Page 9 of One Last Promise

A former vice cop from Miami, one who knew Rigger and what he could do.

“Of course, honey. Mommy just needs to take care of . . . something. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Tillie pulled Hazel close, held her seven-year-old lanky body to hers, savoring her skinny arms around Tillie’s neck and the smell of shampoo and bubble bath. She was everything Tillie lived for.

Tillie met eyes with Roz, who stood behind her, arms folded over her barrel body. Their conversation an hour ago returned to her?—

“If I’d known Rigger was back and after you, I would have come home sooner.”

Tillie knew what it meant to Roz to visit her grandchildren, and frankly, she’d thought it was fine.

Thought she could handle Rigger, if it really was him that’d appeared at the Skyport Diner a month ago, looking for her.

She’d slipped out the back and returned home to scoop up Hazel, pay the sitter, and move them to a hotel.

But her money had run out while she was trying to figure out her next play, and that’s when they’d landed in the car and?—

“What are you going to do?”

Tillie couldn’t tell her. Couldn’t face the barrage of reasons why this might be a terrible idea. In her head, she saw no other way to bargain for her freedom. Hazel’s freedom.

So here she was, saying goodbye to her only treasure, the one reason she had for living. She pushed Hazel away and held her by the arms, meeting those green eyes. “Obey Grandma Roz. I’ll be back by morning, okay?”

Hazel nodded, but fear swept her expression, so Tillie held out her pinky.

Hazelhooked it and smiled.

“Okay, then.” She got up and lifted a hand to Roz, walking to the door.

“I got this. You be safe.”

Tillie swiped the moisture from her cheek and headed out into the twilight, something inside her jerking when she heard the lock click.

Rigger wasn’t going to take anything else from her, so help her. . . .

She got into her car, closed her eyes, and offered a foxhole prayer, although she doubted that anyone might be listening, and turned the engine over.

Someone might be listening, though, because the old Ford Focus started, and she let out her breath.

Then she pulled out and headed east, toward Eagle River.

It wasn’t a fancy house, and perhaps she should have sold it, but after her sister Pearl died . . . well, it was all they had of her. Memories, laughter, and stories embedded the painted panel walls, hard work in the remodeled kitchen, the bathroom, Hazel’s ocean-scape bedroom.

As Tillie drove up Highway 1 to Eagle River, the absurdity of her thinking wound around her chest, squeezed.

Of course Rigger would know to look for a house in the name of his former girlfriend. Deceased girlfriend, but Tillie had never changed the deed.

Stupid!She slammed her palm into the steering wheel.

Even more stupid was sticking around Anchorage for a month, hiding. She should have pointed her car south, headed toward the lower forty-eight. But she just as easily might have ended up on the side of the road, steam coming out of the radiator.

And then there was the whole driving through Canada part, and the necessity of a passport. And while hers might work, Hazel’s had expired two years ago, which meant that driving over the border was outof the question.

So, yeah, she’d fled, bunked in the Bird Creek Hotel, then over at the Puffin Inn, then the Ramada, and finally the one-star Mush Inn.

Cash only. But who knew what Rigger would do to track them down? After all . . . she had his treasure too.

Breathe.

She passed Cottonwood Park, and Fort Richardson, with its safe, cordoned fencing, the military housing that she’d walked away from.

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