Why am I surprised Gamble lied to me?
“It must have been a new relationship,” Mercy murmured. “There’s no record of a girlfriend.” Gamble protected Bree by telling the investigators the driver was “Jerry”?
“Yeah.” Trevor was done with the topic. “You. Redhead. Where’s the money?”
Sandy was silent.
Trevor moved closer, his barrel inches from her face. “Where. Is. The. Money.”
Lunge and shove the barrel up. Mercy saw it play out in her mind. Could I get control of the rifle? Trevor would still have a handgun. And there was Art to consider.
A faint tremor shot through Sandy.
“A minute ago you were my best friend,” Trevor sneered. “Telling me you’d kept it secret from the feds. Now spill it!”
Sandy didn’t speak.
Trevor hooked his rifle over his shoulder and stepped up, grabbing her ponytail in his fists, yanking her head to the left and down. Mercy took a step to grab his handgun.
“Mercy! Stop!”
She froze at Art’s command. His handgun was pointed at her again, his eyes deadly serious this time. He will shoot me. She eyed the rifle over Trevor’s shoulder. Can I get that away from him?
Trevor dragged Sandy toward the cliff. She fell to her knees as he hauled her by the hair, screaming and thrashing to get her hair out of his hands. Sandy was tall and strong, but surprise and terror had given him the advantage. Her piercing shrieks made the hair rise on Mercy’s arms as she stood helplessly, watching her friend be dragged to a certain death.
Sandy flung herself on her stomach, using her entire body weight against him. Trevor continued to wrench her closer to the edge, swearing at the woman, pulling clumps of hair from her ponytail.
Shaking, Mercy looked at Art. He wasn’t watching Trevor; he was watching her. “Try me,” he stated.
“Where is the money?” Trevor shouted at Sandy. He had her at the rim, her head over the edge. He knelt on the center of her back as he seized her head and forced her to look down. “See those trees down there? Wanna join them?”
Mercy ached to cover her ears and drown out Sandy’s cries. She screamed like a dying animal.
Trevor let go of the hair and pushed on Sandy’s hip, shoving her body around to the edge.
He’s going to roll her off.
“Safety-deposit box!” Sandy shrieked.
Trevor stopped. “Where?”
“Eagle’s Nest.” She started to sob, big gulping wet sobs.
Trevor hauled Sandy around until she was sitting upright with her back to the vista. “That’s a good girl.” He patted her head, and she jerked it away.
Sandy looked to Mercy, her eyes wet and full of fear. “Bree didn’t want the FBI to know.”
“You dragged me up here just to make me think you were helping?”
“She wanted the FBI to give up searching for the money. Believe it was gone.”
“I knew it wasn’t gone,” Trevor crowed. He pointed enthusiastically at Art. “Told ya. I knew Leah would hold some of it for Shane.”
“You think she held money for Shane Gamble for thirty years?” asked Mercy. “No woman is devoted to an absent guy for that long—especially a murderer.” She swallowed. “Where’s Nathan May and his money?”
“Don’t care,” said Trevor. “I found Leah, and that’s enough for now.” He threw back his head and laughed. “Could have knocked me senseless when I saw her face in the paper for some teaching award. I knew God was leading me to the money.” He grinned. “Man, she was good at protecting her secret. It was worth two fingers to her.”
Mercy lost her breath.
“You evil fuck,” Sandy shouted from the ground, anger replacing her fear. “You tortured her for money you hoped existed? She might never be the same when she wakes up.” Tears ran down her cheeks, and her hands curled into fists.
Mercy eyed Art. “What do you get out of this? I understand what you got back then, but now?” Come on, Art.
“I agreed I wouldn’t rat his ass out,” replied Trevor cheerfully. “No one will know about the money I gave him, how he lied at his job, or about the women he shot. Otherwise I’d tell—”
“‘Women’?” Mercy cut in. Fury boiled under her skin.
“He’s lucky the second woman is alive, since he thought she was you.” Trevor savored the last word, his cocky gaze full of glee at the firework he’d just lit.
Mercy’s focus settled on Art like a spotlight. Everything else was black.
“You almost killed my niece . . . because you thought it was me . . .”
Her legs wobbled. I’m not going down.
Art looked away.
“What happened to you, Art?”
Images of Kaylie bleeding, terrified out of her wits and asking if she was going to die, ricocheted in Mercy’s mind. She longed to launch herself at the prick and pound his face until his blood ran like Kaylie’s. But she was frozen.
“I trusted you,” she whispered.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Truman and Samuel had found the narrow pass between two rocks and had been moving east for a good fifteen minutes. Truman was antsy, his gaze constantly darting around for the rock shaped like a horse head. Karl had said ten minutes from the pass, but it was an estimate.
There was no horse rock anywhere to be seen.
“Dammit,” Samuel muttered.
“No shit.”
“Was Karl wrong?”
“That narrow pass was definitely as he described,” Truman stated, remembering how it’d threatened to trigger his anxiety when he couldn’t see the way out. Now they were faced with a light spread of small pines and other trees. Karl hadn’t mentioned those.
“He said the rock structure overlooked a valley. We haven’t seen any cliffs yet, so let’s keep going. Maybe it’s on the other side of this grove,” said Samuel, giving his horse a squeeze with his legs, his back straight and chin up. His hips naturally followed the movement of the horse, making it look as if he’d ridden all his life.
Truman urged his horse to follow Samuel. They’d cantered a good part of the way, feeling the pressure to get to Mercy and Sandy. When sweat had foamed on the horses’ necks, they’d slowed to a walk, and now it seemed as if they were crawling.
After a minute Samuel pulled to a stop. “Truman,” he said in a low voice as he pointed far ahead in the trees.
An ATV.
Truman immediately scanned their surroundings. Nothing. All quiet. “Let’s move in a little closer.”
“We need to go on foot,” Samuel stated. “I don’t think backup is coming soon,” he added. “There’s no way county can get here quickly.”
“Mercy is our backup.” I hope.
Samuel gave him a skeptical look but nodded.
Both men dismounted and wrapped their reins around a tree, giving the horses enough slack to graze, and then drew their weapons. They carefully moved to the ATV while constantly watching their surroundings. The ATV was old and beat-up, and Truman wondered how it’d made the journey from Bree’s house carrying two men.
“I bet the ridge is directly east. They left the ATV here to go in quietly,” Samuel said in a hushed voice.
“Let’s go.”
The two men moved cautiously through the grove of small trees. The ground was either rocks or packed dry dirt and was covered with old pine needles that continually cracked and snapped under their boots.