Dark Sky

by Carla Neggers

  Ham breathed through his clenched teeth, his deep breaths only worsening the pain.

  Tatro eased off. “You told me to get this fuck—”

  “I know, I know. But we have a problem. Wendy Longstreet took off this morning. Her family’s out looking for her.”

  “She was at the lake.” Tatro poked Ham with the stick, but not as hard. “This fuck yelled for her to call the cops. I figured I’d dump him back here and go find her.”

  “I’ll go. The girl trusts me.”

  With that gentle, reassuring voice, Ham thought, anyone would. “Don’t hurt her,” he said. “It’s my fault—”

  “Shh, shh. Don’t worry, Mr. Carhill.” The man tucked a finger under Ham’s chin and lifted his head. “I think some of those bites are infected.”

  Tatro grunted. “He stole my emeralds. I told you—”

  The man came out of the barn, showing himself. He was lean and fit, with a shaved head. He continued to address Tatro. “And I told you that you shouldn’t take matters into your own hands. That’s how you landed in jail. I can buy us some time. Once Wendy’s back with her family, she’ll tell them everything. By then, we’ll be gone. I don’t believe in taking innocent lives.”

  “What about the woman and this bastard?”

  “We leave them. We shut down. We can’t risk trying to take them with us.”

  “Then it’s all for nothing?”

  “We can come back after things cool off here. Chances are no one will think to check the barn. Either way, we’ll know.”

  “They’ll die without food and water—”

  “Then they die.” His voice hardened. “Traitors deserve death.”

  Ham coughed. “Traitors?”

  Both men ignored him. Tatro said, “I thought you wanted Major Brooker.”

  “I do. And you want Deputy Longstreet.” The other man’s voice was soothing again. “Patience, Mr. Tatro. That’s what I’ve learned in recent years. Patience.”

  In the haze that was his brain, Ham put pieces of what they were saying together and came out with a bad ending for himself and whatever woman was already in the barn.

  The guy with the shaved head opened the door, and Tatro shoved Ham inside, pushing so hard he practically pinwheeled across the floor.

  He landed against a wall that smelled like hay.

  It was dark inside, but some daylight came through cracks in the walls.

  In short order, Tatro tied Ham’s hands and feet, then gagged him with a bandanna, but didn’t bother with a blindfold. He grinned. “Have fun.”

  The door slammed shut.

  Ham managed to sit up. Did these bastards think he was going to take a nap and wait for them to get back?

  Hell, no.

  His eyes adjusted to the semidarkness. He could make out the outlines of the two doors. And whoever owned the barn had never bothered to clean it out entirely. There were rusted antique farm tools that could probably pull in a fortune on eBay hung on nails and pegs, and there were old barrels, car and tractor parts, a wagon wheel, wooden apple crates. Even if Tatro and that other guy had locked him in, Ham figured he could find something in this mess to get himself out of there.

  Turning, dizzy, he blinked rapidly, trying to make out what was in the far end of the barn.

  A giant meat hook hanging from a rafter. A thick rope shaped into a noose.

  What was this place?

  There were car batteries lined up side by side on the floor under the meat hook. There were jumper cables. A bucket of water.

  Mesmerized, shocked by what he was seeing, Ham didn’t move.

  He thought he heard something. A muffled cry, a moan.

  His stomach lurched. He didn’t want to throw up with the gag on.

  The woman Tatro had mentioned.

  She was tied to a chair, her feet bound, her mouth gagged, her eyes blindfolded.

  Oh, my God, he thought, making a guttural noise to get her attention. She flinched. She had to be terrified.

  But who was she?

  Ham’s pulse raced. Mia O’Farrell. It had to be.

  There was nothing either of them could do but wait.

  When she saw Matt on the road, Wendy almost cried with relief. She ran out to him, her knees buckling under her. He caught her by the arm, steadying her, and she kept gulping in breath after breath, trying to get control of herself.

  “Easy, Wendy. Just take it easy. Your family’s looking for you—”

  “He’s got Ham.” She got the words out, felt her fingertips and her cheeks go numb. “Someone. I don’t know who. I didn’t see him. I was at the lake. I decided to scatter Teddy’s ashes, like you said and—and—”

  “Who’s Ham?”

  “I don’t know. A guy. He was in a kayak. He’s from Texas. The army guy—Brooker. Aunt Juliet’s friend…he’s from Texas, too.” But she couldn’t seem to speak to make herself coherent and was sure Matt didn’t understand what she was saying. “Please. We’ve got to call nine-one-one. I need to tell my dad.”

  “Okay. We will.”

  She started to cry. “I didn’t mean to worry anyone. That’s why I snuck out of the house. So I wouldn’t worry them. Now—I’m scared, Matt. The pack—Ham’s pack. There are emeralds in it. The doorman, Juan. He asked me about precious gems. Why would he do that? Why would he and Bobby Tatro think that Aunt Juliet had emeralds? Who—”

  “Wendy—whoa, honey. Slow down. We can get all your questions answered. Let’s concentrate right now on getting you to your family and calling the police. Okay? Makes sense?”

  She took a breath, nodding, and made herself stop blurting things out.

  “Where are the emeralds?” he asked.

  “What?”

  She stared at him, her heart pounding, that buzzing, alert feeling happening again.

  Something was off.

  She heard a noise in the woods behind her. “Hey, little girl.” Bobby Tatro stood under a maple branch. “Why don’t you take me to the emeralds?”

  Matt looked pained. “I’m sorry, Wendy. I like you. I really do. But I can see now this just isn’t going to work.” He shifted his attention to Tatro. “Stay in the woods, out of sight. Don’t hurt her unless you have no other option. Bring her back.”

  Tatro had an assault knife, exactly like the one in New York. Wendy didn’t know which was worse, looking at the knife or at his eyes. “Where’s Ham?” she asked.

  “See that barn?” Tatro pointed with the tip of his knife. “Your new pal is locked inside. He’s tied up. Gagged. He has no food and no water. If you want him to live, little girl, you’ll bring me to my emeralds.”

  Wendy felt herself going very still inside. These men wanted the emeralds in Ham Carhill’s maroon suede bag. She knew where they were.

  That was her leverage, she thought.

  She remembered her note, her locked bedroom door, Teddy’s ashes—and knew she’d been away too long. Matt hadn’t lied. Her family was looking for her.

  All she had to do was stay alive until someone found her.

  Twenty

  Joshua nearly ran over a damn pumpkin when he pulled into the driveway. He couldn’t see straight. He had no business being behind the wheel of his cruiser, but he’d turned down another trooper’s offer to drive him. When he’d asked her what his daughter could possibly have been thinking to sneak out through the attic, she’d just smiled. “Thinking? She’s seventeen, Trooper Josh. I’ve heard stories about you at seventeen.”

  When he’d left the house that morning, he thought Wendy was asleep in her room. It had never occurred to him she’d taken off. He’d stopped back at his place, checked on Barry, who’d rolled off his couch at some point and was out on the porch having coffee as if it were summer. Joshua had headed out to the barracks to get an update on Tatro’s escape and the search for him.

  Joshua scratched Spaceshot’s head. “Where’s your girl Wendy, hmm?” With one foot, he shoved the pumpkin out of the middle of the driveway. “Quiet around h
ere.”

  He saw that Brooker’s rented car was still in the driveway. He didn’t know if that was a good sign or a bad sign—or no sign at all. His sister’s problems had infected the rest of the family, that was for sure. If his head knew not to blame her, his emotions didn’t.

  But Joshua tried to get control of his thinking, as well as his feelings. Wendy loved her grandparents’ place and felt safe there, and she’d always been one to take off on her own. She’d led a sheltered life, at least until this past week.

  Sam joined him out on the driveway. “I checked the apple orchard,” he said, not bothering with any preamble since Joshua knew his brother meant Wendy. “No sign of her. Matt Kelleher’s gone to look for her. Juliet and that guy, Brooker, are out looking. Rest of the gang’s on the way here.”

  “I’m sorry,” Joshua said tightly.

  “What for? You didn’t climb out the window. Wendy’s got a lot on her mind. Juliet showing up yesterday asking more questions didn’t help. Then Brooker turning up in the middle of the night.” Sam obviously didn’t like any of the recent developments. “Anything on Tatro?”

  “Nothing new.”

  “The marshals must have her place in New York staked out, but you’d think he wouldn’t be dumb enough to show up there. Or here.”

  Paul drove up in his town police car and jumped out. “I just got a call from Eddie Sherman.” Eddie ran a popular local outfitters that catered to tourists. “He said a skinny guy asked about the lake, said he heard it was up near Longstreet Landscaping. He made small talk about Juliet.”

  “Not Tatro—”

  “He rented a kayak and gave the name of Ham Carhill.”

  “Carhill?”

  “He’s from Texas. He was at breakfast this morning. He’s damn skinny, Eddie’s got that right. He looked like death warmed over.”

  Joshua felt a stab of pure, primal fear. “If Wendy’s on the lake—”

  Paul looked at his oldest brother. “Want to take my car out to the lake or yours? We need to find this guy.”

  “Go,” Sam said. “I’ll fill in the gang when they get here.”

  Not trusting himself behind the wheel, Joshua climbed into his brother’s cruiser. Paul glanced at him but said nothing, just backed out and headed for the lake.

  Fifteen emeralds in all.

  Juliet had dumped them out of their little suede bag onto the table and liberated one of them from its bubble wrap.

  Although she knew nothing about precious gems, the polished stone she held in her palm was stunning.

  She’d pulled over when she saw the broken window in her neighbors’ door. The wet, muddy footprints on the steps told her the break-in was recent, and she’d slipped inside to check it out, following more prints into the kitchen. The hip-pack definitely looked out of place on the kitchen table, and she’d unceremoniously dumped out its contents. Granola bars, protein bars, matches, a free Vermont guidebook, a local map.

  And emeralds.

  No wallet, no passport—but she found a checkout receipt from a local motel in the name of Ham Carhill.

  Ethan’s friend, Mia O’Farrell’s covert agent, Bobby Tatro’s former kidnap victim.

  George O’Hara’s Texan and purported traitor.

  Juliet returned the emeralds to their drawstring bag, not bothering to rewrap the one she’d liberated. She squatted down, examining a perfect footprint.

  A running shoe for a foot smaller—way smaller—than her own. Unless Ham Carhill was a tiny man, it wasn’t his print.

  Wendy.

  Clutching the suede bag, Juliet followed the footprints out the back door onto the porch, then down the steps, where they disappeared into the lawn.

  She heard ducks down by the lake.

  And she saw a kayak bobbing in the lake, scraping on rocks.

  Whose kayak?

  She walked down to the lake. The paddle was half in the water, half in the mud, as if whoever had dropped it there didn’t care if it floated away. She leaped onto a flat rock about four feet into the water, but there was nothing in the kayak—no hint that her niece had been there.

  “Aunt Juliet!”

  Wendy. But the tone of her voice, laced with terror, chilled Juliet.

  Bobby Tatro pushed Wendy out of the woods, onto the lawn near the lake. He had one arm around Wendy’s waist and the other around her neck, a knife held to her throat. “My turn, blondie. Hands up where I can see them. If you move a single muscle toward your gun, I’ll slit her throat. You know I will.”

  Juliet raised her hands above her head, and she noticed his gaze follow the one that held the drawstring bag. “Let Wendy go, Bobby. I’ve got your emeralds. I’ll trade them for my niece’s safety.”

  “Your gun, blondie. Toss it into the lake. Then we’ll deal.” He brought the knife even closer to Wendy’s throat. “Try anything, and you watch little Wendy die.”

  “Okay. Just stay cool. I’ll use my left hand—”

  “Do it.”

  Juliet took her gun by its handle and dropped it into the lake.

  “Very good, blondie.”

  “It’s a muddy bottom here,” she said. “I’ll dump the emeralds out and all fifteen of them will disappear into the muck. It’ll take you forever to find them. You don’t have that kind of time. It’s a dead-end road, Bobby. Cops are on the way. You need to get your ass moving.”

  He obviously didn’t like the idea of the emeralds disappearing.

  “All you have to do is let Wendy go. Then you get the emeralds.”

  Wendy’s eyes widened, but she didn’t say a word.

  Juliet focused on her niece. “When you’re free, Wendy, run into the house. Barricade yourself in and wait for your dad to get here. Don’t run away. I don’t know who else is around here.”

  “Matt,” she whispered. “Matt’s around.”

  So, she knew her friend wasn’t who he’d claimed to be.

  “The emeralds first,” Tatro said. “Then the girl.”

  Juliet shook her head. “Not a chance. Let Wendy go.”

  With a sudden burst, he shoved Wendy, so hard that she fell onto her hands and knees, but she got up, scrambling for the house as Juliet had instructed.

  “Toss the bag on the ground,” he ordered. “I know you’re a black belt. But I’m good with a knife.”

  That Juliet knew. She’d wait for the right moment to get it away from him. Not only didn’t she want to get killed, she didn’t want to get killed in front of Wendy. She flipped the suede bag onto the lawn. “If I were you, I’d take your emeralds and get moving. Never mind me.”

  “What makes you think I won’t cut your throat?”

  “No fun for you in that, Bobby.”

  “Where are the keys to your truck?”

  “Left coat pocket.”

  “Jump over here. Do anything, and I’ll kill you, then I’ll kill the girl.”

  Juliet jumped lightly from her position on the rock, landing in the soft, wet sand. “Where’s your friend, Kelleher? Any other accomplices trying to blend in around here and take advantage of people’s good nature?”

  Tatro ignored her. “Get your keys.”

  Juliet dipped her hand into her pocket.

  Without any warning, Ethan leaped out of the woods, and Tatro, distracted, turned, giving her the opening she needed. She went for the arm with the knife, latching on to it, immobilizing it, as Ethan got Tatro around the neck with one arm and, at the same time, reached around with his other arm and latched on to the same forearm she had. But he snapped it, breaking the bone. Tatro yelled out in pain, and the knife dropped out of his hand.

  Moving fast, Juliet picked up the knife. “You’re under arrest, Bobby.”

  He rolled on the ground, holding his broken arm.

  Ethan, breathing hard, stood up and dusted himself off.

  “Nice distraction,” Juliet said, barely aware of her words. “I had him, one way or the other. I have another gun and pepper spray in my truck, and a black belt in karate�
��”

  “You have another gun? I could have broken into your truck instead of sneaking through the woods. The ducks are pissed at me. I’ve got pine pitch all over me.” But he took the knife from her and touched her shoulder. “Juliet.”

  She nodded. “I’m okay.”

  “Go to your niece.”

  But Wendy ran out of the house, the porch door banging shut behind her. “He’s got Ham! He locked him in the barn! He’ll die!” She stopped dead in her tracks before she got too close to Tatro. “Please. Juliet. Do something.”

  “Go, Brooker.” Juliet took the knife back, keeping her eyes on Tatro. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. You can take my backup gun—”

  “What kind?”

  “Snub-nosed revolver. My Glock’s in the lake.”

  He made a face. “Keep it. You might need it.” He withdrew a steak knife from his jacket. “But I’ll switch knives with you. I think you can handle this creep with a steak knife, don’t you?”

  “Ethan, I think you were right.” She tried to smile. “I am in love with you.”

  He winked. “I knew it,” he said, and trotted off with the K-bar.

  By the time he reached the barn, Ethan had a new appreciation for the cool Vermont breeze. Trekking back and forth along the lake had him sweating. But concentrating on his breathing, on not tripping on a root or slipping on a mushroom and stabbing himself, kept him from worrying about Ham.

  The two doors—one wide, one regular—on the front of the barn were boarded shut. He went around back, finding a mirror image of the doors on the lake side. The regular door was padlocked. He noticed the trampled brush and grass.

  At least he knew he had the right barn.

  Since it was Vermont, he had no trouble finding a rock, and the cheap padlock broke with two good whacks.

  When the door opened, Ham Carhill was in the doorway, on his back, poised to kick whoever came through, never mind that he had his feet and hands bound.

  “Twice now,” Ethan said, pulling off Ham’s gag, a red bandanna soaked in drool. “Next time, you get to rescue me.”

  Ham grinned weakly. “Always so humble.” But his eyes flattened with pain and fear. “Wendy?”