Mask of a Hunter

by Sylvie Kurtz

With a finger, she pointed out three locations on the map. “There’s a lake on the backside of the property where the clubhouse is located.”

  Ace bit into his roll. “You don’t dump in your own backyard.”

  “Which is why I’m sure he didn’t unload the car near his mother’s cabin. The bank’s too high there anyway. And too crumbly. We would’ve noticed the marks.” She tapped her finger against another dot on the map. “This campsite has potential. The cousin of a gang member owns it. Lenny’s not active, so he wasn’t on your list. It’s the off-season, so the campground is empty.”

  “Bad blood there. Lenny would just as soon stick a knife in Mike’s back than help him.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t know he’s being used. Maybe Mike just drove up, dumped and walked out.”

  “Maybe.” Ace rose and headed to the kitchen. “This needs coffee.”

  He was much too comfortable in her kitchen, she noticed. She cranked her gaze back to the map and stared at a third dot. About to speak, remembered the bug. Taking the map and the roll with her, she went to the counter separating the kitchen from the living room. “This farm is right near the river. Curtis’s ex-girlfriend, now married to a dairy farmer, lives there.”

  “Why would an ex cooperate with an ex?”

  The coffee gurgled in the pot, filling the apartment with its homey scent. Ace reached into a cupboard and brought out two cups, including the one surrounded by Shakespearean insults she’d sent Felicia as a joke. She shrugged and filled the sudden emptiness gnawing at her with another hit of pastry. “Maybe she doesn’t know. Wouldn’t hurt to go talk to her.”

  “No you don’t.”

  Stuffing the last of the roll in her mouth, she folded the map, wrote the address down on a sticky note and tacked it in the corner of the map. Sebastian was generous enough to offer to pay for the NecroLocation team’s time. The least she could do was pinpoint the most likely spot to find Felicia’s car. “Time is money. I have to.”

  Coming around the half wall separating the kitchen from the living room, Ace glanced at his watch. “Okay. I’ll call in and tell Taz I’ll be late.”

  “Not necessary.” Rory hunted for her tapestry tote, found it on the floor next to the armchair and stuffed the map into it.

  He crouched next to her and lifted her chin with his index finger until all she could see was his dark gaze. “Very necessary.”

  “Part of the job?” She swallowed hard. Why in the world did she want to cry? Not enough sleep, that was it. She swatted at his hand to hide her swipe at the tears squeezing out of her as if she were an oversoaked sponge.

  “No, definitely not part of the job.” He frowned as if the idea was just a little distasteful. “I tend to screw up at relationships. When things get complicated, I bail out. It’s easier that way. But you…” He shook his head. “I thought about you all night long. Couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t get you out of my mind.” He stood up and stuck his hands in his jeans pocket. “If you go and get yourself hurt, how are we ever going to find out if there’s anything worth—” Turning away, he swore. Then his gaze connected with hers and the tenderness there almost undid her. No mask now. Just him, open and vulnerable. “You can’t go off on your own like that. It’s not safe. And I need you safe.”

  If he didn’t stop it, she really was going to cry, and this wasn’t a convenient time. She had to find the car. She had to find Felicia. The last thing she needed to trip over was loving this man. And worse, having him love her back.

  “Okay.” It was all she could manage through the lump in her throat. She propped her tote bag against the lime armchair and rose. “I need to get a few things organized.” She waved her hand toward the crib where Hannah slept. “Hannah.” Then at the ceiling. “Penny.”

  “Okay.” He squeezed by her, then reached for the phone on the side table. She let out a caged breath. The awkward moment had passed.

  Get yourself together. She strode toward the bedroom, only to be confronted with the unmade bed with its tangle of sheets—the evidence of their lovemaking. A shiver shot through her. Was there really a chance that things could work out between them?

  Don’t think about it. Not now. She plucked clothes out of her suitcase and changed. There was time enough later to work it all out. For now Felicia had to come first.

  Neither noticed that the fan was no longer turning.

  THEY SHOWED UP at the farmhouse where Britney Agard lived. She was one of over two hundred people connected to Mike who was investigated. Curtis Fletcher’s ex-girlfriend was interviewed because she’d recently bought a used car from Mike. But everything had looked above-board—on paper, anyway.

  The farm was on the Connecticut River, south of Walpole, along River Road. Large chunks of land were bared, ready for sowing corn. But the river’s edge was lined with trees, as was the property line. The neighbor would have to have a reason to point binoculars this way to see any details. At night, unless there was a full moon, seeing anything would require dedication.

  Coming here with Rory was a decision that could cost him six months of work. But it might also let him snag the brass ring that would dig up Felicia’s car and seal Mike’s fate. He was giving up the big fish—for now. Rory needed answers. He would get them for her. He could adapt. That was his strength.

  After half an hour of talking with the woman in a kitchen that smelled of cow manure, sour milk and fried bacon, the conversation was going nowhere. Ace stood to leave. But the woman’s next words had the cop in him rev to full alert. The timing on Britney’s offer was as off as the smell in her home.

  “I know a good story about Mike, if you want to hear it.” Britney twirled her coffee cup in circles on the white farm table. Her marble-hard gaze was nearly impossible to chisel through.

  Rory leaned forward, one hand reaching toward the haggard woman as if she were a lifeline. “Yes, we do.”

  Lines that spelled unhappiness and aged Britney beyond her years etched her face. Her black wool pants and red lamb’s wool sweater, once stylish, now looked as faded and used as she did. And something about her body language just didn’t ring right.

  “My husband runs the farm, but that doesn’t pay the bills.” Britney looked at one then the other. Money, the bitch wanted money for her story. Ace played dense and let the silence stretch so she’d feel obliged to fill it. When it was obvious neither was going to take the bait, Britney chugged coffee and continued. “Whenever he can, Sam lays carpet for a friend of his.”

  Rory pressed her lips in a thin line. Her fingers curled into the wood as she repressed her impatience. Her shoulders hiked up. To curb the building explosion, Ace stood next to her and rubbed the tense spot between her shoulder blades.

  “This was right before the time Sam laid some carpet for Mike in one of his mother’s houses.”

  “The cabin by the river,” Ace said.

  The woman settled—as if now that she had them hooked, the job of weaving a tale was easier. “That’s right. I was getting dinner ready, when I saw Mike pulling in by the barn. Sam was out with the vet. One of his cows was having problems calving. And you never know how long that’ll take, if you know what I mean.”

  To keep her going, he nodded agreement.

  Britney said Mike told her he had to get rid of a car. “He wanted me to show him the fastest way to where Sam puts his boat in the river, staying off the highway as much as possible.”

  “Did he tell you why he had to get rid of the car?” Rory’s voice sounded breathless.

  “No.”

  “What model of car?” Ace stroked Rory’s back—as much for himself as for her. Touching her calmed him, he realized.

  Britney shrugged and went to the counter to refill her mug with coffee. “How should I know? They all look the same.”

  “Sedan, mini-van, compact car?”

  “Sedan, I guess. Light blue. A big boat of a car with some sort of engine problem. It pinged a lot.”

  Rory’s hand reached and her fierce grip crus
hed his fingers. Her gaze was fiery and the pulse at her throat bucked. “Ace.”

  Ace’s instincts told him this woman was speaking too freely, giving them too many details.

  “I can show you the spot where the car went into the river, if you want.” But her voice and her manner were too eager. Her smile a little too self-satisfied. Every cell in his body wanted to grab Rory and run. This was a trap. “It’s not far. We can take my car.”

  Rory scrambled out of her chair. “Thank you.”

  Ace stopped her with hand. “We’ll follow you out.”

  Penny had needed the car to run errands, so they’d ridden his Indian to the farm. Now he wished for that solid steel cage to protect Rory.

  “You have your cell phone on you?” he asked once they were outside. She reached for the helmet resting on the bike’s saddle, but he grabbed it first.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t like the situation.”

  “Why?”

  “It smells.”

  She blinked, but didn’t back off. “Too bad. I’m going with you.”

  He glanced toward the red SUV pulling out of one of the farm buildings. Britney rolled down her window. “This way.”

  “Stay here and I’ll check this out.” Ace mounted his bike. “If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, call Falconer.”

  “Make your own call.” She grabbed the helmet from his hands and stuffed it over her head. “I’m going.”

  “We don’t know what we’re dealing with.”

  Britney tooted her horn and gestured for them to follow.

  “You’re trying to scare me. But I’m past scared, Ace.” Rory shook her head. “She has the answer.”

  And Rory had to know as much as she needed to breathe. Why did giving her what she needed have to matter to him? “Maybe.”

  Because he understood she had to find her sister, he went against his better judgment, and let her climb behind him. They followed Britney down a rutted farm road, past red farm buildings, a pasture dotted with black-and-white cows, fields of turned-over earth waiting for corn. Once they reached the shoreline, Britney slowed, then stopped at a boat ramp snugged in a curve.

  He was right. Britney Agard had played them, laid a trail of bread crumbs they couldn’t ignore, and led them straight to the ogres in the wood.

  Mike, Bruiser and Mad Dog were waiting for them at the boat ramp. Mounted on growling Harleys, they looked like medieval knights ready to knock lances. When had Britney called Mike? When she’d gone up to the bedroom for the sweater to cover her coffee-stained T-shirt? When she’d disappeared in the pantry to grind coffee beans?

  Not that it mattered. He’d willingly let himself fall into the trap for Rory’s sake. Now he had to handle the situation.

  He’d gambled and lost. Siding with Rory was an infraction of loyalty. And the gang strictly enforced infractions of loyalty.

  If you break the code, you will be hunted down and killed.

  No getting around it. His job in Summersfield was done. And if he wasn’t careful, the status would be stamped Permanent.

  The engine of Mike’s chopped-down Harley thrummed, eager to charge. Ace pretended not to hear him and turned his bike as if he wasn’t in any particular hurry.

  Mike’s engine snarled. Bruiser and Mad Dog barked a throaty response.

  “Ace?” Rory spoke into his ear, her fear palpable.

  “Hang on tight.” Getting closer to civilization would hand them a better chance of survival by putting traffic between them and their predators and by attracting the attention of cops.

  Ace cranked hard on the handlebar, revving the rpms to six thousand. Rory’s arms locked around him vise-tight. He popped the clutch, leaned the bike over hard, and kicked the transmission into high gear. They sped over the farm lane back to River Road.

  Anticipating the sudden dash, Mike and his posse of Sons gave chase. Ace tore down the two-lane road. The twists and hills kept his pursuers behind him. He blasted down narrow dirt lanes, launched into crossroads. Frost heaves had cracked and curled the asphalt, making the ride bumpy.

  Keeping his path unpredictable, he searched for a way to Route 12. There he cut in and out of the morning rush of cars and trucks. Roadwork kept a bridge down to one lane with a stoplight to regulate traffic. Ace zipped through the narrow lane against traffic. Horns squealed. Fists menaced. Shouts threatened. Where were the troopers when you needed them?

  A little farther up the road, he peeled through a yellow light, turned left, hopped on a bridge and crossed over to the Vermont side of the Connecticut River. Cutting a couple of U-turns to shake his followers, he headed for I-91. Mike, Bruiser and Mad Dog were still hot on his tail.

  Rory’s grip around his midsection was an unbreakable lock. “Hang on.”

  He wheeled down an incline, gunned the engine and half slid into a ditch alongside the highway. Her shout skated with the bike. He scaled the opposite side of the ditch, her scream beating against his spine. Kicking the bike into second gear, he wound it as tight as it would go and prayed the transmission wouldn’t rip itself apart. It held and propelled them up the hill. Ace gunned the engine again, belted it into low gear and took on a section of shoulder slick with grass. The bike’s rear wheel started to spin without traction. Cars along the highway screeched out of the way. He zoomed in and out of lanes, hoping to catch sight of a trooper. Rory clung to him as if they were welded together, squeezing the breath right out of him.

  “We can’t outrun them,” he said as Mike and Bruiser were catching up again. They’d lost Mad Dog in the ditch.

  Rory’s head popped up from the middle of his back. Her head whipped from side to side as she tried to pinpoint their location. “Up ahead, there’s an exit.”

  “It leads back to New Hampshire.”

  “Just take it.”

  At the off-ramp, he dropped through two lines of cars and sped down streets near Brattleboro. Bruiser skidded out on a turn, but Mike was sticking to them like flypaper.

  “Take the next left,” Rory shouted.

  The road plunged them back into a network of back roads. “There’s a correction center not far from here. Mike won’t want to go anywhere near there.”

  But Mike was getting closer now. If he didn’t ditch him soon, Rory would get hurt. If he remembered correctly, the road twisted and turned over a spiderweb of streams. “Hang on.”

  Around the next corner, he went on the wrong side of the rail guard, down a steep bank and into a large drainage pipe. He killed the engine.

  They sat. Rory gasped for air. Her hot breath fanned the back of his neck. His chest heaved as he listened for his pursuer. Mike’s bike roared above them and whizzed away. The cooling engine crackled. The brook gurgled. Close by a dog barked.

  “You okay?” He wanted to hold her, but found himself tiptoeing around her, not quite sure where he stood now that he’d so incompetently laid out his feelings.

  She shook her head. “I thought I was going to die.”

  “Me, too.” Because if anything had happened to her, the last of his heart would’ve shattered right then and there.

  “Yeah?” She loosened her death-grip around his waist.

  “Yeah.” Adrenaline still rushed through his veins. “Kick-ass, wasn’t it?”

  “Yeah,” she agreed, smiling faintly. Her face was flushed from the heat of pursuit and her eyes were fiery with a mixture of dread and adrenaline high. She’d never looked more beautiful.

  “What a rush!” She wiped matted hair from her cheeks, then wrapped her arms around her sides as if she were trying to hold herself together. “I don’t ever want to do that again.”

  Him, either. He could handle putting himself on the line, but someone he cared for…that was something else. Ace got off the bike. “We can’t stay here.”

  Hanging on to his arm for balance, Rory slid off the saddle. She didn’t let go. “We can’t go yet, either. What if they’re waiting?”

  Ace scanned the area. The muddy bank,
littered with the remnants of a barbed-wire fence, led to the road. The brook meandered through thick woods still splotchy with patches of snow. A trio of houses in dire need of Bob Vila’s help stood around the curve. “We don’t give them what they expect.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Mike’s looking for a motorcycle.” He glanced toward the crooked trio of houses along the bend. “Ever hot-wire a car?”

  “No! We can’t do that.”

  He laughed and reached for the cell phone in his pocket. At least when she was outraged she didn’t look as if she was going to pass out. “Chicken.”

  He called Seekers, Inc., and explained their situation. Falconer was on his way.

  Mike’s bike buzzed closer. Ace flattened himself over Rory against the side of the drainage pipe.

  Because he didn’t want her to talk, because adrenaline was still stewing in his blood, because he couldn’t help himself, he kissed her. Soft, slow, sweet. As Mike’s bike growled right over them, hesitating, they melted into the shadows, into each other, into the kiss.

  As the sounds of Mike’s motorcycle faded away again, they separated in an awkward untangling of arms and legs. Her eyes were full of questions. He didn’t have any answers. A tight grip squeezed at his heart, and he didn’t know how to deal with that, either. He’d never before let anyone interfere with his mission. How did you deal with a woman who could make you give up who you were, what you stood for?

  They stood, each on one bank of the stream, leaning against the concrete pipe, keeping an eye out on both sides of the road. “In the ditch…” He saw a long shiver roll through Rory as she spoke. “I didn’t think we were going to make it.”

  “I had it under control,” he lied. He’d failed his mission with the gang. He’d almost failed his mission to keep her safe. Neither sat well with him.

  “Back at the highway, I thought they had us.” Color drained from her flushed face. “God, I can’t believe we did this. A high-speed chase. I could’ve ended up a bloody and broken mess on the highway.” The shock in her gaze speared right through his gut. “Then what would happen to Hannah?”