CHAPTER TWO
1349 Words
CHAPTER TWO
If it’s the last thing I do, I’m going to make sure Wilson Andrews goes down.
Mia North sat in the front seat of her beater car, in almost full darkness save for the dim blue light from the digital clock on the dash, repeating that mantra to herself as she waited for her partner to arrive. She’d been repeating those words for months, ever since the Senate hopeful had framed her for murder.
And yet, here she was, still skulking around. Still on the lam. Still away from her family and her life.
And it’s all his goddamn fault.
She closed her eyes and listened to a soft Patsy Cline tune on the radio, trying to calm herself. Getting angry didn’t help anyone. She’d only make rash decisions, take chances. And now, more than ever, with that U.S. Marshal on not only her tail but the tails of all the people she knew and loved, she had to be careful.
She snorted. I’m the queen of rash decisions. That’s probably what got me into this mess in the first place.
She straightened as a pair of headlights cut through the darkness, pulling into the abandoned auto repair shop.
It was him. David Hunter. Her partner.
She sighed. Former partner. It had been a long time since she’d been a badge-bearing member of the FBI, but it was still a part of her. She still considered herself to be an FBI agent, even if she’d been stripped of the badge. Her entire life had been taken away on the day she was arrested for the murder of child predator Ellis Horvath. As she watched David’s car pull into the lot, thoughts of that night came back to her.
She’d acted rashly, barreling into the empty warehouse without waiting for David. But she’d had a good reason. Ellis had been stalking her daughter, Kelsey, and she’d received a call from him, luring her to the place. She wanted to confront him, once and for all.
And then she’d found him there, shot dead.
By whom, she didn’t know. She hadn’t seen the real culprit.
But Mia had been the perfect patsy. She had motive, opportunity, means . . .
And that bastard Wilson Andrews knew it. He’d done it to cover his serial-killer brother’s tracks and conceal what he knew so that he could rise to the state Senate, ruining her life in the process.
But finding a way to bring a man with so much power and influence to his knees wasn’t easy. She kept running into roadblocks, wherever she turned. The Andrews behemoth owned a lot of the city, paid many people off. That she’d survived this long, without being caught, was a virtual miracle. Every time she uncovered a new piece of the puzzle, it only served to show her how enormous and complicated the puzzle really was.
This time, though, she had a slight lead.
His name was Ernie Modesto, and he was a hitman that Wilson Andrews had hired to kill Kevin Reynolds, the police officer she thought might have actually killed Ellis Horvath. She’d stumbled upon Kevin’s dead body. She’d seen money change hands between Andrews and Modesto. She knew Andrews deserved to be in prison, not her. She just needed a gotcha.
Easier said than done.
Mia watched as David Hunter parked his car and stepped out. Looking both ways, he went to the busted night drop box, and slipped something inside.
Then, just as quietly as he’d come, he got back into his car and took off.
After his car took off toward the highway, its taillights disappearing in traffic, she watched him go, wishing she could say something to him. This lonely life meant that she hadn’t spoken to anyone in days, not since she left the motel on the border where her husband Aiden had surprised her for a quick hug and kiss. But any more than that was impossible. She was almost totally cut off from everyone she cared about.
She waited there for a minute, two, thinking about that case on the border. It’d been a misogynistic cult that she’d infiltrated and brought down, with the help of her sister, Francine. It was a good thing, a reminder that she could have a positive effect on the world, even while in hiding.
But it wasn’t enough. She missed Francine. She missed Aiden. She missed her daughter, Kelsey. Her heart physically ached at the thought of them.
She sat there in the darkness, then dragged her hands down her face and said a little prayer that whatever information David had for her, it would bring her closer to proving her innocence.
Then she stepped out of the car.
Looking around to make sure she wasn’t being followed, she opened the lid on the drop box and pulled out a thin envelope. Very thin. That disappointed her. She wanted volumes of information. So much information that the answers would be obvious.
Then she hurried back to her car, got inside, and sped off to another location, the back of a Whataburger restaurant. She’d learned that the trick of being on the lam was to never spend too long in any one place, and she’d never been to this restaurant before.
Parked by the dumpsters, she looked around once again to make sure no one was near; then she tore open the envelope.
There were a few crisp twenties in there, which she appreciated because she couldn’t exactly use her credit card and she’d nearly run out of money, several times. She pocketed them quickly, then unfolded the single sheet of paper and stared at the message:
No dice on Ernie Modesto. Can’t find any evidence to tie him to Kevin Reynolds’s murder. Modesto has a rap sheet for burglary and assault, but nothing else. Also, looking into mention of any “girl” in Reynolds’s history. I’m trying to get a list of Reynolds’s past cases this year, and will keep digging, but it’s hard, all eyes on me. It’s looking pretty grim.
She let out a groan. There was supposed to be more. Ernie had told her that before he’d killed Kevin Reynolds, the officer had mentioned having regrets about some girl. “He begged for his life like a little sissy. Then he said something about a girl. How he should’ve come forward back then, when he first found out about it. He kept saying that, over and over again, how he regretted it.”
Found out about what? What did he regret? Her only hope was that whatever it was, it was related to Wilson Andrews, and because Kevin had witnessed it, he’d paid the price of his life. Wilson Andrews was the lowest of the low, despite his skyrocketing popularity and the media saying he could do no wrong. She wouldn’t put it past him to have a relationship with some underage girl, then bury it along with everyone who knew about it.
If only she could find the thread. That one thread to pick on, to pull, which would unravel the whole thing. She’d been hoping that a background check on Ernie and Kevin Reynolds would bring a link to the Horvath case that she’d been framed for. But this . . . this felt like a dead end. David would keep digging . . . but with all eyes on him, what else could he do?
She turned the paper over and saw another message he’d scribbled there, in his terrible handwriting.
If you need to get any other info to me, leave it there. I’ll check in every few days.
That was something. A little lifeline.
But it wasn’t enough. If she was going to find out what really happened the night Ellis Horvath was killed and she was framed, she was going to have to try harder. Dig more into Reynolds’s past and who this girl was, on her own.
And, like she’d been doing for the past few months, she’d have to take the bull by the horns herself.
- Writer
