Page 38 of The Truth

“Great. I’ll tell the wife there will befoodfor her tonight. She may or may not eat, though. She’s getting finicky lately.”

“How is she doing?” Gunn asked. Cam had married Kyra Dillon, a few months later her brother Jake—the librarian—had married Cam’s youngest sister Celia. Kyra had almost died during a case gone bad. It was one that wouldn’t be forgotten in Value anytime soon.

Gunn and his brothers had been a part of the search crews looking for her and Bailey Addy, the woman who had married the sheriff, too. Both Bailey and Kyra had suffered far more than any human being should have. Sometimes, the evil in the world threatened to overwhelm him. Why did evil always target the most innocent?

That was a question he had yet to answer.

“She is in the million months pregnant andverycranky stage. She nearly chewed my face off this morning, and I was completelyinnocent. I seriously love that woman, and I tell her that all the time, but she nearly chewed off myface. Kimmy is with Grandma Verity, though. They are keeping an eye on Kyra for me. She wanted to come check on Ronnie herself. She’s a bit stubborn, my woman.”

“Pot, kettle, Cam. She says the same about you,” the small redheaded woman said. She was looking at Emerson—who was looking away from her. Deliberately.

Gunn could feel the awkward tension between them.

Gunn looked at her. “I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve met.”

“I’m Leina Chalmers, with PAVAD. I am… also… ”

“Leina was Rei’s true target,” Emerson said, almost harshly, as Adrian’s granddaughter climbed over Emerson’s feet and babbled something at him before waving at Leina. “She has the kids from… that day, Gunn.”

That explained the hurt in both their eyes. Those little girls haunted Emerson. Gunn suspected they would until Emerson let himself truly findpeacewith what had happened.

“I see. I am sorry for what JD Rei did,” Gunn said. “That is not representative of our church at all. Please understand that.”

“I do. I am a profiler with the FBI. Cam and I work REY—Runaway & Endangered Youth. We’ve been working for a few years to try to track the victims of JD Rei.” She looked atEmerson again. “I was hoping you would be willing to help us with that.”

“And the church board wanted some of us not connected to assist. And… they have asked that Gunn and I help oversee,” Adrian said. Gunn knew Adrian had taken on a major role after what had happened to Emerson’s church. The head of the Hope Life Church denomination had stepped down amidst what had happened—claiming it was best for the church as a whole to have a fresh start. Every church that hadn’t been implicated had been asked to vote what they thought and wanted. “Agent Lake called me last week, and when I learned he had family here and was already planning to be down here… that’s one reason we asked you to come here and speak with the elders.”

The elders were located in Finley Creek now, Gunn had assumed that was why Emerson had been summoned. It had been the darkest time in his church’s history.

Adrian was voted in almost unanimously to be the acting head of Hope Life Church countrywide. Adrian was not taking that responsibility lightly.

“We thought… maybe meeting away from Evalyn would be a little easier, considering. For… both of us,” Leina said.

Gunn wasn’t blind to the truth here. There were undercurrents. He just didn’t know what they were.

But he was going to find out.

“So… what is it you want to know?” Emerson asked.

“We are still looking for six people,” Cam said. “Tracking them, and… well… they were the ones responsible for setting up thedealsafter young women between the ages of twelve and twenty-four disappeared.”

Gunn felt sick at what Ronnie’s brother was saying.

“How many girls have been found? Please tell me you’ve found them all?” Gunn asked. Twenty-four years old. Greer wasn’t twenty-four just yet. Ayla and Hala were twenty-four.

That just sat on his soul for a long moment.

“We’ve found most, Gunn. We’ve found most.”

“Cam has been searching for them since… what happened in Evalyn. He’s located almost all of them now. Or… we at least know what happened to them,” the redheaded woman at Cam’s left said. “Some… like my brother’s late wife passed away. But from what we can find, it was natural causes.”

“How many?” Emerson asked.

“Eighty-four, from… about the time my brother was first targeted, until the week your church burned,” Leina said. “For an average of a quarter of a million dollars a year. James David Rei banked most of that money in personal accounts. He wasn’t doing what he did because of some corrupt religious ideology, Emerson. Nothing you ever did convinced him to even start, or caused this. You were just a kid when he began. He targeted Lance, because he saw a boy who had no sense of belonging at home. That was our parents’ doing. That was how he operated. By targeting boys and young women who were alone. Because there was real profit in it for him. He had more than four million dollars in his account. And we suspect there was more, for the cult specifically. We’re tracking that now—well, Cam is. As avictim,I’m not allowed.”

“Eighty-four, and you’ve found all but four?” Adrian asked. “That’s rather amazing, isn’t it?”

“Cam has made it a personal mission,” Leina said. “He’s very good at finding missing people, especially women and kids. One of the best I’ve ever seen.”

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