by Megan Crane
“If you mean we made sure he couldn’t hurt the women and children he was terrorizing.”
“—stole a boat and then rendezvoused with your team this past spring. And with you, if I’m not mistaken.” Kate knew she was not mistaken about anything involving this case. She didn’t even have to glance at the notepad in front of her to refresh her memory, though she pretended she did. “This interaction involved a high-speed chase in the middle of the night, followed by an explosion.” Kate nodded toward the front windows but didn’t take her eyes off Templeton. “You claimed he blew up his own boat a few yards outside this harbor and then jumped in the water. Where you saved him out of the goodness of your heart. His story has always been more complicated.”
“His story changes every hour on the hour.” Templeton’s smile struck her as more edgy than before, his eyes more narrow. “We happened to be in place to contain a potentially far more threatening incident. You’re welcome.”
“Since then, there have been four more incidents involving property damage in and around this island and the surrounding area. Culminating in what happened two nights ago, when a boat that shouldn’t have been in the harbor in the first place blew up within sight of the ferry terminal. The anonymous tip that we received suggested Alaska Force was responsible.”
Templeton looked unconcerned. “We’re not.”
“That’s it? That’s the whole defense you intend to mount?”
“I’m not going to waste my time defending something we didn’t do,” Templeton said in that amiable, friendly, excessively mild way that was beginning to grate on Kate’s nerves. “A reasonable person might ask herself why Alaska Force would blow things up right here in our own backyard. If we were the kind of mercenaries you seem to think we are, that would only draw unwanted attention. Like this meeting.”
It was the first hint of anything other than excessive friendliness in his voice. Kate was delighted she was finally getting somewhere.
“You claim you’re not that kind of mercenary,” she said. “So what kind of mercenary are you? The kind who thinks it’s fun to blow things up, maybe? Just because you can?”
“Are you accusing me of something?” Templeton looked and sounded as if he were asking for a menu. Not as if he was facing down an officer of the law and defending himself, whether he wanted to admit that was what he was doing or not.
“Who are the other members of Alaska Force?” Kate asked, instead of answering his question.
Templeton studied her for a moment.
“We tend to be a reclusive bunch,” he said after a moment. “I wouldn’t want to give you any false impressions. What if I told you what a man calls himself only to be accused of making up a name for villainous purposes? That strikes me as a quagmire I’d be better off avoiding.”
Kate smiled. “Isaac Gentry, your leader. Benjamin Hendricks, otherwise known as Blue. Jonas Crow. Rory Lockwood, the former Green Beret who lied about how he got his injuries last spring. Alexander Oswald.”
Templeton laughed. “Who?”
“Otherwise known as Oz.” Templeton blinked, and Kate made a show of looking at her notes as she rattled off the rest of the list of names she’d memorized. Then she lifted her gaze to his again. “Up to and including Alaska Force’s latest and first female hire, Bethan Wilcox, who joined your team in late August. Did I miss anyone?”
“I don’t know why you asked me for a roster when you already have one memorized.”
She couldn’t tell if that was a figure of speech or if he knew she wasn’t really checking her notes. “Are you a doomsday cult of your own? Is Alaska Force involved in some kind of territorial squabble with other less-than-savory groups?”
“A doomsday cult,” Templeton repeated, and then let out that laugh again. It was big and bright, and most irritatingly, it seemed to lodge itself inside Kate’s chest. She told herself that was the strong coffee the surly Caradine had brought her, warming her from the inside out. “I can’t wait to tell everyone you said that.”
Then he angled himself forward a little, which seemed to make him that much bigger. That much more.
Kate did not allow herself to betray so much as a flicker of reaction. Or to shift herself back at all.
“I’ve always wanted to be in a cult,” Templeton told her, as if they were sharing their hopes and dreams. “Seems like it would be one of those can’t-miss life experiences.”
“It’s not a life experience any reasonable person would want.”
For the first time since he’d sat down opposite her, Templeton Cross looked intrigued. “You were in a cult? And they let you be a trooper?”
“I have experience with fringe survivalist groups, yes. Some might call them cults. I personally view them as criminals, the same as any others.”
It had been so long now that Kate knew her voice stayed cool. Even. She could easily have been talking about any old experience she might have had on the job, and she didn’t know why she had the distinct impression that this man could see right through her. That he could tell, when so many others hadn’t had a clue, that she was talking about herself. Her own experiences. Her personal life that she talked about with no one of her own volition.
That notion chilled her straight through.
“Are you asking if Isaac Gentry has cobbled together a group of fringe survivalists?” Templeton asked. “I’m not sure I know what that even means. This is Alaska. Isn’t everyone here a survivalist by default the minute they make it through their first winter? What makes them ‘fringe’?”
“There’s a difference between what I would call a dangerous survivalist mentality and regular folks who like to keep to themselves, stay off the grid, and conduct their own lives as they see fit.”
“If you say so.”
Kate leaned forward. “Grizzly Harbor has become the epicenter of an ongoing series of violent incidents. And involved in each and every one of these incidents is this group of yours. A band of men with military skills, who like to get themselves in trouble and then tell lies to the authorities about what happened. This is an unacceptable situation.”
“Lies?” Templeton looked innocent—or tried to, anyway, though his face looked purely wicked. “That seems like a harsh word.”
“Everybody lies,” Kate assured him. “Especially to the police.”
“Everybody does? Have you interviewed everybody?”
“It’s the quality, quantity, and kind of lies that you and your friends keep telling that concern me. I have to ask myself what exactly you’re hiding out there in Fool’s Cove. It’s supposed to be nothing more than an old family fishing lodge and a few cabins.”
“Fishing is very relaxing. You should try it sometime.”
“The thing about a basically inaccessible Alaskan cove that no one can sneak up on is that from where I’m sitting, it looks a lot like a fortress.” Kate smiled again. This time, Templeton didn’t return it. “And I have yet to discover something that looks that much like a fortress that isn’t filled with men who are prepared to defend it like one, too. No matter who comes calling.”
“If you’re so interested in whether or not Fool’s Cove is an armed fortress,” Templeton said with a drawl, “why didn’t you just show up there and see for yourself? Isn’t that what police officers do?”
“This conversation is step one,” Kate said. “The friendly approach. I invite you to consider it a warning.”
“I’d better behave, then,” Templeton murmured, and there was a heat in his voice that made her wonder if he even knew what the word behave meant. “You sound like my mama used to. It was best that she never did count all the way to three, if you know what I mean.”
“When we asked for this meeting, we expected to meet with Isaac Gentry,” Kate said, because she found it oddly disconcerting to imagine the woman a man like this would call Mama. “Why isn’t he
here? Is he too intimidated to have this conversation himself?”
There was what sounded like a snort from the kitchen. Kate didn’t turn around, but Templeton’s mouth curved the slightest bit in one corner.
“There must be some misunderstanding,” he said after a moment, and a deepening of that small curve. “I’m here as a representative of Alaska Force, and also as its first, best member. Isaac and I go way back.”
“You and Isaac served together, didn’t you?”
“I consider him a brother,” Templeton said. Which was a touching way to not answer the question, much less talk about what he and Isaac had done while active-duty members of the military. Kate suspected it was part of that highly classified section of his record. “But if you feel more comfortable talking to him directly, I’m sure we can arrange that.” He glanced at his wrist, where he wore a technical watch that looked as if it controlled a fleet of space shuttles. “Thing is, it’s getting dark. It’s a miserable boat ride this time of year, and it’s next-level suffering at night. But I’m game if you are.”
And Kate knew she didn’t mistake the challenge in the way he looked at her, in his glinting gaze that made her body temperature click up a few degrees, though she refused to acknowledge it.
“No, thank you,” she said. “I think I’ll pass on the offer to travel in the dark, over rough December seas, on a boat of unknown provenance, with a man I suspect to be involved in criminal activity. Much less to a heavily armed fortress in the middle of nowhere.”
“Technically, you just described almost every house in rural Alaska.”
“Do you know what sort of people don’t turn up to meetings like this? Ones who have something to hide. Or, say, your run-of-the-mill cult leader who feels he’s far above such mundane concerns. Which is Isaac?”
Templeton tipped his head back and laughed uproariously at that.
He took his time looking at her again, and when he did, he shook his head a little, as if the hilarity had all but overcome him. Somehow, Kate doubted it.
“He’s working, Ms. Holiday. He’s a busy man.”
“You can call me Trooper Holiday, thank you,” Kate corrected him. “But I suspect you know that. Or did they not teach you proper forms of address when you were in the army?” She tilted her head slightly. “Sergeant?”
“I apologize.” Though he looked, if anything, amused that she’d used his title in return. Entertained, even. He did not look apologetic. “We keep it pretty informal around here. It helps remind us we’re not active duty anymore. Trooper Holiday.”
And there was . . . something else in the way he said that. It shivered all the way down the length of her back. Kate sat taller, but the glint in his dark eyes told her he knew why.
When he couldn’t. Of course he couldn’t.
“Let’s get back to this latest incident two nights ago. I’m assuming you know the details.”
“I know the details because I know a thing or two about explosives,” Templeton said, which was agreeing without incriminating himself, as Kate was certain he knew. “And I tend to take a dim view of them being used in the place where I live. Call it a weird preference of mine if you want. So, yeah, I’m aware that some joker blew up a boat. Until your office called us, we figured it was the usual drunk nonsense. Because, let’s face it, out here it usually is.”
“Was it drunk nonsense that knocked your friend Rory on the head and left him tied up for a few hours last spring?”
“My recollection is that he fell.”
“That’s not even a good lie. A man like you can do better. I’m sure of it.”
“First, how can a recollection be a lie? You know what memories are like. So unreliable. And second, what do you mean by ‘a man like me’?”
Kate smiled. “This whole performance. Swaggering in late. Lounging around like you don’t have a care in the world. I understand why they picked you to be their ambassador. You seem so friendly. So approachable, until a person realizes that it’s all a show. And I saw your face when you walked in the door. Before you started smiling so much. I think that’s probably a whole lot closer to the real Templeton Cross.”
She didn’t know when the tension between them had gotten so thick, but she didn’t do anything to break it. She waited, her gaze steady on his, to see what he would do.
To see who he was.
“I’m pretty sure there’s only one Templeton Cross,” he said after a beat, his voice a deep, amused rumble. “I don’t keep extra ones in a jar by the door.” He tapped a lazy finger on the table between them. Kate figured he was reminding her of his intense physicality, the way men often did. Though she didn’t usually feel it inside her, as if he’d stroked her with that finger. “Life isn’t a Beatles song, you know.”
“I read your military file, and what wasn’t classified made it pretty clear that you’re one of the most dangerous men alive today. And what I have to ask myself is why a man with your background would spend so much time trying to convince me that he’s a tabby cat.”
“A tabby cat?” Kate thought she heard another snort from the kitchen. “I can tell you with one hundred percent honesty that I have never attempted to act like a tabby cat in my entire life.”
“You’re only making this worse for yourself,” Kate said softly. “You’re making me wonder what you’re trying to hide. And here’s the thing about me that you should know because, of course, you don’t have access to my file.”
But when she said that, something in his face changed. And she wondered if that little flicker she saw in his dark eyes meant that he did indeed have a file on her. The way ex-military types probably would. She would have to assume he did.
Kate kept going. “When I start wondering about things, it tends to lead to investigations. And those investigations tend to lead to convictions. Incarcerations. You get where I’m going with this.”
“I can’t say I’m a big fan of cages. Or courtrooms.”
“Then I suggest you help me.”
“I’m nothing if not helpful.” His gaze got significantly more intense when he stopped smiling. “How about this? Alaska Force is being framed.”
Two
Templeton Cross was not a man who indulged his temper.
If he had been, he wouldn’t have been here now. He would have been off venting his spleen in the manner he knew best—which usually involved kicking butt, taking names, and making sure he utilized each and every lethal skill he’d been taught so well in the United States Army.
But it didn’t matter that someone had dared to come for his brothers-in-arms. It didn’t matter that whoever it was had been circling around Alaska Force and Grizzly Harbor since sometime in the summer, the best they could figure.
It didn’t matter that Templeton was a man of action who far too often these days found himself shoehorned into his alternate persona. The one where he was so freaking charming he sometimes thought he might choke on his own smile.
None of that mattered, because the Alaska State Troopers had come calling, and it was Templeton’s job to handle it. He’d learned a long time ago that the only thing that mattered was his mission. Usually he believed that totally.
Today shouldn’t have been any different.
“You think you’re being framed,” said the woman across from him at an exposed table in the Water’s Edge Café instead of the more private table Templeton preferred. As if she was humoring him.
Trooper Holiday kept a pleasant expression on her face, but her cool brown eyes were cop straight through. And it had been a long, long while since Templeton had seen that particular look directed his way. It amazed him that he could still feel the same kick he had when he’d been an angry, grieving teenager on a self-destructive rampage. Back then he’d seen that look all the time from every police officer in the greater Vidalia, Louisiana, area.
He co
uldn’t say he cared for the sensation. Nostalgia wasn’t his thing. So he smiled instead.
Her intense expression only cooled further. “And who do you think would go to the trouble of framing a bunch of men with violent, antisocial predilections when it seems clear to me you and your friends are good at doing it on your own?”
Templeton was good at charming people. It was one of the reasons he’d succeeded in his chosen profession. Well. He hadn’t so much chosen the army as he’d been advised by a judge that he’d better get right with the Lord, Uncle Sam, or any combination thereof, because if he showed his face in the courtroom again he’d end up doing hard time.
He might have been basically feral at that point of his life, having been shuttled from one foster care placement to another after his mother died—because Templeton had already been gaining on six feet and was called scary at twelve years old when really, he was half-crazy with grief—but he’d had no interest in being yet another brown man behind bars. Like his own father. No, thank you. He’d introduced himself to Uncle Sam down at the recruiter’s office later that same afternoon and had changed the course of his life forever.
And now here he was. All these years later, telling lies to another cop.
At least this time around, he was better at it.
“If we knew who was framing us,” he said, pleasantly enough, “we’d probably go on out and apprehend them.”
“And by ‘apprehend them,’ can I assume you mean something along the lines of what happened that night last spring out in the sound when yet another boat blew up?” Her voice was as cool as her gaze. And it made Templeton remember being smaller, skinnier, angrier. And so much less in control of himself that he’d been a different person entirely. “That being the night you claim you were out fishing in the predawn hours and just happened to catch the very preacher whose compound you’d disrupted heading for Grizzly Harbor. Loaded up with bad intentions.”
The boat had been packed with C-4 as well as bad intentions, but Templeton only smiled wider. “Fishing is my life.”