Dark Water: Lantern Beach Blackout, Book 1

by Barritt, Christy

  “I always thought that was good advice,” Colton said. “But we all work things out in our own ways.”

  “Yes, we do.” Elise ran a finger over the rim of her coffee mug. “You said there was something that you wanted to talk to me about.”

  “I do. Want to take a walk and talk?”

  She nodded. “I’d love that. Let me get my shoes. It’s a little too cold to go barefoot.”

  Five minutes later, they were strolling across the sand as waves crashed beside them. Elise shoved her hands deep into her pockets, looking like she was trying to stay warm. It was cold outside, but not as cold as it had been.

  “So what’s going on?” she asked.

  “I’ve been attempting to review who could be behind this. Really, our pool of suspects should be very small.” He paced beside her, their steps slow and leisurely. “I feel like there’s something we’re missing here.”

  “I’ll do anything I can to help. Of course. What do you need to know?”

  “There aren’t that many people who know you discovered this information. I was hoping that you could review with me again what you did after you found that go-bag belonging to Daniel.”

  “Of course.” Elise sucked in a long breath and stared off into the distance for a moment. “I found it and looked at everything. It was probably an hour before I decided I had to tell somebody what I had found. I thought about calling you first, but I didn’t know where you were or if you wanted to talk to me.”

  If you wanted to talk to me? What did that even mean? If this was a different conversation, Colton would’ve asked. But right now, he needed to stay focused.

  “So it only made sense that I would call the command. Brian answered—”

  “Who’s Brian?”

  “He’s the commander’s assistant,” Elise said. “He’s worked for him for years. Nice guy.”

  “Right. Go on.”

  “Brian answered the phone and patched me through to Commander Larson. I told him that I had found something belonging to Daniel, and I thought he should know about it.”

  “What did he say?” Colton asked.

  “He said I should bring it down to the command, to his office.”

  “So, at that point, either the commander or Brian Starks may have heard that you found something?”

  Elise shrugged. “I don’t think Brian would’ve heard anything, but I suppose it’s a possibility. But you also said there was a chance that either my house or my phone had been bugged.”

  “Yes, that’s correct. However, if that’s true, then our pool of suspects is much larger than we thought.” Colton rubbed his chin, not liking that thought. But it was a possibility. “When did the commander tell you to bring it in?”

  “As soon as I could. However, I had a full caseload that day, so we agreed to meet the next morning instead.”

  “What did you do with the information in the meantime?”

  “I took pictures of all of it and I saved it on that SD card. I hid the originals somewhere they wouldn’t be found.”

  “I realize you may not want to tell me, but was the information in your house? Not to sound crass, but did it burn up with the rest of your place?”

  “No, I made sure I took it somewhere other than my house.”

  Colton felt a surge of admiration rush through him. “Smart girl. Okay, keep going.”

  “As I was driving in to meet him the next morning, he called me and asked me if I would meet him outside. He’d just been called to a meeting, but he wanted to hear what I had to say. When I got to the command and parked, he met me in a limo as I was about to walk into the building.”

  “A limo?”

  “He was meeting with the Secretary of the Navy. It was his limo.”

  “So you got into the limo with them?”

  “That’s correct. We only had a couple minutes of general chitchat before I told him what I found.”

  “Did you pass anybody else in that process?”

  “The only other person in that car was the driver, but there was a shield up between the front and the back of the vehicle. I’m assuming he couldn’t hear.”

  “Good job, Elise. That’s what I needed to know.”

  “I didn’t tell anybody else about it, but I had a bad feeling. Part of me wasn’t even surprised when that man showed up at my house that night before I fled. My gut told me that something was askew. I came here, and now you and your men and Ty know about it. But there’s nobody else.”

  Colton felt his jaw tighten again.

  “So, if I’m reading between the lines correctly, you think that the culprit here might be someone associated with either one of your guys, the commander, or the Secretary of the Navy?” Elise asked.

  “I don’t want to admit that any of that is true, but it is a possibility.”

  Just then, someone called out and jogged toward them.

  Dez.

  Colton paused, his gut telling him that something was up.

  “You’ll never believe this,” Dez started, pausing beside them. “I just tried to call my friend Kari.”

  “The cryptologist?”

  “That’s right. I wanted to hear if she had any updates on that code.”

  “And?” Colton asked.

  Dez shook his head. “She was in a car accident last night. She’s . . . dead.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Elise couldn’t get Dez’s announcement out of her mind as she washed the dishes from breakfast. She didn’t know this Kari woman, but it was no coincidence she was dead. Colton obviously didn’t think so either. He’d been on the phone since they got back to the cottage.

  Whatever that code said, someone was desperate to keep it hidden.

  This kept getting worse and worse, didn’t it?

  As she dried her last dish, Elise heard the footsteps coming up the steps. She paused and craned her neck to see who was here now. Across the room, she saw Colton tense and start to rise.

  It was only Cassidy.

  The woman waved a quick hello before wandering over to Elise.

  “How are you feeling today?” Cassidy casually crossed her arms and leaned against the kitchen counter.

  “I’m doing okay. Why? Is something wrong?”

  “I just paid a visit to Henry Adams.”

  “How is he doing this morning?”

  “He left the clinic, refused to stay. Our island doctor thinks Henry needs more help, but he wasn’t able to commit him.”

  “If the man is suicidal, I would definitely agree with that assessment. Can you take him to a bigger hospital with more resources?”

  “Apparently, legally, we cannot. But Henry is asking to talk to you.”

  Elise cut off the water and dried her hands.

  “He wants to talk to me?” she repeated, uncertain if she had heard correctly.

  Cassidy nodded. “That’s correct. He thinks you can help him. You have absolutely no obligation to do this, but—”

  “I will.” Elise nodded, certainty in her voice.

  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Colton asked, stepping into the conversation.

  “He doesn’t appear to be a danger to anybody except himself,” Elise said. “I don’t see where this could hurt anything.”

  “I feel obligated to remind you that he had a gun yesterday, and he could have cost someone his life when he fell from the pier and had to be rescued,” Cassidy said.

  “I know. I still would like to talk to him, though.” Elise paused. “Was the gun his?”

  “Yes, it was registered to him. He doesn’t have a criminal record or even a parking ticket, for that matter.”

  “I don’t want you to go by yourself,” Colton said. “If you go, I’m going with you. I don’t care about patient confidentiality.”

  Elise pushed a hair behind her ear. “Since he is not officially my patient, that shouldn’t be a problem. Besides, I would feel better if you were there with me.”

  Colton nodded, but his muscles still
looked tight. “Do you see any problems with that, Cassidy?”

  “I would feel a lot better if you were there also. I’ve got to go manage some of the protesters again, or I’d go myself.”

  “Are they at it again today?”

  “The surveyor is here. We tried not to let word leak, but somehow it did anyway.”

  Colton nodded. “Do you want me to send a couple of my guys over to help you?”

  “There are only about twenty people out today, so we should be fine. But I’ll call if we need you.”

  “Sounds good.”

  After rattling off the address, Cassidy grabbed an apple from the counter and went out the door again.

  Elise glanced at Colton. “Let me get cleaned up a little, and then we can go.”

  * * *

  Colton knew he was probably being overly cautious, but the fewer people Elise came in contact with, the better. Still, he knew that Elise had a heart for helping hurting people. There was no way she wouldn’t offer her services to someone in need.

  A few minutes later, he pulled up to a small cottage one block from the ocean. The place was nothing fancy, but the outside looked neat and clean. Colton stayed close to Elise as they walked up the set of stairs to the entrance.

  Before they could even knock, the door flew open and Henry stood there. He blinked when he saw Colton beside Elise.

  “I asked for her, not you.” Henry puckered his face as if he’d eaten something sour.

  “We are a package deal right now.” Colton’s voice left no room for argument.

  Elise rested a hand on his chest, as if telling him to take a deep breath. Then she glanced back at Henry. “I’m not doing anything without Colton right now. So it’s either both of us or neither of us.”

  Henry stared at them a moment before saying, “Fine. Come in.”

  They stepped inside the outdated cottage with old brown carpet and dark paneled walls. Colton wasn’t one to be a snob when it came to decorating, but there was something about the cave-like atmosphere of this place that felt depressing.

  Henry sat in one of the chairs and directed the two of them to sit on the couch across from him. The man seemed to be in better spirits today. Still anxious, but not quite as frantic or melancholy.

  Elise leaned toward him, her elbows resting on her knees and her hands laced together in a conversational manner. “How are you doing today, Henry? I know yesterday was a rough day, to say the least.”

  “I don’t know how I’m doing today. I want to believe that everything is going to get better, but I’m just not sure I can.”

  “Why do you think that nothing will get better?” she asked.

  “Because it hasn’t yet.”

  “There’s a big difference between not yet and later,” Elise said. “Sometimes these things just need some space.”

  Colton had always been impressed by the wisdom Elise exuded. She seemed capable of calming the most uptight of people. She even had that effect on Colton sometimes.

  Her words echoed in his mind. There’s a big different between not yet and later. Could that be true for him also? Since Daniel’s death, he’d felt that his life had been on pause. Like he would never get past that moment.

  But what if his future still had a “not yet”?

  “What should I do about my wife?” he asked. “I love her more than anything in the whole world.”

  Elise tilted her head, almost as if she hadn’t expected that question. “When was the last time the two of you spoke?”

  “It’s been a week.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Elise nodded slowly, thoughtfully. “Tell me about her.”

  Henry talked about how they’d met. How she was a schoolteacher. Said she was the most loving person he’d ever met.

  Elise listened and asked questions to get more of the story from him.

  As Colton glanced around, his gaze came to a stop at something protruding from beneath one of the chair cushions.

  Was that a gun?

  Suddenly, this meeting seemed like a terrible idea.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Elise felt she was just starting to make progress when Colton nudged her. At first, she wanted to ignore him. Then she realized Colton would only interrupt if he had a good reason. What did he know that she didn’t?

  She rubbed her hands on her pants and stood. “I’m glad we’ve been able to talk today, Henry. I’d be happy to talk to you again sometime, but unfortunately right now our time is up. I need to go.”

  He jumped to his feet. “Time is up? I didn’t realize we were working on a time schedule. I’m not ready for you to leave yet. We only just started.”

  Colton grasped her arm and nudged himself in front of her. “Sorry, but Elise has other things that she needs to attend to.”

  As they stepped toward the door, Henry stuck his foot in front of it. “No. Don’t go.”

  Colton bristled beside Elise. “I don’t think you understand. We’re leaving.”

  The next instant, the man pulled a gun—a second one—from his pocket and swung it out in front of them.

  “You don’t understand. No one is leaving here. Not until I say they do.”

  Elise gasped. Was Henry the one who had been behind the threats against her the whole time?

  She hadn’t seen it coming. If that was true, why would this man have gone to the trouble of pretending to want to kill himself yesterday? It didn’t make sense.

  All Elise could see right now was the gun that he pointed at them.

  “You both need to sit down.” His nostrils flared. “Right now.”

  * * *

  Colton sucked in a breath. He knew he could take this man. But he wasn’t sure he was ready to chance that yet. He couldn’t risk Elise somehow getting hurt in the process.

  “What do you want from us, Henry?” Colton didn’t take his eyes off the man. He’d known Henry was unstable, but he hadn’t expected this.

  “I’m supposed to kill you.” Sweat sprinkled across his upper lip.

  Elise gasped beside him. “Kill me? Why would you kill me?”

  “If I don’t, Alice is going to die.”

  Colton didn’t like the sound of that. “What do you mean?”

  “Someone abducted her as she left work. I got a phone call telling me to come here. That I should wait for more instructions. Then this person told me I needed to have a mental health crisis. In public. And ask for help. Going to the pier and pretending like I wanted to take my own life was the only thing I could think of.”

  Colton’s mind raced. Had the caller assumed that if Henry had a mental breakdown then Elise would be called to the scene? It seemed like a pretty big assumption. Then, again, maybe this person knew Elise well enough to know she had a heart for helping people.

  That didn’t make Colton feel any better.

  “What else did this caller say?” The tremble in Elise’s voice revealed a touch of fear.

  “He told me you were my target. Said you were on the island and you were a psychologist. I needed to stage something where you might come and then I needed to kill you. I could make it look like an accident. Whatever I wanted.”

  “So you went to the pier yesterday,” Colton clarified. He didn’t like the sound of any of this. “Elise just happened to come help the police.”

  “That’s right. But I couldn’t kill her. I just couldn’t. After I fell into the water and was saved, I thought maybe I would have a second chance at all of this. Maybe I could make things right. But then I got another call today.”

  “What did this person say this time?” Colton asked.

  “He said I needed to finish what I was supposed to do yesterday or else. This caller . . . he knew everything about me. He put Alice on the phone. She sounded so scared. I don’t know what else to do.” His shoulders caved in a silent sob.

  “Killing Elise won’t fix anything.”

  Sweat sprinkled across Henry’s face
. “I don’t know what to do. I just want this all to go away.”

  “You’re not a killer, Henry,” Elise said. “I think you know that.”

  “What else am I supposed to do? I can’t let Alice die.”

  “Henry, you need to put the gun down,” Colton said. “We can talk about other ways to get Alice back.”

  “He’s right, you know,” Elise said. “I know you feel like everything is falling apart right now. But you know this isn’t the answer.”

  “But Alice . . .”

  The man stood and waved his gun through the air again. “I just need to end this.”

  As the man pulled the trigger, Colton threw Elise to the floor, his body covering hers.

  Colton glanced back and saw Henry aim the gun at them again. Colton kicked his leg, and the gun flew from Henry’s hand.

  But Colton knew the man had another weapon.

  Jumping to his feet, Colton tackled Henry.

  Just as he pinned the man on the floor, the door flew open.

  Cassidy rushed inside, gun drawn. “Police!”

  It looked like this was over.

  But Colton had even more questions than he’d had before.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  An hour later, Elise and Colton were in the police station, giving their official statements. Cassidy had stepped out of the room to talk to Henry and left the two of them to take a breather.

  Elise was relieved when Cassidy returned to her office and shut the door behind her.

  “Any luck figuring out who made these threats?” Colton asked.

  “Henry isn’t talking. He almost seems comatose, for that matter.”

  “How did you know to come?” Elise asked. “I thought you were at the protest.”

  “I was, but I made some phone calls while I was there. In fact, I started looking into Henry’s background. I decided to call the school and talk to Henry’s wife. The principal said she hadn’t been in for four days and that was unlike her. I talked to one of her coworkers who said the same thing. I figured there was more to the story. Just as I pulled up to the house, I heard the gunfire.”