by Jill Shalvis
Six
The next afternoon, Parker sat up and got licked from chin to forehead for his efforts. “Thanks, dude.”
He and Oreo were both on the floor in the shower of the second upstairs bathroom, where Parker was working on fixing the faulty drain. Just like he’d fixed the leak in the kitchen sink the night before. Of course he’d had to wait until the stubborn-as-all-hell Zoe had gone to bed to do so.
He pulled half a loofah from the drain, shook his head, and started the water. Drained perfectly now. “Done,” he told the dog. Now he and Zoe could each have their own bathroom.
Not that he particularly needed any privacy. He just felt a little bad for his prickly landlord, who clearly had no idea how to accept help.
“She’s stubborn as hell,” Wyatt told him when Parker called to check in. “Always has been.”
No shit, Parker thought.
“Something she’ll never tell you,” Wyatt said, “is that she’s got some debt. Getting a pilot’s license costs a lot of money and she’s got loans to pay off. Now that I’m doing okay, I’ve tried to pay them off for her but she refuses to let me.”
Sounded like Zoe.
“I’ve also tried to help her out with the house,” Wyatt said. “But she always says she’s got it and kicks me out.”
“She told me the same,” Parker said. “So I waited until she was gone to fix a few things.”
Wyatt laughed. “Better sleep with one eye open. You’re going to piss her off when she finds out.”
“Maybe she won’t realize it’s me . . .”
“She’s ornery, but she’s not stupid,” Wyatt said. “In fact, she’s smarter than all of us put together.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve already got the pissing-her-off part down. I seem to manage that without even trying.”
“If that were true, you’d be dead and buried already and no one would ever find your body,” Wyatt said.
Parker laughed.
“Hey, I’m not kidding. She’s something fierce when her feathers are ruffled, though to be fair to her, she’s always had to be.”
“Why?” Parker asked. He knew about their parents. They were foreign diplomats who spent most of their time in third-world countries. Growing up, Wyatt and his sisters had done the same.
“She’ll murder me in my sleep for telling you this,” Wyatt said, “but since you’re living under her nose it might help you understand her. Our parents are great at their jobs but pretty shitty parents. They put it all on Zoe to watch out for us. Or not.”
“She’s only a year older than you.”
“Eleven months,” Wyatt said. “But I was clueless back then. She was the only grown-up. Like the time we were supposed to meet up with our parents in Budapest from our various boarding schools, but they got delayed. Zoe was maybe . . . twelve? And there we were, stuck in a strange country where we didn’t speak the language and Americans weren’t looked on all that fondly to say the least, and she still managed to feed us and keep us safe for the three days it took our parents to get to us.”
Parker was impressed. “She’s tough.”
“More than you know. I don’t know how many times she held it together under grim circumstances,” Wyatt said. “But I do know I’d be dead a few times over without her.”
“You’re her family.”
“Yeah, but it’s just how she’s wired if she cares about you. Trust me, man, when shit’s hitting the fan, there’s no one you’d rather have at your six than Zoe.”
Parker thought about that conversation long after he’d washed up from the plumbing work and sat at the kitchen table with his laptop studying maps of the Rocky Falls area where Zoe had pointed out Cat’s Paw. Like him, she was a survivor and a caretaker. She’d do anything for her siblings.
Just as he would for his sister. He sent money back for Amory’s care every month, but he knew the best thing he did for her was stay away.
After hearing Wyatt talk about Zoe, he couldn’t imagine anything keeping her from being near her siblings. But then again, she didn’t have a job where she chased after bad guys willing to sell their own mother for a buck.
He tried to concentrate on the map in front of him, but he was good at multitasking and a good portion of his thoughts stayed on Zoe.
Watching her fly had been a huge turn-on. She’d handled the plane like it had been an extension of herself, and he’d had trouble concentrating on his business when what he’d really wanted to do was join the mile-high club. Never mind that doing so with his pilot would’ve gotten them killed.
When he’d gone back up with Devon, he’d gotten a better feel for the area. This was more a reflection on the fact that Parker hadn’t wanted to strip Devon naked and lick him from head to toe as he had Zoe.
He’d saved a lot of time by asking Devon to go directly to Cat’s Paw, where he got a longer look at the vehicles in that mysterious clearing. With his high-powered binoculars, Parker had focused in on several additional fascinating facts. One, he could see two huge blinds, way too big for traditional hunting. More like the size that could be hiding vehicles that someone didn’t want seen.
This was proven when he watched a tank being driven into one.
A tank.
In the woods.
And then a Humvee, filled with guys armed to the teeth.
A huge red flag to say the least.
And two, there’d also been a Humvee four-wheeling through the trees toward some low-lying buildings he’d missed the first time because they’d been as carefully camouflaged as the blinds.
And then there were the weapons. The kind that weren’t necessarily for hunting animals—at least not the four-legged kind.
When he’d asked Devon to make a second pass, the pilot had refused, citing two reasons. One, he’d been booked for a direct there-and-back and he didn’t want to tap into his reserve fuel. And two, apparently there were rumors circulating of militia taking over the property and he didn’t want to draw any trouble by bringing attention to himself or the plane.
Militia.
Made sense. And if that was the case, Parker hoped like hell that if anyone down there was paying attention to aircraft in the area, they’d missed Zoe earlier.
Staring at the map now, Parker shook his head. What the hell was going on? He had some ideas and didn’t like any of them. One was a niggling suspicion that he’d had for some time now, that a deal had been struck with Carver for his freedom. Pulling out his phone, Parker called Mick.
His informant answered with a gruff “What the hell do you want?”
“Answers,” Parker said.
There was a pause. “I already gave you a shit-ton more than I should have.”
“Which wasn’t all that much.”
“I gave you all I had.”
“Now see,” Parker said. “I doubt that.”
“Ah, man, come on,” Mick whined. “You know I can’t talk to you no more if I want to keep breathing.”
“Tell me enough to catch the Butcher and you have nothing to fear,” Parker countered.
“Jesus, you’re killing me. Did you go to the Rocky Falls area? Cat’s Paw?”
“Yes,” Parker said. “And why Cat’s Paw? Only locals know about that place.”
“Carver grew up there. He’s still got connections.”
“There’s nothing there,” Parker said. “Except a possible militia hideout.”
“Yeah, his brother’s militia,” Mick said. “And that asshole’s as mean as Carver.”
Parker felt his temper stir. “And you left all this out before because . . .?”
“Because you didn’t ask.”
“Or because you were trying to fuck up the investigation,” Parker said. “A federal crime, by the way.”
“No, I wasn’t trying to fuck you up, I swear!”
“Or maybe you were trying to get me killed.”
“No! Man, you’re touchy. It’s nothing like that,” Mick rushed to assure him.
“Then wh
y don’t you tell me what it is like.”
“You asked and I told you, he’s there in Idaho. It got too hot with you guys, specifically you, so he went home to hide out until things cooled off. He knows that entire area inside and out. And it’s a great place to lay low because it’s tough to get to and nearly impossible to sneak up on him. Plus, having grown up on that mountain, he’s got friends and relatives who’ll protect him to the end.”
“By friends and relatives, you mean the people he’s now using as a screen for protection?” Parker asked.
“Well, it’s not like they’re innocents,” Mick said. “His family tree belongs on the walls of post offices and cop shops across the country, if you know what I’m saying.”
“What else am I missing?” Parker asked.
“Nothing! Now do me a favor and lose my number.”
Parker disconnected. Then he called his only other contact in the area besides Wyatt. Kel was a local sheriff and a good one. If anyone knew anything about this, it would be Kel.
“Been a long time,” the sheriff said when he answered. “You’ve been busy, I hear.”
Law enforcement, all divisions and agencies, were like the quad at any high school. Filled with gossip. “Little bit,” Parker said. “And you?”
“I’m thinking you didn’t call to chitchat.”
Directness. Parker appreciated it. “I need to know what’s going on up at Rocky Falls.”
“Why?”
Fair enough question. “A few years ago we arrested what we thought was a small onetime-operation kind of guy for endangered species poaching. He worked the Pacific Northwest, selling skins and other illegal items to a bigger organization. Small fries, but we wanted the bigger cartel so we cut him loose under certain terms.”
“Certain terms,” Kel repeated. “You recruited him as an informant.”
“To help us catch his former boss, Tripp Carver, also known as the Butcher.”
“The guy who killed one of your agents,” Kel said.
“Yeah, and now we’ve got rumors of four point five million dollars in skins and ivory being readied for sale.”
“And you think this Carver is in Rocky Falls with the goods?”
“Specifically at Cat’s Paw.”
There was a beat of silence. “Thought you were on medical leave,” Kel finally said.
Parker pleaded the fifth, and Kel laughed softly. “Okay, so that’s not going to slow you down, I get it. You got anything more than rumors?”
“I’ve gone further on less. What can you tell me?”
“That you’re not the only one with eyes on the prize.”
Parker read between the lines on that one. “Local law’s on it?”
“Bigger,” Kel said. “We were told to stay out of it. I can nose around some if you need.”
“I need.” Parker heard Zoe coming in the front door, heard the sounds of Oreo scrambling off the spot on the couch he wasn’t supposed to nap in and go skidding to the foyer with a welcoming woof! He thanked Kel and disconnected, and then ambled into the living room.
Zoe had dropped her things and crouched down to give Oreo a doggie treat from her purse. “Who’s a good boy?” she murmured.
“Well, I don’t like to brag, but I’ve been pretty good,” Parker said.
She lifted her gaze to where he’d stopped in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, leaning against the jamb. “Do you want a cookie, too?” she asked.
“Depends,” he said. “Did you bake them?”
She rolled her eyes and pulled Oreo in for a full body hug, giving him a loud smooch on top of his snout.
“I wouldn’t say no to one of those, either,” Parker said. She ignored this, too, except for the flush that stained her cheeks. She looked beat to hell. Her hair was tousled and she had what might have been a grease stain across her jaw. At some point she’d ditched her blazer and wore just the white silky tank top, also sporting a stain across one breast.
Catching him looking, she shrugged. “Dougie, our mechanic, was moving too slow on the Cessna Caravan. I was giving him a hand.”
“You can work on an airplane but you can’t fix anything here at the house?”
“Yeah, well, I’m an enigma,” she said. “An annoying one. Just ask anyone in my family.”
Pushing off the jamb, Parker moved close to her, watching as her breath caught and her eyes locked on his mouth.
It was a relief, really, to know that he caused the same baffling reactions in her as she did in him. “I’m not annoyed by you,” he said.
“No?”
He smiled. “No.”
“What are you?” she whispered, still staring at his mouth.
“Lots of things.” He pulled her up and rubbed his thumb over the stain on her jaw, feeling a surge of satisfaction when her breath caught again. “Including turned on.”
Her gaze flew to his. “I turn you on?”
“Yes.”
She stared at him some more. “We’re not doing this. We’d be stupid to do this.”
“I agree. But that doesn’t seem to mean a damn thing to me.”
She didn’t say anything and he raised his brows. “Am I alone in this, Zoe?”
Appearing to wrestle with that, she hesitated, and he wondered if she’d lie.
“No,” she finally said. “But that’s only because I haven’t actually . . . Well.” She grimaced. “Let’s just say it’s been a while for me. With someone else. Together.” When he smiled, she groaned. “You know what I mean!”
“And that’s the only reason you want me, because it’s been a while?”
She busied herself with gathering up her things.
But Parker hadn’t gained his investigator skills by accident. He’d started as a teen trying to figure out how to get out of the life that had been set in stone long before he’d been born, and he’d only honed his ways of ferreting out the truth in the years since. He’d long ago learned the value of holding his silence, and sure enough his patience was rewarded.
“Okay, that’s not the only reason,” she finally said. “My current theory is that it’s because you’re sweet to my big, silly dog.” She paused. “And also maybe a little bit because you have nice eyes.” She closed hers.
He laughed. “I like where you’re going with this.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” She fanned her heated cheeks. “Except to the shower.” She popped open her eyes. “Alone.” She headed up the stairs.
Parker was trying really hard not to imagine her stripping out of her clothes when he heard the bathroom door yank back open.
“Hey,” she yelled down the stairs. “Why does this lock work?”
Oreo looked at Parker.
Parker put a finger to his lips, and Oreo seemed to grin at him.
The door slammed again.
And a brick fell out of the fireplace.
The next morning Parker found himself at the local gym being beat all to shit by Wyatt’s good friend AJ. Wyatt had recommended the guy for PT, and AJ was putting Parker through his paces when his cell buzzed.
Sharon.