by Jane Toombs
He saw the pier ahead of him and turned to go back. Which was easy enough. Except not always in life. Who was it said you never could go back, that once you’d taken certain steps in one direction your course would never lead backward, no matter how hard you tried to retrace your steps?
Grandma Sonia would say he was indulging the dark side of his heritage with such gloomy thoughts. Maybe so, but that didn’t mean they weren’t true.
Back at the farm, Rachel sat on the swing with Metsa curled on the floor atop the rug. “No strings,” she murmured, causing the dog to open her eyes. She smiled wryly, “You’ve heard those words before, haven’t you?”
She had no doubt Mikel meant them—both for the dog and for her. When he said his final goodbye, he’d leave as he’d arrived—with no extra baggage. No dog. No Rachel. This despite the interlude in the loft. Rachel set the swing into gentle motion as she closed her eyes and relived those moments.
Afterward he’d said he had no words, and yet he’d murmured something to her as they made love—words she didn’t understand, but he must have. What had he told her with those strange words? If she asked him, would he tell her? Rachel sighed.
Instead of dwelling on what had happened and what she wished might happen, she’d do better to try to wipe all that from her mind, since nothing would come of it, not with no-strings Mikel.
She wondered where he was right now and what he was thinking. Did he have any regrets about what had happened between them? Probably not, men seldom did. Mikel, though, wasn’t just any man. For a few moments, anyway, he’d been her man, whether he believed it or not.
Chapter Eleven
The next morning Aino was in good spirits. After breakfast, he insisted on accompanying Mikel to the barn while he milked Daisy. “Pretty handy fella to have around” was his comment after Mikel turned the cow into the field. “Must get it from Sonia. Sometimes wonder if there’s anything that woman doesn’t know. If there is, I’ll bet she thinks she does.”
“My grandmother is awesome,” Mikel agreed.
“As long as you’re with me, she ain’t likely to yell at me for taking a stroll around my own property. Hell, I know I got to be careful these days. Getting better, though. Even Doc said so.”
“Glad to hear it.” Aino’s gait had certainly improved. Making up his mind, Mikel waited until they’d walked awhile before asking, “Would it bother you if I asked a few questions about your son Leo?”
Aino glanced at him. “Why should it? What do you want to know?”
“Why did he come back to Ojibway from New Jersey?”
“Mostly ’cause his wife Betty—she had leukemia, you know—wanted to die among family and friends. She barely made it back here before she did pass on.”
“Who was with him when he arrived besides his wife?”
Aino shot him sharp look. “Funny kind of question.”
Mikel said nothing, waiting.
“Eva, of course,” Aino said at last. “She was only a little thing then.”
“No one else? No nurse for Betty?”
Aino shook his head. “Leo took care of her till they got here, then her folks did. Hard on them, seeing her that way. Both of them died not long after she did. You need to know all this for some reason?”
Metsa, who’d been limping along after them, chose this moment to take off after a chipmunk, almost tripping Aino and knocking the cane from his hand. Mikel steadied him, picked up the cane and returned it to him.
“Dang dog. As ornery as her former owner,” Aino grumbled. “You never knew old Metsala, but he was a real hammer-head. Your grandma calls me stubborn—she should have known him.”
Mikel, glad Aino had gotten distracted from the question he’d asked, said, “I take it you still have relatives in Finland since your granddaughter is visiting there.”
“Yeah, mostly distant cousins and the like. Most of the old folks Mary and I met when we went over years ago are gone now.”
“Distant cousins like Rachel,” Mikel said.
“More or less. Which reminds me. That rod and reel you took fishing when you went with Rachel—I saw it in the back room. If you don’t think you’ll be using it for a while, you might want to put it where it was in the attic.”
“I’ll get on it,” Mikel assured him.
“Mary got me in the habit of putting things where they belong. Sonia’s that way, too.” Aino smiled wryly. “Otherwise she ain’t a thing like Mary. Got a real temper, she has.”
After seeing Aino safely onto the back porch swing, Mikel entered the kitchen, trailed by Metsa, who’d rejoined them after her unsuccessful chipmunk chase.
Neither Rachel nor Sonia were anywhere in sight. Retrieving the fishing gear from the back room, Mikel made for the attic, resigned to having Metsa follow. She trailed him up to the second floor, but hesitated at the bottom of the steep attic stairs. By the time he reached the top of them, though, he heard the dog scrabbling along behind him.
Threading his way among the trunks, stored furnishings and boxes piled on everything, Mikel had just placed the rod and reel back in its niche when a crash made him turn. Metsa stood beside an overturned wooden box he remembered as being on top of one of the trunks. She sat down among the scattered contents as he approached, thumping her tail on the floor and watching him, her expression clearly penitent.
“Okay, I forgive you,” he told her. “If you hadn’t been lame you wouldn’t have been clumsy enough to bump against the trunk and knock the box off. Since it’s not your fault you’re lame, you couldn’t help what happened.”
He knelt, fending off Metsa’s enthusiastic affection, righted the box and began picking up the stuff. As he lifted the end of a scarf, it unrolled and metal clunked on the wooden floor. Mikel stared for a long moment at the old Colt .45 before using the scarf to lift it by the barrel. He rose and examined his find, jolted when he saw the elk embossed on the grip. The missing Reynaud gun?
Chances of this being a duplicate of Renee’s father’s Colt were so slim as to be all but nonexistent. What he held in his hand was proof his hunch had been a solid one. He nodded, checked the revolver to make sure it wasn’t loaded, then rewrapped the scarf around the gun and replaced it in the box along with the other contents before returning the box to its place on top of the trunk.
Either Aino or Rachel or both had been less than truthful with him. Unless the box had belonged to Leo and been stored up here after his death with no one going through the contents. Possible—but he didn’t believe it. In his book, the Colt in the Saari attic had been brought here by Leo from New Jersey. The only way he could have gotten this particular gun was from some contact with Renee Reynaud and Mikel hardly thought it was through her baby-sitting Eva.
He felt certain Leo must have known what happened to Renee, but Leo was dead. Where was Renee now? Who else knew where she was? Aino and Rachel both had questions to answer. And Eva—the one person still alive who’d been in New Jersey at the fateful time and had driven with her father to the Upper Peninsula. Yes, Eva. Instead of springing the gun on Aino and Rachel now, it might be best to wait until Eva got here. Get the three of them together first.
Someone—it sounded like Rachel’s voice—called Metsa. The dog skirted him and scrambled down the attic stairs. Mikel followed more slowly, his heart heavy. Much as he didn’t want to think Rachel might have lied to him, how could he now be sure she hadn’t? It was clearly time to check in with Ed at the agency again. By the time he reached the first floor, neither Rachel nor Metsa was anywhere in sight. When he went outside he saw her car was gone. Admitting to himself he was glad he didn’t have to face her for the time being, he got into his car and drove to town. He parked by Sylvia’s, near a pay phone, only to have a man stop to use it before he got there.
Cursing under this breath, he waited. And waited. Finally he decided his choice was to get in the car and drive to another pay phone or duck into Sylvia’s for a cinnamon roll and coffee. As he hesitated, Louie, one of the to
wnspeople he’d met, walked up and greeted him.
“Going into Sylvia’s?” Louie asked. “Me, too.”
Mikel found himself nodding. Just being polite, he decided, avoiding the knowledge he was delaying the possibility of having his suspicions about Rachel confirmed by Ed at the agency.
Seated, with his coffee and roll, he found himself wishing he’d gone ahead and gotten the phone call over with, instead.
“Hear you took Aino’s boat out the other day,” Louie said.
“Aino’s not quite ready to handle her yet,” Mikel said. “We went to Kaug Isle.”
“That’s a kind of spooky place. Don’t care for it myself. How’s the old guy doing?”
“Coming along, his doctor says.”
“How about you?”
“Me?”
Louie winked. “With Rachel, I mean. No guy I ever knew got very far with her.”
Mikel tamped down his annoyance with difficulty. “We’re just friends.” He finished his roll as quickly as he could and left the restaurant while Louie was still occupied with what he’d ordered. Seeing the pay phone free, Mikel ducked in and called the agency.
After he was connected with his contact there, he’d no sooner identified himself than Ed broke in to say, “If it’s about Rachel Hill, I had to drop that for now. We’ve got a heavy drug deal going down south we’re all tied up with. No time for any side stuff. Get to it when I can.”
Mikel hung up, wishing he was back on duty, on an agency case that had nothing to do with the Saaris or the missing Reynaud girl. But, damn it, he was still on vacation and he’d see this one through. Couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t. The problem was he was beginning to wonder how he meant to live with himself if he did.
As he turned away from the phone, he almost tripped over a little red-haired girl. “Sorry,” he told her mother. Then, noticing the child’s trembling lip, he crouched down and said, “I better look where I’m going, right?”
She blinked, staring at him.
“Want to shake hands?” he asked.
She shook her head, retreating against her mother.
“That’s okay. Maybe next time. Bye.” He rose, satisfied that she’d forgotten about crying. Cute little thing, her red hair reminded him of Steve and Victoria’s Heidi.
In turn, that reminded him that Steve had told him he was sending some photos to general delivery at the Ojibway post office. He’d forgotten all about it. After picking up Steve’s letter, Mikel headed back to the farm. When he pulled into the driveway, he noticed Rachel’s car was still gone. He parked and went into the farmhouse where he found his grandmother in the kitchen making an apple pie. His instinct, carried over from childhood, was to seek her out, even though he no longer shared his problems with her.
“The coffee’s hot,” she told him as she unfolded the top crust over the apples.
He poured himself a mug of coffee, sat down at the table and slit the envelope he carried open. The slip of paper inside asked how things were going, in Steve’s unmistakable scrawl. Two photos were the other contents and he grinned as he saw himself in one, with little Heidi perched on his shoulders, her tiny hands clutching his head. The other was a closeup shot of Victoria and Heidi, both smiling.
After putting the pie now in the oven, Sonia came by and peered over his shoulder. “Who is that?” she asked.
“You remember meeting Steve—this is his wife, Victoria, and their little girl, Heidi.” He offered her the photo.
“Wait until I wash my hands.” That done, Sonia returned and took both the pictures, chuckling at the one of him and Heidi. She handed it back to him, but kept the other, studying it with a frown.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “If you’re trying to match mother and daughter, there’s really no resemblance other than the red hair. Don’t forget what I told you about how they adopted Heidi.”
“I am not yet senile,” she snapped. “Of course I remember. It’s just that Victoria reminds me of someone and I can’t think who.”
When at last she returned the photo, he peered at it closely, then shook his head. Victoria was an attractive woman, no doubt about that, but whatever else Sonia believed she saw, he didn’t. He stuffed note and photos back in the envelope.
“Victoria is the one with the missing sister you’re searching for,” Sonia said. “A sister named Renee.”
He turned and saw she was by the sink, washing dishes, her back to him.
“Yes, she is,” he said. “Why?”
“So quick with the questions you are, special agent. I wanted to be certain I have everyone’s name correct.” She swung around and looked at him. “Here’s a question of my own. Why are you so edgy this morning?”
“Edgy? Whatever gives you that idea?” He would have sworn nothing of his inner turmoil showed on the surface.
“It’s hard to fool the one who raised you. Have you quarreled with Rachel?”
He shook his head.
“Less than a quarrel, perhaps,” Sonia persisted. “What they used to call a tiff. She’s off to the vet’s with Metsa for the spaying and will wait until the dog is ready to come home. Which means she won’t be back until late this evening, so you have time to cool off and to vow to mend your ways before you see her again in the morning.”
He rose, thinking if Rachel had taken the dog earlier, he wouldn’t have found the Colt .45 in the attic. “My ways don’t need mending,” he told Sonia.
“Ha! Perfect, are you? Go look in the mirror, Mikel Starzov. Better yet, look into your soul.”
Mikel stomped out, trying not to feel like a chastised small boy. Grandma Sonia had no idea what troubled him, so her words should have no effect. Still, the first thing he did when he reached the cottage was stare at himself in the bathroom mirror.
Hunter’s eyes, is that what I have? he asked himself. Rachel thought so. He shrugged. His job was to hunt down those who broke the law. In this case, he hunted for a missing girl, now a woman. Not necessarily because she’d committed a crime. Though there was that gun, after all.
Why hadn’t Rachel asked him to ride along with her to the vet’s? Feeling guilty because she’d held back information, maybe? He turned away from the mirror, shaking his head. Rachel might not know any more than she’d told him. It was entirely possible she didn’t know about the gun. That’s what he’d like to believe, anyway, even though his experience argued otherwise. He hadn’t forgotten how terrified she was of guns. Why?
Finding the cottage too confining, he took a walk around the farm. All the little apple seedlings looked good, not a droopy one among them. Examining them reminded him of the day he and the Scouts had planted them under Rachel’s watchful eye. She’d trusted him not to make a fool of himself—couldn’t he trust her a little?
Aino was not using the lounge today, so Mikel finally plopped down on it. He hadn’t slept well last night because he’d been plagued by his recurrent Yolanda nightmare. Apparently he hadn’t yet worked through what the shrink at headquarters had called the “trauma of betrayal” when he’d gone through the required deprograming after the shootout.
But why was the damn dream haunting him almost every night now?
“Take what happened apart,” the doc had advised. “Analyze every action.”
Mikel hadn’t done that. What the hell, it was over and both he and Steve had survived. So had she, he’d heard. Yolanda might be serving time, but she’d be out someday, since she wasn’t one of the principal players. Out and ready to entice some other fool she thought could help her in one way or another. Every word she’d ever said to him had been a lie.
He leaned back and closed his eyes, trying to relax, but he couldn’t shift his mind from Yolanda and what she’d done. He gave up and decided to belatedly take the doc’s advice. Maybe an analysis now would prevent a nightmare later. He deliberately tried to conjure up her face, but, just when he thought he had it, the eyes turned brown instead of deep blue and the face morphed into Rachel’s.
“Go back to when you met her,” he muttered, and was more successful with that memory, except for the realization of how cleverly she’d engineered it to seem random.
Led him along like a blind pup on a leash, she had. That’s what he’d been—an eager puppy, too blinded by lust to realize he was being led to just where she wanted him. Never again.
But hadn’t he made the same mistake yesterday in the hayloft? Mikel opened his eyes and sat straighter. He would have sworn there’d been more than lust involved. And Rachel wasn’t sexually experienced, he’d swear to that, too. In fact, he was pretty damn certain he’d been the first man she’d ever made love with, an erotic experience he wasn’t sure he could ever wipe from his mind.
So, okay, Rachel was no Yolanda. But that didn’t mean she hadn’t lied to him. He could trust no one connected with the Saari family now that he’d found the Reynaud Colt .45 in the attic. He was so engrossed in his thoughts that he didn’t see anyone approaching until a twig snapped underfoot. Mikel sprang to his feet, his hand automatically reaching for the shoulder holster he wasn’t wearing. He stared at Aino, several feet away.
“Startled you, did I?” Aino asked.
“I didn’t mean to steal your seat,” Mikel said. “The lounge is all yours.”
Aino nodded and eased down onto it. “Sit down,” he ordered.
Mikel complied.
“I ain’t going to ask any questions, mostly ’cause I don’t want to hear any lies,” Aino told him. “It’s Rachel I want to talk about.” He gazed at Mikel from narrowed eyes. “Don’t you go hurting that gal. Sonia says she has faith you won’t, but I don’t know you like your grandma does and so I have my doubts. Rachel’s been hurt enough in her life, she doesn’t need any more—you hear me?”
Taken aback, Mikel nodded.
“Good. See that you take it to heart. You best take heed, too, about what I said at the beginning. Don’t go asking me questions about my Rachel.”
“Perhaps you’d like me to leave the farm,” Mikel said.
“No, no, that won’t do any good. It’s too late. I’d rather have you here where I can keep an eye on you.”