by Debbie Mason
“I’m on my way. Stay out of sight, Sadie.”
“I’m in the nursery with Michaela. Abby’s here too.” She glanced at her friend when Gabe swore softly before disconnecting. Sadie briefly closed her eyes.
Any hope Abby hadn’t heard her slipup vanished when she asked, “Who’s Chase? And don’t lie to me. There are two deputies at your door, and you and whoever he really is are acting like they’re the bad guys.”
“I—” Sadie broke off at the sound of Finn barking and Chase saying, “I won’t repeat myself again. Lower the gun before I lower it for you.”
Chapter Nineteen
The bald deputy with the face of a bulldog sneered at Chase, his revolver pointed at Finn. Chase held his gaze and thrust out his hand, bringing his palm down hard on the gun to lower the muzzle before wrenching it from the deputy’s grip.
“What the—” Bulldog rounded on the tall, lanky deputy at his side, who was staring at Chase. “Don’t just stand there. Draw on him!”
“I wouldn’t advise it,” Chase warned, glancing at a snarling Finn. “Now, why don’t we try this again. Show me your badges.”
“We don’t need to show you nothing.” Bulldog puffed out his chest, jerking his thumb at himself and the Jackson County sheriff’s vehicle pulled halfway onto the grass. “Give me back my gun or I’ll charge you with…” He trailed off and rubbed the back of his head, shooting his partner a withering glare.
Chase smiled. “That’s an arrest report I’d be interested in reading. I’m sure your boss would be too.” The guy flushed under his tan. Chase figured it was a combination of anger and embarrassment that he’d so easily relieved him of his weapon.
“Still need to see those badges, boys. Anyone can buy a couple uniforms and add a few decals to a vehicle. If you’d prefer, I can call the sheriff.” Which was his ultimate goal. He wanted to get a read on the man, and these two had just given him an opportunity to do so. Bulldog had also played into his plan to get his prints.
The men shared a look, then shrugged. And that told Chase something else. They weren’t here of their own accord. Their boss had sanctioned today’s visit.
Chase winked. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell him you let me take your weapon.” He tucked the gun in the back of his uniform pants. “Just until I know you are who you say you are. Can’t be too careful these days.”
Tight-lipped, Bulldog clenched and unclenched his fists. Chase smiled. He wished he’d try. This was one of the men who’d shot at Sadie the other night, he’d stake his life on it. He wasn’t as sure about the baby-faced deputy.
Chase punched in the number to the sheriff’s office, noting the baby-faced deputy’s frown as he did so. “Never know when you might need to call in the law,” he said by way of explanation. As he brought the phone to his ear, he laid a comforting hand on Finn’s head. Maybe Mrs. McNab had done Chase a favor after all. He made a mental note to send her flowers.
When he stated his business, the woman who answered put him through. A man’s gravelly voice came over the line. “Sheriff here. My girl tells me you have a problem over on Willow Creek.”
“I have two men on my doorstep claiming to be your deputies, Sheriff. Just wanted to verify with you. They refused to show their ID. I don’t want to get them in trouble or anything. Maybe they’re just embarrassed about their photos.”
“They’re my boys but it sounds like they might be at the wrong address. They’re looking to speak to Sadie Gray.”
“They’ve got the right address.” Chase dropped the friendly local yokel act. “So why don’t you tell me why you want them to speak to my fiancée?” He’d been about to say girlfriend but went with fiancée instead.
“I didn’t know she had herself a fiancé.”
They’d assumed she was living out here on her own, Chase surmised when the two deputies glanced at each other, not looking pleased with the news. Chase was even less so.
“But I do know she has a brother.” The sheriff’s voice had an edge to it now. He’d probably heard the same in Chase’s. “He’s wanted in connection with the murder of one of my deputies so my boys are going to want to talk to his sister, see what she knows. Then they’ll have a look-see around the house and the grounds.”
“Sadie won’t be able to help you. She cut off contact when her brother got involved distributing drugs for the Whiteside Mountain Gang. They’re in your jurisdiction, aren’t they, Sheriff?” He didn’t wait for the other man to answer, keeping a close eye on his deputies, watching for any telltale signs that would reveal their connection with the gang. “Seems to me you would have rounded them up by now. Might be one of them was involved in your deputy’s murder.”
The deputies shared a glance and the muscle in Bulldog’s jaw bunched.
“You trying to tell me how to do my job, son?” the sheriff asked.
“No, sir. Wouldn’t dream of it. I’m just a park ranger.”
“Good, good. Now you let my boys do their job, and we won’t have a problem.”
“You might not have a problem with me, Sheriff. But I’m not sure how the Highland Falls chief of police is going to feel when he hears you’re nosing around in his investigation,” Chase said, spotting Gabe’s truck flying down the dirt road, dust spraying.
“And how’s he going to hear that? You planning on calling him? Because if you are, you might want to have a long think on that plan. We don’t take kindly to outsiders messing in our business.”
“The thing is, Sheriff, Sadie’s already spoken to Chief Buchanan. And you don’t have to worry about her brother showing up here. The chief’s got eyes on the cottage at all times. In fact, he’s pulling up as we speak. No hard feelings though. I don’t blame you for what sounded an awful lot like a threat. If I were you, I wouldn’t want anyone messing around in my business either.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Exactly what you think I mean, Chase thought, but instead said, “Nothing, nothing at all. Here’s the chief now. Would you like to talk to him?” His question was met with silence. He glanced at the screen. The call had ended. “I guess that’s a no. Hey, Chief. I think these two boys would like a word with you about your investigation into Elijah Gray.”
“Is that so?” Gabe nodded as he approached and took in the deputies, glancing to his left when another truck barreled down the road. It was Hunter.
“We’re here to talk to Sadie Gray about her brother’s whereabouts,” Bulldog said with a belligerent thrust of his chin.
The baby-faced deputy stayed quiet, and Chase began to second-guess the interaction he’d witnessed between the two men at the mention of the Whiteside Mountain Gang.
At least he was until Hunter approached. “Dwight, it’s been a while.” Hunter slapped the guy on the back so hard it sent the lanky deputy a foot forward. “Sorry about that. Sometimes I don’t know my own strength.” Hunter smiled and cracked his knuckles.
And that’s when Chase saw it, the utter contempt and lightning-fast temper flaring to life in the deputy’s eyes. Chase was surprised the deputy’s baby face remained smooth and complacent. Dwight was like a snake hiding in the grass, blending in until he struck. Right then, he edged out Elijah Gray and went to the top of Chase’s suspect list for the murder of Brodie.
“I’m here to pick up Abby. She still inside?” Hunter asked Chase.
“She is. Maybe take Finn with you. I don’t want him chasing after the deputies when they leave.” He stepped aside to let the other man pass, the tension in his shoulders loosening its grip. No one would get to Sadie and the baby with Hunter standing between them.
“Let Sadie know it’s you. She’s got a gun, and she’s a crack shot.” He smiled at the deputies, sliding his hand in his pocket. “Like I said, you can never be too careful these days. And speaking of guns, you probably want yours back.” He reached behind him, closing his hand over the butt, making sure the tape he’d palmed stuck. “Sorry, muzzle’s caught on my belt loop.” He brought his other h
and behind him, grunting loud enough to disguise the sound of him peeling off the tape. He palmed it in his left hand and handed the gun back with his right.
Fighting a smile, Gabe said, “You’re wasting your time, deputies. Sadie has no idea where her brother is. But now that you’re here, you can tell me what you know about the shooting in the woods the other night. I’m having a hard time getting the sheriff to return my calls.”
“Sheriff’s a busy man,” Dwight said with no change to his expression or the inflection in his voice.
“Funny, I got through to him no problem not two minutes ago.” Chase watched Bulldog’s face as he gripped his gun. He frowned but didn’t remove his hand to check the butt. He also didn’t holster his weapon. The radio attached to his right shoulder crackled. The same woman who’d answered Chase’s call rattled off an address for a drunk and disorderly through the static.
As Chase and Gabe watched the deputies get in their vehicle, Gabe said, “What do you want to bet the sheriff was calling them home?”
“Definitely calling them to come in, but not to the station. He’s not a stupid man. He wouldn’t want to risk you following them.”
“You’re right. I should have paid closer attention to the address.”
Chase gave it to him. “But you’re not checking it out. It’s too risky. You’d be in his jurisdiction, and you’d be showing your hand. Black will go.” He brought his phone to his ear and went to hand the piece of tape to Gabe. “Let’s see if anything pops on this. On second thought, I’ll have my boss run it. Hunter knows Dwight, so it stands to reason he might have someone in your department feeding him information.” Chase planned to find out everything he knew about the deputy. “Can you put an officer on Agnes?” he asked Gabe while waiting for Black to pick up.
“I’ll take care of it myself.” Gabe looked over his shoulder and sighed when Abby and Sadie came into view. “It looks like the gig is up. Have fun with that.” He patted Chase’s shoulder. “Nice work today, by the way.”
Sadie had her laptop open on the kitchen table, waiting for the server to connect to her brother’s preferred message board.
Abby leaned over her to check out the screen. “I love when you do your hacker stuff.”
Sadie bowed her head. “I’m not hacking anyone. I’m on a message board.”
“Right, of course you are.” Abby gave her a broad wink, glancing at Chase, who stood with his phone to his ear talking to his boss at the FBI. “It’s so cool he’s a special agent. No wonder he sucked at the park ranger thing.”
They’d had to come clean with Abby. She was too smart and had already put quite a bit of it together before she’d confronted Chase in the entryway.
Hunter, who was pacing the living room with Michaela in his arms and Finn trailing after him, raised an eyebrow at Abby.
“You know I think you’re the coolest man on the entire planet. But I’m just so happy my besties have cool guys of their own.” Abby smiled up at Chase, who’d ended his call to come and stand beside Sadie’s chair. “If you’ve never seen Sadie at work, you’re in for a treat. You should have seen her go up against Elijah last summer. She hacked into his Bitcoin account and got my money back. He…” She glanced at Sadie, who was giving her please be quiet wide eyes, and cleared her throat. “I think I need some water. Anyone else want a drink?” She got up to go to the refrigerator.
“I’m good, thanks,” Chase said at almost the same time as Hunter. Then Chase sat on the other chair beside Sadie, nudging the laptop with his finger so he could see the screen.
His thigh touched hers, and she had to control a shiver of awareness. She blamed it on his cologne, vowing to find the bottle and hide the warm, intoxicating scent from him.
“You won’t be able to read his message, you know. It’ll be in code,” she said just as her brother’s avatar popped onto the screen. Relief swamped her. He was alive.
Chase placed a comforting hand on her arm, surprising her with how easily he read her. “You need to get him to come in, Sadie.”
She nodded and responded to Elijah. She could almost sense her brother’s own relief at her quick response.
“Ask him if he has actual evidence that connects the Jackson County sheriff to the Whiteside Mountain Gang and Brodie’s murder,” Chase directed, not taking his eyes from the screen. Sadie had a feeling he was trying to decode their messages. She wouldn’t be surprised if he did, which is why she did exactly as he directed. But her brother’s response surprised her. She stared at the screen.
“What is it?” Chase asked.
“He has proof the sheriff is behind the Whiteside Mountain Gang. He recorded him and two of his deputies on three separate occasions. He doesn’t have proof they killed Brodie though.”
“It’s okay. We can work with that. One of them will turn on the others. They always do. For his own safety, he has to turn himself in, Sadie.”
Another message popped up on the screen. She read it and covered her face. “Damn it, Elijah,” she murmured into her hand. She took a deep breath before facing Chase. “His phone went missing the same night as the drugs. He doesn’t know what he did with them. He was drunk.”
Chase dragged a hand down his face, releasing a frustrated sigh. “Okay, I guess all we can do is hope that, once he’s not in hiding and in fear for his life, he’ll remember something.”
Someone else popped onto the message board. Sadie didn’t recognize their handle. Her brother went dark.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t like it.” She signed off. Her phone, sitting at her elbow, pinged with a text. It was Elijah.
That was one of them on the message board. From now on we’re going old-school, Sis. Tomorrow. After sunset. You know where.
“What does he mean?”
“We used to leave messages for each other, kind of like a treasure hunt. That’s how he’ll communicate from now on. He’ll leave one for me tomorrow at Lover’s Leap. It was our favorite place to watch the sun set and stargaze.”
Chapter Twenty
What do you think about Abby’s plan for the unicorn weekend? Do you think it will create enough interest to impact the store’s bottom line?” Sadie asked Chase from the kitchen, where she was heating up the dinner from Zia Maria’s. Abby and Hunter had left twenty minutes ago.
Chase liked the couple, but he hadn’t been sorry to see them leave. He was enjoying the peace and quiet. Abby never stopped talking, and her mind never stopped working. Admittedly, there were pluses to having her creative mind at work on ways to promote I Believe in Unicorns. Abby had come up with the idea to have a weekend in June devoted to the mythical creatures. She’d feature the event, the store, and Sadie’s grandmother on her popular YouTube channel.
“It sounded pretty good to me,” Chase said. “I’m just a little concerned that people will be in danger if they decide to go unicorn hunting. The woods aren’t exactly a safe place these days.” He sat on the couch playing with Michaela, lifting her in the air and then bringing her back down on his knees, smiling at her happy gurgle. He glanced at Sadie and saw her smirk.
“Especially for you,” she said, her tone amused. “How’s your ankle?”
He glanced at his foot propped on a pillow on the coffee table, courtesy of Sadie. “The ice helped. Thanks,” he said. Then, feeling the need to defend himself, he added, “I might make a lousy park ranger, but I do all right as an agent.”
“More than all right from what I’ve seen and heard.” She glanced over as she placed a plate of lasagna in the microwave. “But do me a favor. Next time you go up against two men with guns, don’t go unarmed. You should have kept your gun instead of giving it to me.”
“I wasn’t overly concerned that they’d pull something in the middle of the day. Besides that, I didn’t want them to see me as a threat. If they had decided to do something stupid, I can handle myself.”
“Still, I would have felt better knowing you were armed.”
/> “I felt better knowing that you were, and I had Finn.” The dog sat on the floor at his feet, his eyes tracking Michaela as Chase lifted her over his head and then back down to his knees. “He likes the baby.”
“He also likes her toys.” Sadie nodded at a small pile of stuffed animals peeking out from under the couch. “I’ll pick him up some of his own tomorrow. Maybe then he won’t steal hers.”
“I’m not thrilled about you going in to I Believe in Unicorns tomorrow.” Sadie planned to work at the store while he stayed at home with Michaela. The officer currently sitting outside in his patrol car would follow her in.
“I know. You’ve made that perfectly clear. But when this is over, I want my grandmother to still have the store and her home.”
“You could just as easily redo the store’s website from here.”
“Once I take the photos of the inventory, I can. But if we want the unicorn weekend to be a success, we need to spread the word. And the best way to do that is for me and Abby to hang out at Spill the Tea for lunch.”
Chase noted the way Sadie wouldn’t meet his gaze. “What else are you planning to do?”
“It’s really annoying when you read me like that, you know.”
“I hear that a lot. It’s never distracted me before, and it won’t distract me now. So spill.”
She grinned, her eyes sparkling. “You’re starting to sound like Nate.”
Her sparkling eyes distracted him, reminding him of how she’d looked after the kiss they’d shared earlier today in the entryway. He’d been dazed and confused, and more than a little turned on. He’d been as relieved by Abby’s interruption as he’d been frustrated.
He focused on Michaela to regain his train of thought, which wasn’t his best idea. She was a miniature Sadie, her eyes sparkling, a heart-stealing smile on her face. She’d stolen his heart the day Black had handed him to her, and Chase had the terrifying thought that her mother had too.