Page 38 of Maverick Detective Dad
But he was too late.
He caught just a glimpse of a black truck as it sped away. A truck with no license plate.
Hell. There was no way to trace it. No way for him to see who was behind the wheel, but he yanked out his phone and called the Silver Creek dispatcher. He gave a description of the truck and asked for immediate assistance in locating it. They might get lucky.
Might.
However, Noah figured the killer had already mapped out his escape before he’d ever fired that dart at Everly.
At the thought of her, Noah turned and hurried back toward the house. Since the rain would no doubt wash away any tracks or trace evidence, he stopped and used his handkerchief to pick up the phone. That definitely wasn’t standard procedure, but if there was something on it that could help them ID the killer, he didn’t want the phone to be ruined by the water.
He slipped the phone in his pocket, and Noah kept his gun ready while he made his way back through the greenbelt. He heard the sirens, and the moment he reached Everly’s side yard, he spotted the ambulance pulling into her driveway. A Silver Creek cruiser was right behind it.
Hudson stepped out of the SUV, his attention going straight to Noah. Noah shook his head to let him know he hadn’t caught the SOB, but at the moment that wasn’t even his main concern.
“Everly?” Noah asked.
“She’s still conscious. Barely,” Hudson added. “But her vitals are good.”
Noah had to see for himself, and while the EMTs and Deputy Lawson hurried out of their vehicles, Noah went straight to the SUV. Everly was there on the backseat, and she was muttering something.
His name, Noah realized.
“I’m here,” he told her, leaning in so she could see his face. And so he could see hers. Her eyes were unfocused, but she turned to the sound of his voice, and she lifted her head off the seat.
“You’re alive,” she muttered, her words slurred. The breath rushed out of her, and her head dropped back down.
“I didn’t catch him,” he let her know. “I’m so sorry.”
But he wasn’t even sure Everly heard him because her face went slack. For one horrifying moment, Noah thought she’d died, and his fingers were trembling when he checked for a pulse. She was alive, thank God, but whatever had been shot into her body had obviously knocked her out.
“This will need to be tested,” Hudson told the EMTs, giving them the dart. “So you’ll know what drug was used on her.”
Noah stepped back so the EMTs would have access to her, and he took out the phone to hand to Deputy Lawson. “I found that when I was in pursuit of the person I believe is the vigilante killer.”
The deputy’s eyes widened a little, and she reached into her back pocket to pull out a small plastic evidence bag. “I’ll get this to the lab right away,” she assured him. She glanced around, and like the rest of them, the rain was soaking through her clothes. “On the drive here, I heard the description of the truck. Somebody might see it.”
She didn’t sound especially hopeful about that. Neither was Noah. The storm would keep a lot of folks inside. It would also cut down visibility, and the realization of that ate away at him because he knew what this meant. The killer had gone back to his hole and could plan another way to come after Everly and him.
The EMTs loaded Everly onto a gurney, and Noah followed them to the ambulance. So did Hudson. Deputy Lawson hurried to her cruiser.
“I’ll lock up the house,” Hudson told him, “and then meet you at the hospital. Are you okay?” he tacked on to that.
Noah was far from okay, and that wouldn’t get better until he was certain Everly would be all right. “I need to catch this snake,” Noah muttered, climbing into the back of the ambulance with Everly.
“I’ll help with that in any way I can,” Hudson assured him. “FYI, I called Grayson, and he’s on the way out here. I thought you’d want to know though that River never showed up there.”
Noah cursed and took out his phone to put an APB out on River. Because if River wasn’t a victim of foul play, then he was most likely the killer.
Chapter Twelve
Everly was trapped, and the jumble of images and sounds came at her nonstop. The sound of her car slamming into Helen’s. The storm with its loud thunder and slashes of lightning.
And the blood.
Helen’s blood.
It turned her stomach, knifed at her as fast and lethal as those lightning strikes, and Everly had to fight hard to push it all away. To come to the surface.
