“Cut the engine!” Junior barked.
I lifted my head just enough to see the spotlight slicing through the forest a few hundred feet past us. The trees were denser there, more conifer than broadleaf. Hopefully, they were thick enough to hide a car. I squinted, scanning the understory for any sign of light bouncing off metal. Nothing.
I glanced down and met Josh’s eyes.
“Can you see them?” he whispered.
I shook my head, but his expression remained wary. He knew what I did: just because I couldn’t see the car from our angle didn’t mean the cops couldn’t see it from theirs.
His gaze moved past me, and I knew from the unfocused look in his eyes that he wasn’t seeing the forest around us anymore. He was coming up with another escape plan if Junior and his driver got caught.
I strained my ears while Josh brainstormed, but all I could hear were my cousin’s ragged breaths. The spotlight swept over his area much like it had ours, and I kept my gaze laser-focused on it, looking for some sign of a car or an interruption in the light that might signal someone was out of the police vehicle, searching through the trees.
“I can’t see you from here,” I told Junior. “And I don’t see anyone in the woods either.”
“Keep looking,” he said, a low note in his voice that I hadn’t heard before.
Up until this moment, Junior had been brash, cocky, and controlling, but now he sounded scared, and it reminded me that he wasn’t that much older than I was. For the first time since meeting my estranged uncle and cousins, I felt a small pang of something like familial responsibility radiating from somewhere in my middle. I didn’t want Junior to get caught. And not just because Josh and I would need to find another way out of there, but because I didn’t like the idea of Junior sitting handcuffed in a jail cell.
I nearly swore. What a great time for this particular emotional response. Absolutely perfect. If those cops made a beeline for the parked car, I’d have to do something about it, and I really, really didn’t want to. I’d had enough risk for one night. Hell, for an entire lifetime.
Thankfully, it didn’t come to that. The spotlight continued rolling on, scanning further and further away until the forest almost entirely obscured it.
“Fuck,” Junior said. “That was close.”
“They’re past you?” Josh asked, sitting up.
“Yeah,” Junior answered. “You’ll have to come to us through the woods. There could be more cops out on the street.”
I got to my feet and started brushing myself off. “Crank the heat. Josh and I need to get warm to avoid frostbite.”
Josh was slower to stand, moving in a halting way that made me wonder just how hurt he was. By the time he reached his full height, he towered over me, more of a large shadow than anything else, thanks to my ruined night vision. He took my hands and leaned close enough to meet my eyes. “Are you okay?”
“My toes are numb,” I said.
“Shit. I shouldn’t have made you wait outside.”
“No, you were right about that,” I told him. “Me going in was too risky. Now, come on. We need to hurry.”
Together, we made our stumbling way through the underbrush. It was denser this close to the road than in the rest of the forest, and I kept tripping over things because of the numbness creeping up my legs. After the second time I almost fell, Josh scooped me up, bridal style.
He let out a pained grunt, and I squirmed, trying to get out of his hold.
“I’m too heavy,” I protested. “And you’re hurt.”
He shook his head, jaw clenched in a stubborn line, his gaze trained down as he placed one foot in front of the other. “I’m fine. And it’s not much further. You’re safer in my arms than on your feet right now.”
I twined my fingers behind his neck and kissed him on the cheek. “I feel safer in your arms always.”
“Gag,” Junior said, ruining the moment.
Any lingering feelings of familial warmth I felt toward him vanished.
Despite Josh’s reassurances that he was fine, getting to the SUV was still a slog. He moved carefully, either because of his injuries or his fear of tripping and toppling us back into the snow. We had to pause several times on our way through the woods, once because Junior thought he saw something and twice more because we thought we heard something. Those moments passed excruciatingly slowly while Josh and I held our breath and strained our ears.
I was so relieved when we finally reached the SUV that I nearly started sobbing, and I could tell from the shaky breath Josh released that he was equally grateful we’d made it.
The driver, an aging man named Jimmy who’d helped locate Brad’s car in my neighborhood, had a few blankets in the rear of the vehicle that he used to cover his seats when he had his dogs with him. He explained this in a low, raspy voice as he opened the rear door for us, apologizing for the wet dog smell, but I was so grateful that I couldn’t give a shit that they reeked, and I thanked him profusely for letting us use them.
Josh and I took our shoes and socks off and wrapped our feet in the blankets while Jimmy pulled out of the trees and back onto the road. There were heaters beneath the front seats, and I told Josh not to get too close to his at first because we needed to raise our skin temperature slowly. Next, we lost our sodden jackets and dried the rest of ourselves as best we could while filling my cousin in on everything that happened after his team bailed on the mission.
Junior wasn’t happy about us setting off the alarm, not even after Josh explained why he’d done it. To Junior, it was better that Brad’s family dispose of evidence than for any heat to be brought onto the power company or his dad.
Josh sent me a disgruntled look as my cousin reamed us out over our behavior, and I tilted my head toward him and dropped my voice as I said, “I told you they weren’t good people.”
By the time we made it onto the highway, my worry over the fate of our feet started to abate. Josh’s toes hadn’t gone fully numb, just tingly, so he was in the clear. Mine had been pale enough for concern, but now that an uncomfortable pins and needles feeling was creeping into them, I knew I’d gotten off lucky for how long they’d been cold and wet.
Junior’s cell rang as we neared the exit for the warehouse district. He held up a finger to everyone in the car and brought the phone to his ear. “What?” A crease appeared between his brows as he listened to whatever the person on the other end of the line said. “And they’re cooperating?” Several moments passed before he nodded and spoke again. “Got it.”
He pulled the phone down and turned to look between Josh and me. “The cops found the bodies.”
My breath whooshed out in a rush of relief. “Oh, thank god.”
“Brad’s mom fainted when they told her,” Junior continued. “His dad gave the cops free rein of the house. Apparently, they didn’t realize what a sadistic little shit their son truly was.”
Josh nodded beside me. “I figured that when they didn’t recognize the smell of the bodies. They thought the housekeeper had forgotten to take the trash out.”
Junior’s gaze sharpened on him. “And how did you recognize it?”
Josh opened his mouth, but I cut him off. “None of your business. And what do you mean, his parents didn’t know? They were in that house going after Brad’s computer.”
Reluctantly, Junior pulled his eyes from my boyfriend and resettled them on me. “They claimed they were trying to find him. Their assumption is that he left the area after the arrest warrant was approved.”
I leaned back in my seat. “That’s good for us, right?”
Junior nodded. “We might not have found his phone, but one of our guys snagged his wallet. We’re going to have someone about his height and build use his debit card up north near the border to make it look like he fled into Canada. That should keep the cops and his family busy for a while.”