Cold Pursuit (2019 Reissue)

by Carla Neggers

Jo wasn’t in the mood to let Elijah out of her sight, but he’d slipped back through the trees just as the Whittakers arrived at the guesthouse and invited her up for tea. She went with them, Vivian chatting breezily about leaf raking and getting the place ready for the winter, Lowell making the occasional amiable comment as they entered their farmhouse through a side door. Vivian pulled off her barn jacket and hung it on a hook. She had on just a short-sleeved polo shirt underneath but looked warm enough. Lowell stayed bundled up in a zip-front charcoal sweater. Jo removed her fleece but kept it with her—she didn’t plan on staying long.

  The interior of their farmhouse wasn’t what she had expected. There was no cozy decor or pictures of cows and fall foliage. The walls were stark white, the wood floors shining, the furnishings bright and modern, the artwork abstract and striking. The Whittakers took her back to a sunroom that looked out on a garden and an open field that stretched down to the river.

  Vivian carried in a tray from the kitchen and set it on the glass table. “I know Nora’s a capable young woman but she shouldn’t hike by herself, particularly at this time of year, with or without the shocking news of poor Alex. If Devin Shay is with her…” She hesitated, lifting a white pottery teapot off the tray and placing it on a thick fiery-red pot holder. “He knows the mountains, of course, and he’s an experienced hiker, but I think Nora’s concerned he’s too obsessed with her.”

  “She told you this?” Jo asked.

  “Not in as many words.”

  “What did she say, then? Can you remember her exact words?”

  Lowell reached for a white plate of an array of cookies obviously from Three Sisters Café and pushed it more toward Jo’s side of the table. “We’re not trying to get anyone into trouble,” he said. “We certainly don’t believe Devin is stalking Nora.”

  “He’s changed,” Vivian said, briskly setting out cups and saucers. “We knew him before Drew Cameron’s death—not well, but enough to see that finding Drew, losing him, affected Devin deeply. Before that he struck us as a happy-go-lucky teenager who didn’t have a clue what he’d do after graduation.” She picked up the teapot and filled Jo’s cup, her expression pained, regretful. “You’re from here, Jo. You must have heard that Devin’s had his struggles.”

  Jo helped herself to a chocolate-chip cookie. “He hasn’t been arrested for anything, has he?”

  “Oh, heavens, no.” Vivian poured her husband tea, not even the slightest tremble to her hands. She filled her cup next, then sat down. “I shouldn’t have said anything. We like Devin very much, and Nora’s a delight. I remember being very confused at that age myself.”

  “What about Kyle Rigby?” Jo asked, taking a bite of her cookie. “Do you know anything about him?”

  “No, nothing,” Lowell said. “We only met him this morning.”

  Vivian picked up her teacup. “He seems quite competent.” She sipped some of her tea. “He’ll be discreet, too. It’d be best for everyone if he finds Nora quietly, without any fanfare, or she comes back on her own. It’s good that Thomas and Melanie are on their way here.” She held her cup in both hands and stared out the window. “We love this place, but I don’t know. Some days…”

  “We’re all worried,” Lowell said, addressing Jo. “And we’re grieving for Alex. He and Nora had their problems, but he cared about her. I think she was coming to see that in recent weeks. He started out with a deficit with her because of his friendship with her father. He was aware that she had to feel betrayed—torn by her love for both parents.”

  Vivian set her cup down and reached for an oatmeal cookie. “We thought it would help that Thomas and Melanie found each other and fell in love. Nora just wants both her parents to be happy. Now…I have a hard time believing Alex is dead.” Her eyes shone with sudden tears. She broke off a piece of cookie. “It’s a difficult situation, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is,” Jo said. “Were you here in April when Drew Cameron went missing? I understand that Thomas and Nora stayed at the guesthouse then.”

  “We came up for the weekend,” Lowell said. “Drew had just disappeared. The state police had launched a search. We weren’t actually in Black Falls when he was found.”

  “It was our first time here in April,” Vivian said. “I couldn’t believe it snowed. Our daffodils got covered. They were just coming up. They bounced right back once the snow melted, but I don’t think Vermont’s where I want to be in April.”

  Lowell set his teacup down with a clatter and smiled awkwardly, obviously embarrassed by his wife’s callous remark. “We didn’t care about the daffodils, of course, but the snow caught us by surprise. We weren’t involved in the search for Drew. There was nothing we could do except stay out of the way.” Lowell got abruptly to his feet. “It’s a tragedy Drew and Alex are both gone now. Jo, we don’t want to keep you, but if you’d care to sit here a while, please feel free to stay as long as you wish. I have some work to do in the yard before dark.”

  Jo seized the opening and left, noting when she got outside that it already was dark. All her trekking up and down Cameron Mountain had consumed what little daylight a mid-November Vermont day offered.

  When she got back to her cabin, she found Elijah in the doorway with a screwdriver in hand, a Red Sox cap tipped back on his head. He stood back and pointed the end of his screwdriver toward a shiny new dead-bolt lock. “Took two seconds and half the cash in my pocket.” He tucked the screwdriver into his jacket pocket. “You always used to say you wanted a guy who’s handy.”

  “It’s a lousy cover for searching my place, Elijah.”

  “I’m on a roll. You didn’t bring much up with you from Washington.”

  “That’s because I’m an optimist and plan to get back to work soon. Elijah, you can’t just walk into other people’s houses. Not that this is a house, but you know what I mean.”

  “Then arrest me.”

  She sighed. “Thank you for the new lock. You could have stayed for tea with the Whittakers, and we could have put the lock on together.”

  “I don’t like tea. Turns my stomach to even think about it.”

  She doubted much turned Elijah’s stomach.

  “Get anything out of the Whittakers?” he asked casually.

  “They think Thomas is overreacting about Nora’s camping trip on the one hand, but, on the other, that Devin could be obsessed with Nora.”

  “Devin’s obsessed with being eighteen.”

  Elijah stood back from the door, and Jo went past him inside, feeling the old floor sagging under her. And this was the good cabin. “It’s not worth it to put new locks on the rest of the cabins.” She blew out a breath and spun around. “You know I don’t have the slightest clue what to do with this place, don’t you? The property taxes on the thirty acres alone are a killer.”

  “Pop got to you in April, didn’t he?”

  “I’m sorry,” Jo said. “I’m being incredibly ungrateful. I’m glad he came to see me.”

  Elijah stepped up into the cabin. “He didn’t think things through. What you’d do with thirty acres and a bunch of rundown cabins in Vermont.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe he did think things through, and this is what he wanted.” She pictured him among the cherry blossoms, his fear and guilt and regret—and love—palpable. But it wasn’t an image she needed to share with Elijah, and she smiled, looking around at her one-room temporary home. “Remember when he found us here?”

  “A good thing he didn’t come armed,” Elijah said dryly.

  “If it’d been my father—”

  “It wasn’t. It was mine. But it doesn’t matter. What I did after Pop kicked me out of the house was my choice. I didn’t discuss it with him or anyone else.”

  “And you have no regrets,” she said.

  His eyes held hers, unreadable under the brim of his cap, but he broke off and winked at her. “I’m having fun being around you again. I forgot how much pent-up energy you have. You’re like a top that keeps spinning at high speed.”
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  Jo went with his change of subject. She didn’t want to delve too deep into the past, either. Not now, not here. “What were you looking for?” she asked.

  “Intruders.”

  “Ah. I can take care of myself, you know.”

  “You always could. Not the point. You’re used to working with a team and high-tech gadgetry. You’re alone up here.”

  “Not that alone,” she said.

  But he just gave her a teasing smile. “Relax. I didn’t go through your private things.” He picked up an ivory-colored petal that had fallen onto the table from one of the lilies Charlie Neal had sent her. “Anything else you’re up to, Jo, besides lying low?”

  “No. I’m here because of Charlie and that video. I know my presence is provocative because of what I do, but Ambassador Bruni wasn’t under Secret Service protection—or any protection, for that matter. If I’d known anything about a threat against him that traced back here, I wouldn’t have been hanging out at the café and canoeing out on the lake.”

  “You don’t own a canoe.”

  “By the way, Beth and I borrowed yours the other day.”

  “So I saw. Anytime. Happy to share. Lake’ll freeze soon, though.”

  “Not before I’m back in Washington.” She ripped open her refrigerator, realizing he was right about her pent-up energy, even if he didn’t understand all the reasons for it. Neither did she. “I don’t know why I’m looking in here. I’m not even hungry.” She shut the door again. “I think I’ll go over and search your place.”

  He shrugged. “Go ahead.”

  She called his bluff and headed outside and up their shared road, paying no attention to how dark it was. Elijah followed at an easy pace, probably considering whether or not he had any illegal weaponry or pictures of girlfriends on his dresser.

  She took the steps up to his deck two at a time and left the slider door open for him when she went in.

  She started her search downstairs with a back bedroom and bath, which he obviously used, then charged through the small kitchen and headed up the spiral stairs to two unfinished bedrooms and a shared bath. She didn’t do a thorough job. She did just enough to prove her point, although she wasn’t sure just what her point was. That she could give as good as she got? That Drew Cameron had been an old man filled with fears and regrets when he’d come to see her, and his talk of the children she and Elijah had never had was just that—talk? Not a premonition. Not some unfulfilled promise of something that had been meant to be.

  When she finished looking around, she returned to the front room, a little out of breath. Elijah picked up a box of wooden matches and opened up the woodstove. Jo pointed toward the back of the house. “You didn’t make your bed this morning.”

  “I don’t make it most mornings.”

  “And your windows need washing. There are fingerprints all over them.”

  “A.J.’s kids were here raising hell the day before you showed up in town. I figured I’d worry about keeping them alive and never mind the windows.”

  She smiled, imagining little Baylee and Jim Cameron racing through the sturdy house and running circles around their Green Beret uncle. “Probably a good idea, seeing how they’re Camerons.”

  Elijah struck a match and set the flame to the edge of a rolled-up newspaper. “They’re a couple of live wires.”

  “Elijah…” She dropped onto the edge of a sectional sofa and pulled herself together. “I don’t want to screw up your life. If I’d known you were here—”

  “You’d have bought a plane ticket to Paris?”

  “New Zealand,” she admitted. “Maybe Australia while I was at it.”

  He shut the stove lid, and behind the glass front the kindling quickly caught fire, sparking, crackling. “Maybe Nora wishes her father was marrying you instead of his fiancée, and she’s staged this little drama to throw the two of you together.”

  “That’s not what’s going on.”

  “I don’t like Rigby,” Elijah said.

  “Neither do I, but Thomas is self-protective. I can see he might want someone up here who answers only to him. I have conflicts that someone private doesn’t.”

  “I think you should stay here tonight.”

  “Why, are you afraid to be here alone?”

  “Shaking in my boots, if that’s what it’ll take. I know you’re a tough federal agent and all that, but I still don’t like the idea of you being alone out here.”

  Jo settled into the sofa and glanced around at the comfortable room. It would have good views of the trees and lake during daylight, a perfect spot for a man fresh back from war—for Elijah, who’d always loved Black Falls.

  He adjusted the dampers on the stove. “Fetch your toothbrush, Jo. You’re not staying alone, and this place has better heat than your cabin. I’m not into freezing body parts.”

  She studied him, noting the serious—even professional—look that had come over him, reminding her that he wasn’t an aimless nineteen-year-old any longer. For most of the past fifteen years, he’d been doing the important, multifaceted work of a Special Forces soldier.

  Finally she said, “There’s more, something you’re not telling me.” She watched him lift a log from his rustic woodbox. “Elijah, has Charlie Neal called again?”

  He set the log upright on the brick hearth in front of the stove. “He has names.”

  “Names—” Jo stopped herself. “I can’t hear this.”

  Elijah ignored her. “Charlie combed the Internet for unsolved homicides that appear to be out-of-the-blue hits with no obvious motive. Two names struck him as being of particular interest. An arson investigator in southern California named Jasper Vanderhorn was killed in a fire in June. In August, a Russian diplomat named Andrei Petrov was poisoned in London.”

  Jo gritted her teeth. Charlie, Charlie.

  “Charlie says he has other names pending. The victims aren’t connected that he’s been able to figure out so far—it’s the manner of their deaths that got them on his list.”

  “That’s not enough to suggest there’s an assassination network involved.”

  “It’s enough for Charlie and my friend in Washington.”

  “Is your friend a conspiracy nut?”

  Elijah didn’t hesitate. “No.”

  “Military?” Jo asked.

  “SEAL.”

  “One of the ones from April?”

  He didn’t answer, but his expression—a mix of regret, resolve and pain—took the wind out of her. But it didn’t last. It was there, almost imperceptible, then gone again.

  He opened the lid on the stove again, picked up the log from the hearth and dropped it on the fire.

  “Elijah, if you ever want to talk about what happened—”

  “I don’t.” He turned to her, his eyes the color of midnight now. “Marissa Neal.”

  Jo didn’t react. “She’s in good hands. She’s fine.”

  “You saved her life.”

  “Whatever I did or didn’t do was my job. Charlie needs to stay out of this, Elijah. He’s smart, but he’s still a sixteen-year-old kid. The police won’t jump to conclusions about Ambassador Bruni’s death. They can’t. They’ll follow the evidence.”

  “I’m not the police.”

  The log caught fire, the flames hissing. Jo got to her feet. “You and Charlie and your SEAL friend in D.C. need to back off.”

  “And you, Jo? What do you need to do?”

  She didn’t respond, just started for the sliders.

  Not that Elijah had given up. He tossed her a flashlight. “Don’t forget your toothbrush.”

  She didn’t mention there was only one bed in the place. Obviously he already knew. She just switched on the flashlight, went out onto the deck and shivered in the sudden cold.

  But it wasn’t just the cold.

  * * *

  The brisk wind helped clear Jo’s head while she walked back to her cabin. She was listening to an owl out across the lake when she saw car headlights down th
e road, and in another minute, a sedan stopped in front of her cabin.

  The headlights went off, and Thomas Asher got out on the driver’s side. “Jo,” he said, his voice croaking with emotion as she lowered her flashlight. “It’s good to see you. I’m sorry it’s not under better circumstances.”

  Before Jo had a chance to answer, a pretty, black-haired woman climbed out on the passenger side, walked around the hood of the car and stood next to Thomas. “I’m Melanie,” she said, shivering even as she smiled pleasantly. “I’ve heard so much about you, Special Agent Harper. It’s a pleasure to meet you, finally.”

  “Same here,” Jo said automatically. “Thomas, good to see you, although I’m sorry about the circumstances. We can go inside, if you’d like.”

  Thomas shook his head. He was wearing just a sweater and looked cold, and clearly distraught. “We can’t stay. Lowell and Vivian have dinner waiting. We’re staying with them. I just wanted to stop by and thank you for your help. But Nora? There’s nothing new?”

  “She’s apparently spending another night on the mountain.” Jo decided to let Kyle Rigby provide a more detailed update. “We’re expecting snow tomorrow.”

  “I heard.”

  Melanie rubbed her arms. “Gosh, I forgot how dark it is up here without the city lights. Nora’s got more guts than I ever did at her age. Even now. I have no desire to camp in this cold. If not for poor Alex’s death, we’d probably have never known Nora had decided to do this trip. She might have told us after she got back, but she’s such a good kid. She wouldn’t want us to worry.”

  “I’m reluctant to notify local authorities at this point,” Thomas said. “They have enough to do without launching a search when Nora’s technically not really unaccounted for. If we go ahead with a search prematurely—” He broke off, looking pained at the thought. “Nora has her entire future ahead of her. Dropping out of Dartmouth for a year is enough of a hurdle to overcome without causing a scene here.”

  “That’s why we brought in Kyle,” Melanie said.

  Jo kept her expression neutral. “Nora’s safety is all anyone cares about.”

  Thomas stepped back toward his car. “I’m sure she’s fine and won’t appreciate all our fretting. She’ll think we don’t respect her abilities.” He looked out at the dark lake. “Alex’s death has us all on edge. It’s an awful thing. I just hope…well, I hate to think of her up there alone, grieving.”