean on after all these years.

  “We could be good together, you know that?” he said.

  She smiled. “Yeah,” she said softly, “I think we could.”

  Jesse’s heart kicked. Easy, boy—don’t rush it. You came on way too fast and strong the other night, asking her to move in with you so soon.

  He said cautiously, “June, once our work here—”

  She glanced up at him. “Our work?”

  “Which part did you miss about being a team?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But what? I want to help you finish here. You helped me put my promise to Annie to bed, now I want to help you fulfill your promise to Matt and Aiden.”

  She stared at him. “It was never like that, Jesse—it wasn’t a promise.”

  “Well,” he said, a mischievous playfulness entering his rugged features, “I wasn’t going to call it an obsession or anything.”

  She laughed, and, damn, it felt good to be able to laugh about something like that. Then she sobered as she saw lust darkening in his eyes.

  “I’m not scared to let them go anymore.” She smiled. “I’m not afraid to take a second chance.” She leaned up, hooking her arms around his neck, drawing him down to her.

  “I love you, Jesse Marlboro,” she whispered against his lips.

  He smiled against her mouth. “Grainger.”

  She shook her head. “I always wanted a mountain cowboy, just like in those old ads, so I’m going to keep my Marlboro Man.” And she kissed him as the sun began to sink behind the hills, and the bells in Cold Plains grew silent.

  Three days later…

  The FBI had made further arrests and laid charges against Rufus Kittridge and Monica Pearl for their roles in three of the Cold Plains Five murders, specifically twenty-nine-year-old Shelby Jackson, thirty-four-year-old Laurel Pierce and twenty-five-year-old Abby Michaels.

  Shelby Jackson was rumored to have been dating Samuel Grayson when she’d disappeared five years ago. Laurel Pierce was the estranged wife of local rancher Nathan Pierce. And Abby Michaels was the mother of Rafe Black’s still-missing nine-month-old son, Devin.

  Agent Hawk Bledsoe had informed June and Jesse that he expected to get more evidence soon, something to finally nail Samuel himself. But until then, everyone remained restless and nervous—things were coming to a head.

  Meanwhile, June and Jesse had driven out from Little Gulch to meet Darcy Craven two towns over. From there they’d hiked in to where the body of Jane Doe, murder victim number two, had been found.

  Darcy now stood atop a rocky ridge, hands on her hips as she caught her breath. Her cheeks were pink from exertion and her hair damp from a soft summer rain. All around them the forest was shrouded in heavy layers of mist.

  They’d been following Eager on an air-scent search all morning, and they’d found nothing apart from litter and the odd garment left by hikers.

  While Darcy rested and June watered Eager, Jesse had gone down the opposite side of the ridge to check out a small trail they’d seen earlier.

  “June, I want to thank you both for doing this,” Darcy said. “I know you didn’t be
lieve we’d find anything. But I just had to come and look.”

  “Hey, it’s the least we could do, Darcy. I just wish we could find something for you that would help with your mother’s identity,” June said as she screwed the cap back onto her water bottle.

  “Isn’t this near where Samuel once had a cabin?” Darcy asked, turning in a full circle.

  “I had no idea he had a cabin in these parts,” said June, checking her GPS.

  Darcy frowned and bit the inside of her cheek. “I think the cabin was supposed to be in this area—I’m sure that’s what I heard Officer Ford say some time ago, that Samuel and his brother used to camp out this way when they were young.”

  June reached for her radio and keyed it. “June for Jesse?” she released the key and the radio crackled.

  “At your service, K9 team.”

  June grinned, and keyed again. “Any signs of an old cabin down your way?”

  “Negative. Trail seems to go nowhere. I’m going to head back up.”

  But as June hooked the radio onto her belt, Eager’s hackles rose and his tail suddenly went straight as an arrow. June stilled, feeling a sudden eeriness, as if they were being watched.

  “Easy, boy,” she whispered to Eager as she turned in a slow circle, carefully scanning the woods, her hand going instinctively for her weapon.

  “What is it?” Darcy came up to her side, suddenly nervous.

  “Are you sure you weren’t followed out here, Darcy?”

  “I—I’m pretty sure.”

  A branch cracked. June spun to face the trees from whence the noise had come. She waited.

  Fingers of mist curled out from the trees, swirling around the bases like wraiths. Branches rustled suddenly. June’s mouth went bone-dry.

  Eager growled, baring fangs.

  “Who’s there?” June called as she drew her gun and clicked off the safety.