“What do you mean put my coat on? Why do I need my coat?”
“Because you’re coming with me.” He put all the outerwear in her hands and then turned to the sheriff. “You’re good, right? I can leave?”
“Sure,” Dane said with a distinct smirk on his face. “Just keep your phone on you.”
“Good idea.” Who knew how far away the plane was.
Tate strode to the kitchen and opened the junk drawer, not worried anyone would be able to use the thing to track him. It was almost useless, capable of making calls and sending texts—not that he ever did—and that was all.
He pulled out his cell phone and pressed the power button. Hopefully he’d charged it before he turned it off last time. He only kept it with him when he was on shift as a deputy sheriff. There was no signal on this mountain, so there was no point in having it on up here. One of these days he would switch to the carrier that actually got a tiny signal in this area, but he hadn’t done it yet.
Tate slid the phone into his front pocket and found the keys to the snowmobile. He wasn’t about to hang around and have this whole thing pinned on him. Not when he might be able to find the plane and prove his innocence. He’d have to deal with Liberty being with him—as opposed to somewhere else, probably causing trouble for him.
She wouldn’t be causing him trouble on purpose, but she would have to do her job, and that wouldn’t be good for him. If she was with Tate, he could keep an eye on her. And keep her safe in case that man had been here to hurt her.
The thoughts spun in his head like a tornado.
“Are you going to tell me where we’re going?” Liberty asked.
“To find the plane,” Tate said. Like that wasn’t perfectly obvious. “If the Russian mob, or whoever is sitting in the back of the sheriff’s car, is trying to frame me for this, then I’m not about to stay here and try to convince the feds and the Secret Service that I’m not involved.” He’d burned those bridges to the ground when he’d tried to punch Locke his last day on the job. “There’s no way I’m going to trust them to believe me when I can prove I’m innocent myself.”
Locke had known exactly why Tate lost his cool and hadn’t blamed him one bit. Which only made the whole situation all the more infuriating. His anger needed an outlet. It wasn’t good if he bottled it up, so he had to channel it somewhere. There wasn’t much to get mad about on this mountain, so he’d been fine.
Until Liberty showed up.
Now he wanted to kick a wall, because prison would not be good for him.
He trailed to his bedroom and got his Beretta from the safe. Two extra clips. He dropped them in a backpack as he walked to the entryway, where he handed it to Liberty. She’d need to carry it.
She raised her brows at his offering. “Is there a reason I have to come?”
Tate figured it was probably a valid question. Apparently Liberty was all about questions these days. The truth was he’d kind of missed her, which was totally messed up. But he had loved her, and she’d thrown it away. Maybe he didn’t want to pass up this opportunity to hang out with her, even under the circumstances.
Instead of actually telling her, Tate waved toward the window. “Have you seen the weather out here? You don’t go out in that alone. You take a buddy.”
Tate thought he might have heard the sheriff snort, but he ignored it. Dane had figured out what it was about even if Liberty hadn’t. She would eventually, and then he would be done for. She’d never liked being tricked.
Tate opened the door, stepped outside and headed for the shed. Joey barked and raced out into the snow behind him, ready for whatever adventure they were going on.
Tate turned to the house and called for Joey to follow him back inside. The dog bounded up the porch steps where Liberty stood, while Tate stayed at the bottom. Liberty jumped aside at the last minute, a nervous look on her face. Was she scared of dogs? He hadn’t thought so. Hadn’t she had a dog once? It was possible something had happened recently that he didn’t know about. Tate figured it was just another indication of their incompatibility.
“You still have that ugly cat?”
Liberty’s mouth dropped open. “Yes. You’ve already asked me that, Tate.”
The sheriff stepped out with them and shut the door, almost choking in an attempt to hide his laughter. “I’ll wait for the Secret Service and then take that guy in.” He motioned to his car, where the intruder sat.
Liberty walked down the porch steps after Tate. “Just answer one question before we go find the plane.”
Tate waited.
“What is up with the Christmas decorations? Your house looks like a postcard.”
“It was a wreck, so I fixed it up. The Realtor’s coming by first thing tomorrow morning for a showing.”
She looked like he’d kicked her ugly bald cat.
Tate flicked two fingers toward the sheriff, who drove away with the intruder, and then stepped into the dark of the shed. He fired up the snowmobile and drove it out. Liberty walked over on black boots. She gaped. Tate just ignored it and said, “Get on. We’ve got a plane to find.”
That got her moving. She jumped on behind him and set her hands on his shoulders. Tate reached back and pulled her arms around him. Before the feeling of her being so close could take root, he set off. Liberty squealed and held on tighter. She would get the hang of it pretty soon, and until then he would ignore the fact that she was holding on to him for dear life.
Tate found the path through the trees and headed up the mountain, toward the valley to the west of town. The snow was a thick covering, but the temperature wasn’t too bad. He’d been out in colder weather than this, when the wind beat against him and he’d felt like he was frozen down to his bones.
As he drove, he prayed they would find the plane and the missing people—and that when this was done and Liberty went home, his heart would still be intact.
Four miles later her grip on his waist began to loosen. Half a mile after that she started to slide to the side. Tate shook his head. She’d fallen asleep, probably exhausted from a day of travel and then showing up at his house only to face intruders. Tate slowed the snowmobile to a stop and left it to idle while he reached back and shifted Liberty so she was sitting upright.
She looked even paler in the moonlight. He held her with one arm and then put his free hand on her face. When her eyebrows twitched, he took off his glove and touched the cool of her skin with his warm fingers. This would turn out to be a mistake, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself from hugging her. It had been too long since he’d received any kind of affection from anyone. Dog slobber didn’t count.
Liberty roused. Tate shifted her so he could see her face and said, “Are you okay?”
She nodded, but couldn’t quite hide the wince. “Headache, but that’s all.”
“Aside from the fact that you’re exhausted.” She always downplayed it when she was hurting. “Can you hang on some more? It’s not much farther.”
She looked up at him as though he’d paid her the nicest of compliments. Tate had seriously missed that look in the last year but didn’t want to dwell too much on the fact that he was soaking it up now. It wasn’t going to help him when she left if all he could do was remember what she looked like. What she felt like. How she smelled. He had to get this woman out of his head if he was going to survive alone for the rest of his life.
Liberty straightened. “I’m good.”
“Okay then.” Tate turned back around to face forward and set off again.
* * *
For the first time since she’d shown up at his house, Liberty had seen the man she’d fallen in love with. She hugged his middle again, and felt the prick of tears in her eyes. Everything good they’d ever had between them...she’d ruined it all when she gave him back his ring and said she’d realized it wasn’t goin
g to work.
Which was true. Considering what she’d learned, there was no way a relationship between them would’ve worked. There was just so much unsaid now. She’d seen the question in his eyes, the pain of their relationship being torn apart when there was nothing either of them could do about it.
And nothing had changed since.
They’d both found some semblance of peace. Liberty could hardly believe that their lives now were what God had wanted for them, but what else were they supposed to have done? This was what God had given them, and it simply didn’t work for them to share their lives.
Liberty wanted to ask Tate if he’d moved on, if he’d found someone to care about, but she couldn’t voice the words out in the cold, dark night, silent except for the rumble of the snowmobile’s engine. She hoped he’d found someone else.
Because she never could.
Tate revved the engine. Liberty saw something out of the corner of her eye and glanced over. Her whole body solidified as she spotted a man dressed in dark clothes, a weapon pointed at them.
“Gun!”
Tate shot forward even faster as the man opened fire. They both ducked and the shots rang out, each one as loud as a firework.
Blast after blast flashed in the dark, illuminating his position. His aim chased the snowmobile’s path as Tate flew across the terrain. Liberty pulled her own gun out and fired back two shots, but the ride was too bumpy. She would never be able to hit him. Still, she gripped Tate tighter with her other arm and both knees and tried not to fall off.
Unless...
The shots continued. Liberty shifted back and launched herself off the snowmobile. She landed on her back in a berm of snow and heard Tate yell. He gunned the snowmobile, then turned it in a wide arc, coming back for her.
Liberty ran for the nearest tree so that at least there’d be some cover from the shots. While Tate raced back to her, she returned fire at the man who now sent bullets at both her and Tate in turn. Then he swung his arm back and fired at her.
Liberty ducked and the bullet took out a chunk of bark. She raced for the next tree, moving closer to the man.
The roar of the snowmobile engine raced up behind her. She glanced over, but Tate wasn’t coming for her. He drove the snowmobile past her, toward the man trying to kill them. What was he doing? His weapon was in the backpack on her back.
Liberty shifted for a better position and fired to give him the cover he needed. Over and over. One shot managed to clip the gunman in the shoulder, and then Tate was in her line of fire and right on top of the man. He launched himself from the snowmobile and tackled the guy to the snow.
The vehicle they’d been riding continued on, but the engine lost power fast and careened into a tree.
Liberty raced over while they fought. The gun went off. She ducked and went to one knee. Tate had the man on the ground. He shifted, put his knee on the guy’s elbow and grabbed the weapon.
Liberty relaxed one tiny notch.
Gun at the ready, she made her way to them. “You good?”
Tate didn’t look at her. The man on the ground was bleeding, but Tate hauled him to his feet. Liberty pulled out her phone.
“Won’t get any signal out here.”
“So what do we do with him then?”
Tate shifted the man’s collar. “Same tattoo. Russian as well, I’m guessing. Maybe the first guy from my house. He’s wearing the right clothes.”
The words weren’t directed at her, but the man didn’t answer. Didn’t say anything. His face was deadpan, with no expression. No movement whatsoever.
“Guess we’re walking back to town,” Tate said. “We can turn him over to the sheriff, and Dane can get some answers.”
That got a reaction.
Liberty saw the slightest movement. “Tate—”
But the man was already in motion. He launched himself at Tate.
Liberty hardly had time to react, but she was a Secret Service agent.
A shot went off.
Liberty fired as well, her aim true, and the bullet hit the gunman square in the chest. Tate fell back and the man landed on top of him. He rolled the man so their attacker lay in the snow. Two choppy breaths later, he was dead.
“Lib.”
She stepped back, even though he hadn’t moved.
Tate got to his feet. He stepped toward her, and she held out a hand, palm up. “We’re okay, Lib.”
She shook her head. “The snowmobile is trashed and we’re in the middle of nowhere.”
“We don’t have to walk back to town now. The mine isn’t far from here. Come on,” he coaxed. “It isn’t far, Lib.”
“Don’t call me that.” She lifted her gaze and looked him square in the face. “Don’t ever call me that.”
They weren’t a team. They would never be a team again, as good as it felt working together. Protecting each other. Taking down their assailant. Liberty had to let go of all her memories with him. Again. As much as it hurt, she had to walk away from Tate and let him live his life. Because one of them should have a future.
And it wasn’t going to be her.
FOUR
Tate wanted to hold her hand. He also wanted to yell at her and get her to tell him why she’d jumped off the snowmobile. He’d nearly had a heart attack when he realized what she’d done. Yes, she was a Secret Service agent. He’d been one as well, and that stuff didn’t just disappear. He was wired to protect, and that meant Liberty along with everyone else. Feelings didn’t matter. Even after she’d torn his life apart. Maybe especially. They didn’t get to pick and choose who they protected.
Thank You for keeping us safe. God had protected them. That man had tried to kill them, and in the end had chosen to end his life by forcing her hand. He’d known what it meant to attack Tate one last time. It couldn’t have ended another way.
Now there was a dead man in the woods. Liberty had taken a million pictures of the body while he checked for ID and found nothing, then noted as many details as he could in a text to the sheriff that would send just as soon as he got a signal. Liberty had said she would email the photos to Dane later after she downloaded them to her laptop.
Aside from that, there wasn’t much they could do about a dead body in the woods. Tate needed to find the plane so he could prove to the Secret Service—and anyone else—that he hadn’t been involved in its disappearance.
Then there were the two men at his house. One had tried to kill him, and the other had planted evidence by leaving the plane’s black box by his front door. The first had come back and tried again. It couldn’t be a coincidence; there was no such thing in their line of work, he had learned. So it wasn’t just the Secret Service pointing a finger at him. Someone else wanted to make sure he was implicated in this. But who? And what did they have to gain, getting him arrested and thrown in prison?
Liberty was silent beside him, and Tate didn’t try to draw her out of it. He had no idea what was going on in her head, but when she was ready to talk to him she would. That had always been their way. What would be the point of making her talk?
Even though it had been more than a year since he’d seen her, a lot of who they had been together still seemed to fit. Despite that, he couldn’t imagine them working as a couple after everything. But then, Tate couldn’t imagine it working with anyone now. Clearly he wasn’t the kind of guy any woman kept around.
Soon enough they were at the old mine, the place Tate had thought of immediately when she’d mentioned a missing plane in this area.
Assuming it hadn’t crashed and there wasn’t debris splayed across the terrain somewhere around here just waiting to be found.
If this was indeed a case of foul play, the plane had to have landed somewhere close to here. After all, the black box had been removed and was intact. It hadn’t been dest
royed or crashed with the plane and buried in the debris.
If the people who were doing this truly wanted the plane to remain undiscovered, it meant they had to be hiding it somewhere. The front part of this system of caves and tunnels making up the entirety of the mine was an opening big enough to taxi a plane into. It would not be completely closed in, but it would at least hide the aircraft for a while.
Tate couldn’t think of a better place to put it.
Liberty stopped and looked across the clearing, at least eight acres of snowfall. “This is it?”
“It’s where I would hide a plane.” When she shot him a look, Tate added, “If I was the one who was behind this. Which I am not, and you know that. Or at least you should.”
Maybe she’d never had total faith in him, and their relationship had been shakier than he’d known. But he’d thought they were good. Preparing for the future, making plans together for when they were no longer Secret Service agents. They’d been busy all the time, out on the road campaigning every few years. On overseas details, protecting the secretary of state and other dignitaries.
They had lived in some amazing places and seen some amazing things, but the strain of that life weighed a person down until they felt old beyond their years. He knew he felt it, but Liberty didn’t look it. Her mom didn’t look her age either, so he figured it was probably inherited.
“How are your parents?” Tate set off toward the mine.
Liberty strode through the snow beside him. “They’re good. My dad won a golf tournament last weekend, beat all of his friends and everything. He was seriously proud. They even got him a little trophy.” She grinned, and her teeth flashed white in the moonlight. “Have you seen your brother at all?”
He’d told her the story about his parents’ car crash when he was in college. It was the first time he remembered being really, truly angry. Tate’s younger brother had been sixteen at the time and had spiraled on a downward descent since then. Braden had hit rock bottom so many times Tate had lost count.
Yuletide Suspect Page 3