Lisa stood motionless as the rain froze on her clothes. The longer she stood there, listening, the more she became a pillar of ice. She wanted to move, but she couldn’t. Horror bled through her mind and sank like a weight into her stomach. Curtis was one of them. She’d been set up. The forced landing in the plane was fake; it had all been done to keep her here in Thief River Falls, to make sure she didn’t escape with Purdue. And that meant something even worse.
Laurel.
Laurel was part of it, too.
She couldn’t trust her best friend. Everything Laurel had told her had been a lie. She should have listened to Purdue’s suspicions about her. The betrayal tasted bitter in her mouth.
Curtis kept talking. “Look, the plan is to go back to the airport in the morning. Wait until then. This woman Shyla drops us off, and then she’s out of the picture. You can have Garrett and Stoll waiting in the hangar near the plane. At that point, we’re done.”
Lisa knew she was alone. Truly alone. She shouldn’t have been surprised, because her life had been leading here for the past two years, taking away everyone she loved, one by one.
“All right, I’ll text you when we’re heading to the airport. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure nothing goes wrong.”
Curtis hung up.
Lisa wasn’t sure what to do, whether she should run, or hide, or pretend she hadn’t heard everything she’d just heard. If she could get back to the house without Curtis knowing she’d been outside, she could slip away with Purdue and be gone before it was light.
But she ran out of time.
Curtis had shoved his phone into his pocket and was now headed straight for her. His footsteps crunched through the layer of ice. He practically collided with her before he even realized she was there. When he saw her blocking his way, he stopped, and she heard a curse under his breath. They were both little more than dark silhouettes in the yard, but he knew it was her, and he knew the game was up.
“You bastard,” she hissed.
“Lisa, calm down. Let me explain. This isn’t what you think it is.”
“No? Because it sounds like you’re setting me up, Curtis. It sounds like both of you have been part of this from the beginning. You and Laurel.”
She turned for the house, but she knew he wouldn’t let her go. Not now. Not when she knew the truth. She tried to run, but she took only two slippery steps before her feet spilled out beneath her, and she crashed to the wet ground on her stomach, knocking the air out of her chest. She rolled over, gasping for breath. Curtis loomed over her body, reaching for her. She skidded out of his grasp, but he closed the gap between them with a few steps.
“Lisa, wait. Listen to me. Don’t make this hard on yourself. All they want is the boy.”
All they want is the boy.
Hearing that made something break inside her. She crossed a line. A line that the heroes in her books had to cross, when violence was the only answer. She could just make out the shine of Curtis’s eyes, and when he was directly above her, she swung the little stone pestle like a billy club, hearing it rush through the air and connect on Curtis’s skull with a mean crack. He fell hard, his knees giving way. He collapsed on top of her, and she had to shove with both hands to dislodge his body and squeeze out from beneath him. She was still struggling to breathe, laboring to swell her lungs again. Next to her, Curtis wasn’t moving.
“Lisa?”
A small scared voice came from behind her. It was Purdue. He’d followed her into the yard.
She managed to get to her feet. He ran to her and threw his hands around her waist and hung on for life. She held him, too, but she knew they didn’t have much time. Curtis would be conscious again soon, and when he was, they needed to be long gone.
“Come on,” she croaked, trying to get the words out.
“What’s going on?”
“I’ll tell you later. Right now, we need to go.”
She didn’t go back inside the house. She took Purdue’s hand, and they made careful tracks across the icy grass, moving in and out of the shelter of the evergreens. A black cat sped across their path, like a bad omen, and three other cats scampered for cover as they ran closer. They passed Shyla’s detached garage and found themselves in the muddy driveway next to her Caprice.
Lisa realized she had no idea what to do next. They had nowhere to go and no way to get there. They could run. They could take the bridge and cross the river into the park, but it wouldn’t take long for them to be caught out on foot once daylight broke over the town.
Then she heard a woman’s voice from the front of the house.
“Stop! Who’s out there? Turn around slowly, and keep those hands where I can see them!”
Lisa made sure Purdue was protected and invisible behind her. She turned around slowly, her arms in the air. A bright light erupted in her face, a flashlight pinning her like an escaped prisoner. This time, when the voice spoke again, she realized it was Shyla. The woman’s tone immediately relaxed.
“Lisa! Is that you? Are you okay? I heard a noise outside, and I don’t mess around when that happens.”
The porch light clicked on with a yellow glow. Lisa saw Shyla at the top of the steps with an AR-15 cradled in her arms, and she had no doubt that the rifle was loaded and ready to fire. Shyla was already fully dressed in camouflage and had hunting boots on her feet. She came down from the porch and marched across the driveway with the cool readiness of a soldier.
“You’re leaving already?” Shyla asked. “Now?”
“Yes. Sorry. Thank you so much for everything, but we have to get out of here.”
“What about your friend? The old guy?”
“It turns out he’s not really a friend.”
“Where is he?”
“In the backyard. Unconscious for now. I don’t want him to know where I’m going.”
“Well, where are you going?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure,” Lisa said. “Somewhere far away.”
Shyla looked as if she was trying to make sense of the expression on Lisa’s face. “You still haven’t told me what’s going on.”
“If I knew, Shyla, I’d tell you. I don’t. I just know I need to get away from Thief River Falls as fast as I can.”
“You won’t get far on foot,” Shyla said. “You need wheels.”
She hiked past Lisa to the door of the garage, unlocked it, and threw it open. The light came on, illuminating the blue sports car inside. Shyla dug in her pants for a set of keys and tossed them to Lisa, who caught them on the fly.
“Take the Camaro,” Shyla said. “It’s free, and it’s fast.”
“Are you sure?”
Shyla shrugged. “I never drive it. Get it back to me when you can. Or keep it. I don’t care.”
“You’re a lifesaver, Shyla.”
“Hey, I owe you,” she replied. Then she put a hand on Lisa’s shoulder. “Be straight with me—are you in some kind of trouble? You’ve got the look of someone who isn’t safe. I know that look, because I’ve been there myself.”
“You’re right. I don’t think I’m safe.”
“Then let’s make sure you can fight back.”
Shyla opened the driver’s door of the Camaro and leaned inside to pop the trunk. She went over to the arsenal on her back wall and took down two weapons, a semiautomatic pistol and an AR-15, which she put in the trunk without a word. Then she unlocked a large cabinet in the corner of the garage and gathered up several magazines of ammunition for both guns. She loaded those in the trunk, too, and slammed it shut.