“Nothing is happening,” Frankie denied. “Preston…the boss just went for a walk in the woods because he was following some hunch that you had—what the fuck!”
A hard fist pounded into the driver’s side window.
Sloane screamed.
Frankie shoved open his door and jumped out of the vehicle.
Out of the vehicle? Who did that? Who jumped out when someone dangerous pounded on the glass of your window? Had Frankie seen zero scary movies? You stayed locked in. You called for help. You?—
“We need more shovels!”
She shoved open her own door. Because the vehicle’s interior light had spilled out from the open driver’s door and she could see Noble. Noble, not Preston. “Where is Preston? Did you leave him?” She locked her fingers around Noble’s arm. He’s holding a gun. “What kind of bodyguard are you? You don’t leave your charge! You don’t leave him in the woods, in a rainstorm, in a?—”
“I think he found a grave. We need help. We need more shovels.” A frantic shake of his head. “We need help! Get the sheriff out here, now!”
A grave?
“There…aren’t any more shovels.” Frankie stumbled back against the side of the car. “Just one. I-I just got one. We have a jack in the back. A spare tire?—”
Was he kidding her? “Call the sheriff, Frankie!” Sloane blasted at him. An order she’d given him before. Her grip tightened on Noble. As for him, “Take me to Preston, now!” It could be a trap. The perp could be waiting. Could have wanted Preston to be out there alone.
Not on her watch.
Noble took off running through the rain, and Sloane was right with him.
Her sneakers sloshed through the growing water that puddled on the ground. The rain hit her face, feeling almost like pinpricks. Bushes tore at the legs of her jeans. She and Noble twisted around trees, burst through more bushes, and then they spilled into a narrow clearing.
Dirt.
Piles of dirt near Preston as he frantically dug into the ground.
Noble shone a light on Preston, and she saw the space…measured the ground that didn’t look like everything else around it. Earth that had been disturbed. Loose. Her gaze jerked away from it as she searched the darkness on either side of them.
The perp could be hiding anywhere. He could start shooting at any time.
But…
The Last Breath Killer didn’t murder his victims with bullets.
He killed them in coffins.
“Watch his back,” she told Noble. Then she dropped to her knees beside what she feared was a grave. Even as Preston continued digging out the dirt with his shovel, she was scooping up dirt with her hands. Shoving her fingers into the dirt as she worked desperately. And all the while, she just kept thinking…
Be alive.
Be breathing.
Don’t be dead. Please, not yet.
Rain poured down on her. The dirt turned to mud in her grasp. Sloane kept digging because she knew Bridget Russell was buried in the ground.
Chapter Seventeen
Preston’s shoulders hunched as he drove the shovel into the ground again. He could hear voices behind him. Sharp calls. But Preston didn’t look up. Sloane crouched near him. She’d been digging, shoving the dirt—the mud—away with her bare hands. She’d been helping him. Noble had been digging. Even Frankie had been dragging out the mud.
Sirens blared. Lightning still flashed. Rain still fell.
The sheriff and her deputies had arrived—those were the voices Preston heard behind him. More help.
