Dangerous Waters

by Toni Anderson

Finn looked pissed as hell and she couldn’t blame him. If they hadn’t caught the fire, it could have spread and destroyed not only the marine lab, but also potentially thousands of acres of forest and god knows how many lives. Exhaustion hit her head on and her vision started to whirl. The thought of walking down to the dock and boating across the inlet was more than she could bear. Plus, all her stuff was in his cabin, not that she had much. It made sense. She put her hand on his back. It was supposed to be a slap of appreciation for a job well done, but her fingers lingered and turned it into something else entirely. “Er, right. I’ll, hmm, see you tomorrow.”

  He watched her, face expressionless even as his eyes burned. “Good night, Holly. Lock the door, and sleep well.”

  Mike sat absolutely still beneath the branches of an old pine, staring at the back door of Brent Carver’s home. Hopefully the small fire he’d set in the trash can would be enough excitement to get the ex-con out of his house while at the same time not doing any real damage. The earlier downpour should stop the flames spreading, but, bottom line, Mike was desperate. His phone vibrated, but he held still. The fire department was going to have to cope without him tonight.

  The door opened and Brent stepped into the darkness. The guy kept an eye on everything that happened in town. He even slept with some sort of radio receiver or scanner set up next to his bed. When he slept at all.

  Gina said he didn’t, not anymore, but Mike didn’t want to think about the fact that he was in a relationship with the woman everyone considered Brent Carver’s girlfriend. The guy had dumped her, and Mike had been there to pick up the pieces. Carver’s loss. His gain.

  Gina had been all for his role-playing games, which had been a bit of a surprise. In fact, she’d told him some of her secret fantasies, which had culminated with her being tied to the bed earlier. Considering the rest of his day, he wished he could do it all over again. Maybe she could tie him up next time and keep him there for a week as her personal sex slave.

  Footsteps echoed through the darkness as Brent went down to the dock and started his small motorboat. Mike waited until he was out of sight and around the bluff before he sprinted to the back door. He turned the handle and the door opened, unlocked. Thank god. He didn’t know anything about locks, and he didn’t want Carver knowing anyone had been here, which he would if Mike had to smash a window.

  His jaw ached from Ferdinand’s fist as he walked into the huge open-plan space. Not bad for an ex-con. No way he could afford all this without some illegal activity. Maybe Remy was right?

  That bastard. Threatening his parents? Motherfucker was gonna get his. Mike touched the gun in his waistband. He wanted to go over to Remy’s and blow them both away, but not only did Dryzek have top-notch security, Mike wasn’t really killer material. Unless they went near his folks or Gina, because then all bets were off.

  Mike wore black leather gloves and carried a flashlight. He started opening cupboards and searching every crevice large enough to stash a hold-all. Nothing in the kitchen or living room. He decided to search upstairs next, just in case Brent came home sooner than expected. He checked his watch. He’d been here five minutes already.

  The wood on the stairs shone like honey. Jeez, the entire place gleamed. It seemed wrong. Wrong that a convicted murderer got to live like a king while god-fearing, hardworking people like him and his parents made do with a small, rickety house and ancient appliances.

  Upstairs were five closed doors and a weird smell. Mike headed for the stink and opened a door onto a massive room that had huge windows facing the sea. There was a couch, and there were hundreds of stacked canvases in various stages of development propped against both walls. Mike’s lower jaw dropped.

  Holy hell, the guy was an artist? Brent Carver was a fucking painter?

  He went across and touched a canvas showing a blue-black lake at the base of a mountain. It was abstract but beautiful. He drew in a breath through tight lungs. He was an artist—and a damn good one. He squinted at the signature in the corner of a finished canvas. B.C. Wilkinson. Holy mother.

  Brent Carver was some artist called B.C. Wilkinson?

  Shit. This was how he made money. He wasn’t going to start dealing coke.

  He backed away, and another sound registered. The motor of a boat. Mike looked out the window and saw Carver’s boat pull up to the dock. His distraction hadn’t worked. He turned off his flashlight and ran downstairs, sprinting like an Olympic athlete to the door nearest the road. He skidded to a halt and then silently eased open the deadbolts. Mike opened the door just as Brent came in the door at the rear of the house. He slipped out and silently closed it behind him. And then he ran. Faster than he’d ever run in his life as his lungs pounded and his heart exploded.

  CHAPTER 12

  Gina used to have a dog, but it had died about six months ago. Sentiment had overruled common sense and she’d never replaced it. Now he opened the back door and slid soundlessly into the kitchen. Years eroded memory. Time eradicated fear. Bad things happened to other people, in other places. Not safe little towns like Bamfield.

  So trusting, so naive, so flawed.

  He stood silently on the worn linoleum floor, clock ticking in the darkness. The refrigerator rattled to life, and he looked at it for a long, grateful moment. It would help mask his footsteps.

  Rage burned in his chest, expanding his lungs to bursting. Human beings were inherently flawed. Most of them were foolish, fickle creatures who didn’t stop to think about the consequences of their actions.

  His fists clenched.

  He’d been like that once. He’d learned his lesson early and never forgotten. Paid the price. Never screwed up again. Then Milbank had come crawling around his place like a cockroach, and he’d been forced into action again, trying to contain the mess.

  She was the last of it.

  He walked down the dark passageway. Brent Carver’s little whore was bound to go running back to him at some point and then everything would get screwed up. He’d made a tactical error stuffing Milbank’s body in the shipwreck. He’d thought he was being clever, but so few people knew about the damned thing that Gina Swartz was a potential loose end. If she opened her stupid mouth, he was sunk. He wasn’t about to let that happen. The walls pressed as heavily against his skin as the walls of that shipwreck had, but at least here he could only drown in guilt.

  It wasn’t his fault. She’d done this to herself. They always blamed others for their own mistakes, but this was on her. Loose lips sank ships, and he wasn’t willing to take any more chances. Not with the things that mattered.

  The scent of laundry detergent drifted from a room to his right. The bedroom door was slightly ajar. He paused as he tried to pick out the woman in the shadows. Then a shaft of moonlight cut over her face as she lay on her back in bed, lips parted.

  She was naked.

  The lack of clothes made his job easier, but he didn’t appreciate the bolt of arousal that shot through him from just looking at her. The sight of her dragged him back to another place, another time, when he’d only cared about fucking any skirt with a pulse. He’d been disgusting. An animal. But the memories made him hesitate, wondering if those velvet nipples would taste as good as they looked.

  He bit his lip.

  How would those breasts look, all plump and swollen? With those womanly nipples condensed into tight little buds of desire as she panted for him while he pumped inside her?

  His hands shook just thinking about it.

  Her skin looked as soft as rose petals. Pale as milk, except for the dark thatch of hair between her legs.

  The room smelled of sweat and sex. Christ, he was so hard his dick strained against his zipper, but he wasn’t that man anymore. He stood there, tempted until he hurt, looking at a woman he had no right to be looking at, wanting to have her, knowing he could get away with it. No one would ever know. No one would suspect. Wasting time, increasing the risk that he’d get caught.

  He moved carefully across the crea
ky old hardwood planks until he stood so close he could reach out and touch her. She’d have liked it too. This type always did, no matter who was doing the touching. His breathing grew tighter in his lungs as he thought about all the things he’d like to do to her. Of all the ways he could take her that a lady didn’t like.

  Covers were tangled around her legs, trapping her. God, he wanted her. To take her, to punish her for making him do this.

  But sex wasn’t everything.

  In fact, sex was nothing against the all-consuming power of love.

  Sweat beaded on his upper lip as he fought temptation and ruin. Her chest rose and fell in the rhythm of deep sleep, oblivious to the mess she’d made.

  Women like her were not decent or good. They were designed to drag good men to their knees and make them beg. He drew out the knife and held it two-handed above her chest. She was nothing but a threat who could destroy everything he’d worked so hard for. There was no regret and no sorrow. He drove the blade down through her ribcage into her heart. Her eyes and mouth opened on a silent, gut-gurgling scream. Her body bowed rigid against the mattress in pain and death. It wasn’t instant, but it was damned close.

  CHAPTER 13

  “Yo, boss.”

  Holly jerked awake. She’d fallen asleep lying half on the couch, half on the floor. Given the pathetic state of her already battered body, she now felt as stiff as a pine tree in an Alaskan winter. She unfolded one inch at a time and wondered if she could take a shot of morphine and still do her job. Probably not, but hell, it was tempting.

  Freddy Chastain stood grinning at her with his Italian good looks in direct opposition to how she felt.

  “You OK, Freddy?”

  He shrugged one shoulder. He obviously didn’t want to talk about his personal life, and as long as it didn’t affect his performance she was fine with that. None of her business.

  “Your face is almost completely green now,” he said.

  “Thanks for the update. No wonder you made detective.” Then he handed her coffee and all was forgiven. “Any news from IFIS on the boat?”

  “They’re scratching their heads trying to figure out the best way to get it to Port Alberni. Said they’d call you when they’d decided a course of action. What were you looking at?” He sat beside her and glanced over the information she’d pulled on Remy Dryzek last night.

  “I went back to basics.” The coffee soothed her sore throat and gave her heart a little shove. She dragged her hair out of her eyes and caught a whiff of sweat. Ew. She needed a shower. From the hiss of water through the hotel’s pipes she’d missed her early morning opportunity. Last night she’d desperately wanted to sleep in Finn Carver’s cabin, which had made the need to return here imperative. She hadn’t even fetched her stuff because she’d known the moment she’d stepped over his threshold she’d have sunk into a deep, exhausted slumber in the bed in the spare room, and if he’d come back, if he’d kissed her, anything could have happened.

  Nothing was going to happen.

  “To catch a killer you have to understand the victim, so I dug a little harder into Milbank’s dealings with our resident Al Capone and came up with a few ideas.”

  “Such as…”

  “We found traces of narcotics in Milbank’s apartment.” Holly leaned closer. “The first night we arrived, I checked out the local bar while you guys went bye-bye.”

  Chastain watched her with eyes that were almost completely black. She’d never realized what a great-looking guy he was until now. Thankfully, he didn’t stir up anything except professional coworker feelings.

  “Dryzek turned up in the bar with his sidekick Gordy Ferdinand. He told Finn Carver he’d misplaced something and he wanted it back.”

  “But they didn’t hint what it was?”

  Holly shook her head. “That would be too easy.”

  “And the apartment was turned over earlier the same evening?”

  “Yep, by a couple of hours.”

  “Circumstantial, but…”

  “I know.” She raked her fingers through her hair.

  “If Dryzek trashed the apartment, what do you think he was looking for? Drugs?”

  “That’s what I’m betting on. Either Bamfield was a drop-off point for smugglers or a distribution point for moving drugs on up the coast. And Milbank was the middleman.”

  “Shall I reach out to narcotics? I’ve got a couple of buddies there.”

  “Do that. And dig into Milbank’s past and see if you can find anything that links Milbank to someone in Bamfield. We need to figure out what Dryzek was looking for and where the hell it is now because that might be the key to Milbank’s murder.”

  Chastain narrowed his eyes. “Do you think Finn Carver has something to do with this?”

  “No.” Holly squeezed her eyes together to try to banish the fuzziness, and then realized it was her brain not her vision that needed waking up. “He seemed genuinely confused by what Dryzek was talking about in the bar, but there was no love lost there.”

  Holly stole a piece of toast from Chastain’s plate before he whipped it out of her reach. “From what I can gather, Finn Carver left the army when Thom Edgefield was beaten to a pulp. Because of Edgefield’s crime-stopper mentality—which we could use more of—he’d made it difficult for organized crime to get a foothold in Bamfield. Sergeant Hammond says RCMP get weekly reports on any suspicious activity in the town.”

  “So you think Dryzek was responsible for beating up Edgefield and Carver came back to level out the playing field?”

  “And they ended up in a stalemate.” Holly nodded. “But with Milbank turning up dead in the neighborhood and Dryzek losing his stash of whatever, I get the feeling the truce might be over.”

  “It still doesn’t make any sense for Finn to find the body and report it.”

  “Criminals aren’t always smart.” Holly was playing devil’s advocate, curious as to Chastain’s take on Edgefield and Finn.

  “But those guys are both scalpel sharp. I mean the professor is screwy, but the man’s a member of Mensa, and Finn, man.” He grinned. “I like that guy. Decorated soldier. Respected diver leader. He seems straight up.”

  “I think so too.” It was just good to hear it from someone who wasn’t dazzled by all that testosterone. “So what I’m thinking is that Milbank finally found someone to work with in town—hence all the calls to the burner cell we can’t find here in Bamfield.”

  “Wouldn’t Dryzek know who Milbank was working with?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.” Holly had been turning things over in her mind on and off all night. That and reliving those kisses. “Perhaps Milbank was trying to make himself more valuable to his boss by keeping a few things secret. Or going freelance.”

  “Or maybe it’s a new contact Milbank was trying to exploit but hadn’t nailed down yet,” Chastain added.

  Holly remembered something else about the night in the pub now too. “Dryzek knew Mike Toben. He had a quiet word with him when he walked into the bar.”

  Chastain nodded. “I’ll go talk to him first thing this morning.”

  “See if we can examine Mike’s financials.” Chances of warrants at this stage were slim. Holly’s phone screeched. She winced as she realized it was Furlong on the line at six in the morning. Fantastic.

  “Good morning, sir.” She spoke calmly even as she stood stiffly and eased the cricks out of her back.

  She half zoned out as Furlong started telling her all the things she had to do that day. Instead, she thought about the couch. Taking an ax to it wasn’t enough. Tonight she was going to sleep in a bed, even if it was in the bedbug-infested rooms at the local dive motel. Her skin shivered in revulsion, but anything was better than feeling like she’d been stuffed in a trunk and left to die.

  Finn’s lungs bellowed and his feet pounded the ground. Thoughts of Holly wanted to push all other images out of his head. He couldn’t stop reliving those damn kisses. Could not get her off his mind no matter how much he pushed hi
mself physically. She hadn’t slept in the cabin, but her stuff was still there. It told him she was still thinking about those kisses too, thinking about her job and how much it meant to her—as if he’d ever jeopardize that. He wasn’t some selfish prick. But he hadn’t had anything to do with Len Milbank’s murder, so it was a nonissue.

  But what if Thom had? Or Brent?

  Then it definitely became a problem, and he was glad Holly hadn’t stayed in his cabin last night because he didn’t think he had the strength to resist her, and he didn’t want to cost Holly her job.

  The sun had risen as he’d pounded up and down Pachena Beach, the ospreys breakfasting on rockfish. An hour spent running and he still burned. He forced her out of his mind and started back along the road.

  The marine lab had dodged a bullet last night. If he hadn’t been right there when the fire started, if he hadn’t smelled smoke, the whole place could have gone up.

  Had this been another attack on Thom? Or just one of life’s random accidents? He’d spoken to each student. Interrogated the ones who’d had cigarette smoke on their breath. Not one of them had admitted to being on that side of the building or using that garbage can as an ashtray. But considering he’d looked like the grim reaper, smeared with soot and bursting with sweat and attitude, maybe it wasn’t surprising.

  A car passed him and hooted, but he ignored it.

  He hit the town marker and pushed himself harder down the hill and up the rise. Past the hospital. There were plenty of bears in the area, so he constantly scanned the thick woods on either side. Most of the creatures around here left humans alone. Cougars were another matter, but they hadn’t had a sighting in over a year.

  He passed the school/library and hit the road to the lab. Last night’s rain looked like it was going to settle back in for the day. The sky had turned gray and overcast. He’d always hated gray, and yet now it reminded him of the storminess of Holly’s gaze. And if that wasn’t the most pitiable observation he’d ever made he didn’t know what was. It was one thing to imagine what she looked like naked, another to start composing sonnets about the color of her eyes. He pushed his pace, swore when his shoelace came undone. Drawing to a stop, he bent down and tied the lace, then spotted a trail of footprints heading into the forest. That’s when he realized exactly where he was. Frowning, he followed the trail through the morning dew. His heart thumped that slow, constant beat, harder and harder as the silence pressed against his eardrums so tightly it started to punch his temples.