“What else can we do?” Leroy asked gruffly. “Bruce Bromley is the sheriff’s brother. If the law is in on the wrong side, we have to take matters into our own hands.”
Cutch shook his head. “The sheriff still has to answer to somebody. We need to get in touch with the DEA—the Drug Enforcement Agency. I learned a thing or two about them a few years back.” He looked at Elise sheepishly, and she smiled, deducing that he referred to that better-forgotten time when he’d been investigated for the research he’d done on meth.
Leroy didn’t look like he wanted to let go of his gun, but Bill McAlister eased himself up from his rocking chair. “I suppose I could look them up and give them a call,” he said, heading for the front door.
“Go ahead.” His brother stood and headed after him. “But if they give you the rub-off, we’ll do this ourselves!”
As Rodney followed the brothers inside, Cutch turned to Elise. “Do you think they’ll be okay if we steal a moment alone?”
The intense look in his eyes made Elise’s heart flutter like a Dacron wing on a windy day. “Where do you want to go?” she asked, trying to ignore the thrill she felt as he took her hand and tugged her off the porch.
“Some place a little more private than this,” he said, leading her toward the barn.
Elise tried to calm her heart as she followed him. She was a grown woman, and she’d long ago grown out of her delusional hopes that Cutch might someday return her affection.
Cutch pulled her behind the barn and started speaking without preamble. “My father’s had cancer for eight years, Elise,” he started. “When he was first diagnosed, he insisted that he would kick the disease without anyone ever knowing he was sick. This was less than a year after he’d finally been appointed president of the bank—his lifelong dream. He was afraid if anyone knew he was sick that they’d think he couldn’t do his job.”
Though the length of elapsed time struck her as vaguely significant, Elise couldn’t figure out why Cutch would want to discuss his father’s health when so many far more important issues were looming. But she kept her mouth shut and let him continue.
“At the same time, he knew it was important to reduce the stress factors in his life in order for his treatment to be successful.” Cutch still held Elise’s hand and now looked down, squeezing her fingers gently. “Our relationship was a source of anguish for him.” Cutch pinched his eyes shut and swallowed.
Elise’s mind raced ahead. “Did he ask you to break up with me?”
“No,” Cutch denied. “His only request was that I not tell anyone about his condition. Nobody could know. Especially not you.” His blue eyes bore into hers. “I found out my father had cancer the day before Sam and Phoebe’s wedding. I was afraid that if I stood up in front of all our relatives and friends and announced that I was in love with my father’s enemy’s daughter that it would kill him.”
The anguish of Cutch’s decision tore through Elise. “So you thought you had to choose…”
“I had to choose between my father’s life and your love. Believe me, Elise, I wrestled with that decision—probably more than I should have.” He hung his head as though ashamed. “We were so young. I still had a year left of college. You were only nineteen. We’d been dating for, what, ten weeks? How could I do that to my father—” Cutch’s throat made a strangled sound “—when he didn’t have long to live?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Elise struggled to understand. “I know he didn’t want you to talk about his cancer, but couldn’t you have at least given me some explanation?”
“I tried. I wanted to talk to you before the wedding, but you were too busy with all the wedding things. Then, afterward, I pulled you behind the curtains on the stage thinking I’d finally get a moment alone with you. I was just going to explain what I could and leave out the part about my dad’s health, but you looked so beautiful.” Cutch leaned against the solid wood of the barn and pulled her close to him. He reached out a tentative hand and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
Just as he had that night. Elise felt her lips tingling at the memory of the kiss they’d shared. She’d dreamed of that moment for weeks, only to have it pulled away from her so quickly.
“I promise you, Elise, I had no idea my cousins were going to pull the curtain open. They caught us at the worst possible moment.”
Whatever tenderness she’d felt at the memory of the kiss they’d shared was shattered as she recalled what had happened next. “You laughed at me,” she reminded Cutch, pulling back from where he stood so close to her.
“I will regret that until the day I die. Everybody else was laughing, and I didn’t know how else to respond. I was young and stupid, and my father was sitting right there at the front table, watching us. I didn’t think. I’m so sorry.”
Elise inhaled a shaky breath, still unsure how she felt about Cutch’s explanation. Too much had hit her too quickly. And they still had to catch the Bromleys.
“Where are you? Elise?” Bill McAlister’s voice echoed through the farmyard. Immediately wondering if he’d been able to contact the authorities, she straightened and took a step away from Cutch.
“We should find out what’s happening.”
“You’re right.” Cutch agreed with a nod, though he looked a little disappointed.
Elise felt a similar twinge. Their relationship had never had a shot at getting off the ground eight years before. And it seemed forces were conspiring to keep them apart again.
She trotted around the side of the barn. “Yeah, Dad?”
“You’ve got visitors.” Her father explained simply.
A gleaming white motor home and matching trailer sat parked in front of her father’s house. Elise recognized the custom mural of gliders in flight that decorated the sides.
“Vera! Bob!” she exclaimed, running to greet her friends from the paraglider festival she’d missed. “What are you doing here?”
“Oh, good, you are here.” A smartly dressed older woman hopped out of the motor home and headed for Elise.
Elise hugged the spiky-haired woman and the balding man who was with her, glad that she’d gotten a chance to see her friends after all, though their timing felt awkward.
The older woman explained. “We couldn’t very well pass so close to your farm and not stop to say hello, especially after that distressing e-mail you sent. I want to see this glider of yours that was shot down. I told Bob I just can’t believe it until I see it with my own eyes.”
Cutch hung back to talk to Bill while Elise and her friends went to the barn and looked at Elise’s glider.
“Were you able to contact the DEA?”
Bill McAlister shrugged. “They took down all the information I could give them and said they’d set up surveillance on Bruce Bromley’s place to determine if there was anything behind my tip. They hoped to know something in a matter of weeks.”
Cutch shook his head. “We need help now.”
“I know. But don’t mention that to Leroy. He’s liable to go shoot somebody.”
From what Cutch understood of Leroy McAlister, he’d spent a couple of decades in the Air Force before returning to Holyoake to run the family crop dusting business. He was the type who liked to go in guns blazing. While that might be great in battle, it wouldn’t be a good idea in Holyoake County. “We’ve got him all riled up about this,” Cutch said, realizing this regretfully.
“I’ll see if I can’t get him calmed down. We’ll head out to the airstrip. That ought to distract him.” Bill looked off in the direction Elise had disappeared. “You keep an eye on Elise for now.”
“Sounds good.” With a nod to Bill, Cutch headed off after Elise, his heart warmed by the fact Bill had entrusted him with his daughter. Did Elise’s father trust him now? It would change his world if he did.
At the same time, Cutch felt impatient. If something wasn’t done soon, Bruce and Gideon would no doubt move their drug lab again, this time to someplace no one would find it. To cover their trail, they’
d likely come up with reasons for throwing him right back in jail. He doubted he’d get out so easily this time. He ducked into the barn and listened with half an ear as Elise chatted with Vera and Bob.
From what he could tell from their conversation, Vera and Bob were power gliding enthusiasts who’d attended the festival in Kansas City that Elise had been so disappointed to miss. The older pair raved about the new set of gliders they’d bought from a dealer at the festival. As Bob explained their need to sell off their older pair of gliders, a light went off in Cutch’s mind.
“Do you have them with you?” he asked, cutting off Bob in the middle of his long-winded explanation about the features that might boost the older gliders’ selling price.
“The gliders? Of course. We weren’t sure we’d be buying new ones, so we had them with us to fly. They’re in the trailer.”
“Can we take a look at them?” Cutch read the man’s startled features and added, “Elise needs a new glider, you know. And I’ve always been interested in the sport. If we pick up a used pair for a decent price—”
“Oh, yes. Right this way!” Bob’s face brightened at Cutch’s suggestion, and he led them back in the way of the trailer.
Elise gave Cutch a confused look and whispered, “You’ve always been interested in the sport?”
“Sure. Don’t you remember when I attended your tutorial at the county fair? I thought I took to it pretty well.”
“True.” Elise still sounded hesitant.
Bob pulled open the rear door of the trailer and hauled out a heavy bag that held a folded glider. As the older man pulled out the glider and began setting it up for inspection, Cutch peppered him with questions on how to operate the machine, and finally, satisfied the gear would meet his needs, he got down to asking Bob what he’d want for both gliders.
No sooner had they settled on a price than Elise pulled on his shirtsleeve. “Could you excuse us just a moment?” she asked her friends with a polite smile. But when she cornered Cutch over by his truck, her smile was gone.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked, a slight screech underscoring her words.
“Don’t you think they’re nice gliders? Or is the price too high?”
Elise set her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Of course they’re gorgeous gilders. Bob and Vera only buy the best. But what do you need a glider for all of a sudden?”
Cutch smiled, convinced his plan was a good one. Bruce Bromley’s place was locked up tight on all sides—no doubt the man felt confident he could securely hide his operation there, if only temporarily. That left them with only one possible means of access to the evidence he guarded behind those eight-foot walls. “We’ll use the gliders to fly over Bruce Bromley’s place. We can take pictures—”
“And get shot out of the sky again?” Elise shook her head angrily. “I don’t think so.”
“We’ll be stealthy. In and out.”
“It won’t work anyway, Cutch. You can’t take pictures and fly a glider at the same time. You have to hold on to the speed bar to control the glider. The minute you try to take a picture, you lose control of your glider. Trust me. I’ve tried a dozen different ways of doing it. I’ve mounted the camera to my glider. I’ve mounted it to my helmet, to my windsuit and even to my gloves. It doesn’t matter where you put it. The second you try to operate the camera, you’re a danger to yourself and a menace to anyone on the ground below you.”
“What if you didn’t have to operate the camera?”
Elise’s face crinkled up and she shoved her hair back behind her ears. “I don’t see how that would—”
“Can you just trust me?” Cutch realized he was running out of time and didn’t feel he could spare the time it would take to explain every little detail of his plans. Besides, he wasn’t exactly sure how he was going to rig the cameras. But he felt certain he could make his plan work. He’d have to.
“Trust you?” Elise’s warm eyes simmered with uncertainty. “Cutch, I bailed you out of jail. I put up my own money in addition to yours. I’m trying to help you catch these drugmakers, but Cutch—” the hitch in her voice stilled her volume to almost nothing “—I’m going out on a limb here as it is.”
Cutch reached for her and let his hands fall gently on her shoulders. She flinched at first but didn’t pull away. “I appreciate that. You’ve taken on enormous challenges, and I feel awful for what you’ve had to go through—”
“It’s not just that.” Elise wriggled out from under his hands. “I learned some things from my dad today about the feud and about my mother. And then all that stuff you just told me about your dad…I still haven’t decided how I feel about everything.”
The enormity of everything Elise was dealing with settled in the air around them. As much as he wanted to wrap his arms around her and try to comfort her, Cutch realized Elise needed her space. He’d been thrust back into her life two days before, and though in his heart he wanted to mend their friendship and make her a part of his life again, he realized she probably wasn’t ready to do that yet. She might never be. “Do you want me to just get out of here?” he asked quietly.
Elise looked up at him with wide eyes. “I don’t know how that would do any good if the Bromley brothers are after us.” She looked over to where Bob had pulled the second glider from the trailer and was busy setting it up for their inspection. Cutch could see indecision warring in her features. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we need to be proactive, to go after them instead of waiting for them to catch us.”
“I don’t want to put you in danger,” Cutch qualified.
With a shrug, Elise acknowledged, “I’m already in danger. I just—” she shook off her defeated posture and raised her shoulders, tilting her chin up in a brave face he could tell drew on what little reserves of courage she had left “—I’m going to trust. I’m going to trust God and trust you.”
“Thank you.” He started to reach for her, wanting to tuck the loose hair behind her ears for her again, to reach out and feel the softness of her cheek and her silky smooth hair, but he recalled the way she’d wriggled away from him only moments before. He might want to be friends again, but obviously she wasn’t ready to return his feelings yet. The last thing he wanted to do was push her away. “First things first. I need to figure out if I can fly one of these contraptions.”
“And then?” Elise met his eyes.
“Then, if we can, we’re going to find some real evidence to lock these guys away.”
THIRTEEN
They spent the next half hour in flying drills. Fortunately, Cutch remembered everything he’d learned at her glider tutorial, which gave them a solid foundation to build on. When Elise was satisfied that Cutch had the basics down, she allowed him to write a check to Vera and Bob for the gliders; then she hugged them and waved as they headed off on their way. Though they’d used all their cash for bail money, Cutch still had money in the bank to cover the check.
Fortunately, Cutch was a natural when it came to flying. After all, it ran in his family. Under any other circumstances, Elise would have wanted her pupil to practice over the course of several weeks before attempting a potentially dangerous flight, but she couldn’t see any way around what they needed to do. They couldn’t trust the sheriff—or anyone in the sheriff’s office—as far as that went. And they had to assemble some sort of evidence against the Bromleys—soon. Elise had no doubt the brothers would be coming after them again. They’d let Cutch go far too easily, and the only explanation was that they planned to simply arrest him again, probably on stickier charges the next time.
“Now what?” Elise asked Cutch as her friends’ motor home and trailer rumbled off down the road.
“Do you have any old cameras that still work that you don’t mind me tinkering with?”
“Sure.” As a photographer, Elise had a soft spot for cameras, and with the rate new technology developed, she’d amassed several that had been replaced by newer models with more impressive features, though the
older cameras were still perfectly usable.
Cutch continued, “Do you have any electrical wire, wire strippers, tinning flux—”
“I don’t even know what tinning flux is,” Elise shook her head.
“Let me call Sam.”
Cutch got on the phone with his cousin, who was an electrician. Elise recalled years before hearing about the projects the two of them had tinkered on together, even some county fair entries in their teenage years. They’d rigged some interesting gizmos, she remembered with clarity. It didn’t take long for Cutch to explain to his cousin what he was up to.
“He’ll bring what we need. Can you show me the cameras?”
They headed to the house, and Elise dug through a box in the closet where she stored her “spare” electronics. She sold a few of her older cameras from time to time, but since cameras were a photographer’s eyes and hands, parting with them often felt like losing part of herself. So Elise had several for Cutch to choose from.
“We need something with a lot of memory and a big screen.” He took one of the cameras she held out to him. “Does this have an easily accessible power switch?”
“Right on top.” Elise reached over and showed him how to turn the camera on.
Nothing happened when he flipped the switch.
Cutch pushed the camera back toward her. “We’re going to need a fully charged battery.”
Pulling a cord from the camera’s box, Elise said, “Just let me plug it in for a couple hours. It should charge right up.”
She reached out to take the camera from him. Her fingers brushed his as he handed it over. She glanced up just long enough to meet his eyes and exchange a slight smile. Then she turned her attention back to the cameras and held up another for his inspection.
Working with Cutch felt natural, yet exhilarating. He was polite, capable and strong. Her heart gave a little twist, and she wondered how things might have been different if their relationship had gotten off the ground the first time around. Would they have lasted? Were they meant to? It was more than she could allow herself to be distracted by at the moment.
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