Page 101 of Deadly Target (Rocky Mountain Courage 2)

“So the man who took Missy made a mistake. He meant to take me.”

“Yes. They found us. They wanted you, baby. To take you from me and hold you hostage. I’m not sure what they had planned. But they took the wrong child.”

“Because that night, Missy wore my pink hat.” They thought Missy was Erica ... Erin. She thought she’d been part of only one tragic cold case—but now she at least had the answer to why Missy had been taken.

God, I need answers. Unfortunately, the answer to her question brought no peace.

“Yes.” Mom’s voice croaked with tears, but she swiped them away, then turned and started making her way through the tunnel again. Erin looked around her and thought about Delmar, spending years of his life to dig this tunnel—an escape—for her mother.

Mom continued, “And Dwayne took us in.” Mom paused again, glancing back to offer Erin a weak smile. “We had a good life here in Big Rapids, didn’t we? Sure, you moved to Seattle, but you were doing well. Everything was good, and I had hoped we were lost forever. Lost and forgotten.” Her smile faltered. “Until now.”

She continued through the tunnel. Erin followed, struggling to wrap her mind around any of this, and held on to a small hope that maybe it was all a dream, or maybe she was the one hallucinating and none of this was happening. That would be better than if this were reality, wouldn’t it?

Mom leaned against the dirt wall to catch her breath. Erin choked back tears as they came to the end of the tunnel.

“The trick will be to get out of here before they start looking,” she said. “Once they find the tunnel, they can catch up to us.”

A strange numbness clung to Erin, and she nodded as if she were watching from outside her body. “Where does this come out?”

“An abandoned water shaft that we’ll follow to a deserted train tunnel.”

“And then what, Mom?” Realization slowly dawned as Mom whispered the next words.

“Then we disappear again.”

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