“I like her. Don’t screw it up.”
“It might be too late.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I care about Janet. A lot. But her life is here, and I haven’t lived in one place since I was sixteen years old.”
Charlie sighed. “Todd, I’m going to tell you something I should have long ago but you weren’t ready to hear. It’s time to stop running.”
“I’m not running. I like moving. Seeing new places and exploring the world.”
“You’re running,” she answered flatly. “From your parents’ car accident, from their deaths, from building a home and a life because you’re scared to lose it all again.”
He took a step back as if she’d slugged him. Each word burrowed deep into his heart and lodged there, ripping open scars he’d buried but not forgotten.
“Todd, the life you’ve been living is a Band-Aid, but it’s not for the long haul. Your parents wouldn’t want you to be alone forever. God doesn’t either. Maybe He put Janet in your life because it’s time for a change.”
A thousand frames of his parents flickered through his mind in a matter of seconds. Their happiness so solid and real…until it wasn’t. Gone, snuffed out by a drunk driver, within seconds.
He swallowed the lump in his throat. “I don’t know if I can.”
She pointed to the window. “You see that?”
He turned. Inside, Janet sat on the couch. Her curly hair was pulled back from her exquisite face and the cutest creases formed between her brows as she studied something on her phone. Next to her, Callie sat close, the dog’s head resting on her owner’s lap. All around them was the chaos of renovations. A ladder in the corner, his toolbox on the floor.
“That’s your future,” Charlie said. “Right in front of you. A woman who loves you. Someone you can build a life with.”
His breath hitched.
“If you’re not brave enough to grab onto it with both hands…” She shook her head. “Well, more the fool you.”
Nine
“Are you sure about this?” Janet adjusted the goggles on her face and frowned. “I do want the wall gone, but I wasn’t expecting to do it tonight.”
“It’s better than sitting around waiting for the phone to ring.” Todd picked up the sledgehammer and handed it to her. “We’ve forwarded the information to the state police and the chief. There’s nothing more we can do for Valerie right now, which leaves us twiddling our thumbs.”
The man had a point. She tested the weight of the sledgehammer. Todd took several steps back, and she slammed into the drywall. It caved. She did it again and again, until she was panting and sweat dripped down her back.
“Feel good?” He grinned at her, his dimple winking.
“Yes.” She smiled back, grabbed a piece of drywall, and ripped it off. “You were right. I needed to take my mind off everything.”
“And the best part is, after we’re done, we get to make something better.”
Janet yanked another piece of drywall down. She peered into the space. “Hey, Todd, there’s a room inside the wall and…is that a door in the floor?”
She ran to get a flashlight while Todd tore down enough of the wall so they could get inside the hidden room. It wasn’t big, maybe six feet by six feet, just enough to hide the metal door in the floor. Something tugged at the back of Janet’s memory, but she couldn’t quite catch it.
“How weird.” Todd bent down and grasped the handle. The hinges creaked and groaned, revealing a set of metal stairs. “A root cellar? Or a basement?”
“They aren’t common in Texas.” She gasped. “Jail! Todd, that’s what Valerie was trying to tell me.”
“You lost me.”
“This property used to be the site of the old Sweetgrass courthouse, and the jail was on
the opposite side of the road. They built a passageway under Main Street to transport the prisoners from one to the other for safety reasons. When a hurricane took out the entire town, it moved locations to the present-day one.” She shone the flashlight into the gaping hole in the floor. “This must be the old passageway, and there should be a door on the other side hidden somewhere on the Bertrands’ property.”
He inhaled sharply. “It’s where Valerie is being held.”
Janet tossed aside her goggles and started down the stairs. Todd grabbed her arm.
“Hold on. We aren’t going anywhere until we tell the police.”
“Who? The chief is the closest, and he hasn’t been much help so far. Besides, we don’t know for sure she’s down there. We just think she is.”
The chief wasn’t going to rush over on a hunch, and Janet wasn’t going to leave Valerie down there for one minute more than necessary.
“Wait.” Todd disappeared from view and came back with a large knife. “Let me lead the way.”
She shone the light on the stairs, guiding his path, before following him down. The corridor was wide enough for three men, and Janet had no trouble imagining two jailers, with a prisoner walking between them, traveling the route. Their footsteps whispered against the concrete and spiderwebs clung to the corners. She shivered as the dampness embraced her.
Todd adjusted his hold on the knife. “Make sure you stay behind me.”
Together, they crept down the corridor. Sweetgrass Jail was stamped into the concrete at regular intervals. Dust particles danced in the beam of the flashlight. Janet’s nose burned and she scrunched it, stifling the urge to sneeze.
Todd drew up short. He placed a finger to his lips before reaching out to click off the flashlight. Darkness enveloped them. Her heart thundered against her ribs, and she held her breath, straining to hear.
Faint voices filtered down the corridor.
Some decisions were instinctive.
Continuing forward held risks, but so did returning back to Janet’s house. There was no guarantee they wouldn't be discovered either way. There was also Valerie to consider. Todd had promised to protect Janet, but he also wouldn’t leave a vulnerable woman on her own
