by Lisa Harris
“Me neither.” He shoved his phone back into his pocket. “Let’s walk a little further along the ridge, but then I think we need to head back to Orcas Island. There is no way we can search the rest of the island in the dark, and more than likely they’ve already left.”
He was right. They needed to focus their efforts on ensuring their fugitives didn’t make it across the border.
They continued along the trail that followed a rocky ridge a dozen feet above the shoreline to their right and a long row of madrone trees, with their distinctive peeling red bark, on the left.
The sound of a motorboat in the distance pulled her attention to the water, where the tide sprayed against the rocks below, but there was no way to see who was on the boat in the semidarkness. She turned back to the trail. Jonas must not have noticed she stopped, because he’d disappeared over the next small hill.
She hurried to catch up, then started running when she heard a shout. But when she reached the top of the rise there was still no sign of him.
“Jonas?”
She stared down the steep decline. She could hear him, but it was too dark to make out his form.
“Jonas?” she called again.
There was no response.
Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . . And then there were none.
She reined in her mind from where it wanted to go, but how had Jonas slipped off the trail? She shook her head. It didn’t matter how. She had to concentrate on getting to him, but the slope to the shore was too steep where she was, and she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to get down without slipping. Which brought up another problem. What if he was injured? Getting him help wasn’t going to be easy.
She started praying as she scurried around to where the terrain was less steep, then made her way down the rocky slope to the shore, careful to watch her steps. At the bottom, she was able to double back and use her flashlight to search for Jonas.
“Jonas?”
Where was he?
A moan a few feet in front of her answered her question.
“Jonas?”
He was on his side, trying to get up, when she finally reached him.
“Wait, don’t move.” She crouched down beside him on the sandy shoreline, the tide lapping inches from her feet. “I need to make sure nothing’s broken. Does anything hurt?”
“I’m just banged up a bit. I think I’m okay.”
He groaned again while attempting to stand.
“Wait a minute. You’re more than banged up. You just fell a good fifteen feet off that rocky slope.” She shined her flashlight at him, trying to assess the damage. “Jonas, you’re wet and your head’s bleeding.”
He touched his forehead that was sticky with blood. “I think it’s just a cut.”
She pulled her sleeve down, then wiped it across his forehead gently.
He winced.
“Sorry, but I need to see where the blood is coming from.”
She frowned. It looked like he was right. It was just a small cut, but she needed to get him both cleaned up and dry.
“Do you think you can walk?”
He nodded then pushed himself up, using her partially for support.
“Let’s get you back to the house,” she said.
“Uh-uh. We need to go straight to the sheriff’s office.”
“Trust me, I’m ready to get off this island, but I saw a first aid kit back at the main house—”
He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward him. His eyes widened in the moonlight. “You don’t understand, Madison. I didn’t stumble off that incline. Someone pushed me.”
She stared at him. She heard what he said, but the words didn’t compute. Someone had pushed him? No. He had to have imagined it. She’d only been a few yards away from him and hadn’t seen anyone. And besides—what was the point of pushing one of them off the ridge? It didn’t make sense.
Still, another chill swept through her.
“Why would someone push you?” she asked as they began shuffling along the beach. “If it was Jesse and Nadia, as far as we know, they still have weapons. Why not just set up an ambush and get rid of both of us?”
“I don’t know.” Jonas kept up with her despite his slight limp. “Kira kept telling us that no one was supposed to get hurt.”
“And we know that Ben’s the one who shot Felicia and the guard.”
She searched for an explanation but came up blank. With their faces posted all over the news and every law enforcement agency looking for them, Jesse and Nadia seemed to be getting more desperate. And dangerous.
Madison held her weapon out beside her, peering into the darkness as they made their way back down the rocky shoreline. The best option at the moment was to return to the main island and bring back reinforcements.
“Why not just leave the island?” Jonas’s question broke into her thoughts. “They could have slipped away and gone somewhere else without confronting us. We’re missing something.”
The sun had completely dropped beneath the horizon. Out of the city, the sky no longer had so many lights to compete with, creating a swath of stars hanging above them, but there was no sign of whoever had just attacked Jonas.
He stopped midstride and turned to her. “What if there was something they didn’t want us to see?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” he said, a new determination hardening his expression. “But we need to go back and look.”
“No, you were right before.” She gripped his arm. “We need to get back to our boat and not do this on our own. Next time things might not end with just a few bumps and bruises.”
“I’m fine, Madison, and if we wait, it could be too late.”
She frowned, still not convinced.
“Just humor me.” He met her gaze in the light of the moon. “Let’s search down the trail a bit further. If we don’t find anything, we’ll return to Orcas Island.”
They had just enough light to follow the trail that wound its way above the shoreline.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked.
“I’m sure I’ll be sore tomorrow, but I’m fine.”
She walked next to him, senses on high alert, still not sure what they were looking for. But something had motivated Jesse and Nadia to attack Jonas. They just needed to figure out what. And make sure it didn’t happen again.
Moonlight reflected against something to her left.
“Jonas . . . It looks like there’s another small shed out here.”
She aimed her flashlight at a shadowy structure, struggling between not wanting to call attention to themselves and needing to see what was out here. She surveyed the ground in front of her. Fresh footprints in a patch of mud led toward the small wooden building.
“They were here.”
She headed toward the outbuilding, keeping the flashlight’s beam low, then paused. Half a dozen feet ahead of her, the earth had been dug up.
“Jonas.”
A shovel leaned against the side of the shed, next to what looked like a grave. She knelt down, then brushed away a layer of the dirt.
“What did you find?” Jonas asked.
A sick feeling spread through her. “A body.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
Jonas shined his flashlight at the blank expression of the face staring up at them and felt his stomach roil. “This isn’t one of our suspects.”
“Yeah, but who is it then?” Madison stood up and brushed off her pants. “The caretaker isn’t supposed to be here.”
He glanced back toward the main house, trying to replay in his mind what might have happened. Their fugitives took someone by surprise. A fight ensued. Then someone ended up dead.
He blew out a sharp huff of air, took out his phone, and started taking a series of photos for evidence. At the moment, there was no way to ID the body, and they didn’t want to touch anything else until they could get a forensics team here. They’d have to go back to Orcas for that. And in the meantime?
“I’
m hesitant to leave the body here unguarded,” he said.
“Except separating isn’t the answer either at this point. We can go back to the boat and radio for help.”
She was right. Especially with the high probability of an ambush in the equation. They’d wait together for backup to arrive and search the island. And if Jesse and Nadia had fled, they’d just have to ensure they didn’t go far.
They headed back to the dock in silence, save for the water lapping against the shore and an occasional owl hooting in the distance. While there was a chance that their fugitives were still on the island, his gut told him that they were long gone. Attacking him had given them time to escape. Even so, he kept his eyes on the tree line in case they were still here and had any intentions of ambushing them.
Moonlight hit the water as they stepped onto the boat, and Madison went to start the motor.
He waited for the purr of the engine coming to life, but the silence of the night continued to press in on them.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, stepping toward Madison.
“Looks like they’ve sabotaged the boat,” she said. He watched her try a few different things, a determined look on her face.
Water lapped against the side of the boat with the tide, pulling his attention to the other side of the dock. His heart sank. “They also untied that old fishing vessel and the canoes.” He turned back to Madison. “Can you fix what’s wrong with our boat?”
She leaned against the side of it. “I don’t know. It looks like both the motor and the radio are shot.”
A shiver ran up his spine. He glanced back toward the house. This left them no way off this island. No phone service, no way to contact anyone.
“This may not be ideal,” she said, “but I suggest we move on to plan B.”
“Which is?”
“Once I’m done patching you up, we can search the house for a radio or some way to communicate. I know McBride said there’s no service here, but there has to be another way to get ahold of the sheriff.” She stepped back onto the dock. “Unless you want to try and swim across the sound.”
“Funny.” He stepped up onto the dock after her, well aware of their surroundings. “On the positive side, I can’t think of anyone I’d rather be stuck on a deserted island with.”
She let out a low chuckle. “That’s definitely the right thing to say, but it’s not like no one knows where we are. When McBride doesn’t hear from us tonight, he’ll send someone to check on us.”
“Unless he thinks we’re waiting until morning to give him an update.”
Inside the house, they made another quick search of the premises, but it was quiet, with no indication that Jesse and Nadia had been back. Which only confirmed his belief that the two were long gone. He made sure all of the doors were locked, and he turned only one small lamp on. If they had to spend the night here, he didn’t want to be taken by surprise if he was wrong about his assumption. A second ambush could end very differently.
“I’ll make a deal with you,” he said, checking his weapon.
“What’s that?”
“I’ll make dinner while you search the house for a way to communicate with the sheriff’s office.”
“Deal, but first I need to clean the cut on your head.”
He started to protest, but the look on her face and the no-nonsense way she placed her hands on her hips stopped him short. “Fine,” he said, pulling up a stool and sitting down.
“Thank you.”
Madison crossed the kitchen to wash her hands, then pulled a first aid kit from under the sink. “You’ll probably end up with a scar above your eyebrow,” she said, moving closer to clean the wound, “but at least the bleeding’s stopped.”
He shifted on the stool, unsettled by her nearness. He’d been joking about being stuck on an island with her, but there was also a grain of truth in his words. And ignoring that truth was getting harder and harder. He tried to focus on what he might find in this house that would constitute a good meal as she worked on the cut.
“That should do it,” she said a little while later, putting a layer of antibiotics on it.
“Thanks.” He ran a hand through his hair, careful to avoid the tender flesh of his forehead.
“Of course.” She dug something out of the kit and handed it to him. “Pain medicine. You’ll thank me in the morning.”
He shot her a smile. “Whatever you say, doc.”
He escaped into the kitchen as soon as she was done and started rummaging through the cupboards for something to eat. Felicia’s death should only have reinforced the fact that he was playing with fire when it came to Madison and his emotions. So much for compartmentalizing his personal life from his career. But was there a way to do both? He wasn’t even sure anymore.
He pulled out a large pot, set it on the stove, then grabbed a few canned goods he’d found in the pantry. While there wasn’t much, he’d found a few odds and ends. His mother used to make a dump soup with whatever was in the cupboard. He figured he could do the same thing here.
The soup was just starting to simmer when Madison came back into the kitchen, her hands empty.
“No radio?” he asked.
“Nothing. You’d think they’d have some kind of backup plan here.” Her brow furrowed. “Something actually smells good.”
“Don’t act so surprised.”
“I’m not.” She joined him at the stove. “Trust me, I already know you can cook. I’m just trying to figure out what exactly you’re making us.”
“I might have to come up with a name, I suppose, but taste it first.”
She hesitated, then pulled a spoon out of the drawer and sampled the soup. Her lips turned up slightly. “It’s not bad, actually.”
“I told you to trust me.”
“And I did, didn’t I? Now, won’t you tell me what I just ate?”
“A bit of everything I found in the cupboard.” He divvied out their dinner and set two bowls down on the table, then sat down. “Pasta, beans, hominy, diced tomatoes, corn—”
“Never mind.” Madison waved her hand, joining him at the table. “It tastes far better than it sounds. I don’t think I want to know. It’ll ruin it.”
“You’re impossible.”
“Are you forgetting you said there’s no one you’d rather be stuck on a deserted island with?” she said, stirring her hot soup.
“Fine. How about”—he paused to take a spoonful and think of the right descriptor—“slightly challenging.”
She rolled her eyes, then her expression darkened. “We can try to laugh our way through this, but how are you doing?”
He hesitated before answering. “I’ll probably be processing things for a long time. On a selfish note, some of the things Felicia told me before she died gave me some closure.” He stirred his soup idly, looking down to avoid Madison’s eyes. “I’m thankful for that. I had always hoped that she and I could at least be friends. I just never expected things to end this way. And I’m sad that her life was wasted when she had so much to offer.”
“Me too.”
He took another spoonful. “I spoke with her boyfriend before we came up here.”
“He must be devastated.”
“He is. Though he told me he wasn’t surprised that she died the way she lived. Always wanting to make things right.”
“I think the two of us would have gotten along.”
Jonas paused, trying to process what he thought about the comment. “I think you would have too.”
He focused on his hodgepodge soup, avoiding her gaze. Madison had been the first woman in a long time that he could imagine taking home to meet his mother. The person he could actually imagine spending the rest of his life with. And yet he knew what was stopping him. He’d planned on marrying Felicia, and then in an instant everything changed when she got shot.
Feelings he didn’t want to acknowledge warred against his need to guard his heart and the boundaries he’d set. Was he making a mistake keeping Madi
son at arm’s length?
“I think one of us needs to stay awake,” she said, breaking into his thoughts.
He scooped the last of his soup into his mouth. “I can take the first watch then.”
“You sure?” she asked.
“Mmhmm. Not sure I could sleep now anyway.”
“I’m pretty sure I can.” She took the empty dishes to the sink and rinsed them.
Jonas tried to settle his thoughts while she worked, but they were in the middle of a case. Figuring out these feelings would have to wait.
Madison finished up and dried her hands on a dish towel. “Good night, then,” she said through a yawn.
“Good night, Madison.”
He watched her head toward the stairs, then walked around the first floor, double-checking that everything was locked. There was no movement outside. No indication that anyone was nearby. For the moment, anyway, all was quiet.
The smell of something cooking jolted him awake. He sat up on the couch where he’d managed to get a few hours of sleep. In the dim morning light, he could see Madison standing at the stove, flipping pancakes.
“You’re just in time. I was about to wake you up. This isn’t my brother-in-law’s famous recipe for homemade pancakes, but I found a box in the pantry, along with some syrup.”
She set a bottle of syrup and a plate stacked high with pancakes on the table.
“Wow,” he said, heading to the dining area. “Best case scenario, I was expecting a bad coffee.”
“You might be a genius in the kitchen, but I have a few tricks up my sleeve as well.”
“I’m impressed.”
She waved off the compliment. “Don’t be too impressed. Anyone can add water and stir.”
“I’m not complaining.” He laughed. “And you made coffee?”
“It’s hot if you’d like some.”
“I would.”
She finished the rest of the pancakes and turned off the burner. “Once we’re done here, I think we need to search the rest of the island. There’s got to be a way off this place. Maybe another boat?”
“Either that or Michaels will eventually send out the cavalry to find us.”