Behind the Lies (Montgomery Justice #2)(80)

“Hey, Seth, shut off the TV.”

He half expected Jenna to stalk out and tear into him, but Sam reaching out to him instead of her seemed to have broken her. Plus, Brad’s call had obviously shaken her to her core. She’d become comfortable with the idea of running. She’d trusted him to help her disappear, but that was it. “I don’t think Jenna believes we can stop Brad Walters.”

“She’s wrong,” Luke said. “She’ll come out when she’s ready. She probably just needs to process.”

“Process? Seriously?” Seth laughed. “Where the hell did you learn that?”

“Army shrinks,” Luke muttered.

“Yeah, well, Jenna doesn’t process,” Zach said. “She stands her ground…or runs.”

A flash of insight hit him. “Damn it, she runs.” He rose from the chair so fast it clattered to the floor behind him. He should have recognized that look on her face. The same resigned determination he’d witnessed after she’d hot-wired his damned truck.

“You think she’s gone?” Seth said, following at his heels.

“God, I hope not.”

His hand gripped the last bedroom’s doorknob. Locked.

He knocked on the door. “Jenna?”

No answer.

He knocked harder. “Jenna!”

“Shh. You’ll wake the kid,” Luke said.

A dark, horrifying feeling enveloped Zach. She wouldn’t have run without her son.

“Check Sam,” he shouted at his brothers, then kicked in the door. The room was empty. The curtains fluttered in the window.

“The kid’s gone,” Luke yelled from down the hall.

Zach stuck his head out of the window and his blood froze at the stain of crimson on the windowsill. The screen lay in pieces on the ground.

No. He cupped his hands. “Jenna!”

His heart raced as he waited, focusing, praying to hear the sound of her voice above laughter from the bar.

Seth ran in. “They’re both gone.”

Zach turned and his foot slipped on a piece of paper. He glanced down at the floor and scooped up the file folder and the small locket he’d caught her fondling. It didn’t take a second to scan her father’s mug shot, record, and date of death. Jenna had told Zach her father died when she was fourteen. The same year her father had gone to prison. Oh God. Had this been the final straw for her? Had it sent her into the night? That made no sense.

“Zach,” Luke said, pocketing the necklace. “We’ve got a problem. My phone was on the bed. She called Walters.”

“Oh, Jenna,” Zach rubbed his face. He cursed himself for not forcing himself into this room and making her talk to him. “There’s blood on the window.”

“She could still have left voluntarily,” Luke said.

“You’re right,” Zach muttered. “Check the cars. She might have hot-wired one or stolen the keys. She’s resourceful.”

They burst out the front door. All the vehicles were there. Zach yelled her name again, his desperation growing.

She’d left on foot? But the blood…

Zach scanned the parking lot. The spotlights had been dimmed after the basketball game ended, but something unusual caught his attention. An area of torn-up grass to the side of the house. He knelt down. Wet, sticky. Blood. And two tiny hands had dug into the earth.

Sam.

“Seth, get over here,” he said quietly, his fist clenched to tamp down the foreboding.

His brother crouched beside him and let out a curse. He spanned his hand across the smaller handprint. “Sam didn’t go willingly.”

“Brad’s taken them.” Zach bit down.

“It doesn’t mean he’ll kill her.” Seth studied the ground more closely. “There was a car here.”

“Brad wants the evidence,” Luke said. “He needs her until he gets it. We have time.”

“The evidence is still in California in a safety deposit box. She mentioned La Jolla. There are hundreds of possibilities.”

“Then we’ll start searching,” Seth said.

Luke let out a slow, deep breath. “She’ll buy us time. She’s already proven she can think on her feet.”

Zach rubbed his chin. “Yeah, but she’s afraid of him.”

“Jenna had the courage to leave,” Luke reminded him. “She called him. She faces her fears.”

“She might tell him the evidence is in California and only she can retrieve it. That might give her an escape opportunity. She’s smart that way,” Zach said.

“We need a watch on the airports. Walters won’t want to take sixteen hours to get that evidence. He’ll try to hire a private plane.”

“I’m on it,” Luke said.

Zach followed his brothers inside. Within seconds, Luke had opened his computer, and Seth pulled out his phone to hit up his own contacts.

An overwhelming fear paralyzed Zach. “We’ve got to find her,” he choked. “I don’t think I can live without her.”




Darkness and cold metal surrounded her. The smell of exhaust and rubber filled the air. A bounce shifted Jenna hard against a mound under her shoulder. The roar of a vehicle rumbled around her. Oh God. She was in the trunk of a car.