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They lost the Bronco until it was almost back to the state highway. They spotted taillights down there on the flat, turning back toward town. Bree put on the headlights and sped up. There were more cars on the road. She hung back three cars from the Bronco as it passed the crumbling brick factory where Alex’s mother had sewn sheets and pillowcases. She stayed in that position almost to the old Piggly Wiggly store.
Right before the railroad crossing, Finn Davis turned hard left, along the tracks, and disappeared from view.
“Where’s that go?” she demanded.
“It’s a maintenance road, I think.”
Train tracks. Hadn’t Stefan Tate said there were strange goings-on along the train tracks that he’d been unable to figure out?
Bree made a split-second decision, pulled into the Piggly Wiggly parking lot, and jumped out of the car. She ran along the sidewalk toward the train tracks. The crossing lights began to flash. Bells rang. The gates lowered and she could hear the rumble of an oncoming train.
Bree scanned the area as the train horn blew. An abandoned building to her left. An empty lot with trees that lined the far side, separating the lot from the tracks. She dashed at an angle across the empty lot into the trees and found herself on a small bluff above the tracks. She pushed vines aside.
The headlights of the train and the Bronco lit up Finn Davis, who stood on the maintenance road a hundred yards away and not ten feet from the tracks. Bree got the binoculars on him. He didn’t seem at all concerned about the engine. He was looking at the cars behind it, which were rolling into view from around the bend.
Bree moved the binoculars to the boxcars a
nd spotted the silhouettes of two men on top of one, two more four cars back, and another pair six cars beyond that. As they passed Davis, they raised their hands in some sort of salute that she couldn’t make out due to shadows.
But Marvin Bell’s adopted son was crisply visible when, in response to their salute, he raised his right hand and held three fingers high.
Chapter
60
West Palm Beach, Florida
An hour later, in my bed at the Hampton Inn, I came wide awake, sat up, and said into my cell phone: “Those guys riding the train on our way into Starksville that first day, they did that same salute.”
“Definitely,” Bree said, back in North Carolina.
I shook off the cobwebs in my mind. “How many did you see?”
“Six total.”
“Were they on specific cars or random?”
“They were all on freight cars, mixed in with tankers.”
“What did Davis do after the train had gone?”
“Got back in the Bronco, turned around, and headed north, probably back to Pleasant Lake,” Bree said. “I abandoned the surveillance at that point.”
“I’m still surprised about Guy Pedelini. I pegged him as a good guy.”
“I did too,” Bree said. “But I’m coming over to Pinkie’s point of view.”
“Which is?”
“Don’t trust anyone in Starksville who isn’t family.”
“Cynical, but probably a good idea for the time being.”
“Here I’ve been hogging the conversation. Any luck down there?”
“Nothing but luck,” I said and then filled her in on my day.
“Wow, that was fast,” Bree said when I was done. “Who’s this minister you’re going to see?”
