That man, that damned lawman, had gone and killed him true and through in one shot.
And her shot?
Well, Lana had been slower to it.
When she’d been asked to follow Detective Williams, she hadn’t expected to find a Mrs. And when they had come all the way here, of all places? Lana thought it was better to keep at least one of them alive to get some answers.
That’s the only reason she’d pulled her shot.
The reason the two had tucked into the building?
Lana saw the blood on the porch and guessed that for all Rafe was bad at, his first shot must have landed somewhere. But which one had taken it?
She didn’t need to peek through the door to see if the couple were waiting for her right inside. The door was in pieces and gave a clear view of a confusing development.
The floor was gone.
Some of it, at least.
Lana held her gun out, ready to squeeze the trigger, and took a tentative step toward the hole in the hardwood. Sunlight from uncovered windows in the ground-level room gave just enough light to show there was an entirely different room hidden below. An old metal hunk of machinery could be seen at one side whilea whole lot of nothing could be seen around the rest of the debris that had caved in.
The couple who had done the falling were nowhere to be seen.
Blood was, though.
That seemed to be the only easy thing to make out from her vantage point at the edge.
Lana held her breath. She cocked her head to the side a little.
No talking.
No rustling.
They had to have survived the fall, or else she would have seen their bodies. Maybe they were hiding in a part of the room she couldn’t see?
Lana resisted the urge to sigh.
It would have been a whole lot nicer had Rafe not died.
She could have made him go down below and figure out their situation. But he had died the way he’d foolishly lived: impulsively.
That wasn’t how Lana worked.
She kept her gun ready but lowered it to her side and looked around the rest of the aboveground space. She hadn’t been there before but knew no one came around this part of the mill anymore. Whether they were paid to avoid it or just did it naturally, she didn’t know or care. Her only job had been to follow, watch and report back.
Shoot if needed, only kill if you were told.
The room was large and open and looked to be a storage area that had been converted to hold several sleeping spaces. Rusted and broken iron bunk beds were positioned throughout the back end of the space. Nearest her seemed to have been a more general hangout spot. A couch that hadn’t fallen below sagged low against the wall to her left. The wall to the right had a fogged window that looked out at another building in the distance.
She wasn’t sure what building that was and, honestly, didn’t care.
What she needed to do was figure out if the detective was still alive.
Lana was light and cautious with her steps around the opening in the floor until she made it to the back end of the main room. There were two closed doors, and both complained with metallic whines as she opened them.
The smell of mold hung heavy in the communal bathroom behind the first. The second held more of the same but with an added slight rot, which made sense considering it was a small, obviously forgotten kitchen. In neither room was there a set of stairs or another door that could lead to the room below.
Knowing there wasn’t a back door, Lana opened a window over the sink. She climbed through it with ease and walked along the back wall of the building.
