Sharon Dunn - In Too Deep

She appreciated how calm he seemed to be. It helped her to relax, as well, as the morning sun warmed the interior of the car. Maybe this would just be a simple pickup. Sometimes teenagers tended to be dramatic when there was no reason to be.

She glanced over at Joseph as they came to the edge of town. He drove past fields filled with cows, and the road changed from gravel to dirt. They drove for a long time without seeing another dwelling. This place was pretty remote.

Then the junkyard, surrounded by a high fence, came into view. Buses and single-wide trailers served as part of the fence. The man who had owned the junkyard, Peter Leman, had died two years before, leaving no heirs. The county had not had the funds to clean up the area. The No Trespassing signs had not stopped teens from using it as a place to hang out.

“The front gate is locked. We’ll have to park outside and walk in.”

Joseph pulled off the road and killed the engine. “This is a big place.”

“I have a pretty good idea where he might be.” She pushed open her door. “There’s a gap in the fence where we can get in.”

As she hurried around to the side of the junkyard, her heartbeat kicked up several notches. She slipped in between a bus and board fence.

Joseph followed her. He stood beside her, his hand slipped into his open jacket. She saw then why he had gone into the bedroom. He had a gun in a shoulder holster. He thought they might be stepping into something violent, too.

Hadn’t he lost his first gun somewhere on their run through the forest? Maybe it was just for protecting his business, but she wondered why the manager of a skateboard shop would have two guns.

A wall of partially crushed cars blocked her view of the rest of the junkyard. “This place is an accident waiting to happen, but we haven’t been able to keep the kids from coming here.” Sierra maneuvered around the wall of cars.

“I don’t get it. Scenic View has all kinds of recreational possibilities. Why come here?”

“I think it’s the danger factor. Didn’t you like adrenaline when you were a teenager?”

“Still do.” He offered her a brief smile, raising his eyebrows.

The moment of humor that passed between them lightened the tension she felt. She zigzagged through the junkyard, past rows of appliances and piles of tires. There were several sheds on the property that Sierra knew contained old books, magazines and newspapers. Peter Leman had been the ultimate hoarder.

Joseph tilted his head to look up at a mountain of twisted and intertwined pieces of metal. He shook his head. “It’s like an amusement park for junk collectors.”

“There is a big pipe at the far end of the fence where kids hang out.” She glanced around, not seeing any signs of anyone else in the junkyard.

As they made their way through the labyrinth of junk, wind blew around them, causing the metal to creak. Tarps that covered piles of junk flapped in the wind.

She pointed. “The pipe is just on the other side of that motor home.”

He crouched by the motor home. She slipped in behind him, unsure what was going on here. A hundred frantic thoughts zinged through Sierra’s head. Was Trevor safe? Was he even here?

Had the drug dealers set him up to make the call, or had his emergency been an emotional one? Had he decided to ally himself with the dealers after all?

Again, Joseph touched his chest where the gun was. “Let’s take this slow.”

His action sent a fresh dose of terror through her. He was anticipating violence.

Joseph pulled his gun and rushed toward the next object that would provide them with cover, in case someone was lying in wait for them in the pipe. He crouched behind a pile of car doors, then lifted his head above them. He could not see the interior of the pipe, but it was easily big enough for a grown person to stand inside.

Though arguing with Sierra about coming out here would have been an act of futility, he still didn’t like the idea of putting her or any civilian in danger.

She’d handled herself fine while they had been running from the drug dealer by the lake. He wondered what made her so tenacious in her need to help this messed-up kid who might have betrayed her.

Sierra leaned close to Joseph’s ear and whispered, “Should I call out for him?”

Joseph shook his head. What if someone more dangerous than Trevor was close by? “You stay here. Let me go.”

She nodded.

With his gun lifted, he ran toward the pipe. The interior came into view. He lowered his gun. There was no one inside, only evidence of what went on there—empty beer bottles and even a syringe. A magazine lay open, its pages flapping in the breeze.

The sight of the debris, of lives being destroyed, made his heart heavy. His baby brother, Ezra, had been so young when he’d overdosed. How did someone with so much to live for get to such a hopeless, dark place?

Sierra came up behind him. She must have sensed his shift in mood. “You all right?”

He pointed inside the pipe, backing away from the memories of Ezra’s transformation from a happy, bright kid to a prisoner of his own addiction. “This kind of stuff makes me angry.” Very few people knew why he had become a DEA agent. The pain still cut deep.

“Me, too,” she said. Her expression softened, and her voice filled with compassion. “I just decide every day, in whatever small way I can, I’ll work to pull a kid from the fire before he or she is consumed.”

He studied her for a long moment, feeling drawn to her. “Exactly.” They were on the same side. Both of them fighting for the same thing, just in different ways.

They searched the rest of the junkyard, finding no one or any evidence that someone had been here recently. When he tried the number Trevor had called from, the phone didn’t even ring on the other end.

“Probably a throwaway phone,” he said.

Frustrated, he slipped outside the junkyard and returned to his car. Sierra followed him. She sat in the passenger seat while he settled in behind the steering wheel and buckled his seat belt.

“Something is going on with Trevor. He sounded scared on that phone call. We have to find him.” She laced her fingers together. Her forehead furrowed.

His heart went out to her. “We need some kind of lead to find him. Kids talk when they come into the shop. They think I’m not listening. And some of them even trust me enough to let me know what they know.”

She turned to face him. “Yes, the skateboard shop is ideal for finding out what’s going on with teenagers. Even the ones who are using drugs.” She narrowed her eyes at him, expecting a response.

This was the moment of truth. “I guess you figured it out.”

“You didn’t act like a shop owner back there in the junkyard. You acted like a cop.”

He tensed. “It’s important that no one else know.”

“I’m good at keeping secrets.” A soft smile graced her lips.

“That man you saw in the forest is very high up in the drug trade.” He placed his hands on the steering wheel. “If we can take him down, it would go a long way to destroying the drug network in this area.”

“So that’s why he sent his henchman after me.” Her voice filled with anxiety.

He turned the key in the ignition and pressed the gas. He wished there was something he could say to lift the burden of worry from her. Sometimes silence was the kinder choice over saying something trite or untrue.

The car rolled up a long hill. “Kind of like a roller-coaster ride,” he said, hoping to distract her from her worry. He aimed the car downhill and coasted, lifting his foot off the gas.

“Yeah, I guess. Never thought of it that way.” She sounded a million miles away as she stared through the windshield.