I raise my head. At first all I see is tree trunk, but then I notice movement to the right of the headlights. The figure of a man emerges, silhouetted against a red pickup truck parked along the side of the road. The man we think is Dexter Robbins is standing in front of us, staring into the windshield. As we stare back, he lifts one hand and beckons us with the gun he’s holding.
A gun. Shit.
Out of the car, the gesture says.
“You stay,” I tell Brynn. “I’ll go.”
“No,” she says, opening her door before I have a chance to protest, and we both scramble out of the car much too fast for people about to face an armed man. I reach Brynn’s side as the guy holds up his phone and points the flashlight app at us.
“There are two of you,” he says. At first I think he means me and Brynn, but then he adds, “You twins?”
“Sisters,” Brynn says, shivering in her sleeveless dress. I want to put an arm around her or give her my suit coat, but I’m afraid of making any
sudden movements. Unlike with Mr. Solomon, I’m pretty sure this guy’s gun isn’t a scare tactic. “Is she okay?”
He ignores the question and keeps the bright light shining in our direction, making it impossible for me to see anything else. “It was you at the pawnshop,” he says. “Not her. No wonder she couldn’t tell me a goddamn thing.”
Despite everything, I feel a stab of admiration for Ellie. She could have told him a lot of things, but she didn’t. “We want to talk to her,” I say. Dexter lowers the phone flashlight enough that I can see Ellie moving around in the passenger seat of the red pickup truck, but there’s something stilted about the motion. Like she’s being restrained.
“I don’t give a fuck what you want,” he says. “Are you Dexter Robbins?” Brynn asks.
“I’m asking the questions here,” he says. “You had Billy’s medallion.
Why?”
Which is answer enough.
“I—oh God.” Brynn twists her hands, then casts a despairing glance behind her at a still-unmoving Nick. “He was my teacher. I knew him as William Larkin. I don’t know if you even know this, but he…he died, four years ago.” She pauses, waiting for a reaction.
Dexter snorts. “Yeah, I know. When you came along, flashing that medallion, I caught your license plate number and had a buddy of mine at the DMV look it up. Then I looked you up, trying to figure out what the hell your deal was. I ended up on the website for that fancy little school of yours, and there he was—goddamn William Larkin. Getting memorialized with a fucking garden.” I’m shocked at the disgust in his voice—there’s not a hint of grief or regret, anywhere. “Good riddance to him,” Dexter adds. “No traitor who cuts me off and changes his name is a son of mine. Here’s the thing, though—”
His voice turns musing as he continues. “Four years ago I hadn’t talked to Billy in forever. Then all of a sudden he emails me out of the blue, bragging that he found his little brother at the school where he was teaching. Said he was gonna bring him by for my birthday, but after that? I
never heard from him again. Figured he was full of shit like always, especially since he’d never even bothered to tell me he was a teacher. But he wasn’t lying about that after all—so I figured, maybe he wasn’t lying about Mikey either.”
I can’t think of anything to say in reply, but Dexter isn’t looking at me anyway. He’s laser focused on Brynn. “My youngest son. He’d be about your age, and if I know anything about his mother, I know this: she likes to put down roots. If Mikey grew up here, he probably lives here still. I saw online that you were having a dance tonight, so I showed up. I thought I’d recognize Mikey right away, but it was too crowded.”
Bitterness tinges his voice. “Or maybe he’s just been gone too long. Then I saw you—or I thought I did—and I figured, that girl owes me some answers.” He snorts again. “Your sister wasn’t inclined to help, so I took her for a ride to let her know I mean business. And here we are. Now I’m gonna ask you the same thing I asked her: where’s my boy?”
“I—I don’t know,” Brynn says, and gulps. “I only had that medallion because I was working on a story about Mr. Larkin for a true-crime show. I didn’t know he even had a brother.”
“I think you’re lying,” Dexter says.
“I’m not,” Brynn says. They stare at one another for a few seconds in unnerving silence, until she adds, “Can you please let me see my sister? And call for help? I think…” She casts an anxious glance over her shoulder at Nick’s car. “I think my uncle is hurt.”
“Hope so,” Dexter says shortly. Then he cocks his head. “You got a lot to say, don’t you? But it’s nothing I want to hear.”
“Look, can we just—” I start, but Dexter silences me with a flick of the
gun.
“How about we try a different tack?” he says, his eyes returning to
Brynn. “I’ll ask a question, and if I don’t like your answer, I’ll put a bullet through your sister. We’ll start small, maybe with a hand, and work our way up.”
“No!” Brynn screams as Dexter starts backing up toward the pickup truck. “Stop! I’ll tell you whatever you want!” I feel sick then, because of
course she will, she has to—but that means exposing Mason. Whatever happens after that is going to eat her alive.
“I’m out of patience, little girl,” Dexter snarls, still moving. “You and your sister are about to learn what happens to people who play games with me.”
There’s a second when he lowers the gun as he approaches the passenger side of the pickup, when I think—Can I reach him in time? And I know I can’t, but I’m still poised to try when a sudden roar fills my ears. I see movement out of the corner of my eye that makes me half turn, and Brynn lets out a surprised yelp as Nick Gallagher reverses his car away from the tree and then lurches forward. We’re nowhere near its path, but I grab Brynn on instinct and yank her away. Both of us tumble to the ground as the car races past us. There’s a sickening thudding sound, and then total silence except for the low rumble of the engine.
“Oh my God,” Brynn whispers, her face buried in my shoulder. “What did he…What happened?”
I sit up slowly, cradling her in one arm, and try to make sense of the scene in front of me. Nick’s car is stopped a few feet ahead of us, exhaust swirling around the tires. The pickup truck is still parked beside the road, with Ellie’s shadowy figure moving inside.
And Dexter Robbins is nowhere in sight.
