“Who was in the first truck?”
Dean gave a name.
Cole knew it.
Raymond Voss.
Local contractor.
Father had been a notorious bookmaker decades ago.
Raymond now owned half a dozen trucking and demolition companies.
Cole looked at Ellis.
“Tell dispatch.”
Ellis relayed everything.
A deputy reported they were seven minutes away.
Cole turned toward Maya.
He signed:
We’re going to your dad.
She nodded immediately.
Then pointed toward Dean.
Him too?
Cole looked at his brother.
“No.”
Maya understood enough from his face.
Cole signed:
He stays here with Ellis until police arrive.
Dean did not argue.
Maybe because he was tired.
Maybe because for the first time in fifteen years, he understood he had no right to control what happened next.
Cole grabbed his rain jacket.
Maya followed.
Jonah objected.
“You’re not taking a kid into whatever this is.”
Cole stopped.
He was right.
Maya immediately saw the discussion.
She signed sharply:
I’m going.
Cole answered:
Dangerous.
Dad is there.
Police coming.
Dad told me to come back.
Cole stared.
She continued.
He will think I am hurt if I don’t.
Cole could not argue with that.
They took Jonah’s SUV rather than motorcycles.
Maya sat in the back.
Cole drove.
The rain turned the highway into black glass.
For the first thirty seconds, nobody spoke.
Then Maya tapped Cole’s shoulder.
He glanced at the rearview mirror.
She signed carefully so he could watch in short pieces.
Why didn’t Dad visit you?
Cole’s hands tightened around the steering wheel.
He answered aloud at first, then remembered.
At the next red light, he signed:
I hurt him.
Maya watched.
How?
Cole thought about giving a child a softer version.
Then remembered the life she had already lived that night.
I believed something bad about him when I should have believed him first.
She frowned.
Did you say sorry?
Cole almost laughed.
Children always found the shortest path to the hardest question.
He signed:
I never got the chance.
Maya looked out the window.
Then:
Maybe tonight.
Cole swallowed.
The light changed.
They drove.
The abandoned Harper gas station appeared less than a minute later.
Dark canopy.
Broken sign.
Weeds pushing through cracked pavement.
Behind the old building sat a battered Ford pickup at an angle against a drainage ditch.
Driver’s door open.
Headlights dead.
Cole stopped hard.
Maya reached for the handle.
“Wait.”
She could not hear him.
Cole caught her sleeve gently.
He signed:
I go first.
She shook her head.
Together.
Cole saw Hannah again.
That same stubborn jaw.