“Sloane and I will head out there now,” Michael said. “Callwith updates and exact location, and call the sheriff’s office as soon as you have a location.”
“I’ll reach out now, put them on alert,” Catherine said. “I should go with you.”
“Only you can break Garrett Reid,” Michael said. “He knows more than he’s said, and if we find that Matt and Kara are...” He couldn’t say it. “You said she’s not coming back.”
“I could be wrong,” Catherine said.
“But you think the odds are she’ll run.”
Catherine nodded.
“Then get everything out of Reid. I don’t think he believed you that her true name isn’t Audrey. He knows her as Audrey. Prove she’s not who she told him she was, and I think he’ll talk.”
Catherine’s lips curved up. “So you’re the shrink now.”
“I’m a man who has once been deeply in love. We don’t like being played for a fool.”
Michael opened the door to leave and Ryder said, “Wait. I think—I think Matt just emailed me. It’s through some else’s X account.”
“Whose?” Catherine asked.
“I don’t know, but it came in through my junk mail. I could have missed it.”
“Read it,” Michael said.
Ryder cleared his throat. “‘It’s Matt—we’re safe for now. Garrett has a female partner. Attractive blonde, thirties. Garrett’s lawyer is Franklin Graves and is being blackmailed—Garrett’s partner abducted his wife, Lily, and son, Nathan; they are with me. Get him protection ASAP. We’re in an abandoned farmhouse approx. one mile west of the flooded Sweetwater Cannery in GA. Lily’s phone is cloned; don’t respond or call. I’ll be in touch when I can.’”
35
Matt put a towel in the still-warm water that Lily had used to clean Kara’s wound, squeezed it out, and thoroughly wiped his face and hands. Then he ran his head under the sink, the cool water refreshing. When he dried, Lily handed him half a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. “Since you haven’t eaten in a couple days, you need something, but not too much at once.” She had also refilled all the water bottles and put them in the refrigerator.
“Thank you,” he said. He was still filthy, but he hadn’t wanted to shower and take the chance that Garrett’s partner might show up.
Kara came into the kitchen and said, “The living room and eastern corner of the porch have the best vantage points to see anyone approach.”
“Go to the living room, but stay inside for now. I’m going to find the breaker box and turn off the power. That should render the cameras useless. Then we’ll make a plan.”
“I can walk,” Kara said.
Not far, he thought, but didn’t say. Kara was generally realistic about her capabilities, but she always pushed herself too hard.
“If the message got through to Ryder, they’ll find us before dark.” Sunset was around 8:30. It was now four. Ryder would call the sheriff, the local FBI office—Jacksonville was closer than Atlanta. But the sheriff would be able to respond faster, and would know exactly where they were based on the flooded cannery. If that was the case, help could arrive in less than an hour.
If Ryder got the message...
“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Matt said and left.
He walked carefully down the porch steps, recognizing that they had been sabotaged much in the same way that the stairs in the factory had been sabotaged. Had Lily triggered the only trap? Or were there more?
Matt was on edge, every nerve tuned to his surroundings. The houselookedsafe—but if there were traps, he might not see them until it was too late. He wanted to leave, to vanish into the woods, but waiting out there for help that might never come didn’t seem much safer. At least with the house there was water and shelter.
“Stop it,” he muttered. “Lily and Nathan have been here since Saturday.”
Still, the unease wouldn’t let up. That fake bomb on the gas canister—was it just a distraction? A warning? It felt like Garrett and his partner had more planned. Something worse. While logically Matt could believe that Lily would have triggered any booby traps—like the small explosion on the porch stairs—he couldn’t be certain.
He circled the house slowly. No generator. So someone was still paying the electric bill. The waterline from the flood was obvious—two feet up the siding, right to the porch. No wonder the basement was so waterlogged. Even with a sump pump, there was still water in the lower slope of the basement. Maybe the house wasn’t salvageable, which was why it had been abandoned.
Had Garrett found the place like this? If so, why the electricity? Matt itched to call Ryder, to hand this whole mess over to someone who could dig into property records, ownership, utilities—anything. The house was mostly empty now, but someone had once lived here.
