Chapter 7 - The Waters of Retribution
Before Rebecca's body could tilt completely over the edge, a hand shot out through the torrential rain.
It wasn't Reynolds. It wasn't one of the state troopers.
It was me.
I lunged forward across the wet asphalt, dropping Ethan's journal onto the dry interior of the cruiser seat, and grabbed Rebecca by the collar of her dark leather jacket with both hands.
The violent momentum of her fall yanked me hard against the concrete guardrail, the rough stone biting viciously into my ribs. The air left my lungs in a sharp gasp, but I held on. My fingers dug through the wet leather, locking around the heavy collar stitching with an iron grip forged by raw, unfiltered fury.
Rebecca hung over the roaring void, thirty feet above the churning, muddy waters of the swollen creek. Her legs dangled helplessly in the air, her face turned up toward mine, her eyes wide with sudden, terrifying shock.
"Let me go!" she shrieked, her hands clawing wildly at my wrists. "Let me go, Thomas!"
"No," I growled into her face, my teeth bared, my arm muscles screaming under the strain of her weight. "Death is too easy for you, Rebecca. Dying in a river is a mercy you don't deserve."
"Thomas! Pull her up!" Reynolds roared, throwing his weight beside me, grabbing Rebecca's right arm while another trooper grabbed her left.
With a collective, surging heave, we yanked her back over the guardrail. She hit the wet asphalt with a hard, ungraceful thud, gasping for air like a landed fish.
Before she could even scramble to her knees, Reynolds pinned her shoulders to the ground with his knee, pulling her arms behind her back with brutal efficiency. The sharp CLICK-CLICK of steel handcuffs echoed over the noise of the storm.
"Rebecca Miller-Vance," Reynolds barked, pulling her roughly to her feet by her elbows. "You are under arrest for Capital Murder, Attempted Capital Murder of a Minor, Aggravated Kidnapping, Child Endangerment, and Grand Larceny. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law."
Rebecca didn't speak. She didn't scream. She didn't curse.
As the rain washed the dark hair from her face, she looked at me with an empty, hollow stare. All the theatrical villainy, the arrogance, and the cold charm had been completely stripped away, leaving behind nothing more than a small, pathetic parasite whose host had finally broken free.
I watched as the troopers shoved her into the back seat of a marked cruiser, the heavy steel door slamming shut with a definitive, satisfying THUD.
Reynolds walked back to my side, wiping the rainwater from his eyes. He looked down at the seat of his cruiser, where Ethan's blue notebook lay completely dry and undamaged.
"We got her, Thomas," Reynolds said softly, placing a heavy, warm hand on my shoulder. "We got both of them."
"Not yet," I said, leaning against the hood of the car, my chest heaving as my adrenaline began to crash. "The work isn't done until those kids are safe."
"They are safe," Reynolds promised. "CPS has already filed emergency custody petition papers. Because of your relationship and the evidence provided, you are being named their temporary legal guardian effective immediately."
I closed my eyes, letting the cold rain wash over my face. For three years, I had lived in a shadow of guilt, believing that my brother's death had severed my family beyond repair. But standing on that highway, surrounded by the flashing red lights of justice, I realized that Ethan hadn't left me helpless.
He had left me his legacy. He had left me his children. And he had left me the truth.
An hour later, the crime scene investigation team secured the broken Lexus.
As Reynolds had predicted, the forensic techs located the hardwired solid-state telemetry drive beneath the shattered plastic of the center console. When they hooked it up to a mobile diagnostic monitor in the back of the forensics van, the high-definition cabin footage pulled up instantly.
I stood beside Detective Reynolds, watching the glowing screen.
The video dated three weeks prior showed Rebecca and Richard sitting in the front seats of the car while parked in the driveway of Ethan's house.
"They're getting too quiet down there, Rebecca," Richard’s voice came through the high-fidelity speakers, clear and crisp. "The boy isn't even asking for food anymore. What if he dies before the quarterly trust distribution clearing date?"
"Then we report he died of a sudden congenital heart defect, just like his father," Rebecca’s voice replied on the recording, her tone completely casual as she adjusted her lipstick in the vanity mirror. "The doctor who signed Ethan's death certificate is on our payroll. As long as the girl stays alive until she turns five, the secondary trust disbursement clears automatically."
Reynolds looked at me, his eyes burning with absolute, uncompromising disgust.
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"This tape goes straight to the District Attorney," Reynolds said. "This isn't just a life sentence, Thomas. In the state of Texas, for capital murder of a parent coupled with the attempted murder of two toddlers, this is a lethal injection case."
"Good," I said, my voice completely devoid of pity. "Let the law finish what she started."
