“He doesn’t return my calls. I invited him to Christmas, but I figure he’ll probably just ignore the holidays.” Tate paused, unsure whether or not to add this next part. In the end, he decided to brave the potential heartbreak. “The house I’m living in right now is actually our family’s vacation cabin. I fixed it up so I could live there.”
“But you told me it’s for sale.”
“I tried. I really did. I just can’t face it by myself, Lib. I can’t live with all those happy family memories and be by myself.”
Liberty stared at him with some kind of wonder he didn’t understand. “Tate, why haven’t you found someone?” Her voice was full of so much pain it almost hurt to hear it. Like she couldn’t believe he didn’t meet eligible women every day.
It wasn’t like they just showed up on his mountain.
She cleared her throat, and he let her change the subject. “Your Christmas tree is very nice. And the place looks great.” She spoke tentatively, like she wasn’t sure how the words would be received. “I haven’t even had time to get mine up yet. And I was planning on going down to Florida anyway, but that isn’t going to happen now.”
“I’m sorry this has ruined your Christmas plans.”
“I might still be able to get them back on track. I have a few days of travel left before Christmas Eve. If this gets wrapped up before then, I’ll probably still try to head down to see my parents if I can.” Liberty tucked some hair behind her ear, the way she did when she was avoiding something.
Tate figured she didn’t want him to know her Christmas wouldn’t be anything special, just a visit with her parents. It would be more than what he was looking forward to—assuming his house didn’t sell in the next week.
A fire in his fireplace, hot coffee and a book. Sounded about perfect, but it wasn’t anywhere near as enjoyable as the years they’d meet up on Christmas Eve at one of their homes and watch an old movie together. It had been a tradition, a part of their life together. One he’d dearly missed last Christmas Eve.
Right now wasn’t the time to dwell on memories. Not when they had a plane to find.
“I’m sure that’ll be great,” he said.
She shot him a funny look, but he didn’t have time to figure out what it was about. Tate led Liberty over to the mine’s entrance. Once one of the most prominent sources of coal in this entire area, the cave had an opening big enough to accommodate heavy equipment. It stretched above their heads and to their left and right. The inside was a dark cavern he could barely see into. Good thing he’d brought a flashlight.
When they were close enough for her to see just how big it was, Liberty gasped. “You could totally hide a small aircraft in there.”
“Me, specifically?”
“You know what I mean, Tate. This place is big enough to hide a business jet like the one that disappeared. I really hope we find it and the people who are missing. I can’t imagine what they’re going through.” She started to walk fast.
Fifteen feet from the mine’s opening, a rumble shook the ground. Before Tate could register the fact that it was an earthquake, an orange fireball split the space between the roof of the mine and the walls.
The force of the explosion pushed them back onto the snow with a rush of hot air and flames.
* * *
Dirt and rocks rained down over the entrance like a tsunami of earth as the mine exploded in on itself. Tate grabbed her arm, but Liberty was already climbing to her feet and running. The roar was almost as loud as the deafening explosion. Her ears rang, and she thought he might be yelling instructions to her, but she couldn’t hear. Thankfully, the terrain wasn’t sloped, or there quite likely would have been an avalanche.
The ground started to shift under her as she ran. Liberty stumbled, and Tate scooped her up like the hero he’d been to her for years. Underneath he was still the same protective guy she’d loved. Being in his arms had been the safest place, second only to right at his back during a fire fight. And she knew which she preferred.
Tate picked up the pace, forcing her to keep up. Liberty ran until sweat chilled on her temple and ran down her back. She estimated it was almost half a mile before they were clear of the explosion and the debris it had caused, and Tate slowed.
Liberty set her hands on her knees and bent forward, sucking in breaths.
Tate set his hand on her back. When she looked up he was scanning the area. Then he looked at her. “I think we’re clear.”
Liberty straightened. “What do you want to do now?” She could barely think. They’d nearly died. Her head spun, and it was entirely possible she was going to fall over. Just swoon and pass out, like she wasn’t a Secret Service agent.
She sucked in a breath and squared her shoulders. Then gasped. The mine was gone. The mountain had caved in on itself like an empty burlap sack. Tate stepped toward it, but she waylaid him with a hand on his arm. “We’ll be careful,” he said.
“You want to go over there?” Was it even safe to walk over the debris?
“We need to see if the plane was in the mine. We might be able to get a look.”
“We should tell the Secret Service.” Not to mention the FBI and the sheriff. “There’s no way that explosion was missed, even if it is the middle of the night.”
“It’s only one in the morning.”
She glanced at him. He’d always been Mr. Night Owl, while she was an early riser. Something about the dark had always creeped her out. She didn’t like being outside in the middle of nowhere at night. But even though she wasn’t alone, she still couldn’t relax too much. He would protect her, and she would hold up her end, but it wouldn’t last.
Liberty looked at her phone, just so she could do something unrelated to Tate. His presence had always filled a room. When he was calm, that calmness seemed to permeate the air. When he was agitated, like he was now, she had to let him work through it. He’d told her he had tools he used to process his emotions. Methods for reining it in while he thought through what needed to be worked out.
She couldn’t imagine it had been easy to lose his parents so young and suddenly have to take care of his brother full-time. He’d said it was going into the military that saved him and gave him the structure and discipline he’d so badly needed back then. He’d thrived, making it all the way to a senior NCO. The Secret Service had been a good move, though he’d brushed up against the bureaucracy more than once.
Tate was all about improving methodology instead of doing things the same way over and over. If it could be improved, it should be. Liberty agreed, though she was more of a follower than a leader. Some people were naturally take-charge people. She could do it if she had to, and she had in her personal life. But only when it was a necessity.
“No signal?”
She sighed. “Nothing.”
“I figured as much. The whole mountain where my cabin is, I get nothing.” He held up his own device—one of those ancient flip phones.
“I didn’t even know they sold those anymore. Does it even connect to the internet?”
Tate shrugged. She knew he’d never enjoyed email and probably hadn’t done a Google search in his life. The man still used a phone book to look up numbers. She’d called him a “dinosaur” about technology more than once.
Tate stepped over snow mingled with dirt and rocks, testing each step to make sure it would hold his weight. Liberty did the same, carving out her own path to his right. “The ground seems pretty stable.”
“But the mine is toast.”
She nodded. “We aren’t going to be able to see inside.”
“Still, the explosion might have made the plane visible. We at least have to look at it from all angles, in case we can see something.”
“The FBI and the Secret Service are going to have to bring earth movers up here to clear it out if they really w
ant to find out if the plane was here. Is here.”
He pointed left, past the mouth of the mine that was no more. “There’s a road on the other side. We can follow it out and get to town, get the word out that we think we know where the plane might be.”
Liberty nodded. “That’s a good idea. We can start convincing them you don’t have anything to do with this.”
“Is that why you came by yourself?”
She glanced at him.
“There has to be a reason you didn’t come with your team. You drove out by yourself to my cabin.” He paused. “I didn’t think about it until now, since we’ve been busy fighting off guys. But now that I think about it, shouldn’t you be working with the Secret Service instead of flying solo?”
“Locke knows where I am.” Liberty figured it was time to admit the truth. “He wanted to wait out the snow, but I said I was leaving right away. So yeah, it was bad and I almost didn’t make it. But I got to your cabin, and they should have been maybe an hour behind me. They were going to check into the hotel first.” She shrugged. “I figured I could get a jump on proving you weren’t part of it.”
“So you didn’t think I was guilty.”
“Your mental state isn’t the best, but it doesn’t exactly scream ‘domestic terrorist.’”
He gave her a dark look. “What exactly do you know about my mental state?”
“The blog—”
“Right, the blog.” He lifted both hands, palms up. “I have no idea what blog you’re talking about. I’m not even sure what one is.”
She had thought it was weird that a technologically inept man such as Tate would suddenly start a blog. “About eight months ago you started posting monthly rants. At first they were just generally disgruntled, stuff about the government and how it’s run. Federal agencies. Budgets.”
“And you thought that was me?”
“It was all stuff we’ve talked about.” What else was she supposed to have thought?
“I don’t own a computer, Liberty. I have no internet access.”
“I didn’t know. It seemed like you, kind of.”
“Kind of?”
Liberty shrugged. She’d hurt him, and when he had started the blog—or when the blog had started—it’d made sense to her he’d feel that way. She just hadn’t figured he’d spew his feelings online. “What do you want me to say? I thought you were lashing out because I hurt you.”
“And you came here to what...apologize?”
“Would that be so awful?” she asked. “I felt like I owed you something at least.”
Tate didn’t react. Not in his face, and not in his stiff body language. “The last thing I want to hear from you is that you’re sorry. At least have the guts to stand by what you did. You tore us apart for whatever reason was in your head.” He paused. “Does the reason still apply?”
Liberty nodded, unable to speak past the lump in her throat.
“Then there’s nothing more to say about us.”
Liberty nodded again. “It’s good you think so. You’ll be able to move on with no ties to us or anything else in your past.” It hurt to say those words, but she wanted him to know he was free. He needed to believe she would be happy for him. “Is there anyone in town you’re...interested in? Have you met someone?” Maybe he would answer now.
Tate’s eyebrows drew together. “You want me to be with someone else?”
“I want you to be happy, Tate.” It was why she’d let him go.
“Guess I’m just not wired for happily-ever-after.”
Liberty blinked. “Of course you are. Why would you say that?”
“You made it pretty clear we weren’t going to work, so why would it work with someone else?”
“Why would it not?” She hated that he thought this. She had to change his mind. “Of course you can be happy.”
“And waste months—maybe even years—trying to find out? I’m done with relationships. Otherwise I’d have figured it out by now.”
“Plenty of people find happiness in their thirties.”
“Yeah? Like you?”
Liberty wanted to say something. Instead she just closed her mouth. What was there to say? Relationships were great, but she wanted more for Tate than she could give anyone, and a man who didn’t realize the demands on Secret Service agents would never understand her life. It wouldn’t work, and since Tate was gone from her life, she hadn’t even been looking. She had thought he was her future, but that wasn’t the path God had set before her.
A car engine revved.
Liberty spun around to see a truck round the corner over where Tate had pointed out the road. The vehicle rumbled fast over the ruts of debris, right toward them.
Tate set one hand on her stomach and moved her back so he was in front of her. Liberty glanced around the breadth of his shoulders. “It’s coming right for us.”
“Give me the backpack.”
She did so, and they started to run. But before Tate could get it open gunshots exploded the dirt around them.
“Freeze!”
Liberty halted. Tate slammed into her, backpack first. He dropped it and slid his arms around her. She lifted her hands.
“Both of you, in the truck.”
FIVE
Liberty didn’t ever want to move, and not because she would be shot by the men in this truck. Tate’s arms were around her. Strong arms she had missed so much, it made her want to cry at the chance to feel them again after being alone for months. Just over a year.
“I said, in the truck.” The man wore boots, jeans, a wool sweater and a leather jacket, and held a revolver on them. “That means now.” Beyond where he stood at the open door, another man sat in the driver’s seat.
Tate took his arms from around her and held his hands up. “No worries.”
The man didn’t look like he agreed. Tate put his hand on her back, and they moved slowly toward the truck. Liberty climbed in first, over the fast-food wrappers and the blanket strewn on the seat. It smelled bad. She glanced, once, at the backpack as Tate slid in beside her, and the gunman got in the front. The man turned, his gun still pointed at them.
He motioned with it to Liberty, and she saw Tate stiffen out of the corner of her eye.
The driver turned around. He was older, and also wore a leather jacket covered in patches. He had the same tattoo as the man in Tate’s kitchen. They didn’t have accents but were evidently affiliated with the Russians in some way. “Don’t worry, you probably won’t catch a disease from the truck.”
Liberty had been attempting to ignore the state of it, especially the sticky thing under her shoe, but now it was impossible.
The gunman said, “Hands.”
She lifted them, and the driver put a zip tie on her wrists, securing them together. He did the same with Tate, tying them so tight the strap cut off her blood circulation. Liberty glanced at Tate as the older man, the driver, turned the truck around. It was hard to stay upright, and she had to grab the seat back to keep from falling into Tate’s lap.
She glanced at him again.
Still nothing. Tate’s face was blank, but his gaze studied every inch of these men. The tattoos, the patches. All of it. She tried to see what he might be seeing, but couldn’t. After a minute or so, she slid her coat pocket onto her lap and eased her phone out gently. If she suddenly got a signal it wouldn’t be good. The phone would come alive with incoming messages, emails and missed calls. The beeping notifications would be a giveaway for sure.
No signal.
She turned her ringer to silent and slid the phone back into her pocket before the passenger with the gun saw her.
Kidnapped. What was Locke going to think?
Her boss always had an opinion, but first he’d have to realize what had happened to her.
They might think she was part of this as well, and she would be implicated in the plane’s disappearance. Liberty was a woman in a male-dominated profession. She was used to having to prove herself, and this would be no exception. Especially when it was not just her reputation on the line but Tate’s as well.
No one else except her team cared where Liberty was, or what she was doing. No one would be calling to check up on her, and she hadn’t told anyone but her neighbor—who fed her cat when she was gone—that she would be leaving.
The pang in the vicinity of her heart wasn’t unexpected, but the strength of it was what hurt. And why? It shouldn’t hurt when this was the way it was supposed to be. She should be used to it by now. This was the road God had called her to walk. But it was hard. She couldn’t believe how hard it was turning out to be. Not that she’d thought being alone would be easy, but for it to hit her this intensely? Liberty blew out a breath.
The driver let his foot off the gas a split second at the stop sign, and then pulled out onto the highway.
The gunman turned back, and Liberty caught his gaze. She looked away, not wanting to have some kind of wordless communication with him. He would know he’d gotten to her. Yes, she was a trained Secret Service agent. But that didn’t mean Liberty never got scared. The day she’d told Tate she was overwhelmed by it, years ago after a member of their team had been killed by an out-of-control truck, he’d told her fear was good. And how it was normal to be scared, but courage would show in what she did with the fear.
Liberty looked at him now. Tate still didn’t look at her. Maybe he was scared, too. But he didn’t look like he was. He almost looked as though he was...waiting for something.
She shifted on her seat and said, “Where are you guys taking us?”
Maybe these men were just looking for a lone stretch of highway where they could kill them and dump the bodies out of sight. But maybe not. It was worth trying to find out, if she could.
The gunman grinned, his teeth bright in the dark interior of the car. “Got a mess to fix.”
“Are you going to kill us?”
Yuletide Suspect Page 4