Keep Her Safe(121)

I stand. “Maybe whoever was renting here knew that my father was a—” I let out a yelp of surprise when I look up to find that same man from the other day standing in the window, his face inches away from the glass.

Staring at me.

Noah stands to his full height and levels the guy with his own stare, one full of warning.

But the man—I’m guessing in his late sixties—doesn’t seem the least bit fazed.

“He was here that first day we came, when Klein was here,” I whisper, my gaze drifting over the wiry, old black man. He’s wearing the same brown trousers and rumpled shirt that he was wearing that day as well.

And . . .

“Oh my God.” I restart the video from my phone.

He’s wearing basically the same thing as the mysterious man talking to my father was wearing.

“Noah . . . this man was there that night.” I hold my phone to the glass, to where the man can see it clearly.

Chocolate-brown eyes shift to the screen, watching for two . . . three . . . four beats, before drifting back to me. And then he nods ever so subtly, almost to himself, and vanishes into the darkness of the room.

I’m about to slam my fist on the door when it opens.

“Who are you?”

He inhales deeply through his nostrils. “My name is Isaac. And you are Gracie May Wilkes.”

Hearing my full name roll off the tongue of this man—a complete stranger—makes my stomach flip. “How do you know that?”

“Because your father told me.” He jerks his head, indicating that we should follow him.

With a look back at Noah, we trail the old man into the motel room. His apartment, it would seem, based on the everyday clutter. The standard furniture has been replaced with a twin bed in the corner, a worn brown Barcalounger across from a contrastingly new small flat-screen TV, and a small table with two chairs, currently housing stacks of newspapers. Magazines sit on a side table, and dirty dishes are piled neatly by the sink. The air is stale, a faint scent of body odor lingering.

“I wondered when you’d find your way here.” Isaac moves slowly as he clears the papers away to allow us a place to sit.

“You knew Abraham Wilkes?” Noah asks for me, because I can’t seem to form words.

“I talked to him here and there. He was comin’ here every day, lookin’ for someone—”

“Betsy.” I finally find my tongue. “He was looking for her.”

“Lookin’. But not findin’. He’d just missed her by a few days, if I recall.”

“She was staying here?”

“Yes, ma’am. She was here. And then she was gone. Kept an eye out for her, but . . . never saw hair nor hide of her again.”

“Did you take the video of the drug bust?”

“I did. Right from that very spot over there. But it seems you’ve already figured that out.” He sighs as he eases himself into his lounge chair. “I’d been having trouble with vandals bustin’ into that vending machine. I wanted to catch ’em red-handed and I needed one of those things to do it. What do you call them again? Those . . .” His hand waves aimlessly in front of himself, as if the answer is in the air.

“A camcorder?”

“Camcorder. Yes. Can’t keep up with all this technology.” He chuckles as my gaze roams the room again, to the flat screen, and the laptop on the corner desk. “That’s all my son’s doing. He brings this stuff over for me every once in a while. God only knows which trucks they fall out the back from, but I don’t ask questions anymore. Anyway, he brought one of those fancy new camcorders and set it up right over there, by the window. Stacked some books to get it the right height. Taught me how to turn it on before I went to bed, and that was that.

“Well, I was tinkering with it over dinner and I guess I set it to record earlier than usual. I went out to do a few last jobs for the day. That’s when I ran into your dad, out in the parking lot. And then the cavalry came in after that guy. Didn’t realize I’d caught the whole thing on tape until later that night when I went to turn it on, only to find it already running. And I sure didn’t realize exactly what I’d caught until I replayed it.” He waggles his brow. “So I did what I thought was right, and I gave the video to your dad, the next time he came ’round.”

“When was that?” Noah asks.

“A few days before he died.”

I share a glance with Noah. “Have you watched the news lately?”

Isaac leans forward, resting his bony elbows on his knees, leveling me with those wise eyes. “Girl, I’ve known your daddy was innocent from the night he died.”

Something in his tone makes my heart flip. “How?”

“Because he was set up.” He says it so matter-of-factly.

“And how do you know that?” I ask, my voice barely a whisper. “Did you see someone do it?” Did Mantis scare him from speaking?

But Isaac says nothing, heaving himself out of his chair to mosey over to the corner of the room. Digging out a screwdriver from his tool belt, he eases himself down onto one knee and unfastens the air exchange panel from the wall. He reaches in and pulls out a jump drive.

“I did one better. I recorded someone doing it.”





CHAPTER 53