Chapter 5 - Out of the Jurisdiction
Diane sank into a dining chair, her face completely drained of color. The reality of who she had married, who she had invited into her home, and who she had allowed near her daughter crashed down on her like a collapsing roof. For two years, she had believed Wade was her second chance at a stable, affluent life while I was deployed across the world. Now, she was looking at photographic evidence of an eleven-year-old girl’s covered-up murder.
"My God," Diane whispered, her voice shaking violently. "Ava saw this. Wade knew she saw it."
"He didn't just know," I said, ejecting the card and slipping it into a waterproof sleeve inside my dog-tag chain. "He tried to silence her. And if we stay in this county tonight, Frank will have a corrupt magistrate issue an emergency custody removal order before breakfast. We wouldn't even make it to a hearing."
I walked back down the hall and knocked on Ava’s door. "Ava, pack your go-bag. Clothes, your laptop, and Buddy. We move in three."
Within five minutes, Ava emerged. She had changed into jeans, heavy hiking boots, and a hooded jacket. She carried her small canvas backpack, the stuffed fox tucked securely into the side mesh pocket. When she saw her mother sitting at the table in tears, Ava stopped, her expression guarded and wary.
Diane looked up at her daughter. For the first time since the reception, she didn't look at Ava with embarrassment or anger; she looked at her with pure, suffocating remorse. She stood up, took two unsteady steps toward Ava, and dropped to her knees on the floor.
"Ava... I'm so sorry," Diane wept, reaching out with trembling hands. "I didn't believe you. I thought... I was so scared of what people were saying..."
Ava looked at me, then down at her mother. She didn't pull away, but she didn't embrace her either. She simply reached out with her bruised left hand and touched Diane’s shoulder. "We have to go, Mom. Wade’s friends are coming."
We loaded into my rental truck—a nondescript four-wheel-drive Ford F-150 with out-of-state plates. As we pulled out of the driveway, I noticed a silver sedan parked three houses down, its headlights off, its engine idling. The Mercers already had eyes on the house.
I didn't head toward the highway interchange that led to the state capital. That was the obvious route, the one Frank’s state trooper buddies would be watching. Instead, I turned west onto the secondary gravel roads that cut through the old logging tracts near the state line.
My phone buzzed on the dashboard. It was an unknown local number. I tapped speakerphone.
"Sergeant Carter," Frank Mercer's voice sounded through the truck's speakers, cold, metallic, and triumphant. "Just letting you know that Judge Hollister just signed an emergency protective order. Your daughter is officially listed as an endangered runaway involved in a felony assault. If you cross the county line with her, it becomes interstate parental kidnapping. You will be arrested by federal marshals, and your military career will end in Fort Leavenworth."
"You forgot one detail, Frank," I replied, keeping my eyes fixed on the winding gravel road ahead.
"And what is that?"
May you like
"I’m not taking her to a state court. I’m taking her to an active military installation. Federal territory, Frank. Your little county warrant isn't worth the paper it’s printed on inside the gates of Rock Island Arsenal."
I hung up and crushed the burner phone beneath the heel of my combat boot.
