She Has A Broken Thing Where Her Heart Should Be - J.D. Barker Page 0,224

off from Puget Sound when we arrived.”

“A seaplane? How could we not know about a seaplane?”

Oliver didn’t reply.

David Pickford leaned against the wall and drummed his fingers on the windowsill. “Doesn’t really matter, I suppose. We know where they’re heading.”

Oliver drew in another breath. “What do you want me to do here? With the house?”

David shrugged, the answer obvious. “Take anything useful and burn the rest. Burn everything.” He considered this for a moment and added, “Is Dalton’s car there, the black GTO?”

“Yes.”

“I want that car. Have someone drive it back. Burn everything else.”

“Okay.”

“Fly back in the Charter jet when you’re through. I’ll need you here.”

Oliver said, “It’s almost over.”

“Yeah, almost.”

16

My father’s house on Whidbey Island sat perched atop a tall cliff overlooking Puget Sound. Shortly after making my phone call, we wrapped Stella in a thick blanket so I could carry her with our various bags wrapped over our shoulders. Preacher carried Hobson, who continued to squirm in his bindings. Cammie and her daughter followed behind us, all eyeing the man nervously, toting their own bags. My father led the way, his beaten body fighting him every step. He took nothing from the house, said he already had a go-bag packed and waiting.

We followed him across the backyard toward the cliff, then down a rickety set of wooden steps attached to the cliff face with heavy metal bolts and anchors. At the base of the stairs, built on large concrete pylons sunk into the sands of a small private beach, was what appeared to be a boathouse. I fully expected to find a speedboat of some sort inside, so when my father opened the door revealing a plane on large floats, I think I was as surprised as everyone else.

“This is a 208 Cessna Caravan. I bought it a few years ago after receiving my pilot’s license, mostly to get back and forth from the mainland faster, but it’s got range and they won’t be able to follow us. If I keep low enough, I won’t need to file a flight plan.”

Preacher circled the aircraft, running his hand over the wing. “This is big. We can take the guns.”

“Like I said at the house, this isn’t about space, it’s about weight. Every pound we add shaves miles off our travel distance. Miles we can’t afford to lose. If we stop to refuel, we’ll end up in a database. They can use that intel to track us. This is a one-way trip.”

“To where?”

The “where” turned out to be Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, and my father was right—by the time we touched down on the water, we had nothing but fumes in the tank. The flight took us nearly seven hours. My father had removed the last two passenger seats, and I was grateful for that. Preacher and I positioned Stella in the back of the plane on the floor in her blanket so she could rest. She stirred several times during the flight but only woke once. When I told her where we were, she only nodded and drifted back off to sleep. About an hour into the flight, Preacher tied a makeshift blindfold over Hobson’s eyes. Once he was unable to see Cammie, he stopped squirming and returned to the docile state he had been in while driving with Stella and me. To be safe, we kept his hands and feet tied up.

My father landed the plane on Devil’s Lake with the practiced hand of a veteran, and I considered all the things I didn’t know about the man. Twenty years of life lived. I imagined learning to fly a plane was only one of many secrets.

He maneuvered the plane to the northern edge of the lake and guided it gently to a long dock. Preacher opened the door and grabbed a rope as we sidled up beside it. I jumped out and tossed him a second rope I found coiled up in a plastic storage container fastened to the wooden planks. With my father barking out instructions, together we secured the plane.

The dock led to a well-maintained sloping lawn. Beyond that stood two buildings—a small log cabin and a large metal shed. My father said he bought the property nearly a decade earlier but rarely stayed there. He paid a caretaker to maintain the place for him. I had yet to learn how he afforded such things and planned to ask him when we finally arrived at our destination, but for now, questions had to wait.

I carried Stella