Emergency Reunion

by Sandra Orchard

  “Where are we going?”

  “Here.” He turned into the parking lot next to the trailhead for the river trail they’d been jogging every morning. He shut off the engine and when he turned toward her, hitching his knee onto the seat between them, his expression looked pained. “I’m afraid that I’m the reason all these bad things have been happening to you.”

  “What? Why? That’s ridiculous.”

  “Hear me out.” The ache in his voice made her heart twist. “Remember my theory that Joe, or whoever had been setting you up, got scared when I started investigating, and framed Eddie to derail my investigation?”

  “Yes.”

  “I think it was Zeke and his nephew framing him.”

  “Zeke? But all kinds of things happened to me before you came back to town.”

  “Yes, and maybe someone else is behind those, or maybe you were right and you’d had a run of being the dark cloud. Either way, after you caught Eddie in your ambulance, I think Zeke and his nephew saw the potential to exploit Eddie’s condition to make me look bad or to goad me into doing something corrupt to protect him.”

  “But why would they do that?”

  “I got the opening Zeke’s nephew was after for one. Then there’s a bunch of little things like why’d Zeke show up five minutes after me at the dog attack when he’d told me he was on his way when he called me? And since I was still off duty with the concussion, I left him to visit all the Rottweiler owners except Luke’s father.” He dug his clenched fist into his thigh. “For all I know, he covered up for the owner. Said the dog was there when it wasn’t. I can go back and check every one myself. But if any are missing a dog now, they could say it only just went missing.”

  “But Zeke’s a deputy sheriff.” She trailed her fingers over his clenched ones, hoping to soothe his tension. “Do you really think he’d jeopardize my life to get you kicked off the force so his nephew could apply for a position he still might not get?”

  “I know it seems crazy.” He turned his hand beneath hers and gently clasped her fingers. “I hate to think that my being here has in any way endangered you, but Zeke was in a position to know when your ambulance was the only one at the base and would be the next to be dispatched. Either he or his nephew could’ve pretended to be Eddie’s drug pusher and called to lure him to the drug house, then phoned 9-1-1 from the pay phone.”

  “But those kids. They said Ted bribed them to attack me and Dan.”

  “When Zeke and I made the arrests, he whispered something to each of the kids. I thought he was trying to put the fear of God into them, but now I think he might have been cuing them to finger Ted.”

  “Are you serious?”

  Cole winced. “You’ve got to admit that Zeke seemed pretty eager to arrest Ted. I don’t think that had been his original plan. He probably hoped to nail Eddie, but the surveillance tapes cleared him, and Ted’s being in the food court when we showed up made him a convenient scapegoat.”

  “How does Zeke’s nephew fit into all this?”

  “That’s what I only just figured out, thanks to a comment made by the deputy that Zeke handed the mall staff photographs to.” Cole pulled a photo from his back pocket. “Do you recognize this guy?”

  “Yeah, he’s the security guard who directed us to the food court and then disappeared.”

  “He’s also Zeke’s nephew.”

  Her heart jumped. “Oh, wow.” She stared at the photograph. “Oh. Wow.”

  “Yeah. Planting the smoke bombs would’ve been easy for him, as well as giving the teens tips on how to avoid the cameras. He was also the one who met us in the security room. I should have clued in the second he stammered over your location in the mall.”

  “But...” She swallowed. “That girl’s kicks could have killed me. How far will Zeke and his nephew go to get what they want?” She pictured Zeke in his deputy’s uniform, thought about the power he wielded. “How can we stop them?”

  * * *

  Cole spent most of the next day at his desk working on reports and cross-referencing data from all the incidents involving Sherri. With Ted positioned to take the fall, he was confident Zeke wouldn’t risk pulling any more stunts. But verifying he’d been behind the others wasn’t proving to be easy, even with Zeke tied up in court all day and not around to look over his shoulder.

  Of course, being preoccupied with thoughts of Sherri and the dinner she’d agreed to share with him tonight wasn’t helping. Speaking of which... Cole glanced at his watch and closed his files. He didn’t want to keep her waiting.

  At his request she’d moved back in with her parents for the time being. A strange feeling pinched his gut as he turned on to the street that had been his for the first eighteen years of his life. At the sight of his dad and Eddie talking to Sherri over the fence between their childhood homes, Cole fought the urge to step on the gas. He parked at the curb and sat there, watching their easy conservation, an odd longing to be part of it warring with the feeling that he’d be betraying his mother if he joined in.

  His heart twisted. He was probably an idiot for asking Sherri out in the first place. She might be feeling grateful right now for his concern about her, but once her life settled back down, he’d still be the brother of the drug addict who’d assaulted her and the son of a man who’d cheated on his wife. Not prime long-term relationship material. Never mind that his being here likely had been what had triggered all her troubles in the first place.

  Well, maybe not all her troubles.

  He closed his eyes, remembering how she’d burrowed into his chest and cried her eyes out as they’d stood beside her partner’s grave. Everything in him longed to take away her pain. At the same time, he feared he’d only end up causing her more. He lifted his gaze.

  Dad offered him an uncertain smile and a small wave.

  Cole nodded and, prying three fingers from the truck’s steering wheel, fluttered them in response. He should go over there and talk to him. Except his legs refused to cooperate.

  A heartbeat later, Dad said something else to Sherri, reached across the fence and squeezed her hand, and then headed into the house without another glance Cole’s way. Yeah, typical. Clearly he wasn’t any more eager to move toward reconciliation than Cole was. In his mixed-up, immature eighteen-year-old mind, he’d figured staying away would be punishment, but he wasn’t so sure Dad had cared. Sure, he’d sent a card for college graduation and said he’d have liked to be there.

  Cole braced for the bitterness that usually piggybacked that thought. Surprisingly, it never came, only a pervasive sadness. That’s one prayer God had answered anyway. “Thank you,” he murmured. Now, if You could help me get Eddie back on track, that would be great.

  Cole shoved open his truck door and sauntered to Sherri and Eddie.

  “Hey.” Eddie actually made eye contact, despite the fact that their last conversation had consisted of Cole interrogating him over what he’d been doing at the mall and whether he could identify any of the punks who’d attacked Sherri. “Sherri says you caught the kids that hurt her.”

  “Some of them anyway.” Cole squinted at him, trying to decide if Eddie’s cheery disposition was the effect of a drug high or if God was already answering another prayer. They’d made plans to go to a ball game together on Saturday. It was a start.

  “I wish I could’ve been more help.”

  Sherri clasped Eddie’s arm. “Just stay away from guys like the one who sent you to my ambulance and we’ll all be okay.”

  Eddie’s cheeks flamed, his gaze dropping to her hand. “I will.”

  “Hey,” Cole said, “would you like to join Sherri and me for dinner? We might go mini-golfing afterward or maybe take in a movie.”

  “Nah. Dad’s barbecuing steaks.”

  “Ah, can’t compete with that.” Nobody barbecued steaks as good as Dad. “We’ll see you later, then.” Cole caught Sherri’s hand. “You ready to go?”

  Two hours later Sherri’s eyes twinkled with scarcely contained
amusement as he missed yet another gimme putt on the final hole of their game.

  Truth be told, he’d miss a thousand putts if it meant seeing her look so relaxed, happy and carefree. Not that he’d missed the putts on purpose. He shook his head, then reining in the smile tugging at his lips, tapped the ball into the hole for a double bogey. “This is your fault, you know. You’re way too distracting.”

  Her eyes widened. “I’m distracting? I stood perfectly still and quiet while you putted. You’re the one who cracked jokes trying to distract me, and when that didn’t work you nudged the windmill to ricochet my golf ball back to the tee.”

  He laughed. “I had to do something to even the playing field. How was I supposed to keep my eye on the ball when you were standing there looking so beautiful?”

  She blushed. “Now who’s trying to distract who?”

  Cole leaned on his putter and studied her, knowing he was playing with fire but unable to come up with a single reason to stop as he watched joy bubble from her like a sparkling fountain.

  “I’m beginning to think you asked your brother to join us so you wouldn’t look so bad at the game,” she teased.

  “No—” all at once, he could think of nothing except kissing her. He caught her about the waist “—that was to keep me from doing this.” He curled his arm to draw her to him. Her delicate scent invaded his senses, as it had been doing all night. Her lips shimmered in the spotlight shining down on them as he paused long enough for her to pull back. Her disarming smile touched a part of him he’d thought beyond reach and sent his already pounding heart thundering as their lips met.

  She tasted of peppermint and chocolate, only sweeter. Much sweeter. She swayed toward him and joy and an intense possessiveness surged through him. Wrapping his arms around her, he drew her closer to deepen the kiss, only to be foiled by the blast of his phone. He managed to ignore it for two rings, until Sherri pulled back, a shy smile dancing on her lips.

  “Aren’t you going to answer that?”

  He let out his best reluctantly acquiescent groan as he tugged the phone from his belt. “Hello.”

  “Cole?”

  The anxiety in his dad’s voice stripped the grin from Cole’s lips. “What’s wrong?” He dropped his hand to Sherri’s, clutching it like a lifeline as a horrible premonition rampaged through his mind. His dad hadn’t called him in seven years. Not once.

  “Eddie’s gone.”

  “What do you mean gone?” Cole demanded.

  “I’ll meet you at the truck,” Sherri whispered and hurried over to the kiosk with their putters and golf balls.

  “I took him to the video store on Canyon to pick out a couple of movies while I ran into the grocery store. But when I got back, he was gone.”

  Cole slowed his frantic stride and waited for Sherri to catch up. “Maybe he went looking for you at the grocery store.”

  “That’s what I figured, because the video store had closed by the time I got back to it, but I went up and down every aisle in the grocery store and even tried having him paged. I can’t find him.”

  “Have you tried his new phone?”

  “He’s not answering. I would have driven home to see if he started walking, but I didn’t want him to find the car gone if he’d wandered off with a friend and came back. I’ve spent the last forty-five minutes searching every shop and corner of the parking lot.”

  “Forty-five minutes!” Cole opened the truck door for Sherri. “Okay, we’re on our way.”

  “I tried calling the sheriff, but they said he had to be missing twenty-four hours—”

  “I’ll call. Was he still wearing the same clothes I saw him in?”

  “And a navy blue windbreaker.”

  “I’ll make sure the deputies are on the lookout for him. Hold tight. We’ll be there in a few minutes.” Cole hit Disconnect and tossed the phone to Sherri. “Dial the sheriff’s direct line. He’s in Contacts.” He rammed the truck into Drive and squealed out of the parking lot.

  An instant later Sherri filled the sheriff in on the reason for the call and handed the phone back to Cole. “Yeah, sheriff. I need a BOLO on Eddie.”

  “Your father already—”

  “No, listen, sir, please. His sneaking off doesn’t add up. Not tonight.”

  “He’s done it before. Addicts can’t quit as easily as they’d like us to think.”

  “Yeah, that’s why we need every deputy on the lookout for him.”

  The sheriff’s sigh told Cole that his boss had to be regretting ever hiring him. “I’m sorry, Cole. We just got word of an infant being kidnapped from his home. If not for your father’s call, I would’ve already called you to come in. We’ve put out an Amber Alert and notified State Police, but I need every available deputy on this. I can put out the BOLO, but that’s all I can do.”

  “We’ll find him,” Sherri said, taking back the phone.

  Cole wanted to believe her, but the burn in his gut said something was very wrong. “Eddie was happy. Had a fun night planned with Dad. Dad can be a lot of fun to hang out with when he wants to be. I can’t see Eddie ditching him.”

  Sherri reached across the seat and squeezed his hand. “We’ll find him,” she repeated.

  Dad flagged them down the instant they pulled into the parking lot. “Did you talk to the sheriff?” he asked as Cole parked beside him and rolled down his window.

  “Yes, but a baby’s been kidnapped so they have more urgent priorities at the moment.” Cole glanced in Dad’s car and noted the single bag of groceries. “Is that all the groceries you picked up? What took you so long to get back to the video store?”

  “A lady needed my help.”

  Right. Figured. He should’ve known.

  “What do you think? Should I stick around here? It’s getting dark. And he’s more likely to remember the home number than my cell phone’s if his phone’s dead. And it’s got to be.” Dad turned his phone screen their way. “I bought him a phone I can track, but I’m not picking it up. See?”

  Or Eddie had deliberately scuttled the feature. The burn in Cole’s gut spread to his chest. The situation was looking worse by the second. “Okay, you head back to the house. Call his friends. Ask them all to be on the lookout for him. Keep trying his cell. Sherri and I will drive around and look for him.”

  “Maybe he caught up with a friend and lost track of time,” Sherri suggested.

  Yeah, but Cole doubted it, especially if he’d wandered to the grocery to see what had been taking Dad so long and spotted him flirting with another floozy. “Let’s hope they’re walking the street, then.” He and Sherri trolled the area in ever-widening blocks.

  When he neared Sherri’s street, she said, “Why don’t you let me off at my apartment and I can pick up my car? I wanted to bring it to my folks’ tonight, anyway, and we’ll be able to cover more ground that way.”

  Cole slapped his hand on the steering wheel. “Why can’t my dad ignore women for one lousy night? Eddie would be home watching a movie with him if Dad hadn’t wasted who knows how long helping some desperate woman.”

  “Your dad loves your brother and you. You need to forgive him. Holding on to your anger isn’t helping Eddie.”

  Everything in him stiffened. “This is exactly why I can’t forgive him. The man cares only about himself.” Cole twisted his fisted hands around the steering wheel. “I should’ve known this would happen. I shouldn’t have gone out tonight.”

  Sherri glanced away.

  “Hey.” Feeling like a heel, Cole reached across the seat and gave her hair a gentle tug. “I don’t regret going out with you.” Not really. He traced the scar Eddie had left on her cheek. “Although why you’d want to get mixed up with me, I don’t know.” He returned his attention to the sidewalks, a sigh seeping from his chest. “You deserve a lot better.”

  She let out an unladylike snort. “You quit your job to pick up and move back to a town you never wanted to see again just so you could help your brother. And ever since you got
here you haven’t stopped looking out for me, too. What’s not to appreciate?”

  He shook his head. “You never cease to amaze me.” He squeezed her hand. “But I’d rather you stick with me, tonight. If Eddie was mad at Dad, he could’ve gone drug seeking. After what he did to you the last time, I don’t want you to find him without me.” Cole drove past her apartment building.

  “Cole, stop!” Sherri slammed her palm to his dash, her gaze fixed on his side window.

  He rammed the brakes. “You see him?”

  “There’s someone in my car.”

  Cole hitched his arm over the back of his seat and reversed far enough to pull into her apartment parking lot. As his headlights swept over her windshield, his breath caught. Eddie was in the passenger seat. “He must’ve come here looking for me.” Only Eddie was leaning against the window, his head flopped forward.

  Sherri was already racing for her car, before Cole registered stopping his truck. She yanked on the door and when it didn’t give, fumbled in her purse.

  Cole raced to the driver’s side. “It’s locked, too!” He tried smashing the window with his elbow.

  “I got the key,” Sherri shouted, yanking open the door and catching Eddie as he tipped out. “Help me get him to the ground.”

  Cole hooked his arms under Eddie’s and hauled him out. Under the harsh beams of Cole’s headlights, Eddie’s face looked deathly gray. “Is he breathing? He’s not breathing!”

  “Call 9-1-1.” Sherri pressed an ear to Eddie’s chest, then pounded it hard and started compressions. “C’mon, Eddie. Don’t you die on me.”

  Cole punched the numbers. “I screwed up. I shouldn’t have left him.”

  “What’s your emergency?” the operator came on and the words balled in Cole’s throat, his gaze fixed on Eddie’s lifeless face. “Hello?”

  “My brother, he’s not breathing. We need an ambulance.”

  “Your location?”

  His mind drew a blank. “Sherri, what’s the address?”

  She shouted it out and Cole repeated it into the phone. The welcoming peal of sirens soon filled the air.