But he’s already moving.
He’s right. The practical crisis is immediate: a woman in shock and a van in the ravine. Scrambling after him, I exhale hard through my nose, trying to think. I’m a cop—I know how to deal with situations, even if this one is unorthodox. “We need to call this in.”
“No.” Luke’s voice is sharp and final. He stops next to his truck. “Open the back.”
I open the side door, not because he ordered it but because the woman needs to get warm. “Why not?”
“Because we don’t know if calling it in will put her in danger.” He sets her gently on the back seat of his truck, making sure my coat is snug around her before taking out a knife from somewhere on his body and cutting the zip ties.
His statement startles me. I grew up a sheriff’s daughter. To me, the law has always been representative of right and order—it’s supposed to protect. Granted, I’ve had some questions and doubts lately about what’s been going on in Iron Ridge, butthis—I look at the woman again—is beyond anything I imagined. I feel a chill, like I got dunked in the water too. “Danger from who?”
He straightens and faces me. “Turner.”
“Jesus,” I whisper. The name hits like a physical blow.
Luke watches me. I know he’s thinking of two months ago when I showed up at their ranch and told them I thought the Turners arranged the accident that killed Emma’s dad but that I couldn’t do anything about it. I know what they think I implied, but as long as there’s no victim, there’s no crime, so if they wanted to take care of Cole Turner like they did Eli, making him disappear, there wasn’t anything I could do.
I look at the woman in the truck. Luke’s right—if she’s somehow involved with Turner or witnessed something she shouldn’t have, me calling this in could be a death sentence for her. The most likely scenario would be that this woman disappears for good. Like I said, no victim, no crime.
Luke watches me work through it—watches me understand the scope of what we’re looking at. I wait for him to say something snarky or flippant, but he just waits for me to tell him what I want to do.
I glance at the woman, shaking in the back of his vehicle.
Fuck. I have no choice.
Exhaling, I look Luke in the eye and nod.
And just like that, I’ve crossed a line I didn’t even know I was standing on.
14
LUKE
“Ihave a blanket in my cruiser.”
I watch Harper stride to her rig, grabbing a thermal blanket from her trunk and bringing it back to wrap around the woman with the kind of efficiency that tells me she’s done this before. She talks softly, and the woman nods shakily.
Assured she has the woman, I lean across the front seat and open my glove compartment. It’s time to do my thing. “You guys still there?”
“Riot, what the hell is happening?” Mason’s voice sounds tight even through the speakers.
“Got it under control,” I say, pulling out a flashlight.
“Did I hear Harper’s voice?" Mason asks cautiously.
“Yep.” I turn the flashlight on and off a couple times to test it.
"Deputy Sheriff Harper Garrett?"
"As if the world could handle two Harper Garretts." I wink at Harper, including her in the conversation. “I’m going to sweep the van to see what I can find. Then I’ll bring the survivor to Blackthorn. Have Lily ready. She’s going to need medical attention.”
“Copy that.”
I click off, flash a grin at Harper who’s still glaring at me, and jog to the edge of the bridge. I slide down the embankment, boots hitting the rocky bank hard. The van is half-submerged now, nose-down in the current. Water rushes around it, cold and black.
I wade in.
The driver’s body is still slumped against the steering wheel, head tipped to the side. The passenger—the one who shot at me—floats face down half-in, half-out of the van.