Page 116 of Break My Fall

Lots and lots of bones.

“I think we found Johnstone’s burial ground.”

It was another eight hours before Gray finally walked into his house. Carlos was safely en route to Raleigh. It wasn’t safe for him to be anywhere near Neeson.

Faith Powell had arrived an hour after they walked out of the woods, and she’d brought friends. A forensics team from the State Bureau of Investigation, based out of the Asheville area, descended on the woods. They established a large perimeter and set up huge tarps over the most obvious burial sites. They worked until after dark getting the bodies out. In all, there were nine fresh corpses, including the man who’d shot Gray. There were three female bodies whose decomp indicated that their deaths had been in the last month. Gray suspected that they were the three women Carlos had told him about.

Everything else would have to wait for daylight. The rain had stopped around dark, but the temperature was going to drop into the teens tonight. The SBI team set up high-tech surveillance and planned to spend the night in a warm van, watching monitors, rather than in the forest with the skeletons.

Gray supported that decision.

Faith Powell had taken the opportunity to storm the castle. Literally. She’d brought a team with her, and they arrived at Marvin Johnstone’s home to find the place in chaos. She took him into custody, placidly ignoring his insistence that he would have herbadge, that her career was over, and that she would regret the day she took this action.

Dennis Kirby didn’t say a word when she arrested him and took four Neeson officers into custody.

Tonight, Faith and her team were headed back to Asheville, along with the prisoners. She would be back in the morning, and she’d probably wind up staying for several days. He would be glad for the help.

Gray stumbled into his kitchen. He was tired in a way he’d never been before. Everything hurt. Dr. Shaw had said to expect muscle pain from the hours of intense cold, and that he had a bruised rib from the bullet he’d taken to the chest. But otherwise, there was nothing wrong with him that sleep wouldn’t fix.

Except that he needed to see Meredith. He’d talked to her twice. The last time had been two hours earlier, and he’d told her he would see her tomorrow. She was fine. She’d warmed up nicely and her head had cleared. Dr. Shaw told her there would be no permanent damage, but she’d also prescribed a sedative because she was concerned about how keyed up Meredith was.

He glanced at his watch. 10:00 p.m. He could call her. If she’d taken the sedative, she’d be zonked. But if she answered—

He stepped into his living room and dropped the phone.

A fire roared in the fireplace. On his coffee table sat two steaming mugs. And in his oversized chair sat Meredith, wrapped up in blankets. “Hi.”

She threw the blankets off, but he reached her before she could stand. He pressed a knee into the seat beside her and kissed her.

There was no passion or intensity in this kiss. This was a kiss filled with relief and gratitude and the need to reassure his heart that she was alive. When they broke apart, she patted the seat beside her. “I won’t stay long. We both need to sleep. But I couldn’tlet the man who took a bullet for me be greeted by a cold, empty house.”

He settled in beside her, and when she curled into him, her head on his chest, he draped the blanket over them both and knew he was finally home.

THIRTY-TWO

MARCH

“Please, make yourselves comfortable.” Meredith indicated the chairs that ringed the firepit. They’d brought in extras for their guests so everyone had a seat available to them.

Tables were set up nearby with a chili bar, soft drinks, bottled waters, and brownies. It was simple but welcoming.

Dr. Sabrina Fleming-Campbell was easy to pick out of the crowd. She and Mo were in an intense discussion about computers that made no sense to anyone else. Sabrina’s husband, Adam, stood nearby talking to Donovan and Cassie about the scuba diving they were planning for their honeymoon.

FBI Special Agent Faith Powell was talking to Gray and Cal, while her husband, Secret Service Special Agent Luke Powell, and Bronwyn talked about the possibility of a presidential visit to The Haven.

Meredith leaned against the porch rail of her tiny house and thanked God, again, that she’d made it out of the forest alive.

Carlos joined her on the porch. A month after returning to his real life, he carried a somewhat haunted expression.

“Are you okay?”

He pulled in a long breath. “No.”

“Is there anything we can do to help?”

He pointed to the groups of people talking. “This helps. Normalcy. Good people who do the right thing. It helps me remember that I’m one of the good guys.”

“You’re definitely one of the good guys.”

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