He believes me.
She nodded and slowly stepped down from her perch, attempting to hide how badly her knees shook.
“Well, we’ll take care of her and then you can show us.”
Us?
Mercy peered from the scrubby pines and caught her breath. A man stood near the rock formation, his rifle aimed at Sandy, who had climbed partway up the horse’s head.
Sandy’s eyes were wide, her mouth slightly open as she stared down at him.
Mercy drew her weapon. I have cause. She lined up her shot, her heart strangely calm, his torso in her sights.
Metal dug into her temple.
Her heart stuttered as she froze.
Who?
“Can’t let you do that, Mercy.”
That voice. Mercy briefly closed her eyes and lowered her weapon. It can’t be. A stabbing sensation rose in her chest.
It’s him.
Art snatched the gun out of her hands and flung it into the trees.
She turned her head the slightest bit, pressing her temple harder into the gun, and met his gaze. “Fuck you. You fucking rat.” Anger shook her voice.
He smiled, but the emotion didn’t reach his eyes. “You know nothing about me.” Art roughly searched her with one hand, taking too much time at her breasts.
“You’ve been wanting to do that for years, right?” she snapped.
“In my dreams every night, babe.”
Realizations swamped her brain.
“You screwed up this investigation at every turn. You tried to get me to go to Canada, for God’s sake.” Anger flooded her. “Have you done that since the very beginning? For thirty years?” Her fingers flexed, aching to squeeze and destroy something. Preferably his black heart.
“Walk,” Art ordered, moving the gun to press her spine. “Over by her.”
Refusing to raise her hands, she marched over to where Sandy now stood, below the horse’s cheek. Sandy blinked rapidly but seemed in control of herself.
Mercy crossed her arms and took in the second man, who still held a rifle on Sandy, recognizing the eyes and shape of his face immediately. She’d stared at his photos a thousand times. “Trevor Whipple,” she stated. “I’ve been looking for you.” She tilted her head and frowned. “You look a lot older than the photos we had digitally aged.”
Art snorted, but Trevor’s icy-blue eyes glared at her.
“Life on the run hasn’t treated you well,” she continued, deliberately running her gaze up and down him, lingering on the handgun in his shoulder holster. “Scuffed work boots . . . jeans about to disintegrate . . . dirt ground deep into your hands. I don’t think you lived the life of a millionaire. I’d guess you ended up as a ranch hand.”
Trevor’s barrel moved from Sandy to Mercy. Glancing at Art, she saw concern flash in his eyes. Is Art not wholly committed to Trevor’s plan?
“It’s not too late, Art,” Mercy said. “Right now all you’ve done is point a weapon at me. I can’t help you if you take it further.” Her gaze went from his pistol to the rifle slung on his shoulder.
Two men. Four weapons.
Trevor laughed, and Mercy noticed his teeth were brown. He was the charmer of the robbery bunch?
“Oh, it’s way too late for Art, Special Agent Kilpatrick. Waaaay too late.” He laughed again.
Anger flickered across Art’s face, and Mercy felt her heart sink. “What did you do, Art?” she whispered.
He said nothing, his face carefully blank.
Trevor looked from Art to Mercy. “Aren’t you going to answer the special agent?” he prodded, his grin widening. “Tell her.”
Mercy could barely breathe.
“I’m disappointed in you, Art,” Trevor said with fake sorrow. He winked at Mercy. “Art here had a run-in with a reporter.”
“Don’t tell me you shot Tabitha Huff,” she said softly, the dead woman’s face fresh in her memory.
He looked away.
But Mercy knew.
“What did Trevor have on you, Art?” she asked. “What would push you to murder?”
“Shut up,” said Trevor. He pointed his rifle back at Sandy. “This lady has also been telling you lies, Special Agent Kilpatrick. She knows exactly where the money is.”
Every time he said Mercy’s title, he slurred it like an expletive.
Mercy wasn’t done with Art. “You were an FBI agent!” She hurled the words at him. “What was your price to betray your country? Thirty pieces of silver?”
Satisfaction filled her soul at his flinch.
Trevor sneered. “His price was two hundred grand.”
Mercy contemplated Art with disgust. “For two hundred grand, you spent thirty years misleading a major investigation.” She moved her gaze to Trevor. “What happened to your part of the money? You didn’t spend it on clothes.”
“Fuck you.”
The rifle pointed her way again.
“Did Art come to you, Trevor? Did he track you down, and then you bought your way out?”
“Something like that. The feds were getting close. His wife had died, and he was drowning in medical bills. Once I discovered that, I knew I had him.”
She turned a bitter gaze on Art. “Your sob story about your wife’s cancer feels a little hollow now.”
Art had kept his handgun pointed at the ground until now. He raised it, and a chill washed over Mercy as he pointed it directly at her head. “Do not talk about my wife.” His voice was low, his words shrouded in pain.
Mercy didn’t care. She turned her contempt to Trevor. “Did you shoot Ellis Mull?”
He sneered. “I didn’t do it. It was that tiny little bitch.”
He means Bree. She was the driver, not Sandy.
“Bull,” Mercy said.
“No bull.” Trevor flashed his brown teeth again. “She was vicious.” He looked at Sandy. “Leah—Bree—told you where her money is. Spill it.”
“Bree had money left? After thirty years? I doubt that,” Mercy told him.
“Then why the fuck are you digging?”
“If I didn’t, I’d always wonder if it existed, but I admit it was a long shot. Apparently your money didn’t last long.” She frowned. “Just how much did you end up with?”
Art’s uncertain expression kept her peppering Trevor with questions. He wasn’t completely on Trevor’s side. She felt it and would press that advantage as long as she could.
No SWAT team is going to drop from the sky.
There is no other hope.
I know there is a decent man in there somewhere.
Trevor shrugged. “I took Ellis’s portion along with my own. Leah and Nathan split with the rest of the money. Never saw her again until recently.”
Bree shot Ellis, but you got his money? Right.
“What about Shane Gamble? He was just out of luck? No one held money for him in case he got out of prison?”
“Dunno. Ask Leah. She was his girlfriend.”
Sandy gasped. “You’re lying.”
Trevor raised a brow at her. “They were hot and heavy. He brought her in at the last minute to drive for us but promised the money would still be split four ways.”
Why am I surprised Gamble lied to me?
“It must have been a new relationship,” Mercy murmured. “There’s no record of a girlfriend.” Gamble protected Bree by telling the investigators the driver was “Jerry”?
“Yeah.” Trevor was done with the topic. “You. Redhead. Where’s the money?”
Sandy was silent.
Trevor moved closer, his barrel inches from her face. “Where. Is. The. Money.”
Lunge and shove the barrel up. Mercy saw it play out in her mind. Could I get control of the rifle? Trevor would still have a handgun. And there was Art to consider.
A faint tremor shot through Sandy.
“A minute ago you were my best friend,” Trevor sneered. “Telling me you’d kept it secret from the feds. Now spill it!”
Sandy didn’t speak.
&n
bsp; Trevor hooked his rifle over his shoulder and stepped up, grabbing her ponytail in his fists, yanking her head to the left and down. Mercy took a step to grab his handgun.
“Mercy! Stop!”
She froze at Art’s command. His handgun was pointed at her again, his eyes deadly serious this time. He will shoot me. She eyed the rifle over Trevor’s shoulder. Can I get that away from him?
Trevor dragged Sandy toward the cliff. She fell to her knees as he hauled her by the hair, screaming and thrashing to get her hair out of his hands. Sandy was tall and strong, but surprise and terror had given him the advantage. Her piercing shrieks made the hair rise on Mercy’s arms as she stood helplessly, watching her friend be dragged to a certain death.
Sandy flung herself on her stomach, using her entire body weight against him. Trevor continued to wrench her closer to the edge, swearing at the woman, pulling clumps of hair from her ponytail.
Shaking, Mercy looked at Art. He wasn’t watching Trevor; he was watching her. “Try me,” he stated.
“Where is the money?” Trevor shouted at Sandy. He had her at the rim, her head over the edge. He knelt on the center of her back as he seized her head and forced her to look down. “See those trees down there? Wanna join them?”
Mercy ached to cover her ears and drown out Sandy’s cries. She screamed like a dying animal.
Trevor let go of the hair and pushed on Sandy’s hip, shoving her body around to the edge.
He’s going to roll her off.
“Safety-deposit box!” Sandy shrieked.
Trevor stopped. “Where?”
“Eagle’s Nest.” She started to sob, big gulping wet sobs.
Trevor hauled Sandy around until she was sitting upright with her back to the vista. “That’s a good girl.” He patted her head, and she jerked it away.
Sandy looked to Mercy, her eyes wet and full of fear. “Bree didn’t want the FBI to know.”
“You dragged me up here just to make me think you were helping?”
“She wanted the FBI to give up searching for the money. Believe it was gone.”
“I knew it wasn’t gone,” Trevor crowed. He pointed enthusiastically at Art. “Told ya. I knew Leah would hold some of it for Shane.”
“You think she held money for Shane Gamble for thirty years?” asked Mercy. “No woman is devoted to an absent guy for that long—especially a murderer.” She swallowed. “Where’s Nathan May and his money?”
“Don’t care,” said Trevor. “I found Leah, and that’s enough for now.” He threw back his head and laughed. “Could have knocked me senseless when I saw her face in the paper for some teaching award. I knew God was leading me to the money.” He grinned. “Man, she was good at protecting her secret. It was worth two fingers to her.”
Mercy lost her breath.
“You evil fuck,” Sandy shouted from the ground, anger replacing her fear. “You tortured her for money you hoped existed? She might never be the same when she wakes up.” Tears ran down her cheeks, and her hands curled into fists.
Mercy eyed Art. “What do you get out of this? I understand what you got back then, but now?” Come on, Art.
“I agreed I wouldn’t rat his ass out,” replied Trevor cheerfully. “No one will know about the money I gave him, how he lied at his job, or about the women he shot. Otherwise I’d tell—”
“‘Women’?” Mercy cut in. Fury boiled under her skin.
“He’s lucky the second woman is alive, since he thought she was you.” Trevor savored the last word, his cocky gaze full of glee at the firework he’d just lit.
Mercy’s focus settled on Art like a spotlight. Everything else was black.
“You almost killed my niece . . . because you thought it was me . . .”
Her legs wobbled. I’m not going down.
Art looked away.
“What happened to you, Art?”
Images of Kaylie bleeding, terrified out of her wits and asking if she was going to die, ricocheted in Mercy’s mind. She longed to launch herself at the prick and pound his face until his blood ran like Kaylie’s. But she was frozen.
“I trusted you,” she whispered.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Truman and Samuel had found the narrow pass between two rocks and had been moving east for a good fifteen minutes. Truman was antsy, his gaze constantly darting around for the rock shaped like a horse head. Karl had said ten minutes from the pass, but it was an estimate.
There was no horse rock anywhere to be seen.
“Dammit,” Samuel muttered.
“No shit.”
“Was Karl wrong?”
“That narrow pass was definitely as he described,” Truman stated, remembering how it’d threatened to trigger his anxiety when he couldn’t see the way out. Now they were faced with a light spread of small pines and other trees. Karl hadn’t mentioned those.
“He said the rock structure overlooked a valley. We haven’t seen any cliffs yet, so let’s keep going. Maybe it’s on the other side of this grove,” said Samuel, giving his horse a squeeze with his legs, his back straight and chin up. His hips naturally followed the movement of the horse, making it look as if he’d ridden all his life.
Truman urged his horse to follow Samuel. They’d cantered a good part of the way, feeling the pressure to get to Mercy and Sandy. When sweat had foamed on the horses’ necks, they’d slowed to a walk, and now it seemed as if they were crawling.
After a minute Samuel pulled to a stop. “Truman,” he said in a low voice as he pointed far ahead in the trees.
An ATV.
Truman immediately scanned their surroundings. Nothing. All quiet. “Let’s move in a little closer.”
“We need to go on foot,” Samuel stated. “I don’t think backup is coming soon,” he added. “There’s no way county can get here quickly.”
“Mercy is our backup.” I hope.
Samuel gave him a skeptical look but nodded.
Both men dismounted and wrapped their reins around a tree, giving the horses enough slack to graze, and then drew their weapons. They carefully moved to the ATV while constantly watching their surroundings. The ATV was old and beat-up, and Truman wondered how it’d made the journey from Bree’s house carrying two men.
“I bet the ridge is directly east. They left the ATV here to go in quietly,” Samuel said in a hushed voice.
“Let’s go.”
The two men moved cautiously through the grove of small trees. The ground was either rocks or packed dry dirt and was covered with old pine needles that continually cracked and snapped under their boots.
A piercing scream made Truman catch his breath.
“Sandy,” said Samuel, looking pale.
Not Mercy.
Is that good or bad?
Male and female shouts sounded ahead, and Truman moved faster. As he got closer to the edge of the grove, he saw the back of a giant rock sitting on the edge of the ridge. Beyond the rock all he saw was blue sky; the ground dropped away. To the left, he made out three figures. No, four. One is on the ground. Spotting the red hair, he realized one of the men was struggling with Sandy. Relief swept through him as he spotted Mercy standing next to the rock.
He stared at the man with a weapon on her. Holy shit. Art Juergen.
How is Art involved in this?
Money. Two million dollars went missing.
“Samuel,” he whispered. “That’s the FBI agent who assisted with the robbery case.”
Shock crossed Samuel’s features. “The retired one?”
“Yes.” The one Mercy trusted implicitly.
“Mercy must be livid.”
“I suspect that’s putting it mildly.”
How long has he lied to her?
“I don’t recognize the other guy,” said Truman. “Say . . . see that?” He pointed at a shovel leaning against the rock.
“Yeah. And the ground is all dug to hell.” Samuel paused. “Holy crap. Were Sandy and Mercy digging for money?”
“That
’s my guess,” Truman whispered, understanding why Mercy hadn’t elaborated in her voice mail. Searching for buried treasure sounded ridiculous.
The screaming had stopped, and Sandy sat on the ground, her head down and her shoulders sagging. Truman couldn’t hear the conversation, but the man by Sandy seemed quite pleased. Mercy’s body language verified that she was furious.
“I’ll go to the right of the rock,” Samuel said softly.
“Left for me. I’ll come in behind Juergen.” Truman was still appalled at the sight of the former agent.
Money changes everyone.
Samuel moved right, pine needles crackling under his boots. Truman went left and spotted two tied horses that must belong to Sandy and Mercy. He moved until the horses blocked the people at the rock from seeing him.
Both horses lifted their heads and swiveled their ears toward him as their gazes locked on him in alert fascination.
Please no.
One gave a high-pitched whinny in his direction.
Mercy’s center of balance was forward, and every muscle focused on Trevor’s moves, waiting for his concentration to waver, aware she’d have a split second to make a decision. Being shot by Art was a risk she’d have to take.
At the whinny, Trevor turned toward the horses, and Mercy exploded into action, surging forward.
“Hey—” he started.
Mercy snatched the loosely held rifle from his left hand and swung the butt at his head like a bat, every ounce of her strength in the swing.
He ducked, but the rifle hit a glancing blow off his face. Mercy hurled the rifle over the cliff and had his handgun out of his holster before Trevor could see straight again. She pivoted behind him, snagged his neck in a chokehold, and pointed his weapon at Art.
At Mercy’s lunge, Sandy scrambled and grabbed the shovel. She faced Art, her legs planted and slightly bent, the blade in front of her chest, ready to attack or defend.
“Behind me,” Mercy ordered, panting for breath, every nerve throbbing with energy. Sandy obeyed, stepping sideways, her gaze never leaving Art.
Trevor thrashed, and Mercy tightened her arm. “Hold the fuck still,” she said in his ear. His hands dug at her arm. She placed the tip of the barrel against Trevor’s temple, her gaze locked on Art, and Trevor stilled.
A Merciful Fate Page 29