Page 61 of Not This Night

"Cut the crap, Joe!" Rachel barked, slamming her palm against the dash for emphasis. Her mind raced to connect the dots—Lucy's cold, lifeless body sprawled beside Miguel's in the opulence of their mansion, a scene she couldn't shake from her memory.

"Think, Joe! What did he have on her?" Rachel drilled down harder, her piercing gaze fixed unblinkingly on the man cuffed in the backseat.

"Dammit, I don't know!" Big Joe shouted, rattling his restraints against the car door. "Just that it'd break her heart or something sappy like that."

Heartbreak. Murder. The words echoed hollowly in Rachel's thoughts. She pressed her lips into a thin line, the wheels turning behind her steely gaze. Lucy Thompson's death was no coincidence, and neither was her connection to Charlie. The puzzle pieces were falling into place, but the picture was far from complete.

The red truck. It came to Rachel in flashes, the crimson blur at the scene, the stench of spilled blood mixing with Texas dust.

“What color is Charlie’s truck?” she demanded.

“Red,” Big Joe said.

Rachel hissed in frustration. She was hoping for something else. Something they could act out. The APB was out, but Charlie was on the run.

"Never could've done it," Big Joe said, his tone laced with a conviction that didn't reach his eyes.

“What’s that?” Rachel asked.

He said it again, more firmly, “Never could have done it.”

“Done what?”

“Kill.”

“What do you know about killing?”

He scowled. “You rangers come here, because those dead rich folks?”

“You know about that?”

“News.”

Rachel stared at him, and he stared back just as sullenly.

"Right." The linchpin was the blackmail, but she didn’t have enough yet. Big Joe needed to talk.

"Lucy and Miguel... Think. What did Charlie have on them?"

"Beats me." Big Joe's shoulders lifted in a half-hearted shrug, a silent admission of ignorance—or deceit.

"Beats you," Rachel echoed, her frown etching deeper lines across her brow. She chewed on the inside of her cheek, the taste of iron filling her mouth as she bit down too hard. Lucy Thompson hadn’t just been killed; she’d been silenced. But for what?

"Dammit."

“Let me out,” Big Joe said.

“You tell me everything?” she asked.

“Yes. Now keep your word. Let me out.”

Rachel hesitated only a moment.

She sucked in a harsh breath, her nails digging into the padded dashboard. "Ethan," she barked suddenly, causing him to startle at the sharpness in her voice. "Pull over."

He shot her an incredulous look. "You sure, Rae?"

"I'm sure," she snapped, her gaze fixated on the disappearing horizon, the encroaching twilight casting long shadows over her taut features.

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