The Faithful (23 page)

CHAPTER FORTY

“Sumner, you’re going to have to trust us,” Ora said, touching his arm gently.

He wanted to keep arguing, but there was no point. She was right. Lexy, Ora, and Phoenix had been called home. He could either go with them to his certain death, or he could go rogue.

“Sumner, find the redhead,” Lexy said, coming up beside Ora and looking up at him earnestly. “If we can’t get Jack away from The Ranch, then we might still have a chance if you can find her. That redhead, whoever she is, is the key. We all sense that.”

“Jack is key, too,” Sumner argued.

“Yeah. He is. And we’ll do our best to get him. I promise,” Ora said.

“Sumner, if you come with us, it will put all our lives in jeopardy,” Phoenix added. “They can’t know we’ve joined forces.”

“Your lives might already be in danger,” Sumner said. “There’s a very real chance he’s calling you back early because he’s been tipped off.”

“I know.” Lexy gave her brother a look. “Mannix probably told Father Narda that Phoenix was poking his nose where it didn’t belong.”

Phoenix’s cheeks reddened. “Once again, I’m sorry.”

Ora shook her head. “It doesn’t matter now. If he’s been tipped off, we’ll have to deal with it. My dad isn’t going to kill me over it. The punishment might be harsh, but it won’t be deadly.”

“Not for you, but what about us?
Our
dad isn’t the High Priest,” Lexy said.

Ora met her gaze. “Honey, I would never let my dad hurt you.”

Sumner felt a stab of jealousy. That was the difference between the Disciples and the Chosen, in a nutshell. The Chosen were the true children of
I Fidele
. The Disciples were expendable. They didn’t have fathers who would protect them, and that created a chasm between the two groups that could never be bridged.

Could he trust this group of spoiled kids? Their hearts might have been in the right place, but they were so
young
. He’d already witnessed enough in the short time he had spent with them to know they were guided more by raging hormones and teenage angst than by logic. They were narcissistic and overindulged. Was it wise to lay such a huge responsibility at their feet?

Ora squeezed his hand. “We’ll give you a head start, and shield you as long as we can.”

“It won’t be for long. Once we separate, it will be difficult to protect you,” Phoenix added. “You need to stay well hidden.”

“I know,” Sumner said.

“They’re going to hunt you,” Lexy warned.

“I know,” Sumner said again.

“And they won’t ask questions. They’ll kill you on sight,” Lexy added.

Sumner nodded, swallowing hard. “Any idea where I should go?”

Lexy closed her eyes briefly, as though assessing an internal map. “North and west,” she said with certainty.

“Okay.” That was as good a direction as any, he supposed—except The Ranch was also to the northwest. Phoenix left the room and returned with a wad of cash. He pushed it into Sumner’s hands.

“Here’s thirty grand. Use it to stay alive.”

“I can’t take your money,” Sumner protested.

“It’s not my money. It’s
I Fidele
’s money. And as you well know, it’s just a drop in the bucket.”

Sumner did know that. Without further comment, he shoved it into the front pocket of his jeans.

“Be careful,” he told them, surprised to feel the sting of tears in his eyes. Would he see any of them again? Ora hugged him.

“You too,” she whispered. “Call me if you need help.” He knew she didn’t mean on the phone.

Lexy hugged him, and then Phoenix gave him a manly clap on the shoulder. Sumner turned and left, refusing to look back as he closed the apartment door behind him. He had been alone for a long time, and had gotten just a taste of what companionship felt like. It was hard to leave, hard to walk away from the relative comfort he had found in their presence.

Sumner took a Greyhound bus to Austin and spent his first night in a hostel off East 6th Street, in the high-crime Entertainment District. He purchased new clothes: underwear and warm socks, blue jeans, and black T-shirts. He also picked up a puffy green coat that would keep him warm and distort his shape, personal hygiene products, and a duffel bag for storage. He also bought a bottle of brown hair dye and electric clippers, which he made use of back at the hostel.

With his newly shorn dark hair, Sumner wandered along East 6th Street. Psychic abilities sometimes came in handy. It wasn’t long before he found exactly what he was looking for: an operation that made decent fake IDs. It was a thousand dollars to get a full set, which included a California driver’s license that would pass all but the closest of inspections, a new birth certificate, and a prepaid MasterCard.

New papers in hand, he purchased an iPhone and set up an unlimited data plan, paying for a year in advance. He spent the rest of the evening searching Craigslist for a suitable vehicle. He slept as well as could be expected of someone being hunted, and was in a taxi by six the next morning.

Seventy-five hundred dollars bought him a white 1984 Westfalia camper van. It was loaded with a kitchenette, a two-person table, and enough room to sleep four if he ever decided to open the pop-up roof. It had been well loved and ran smoothly, although it took him a good hour to get used to the manual transmission, something he hadn’t operated since his early twenties.

The old man he bought it from was kindly, and he’d stocked it with blankets and towels. His plump wife took pity on Sumner’s slender form and piled the fridge with goodies, despite his protests.

Why did kindness make him feel so guilty? Sumner blinked back tears, thanking them for the tenth time. If they only knew the things he’d done, the pain he’d caused.

But as he found his way out of Austin’s maze, he had a thought, and it eased the heaviness in his chest: Maybe it wasn’t too late to save his blighted soul. And maybe the road to redemption was north and west in a VW van, in search of the redhead.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

“It’s my fault! It’s my fault!” I was both wailing and sobbing, tears and snot mixing in a disgusting stew of phlegm.

Josh had cleared us out of the hotel room in less than five minutes, and was weaving silently through the light evening traffic on I-25, his grim face ghostly in the dim light of the dashboard.

His jaw was tight, his eyes methodically switching focus like a man watching a tennis match. Forward to the windshield, up to the rearview mirror, left to the wing mirror, right to the passenger wing mirror, and repeat.

Around Caballo Lake, I ran out of steam. My wails turned to soft sobs, my sobs to snuffles and hiccups. I closed my eyes against the searing pain in my head and tried not to replay the image of Kahina’s bloody corpse in my mind.

My head was splitting open, so I dug through my purse for my pain meds and dry-swallowed a couple. The next thing I knew, Josh was shaking me awake. I startled out of the blackness, good arm flailing, fighting an unseen enemy.

“Shh! It’s okay!” he hissed. His face swam into focus. I could barely make him out in the dark; he had turned off the engine and all was silent except our labored breathing and the ticking of the engine as it cooled.

“Where are we?”

“Truth or Consequences. We need to change vehicles. This FJ Cruiser is like a beacon.” He wasn’t looking at me, but rather beyond me through the passenger window. I swiveled to look. It was a used-car lot, dimly lit and gated off.

“Looks like they’re closed for the night,” I said, stating the obvious.

“Yes.” Hard determination was pinching the corners of his eyes.

“I’m pretty sure it’s frowned upon for a federal agent to steal a car.”

He looked away from the lot long enough to trap me with his gaze. The cold steel behind his eyes caused a ripple of fear in me. Perhaps it was the tears he had shed in the hospital, or the gentleness with which he’d taken care of me. Whatever the reason, I had wrongly pegged him as a soft man. In the darkened car, there was nothing soft about him. He was all sharp edges and blunt force, ready to cut and bludgeon to get what he needed.

“I’m not a federal agent. Not anymore.” Josh jumped out of the car and slammed the door behind him, giving me one last piercing look that pinned me to my seat. I understood the silent order to stay put, and I wouldn’t have left the car if it caught fire around me.

Then who the hell are you? I wondered.

I waited in the ticking quiet of the FJ Cruiser for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, the dark shape of a fast-moving car appeared from the back of the lot. It aimed straight for the chain-link gate, breaking through with a shower of sparks and a horrible screeching sound as metal scraped against metal. The car swung around, fishtailing, and pulled to a stop in front of me.

Josh jumped out of the driver’s seat and trotted back to me. The engine was off, so I couldn’t lower the window. I opened the passenger door instead, and as soon as I did, I caught the dull bleating of the dealership’s alarm.

“Do you think you can drive?” He was huffing, a sheen of sweat visible on his cheeks and brow.

“I guess so,” I said without confidence. The pain had eased to a distant throb, but between my left arm and my right leg, I wasn’t really in my prime.

“Great. It won’t be far. But we need to get out of here. Fast.”

Well, duh.

He helped me out of the car and I limped around to the driver’s side. I needed a boost in, and he turned on the engine and adjusted the seat and mirrors back to my position.

“Just follow me,” he ordered, and trotted back to his stolen car, which was a silver Ford Fusion. He’d pulled off the price stickers, but there were no license plates.

Josh took care of that problem with haste, stopping in a residential neighborhood a mile away and lifting the plates off a late-model Subaru. Within minutes, he had them attached to the Ford and we were weaving out of Truth or Consequences northbound.

I trailed him past Elephant Butte Lake State Park, following the signs toward the municipal airport. He entered the long-term parking lot and stopped at the far end. I pulled into the stall beside him and cut the engine.

He opened my door. “Leave the key in the ignition.”

“Are you serious?”

He hauled me out of the car and pried the keys out of my hand.

“Wait a minute! I’m not abandoning my car!” I argued.

He stuffed me into the passenger seat of the Ford, then yanked the Toyota key off the ring and handed me the rest.

“Hey!”

“Ryanne.” His voice was terse. “If they don’t know what you drive by now, they will soon enough. That car will get us killed.”

Without waiting for further argument, he slammed the door in my face and emptied the trunk of the FJ, which had held his laptop bag and a metal briefcase. He yanked my purse out of the front, dumped his bags in the trunk of the Ford, and handed over my purse as he slid behind the steering wheel.

We took off with a screech of the tires, and I turned to get one last look at my FJ as we sped out of the parking lot. I felt like I was abandoning a faithful friend.

We stopped again in a quiet neighborhood in Socorro, and Josh switched the stolen plates for ones off an old Mercedes. We were back on the road within five minutes.

“Why did you attach the first plates to the Mercedes?” I asked.

“So it takes longer for them to notice their plates have been stolen.”

In Albuquerque, he switched out the plates for a third time before picking up the I-40 eastbound toward Texas.

The sky was just beginning to lighten as we approached Amarillo. Josh had insisted on driving the whole way, and he looked exhausted. There were dark-purple smudges under his eyes, and the five o’clock shadow on his face couldn’t hide the pale skin underneath.

He hadn’t relaxed his vigilance behind the wheel one iota, and drove through New Mexico like a man being chased by the demons of hell. Which perhaps he was. He changed lanes frequently, and several times he abruptly exited the freeway, only to pull back on again, watching the rearview mirror intently.

“What are you doing?” I exclaimed the first time we careened, kamikaze-style, down an exit ramp.

“Countersurveillance.” His voice was curt, angry even, and after that I kept my mouth shut.

While he didn’t lose the intensity of his vigilance, his shoulders relaxed a bit when we crossed into Texas. We pulled into a dismal-looking motel on the outskirts of Amarillo, and bounced across the cracked pavement to the back of the two-story building.

“Wait here while I get us a room,” he said as he shut off the engine.

“I want to come with you!”

“You’re covered in blood.”

“What . . . oh, shit!” I mewled in horror. In the first light of dawn, I could just make out the dark streaks on my shirt and jeans. There was blood smeared on my hands and crusted under my fingernails. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

“Because there was nothing you could do about it. Wait here. Lock the door.”

Josh returned within minutes, and led me to a room at the far end. He helped me across the threshold like an unenthusiastic groom.

The room was drab and faded, and smelled like the last occupant enjoyed slaughtering cats while chowing down on Chinese food and beer. I hobbled directly to the dingy bathroom, which had mold rimming the cracked tiles and a burn mark on the sink counter. It looked like the perfect place to wash off blood, and I wondered how many people before me had done just that.

The shower was a tepid drizzle, and the bar of no-name soap was whittled down to a thin sliver. I wrapped the towel around my torso for modesty, rinsed my sling and hung it to dry, and left my disgusting clothes in a sodden heap on the bathroom floor.

I emerged clutching the towel against my chest, but I needn’t have worried. Josh had wrapped himself in the bedspread, and was lying on the drab carpet against the door with his head on a folded-over pillow. He was snoring softly, like a faithful guard dog. His gun was tucked up against the pillow, his hand at rest a foot away.

After a careful inspection for bedbugs and gross stains, I eased under the blankets and laid my head against the lumpy pillow. Sleep pulled me down with its powerful undertow, and I succumbed gratefully to the dark waves of unconsciousness.

I awoke from a restless sleep filled with knives and blood. Josh was watching me from the depths of the armchair, three feet from my head. He was holding the gun loosely in his right hand, his suit crumpled, tie askew, and hair standing on end. He looked like a frat boy after a rough night of bingeing. Or maybe after a weekend in Vegas.

“What?” I asked.

The unblinking intensity of his stare made me squirm. Painfully aware of my state of undress, I pulled the sheet up to my chin. The towel was loose and twisted around my waist, and I wondered how much skin I had inadvertently exposed.

He blinked and sat back. “What size do you wear?”

“What?” I could feel the blush rising up my neck and warming my cheeks.

“You’re very small. Size two? Four?”

“Next you’ll be asking me how much I weigh. Didn’t your mom ever teach you manners?”

He blinked again, and a slow smile spread across his lips. I was surprised at how much I liked seeing it; vigilante Josh was kind of scary.

“Sorry, let me start again. I’m going to find a Walmart. We both need new clothes. If you write down a list of toiletries I’ll pick those up for you, too.” He ripped a page out of his pocket notebook and handed it to me with a pen.

I couldn’t very well argue. Until I had some clean clothes to wear, I would be stuck in this room. I wrote down my clothing, bra, and panty sizes, added my list of toiletries, and handed it back to him without meeting his eye.

“Um . . . do you prefer bikini, or thongs, or . . . ?” His skin was competing with mine to see whose could get the reddest.

“Bikini is fine.”

He grunted in response and left with mumbled instructions to lock the door behind him.

An hour and a quarter later, there was a gentle knock on the door. I dutifully peeked through the curtain before letting him in. In one hand, he was carrying several overflowing Walmart bags; in the other was a tray with two giant Starbucks cups.

“Coffee. You’re my hero.” Towel clutched around me, I stepped back from the door and watched him set everything down on the Formica table.

“I figured you wouldn’t let me back in without it.” He handed me a couple of bags and I retreated to the bathroom to wash up and get dressed. When I emerged, he was sitting at the table sipping his coffee and leafing through a newspaper.

“How do the clothes fit?” he asked.

“Fine, except . . . well, I think the top is a little low-cut.” I didn’t bother to mention that baby pink was the last color I would ever choose to wear.

“It looks good to me,” he replied, and then hastily looked back down at his newspaper, but not before I caught the flash of male heat in his eyes.

Oh,
I thought.

After a moment of awkward silence, I grabbed my coffee and sat across from him. “So, what now?”

“Now, we eat,” he said, nodding at the bag on the table. With my good hand, I pulled out blueberry-bran muffins, raw cashews, yogurt, and bananas.