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“Only the general risk to life and limb being around you.” He stared at her.
“You’ll have to fill me in because I think I’m missing something.” For some reason the priest believed she presented a serious threat to him. And why would he think that?
“I believe some time ago you met a dear friend of mine in Albuquerque. A key player in our effort to ensure the freedom and safety of victims we come across.” The priest paused. “Both here and across the border in the town of Hatchet, and even farther north as well.”
A friend of his. Hatchet.
That could only be one person.
Kenna said, “You have this Underground Railroad-type of thing going on, and it was going up to Hatchet?” That couldn’t have been super secure, given the entire town turned out to be connected to all kinds of shady business.
“Since you uncovered the issues with that town we have sought alternative routes,” Ramon said. “And our success rate has increased dramatically.”
She had met the priest in Albuquerque. The priest who was killed by Peter Conklin, a man who turned out to be a serial killer. Sadly not the person who had been murdering people down here over the last decade or more, or that would have stopped.
“The priest was your friend?” Kenna said.
“I considered him my brother,” he said. “And you failed to keep him alive.”
She ducked her head, a lump rising in her throat. “He was a good man.” It hadn’t taken long knowing him to understand that he’d been a force for good in the world. He’d even encouraged her to seek the light in the darkness. To be that light to the dark places around her.
“‘None are good, no not one.’” The priest stared at her. “But I understand what you mean. I considered him dear to me.”
She sniffed. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
Stairns had lived, but the priest had been killed. Both good men. One was a servant of God and the other was a man who strove to make amends for his mistakes. Even Kenna had barely survived that encounter with a serial killer’s lair in a hotel in Albuquerque.
Would this situation turn out to be a trap like that?
Things would make a whole lot more sense if evil was eliminated and good got to continue and thrive. But life seemed determined not to work like that.
Ramon squeezed his fingers together. “Now that we all understand where we’re coming from, you haven’t seen Kart?”
The priest shook his head.
“If you hear anything about Javi, or where Kart might have taken him, will you call me? I’d like to make sure the boy is safe.”
“So would I,” Kenna said.
The priest glanced between her and Ramon. Finally, he nodded. “I will pass on anything I learn.”
“Thank you.” She didn’t reach out to shake the man’s hand, unsure if he would want to accept it. “For everything you do.”
He only stared at her, then his gaze flicked down to the cross necklace. She didn’t tell him it was a GPS tracker.
“Right.” Ramon stood. “Let’s go.”
He wrote something on a notepad he left on the priest’s desk. As they headed to the door and out the same hallway they’d come down, Ramon said, “We keep it low-key, but I know what they do.”
“The priest…and who?”
“The doctor.”
Of course. “So they pinpoint people they can save, and they rescue the individual. And that’s the way you got Camila and Luca out?”
“We alternate through methods. We don’t always work together, but we have an understanding. They have channels I don’t know about. Missionary charities where they can get the paperwork to get people across the border under fake names using missionary work visas. They can transport them all over, and then the people disappear.”
“I just hope they end up somewhere safe when they get where they’re going,” she said. “Not like Camila and Luca.”
