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“Can you call her and tell her it was me? I have to talk to her, but she’s not answering her phone.” He nods, and I keep my eyes on him, scrutinizing his every move, searching for signs of nervousness or fidgeting. He appears calm. “She might not recognize my number.”
He holds out his pad and a pen. “Give me your number, and I’ll tell her.”
As she writes her number down, she says, “This is urgent. Can you call her now?”
He pulls out his phone and puts it to his ear. After a few seconds, he shrugs. I make a mental note of the time so Martinez can verify if he called her. “She didn’t answer. But I’ll tell her you need to talk to her as soon as possible. Are you guys staying in town?”
“No,” I spit. Kali might be in danger here. There’s something going on, and we don’t need to be stuck in this small town. Martinez is putting out a statewide lookout for my mom. She’ll be on the radar of every cop in the state of Texas.
“You might want to check your messages,” I suggest to Chip, my hand gripping the door handle as I settle into my truck. “There’s going to be a BOLO for Pearl any minute.”
His eyes widen, and a furrow creases his forehead. “What? What’d she do?”
“She’s wanted for questioning in connection with the girl that went missing last night.”
A droplet of sweat beads on his forehead. His calm demeanor shifts. “This is ridiculous. She hasn’t left Blackburn. What does she have to do with anything?”
“That’s for the Austin PD and Texas Rangers to find out.” His face is beet red by the time I back out. I glance through the rearview mirror, and he’s on the phone yelling at someone. Chip’s involvement is still up in the air for me. But he knows something. The pieces of the puzzle don’t fit together neatly, and I’m left with more questions than answers.
Leaving town, Kali stares out the front window. Every couple seconds, she’s shaking her head, engaged in an internal conversation. I give her a moment to take everything in. She finally says, “She was like a mom to me. She couldn’t have had anything to do with what happened to me.” I sense her questioning eyes on me, but she won’t like my answer.
“She’s not the person you think she is. I told you that after my brother died, something broke. She didn’t care who she was with or what they did to me. She’d let my stepdad beat the shit out of me with a switch for not eating one carrot on my plate and then tell me I deserved it. And that was one of many. He was a hothead who had a thing for hurting people.”
Her gasps reverberate in the truck. Holding her hand over her mouth, she utters, “Oh my god. Was this revenge for what my dad did?”
“I wish I could tell you how that brain of hers works, but I don’t speak crazy.” Gave up trying to figure her out after she married Carl. I hold off telling her about Chip because she’s already freaking out. I’ll tell Martinez as soon as I get back to the precinct because I’m not sure if he’s involved, but that connection is definitely worth looking into.
There’s a heavy silence, and I want to reach for her, reassure her that her friend had nothing to do with this, but I can’t. “You never saw her at the diner? We work the same shifts.”
Her question surprises me at first, then grates on my nerves because I think I’d know if I saw my mom. “She wasn’t there when I went in for pie.”
Another gasp escapes Kali’s lips. “She knew you were there. That day…she was fine one minute and the next, she hurried out of there saying she was sick. I was so confused because she never calls in sick. Now it all makes sense. Well, clearly, not all of it,” she adds. That’s why they were short-staffed and everything was backed up. She must’ve seen me come in.
Guilt tightens its grip around me, and a bitter taste of responsibility that I set the entire plan in motion sours my stomach. She hid herself from me. Why? Why didn’t she want me to know she was there? Had I left well enough alone, Kali would’ve never been taken.
Buried alive.
Fuck.
Kali was right moving away from me. No other women have been taken—that we know of—since she left. This was personal. My mom. Revenge. Hatred. But where does Shanna Clark fit into this picture?
I might not have put her in that grave, but this is all my fault.
CHAPTER 41
Kali
A door swings open, and my gaze locks on Martinez walking toward me. The Texas Rangers found Pearl two counties over from Blackburn, headed north, and brought her in just a little while ago. He’s only been in there with Pearl for five minutes. While he allowed Paxton to watch the interview, I had to wait out in the hallway.
“What’s wrong?” I ask as he approaches.
He shakes his head. “She won’t talk until she talks to you first.”
I bite my lip. A part of me needs to hear what she has to say while the other part is being shredded at the mere thought that the woman I looked at like a mother had something to do with my nightmare.
Yet, she might tell me where Ari is.
I stand, taking a deep breath. “Okay.”
