Paranoid(126)

Kayleigh had run to Cade, talked to him, tried to keep him conscious, fearing his wound would be mortal.

“Stay with me!” she’d ordered. “Ryder? Cade? Do you hear me? Damn it, you stay with me! Don’t you dare leave me!”

But he’d drifted away from her despite her best efforts before she could tell him that she loved him, that she’d always loved him, that he just couldn’t die on her.

Before the EMTs had taken him away, she’d heard his phone bleat and she’d picked it up, reading Rachel’s desperate text, then listening to the voice mail message. It didn’t make sense. They’d caught the killer. Hollander was clinging to life, or had been when he’d been hauled away, under guard and by ambulance, to the hospital.

So why was Rachel panicked?

Because her daughter had snuck out to be with her boyfriend?

Yeah, that wasn’t good, but not exactly abnormal. Teens did it all the time. And Rachel was a bit on the hysterical side, a woman whose fears drove her.

Still...

She went into the voice mail, caught the one from Rachel asking Cade to call, and then she listened to a long one . . . another message, a longer one, and her heart turned to ice. It ran for several minutes and recorded a horrifying confrontation between Harper and Lucas Ryder. Fear galvanizing her, Kayleigh started running to her car.

She didn’t hesitate for a second even though she was certain her actions tonight, the shooting of Hollander, would be under review. She could be on leave. Even though when she’d blasted Hollander, the shooting had been caught on police cameras, her actions would be studied and she’d have at the minimum a few days off so that the department could verify her actions were called for.

But right now . . . while the Seaside PD was wrapping this up, she could get away. She had her own vehicle. And she needed to get to that cannery and fast.

She found Biggs standing near one of the police cruisers. “I have to leave. Now.”

“Whoa. Wait.”

“No time to explain. I can’t deal with any red tape or even questions. Cover for me,” she said under her breath.

“For what?”

“Everything.”

“Uh-oh. What’re you planning, O’Meara?”

“Just cover me. I’ll call.” She was already jogging to her car. She turned, looked over her shoulder, and added, “Oh, yeah, you’d better find a way home.”

*

Atop his bed, Dylan stared at the screen of his laptop and frowned. Absently, as he watched his monitor, he chewed on a tough piece of jerky and ignored Reno prancing beside the bed, whining for a bite.

What the hell was his mother doing?

After cruising through the streets of Edgewater she seemed to be stalled on the west end of town. Near Harper, but not in the same spot.

He was tracking them both, as he had for the past six months, just to keep tabs. He’d felt it was some supremely cool irony that instead of his mother tracking his phone, he was keeping hers in his sights. Just the opposite of so many kids he knew whose parents were monitoring their whereabouts.

This spy shit was amazing!

But now he was worried.

His mom was on the move again, heading toward Harper, who was at the old fish-packing plant on the edge of town. What the hell was she doing there? Yeah, he’d helped her again by shutting down the old alarm system so she could sneak out and hook up with Xander, but he didn’t think they would go to the building that caused their mother a major freak-out.

What was that all about?

Nothing good.

Right?

His mom was on the move again, heading to the packing plant.

Weird, weird, weird.

Something wasn’t right.

In fact, it was very bad.

He reached for the last piece of jerky from what was ridiculously labeled a “jumbo pack,” then, seeing the dog out of the corner of his eye, bit off a piece and threw the rest to Reno, who caught it on the fly and swallowed it whole.

Lacing his hands behind his head, Dylan watched the screen. He could tell that his mom had turned into the lane leading to the cannery, so she should run into Harper. Right? Harper wasn’t moving . . . or at least her phone wasn’t.

She wouldn’t leave her cell though.

It was, like, glued to her.

But...

He bit his lip and pulled up his GPS for an aerial terrain view, but could see nothing more. “Come on, Harper,” he said, squinting and beginning to worry, “what’re you doing?”

*

Rachel’s heart clutched as she drove down the bumpy, pock-riddled asphalt of the cannery’s lane. In her headlights she saw the weed-choked ruts and her heart beat a painful drum the closer she got to the old building. Her skin crawled and she couldn’t help but remember the last time she’d been here, twenty years earlier, and the tragedy that had ensued.

She crossed the bridge and her headlights caught the reflection of taillights. Xander’s Jeep. Parked at the gate, which was ajar, the chain holding it closed snipped by bolt cutters that had been left in a tuft of grass.

Oh. Dear. God.

She pulled up behind the Jeep, which was all buttoned up. No one inside. The night was close, the smell of the river teasing her nostrils, a sense of foreboding in the air.

She speed dialed Cade.

And he picked up.

Thank God.

“This is Detective O’Meara,” Kayleigh answered.