Girl, Stolen(7)

Another noise was layered over the barking, a high-pitched metallic whine. A saw. The sound, which was coming from someplace in front of the car, abruptly ceased. The window whirred as it glided down. Cold seeped in and pressed against her, even under the blanket. The smells of wood smoke and pine needles filled the car.

The dog stopped barking and started to whine. Footsteps crunched on gravel. Cheyenne’s problem had just gotten twice as complicated. Now there were two people, not one. But maybe this new person would see how ridiculous it was that she was a prisoner. Maybe he or she – it would be a lot better if it were a she – would insist that Cheyenne be freed immediately.

But it was a man who spoke, in a rough voice that mingled interest and suspicion. “God damn, Griffin, what’s this?” Cheyenne filed the name away. Griffin. If she ever got free – she quickly amended that to when – she would make this Griffin pay. “Where’d you get it?”

“At the mall. Somebody left the keys in it.”

“God damn!” The same words, only this time filled with respect. “But what happened to your face?” Good, she had hurt Griffin. Then the other man must have realized what was under the blanket, because his tone changed. “What in hell is that in the backseat?”

“It’s a girl.”

“You killed a girl!” Disbelief.

“No, no,” Griffin said hastily. “She’s just tied up. She was in the car. Lying down in the backseat. I didn’t see her at first. And by the time I did, it was too late. So I had to take her with me.”

The smack of flesh meeting flesh. Cheyenne realized that the other man had just slapped Griffin.

“So you brought her back here? That wasn’t a real smart idea. Why am I not surprised that it was you that thought of it?”

“What else did you want me to do?” Griffin whined. “In five more minutes, the place would have been crawling with cops. I had to get away as fast as I could. I’ll just wait until tonight, and go drop her out on a logging road. And then I’ll hightail it out of there.”

“You idiot! She knows what you look like. And now she’s been here. I don’t need to spell it out for you. She’ll say who we are. She’ll get the cops back here. Are you trying to back me into a corner?”

“But she’s blind, Dad!”

Dad?





IN CASE THE LAW COMES LOOKING


“Give me her purse,” Roy demanded. He held out his hand. “Let’s see who she is.” He was still angry, that was clear, but Roy was always at least a little bit angry.

The thing was, Griffin thought, watching his dad carefully, his cheek still stinging, how angry was he?

“I already know who she is. Her name’s Cheyenne Wilder.”

He got out of the car. Roy took a step closer. He was all up in Griffin’s face now, nose to nose, which was kind of a surprise. How long had he been nose to nose, eye to eye, with his dad? Sensing the tension, Duke started growling.

Griffin stepped back, holding his hands up in surrender.

His dad spit tobacco out of the side of his mouth. Roy was nothing but muscle and tattoo. Despite the cold, Roy was dressed the way he always was, in a black leather Harley vest open over a flannel shirt. The sleeves of the shirt had been torn off, ragged over his bulging pecs. The Skoal can in his chest pocket had left a faded circle on the plaid.

Jimbo and TJ came out of the barn. Griffin was glad for the distraction.

“Whoa! What is that?” Jimbo asked, shaking his head in admiration as he took in the Escalade. Even though he had plenty of personal insulation, Jimbo was wearing so many layers he looked like the Michelin man. Jimbo was always cold. “A little something you picked up shopping?”

“Sweet!” TJ chimed in. TJ was skinny and short, not much taller than Cheyenne, with a long dirty blond ponytail poking out of the back of his trucker’s cap.

“Only there’s a problem,” Roy said. The red in his face had faded slightly. “The car came with a little something extra. A girl.”

“A kid,” Griffin felt the need to interject. He could already see TJ perking up, and he didn’t need him to get the wrong idea. “And actually, she’s blind, so she didn’t see anything.”

The two men peered through the half-open window at Cheyenne. Underneath the blanket, she was absolutely still. Griffin hoped she couldn’t hear exactly what they were saying.

“So she’s really blind?” TJ asked in a loud voice.

Griffin saw her flinch under the blanket.

Jimbo nudged TJ. “He said blind, dummy, not deaf.”

Roy turned his head to spit tobacco juice. “Did you change the plates?”