Cut and Run(13)
She’d warned Jack more times than she could count to keep clear of helping those who peddled in human flesh and drugs. “When was the last time he did that?”
“It’s been a couple of years. Like I said, he’s been a hermit mostly.”
“Do you think he helped someone while you were gone?”
“How would I know?” He reached into his jeans pocket, pulled out a can of dip, and wedged a pinch between his cheek and gum. “You think someone like that killed him?”
“Or someone looking for one of his patients.”
“He was stubborn. He’d not have ratted out anyone.” Pride rang under the words.
“I know.” She shook her head, some of the steam venting from her temper. “I’m going to find out who did this to Jack. I won’t let his death go unsolved.”
“That’s good. Pop deserves as much.”
She grabbed her backpack and walked out of the trailer, slamming the door behind her. She kept Dirk in her line of sight and a safe distance away, knowing a guy his size could beat the hell out of her without really trying. The truth was she didn’t know or trust her brother.
He followed, holding up both his hands in surrender. “We got off on the wrong foot, Macy. I didn’t come up here to stir trouble between us. I’m as upset as you, and I can be a blockhead like Jack used to be. Truce?”
Macy could play nice while she investigated Jack’s murder. She crossed the deck and the hard red soil toward Jack’s truck. “Sure. Truce.”
“Where are you going?” Dirk asked.
“To a hotel.”
She tossed her backpack into the front seat and slid behind the wheel before slamming the truck door and turning on the engine. As she pulled out of the yard, she glanced in her rearview mirror and caught Dirk opening the trailer door. If Jack had told him about the hidden compartment, he was in for a treat.
She drove for almost a mile before she hit a stoplight and pulled out the phone to check her browser for information on Faith McIntyre.
The pathologist’s picture appeared, and the instant Macy got a good look, she did a double take. The woman was her age, she had blond hair, and they shared the same blue eyes. The likeness was so similar that she thought for a moment she was staring at her own picture. A closer look told her she wasn’t. Faith’s face was slightly rounder than hers, and her eyes looked a little less jaded.
The light turned green, and she drove ahead a few hundred yards toward a gas station. She pulled into the parking lot, not trusting herself to drive.
The close resemblance was unsettling. “What the hell?”
When she’d heard Dr. McIntyre’s thick Texas drawl, she had never once thought it sounded familiar or even remotely like her own.
An unsettled feeling rolled through her, as if a quake were shaking the earth under her. Most kids might have fantasized about being adopted or wondered what it felt like, but she’d never had to wonder. Ever since she’d realized most raven-haired, olive-skinned parents didn’t usually make blond-haired, blue-eyed babies nicknamed Snowflake, she’d assumed something was off. Now as she looked at Faith’s picture, she knew if they weren’t twins, there had to be a strong genetic connection between them. Her parents had come clean about her adoption when she was eight, but they’d never once mentioned she had siblings. Jesus, why hadn’t they told her she wasn’t alone?
Her head was spinning as the screen image glowed. She wasn’t sure how long she sat before she drew in a steadying breath. “Shit, Jack. A simple conversation would have made better sense than all the secrets.”
One way or another, she’d meet Faith McIntyre. But for now, the Hill Country and East Austin addresses waited. She typed in the rural address, and when it loaded, she took a right onto the road and drove past a lone strip mall and scattered homes before the turnoff to Blanco, Texas, appeared.
The moonlight was bright enough to illuminate sparse brown land covered with scrub trees and bushes. But the land and her surroundings barely registered as her mind spiraled around the idea that she might have a sister. Did Faith McIntyre know about her? One way or another, they would have questions for each other.
Which led to renewed questions about her birth mother, who had always been shrouded in we-don’t-knows and mumbled comments about a closed adoption. If her mother or Jack really knew who she was, they’d never said, regardless of how often she’d pressed.
Her headlights cut into the deepening darkness. Hoping to settle her racing mind, she switched on the radio and found a country western station. She’d lived in Dallas growing up before moving east for college and then the academy, but despite all the bland apartments scattered across the country, she always felt at home when she heard country music. She cranked it, hoping the melody would drown out her thoughts.
The Maps app on Jack’s phone reminded her of an upcoming turn, snapping her back to the present. She slowed as she searched the road for a sign. There wasn’t one, and she was halfway past a small rusted mailbox when she realized she’d found her turn. She backed up and took the left, grimacing as the dry brown dust kicked up around her car.
Ahead, her headlights sliced over a brick house that faced east. The windows were boarded up, and the roof looked like it had taken a beating in a recent storm. It had a low porch that ran across the entire front and a single rocker that stood eerily still.