Page 96 of Her Unending Horizon

He wouldn’t misbutton a shirt. His laces would be even.

What’s more, this stretch of 441 wasn’t a shortcut to anywhere Tyler should have been going. If he’d headed home to Alabama from the fight, he should have been on I-75, not winding deeper into the Smokies.

This was a set-up, pure and simple.

I covered Tyler’s body again, then Fletcher and I snugged the straps and rolled the stretcher to the back of the rig. The loading system whirred as it lifted him in.

I jogged back to the edge of the embankment. “Rankin!” I called down.

He looked up. “Yeah?”

“Anything in the cab with him?” I asked. “Gym bag, duffel, anything like that?”

Rankin shook his head. “Glove box had registration, insurance card, old fast food napkins. Passenger seat was empty. Floorboard, too. No bag. You need anything else, we’ve got interior pics.”

“Copy,” I said.

No bag. No gear. No sign of the clothes he’d fought in.

I turned and climbed into the back of the ambulance where Fletcher was hooking him in.

“Do me a favor, pull his wallet.” I asked Fletcher.

“Why? You heard Rankin, they got everything they need off the insurance card,”

“I know,” I said. “Humor me. Check his wallet. I want to see something.”

“What the fuck are you doing, Post?” he demanded. “You gonna rob the dead now? That a new hobby?”

“Just do it,” I said, sharper than I meant to. “Please. I’m betting there’s nothing but ten dollars in his wallet, but I’m hoping I’m wrong.”

He muttered a curse under his breath but reached for the kid’s back pocket, pulling the wallet free. He flipped it open, using the dome light to see.

“You were close,” he said after a second. “Seven dollars. That’s it. Couple of crumpled ones and a five. No credit cards, just a debit card and a picture of a pretty girl.”

My throat closed.

Em.

“I thought you wanted to see if he had a wad of cash,” Fletcher said. “What the hell is going on?”

“If this was legit,” I said, keeping my voice low and even. “Even a shitty underground purse would’ve left him with a few hundred in his pocket, minimum.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Fight money.”

Fletcher’s head whipped around. “This is one of your guys?” he asked. “From…those fights?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Tyler. From Alabama. Fought at a distillery last night. Took a bad knockout. Should’ve been in a hospital or on I-75 heading home. Instead, somehow he ends up alone on a mountain road he had no reason to be on, in a truck with no bag, wearing a shirt he couldn’t have buttoned that crooked on his best drunk day, with seven bucks in his wallet and no fight money.”

Silence stretched. I could almost hear Fletcher putting it together.

“I didn’t know,” I said. “I had a bad feeling. Now I’ve got more than that.”

“Are you saying this was staged?”

I nodded.