Run, Rose, Run(97)

“He knows Rose,” the older girl said.

Ethan turned to them. “Have either of you seen your sister?” he asked. “Or heard from her lately?”

They shook their heads solemnly, and Ethan struggled to push back a growing sense of unease. He knew she was close. Why wouldn’t she reach out to them?

“Listen,” he said, “I know Rose came back this way, and I’m trying to find out where she is.”

“She ain’t here,” Clayton said, stepping down off the porch. The dog started barking again. “Shut up!” he yelled, and it whined and lay down. “I don’t know where she is, and I don’t care. I just know that whatever they did to her, she deserved it.”

“Deserved what?” There was a sharp edge to Ethan’s voice. “Who’s they?”

Clayton spat again and said nothing.

“We haven’t seen her in a couple years,” the teenager said quietly.

“Is she gonna come visit?” the younger girl asked. “I miss her.”

Ethan looked at them with overwhelming pity. How hard it would be to live out here with only that angry man for family. “She’ll visit,” he said. “I’m sure she’s on her way.”

“That girl had the devil in her,” Clayton said. “Couldn’t beat it out.”

Ethan stiffened, but he didn’t want to start a fight with Clayton, not with his daughters standing right there.

He made a subtle beckoning motion, and the girls saw it and followed him toward his truck. “Are you okay?” he whispered as he opened the door.

The big one nodded. “Is Rose?”

“I hope so,” Ethan said. “I have to find her. If you hear from her, you call me, okay? I’ll be in town.” He gave her his cell number, and he could hear her repeating it to herself as the girls walked back toward the house.

Then he felt something sharp stabbing him in the low part of his back.

“You better go on if you want to keep your guts inside you,” Clayton said.

Ethan whirled around so fast the other man didn’t have time to react. Ethan grabbed the barrel of the rifle and yanked it out of Clayton’s hands, throwing it into the Ram’s cab at the same time he brought a left hook to the side of Clayton’s head. Clayton stumbled sideways, hollering, and Ethan jumped into the truck. Then he was spinning it around in the dirt yard and peeling away down that sorry excuse for a driveway, AnnieLee’s stepfather roaring in rage behind him.

When he’d made it to the main road, Ethan glanced over at the rifle. He’d been right: it was a Winchester Model 70, just like he used to have.





Chapter

88



That evening, Ethan parked on the edge of town in front of a building whose sign proclaimed it the PROUD HOME OF POSSUM TOM’S LIVE BAIT. But Possum Tom, whoever he was, was long gone; the windows of his store were boarded up and trash littered the doorway.

Ethan watched as a fat raccoon slowly descended a nearby tree and proceeded to nose its way along the sidewalk, as casually as if it was out for a twilight stroll.

“Be careful, buddy,” Ethan said as the creature ambled by. “Don’t want to end up as someone’s dinner.”

Ethan’s own dinner came out of the messenger bag he always carried: two protein bars, a bag of sunflower seeds, and a bottle of Gatorade left over from a greenroom back in Colorado. After he ate, he sat there with the stolen gun in his lap, absently running a thumb along its smooth stock. He was trying to keep his mind as empty as possible, because otherwise it was filled with awful visions: AnnieLee being picked up by someone dangerous. Being taken somewhere she didn’t want to go. Being hurt or kidnapped or—

He shook his head. Enough.

And what about those girls he’d met today—her half sisters? Did Clayton hit them the way he’d hit AnnieLee? Ethan hoped Clayton was kinder to his own flesh and blood.

He couldn’t imagine what it’d be like to grow up in the middle of nowhere like that, in a house that looked like a strong wind could blow it over. As beautiful as the land was, Clayton’s mark on it was nothing but ugliness.

Ethan set the gun aside and reclined a little, listening to the deep quiet of an Arkansas night. Somehow he must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he knew there was a loud banging on his window. He sat straight up, his heart racing and the rifle already back in his hands.

But the face on the other side of the glass didn’t belong to a threat. Peering in at him was a scared-looking girl. It was AnnieLee’s teenage half sister, the one whose name he didn’t even know.

He rolled down the window. “Hey,” he said, his voice hoarse with sleep. “Come around, kiddo. Get in.”

A moment later she was climbing into the passenger side. “I shouldn’t be here,” she said.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Considering I stole my daddy’s truck and drove it without a license and made it all the way here without killing myself, I’d say I’m doing pretty good.” She held out her hands and looked at them, flexing her fingers. “I was holding on to that damn steering wheel so tight I must’ve got blisters.” She looked over at him, and her eyes were huge in the darkness. “Clayton’s gonna kill me if he finds out, but I just…I needed to talk to you. And you didn’t answer your phone.”