far side of the parking lot a few minutes ago. We should have started driving already, but we don’t know where to go. Which means we could be heading in the wrong direction, moving further away from Trinity.
“What if he’s lying?” Zach asks, twisting in his seat to scan our faces.
“Gabriel? Why would he?” Rube sits forward a little in his seat. “He’s dead.”
According to Gabriel’s letter, Trinity’s father—Keith Malone—is still alive. And although he states it as a fact, he doesn’t back it up with evidence.
“Then what about her mom? Is she alive too?”
“It doesn’t say,” Cass reminds me.
“Yeah…but…”
“Look, this isn’t getting us any closer to finding them,” Cass says. He flicks the butt of the cigarette out of the window.
“What will?” Rube asks.
Quiet settles down. I’ve been trying to figure that out the past ten minutes, and I’m sure everyone else has too. But we don’t have any leads.
“We’re assuming Gabriel took her, but what if it wasn’t him?” Zach says quietly. And then puts his hand over Cass’s so he’ll stop tapping his nail. “He could have had someone else do it.”
“But how would he know—” Rube begins, sighing as he speaks.
“The lawyer.” Cass snatches his hand out from under Zach’s and clicks his fingers. “She obviously called him when Trinity picked up the key.”
“So? We weren’t followed here,” Rube says. “How would he know exactly when—”
Rube stops talking when Zach lifts a hand and points out his window.
We all turn to look.
“What?” I ask, peering at the house. The garden. The roof.
“There,” Zach says.
And then I see it.
A For Sale sign.
But I don’t get it.
“He’s watching the house,” Zach says. “Trinity’s old babysitter said a young couple moved in across the road. No kids, but the house is big enough for a family of five.”
“So they watch the house. Someone lets him know Trinity’s arrived. He comes and snatches her? And then what? Where does he go? And why?” Cass shakes his head. “What does he—”
“We have to go back,” I say. “Back to her house.”
Zach opens his mouth as if to argue, but then closes it again. Cass and Rube look at him, then at each other. Like there’s a telepathic conversation going on.
It’s fine, I’ll wait them out.
“He’s right,” Cass murmurs. “Everything leads back to that house.”
“But the safe is gone,” Rube says. “What else could there be?”
There’s a beat of silence. Then Zach says, “It’s not much…”
I grin at him. “But it’s a start.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Rube
My first and only foster family had a study in their house. One wall was lined with bookshelves and old, musty books.
One day when my sisters were all at cheerleading practice and I’d been left alone for the first time in my new home, I was climbing up the walls from boredom. I tried watching television, but it didn’t hold my interest.
So I explored the house, peeking into rooms I’d only caught a glimpse of before.
The study fascinated me. It felt stale and unused—when I opened the door, dust motes shifted through stray beams of light shining in from the window. I felt like I was walking into a crypt.
I went over to the bookshelf and worked my way through the titles. Some of the books stuck together when I tried pulling them out.
Those I left alone, scared I’d damage them and get crapped out.
But some came out a little easier. Titles I’d later learn to recognize, but which were alien to me back then.
Alice in Wonderland.
A Tale of Two Cities.
Casino Royale.
Great Expectations.
I’ll never forget the smell of those books. Or how, when I turned the first page of Alice in Wonderland, I wondered why on earth an adult man would own a book like that.
Since then, I’ve always been drawn to books. My interest moved to bibles when I decided to play the part of a pious kid on his way to becoming a priest as a way to get closer to Father Gabriel without rousing suspicion.
Very little of that interest was feigned.
I found solace in the pages of any bible I read.
Cass is right—there’s no safe in this room anymore. But there is a treasure.
Seems Trinity’s parents collected bibles. Mostly King James, but there’s a Geneva here too. I crack them open, hoping to find a clue, but they’re as barren as the big white one Trinity came to Saint Amos with.
It makes sense—you’d destroy the value of the book by marking it—but a cheap mass-produced King James is just as empty.