Shirlee McCoy - Mystery Child

Somewhere beyond the tree, leaves crackled. She waited, expecting to hear men’s voices, a shouted warning. Fist against flesh. Something. Anything.

She heard nothing but that soft crackling sound.

She edged back until she was wedged between pine boughs, the sharp, tangy scent of broken needles filling her nose. Jubilee had gone still, one hand clutching the little bag of chocolate candy she’d been given, the other clutching a fistful of Quinn’s jacket.

She still hadn’t spoken, but those screams? They’d probably stay with Quinn for the rest of her life. They’d been the sound of profound terror. No child should ever have to feel that. She shifted her grip on Jubilee, listening for any sign that August’s friend was returning. Friend? Maybe. Quinn had no idea who the guy really was. He hadn’t introduced himself, and she hadn’t thought to ask how he knew her brother. She hadn’t gotten a good look at his face, either. She had noticed the scar that bisected his cheek, though. If she’d met him before, she’d have remembered that.

Jubilee shoved against her arms, trying to wiggle down. Quinn held tight. No way was she putting the child down, but August’s friend had been right about one thing—running with a five-year-old in her arms wasn’t going to be easy. Quinn had her mother Alison’s build—small-boned, short, thin. Her sprint from the Jeep had been fed by adrenaline. Now, she felt tired, her arms aching, her legs trembling. Still, she wanted to run. She just wasn’t sure what direction to go.

They couldn’t stay there forever.

Eventually, the night would pass, day would dawn, and they’d be sitting ducks, waiting to be spotted by whoever was after them.

Tabitha’s husband?

It was the only thing that made sense. Quinn had no enemies. She barely had any friends. Funny how people pulled away during times of grief. Strange how those that she’d been closest to seemed to have drifted the furthest after Cory was buried. Or maybe she’d been the one to drift away, separating herself out from the pack of happy, successful couples that she and Cory had once gone bowling with, camped with, biked and hiked with.

She shook the memories away, ducked beneath the pine boughs and stepped out of the shadow of the tree. She had to move or she’d be frozen forever, too terrified to do anything but wait for someone to find her.

Jubilee stared at her through eyes made dark by fatigue. Wisps of hair had escaped the braids they’d been plaited into. A few long strands straggled across her neck and curled up to touch the bruise on her cheek.

Poor kid. She hadn’t slept much during the long drive. She’d just sat in her booster, staring out the window. She hadn’t spoken, but she’d responded to questions with nods or shakes of her head. Obviously, she had a good receptive vocabulary. There was no doubt that she’d understood everything Tabitha had said to Quinn. She knew she was going to DC to see her biological father. Had she met Daniel Boone Anderson before? That was something Quinn should have asked, but she’d been too shocked by Tabitha’s sudden appearance to think straight.

A light flashed to the right. There. Gone. Someone searching through the woods, and whoever it was had probably heard Quinn shuffling through the dead pine needles and fallen leaves.

Quinn didn’t dare stop, didn’t dare go back to the tree or duck into another hole. They’d find her this time. She was certain of it.

She sprinted into a thicket, brambles and branches tearing at her hair and snagging the comfortable yoga pants she’d worn for the ride.

She barely felt it.

Keep going. That’s all she could think about. Run as fast as you can.

Jubilee’s weight slowed Quinn down, but she pushed through the other side of the thicket, dodging through trees. Her foot caught on roots that snaked out of the ground, and she fell hard, skidding on her knees, one hand on the ground, the other clutching Jubilee.

A man stepped out in front of her, appearing so quickly, she thought she must be imagining the dark form.

He moved toward her and she scrambled up.

“I have a gun,” she lied, her voice shaking.

“No, you don’t. You’re a pacifist to the core,” the man responded, his voice so familiar, she wanted to cry with relief.

“August?”

“Yeah, and you’re lucky it is. Didn’t Malone tell you to stay hidden?” he responded.

“Not exactly,” she hedged.

“Exactly,” a man said, his voice coming from behind Quinn. “I told you to stay put until I got back.”

“I decided I’d be safer heading to my brother’s place.”

“Your brother was the one I saw walking through the trees. If you’d given me half a minute to check things out, you could have saved us all some time.”

“I gave you more than half a minute.”

“Learn a little patience. It might save your life one day,” he retorted, his eyes blazing through the darkness.

“How about we discuss this at my place?” August cut in. “I’ll feel a whole lot better about everything once we’re not standing in the woods making it easy for any sniper who happens to be skulking around.”

A sniper?

That wasn’t something Quinn wanted to think about.

She shuddered, clutching Jubilee a little tighter.

“I agree,” Malone said. “I don’t know about you, McConnell, but I’m not liking the way things are playing out.”

“You want to walk or go back to my SUV?” August asked. The fact that he was asking surprised Quinn. August had been doing his own thing and going his own way for as long as she could remember. He’d joined the marines at eighteen, been discharged honorably five years later. Now he worked private security, traveling around the country doing work for a high-profile security firm. He didn’t ask anyone for advice, and he never seemed to need help.

“It’s your call. You know the area better than I do,” the guy responded. Malone? That’s what August had called him. Maybe they were old military buddies. Quinn would have to ask. After they got out of the woods.

“Let’s walk to my place. I’ll come back for the SUV after law enforcement gets here.”

“You called the police?” Quinn had promised Tabitha that she wouldn’t. She’d kept that promise the same way she’d kept so many others. She was big on that. Keeping promises. Mostly because her father had never kept his. Not to her mother. Not to her. Not to any of his children, friends or relatives.

Danner McConnell had been a conman. A liar. Sometimes even a thief. He’d been charming, too. Funny. Always at every dance recital or school performance. He’d liked people, and people had liked him, but he’d never made a promise he hadn’t broken. He’d never sacrificed anything for his family. He’d died of a massive heart attack Quinn’s senior year of high school. She’d been sad, and she’d been relieved. For the first time in nearly three decades, Quinn’s mother had been free to live her life happily. No husband scheming and jostling to get whatever he could from whomever he could. No explanations needed for money borrowed and never repaid, tools taken and not returned. The jovial, sweet guy who’d mowed the lawn for the neighbor and cheered from every audience was what Quinn tried to remember, but in the back of her mind, she couldn’t quite forget all the promises broken and all the nights she’d heard her mom crying in her room.

“I called the police when I found your Jeep. The door was open, the keys were in the ignition and you were gone. The police seemed like a good idea,” August replied as they walked back the way Quinn had just come. Apparently, she hadn’t been sprinting toward his house. Who knew where she and Jubilee would have ended up if August and Malone hadn’t stopped them.