I wanted to laugh at the sense of betrayal I couldn’t shake as I tried to accept the fact that my father had hired people to kill me. After all he’d done to me, not to mention that I’d fully accepted that he would kill me himself when he got out of jail, here I was, hurt that he’d decided to not even waste his time getting his hands dirty by killing me himself.
God, I really was a fucked-up mess.
Jace drove the car around the back of the property and pulled it into an old barn. “You can get out,” he said to me as he climbed out of the car. I did as he said and then watched as he worked to disassemble the rifle he’d used earlier after we’d driven away from the cabin. He placed the gun in a case, then grabbed it and a small bag from the trunk.
“Can you help me?” he asked as he put the things on the ground and then reached for a tarp. I helped him spread it over the car. Just before he covered it completely, he removed the license plates from the car and tucked them in the bag.
I followed him from the barn and back toward the front of the house. I thought we were just switching cars, but realized I was wrong when we began heading toward the large dock.
“Where are we?” I finally asked.
“Elkton, Maryland.”
It was an answer, but not really the one I wanted. “I thought we were headed west,” I said.
“We need to get more lost than originally planned,” Jace responded. “Water’s as good a place as any.” He pointed at a large boat bobbing gently on the water at the end of the dock.
“Is that your boat?”
Jace shook his head. “My friend’s,” he said as he motioned to the man watching us from the front of the house.
“How do you know him?”
“He was my spotter.”
“Spotter? What’s that?”
“He monitored things like wind, trajectory, and temperature and helped identify targets for me.”
It took me a moment to understand what he was saying. “What, you mean like for a sniper? Is that what you were?” I remembered the big gun and the scope on the top of it.
“Yeah,” was all Jace said. From his tone, I gathered it wasn’t his favorite thing to talk about. “Dalton,” – he motioned to the guy – “got out about a year after I did. He bought this place a few years back. I come out here sometimes when I need to decompress.”
I glanced back at Dalton. He was about the same age as Jace and had black hair that was a little longer on top and shorter on the sides. His stance was rigid while his eyes stayed on Jace as we made our way toward the dock, and I couldn’t help but wonder why. Did the two men have a history that went beyond their time in the military?
I hated the burn of jealousy that went through me.
“So, what, he’s agreed to let you use his boat? Just like that?”
Jace glanced at me, then at Dalton. “Just like that,” he agreed.
I fell silent as I followed Jace onto the dock. The boat was big, but not like the fancy yachts I’d seen at the marina my father had kept his own fishing boat in. Jace helped me climb aboard and while he got the engine started, I explored the boat. It was surprisingly well appointed with a small kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. The bedroom had a full-sized bed in it, as well as a television and a DVD player. Several plastic bags sat on top of the bed. Curiosity got the best of me and I looked through a couple. There was an assortment of new clothes in the bags, in two different sizes. There were toiletries too. A glance in the kitchen showed the fridge was full, as were the few cabinets.
I went above deck in time to see Jace throwing off the lines securing the boat to the dock. Jace gave Dalton a final wave before maneuvering the boat out into open water. I knew we were likely on Chesapeake Bay. My father, Nick, and I had spent a lot of time fishing in Chesapeake Bay. It was only later that the fishing trips had stopped being about fishing.
I felt a wave of cold go through me and I automatically wrapped my arms around myself as I made my way to the front of the boat. It was late spring so the weather wasn’t particularly cold, but as the boat picked up speed, the wind bit at my skin.
I wasn’t sure where on the bay we were at, but I felt some of the anxiety start to ease as we got farther out onto the water. There were other boats around, but it wasn’t particularly busy, and seeing regular people just going about their day as they fished or just explored all the little inlets made things feel a little bit more normal. It was easier to pretend that the events of the morning had just been some hellish nightmare.