Noah said, “But how did you know the chief wasn’t involved too?”
Misty shifted uncomfortably in her chair. The dog whined. “Well, when Ray’s friends found out that Ray and I were, you know, in a relationship, all of a sudden they all started showing up at the club. It was weird, like they wanted to check me out or something. It got to the point where it was a little creepy with some of them. Anyway, the chief never came to the club. Ever. But I met him a couple of times. I had brought Ray some coffee and food to the station during the Coleman search.”
“Oh, but not Dusty?” Josie asked.
“Boss, please.”
“Chief Quinn,” Holcomb said.
Misty shot her a dirty look and went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “I called and asked for him directly. They must have thought I was his wife ’cause they didn’t even ask who I was. I told him what was going on. He came right over. He said he had an idea that something strange was going on in his town, but he didn’t know what. He said he wasn’t sure how far things went, and until he sorted it all out he wanted me and Isabelle to hide. So he took us to his lodge. He said if he didn’t come back for us in two days, I should call Josie and only Josie. From the landline, not from my cell phone.”
“Did he say why?”
“He said she was the only person in this godforsaken town he could still trust.”
Chapter Seventy-Seven
On the day of Ray’s funeral, Josie woke at five in the morning. She tried on a half dozen variations of funeral attire before finally settling on a simple sleeveless black dress with a pencil skirt. Around her neck was the diamond pendant that Ray had given her before they went away to college. He had saved up for months to buy it for her. It was his parting promise to her that they would return to one another. She spent an hour pinning her hair back and then letting it flow down her back and then pinning it back again before finally deciding to leave it down. Ray had always liked it that way. She stood before the full-length mirror in her bathroom and thought how silly it was to be dressing up for the funeral of a man who had betrayed her, cheated on her, and then been complicit in the abduction of Isabelle Coleman.
Her Ray.
She slid into a pair of black heels. He had always loved her in heels. She thought about pinning her hair back up as a concession to the conflicting emotions she was having about him. But no, she decided. Today she wasn’t laying to rest the man who had wronged her. She was laying to rest the sweet boy who had saved her from her childhood nightmare, who had let her push every boundary he had, who had loved her in spite of the bad things that had happened to her. Today she was laying to rest the man she had married—decent, honest, loyal Ray. She might never reconcile the boy and the husband she loved with the man Ray had become in the last year or so of his life. But she would have to say goodbye to him. She had no choice.
A knock sounded from her front door. She took her time getting downstairs, expecting Trinity but instead finding Noah on her doorstep. He wore his sling over an impressive black suit. His brown hair was expertly tousled. Only his face looked pained. Her heart leaped into her throat. “What is it?” she asked, thinking of Lisette, of Luke.
Please, oh God, please. I can’t lose another person.
“Josie,” he said. “Can I come in?”
“Just tell me.”
“Alton Gosnell died in his sleep last night.”
She sagged against the doorway. Noah stepped forward and took her elbow with his left hand, guiding her inside and nudging the door closed behind them with his foot. He directed her toward her living room but froze when he saw it was empty.
She smiled sheepishly. “I don’t have any furniture.”
He looked behind them, put a hand on her lower back and steered her in the opposite direction, toward the kitchen. She let him pull out a kitchen chair for her and pour her a glass of water. She, at least, had glassware. He sat down across from her. “You okay?”
She took a sip of water. “That son of a bitch,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” Noah said. “Not that he’s dead, but that we didn’t have a chance to put him away. The director of nursing called this morning. She said his infection had been improving. A bed had opened up at Denton Memorial. They were going to move him today. She said he was finally well enough to be moved. He wasn’t in the best health to begin with, but she thought he had turned a corner, might have a few years left.”
“My grandmother said he would never make it to prison. But still, I hoped…” she trailed off. A moment passed. She met his eyes. “Noah, would you mind driving me to Rockview?”
He stood and offered his good arm. “Of course,” he said. “You and Lisette can ride with me to the service.”
Lisette waited for them in the lobby, dressed in a smart gray skirt suit, a wide-brimmed black hat elegantly covering her gray curls. When she saw them enter, she sprang up, clutching the handles of her walker and making a beeline for the double doors. “Let’s go,” she told Josie and Noah, pushing past them into the parking lot. Josie and Noah looked at one another, shrugged and followed her out. Josie sat in the back with Lisette as Noah drove them to the funeral home.
“Gram,” she said. “You know about Mr. Gosnell, don’t you? Did they tell you?”
Lisette met Josie’s eyes. “Of course, dear.”
“I’m really sorry, Gram. I wanted him to pay for his crimes.”
Lisette reached a hand across the seat and patted Josie’s knee. Then she smiled at Josie, her eyes twinkling with something that looked very close to satisfaction. It was the same look Josie had seen in her eyes the day that she finally and permanently wrested custody from Josie’s mother. She was triumphant. “Oh, Josie dear, he did pay. Don’t you give him another thought. Things have been set straight.”
Josie’s brow furrowed. “You mean you’re not upset?”
Lisette turned to look out the window. “No, dear. For the first time since my Ramona went missing, I finally feel a bit of… peace.”
“I’m going to find her,” Josie said.
“I know.”
Noah pulled into a parking spot at the funeral home and helped Lisette out. Josie followed behind them. Ray’s mother had planned the service. She had wanted something quick and simple, and neither she nor Josie could afford a large affair. Josie had wanted to get there early so that she could spend a few minutes with him in private. She left Noah and Lisette chatting with Mrs. Quinn while she approached his open casket at the front of the room. The funeral home had done a good job making him look handsome in his police uniform, his blond hair neatly combed, eyes closed in what looked like a peaceful sleep. But somehow he just didn’t look like the man she had loved. She touched his cold hands. This was not her Ray. It was just the shell that had held all the parts—good and bad, wonderful and ugly—that had made him hers for so many years of her life.
Still, she could not stop the tears from rolling down her face. “Damn you,” she muttered to him. “Damn you for leaving me.”