Falling in Love on Willow Creek

by Debbie Mason

“The guy they found dead in the woods a little more than a week ago? He was a deputy with the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department. His name was Brodie. I was his CI—his confidential informant. He—” A gunshot blast rent the night air.

  Sadie threw herself at her brother, bringing him to the ground as a bullet whizzed past their heads. She grabbed Elijah by his shirt and the backpack by the strap, dragging them with her as she belly-crawled behind the rock. Another blast of gunfire came from the opposite direction, the bullet pinging off the front of the rock.

  “There’s two of them,” she whispered, taking the gun from her pocket. She didn’t bother asking her brother if he was armed so she was surprised when he lifted his T-shirt to pull a gun from the back of his jeans.

  He shrugged. “Granny made me take her gun when I went on the run last summer.”

  Two consecutive shotgun blasts echoed in the woods, the bullets hitting the top of the boulder, sending shards of granite onto their heads.

  “Do you know how to use it?” she whispered while digging a water bottle out of the backpack.

  “Yeah, I’ve been practicing,” he whispered back.

  “Good. Pick up one of those rocks and toss it hard to your right.” As he did as she directed, Sadie leaned around the boulder to toss the water on the fire. The flame sputtered and then winked out at the same time one of the shooters fired where Elijah had tossed the rock.

  Her heart racing, she leaned back against the boulder, taking a moment before whispering to her brother, “On the count of three, shoot once, then get off a second shot to the right of your first one.” If they gave the impression that there were more than just the two of them, maybe the shooters would back off.

  She counted down and fired on three. Elijah’s gun jammed. Seconds later, she got off another shot. Her brother managed to get off one too. Bullets pinged off either side of the rock. Her plan hadn’t worked. The shooters weren’t backing off. If anything, they were getting closer.

  Sadie patted the ground, her fingers closing over the rocks that had been digging into her thigh. She handed one to her brother. “I’m going to throw mine, and then you’re going to throw yours. Once you do, I want you to run low and fast, but not in a straight line, Elijah. Go to the caves.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not leaving you.”

  “It’s you they want. Here.” She handed him her gun. It was more reliable than her grandmother’s. Another shot rang out, the bullet shredding the bark of the tree she’d gauged the person shooting at her to be hiding behind.

  A man swore and a radio crackled.

  She wondered if his partner had nearly shot him. Or were there now more than two shooters? She didn’t have time to figure it out or what it meant for them. “Be careful, Elijah,” she said and drew back her arm.

  They threw the rocks within seconds of each other. Elijah’s skipped along the ground. It sounded like someone was running through the woods while hers sounded like someone had run into a tree. He’d always had a good arm—and a soft heart, she thought at the sight of tears shining on his cheeks. “I love you, Sadie. You and Granny. Don’t die,” he said, then sprinted into the woods.

  She didn’t have time to respond or to think about the danger they were in. She had to cover his back. She inched up and got off a shot down the middle of where she suspected the two men were positioned, ducking down when they returned fire. Only the gunshots weren’t directed at her. They seemed to be directed at the initial shooters…or had they gone after her brother? The snap of branches and crackle of leaves indicated they were on the run.

  “Stay safe, baby brother,” she whispered. She should have told him she loved him. It might have been her only chance. She pushed away the dark thoughts and leaned as far to the left as she could without making herself a target. Raising the gun, she aimed it in the direction the last shot had come from and pulled the trigger. The gun jammed again.

  Branches snapped under heavy footfalls. Someone was coming her way. She closed her eyes and prayed. Then she aimed in the direction of the sound. She pulled the trigger. The gun jammed.

  In the distance, she heard rapid shots of gunfire. Someone returned fire, and then someone yelled out in pain. The gunfire and the cry didn’t come from her brother, she was sure of it. The caves were in the opposite direction. But the heavy footfalls had closed in on her.

  She scrambled for the flashlight. Turning it on, she smothered the beam of light on her thigh, searching the ground for a good-size rock. Finding one near the base of the boulder, she hefted it in her hand. She’d let them get close enough, shine the light in their eyes, and hit them with the rock. Then she’d take off and pray she’d bought herself enough time to get away.

  She shot to her feet, shining the light directly into a man’s face. She raised her hand with the rock.

  “Sadie, it’s me. It’s Gabe.”

  Fighting back a sob, she let her hand fall to her side. “Thank God.”

  An hour later, as she sat on the couch in the cottage, she wished anyone but Gabe had found her. She hated to lie to him but she wouldn’t put him in danger. The last law enforcement officer her brother had confided in had died.

  “I’m sorry. I wish I could tell you more, Gabe. But like I said, I’d barely gotten to say two words to my brother when they started shooting at us.”

  “You left here at nine-fifty,” Michael said. “According to Gabe, reports of gunfire came in at ten-ten. Surely you would have had time to share more than a few words with your brother.” His intent stare hadn’t left her face from the moment she walked in with Gabe. It was like he was judging her every move, every word, and he clearly found them lacking in sincerity.

  He was angry—at her. He didn’t have to say so with words; his expression told her everything she needed to know.

  “You missed your calling, Michael. You should have been in law enforcement.” She tried for a flippant tone instead of a guilty one.

  “I am.”

  Gabe glanced at him.

  He shrugged. “Park rangers fall under the purview of law enforcement.” His gaze returned to her face, no doubt waiting for her answer.

  “I don’t know what you want from me. I can’t tell you any more than I already have. The people you should be questioning are the ones who shot at me and my brother.”

  “They were shooting at your brother. If you hadn’t gone off to meet with him, you wouldn’t have been in danger, and your daughter wouldn’t have been at risk of losing her mother.” Michael shoved his hands in the pockets of his chinos and looked away, his jaw clenched.

  Those were the words that she’d been waiting for from the moment she’d walked through the door. “I know. I’m sorry I lied to you, Michael. I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “Use your head,” he said, then winced. “I should probably go.”

  “Me too. I’ll follow up with you tomorrow, Sadie. You might remember something after you’ve had some rest. I’m leaving one of my deputies. They’ll be outside in their patrol car.”

  “Thank you.” She stood up to see them to the door. It wasn’t until she did that she realized the boxes that had filled her living room and kitchen were gone. “Michael, wait. Can you stay a minute?”

  She thought he might ignore her and keep walking as Gabe opened the front door. But he stopped, murmured something to Gabe, and then turned to her.

  Gabe glanced from Michael to her, a pained grimace on his face as he shut the door behind him.

  “What did you want to say, Sadie?”

  “I just wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done, looking after Michaela, unpacking and putting everything away. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.” She gave him a tentative smile.

  He didn’t return it. “You’re welcome.” He reached for the door and glanced back at her. “Goodbye, Sadie.”

  There was a coldness, a finality in his words, and her heart tumbled to her toes.

  “I’m not going to see you again, am I?”
she asked.

  “I’m sorry. But no, you won’t.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  No way. You’re not telling Sadie who we are. We can’t trust her. Look what she pulled last night.” Black tossed his cigarette, grinding it into the asphalt with the toe of his sneaker.

  Thanks to his partner, the area around the industrial waste bin behind I Believe in Unicorns was littered with cigarette butts. Chase toed them into a small mound. “You should clean this up.”

  “You’re talking about blowing our cover to a woman who just showed us her true colors, and you’re worried about a couple cigarette butts lying around on the ground?”

  “There aren’t a couple of butts, there are twenty-two. You smoke too much. It’s bad for your health—and mine, since you continue to smoke around me even when I ask you not to. Death from secondary smoke has been scientifically proven, Black.”

  His partner shook his head. “I don’t get you, Mikey. I really don’t.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me, but what does surprise me is you can’t see the benefit in telling Sadie who we are.”

  “Enlighten me, O brilliant one.”

  Chase pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger in an attempt to alleviate a headache that came from lack of sleep, worry over Sadie and the baby, and indirectly inhaling two cigarettes. He wondered, and not for the first time that morning, how he’d gotten saddled with this man for a partner.

  “If—and that’s a big if for me—she’s working with her brother, we’re more likely to get her to turn on him if she realizes we’ve been surveilling her and her grandmother and that we have the authority to make a deal. The last thing she wants is to end up in prison.” His chest tightened at the image of Michaela being ripped from her mother’s arms as they led Sadie away in handcuffs, just as it had last night when he’d learned she’d lied to him and could have been killed.

  She’d put herself in danger without any regard for the consequences. Whoever shot at her and her brother last night, they’d assume she was involved, just like his partner had. Both Sadie and Michaela were in danger, and the only way Chase knew how to protect them was to tell her the truth. He was honest enough with himself to admit that the fact he’d no longer have to lie to her played into his decision.

  But there was another reason he wanted to tell Sadie the truth, one he wouldn’t—couldn’t—share with his partner. By Chase’s calculations, Black should have come upon Sadie and her brother within minutes of the gunmen. Black was former special ops. From everything Chase had read in the agent’s military file, Nathan Black’s targets shouldn’t have been able to get away from him as he’d claimed when Chase and Gabe had questioned him at the rock in the woods last night. Chase also didn’t believe Black’s claim that his shots went wide.

  Black had a night scope on his rifle, something he obviously didn’t know Chase was aware of. But Chase made it his mission to know every last detail about the men and women he worked with. However, one detail about Black eluded him—what was his endgame?

  Chase had a feeling his partner’s brand of justice wasn’t the same as his. He didn’t want Sadie caught in the crossfire. When she was at her grandmother’s store, she’d be under his partner’s protection. She needed to know Black’s true identity so he couldn’t play her. There was the added benefit that she’d tell Chase if she saw or heard something suspicious.

  If she ever talked to him again. He didn’t fool himself that his confession would go over well.

  “What if Sadie is the mastermind and not her brother? Hear me out,” Black said when Chase opened his mouth to shut him down. “Like I told you and Gabe last night, I didn’t hear or see much, but it was obvious Sadie was calling the shots. She knew exactly what she was doing. She’s smart and one hell of a shot.”

  Admittedly, learning that Sadie had been armed and knew how to use a gun had concerned him. Although practically everyone in the small town owned a gun, according to Gabe.

  “Look, I know you have this Madonna fantasy going on but just because she’s a yummy mummy doesn’t mean she doesn’t also have the brains and motivation to be behind this. It’s in her DNA. This isn’t the first time she’d find herself on the wrong side of the law either. There was that incident with her father. She was the one who helped him escape police.”

  “Allegedly. They never found any proof.” Not that he’d admit it to Black, but the thought had also crossed Chase’s mind.

  Jeremiah Gray had put Sadie, a thirteen-year-old at the time, in an untenable position. So had her brother. Just like in her romantic relationships, Sadie had placed her trust in the wrong men. Men who had no scruples when it came to taking advantage of her innate goodness. He ignored the voice in his head that said he’d basically done the same.

  “Because they underestimated her, the same as you are. In my experience, women can be just as manipulative and deadly as men. Maybe more so.”

  “Whether I’ve misjudged her or not, this is our best play moving forward. We’ve wasted months looking for Elijah, and now that he’s gone to ground again, we need to ensure we don’t waste more time. Sadie will lead us to him.”

  “And why did we waste three months?” Black cupped his hand behind his ear. “Come on, let me hear you say it. No? Then I’ll say it for you. Because we underestimated Agnes MacLeod. We never suspected that our Betty White look-alike was hiding her grandson.”

  “Neither did Sadie, and Agnes raised her,” Chase said, still flummoxed, and irritated that Sadie’s grandmother had managed to pull the wool over their eyes.

  “But did she really? Maybe the three of them are in on it together.”

  “Either you need more sleep or your filthy habit has starved your brain of oxygen one time too many if you actually believe that.” He toed the last of the cigarette butts into the tidy mound. “We’re going with my plan, Black. Meet me at the cottage after work. We’ll tell Sadie then. Keep a close eye on them today. Let me know—” he began as he went to walk away.

  Black grabbed him by the arm, whipped him around, and pulled him up hard against his chest.

  “What the—” Chase got out just before Black angled his head as if to kiss him.

  Sadie stood at the back door of I Believe in Unicorns, staring at Michael and Nate. She rubbed her sleep-deprived eyes. She knew she was tired but imagining the two men were kissing was ridiculous. They couldn’t be…

  She blinked them back into focus. They still looked like they were kissing from where she was standing. The man she’d spent the past three months fantasizing about was kissing another man.

  If she needed further proof her brain synapses weren’t firing on all cylinders, it had just been handed to her on a big, shiny silver platter. Even now, images from yesterday, moments when she thought there might be something between them, played out behind her eyes. She was lucky Gabe had been in the driveway last night, otherwise she might have chased after Michael and declared her feelings for him, anything to make him stay.

  She was about to turn away and give them their privacy when Michael pushed Nate away. Then, as though Michael sensed her standing there, he raised his gaze. His lips flattened, and he shoved Nate again. “I don’t believe you,” he said to the other man.

  Nate glanced back at her and shook his head before saying something to Michael that she couldn’t hear.

  “Too bad. You brought me in on this. We’re playing it my way,” Michael said to Nate, then walked toward her. “Sadie, we need to talk.”

  What did he mean by You brought me in on this? Something wasn’t right. She had a feeling she wasn’t going to like what he told her. She thought back to Michael’s interactions with Nate yesterday. “You two know each other, don’t you?”

  Michael nodded, glancing over his shoulder at Nate, who’d lit another cigarette. “We do. You know him too.”

  Nate muttered something, took a long drag of his cigarette, and then tossed it.

  “Of course I do. My grandmother hir
ed him.” Her voice hitched as Nate joined Michael. The ex-offender seemed different. His easygoing demeanor was missing. He looked a little scary.

  The garbage truck rattled into the alley. “We should probably take this inside,” Michael said.

  “Oh yeah, we should. Unless you intend to out us to everyone in Highland Falls,” Nate muttered.

  Okay, so it sounded like her brain had been going in the wrong direction after all. This was about the two of them coming out as gay. A much better scenario than the one that had her thinking she should slam the door and run. They weren’t working for the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department like she’d begun to suspect.

  She gave them an understanding smile. “Small towns get a bad rap. People aren’t as closed-minded as you think. You don’t have to worry how people in town will react to you guys being partners.”

  “We’re partners, Sadie, but we’re not gay.” Michael held the door open, lifting his chin for her to lead the way.

  She turned to face them, blocking the entrance. “No, you’re not getting anywhere near my grandmother or daughter until I know who you are. Show me some ID.” She slid her hand into the pocket of her jeans, closing her fingers around her phone. Gabe or one of his deputies could be at the store in under four minutes. All she’d have to do is yell for her grandmother to get Michaela out of the store. The knowledge gave Sadie the confidence to lift her chin and hold Michael’s intent blue gaze.

  “You don’t have to be scared. We’re not going to hurt you. We’re here to protect you, Sadie.” He took his wallet from his sage-green uniform pants and flipped it open.

  She stared at the badge. “FBI,” she whispered, lifting her gaze to his. “You’re an FBI agent?”

  He nodded, pocketing his ID before she could examine it. “Nate’s an agent with the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation.”

  The man she’d believed to be an ex-offender flashed his badge. This time she was more careful. She didn’t let the sight of the badge distract her from matching the face and the name to the man towering over her.