Sam scoffed.
Jake grinned, giving Samantha a 100-watt smile, and continued. “They didn’t care for my ‘southern fried bullshit’, their words, not mine. That’s when it got physical.”
“That’s when I saw them knock your good ol’ southern boy out and I jumped out of the gondola.”
Max’s heart skipped a beat, a muscle in his jaw twitched, and he wanted to wring her skinny neck. “You…you jumped out of the gondola? Are you out of your damn mind?” He swallowed hard the large lump in his throat.
Sam shot daggers at him from her eyes. “What the hell else was I supposed to do? Not like, you answered your cell phone. And I couldn’t sit back and watch some guy get dead.”
“No, you have to go be Little Miss Girl Scout and save the day.” Max raked fingers through his hair. He took a step toward Sam, and put his nose an inch from hers. “Damn it, Samantha, you’re supposed to be careful.” A flash of anger flickered in Sam’s gaze, her fists clenched at her side, and she glared at him. “This is why I had Jake shadow you.”
“And look how well that turned out,” she shot back.
Jake cleared his throat. “Can I interject here?”
Max never took his eyes off Sam. “No!”
Jake cleared his throat again.
He wanted to punch something, anything. It might as well be Jake. Max spun. He stopped cold when he saw Jake standing with his hands in his pockets, smiling, innocent as all can be. Not. He glared at him. “What?”
“Maybe we can save the drama for later and figure out who the thugs were, why they followed Samantha, and dragged me up here.”
She stepped forward. “Good idea. Maybe we can get you some ice for that knot on your head you keep rubbing at before you go bald.” She touched Jake and strode past him to the closet where he had emerged. Before she walked through the open door, she paused and turned back. Her gaze met his dead on.
“Why were you in the closet? And for that matter,” her acerbic tone cut him accentuated by white knuckled fists on the door, “why did you follow me to the mountain? Wasn’t it bad enough you sent your guard dog after me?”
His shoulders stiffened, but he leveled his stare right back at her. Samantha had better learn that you could trust someone and still do things to make certain they were safe. He did not intend on losing her, whether to an idiot ex-lover, or a murderer. She was his and that meant he would do whatever necessary to keep her from harm.
“I didn’t follow you,” he explained through gritted teeth. “I ended up in the closet by following Kevin’s directions.” Jake drew up next to him. “There’s an underground tunnel that runs from here to Mickey’s house.”
“You mean one of the old Underground Railroad tunnels?”
Max nodded. “That night we used the escape route out of Mickey’s. That was the tunnel. Only I didn’t realize it had a second branch to it hidden behind a secret door. Kevin marked it for me.”
“And it ended here? In the closet?” Jake asked.
“I guess that makes sense. Many of the tunnels have never been marked or have been forgotten. Every once and a while you hear of drug traffickers using some of the tunnels to smuggle their dope between Canada and Vermont.”
“Shee-it.”
Max grinned and noticed Sam crack a smile at Jake’s drawled out curse. Finally, the air between them lightened.
“Are there more tunnels on this mountain?”
She shrugged, went into the closet, and came back out with an ice pack. She bashed it over her knee and handed it to Jake. “Here. Please stop touching your head.”
“Thank you kindly.”
“As for your question, there probably are more tunnels, there’s probably a network of tunnels. However, where they might be located, I don’t have a clue. I would guess the historical society would have them documented, maybe even the police department. How do you know this was an end? Maybe this was a beginning.”
He watched Sam’s eyes glaze over, but then she tilted her head. The wheels turned. It must have been the mention of the police department. She had to be thinking of her father. Did he know about the Underground Railroad network? Is that why Kevin went to her father? This whole situation kept weaving itself into a circle. Damn it! Everything came back to Samantha’s father.
“Well, let’s go see what we can find.” The suggestion came from Jake who now led the way back through the closet. Sam followed right on his heels. Not given a choice, Max pulled up the rear.
* * * *
They did not find a damn thing. They hadn’t found another tunnel or any other clue from Kevin. He dug his fingers in his eyes and rubbed at his frustration. What was he missing?
While he stood, staring in frustration at the closet door in Mickey’s bedroom that led to the two tunnels, Jake and Samantha were in the kitchen fixing something warm to drink. Reaching into his pocket, his fingers brushed against the square diamond he found.
What about Sixth Element? Where was that located? Who owned it? What were they doing that they were not supposed to be? In addition, what did diamonds have to do with underground tunnels?
Holy shit!
* * * *
“I got it!” Max ran out of the bedroom as if his feet were on fire.
Samantha almost spilled her hot chocolate. When she looked up, she saw Max’s eyes were alight with excitement. “Got what?”
“What Kevin tried to tell me. It’s a smuggling operation.”
“How do you know?” Jake asked before she could.
“Because.” He took a deep breath. “Why put this,” He laid a square diamond on the counter, “in that tunnel? It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Max, don’t you think that’s a stretch? I mean he put it in your own boss’s tunnel. Maybe Kevin believes your boss is part of the smuggling ring?”
The narrow-eyed look he gave her was enough of a warning. Sam held up her hands in defense.
“He put it in that tunnel to tell me there were other tunnels and that’s how someone is smuggling diamonds, through those tunnels.”
“There could be five hundred tunnels for all we know. Which ones are they using? Where are they located?” Did her father know about the Underground Railroad? Had he tracked some criminal using the tunnels? If he had, wouldn’t she know? He would have told her.
Had those two thugs planned to make their escape through the tunnel? They hadn’t found another one so it would have only led to here. Could they have missed it? It was dark down there and the small flashlight had not been much help in illuminating their way. Hell, if the floor hadn’t been all dirt Sam was certain she would have tripped over herself.
Did Brad know about the underground caverns? Why would he need to? The tunnel would explain why no one could raise him on the walkie-talkie. The granite walls that her hands ran along would interfere with reception. It was probably the reason Max had not gotten her phone call either. Should she have known about these passageways? Was this a piece of her missing memory?
“The lady’s got you there, Max. You gotta narrow it down.”
Sam got to her feet, walked past Jake, and poured the rest of her cocoa down the sink.
“Maybe I missed something using that FalconView software. Maybe there is more in what Kevin left me.” Max raked fingers through his hair and paced away from them.
Returning to her seat, she picked up her jacket and started to slip it on.
“What are you doing?”
“You guys deal with this. I’m going to go find Brad. He’s on the mountain and now’s my chance.”
In the blink of an eye, Max had her by the shoulders in a firm grasp. “Uh-uh. No way!”
“Damn it, Max, I wasn’t asking permission!”
“Uh-huh.”
“I need to confront Brad. He knows something and we need to find out what. This has to be why I could not find him. He has to be using those tunnels.” Brad was in on it. She knew it to the bone.
“Maybe all the mountain employ
ees know about and use the old Underground Railroad,” he suggested.
Sam shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. I can always ask around. It doesn’t really matter. I want to find out what Brad is up to. If it is smuggling, as you suspect, then he is the only diamond expert around here that I know of. He is in it up to his eyeballs. I can feel it.”
“All the more reason not to confront him by your lonesome.”
Ugh. Now she had double the amount of testosterone men dictating her life. She turned her narrowed gaze on Jake. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”
Behind her, Max chuckled. She spun and pinned him in her sights.
“Yes, Jake needs to be doing something else. I was about to get to that when you interrupted the flow by wanting to take off half-cocked after your old boyfriend.”
She sneered at him. “Okay, what?”
“Ruby is way better than any of us at software and cracking codes. Jake is going to go back, tell her about FalconView, and see if I missed something. They can also do more looking into Sixth Element. I don’t think we’ve dug into that enough yet. There’s something there and I want to know what it is.”
“And what exactly are we going to be doing? Twiddling our thumbs? I thought you wanted to find Kevin.”
When Max’s jaw muscle twitched and his fingers clenched, she knew she had pushed too hard. Lowering her head, she apologized. “I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry.” Max did not respond.
“We’re making a visit to the Historical Society. I want to track the Underground Railroad.”
“What about Brad?”
“Leave him.” Sam opened her mouth to say something but before she did, Max continued. “We’ll get to him later. I agree he is involved, but let’s work our way around to him once we know what is going on. Better not tip our hand too early.”
She hated to give in but Max was right. She nodded her agreement.
“I’m outta here. See ya.”
“Call as soon as you or Ruby comes up with something.”
“I’ll holler.” Jake waved goodbye and shut the door behind him.
* * * *
A small building in the middle of town housed The Historical Society. The only person in the place was an elderly woman wearing a nametag that stated, “My name is Maude” in white letters. Maude ran the show. Sam hung back and watched Max work his magic on the older woman. It amazed her how his charm worked on women of all ages. Maude giggled as he wormed his way into her heart.
“Here you go, hun. These books will have a map of the Underground Railroad. At least what has been identified and documented.” Maude left them with two, old, leather-bound books.
Max handed her one. “Let’s get to it.”
Just when she wanted to give up she found something. It took her several minutes and a lot of flipping through her still partially blank memory but she finally figured it out. “My condo,” she muttered.
“Did you say something?”
“My condo.”
“What about it?” Max asked absentmindedly without looking at her, his concentration on the images in front of him.
“Look at this.” She pulled at his arm to get his full attention. “Look at this!” She pointed to the picture on the yellowed paper.
He looked at the book then her and back at the book again. “It goes all the way to the Canadian border.”
“I know where that is.”
“Where? Let’s go.” He slammed the book closed and pulled at her. “Thanks, Maude.”
They got in his SUV. “Where to?”
“My condo.”
THIRTY-ONE
Her condo? “What the hell are you talking about?” He shouted the question inside the cab of his SUV.
“I have a condo at the mountain just like your boss.” Sam answered without ever looking at him.
“And what, you just now remembered this?”
“Yes.”
“Bullshit!” His heart pounded in his head as his fist slammed against the steering wheel. “After all this time?”
She shrugged. “I’m sorry my memory didn’t come back in one fell swoop and in your required time frame.”
“Pretty damned convenient if you ask me.”
“Convenient? You think any of this has been convenient?” She turned on him and Max was pretty certain she wanted to strike out. Good thing he was driving. “I’m sorry. I never intended on getting shot on the slopes and landing on your doorstep and losing my memory. I also never expected my father to be involved with the FBI and put himself in danger, but that’s the way it is. Deal with it.” She crossed her arms in a huff.
He blew out a deep sigh and spoke to the back of her head. “Okay. All right. I guess it sorta makes sense. That day you landed on my foyer floor I wondered why my door. I thought it was a set up.”
Samantha nodded. “I can see why you’d think that.” Eyes squeezed shut, Sam continued talking. “I remember trying to get in the door, your door as it turned out, but I couldn’t. I mistook your place for mine. When I couldn’t get in I thought for certain I was a goner.”
She probably would have been if he had not been lucky enough to find her. “Why would you own a condo when your father lives so close by?”
She rolled her eyes and gave him one of those ‘are you an idiot?’ looks. A smile tugged at his lips. “Yeah, okay, I get it. You need your own space.”
“And so does Dad.”
He parked the SUV, checked his weapon, and got out. “After you.”
From the outside, the cottage Sam led him to looked almost identical to Michael’s. He could see why she had mistaken his place for hers.
Sam opened the door and gasped.
Max looked past her through the open door. The inside was completely different. Where Michael’s condominium had the definite feel of a mountain retreat with wool-covered furniture, plush carpeting, and the requisite moose head over the fireplace, Sam’s had a much more feminine and homey feel. The living room was the color of warm sunlight, two paisley chairs and a chenille loveseat sat in front of the fireplace, sans moose head. The layout was the same but the look and feel diverged greatly.
His gaze moved beyond the living room to the dining room, and that’s when Max saw what caused Sam to go rigid and freeze in her tracks. Damn! She found Brad. Pushing past her, he entered the house, careful not to touch anything.
Brad lay face up with his legs on the kitchen tile floor, his torso in the dining room, a ski pole sticking out of his chest.
Not that he thought there was any chance the man was alive, but just in case, he bent to check for a pulse.
“No honor among thieves,” he mumbled as he got to his feet.
“You—you think maybe those two thugs that hit Jake killed him?”
He shrugged. “No clue.”
“But why? I mean…”
Sam sucked in a sharp breath. When her lip quivered, he touched her then pulled her into his embrace tucking her head into his shoulder. She shivered.
“Sam, are you okay?”
She nodded against his coat then stepped away from him, swiping at her eyes.
“Your first dead body?”
Wringing her hands, she shook her head. “My mother,” she whispered.
“Your mother? You mean you saw your mom at the viewing?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I came home from school one day and found her dead on the kitchen floor, a gaping hole in her chest and lying in a pool of blood.”
Holy shit! He had never even asked about her mother. He could barely handle what happened to Lucy, he could not imagine what a child felt after finding a parent dead. Reaching out, he pulled her back into his embrace, and wrapped her in his arms. She told him what happened in a matter-of-fact tone but her lips quivered. His heart ached for her.
“No wonder you’re so tough.”
A giggle wrapped around a whimper came from Sam. “From that day forward my father was adamant about teaching me everything he knew about self-defense, a
nd when he didn’t know any more he sent me to every class on karate, Tai Kwondo, even sex education.”
Now, he laughed. “Sex ed?”
Sam stepped back, wiped unshed tears from her eyes, a slight grin creased her face. “He believed in defending my honor as well against disease and pregnancy.”
She gathered herself together. “What do we do? I’ll call the police.”
Before she moved, he grasped her forearm and halted her movement. “Not yet.”
Her eyes widened. “Why? We can’t leave him.” Her voice pitched higher, panicked.
“We’re not going to, but we are going to see what we can find out before the police get here and shut us out. They will consider us suspects and we’ll be answering questions for hours.” The last thing he wanted to do was waste time with the cops when they could be out there searching for the person who stuck a ski pole through Brad’s heart, who more than likely was the same person who kidnapped his brother, and put a bullet in Samantha.
“Why do you think Brad came here? Did he use the tunnel or maybe something else?”
“You got me. Let’s see if we can find a clue.”
“What do we look for?” she asked, without glancing at the dead man.
He hadn’t a clue. He would really like to check Brad’s pockets. Most people wrote stuff down for fear their memory would not hold out. That would have to wait. “Can you remember where the entrance to the Underground Railroad is?”
“Huh?” Under his touch, Sam’s muscles were taut, like a bow ready to be let loose. Her neck stiff, her gaze locked on his. He figured she avoided looking at the corpse. Not that he blamed her.
“Where do we find the Underground Railroad?”
“Oh. Oh, yeah. Off the kitchen—” Max watched Sam swallow hard before she continued. “There’s a wine cellar through the door on the other side of the kitchen.”
He stepped away from Sam, still blocking her view of Brad, and peered into the kitchen. Great, there was only one way into the kitchen. “Close your eyes.”
“What?”
“Close your eyes.”
Before she could comply or protest, he lifted Sam into his arms, turned, stepped over Brad, and into the kitchen. Blocking her view of the body, he set her back on her feet next to the cellar door.
Killer Bunny Hill Page 19