Chapter 3

Lonny Pryor got back to his apartment just after daybreak. He'd driven straight to the ER to get his knee fixed and sat stoically through it all while the doctor and nurse razzed him about the pantyhose bandage as they applied surgical glue to close the cut. He nodded and laughed with them and was grateful for the prescription for pain pills when he walked out.

His visit to Billy Eggers had gone south, but he thought he'd cleaned up the witness. He didn't know who she was, but he figured she'd bleed out or exposure would finish the job. He entered his apartment, weary to the bone. Stowed the handgun in his safe, then called in. The phone rang three times before it was answered.

"Hello?"

"This is Gunny."

"Yeah?"

"Shit happened," he said.

Junior Henley paused. "What kind of shit?"

"Eggers got violent. We got into a heated argument. I pulled my gun. We wrestled with it, and it went off. He's dead."

"Dead! You weren't supposed to kill him!" Junior shouted.

"Yeah, well, it happened. And that's not all. There was a woman at the house, and I didn't know it until I saw her running to his car. I gave chase, but I had to run her down across two counties to shut her up. You never told me he had a woman."

"Son of a bitch! He didn't have a woman. What did she look like?"

"A skinny little blond with curly hair."

"That's his sister, or should I say, ‘She was his sister'? So, she's out of the picture, too?"

"She is now," Gunny said.

"You're sure?" Junior asked.

"Well, I chased her through a freaking forest in a rainstorm and shot her in the back," Gunny said.

"What did you do with the body?"

"Nothing. I missed getting struck by lightning by about fifty feet. I messed up my knee and got my ass out of there. She'd already wrecked the car. She was disoriented and walking in circles when I caught up to her," Gunny said.

"How the hell did you find her?"

"Eggers had a tracker app on his phone for his own car. All I had to do was follow the blip."

"What did you do with the phone?" Junior asked.

"Busted it into pieces and threw it out the window on the way home."

Junior sighed. "Yeah, okay. What about the gun?"

"Yes. I'll bring it over tomorrow."

"No. You bring it over now. It's Dad's. I need it back," Junior said.

Gunny frowned. "Dammit, Junior! I just got the cut in my knee glued shut. I hurt like hell, and I'm beat, and you gave me a registered gun? What the fuck's wrong with you?"

The line went dead in his ear.

He went back to the safe and got the gun, then stopped at the kitchen table and broke it down, wiped his prints from every piece, and then wiped the ammo before reassembling the gun and reloading it. Then he hobbled back to his car and drove all the way across town and into the ritzy part of the city to Henley's estate, pulled up in front of the iron gates across the driveway, then waited.

Moments later, the gates opened. He drove through, then around to the delivery entrance, got out with the gun, and rang the buzzer.

Seconds later, the door opened. Junior Henley was in the doorway. Gunny handed the gun over. "Are we good?" he asked.

"We're good," Junior said.

Gunny went back to the truck and drove home, but Junior's troubles were just beginning. He had to get rid of his father's gun and deal with the wrath of it going missing, and he had to let him know what had happened with the visit to Eggers. The lucky part for Junior was Daddy wasn't home, so he loaded everything up in his Porsche, made a call, and left the property.

***

Johnny Knight was groggy from the pain pills he'd taken after lunch and lay down to sleep about midafternoon. Carey had tucked him in and told him she loved him, and that's the last thing he remembered until he woke to a dark house. Surprised that it was so late, he rolled over to check the time and frowned. It was fifteen minutes after 3:00 a.m. and Carey wasn't in bed beside him. He threw back the covers and sat up on the side of the bed until he got his bearings, and then grabbed his crutches and stood. The room was spinning, but it would stop, so he waited until it did and then went to the bathroom, sloshed some water on his face, and opened the bottle of pain meds. Only two left.

He replaced the lid and put it back in the cabinet. There was no money for refills, and the titanium rods and screws in his leg weren't going away. He'd been a lineman for the electric company for almost ten years, and the fall he'd taken should have killed him. Instead, it had shattered his right leg from the knee down. The bones would knit back together, but he'd never climb another power pole or walk with ease again.

They'd been living off of Carey's tips from waitressing while waiting for workman's compensation to start paying out, and she wasn't getting paid for five more days. He wasn't sure he could hold out that long without pain meds, but he was about to find out.

He grabbed his crutches and headed for the living room, thinking Carey must have opted to sleep on the sofa to give him room in the bed. But the living room was empty, and when he began turning on the lights, it didn't take long for him to realize her purse and phone were gone.

He hobbled back to the bedroom to get his phone, then sat back down on the side of the bed to call her and realized she'd left him a voicemail.

"Johnny, I caught the bus to Billy's to borrow some money to get your meds refilled. He was just about to give me a ride home when someone drove up. Johnny gave me his car keys, told me to hide and, if I heard gunshots or fighting, to take his car and run."

When she paused to take a breath, Johnny's heart stopped, too. The panic in her voice was more than he could bear.

"There was a horrible argument, a lot of shouting, and I heard Billy say something that sounded like gunny or money , and the man said something about new men in the territory, then sounds of a fight and furniture breaking, then a gunshot. I ran out the back door, jumped in Billy's car, and drove away. I know the man was following me, but the sun went down and now I'm driving in this terrible rainstorm. I don't know where I am, and I think Billy's dead, or he would have called."

When she choked on a sob and paused, he wanted to cry with her, and then she continued.

"I think I took a wrong turn. I just wanted you to know. I'll try to call again, but the cell service is spotty. I think I'm in the mountains. I love you."

Johnny Knight was so scared he couldn't breathe. His hands were trembling as he called her number over and over, but it kept going to voicemail, so he called his best friend, Thomas Wheaton. Tom was a cop. He would know what to do. But the phone rang and rang, and just as he thought it was going to go to voicemail, he heard Tom's voice, short and bordering on aggravation.

"Damn it, Johnny. This better be good."

"I just woke up. Carey's gone and there's a hell of a voicemail from her on my phone. She was at Billy's. She thinks Billy's dead, and she's on the run from the man who shot him. She's driving Billy's car. She drove into a rainstorm in the dark and she's lost. It's all on the voicemail. I don't know how to report this. I can't fuckin' walk, and our car is in the shop. I need help."

Tom was already out of bed and pulling on clothes.

"I'm on the way. Hang in there, buddy. I need to hear the message to figure out who to report this to, and we'll go from there. Give me fifteen minutes. Unlock your front door and turn on the porch light."

"Thank you," Johnny said, and then the line went dead.

He hobbled to the front door on his crutches, unlocked it, then turned on the porch light. He was hurting, but he wasn't taking anything that would put him to sleep, so he popped three over-the-counter pain pills and sat down to wait.

***

Thomas Wheaton pulled up into the driveway at Johnny's house, got out on the run, and when he walked in the house and saw the look on his buddy's face, his heart sank.

"Have you heard back from her yet?"

Johnny shook his head and gave him the phone.

Tom listened to the message, and then handed it back and pulled his notebook and pen out of his back pocket. "What's Billy's address?" he asked, then wrote it down when Johnny told him. "What time did Carey leave?"

"I don't know for sure. She helped me into bed a little after three p.m., I think. I'd taken pain pills and fell asleep. I woke up to this message, but she sent it just after eight p.m., and I didn't wake up until just before I called you. I tried to call her over and over, but it just goes to voicemail."

"What kind of car does he drive?" Tom asked.

"Last I knew, it was a white 2019 Jeep Cherokee," Johnny said.

"Billy's got priors," Tom said. "If he's dead, it's likely drug related."

"Oh, hell, we both knew that. But he's all the family Carey has, and Billy practically raised her. He worships the ground she walks on."

"Are you out of pain meds?" Tom asked.

"I have two left. I've been saving them for when it gets really bad."

"Shit, Johnny. You could have asked me. Sit tight. We'll deal with your meds in a minute. Right now, I need to call all this in."

Johnny leaned back and closed his eyes as Tom walked out of the room to make the call, but he couldn't stop the tears. Carey was his life, and he was scared to death that hers was already over. He could hear Tom's voice in the other room, but let the sounds roll over him. All he wanted was for Carey to walk in the door with that beautiful smile on her face.

A few minutes later, Tom came back. "Here's what's happening," he said. "The first thing they're doing is a welfare check at Billy Eggers's residence. If he's dead, they'll go from there. We put out a BOLO for his car. And the detectives are running the name Gunny through the system on the off chance there's actually someone in the system with that alias. We'll see how many hits we get on that. Now tell me where the bottle is with your pain meds."

"In the bathroom medicine cabinet," Johnny said.

Tom headed for the bedroom and then into the en suite bathroom. When he came back, he laid the two remaining pain pills on the table.

"I'm going to get this refilled. I'll be back."

Johnny wiped the tears off his face and nodded. "I owe you."

"You owe me nothing, John Knight. Nothing. We're friends. We'll get through this together. Understood?"

Johnny nodded.

"Take the pain meds," Tom said.

"Can't. Not until I know what's happened to my girl."

"Jesus, Johnny. It could take—"

Johnny looked up.

Tom sighed. "Right. I think there's a twenty-four-hour pharmacy not too far from here. I'll be back as soon as I can. Do you need help getting back to bed?"

"No. I can manage. But take my house key with you. It's in that dish on the hall table. Lock the door when you leave."

***

The welfare check at Billy Eggers's house yielded exactly what Carey had described. The front door was ajar. The living room was a disaster, and Billy's body was lying in a pool of congealed blood. The back door to the house was open, and his car was missing. Crime scene investigators were called to the scene, as was the county coroner. The can of Pepsi that Carey had been drinking was bagged along with everything else, including a spent cartridge shell.

***

It was just after daybreak when Annie Cauley left her house on Pope Mountain to make her daily drive down into Jubilee. There would be people waiting in line for her baked goods by 6:00 a.m., and she needed to have Granny Annie's Bakery open for business. She knew her daughter, Laurel, would have driven in before daylight and already be at the shop setting dough to rise.

She hadn't slept well because of last night's storm. The rain had been a deluge, and when she walked out onto the back porch to watch the sunrise, she could hear the water coming off Big Falls and roaring down the creek that ran through Jubilee, even from this far away.

She and her husband, John, were one of the families living highest on Pope Mountain, so the drive down every morning was a long one. She was coming up on the road leading to her nephew Cameron's house when she caught a glimpse of a white vehicle off into the trees on the south side of the road. It was obvious it had crashed, and the passenger door was standing open.

Annie slammed on the brakes and killed the engine, then got out on the run, taking care not to slide as she moved down into the ditch. Her worst fear was that she'd find a body. She saw a purse lying on the floorboard, but the car was empty. Knowing better than to disturb anything that might turn into evidence, she ran back to her car and made a quick call to Cameron. It rang a couple of times before he answered.

"Hello."

"Cameron, this is Annie. There's a wrecked car off in the trees a couple of hundred yards up from your driveway, but no driver in sight. Do you know anything about this?"

"No! It rained so hard last night the only thing I could hear was Ghost whining. He hates storms. So obviously no one has reported this, or the police and a wrecker would already be on the scene. You call it in. I'll take Ghost and see if he can track whoever was in it."

"Yes, okay, but I can't imagine how there'd be a scent left after all that rain," Annie said.

"It won't wash it away. It just disperses it a little. Ghost is good. Maybe we'll get lucky. Thanks for letting me know, Auntie." Cameron said.

"Of course," Annie said, and after they disconnected, she called the Jubilee police.

"Jubilee PD, Sergeant Winter speaking."

"Walter, this is Annie Cauley. I just found a wrecked car off in the trees just up the road from Cameron's driveway. The car is empty; the door is wide open. I saw belongings in the car but no sign of the driver. It looks like a bad accident. Has anyone been picked up from here in the night?"

"Let me check the log," Walter said, and then came back. "No, ma'am. There was not. I'll get dispatch on this. Thanks for calling it in," he said.

"Sure thing, and Cameron's taking Ghost to the crash site to see if they can find the missing driver," Annie added.

"I'll make a note," Walter said.

Satisfied she'd done all she could, Annie continued her trip into town, as Cameron headed for the bedroom to change his clothes. Ghost sensed an outing and followed him.

Cameron's wife, Rusty, was getting their little boy, Mikey, dressed, when she heard Cameron coming toward the bedrooms.

"We're in here," she said.

He paused in the doorway to Mikey's room, and couldn't help smiling. Their son was growing so fast. He'd be in first grade this year and, like every other Pope, was tall for his age. But he was arguing with his mother about going out to play.

"Michael! What did Mama say?" Cameron asked.

Mikey ducked his head. "Too wet to go outside."

"Then why are you arguing with her? You're not in charge around here, boy. You do what Mama says, understand?"

Mikey frowned, but the tone in his daddy's voice was the one that meant business. He nodded.

"And what do you say to Mama?" Cameron prompted.

Mikey looked up and smiled at Rusty. "Mama's pretty."

Cameron grinned.

Rusty snorted. "Lord. Like father, like son."

"Well, you are pretty, so there's no arguing that," Cameron said, and gave her a quick hug. "On another note, Aunt Annie just called. Somebody wrecked their car just up the road from our driveway, but nobody's in it. She's already called the police and a wrecker, but I'm going to take Ghost and see if we can figure out where the driver went."

Rusty frowned. "Oh no! I hope it's just a case of someone picking them up and already taking them into Jubilee."

"Me too, but I need to check. If the driver was injured, there's no telling how disoriented they could have been, or how far they might have wandered into the woods."

"Yes, I understand, but be careful," Rusty said.

Cameron slid his arms around her and nuzzled the back of her neck. "Always. I'm taking my sat phone, and I have Ghost. We'll be fine."

A few minutes later he went out the front door with Ghost on a leash and headed up their driveway. Once they got to the road, they turned left and started walking up the mountain. It didn't take but a few minutes to reach the wreck, and then he jumped the ditch with Ghost and headed for the car.

Like Annie, the first thing he saw was the purse lying on the floorboard. But he wasn't as cautious as Annie. He wanted to know who he was looking for, opened it, found a wallet, and the driver's license for a young blonde woman named Carey Eggers. He put everything back in the purse, then let Ghost get the scent.

"Seek, Ghost, seek!" The giant German shepherd whined as his ears came up.

Cameron dropped the purse where he'd found it and gave Ghost his head. When the dog went straight into the trees, it answered one question for Cameron. Carey Eggers was somewhere in the woods.

Ghost turned into the heat-seeking missile that he was and started running, keeping Cameron on the move behind him. Twice, the dog was confused by the scent and circled until he keyed in on it again.

By the way Ghost was tracking, Cameron feared the woman was disoriented, or she would have had no reason to go into the trees. She would have either stayed in the car or started walking down the road.

Then Ghost whined and began straining at the leash to go faster. Cameron unclipped it from the shepherd's collar and let him go, then had to run even faster to keep up. Minutes later, Ghost disappeared, and Cameron kept running toward the place he'd seen him last.

He was coming upon a small clearing when he saw something on the ground up ahead. A cell phone! Then he heard Ghost whining, followed the sound, and walked up on his dog lying with his head across the legs of a woman's body.

Damn it. "Good boy," Cameron said as he knelt beside the body and laid his hand on Ghost's head. He was about to reach to check her pulse when he saw the bullet hole in the back of her shirt. "What the hell?"

He slid his hand down the side of her neck and was shocked she had a pulse. It was faint and thready, but she was alive. He rolled her over and saw bruises on her face, a cut on her forehead, and when he pushed her shirt aside to look for an exit wound, he saw bruises on her belly. That had to be from the wreck.

"You ran into the trees because someone was after you, didn't you, Carey? Hang in there, girl. I'm calling for help."

He grabbed his sat phone to call for an ambulance and then called the county sheriff's office.

***

Sheriff Rance Woodley was writing up a maintenance request to get plumbing repaired in two of the jail cells when the dispatcher buzzed his desk. He picked up the receiver.

"This is Woodley."

"Sir, we just received a call from Cameron Pope on Pope Mountain. He and his dog found a woman in the woods up above his house. He thought he was looking for the driver of a wrecked car up in the trees, but when he and his dog found her, she had a bullet wound in her back. She has head wounds and bruises, likely from the wreck. He thought she was dead, but then realized she still had a pulse. He's already called for an ambulance to take her in to Jubilee Hospital, but since she was shot in our jurisdiction, we caught the case."

"Shot! Well, damn," Woodley said, remembering another shooting up on the mountain a couple of years back. "Okay…get the directions to the crime lab and get them on the scene, dispatch a couple of officers, and call a tow service for the wrecked car, too. I'll be en route to the hospital to see if she's regained consciousness, and then I'll contact the team on the ground."

"Yes, sir," the dispatcher said, and disconnected.

Woodley glanced at the paperwork. The plumbing request was going to have to wait. He picked up the phone.

***

Jubilee Police Chief Sonny Warren was at his computer when his phone rang. He hit Save and then reached for the receiver.

"Hello."

"Sonny, it's Rance. I'm about to invade your world again. Just got a call about a shooting victim in the woods just up from Cameron Pope's place."

Sonny frowned. "Who found her?"

"Cameron and his dog. I'm told your ambulance crew will be picking her up, but I'm towing in the car the driver wrecked before it was abandoned. I'm on my way to Jubilee in the hopes she regains consciousness. She left a purse in the car. Cameron checked the ID. It matches the woman he found. Her name is Carey Eggers. When he found her, he thought she was dead, so she's probably not in good condition. Do me a favor. It'll take me a while to get there, so would you please go meet the ambulance when they bring her in and see if she's talking? I don't want to lose the chance of getting any info in case she passes. You know the drill."

"Yes, I can do that," Sonny said.

"Thanks. I'll see you soon."

***

Sonny was in the ER when they brought in the woman from the wreck. She looked dead, so it was no wonder Cameron thought she was, and as soon as they had her stabilized, she went straight to surgery. Her condition was dire, and surgery was her only option for survival, so an interview was not going to happen. Disappointed, he sat down to wait, and shortly thereafter, Sheriff Woodley arrived in the lobby.

"Anything?" he asked as he sat down beside Sonny.

Sonny shook his head. "She's in bad shape. Never did regain consciousness before they took her to surgery."

"Well, thanks for covering for me. I'll take it from here," Rance said.

"No problem," Sonny said, then went back to the precinct, while the team from the county crime lab arrived on the scene of the accident.

Cameron took them back to the area where he found her. They bagged her cell phone and the flashlight she'd dropped, and bagged a shell casing found nearby, but the rain had destroyed any other signs or clues that might have been helpful.

***

A couple of hours later, Carey's surgeon, a doctor named Kline, came into the waiting room looking for the sheriff. There was only one man in the waiting room wearing a uniform, so he headed for him.

"Are you here for Carey Eggers?" Kline asked.

"Yes. I'm Sheriff Woodley. How is she?"

"I'm Dr. Kline, her surgeon. She's in recovery, but in critical condition and will be going straight to the ICU."

"Did she ever regain consciousness?" Woodley asked.

"No, and if she does regain consciousness, it's going to be a while before you can speak to her."

"Understood, but I'll be needing the clothes she was wearing to take back to the lab," Woodley said.

"When we saw the bullet wound, we assumed you would. They're already bagged. I'll have one of the nurses bring them to you," Dr. Kline said.

"Thanks," Woodley said. "And keep me updated on her condition. As soon as she wakes up, I need to talk to her."

Dr. Kline nodded and left, and a few minutes later, a nurse came looking for the sheriff.

"Sheriff Woodley? Dr. Kline asked me to bring these to you."

"Thank you," Woodley said. He left the hospital with the clothes and headed back to his office to turn them over to the lab.

***

It was midday when Woodley got back to his office and began going through the papers that had been left on his desk. Within moments, he came upon the BOLO regarding Billy Eggers's missing car. He immediately checked the report on the vehicle towed in and, when he realized it was the same one, called the contact number.

"Bowling Green PD. Detective Gardner speaking."

"Detective, this is Sheriff Woodley out of Jubilee, Kentucky. I just received your BOLO about a missing car belonging to a Billy Eggers. We towed that car off Pope Mountain this morning. It was wrecked during a rainstorm sometime last night."

"Who was driving it?" Gardner asked.

"A woman named Carey Eggers. Her purse and identification were found in the wrecked car, but the car was empty. However, we were notified later of a woman who was found unconscious up in the woods and it was her. She'd been shot."

"Shot! Damn," Gardner said. "Where is she now?"

"The hospital in Jubilee. She's undergone surgery. I don't know anything more. She has yet to regain consciousness."

"Thank you for your information. There are people who've been looking for her for hours," Gardner said.

"What happened?" Woodley asked.

"It appears she was a witness to her brother's murder. Looks like the killer ran her down."

The skin crawled on the back of Woodley's neck.

"Do you know who it was?"

"No, and I'd appreciate it if you didn't advertise the fact that she's still alive," Gardner said.

Woodley frowned. "I'll call the Jubilee PD and ask Chief Warren to make sure nothing is put in the local paper, but I can't promise word doesn't spread locally."

"Thanks," Gardner said. "If we can find the shooter, we'll let you know, and if she wakes up and is able to be interrogated, let me know."