“My baby?” Claire called from inside, panic rising. “Ava?”
“I’m here!” Ava cried. “Mom, I hired bikers!”
For half a second, even in the heat and fear, Big Joe let out a broken laugh.
Then Claire started crying.
Ethan knocked hard.
“Claire, can you get to the door?”
“No.” Her voice cracked. “He put a chair under it. I can’t move good.”
Luis came around the side.
“Bedroom window’s open two inches. Screen’s torn. I can get in.”
Ethan nodded.
“Do it.”
Luis was the smallest of them, wiry and quick. He slid through the window with practiced ease, disappearing into the trailer. Thirty seconds later, something scraped behind the front door. A chair dragged away. Locks turned.
The door opened.
The smell came out first.
Stale beer. Sweat. Broken drywall dust. Fear.
Then Luis appeared, face dark.
“She needs EMS.”
Ethan stepped inside.
Claire Miller was on the hallway floor near the bedroom door, one arm wrapped around her ribs, the other reaching for Ava before Ava even crossed the threshold. She was thirty at most, with the exhausted beauty of someone who had once been bright and had spent years dimming herself to survive. One side of her face was bruised. Her lip was split. Her right wrist was swollen badly.
Ava broke free from Maggie and ran to her.
“Mom!”
Claire pulled her close with a cry that seemed torn out of the deepest part of her.
“I told you to go to school,” she sobbed.
“It’s Saturday.”
Claire shut her eyes like that hurt.
“I know, baby. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
Ethan knelt a careful distance away.
“Claire, sheriff’s on the way. Ambulance too.”
Claire looked up at him, disoriented.
Her eyes moved over his vest, his beard, the men behind him, and panic flickered.
“It’s okay,” Ava said quickly. “I hired him. He’s mine.”
Ethan felt his throat close.
Claire stared at her daughter.
Then at Ethan.
“She gave you money?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
A broken laugh turned into a sob.
“She had a jar,” Claire whispered. “For a bicycle.”
Ava buried her face in her mother’s shoulder.
“I don’t need a bike.”
Claire’s face crumpled.
Ethan stood and turned away because some moments did not belong to strangers.
Outside, Mason called, “Truck coming.”
Every man in the trailer went still.
Claire’s eyes widened.
“No,” she whispered. “No, no, no.”
Ethan stepped onto the porch.
A dented red pickup came fast down the dirt lane, dust rising behind it. It swerved into the yard and stopped crooked near the broken truck. The driver’s door flew open.
Ray Cavanaugh climbed out with a twelve-pack in one hand and rage already on his face.