What Doesn't Kill Her (Cape Charade #2)(21)

She’d left Horst on the road, but clearly he was working with someone. That someone wanted the mummy’s head, or at least wanted the money they would get for it. There might be, was probably, a tracking device on the van or in the head’s travel bag or both. She already knew these guys would kill to obtain the head. She needed to get going, get away, save the head...save Rae.

“Get up here on the seat, sit down, strap in.” Kellen fumbled for her phone. “We have to go.”

“Okay, Mommy, let me get my blankie.” Rae knelt beside the back seat and dragged out her Ocean Princesses backpack.

Now Kellen remembered that flash of pink. If only she’d followed up, she would have found Rae, called Max, and she and Rae would be on their way home now. Horst could have stolen the head without trying to kill her, and he’d be dead because whoever wanted that head wouldn’t share the profits. But Kellen wouldn’t be involved, and her child would be safe. “We don’t have time for your blankie.” She ran her hands over herself, searching. Where is my phone?

The look Rae shot at her was nothing less than incredulous. “I have to have my blankie!”

From somewhere, Kellen heard those very words echoing down the years. Who, time and again, had said that?

Oh, no. That was her voice. “Right. I’m going to start driving.” She put the van in First and eased forward. She felt in her lower pants pockets, then her shirt pockets, then back into the pants pocket where her phone should be. That pocket was unbuttoned.

She hadn’t unbuttoned it. How had it come to be—?

She caught her breath and stared up the slope of the road.

Horst. His claim to be a Disney World pickpocket. All that bragging she had put down to nothing but words from that big silly man-boy—and he’d lifted her phone slick as a whistle.

When had he done it?

When she was loading the head into the van. When she was removing her jacket. When she was distracted by that glimpse of pink.

“Mommy, I have to be in the seat belt!” Rae’s indignation practically fogged the van. “If I’m not in the seat belt and you stopped suddenly, I could be hurt or even killed.”

Kellen kept driving up the narrow road, picking up speed, keeping one eye on the rearview mirror. “Did your grandma tell you that?”

“Yes, and my daddy.”

“They’re right. Did they tell you you’re a big girl and you can strap yourself in?”

“No...”

“Give it a try.”

In a slow and disorganized operation, Rae dragged Patrick, her ragged stained yellow yarn blankie and a bunch of ragged pieces of paper stapled together between the front seats, then looked at the passenger side. “Where’s my car seat?”

Kellen squeezed the steering wheel and for the first time, realized she was on the fine edge of hysteria. She wanted to shout, How should I know where your car seat is? She wanted to grab Rae by the shoulders, to shake her and insist she admit she’d done a terrible, dangerous, reckless thing. She wanted to explain that they would probably both die.

No matter what Kellen did or said, or what Rae agreed to, they would probably die.

Oh, God. Kellen was a terrible mother. She wanted to rattle her own child, and they were going to die. She had to try, but if she couldn’t save them...

She glanced at her daughter, at the dirty bruised bewildered face, and knew Rae didn’t have a clue. Kellen took a breath and got control of her temper. “We don’t have your car seat. If I’d known you were coming, I would have brought it, but since you surprised me, you should slide up there and buckle your seat belt.”

“I need my car seat. If I can’t see out the window, I’ll vomit.”

Of course you will. In a soft coaxing voice that hid an overflow of worry and irritation, Kellen said, “Sit on your friend Patrick. He won’t mind.”

“Okay!” Rae put Patrick on the seat, hopped up on him, turned to Kellen. “Buckle me in.”

I’m driving. Kellen bit back her response. Bad mother or not, she could see that a seven-year-old couldn’t—

“Or I can do it!” Rae got on her knees to reach the seat belt, dragged it over her and clicked it tight. She stuffed her blankie between the high end of the belt and her neck, leaned against it and sighed. “I hurt my face when you killed that man.”

“I didn’t kill him...! That bruise on your cheek?”

“You shot him.” Rae touched her bruise. “Yes, there.”

“He wore body armor. That protected him from the bullet so he didn’t die. I did throw him out on the road, and he’s after us with his bad friends.” Kellen groped at the side of her door, found the first aid kit, dug around and got a chemical ice bag. She snapped it and when it got cold, she passed it to Rae. “Put that on your cheek.”

“Okay!” Rae did for maybe five seconds, then held tattered pages out at arm’s length. “Look at our book!”

The road was gravel and cluttered with washboards. Every curve turned in on itself and climbed straight up the side of a mountain. Occasionally the road dipped into a creek bed. The wheels clattered over rounded stones and through trickling waters that, despite the summer months, would be still bracing. Or icy. Depending how long your feet were in them. Kellen maintained a speed that kept the roil of dust at a minimum, and all the time, she wanted to give way to her panic and put her foot flat on the accelerator. “I can’t look at it right now. What does our book say?”