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“I know where he took her, Agent Granger,” Milo said. “I followed them.”
“Well, why didn’t you lead with that?” he hollered, and Milo flinched. “Sorry. I’m worried about her is all.”
“Where did he take her?” Owen asked.
“To a marina. They got on a big speedboat, and I couldn’t follow. So I thought I’d come back and see what was left to be done to prep the house. My place is already done, and I want Miss Hemmingway to be safe. She said she wasn’t leaving.”
Ty noticed the tailgate of his truck down and materials inside. Seemed maybe he was telling the truth. Or he was using the hurricane proofing to simply skulk around her and her property. One crisis at a time. “Where is it? The marina?”
He gave them directions. “Milo, everything you’ve done is great, but you can’t show up at Miss Hemmingway’s without permission even to help with chores and stuff. It’s stalking, bud. And that’s illegal. Am I getting through?”
“Sure.”
Pretty certain he wasn’t. But now was not the time. “Go on home or evacuate the island. It’s getting worse. I’ll find her.” He had no idea how, but for once Ty was a step ahead. No way Garrick or Dalen would know about Milo. If they did, he’d be dead.
Unless Milo was also a part of this. Was it his job to infiltrate Bexley’s life? Was his story even real? Had he been groomed like Josiah? His story had been flimsy.
This could be another elaborate part of the game. A trap.
He stormed back into the house, Owen on his heels. Both of them dripped water onto the floors as they moved to Josiah’s room and to the computer. “He might have mentioned his place in a chat with him. He’s been grooming him, Owen. Goes back a solid year. I have no idea what he’s made that child believe, but it’s been nothing but antagonistic words toward Bex and the father he doesn’t know. He’s using him as a pawn.”
“We’ll figure it out.” Owen scrolled through his phone. “I can use the boat landing address and see what’s around. I’m thinking an island. Maybe one I’ve already flagged.”
Ty didn’t find anything in the chat about an island, and he kicked a shirt lying on the floor. Time was running out. He glanced down at Josiah’s sketchbook. The shirt had concealed it, but now it was open, and he picked it up.
Landscapes. A portrait of Tiberius. He flipped until a sketch caught his eye of an island surrounded by marshy land and a monstrous house right smack-dab in the middle. The place didn’t seem conjured from his imagination, and every other drawing was a real location.
He showed Owen the sketch.
Owen studied it. “I know where that is. ’Bout twenty miles south of Patrick Swain’s place, and the marina is only ten minutes away.”
Ty tossed the sketch pad and punched the wall, feeling his knuckles crunch and burn. “We can’t make it twenty miles with a hurricane barreling down on us, and it’s out in the middle of the water. We’ll all die.”
“They made it twenty miles,” Owen countered. “The hurricane hasn’t progressed much more since then. We can make it. We can do it. But it’s going to take some faith in something greater than ourselves.”
Ty didn’t buck him. He was on a teetering seesaw at the moment.
Owen laid a hand on Ty’s shoulder. “I don’t say anything to you about faith and religion and God, and that’s my mistake. I know you got jacked by your family. All your life was about being controlled and manipulated in the name of God to benefit them. You’ve been hurt. Betrayed. But that’s a cult, brother. That has nothing to do with a very real God.”
“Owen, now is not the time to preach me a sermon. Bexley and my son are on some godforsaken island and we may not be able to rescue them.” Anxiety tightened his lungs and shot acid into his throat like a fire-breathing dragon.
“It’s not godforsaken. No place is godforsaken, Tiberius. I’m not preaching. I’m telling you the truth. We need divine intervention here. Or we ain’t gettin’ ’em back.”
Owen was right about one thing. They couldn’t man a boat alone in a hurricane. If God was real and wanted to climb in a boat with them during the storm of his life, he wasn’t going to say no. Not today. “Who’s going to give us a boat?”
“Use your imagination.” He smirked, then got serious. “It’s time to go.” He tapped his chest with his fist, and Ty mimicked it.
“This is a suicide mission, O.”
“Ride or die.”
He’d rather ride.
But he was probably going to die.
Blue Harbor Marina
Friday, September 7
