He gave me a smile and kissed my hand. “I know you do. You’re a trained con artist, you can’t forget that. If you didn’t walk into every situation with suspicion, I’d question how you survived so long.”
“So what do you think?” I asked him, suddenly doubting everything.
“I think your uncle sounds like an honest man. And I know he took care of you when we were kids, like you were his own daughter. I think he needs our help—that he deserves our help, and I believe that Javier has targeted him. But, I also think to be safe, we don’t park at the motel. Just around the corner. We sneak in.”
“Better paranoid than dead?”
“You know it.”
Once we located the hotel on my phone and spied the flickering signpost in the distance, we took the first side-street and parked down by an abandoned house on an overgrown lot. There was nothing but small farms in the area, a place that would probably seem very bucolic during the day but looked lifeless and deserted at night.
“Should we bring a gun?” I whispered as we climbed out of the car.
He eyed me over the roof. “I don’t think it could hurt. I’ll bring mine.”
I liked that idea. I didn’t want to have to use my gun in any situation that involved Uncle Jim. I was too close and it would get messy.
We quietly walked up the street, eyes peeled, ears scanning for anything unusual. A few cars puttered past on the main road up ahead, and in the distance an owl hooted, but there was nothing else except the sound of our feet as we crunched through gravel on the shoulder.
When the hotel got closer, Camden gestured for us to head in through the back of the property and scale over the fence. My arms burned from the effort but I made it over okay. We landed on the ground with a soft thud and observed the scene.
It wasn’t a hotel at all but a rundown motel. From the back, it looked like only one of the rooms in the bungalow block was occupied. I did a quick count and the small bathroom window with the light on was probably Uncle Jim’s.
I gestured at it and Camden nodded. We crept closer and tried to look in through the frosted glass pane but couldn’t see anything. Camden tried to listen with his ear pressed against it. He heard nothing either. That could be good or that could be bad.
We went around the side of the block and came into the front. There was a rusted chain link fence surrounding a tiny swimming pool with heaps of leaves floating in it, a small house for the office, and the single row of rooms. There was only one car, my uncle’s old truck, and that was it. I scanned the dark street to see if there was anything out of the ordinary but there was nothing—so far—that made me suspicious. It looked like he’d been telling the truth, which made me feel bad for doubting him and bad for putting him in this position.
With Camden leading the way, his hand hovering near his waistband where he had tucked his gun, we headed for room number eight. I made a sign at him to be careful, take it easy, and don’t go in the room guns a blazin’ on my poor uncle. I’m not sure if he picked up on the gesture or not.
I quickly rapped at the door. “Uncle Jim?”
Camden stepped back and to the side, his hand on the gun handle now, like he was playing cops and robbers.
I waited with bated breath, listening hard, until the door opened a crack, the chain lock on.
“Ellie,” Uncle Jim said, giving me an odd smile. “Come on in. I’m so glad you came.”
He undid the chain lock and opened the door. He looked like he wanted to hug me—he was being quite emotional for my stoic uncle—but first I needed to be sure he was alone. I brushed past him and did a quick sweep of the room. Camden followed, going even further by checking the bathroom and closets.
“Looking for someone?” Uncle Jim asked, his voice shaking a bit. He must have been stressed out of his gourd.
I quickly gave him a hug while Camden locked the front door. “Sorry, you know me, Miss Paranoid.”
“I know,” he said softly. “Now I can see why you are.”
He went and sat on the sagging bed with the tacky green floral duvet and started tugging at his flannel shirt. He let out a sigh. “I don’t know what to do, Ellie.”
I exchanged a look with Camden. Mine was sympathetic. His was hard. He looked at Uncle Jim with all the warmth of a hawk scouring a field for its next dinner.
I mouthed What? to him but Camden ignored me.
“Tell us what happened?” Camden asked in a steely voice.
Uncle Jim glanced at him, surprised. “I already told Ellie everything.”
“You never told me,” Camden pointed out. “So tell me.”
My uncle pursed his lips, looking Camden up and down. “How on earth did the both of you get on the run together?”