Breathe (Colorado Mountain #4)(157)

Faye had made her giggle.

That was his girl. She could break through anything. Even shit this huge. He knew it since she’d done it for him.

He felt his lips tip up as his phone rang and he saw Faye and Miah’s eyes cut to him and Becky jump, terror filling her features, her eyes cutting to her brother.

He automatically sent a reassuring smile their way, pulled out his phone and, for Becky’s sake, stayed calm and acted like what he was doing was just what it was, normal and natural.

He looked at the display and, at what he saw, he figured he knew the reason behind the call.

He took the call and put the phone to his ear.

“Frank, they at the Station?”

“They arrived twenty minutes ago,” Frank replied. “We got them sorted with coffees from La-La Land and some of Shambles’s brownies. Gave them a briefing up to now. Took the DNA samples. Lab is primed to fast-track it. But, uh…” he hesitated, “not callin’ about that, Chace.”

Chace felt his brows draw together. “What’re you callin’ about?”

“You got privacy?” Frank asked.

Fucking shit.

“No,” Chace answered.

“Get it,” Frank said quietly.

Chace didn’t look into the family room as he moved out of the doorway, up the stairs and into the living room on the top floor.

“Got it,” he said to Frank.

“Right, well, brother… f*ck,” Frank started then stopped.

“Frank,” Chace prompted impatiently.

At his prompt, Frank went on hurriedly, “Okay, man. We got an outta town biker in holding, no big thing, pulled him over for reckless driving, he’d had a few, not over the limit, he was just jacking around. But when we ran his license, found he had a bench warrant on him, tickets he hasn’t seen to in C Springs. But he’s been in there with Enid most of the night and apparently, she’s been rambling. Some of the shit she said he thought was more f**ked than what seems to be her usual f**ked. When he got breakfast, he told Jon. Jon told me. We pulled her outta holding and put her into an interrogation room and asked more questions. Took a while, brother, but got it out of her.”

When he didn’t go on, Chace asked, “Got what out of her?”

“The reason she cast Jeremiah out.”

“And that would be?” Chace pushed when Frank again stopped speaking.

“Okay, Chace, shit, okay…”

“Frank,” Chace clipped when he trailed off.

When Frank continued, he again did it quickly. “Apparently, Jeremiah got away. He’d been attempting escapes frequently with zero success but he made it clear. He was in the woods. Brother, from what we can tell, he was in Harker’s Wood. What he saw there flipped him right the f**k out. So right the f**k out, he went back to the only thing he knew. He went back to her.”

Chace’s body went still as a statue and his mouth felt strange when it formed the words, “What did he see?”

“From what we can get from her, he saw a blonde woman givin’ a man a blowjob.”

Oh f**k, no.

Please God, no.

Chace closed his eyes and dropped his head.

“I think it was Misty, brother,” Frank whispered. “Enid didn’t see it, she wasn’t there. She just beat it out of him and what he told her he saw, she lost what was left of her marbles and got shot of him, thinkin’ he was makin’ that shit up or that he was the son of Satan or whatever. But I reckon, and the timeline jives, that he saw Misty and the man who murdered her. It flipped him, he went back to her because it was the only thing he knew, the only protection he had.”

It would jive, Chace knew it. Jeremiah was terrified when he was out on his own. Chace could see this fear coming from Enid, knowing his sister was still captive but he could see it was more. He’d seen Misty’s face get raped, probably sensed her terror, maybe saw the gun and possibly saw her murdered.

Fuck, he’d seen that shit.

Fuck, he still had to be holding onto that fear.

Fuck!

“He could be the key to finding who did Misty,” Frank told him quietly then finished, “And Newcomb.”

Chace opened his eyes and lifted his head. “Who knows this shit?” he rapped out.

“Uh, me, Jon, the biker and the video camera that caught my questioning.”

“You tell Cap. And you tell Jon to keep his trap shut and make sure Jon gets that message. He runs his mouth, I’ll lose my mind and the way I lose it he will not want. You make sure that biker thinks she’s just a lunatic and you don’t share that shit with anyone else.”

Frank was silent then, “They find out there was a witness –”

“Then Miah’s f**ked,” Chace finished for him.

“Shit, brother,” Frank murmured then, “But, Department’s clean.”

“Shit leaks, like it does whenever Jon runs his mouth. This gets to the wrong ears, that kid just went from enduring a goddamned nightmare to runnin’ scared the rest of his f**kin’ life.”

“Right,” Frank whispered.

“I’m callin’ his psychologist. Then I’m comin’ to the Station.”

“Right,” Frank repeated.

“You got shit to do,” Chace told him.