Sable Quinn Trilogy Boxed Set

by K. J. Dahlen

  "Did you know Gabriel and Emma very well?" Sable asked.

  "I knew them both very well. For almost forty years," Stephan admitted. "That’s why when Gabriel came to me in reference to you, I was shocked. As I said I wasn’t aware Micah had any children and as you don’t carry the Reardon name I was skeptical at first. Even after Gabriel explained how you came to him I urged caution, but Gabriel knew what he wanted and wasted no time. He asked me to change his will and I did. I think you should know that you are his only beneficiary and you are now a very wealthy woman."

  "I don’t want his money. My relationship with the Reardons wasn’t like that."

  Stephan smiled. He had been afraid for a moment that Sable would have reacted differently. Gabriel warned him she would balk at the inheritance. They had argued about what he wanted but Gabriel won out in the end. "There really isn’t anything you can do to refuse it, you know. Gabriel made sure of that when he changed his will." He paused a moment then told her, "Gabriel was sure you wouldn’t accept the money and he had a suggestion about what you could do with it. He wanted you to set up a scholarship fund for people who wanted to become lawyers but couldn’t because they couldn’t afford to go to college. He said maybe he could pass on his love of the law to someone worthy after all."

  Sable thought about his suggestion for a moment. Gabriel had been a wise old man. He knew she wouldn’t accept his gift but this way his generosity would benefit everyone. "That works for me." She glanced over at the twin caskets and knew in her heart that Gabriel’s legacy would live on through someone else’s heart.

  "If we can get together in a few days, I can help set his wishes in motion." Stephan told her. Stephan glanced at the caskets for a brief minute then glanced back at Sable. "He was a unique man, your great-grandfather but he was a good man."

  "That’s what Emma said about him just before she died," Sable told him. "He didn’t deserve what happened to him, and he had his own share of faults," She paused then continued, "But then don’t we all. We all make our own mistakes, and I think Gabriel was trying to make up for the way he judged me when we first met. I only wish we had more time together before he died."

  "He was a stern man but he was always fair. Gabriel tended to treat you the way he read you, and he was able to read people very well. Gabriel learned to read a person’s body language over the years. He defended people and nine times out of ten he was right on the money." Stephan told her.

  "It’s too bad he never let that side of him show. To me he was an arrogant old poop. He was always growling at someone or something. He wouldn’t accept our help when Micah first came to town and it almost cost him his life. The beating he took a month ago almost ended his life. When he came to see me after Emma had been kidnapped, I saw a different man, a new man but the old poop was still there under the surface," Sable grinned. "I wish I had known the friend you spoke of earlier."

  Stephan smiled. "He was quite the character."

  "Please get the paperwork ready for his gift. I can’t think of a better legacy than this one. Micah’s legacy was murderous but Gabriel's legacy is life giving and he would be happy about that."

  "I’ll be in touch." Stephan turned to leave the church.

  After he was gone Sable glanced at Nick. "Well that was a surprise."

  "You were family and he knew you would do the right thing," Nick reminded her. "I guess I would rather deal with Gabriel’s legacy than Micah’s. At least Gabriel’s legacy has a chance of surviving with the next generation."

  Sable agreed. "Let’s hope Micah’s legacy is done. I hope he doesn’t have any more children out there wanting revenge."

  The Unknown Son

  Chapter One

  Sable glanced over at the empty desk in the office and wondered when Max would be back. The bullet he received from Shawn last week had done a number on him, but he survived. She had hoped the nightmare of her past was truly over now but even as she gazed at the open letter on her desk, she knew she might have one more battle to fight.

  The letter was from Maggie Yost and it had come out of the blue. She hadn’t thought about Maggie since she’d left Chicago a few months ago. She’d disappeared from the hospital against medical advice after Micah died. Sable tried calling her in Cleveland but Maggie had never returned. Sable learned from Kyle Benson, Maggie’s landlord, she had called him and asked him to pack her things and put them in storage. She would deal with them later. That had happened a couple months ago. Since then he had not seen her or heard from her.

  Sable was surprised by Maggie’s letter, but her surprise soon turned to dismay when she read what she had to say. The dismay turned to dread when she realized her nightmare wasn’t quite over yet.

  This is the hardest letter I’ve ever had to write. I’ve never admitted this to anyone else, not even myself, but I made a very bad mistake twenty two years ago and now that mistake is going to kill me. I told you I fell in love with Richard at the same time your mother was with Micah, but that wasn’t the truth. Summer had been with Micah earlier, almost two or three years earlier. When Micah and Richard came back and Micah found out about you, that’s when I met Richard.

  I fell in love with what I thought was his bad boy image. I didn’t realize what I thought was an image was the real deal until it was too late. He was a real bad person. I was caught between a rock and a hard place. I knew if I left him Richard would track me down and kill me. He told me often enough when he noticed I didn’t want to be with him anymore. I thought he was becoming lost to his own reality then he was dead. When Micah killed Richard, I knew I had to run before he could find and murder me. I saw the fight they had that day and I was witness to the murder. I knew the only way he wouldn’t kill me is if he couldn’t locate me. I had to run away and that’s exactly what I did. I moved around a lot so Micah wouldn’t find me.

  It wasn’t until weeks later I found out I was carrying Richard’s child. At first I didn’t know if I wanted to keep the baby or not, but in the end I couldn’t harm my baby. My baby was the only innocent one out of the bunch of us. It was hard to be alone and pregnant, but I knew I couldn’t go home. My family would never have understood my relationship with Richard, and I wanted to keep my baby. When my son Noah was born, I tried to forget his father. I had hopes he would become my son and not a reflection of Richard.

  We struggled but we had each other. Noah was such a happy child and he became the love of my life. After awhile, I guess I had forgotten about Micah. I thought I dodged the worse but all that changed when my son was ten. He became secretive and sneaky and he began looking at me with mistrust. I tried to get him to talk to me but he wouldn’t tell me what I’d done wrong. It never dawned on me I could lose him; especially not to the one person I had learned to fear more than Richard. Noah spent a lot of time away from home but he wouldn’t tell me where he was or who he was with. Then when he was fourteen he ran away. It was several weeks before I realized he was running straight to Micah.

  Micah sent me a postcard about three weeks after Noah disappeared. He told me not to worry about my son; Noah was with him and he would raise him to be a man, just like his father was. He told me he would be back to settle the score with me at a later date. Every day for the last nine years I’ve had to live with the fear that one day Micah would just show up at my front door. I moved from town to town hoping to avoid the confrontation I knew was coming.

  When you found me, I was almost relieved. I’m only sorry I didn’t tell you the truth, the whole truth but I had to keep certain things from you. I still had to protect my son. I prayed Noah wasn’t with Micah and for a moment I thought he wasn’t. When Micah took me to the well, he told me Noah had become the man he had hoped. He said Noah took to the life better than Richard had and if by some chance Micah died in the final battle between the two of you, it would be Noah that would finish his work; Noah, Sam, or Shawn.

  I’ve been running for awhile now but it hasn’t done any good. No matter where I go I can still feel
him right behind me. I don’t know if he’s really there or not but someone has been watching me. Maybe it’s only my conscience making me feel this way, but the other day I saw someone standing on the corner staring at me. I came to La Crosse to get lost in the crowds but I think Noah has found me again. I know after all I’ve done to you, you have no reason to help me but I’m begging you to please help me. I don’t want to die by my son’s hand.

  Even as I write this letter I can feel him getting closer. I received a call late last night. When I picked up the phone, I heard a voice I barely remembered. He told me he was in town and wanted to stop by and say hello. When I told him I didn’t believe him, he told me I shouldn’t. He said he was here to tie up loose ends. He said he had a job to finish and Micah was counting on him to finish it.

  “Nick,” she called out.

  Nick lifted his head from the report he was reading. When Sable held up the letter she received in the morning mail, he pushed back his chair. Walking over to her desk, he took the letter and began reading it. A moment later he lifted his eyes from the paper and looked at her. “Are you kidding?”

  Sable shook her head. “Apparently this nightmare isn’t quite over yet.”

  Nick dragged a chair over to her desk and sat down. He carefully read the letter again. Tossing the pages on her desk, he looked at Sable. Without taking his eyes off Sable, he called out. “People, we have a situation.”

  Brandi and Quentin looked up from the work they were doing. Both stood up and moved to Sable’s desk. “What’s up boss?” Brandi asked.

  “Sable’s got another relative looking for revenge.”

  Brandi glanced quickly at Sable but her face was closed. Sable’s gaze remained on her desk and there was a tenseness in her shoulders and arms. Her hands were clenched into fists and her lips were tight. Brandi reached over and picked up the letter by the edges. Skimming it quickly, she turned to look at Nick. “What do you want us to do?”

  “I want the letter copied then dusted for prints. You’ll probably only find Maggie’s, Sable’s, and mine on the letter, but I want it done anyway. Then see if you can track down the information in the letter. See if there is a birth certificate for Maggie’s son.” Nick stood up. “As soon as we verify the contents, let’s locate Maggie and talk to her. We need to know as much as we can about the last twenty years of her life.”

  Sable picked up the letter. “She moved from Cleveland to La Crosse, Wisconsin. She says she didn’t want her son to catch up to her and now she fears he has. She’s noticed someone following her the last few days.”

  Nick frowned. “Yeah, I read that. She also thinks he’s spent the last nine years with Micah and the boys. If the boy was with Micah, he would have been trained in the art of murder and mayhem.”

  “The boy has a name. It’s Noah Yost,” Sable reminded him. “As Richard and Maggie were never married he would have her name not the Reardon name.”

  “Yeah, but Richard wasn’t legally a Reardon. His last name was Kline, the same as his mother’s.”

  “Legal or not, Richard called himself Reardon.” Quentin called out as he handed Nick a piece of paper, “I found the boy’s birth certificate. Maggie listed the father’s name as Richard Reardon, and married or not she gave the kid the Reardon name. He’s been Noah Reardon since the day he was born.”

  “What a tangled mess,” Sable said.

  “I also found a missing person’s report filed in Cleveland nine years ago. Maggie reported her fourteen year old son Noah missing. According to the report, the police think the boy ran away.”

  “Maggie claims Noah called her last week. She doesn’t know how he found her but his call scared the hell out of her. He asked her about his father but she wouldn’t tell him anything. Then she said she looked out the window and saw someone staring at her house. She said she barely recognized him, but she knew in her heart it was Noah standing there.” Sable hesitated then said, “She sounds scared to death.”

  “I know. I read the letter too. I think she has a reason to be afraid. If Noah has spent the last few years with Micah, then she is in danger.” Nick said. “And right now we have no way of determining he didn’t.”

  “I think I need to call her and find out more information. At least then we would know where to go from here.” Sable reached for the letter. Maggie had included a phone number and address at the end of the letter. She stood and walked to the copier and ran a reproduction of the letter. She put the original letter in an evidence bag and handed it to Brandi.

  She went back to her desk and reached for the phone then dialed the number Maggie gave her and waited for the phone to be picked up on the other end. Sable wondered what she would say. On the fourth ring, the phone was answered. ‘Maggie, this is Sable Quinn.”

  “Oh, thank god it’s you.” Maggie said. “I was afraid it was Noah.”

  “I got your letter today and I have some questions.”

  “I would imagine you do. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you all this before. You were straight with me and I should have told you that night in the hospital, but I just couldn’t. I had to protect my son.”

  “I know. At the time you had no reason to tell me anything. After keeping your secret that long, you had no reason to trust me with it,” Sable reasoned. “So why did you bring this to my attention now?”

  “I got a phone call from Noah last week,” Maggie said. She seemed reluctant to say anything but she knew she didn’t have an option. “He was pleasant at first, almost like he was before he left all those years ago.”

  “What else did he talk about?”

  “At first he talked about all the places he’s been since he left home. I guess they moved around a lot. I really didn’t want to ask but I slipped. I asked him about who he met on his journey.” Maggie hesitated. “That’s when he turned nasty and told me I’d lied to him since the day he was born. I asked what he was talking about. He said Micah found him when he was ten. He was drawn to Noah because of the color of his eyes. He told Noah he was family. Then he convinced my son I was the bad guy and he would never lie to him.” Maggie paused a moment. “Micah told my son I murdered his father. He said we all lived together in Texas. Him, Summer, me, and Richard. He told my son you and your mother died that fall, and after I murdered Richard, I took him and ran away.”

  “Did you tell your son the truth?”

  “I tried, but no matter what I said Noah wouldn’t believe me. Micah had him convinced he couldn’t believe anything I said. Noah told me he wanted the only thing I had left of his father’s. Micah told him I took Richard’s knife with me when I left. He said it was a special knife. It was a unique set made for them from an old Indian tool maker in Oklahoma. Each knife has an ivory handle. Micah had one and Richard had the other.”

  “Was that the knife I found in the box you gave me a few months ago?”

  “It must be. That was the only knife I ever had. When I took the box of items, I didn’t really know what was inside. I couldn’t even bring myself to look in the box for a long time after I left. The items in that box were leftovers from a different time and place. One I didn’t know if I ever wanted to remember or not.”

  “Did he say what he wanted the knife for?”

  “No, he only said he wanted it because it belonged to his father,” Maggie said. “I may be wrong, but he really was upset when I told him I no longer had the knife.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He became frantic for a moment. He told me I had to have the knife. He told me the knife was his birthright and I had no right to throw it away. He claims it was one of two knives Richard and Micah had custom made for them. He seemed to calm down when I told him I gave the knife to you.” Maggie hesitated then went on. “He asked me if I thought you would destroy the knife. I told him I doubted it as it was evidence in a murder.”

  “What did he say then?”

  “He chuckled and said it would be again when he took it from you. He said as long as you had the knife
I might live another day.” Maggie's voice lowered to barely a whisper. “I couldn’t believe my ears when he said that.” She hesitated before she asked, “My son is going to murder me, isn’t he?”

  “That seems to be what the males in the Reardon family do. By now he must know what happened to Sam and Shawn.”

  “He does. I mean he told me you had a lot to answer for. He told me after he took care of me, he was coming after you. He said he wouldn’t fail where the others had,” Maggie said. “I think he’s been in Chicago.”

  Sable remembered in the warehouse by the dock there had been three sleeping bags. She assumed the third one was Micah’s but it could have been Noah’s.

  “Where are you staying?” she asked the older woman.

  “I don’t know how but he followed me here. He said it was arranged that when Sam and Shawn went up against you, he would track me down and finish what Micah started. Apparently, I was part of the past Micah wanted taken care of. Noah knows I’m here in La Crosse somewhere, he just doesn’t know where exactly. I’ve been moving around the city every few days.”

  “Just keep doing what you’re doing. It should only take about four hours to get there. We’ll meet somewhere and we’ll take you into custody. We can keep you safe until we determine exactly what kind of threat your son is.”