by Jan Coffey
Nate’s mother, Karen, was a veterinarian. His father, Bill, was some big-shot engineering manager at an area Fortune 500 company. And as far as the two “deadbeat bums,” Nate’s younger brothers, Neil was a security expert working for the U.S. government, and Milt was finishing his law degree at Harvard. Not exactly what Ellie had been told.
This was the first time in a year that everyone was home at the same time, so the Murtaughs had another reason to celebrate.
With the exception of Karen, who was average in height, the rest of them were over six feet tall. They argued more than talked, and they were merciless in giving each other a hard time. But they were all polite and especially welcoming to Ellie for the first hour. Then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, the line between them evaporated, and she found herself in the middle of the verbal free-for-all that constituted life in the Murtaugh household.
By eight o’clock, Ellie had eaten more in one day than she would normally eat in a week, had drunk more than she would normally drink in a month, and had laughed more than she would laugh in a year.
At nine o’clock, the two women retired to the porch that wrapped around the side of the house. The night was comfortably cool, and two citronella candles were the only source of light. Karen talked about her veterinary practice and how she and Bill both wanted to slow down a little and have more time to play. Ellie talked about her antique shop and about living in Philadelphia. Nate’s mother listened with interest as Ellie talked about what she liked and disliked about her routines. Karen told her about a program a few of the vets in the area had been trying to start that would provide trained animals as pets to senior citizens for free. Though Ellie really didn’t know anything about animals, she found herself sharing ideas about funding and logistics. She told Karen about the celebrity auction to raise money for the Children’s Hospital.
With the family’s dogs and cats curled up all around them, Ellie couldn’t remember a day in her life when she’d felt such a sense of belonging. She could only imagine how comforting it would have been to grow up here with these people. Meeting them, she understood Nate and the confidence that was an integral part of him.
Ellie thought of Chris and how her little gifts could never fill the void the eight-year-old must be feeling in his life. She remembered how homeless and alone she’d always felt as a child, even after Ray had taken her under his wing.
Karen Murtaugh was a woman with ideas, and she managed to pull Ellie back from the mists of her past with more talk of a fund-raiser.
“You know how they open the track here in Saratoga for a month in August for horse races. How about if I have a huge cookout in August on the day of the week when they’re not racing? Maybe even two or three of them, depending on how things go? You and I can get the boys to set up a huge tent in the backyard. Whoever wants to can bring their antiques to see what they’re worth, and we can ask for a ten-dollar donation to our Animals for Seniors program.”
“Plus they get fed,” Ellie added. “And I’m sure you could get a number of the antique dealers from the area to serve as experts.”
“It’ll be like one of those antique road shows on TV,” Karen continued enthusiastically. “But even better, because they’d be dealing with you.”
Ellie didn’t have the heart to mention that she wouldn’t have any reason to be here with Nate in August. By then, his life would have taken him back to New York, and he might not want her to have anything to do with his family.
“Another solid fund-raiser is also an auction, as long as you can get enough donations,” Ellie suggested.
“That would be great.” Karen nodded. “You know, we could plan something for every weekend. And the best part of it will be getting you two up here often.”
Karen went on to tell her how peculiar she found it that the local charities mostly ran fund-raisers that involved some kind of sports tournament. What she was really looking for was a way to get entire families involved. Did Ellie think the barbecue-antique tent idea would bring in families?
Ellie was a little slow on the uptake, but she eventually recognized the matchmaking tone—or at least the assumption that she and Nate were already an item. She was looking for a way to clarify things when Nate walked out on the porch with a plate full of cupcakes and three beers.
“Your gift went over better than mine.” He smiled at her. “A military-and-political history book. And here I thought Dad couldn’t read anything other than technical manuals and magazines. He hasn’t moved from his chair since he opened your present.”
“Yes, he loves the book you gave him.” Karen looked at Ellie. “He told me it’s dated 1879 and showed me all those engravings. It must have cost you a fortune.”
Ellie shook her head. “It was nothing.”
Not knowing anything about Bill Murtaugh, and with no time to go out and shop, she was relieved she’d chosen the right gift.
Nate plopped himself down on the porch swing next to Ellie. She tried to slide over to give him room, but there was nowhere to go. He balanced the plate of cupcakes on her lap and handed her and his mother one of the beers.
“I don’t think I could eat or drink again for at least a week.”
“Yes, you can.” He put an arm around her shoulder and started the seat swinging gently. “Sunday brunch at the Murtaugh Inn is when we really eat.”
“Bill is famous for his French toast.” Karen smiled.
“And Mom is famous for her cinnamon rolls…right out of the container.”
“Don’t forget my doughnuts, either. I get up every Sunday to go buy doughnuts.”
“She sure does.” Nate rubbed his hand up and down Ellie’s arm and drew her closer to his side. Too conscious of Karen’s interest in the extent of their relationship, Ellie had the intense desire to run and hide.
“What are your no-good brothers up to?”
“Arguing over some TV commentary about this year’s election and plowing down cupcakes.”
Karen got to her feet. “Then I think I’ll go and sit on the birthday boy’s lap for a few minutes and look through his book with him.”
“That should make his birthday.”
Ellie smiled as Karen winked at her son and went inside.
“She’s a wonderful person.”
“She has to be. She’s my mother.”
Ellie poked him in the stomach. “You are a spoiled brat.”
Nate grinned. “Only if I can get the same thing from you on my birthday.”
“Be sure to put it on your list.” His blue eyes looked almost black in the flickering candlelight. “When is your birthday?”
“December.”
“And what do you want?”
“You, on my lap.” He leaned down and brushed his lips against hers. “But you can start now.” He deepened the kiss.
“I can’t,” she whispered breathlessly a minute later. She clutched the beer bottle tightly as his lips trailed kisses on her face and her neck.
“Why not?” He pushed the collar of her shirt down and tasted her sensitive skin beneath it.
“I don’t think I can sit on your lap with-out…us…you know. And you told me yourself about your mother’s no-sex rule under her roof…how she used to threaten you?”
“I don’t think she really meant it.”
“She strikes me as a very serious person.”
Nate took his arm from around her and began peeling the paper off a cupcake. “She is, most of the time. But threatening to neuter her own sons?”
Ellie laughed. “I have a hard time believing she would really say that to you three.”
“Well, all of us were hellions as teenagers, and with parents who both worked more than a full-time schedule, some serious threatening was required.”
Ellie was still smiling when she looked into his face. “You—the solid citizen, the decorated FBI special agent—a teenage hell-raiser. I can’t wait to hear those stories.”
“Well, you’re not going to.” He
ate half of the cupcake in one bite. “I’m not talking.”
“I bet with the right kind of bribe, either Neil or Milt will talk.”
“Honey, you don’t need to bribe those two. In fact, you won’t even need to ask. They just didn’t want to scare you off today. The next time we come up here, even my parents will be telling you horror stories about me.”
The next time. The words made Ellie’s pulse jump. Although she tried to hide it, there was no lying to herself. She’d fallen hard and fast for Nate. To hear him say that caused her throat to knot up with emotion.
Ellie put what was left of the cupcakes and her beer on the table next to the swing and cuddled up against him.
His arm was around her again in an instant, drawing her closer. “You don’t have to be afraid. None of them are true. They make those stories up as they go.”
Ellie shook her head and pressed her face against his chest. This was becoming her favorite place in the world. He rubbed his chin lightly in her hair. His hand caressed her back. He placed a kiss against her forehead.
“Did you have a good time today?”
She nodded, still not trusting her voice.
“Unfortunately, I’ll have to go up to Ticonderoga after brunch tomorrow. I should be back in time for dinner.”
“I want to go with you,” she said softly.
He caressed her arm. “I’d like that.”
“Did you find out anything about Teasdale?” she asked. Nate had been on the phone with the local police a number of times today.
“He’s clean, apparently. Bought the house and moved up here about six years ago. Quiet—lives alone. As far as the IRS is concerned, he’s retired and his only income is from social security. The only thing that doesn’t jive is that he paid cash for the house to start with.”
“Maybe he clips coupons.”
“That must be it.” He smiled. “He has no police record. He doesn’t have any friends or enemies, as far as anyone knows. And that’s pretty much it.”
“You sent him the package.”
Nate nodded. “I checked the tracking. It was delivered today.”
“So he should be working on whatever it is that he’s trying to impress you with.”
They sat quietly for a couple of minutes, listening to the sounds of the night and the voices of the Murtaugh brothers drifting out from the kitchen.
“Before we left, you didn’t tell anyone else about us meeting Teasdale, did you?”
She shook her head.
“Me, neither.”
Nate took a sip from the bottle, kicked the swing into action and stared into the darkness at the country road leading up to his parents’ house. He hadn’t said anything, but she sensed the change in him. His muscles had become tense. The concentration and intensity were back, even in the way he was supposedly relaxing on the porch swing.
“What’s wrong?” she asked quietly.
“Want to go for a ride?”
Ten minutes ago, she would have given him a hard time for the suggestion, convinced that he had an ulterior motive. But right now, she knew something much more serious was on his mind. “Where are we going?”
He got to his feet and pulled Ellie with him. “We’re going to ride by Mr. Teasdale’s place.”
“He was pretty definite about not wanting to see us until Monday.”
“I know. We’re not going to drop in for dessert.” He gathered up the bottles and the plate from the table. “I’m just going to tell the guys inside we’re going off to neck by the lake.”
“Don’t you dare.”
He kissed her and disappeared inside.
Ellie grabbed her sweatshirt off the railing and put it on. She understood how Nate felt. To start with, this job should have been a simple one. No matter how valuable an offered artifact was, whether stolen or legitimately owned, the auctions were generally hyped with more bells and whistles than this one. The secrecy about the whole thing was getting on her nerves. And since they’d started looking for someone to duplicate the flag, there was a feeling of doom hanging over them.
She thought back to when she’d felt this first. It all started with the SUV heading right for them in front of Atwood’s shop. In all the years of her life, living in the city, Ellie had never had a car come that close to running her over.
“Are you ready?”
Nate had pulled a light jacket on over his T-shirt. She didn’t try to make small talk, or ask any more questions. He needed to concentrate, and she understood. They’d driven up to Saratoga in Nate’s sedan—what he called the company car—but they took Karen’s new Explorer tonight since it had a global-positioning device in it.
The address they had for Teasdale put his house northwest of the town, in a wooded area and far off the beaten track from the regular summer tourists. Ellie watched the map display as Nate drove. Soon, the houses became farther apart. After another half a mile, occasional bright lights down a long driveway were the only sign of anyone living in the area.
A few more miles along the rolling, pine-covered countryside, and Nate stopped the car by the mailbox across from a gravel driveway. The number matched the address. Ellie looked down the dark drive. Other than a small, carefully painted No Trespassing sign nailed to a tree, there was no sign of life down the drive. The destination matched what was on the vehicle’s map display.
A newspaper carrier route box was next to the mailbox. Ellie noticed the paper inside at the same time as Nate. He pulled the car up to it, and she took out the paper. He turned on the overhead light.
“Today’s paper.”
“Maybe he didn’t want to walk out and get it,” she suggested.
They sat in silence for a few seconds, Nate looking out at the still countryside. She rolled up the paper and put it back in the box.
“Didn’t he say the overnight package should be dropped by the back door of the house?”
“That’s right,” she answered.
“If this road is okay for delivery trucks, then it should handle us.” Nate turned down the private road.
“What do we tell him if he comes out with a shotgun?” she asked apprehensively.
“We arrived in town early and were double-checking the way to his house for Monday.”
Ellie still couldn’t get rid of the hot ember of worry that had nestled in the pit of her stomach. As a teenager, she’d had nerves of steel. She didn’t allow fear when she was about to do a job. Concentration, speed, remembering verbatim and following the instructions she was given—these were the things that had guided her on occasions like this. It was far too time-consuming to let her mind dwell on anxious thoughts.
That had been the life she left behind a dozen years ago. For more reasons than one, she was glad of it now.
The single-story, ranch-style house came into view after a sharp bend along a creek. Not a single light was on. The door to the attached garage was closed. As Nate approached the house, two sets of floodlights mounted on the house came on.
“Did we wake him up?” Ellie asked.
“Motion sensors, I think.”
They sat for a couple of minutes, waiting for other lights inside the house to go on. But nothing happened.
“It could be that he’s not home,” Ellie offered. “I think we should go.”
“I’m going to take a look around first.” Nate turned off the engine and shut off the lights. “You sit right here and wait for me.”
Ellie’s instincts were telling her that they should get out of here, but she clamped her mouth shut. Nate was a professional. He knew what he was doing. If his instincts told him that he needed to check the place out, then she needed to trust him. Besides, she was certain nothing she said was going to change his mind.
“I’ll leave the key in. You lock the door as soon as I get out. Just toot the horn if any cars come down the driveway.”
He grabbed a large flashlight from under the seat. As soon as he opened the door to get out, though, Ellie climbed across the sea
t after him.
“I’m coming with you.”
He considered that for a moment, nodded and took the keys. “Let’s try the front door.”
As they moved toward the house, Ellie gazed at the dark woods surrounding them. The screech of an owl and the buzzing of summer bugs around the floodlights were the only sounds. She remembered what she’d once read in a Sherlock Holmes story about the safety of the city versus that of the country. Holmes preferred the city, where neighbors could hear the cries for help of victims. In the country, nobody heard you scream. She shivered and hurried to keep up.
Nate rang the doorbell and waited. There was no answer. After ringing it a second time, he walked over to the garage door and shined the flashlight in one of the small windows.
“There’s a car inside.”
“Somebody could have picked him up,” Ellie whispered hopefully.
A graveled walkway with meticulously kept flower beds on either side led toward the back of the house.
“Are you sure you don’t want to wait in the car?”
Ellie shook her head and grabbed on to the back of Nate’s jacket as they started in that direction. No floodlight came on to light the backyard, and Ellie was glad they had the flashlight.
A number of raised-bed vegetable gardens sat on the southerly slope by the house, but Ellie didn’t feel a need to take inventory of anything in the dark. She just wanted to get out of here. The yard in the back dipped sharply, with a wooden deck coming off the main floor. There was a sliding glass door underneath the deck that she imagined led to a basement. There was a welcome mat by the door, and a table and a couple of chairs close by.
Nate pointed the flashlight at the glass door. She stepped closer and saw a workshop with benches and tools beyond the glass. As she did, she kicked something on the ground.
“What’s this?”
Nate pointed the light on it.
“It’s the package I overnighted to him yesterday.” He picked it up and looked at the unbroken seal of the envelope before handing it to Ellie. “Hold on to it.”
The sick feeling in her stomach got worse. Teasdale had insisted on having everything there on time. Nate pointed the light at the welcome mat they were standing on. He ran it slowly up along the edge of the door and looked closely at the lock. He flashed it again inside the workshop, specifically on the floor. Carefully, he used his sleeve to open the door. It was unlocked and slid open a crack.