Page 22 of Tracked
“You. You’re the bitch sister I talked to that day.” He pivoted and started in my direction. I backpedaled instinctively until my shoulders collided with his truck. “You’re the reason she turned into a cunt—”
“Hey!” Calder’s shout detonated through the clearing.
Moving in the span of a single blink, Calder put himself between Brandon and me, flattening his palm on Brandon’s chest like a wall not to cross. “Mr. Westman.” His voice rumbled with a threatening kind of calm. “You smell like a growhouse, and your registration is still expired, so either I make some calls and get you in more trouble or you tell me where Rachel Crane is.”
“Fuck you.” Brandon knocked Calder’s arm aside and shoved him like this was some high school playground and he was going to give Calder a beating. Calder stepped back and steadied himself. “I don’t have to tell you a fucking thing about that cunt,” Brandon spat, and then he swung.
“Calder!” I couldn’t stop my warning, but he didn’t need it.
Calder easily ducked out of the path of Brandon’s fist. Using the momentum of the attack, he grabbed the back of Brandon’s shirt and propelled him into the side of his camper. There was a sickening thud, followed by a roar of pain and a definite dent left in the metal exterior.
“Fuck, man.Fuck.I think ... you broke my fucking nose!”
Brandon didn’t get a chance to stumble or collapse to the ground before Calder was behind him, wrenching one of his arms behind his back and pinning him to the camper with a forearm wedged to the back of his neck.
His nose was definitely broken, the bulbous end angled unnaturally to the side of his face, blood streaming from his nostrils, but I kept my professional assessment quiet.
“Where is Rachel?” Calder demanded.
“She’s not here,” he snarled. “Go ahead and fucking look. My camper’s open.”
Calder jerked his gaze to me and nodded, a wordless instruction to check inside.
The handle was unlocked. A dense wave of marijuana hit me as soon as I opened the door and slammed me back to the hospital that day, the thick scent of pot oozing from every fiber of Ian’s clothes.Coughing, I covered my mouth with my sleeve and held my breath, choking off the memory as I looked inside.
There was a bed, bags of weed, smoking paraphernalia, and no sign of my sister.
“It’s empty,” I said, gulping in fresh air as the door shut.
“I fucking told you—ahh,” Brandon whimpered as Calder lifted his arm and increased the strain on the man’s shoulder. “Come on, man. I fucking told you—”
“When was the last time you saw Rachel?”
“I dunno. Two weeks ago, maybe?”
“Where?”
“Here.”
“So she was here with you?”
“Yes, and then she fucking left me.”
Left him.My breath hitched, my eyes connecting with Calder’s. Maybe my sister had listened to what I’d told her that afternoon after all.
“Do you know where she went after she left?”
“Did you not fucking hear me? We broke up. Why the fuck would I know or care where she went after—ahh. Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Brandon rose on his toes, seeming desperate to escape the pressure Calder put on his arm, his shoulder on the brink of popping from its socket.
“I did hear you, Mr. Westman. However, you don’t seem to be hearing me. You were the last person to see Rachel alive and alone in these woods. If you need me to spell out more clearly how bad that looks for you—”
“All right, fuck.” Brandon spat, blood and spit running from his face down the side of his trailer. “I don’t know where she went, but she left because she wanted us to go to some touchy-feely kumbaya retreat instead of coming here and hunting like I’d planned.”
I moved closer, the threat of him nothing compared to the information he had. “What retreat?” I asked before I could stop myself, feeling the heat of Calder’s warning stare.
“I don’t fucking know.” His lip curled, but he’d clearly learned his lesson, because he kept talking. “Some couples thing in the BLM around here. She tried to talk me into it, saying it would be good for our relationship, help us work things out.” His voice took on a mocking whine. “I told her that bullshit was for pussies and there was no way in hell I was going. We argued. She said she’d go on her own and find a better man, and I said fine, because honestly her pussy was too fucking high maintenance anyway, and then she left. Haven’t seen her since.”
Red rimmed the edge of my vision, a shocking notion entering my mind: I wanted to do this man harm. Not lethal harm, but memorable harm, for the way he talked about my sister.
