The Third Secret

by Tara Taylor Quinn

Oh, God. Stevie. What have I done to you?

  The scrambled phone rang. Rick had ditched his disposable in the Miami airport.

  Sarge’s number flashed on the screen.

  “Yeah,” he said, putting himself in another time and place. A mental state in which he’d trusted his sergeant with his life.

  With Steve’s life.

  What had the bastard done to Steve?

  “Do you have something?” Rick asked as though they were still working together and Sarge had been calling with another update. In their old life, Sarge wouldn’t be calling for any other reason.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.”

  “You found the mole.”

  “No. He found me.”

  Brady had wanted him to know that Sarge owned the bar. When he’d first found out about Sarge’s connection to the bar, to Brady’s Maria, Rick had been so sure his friend was telling him that Sarge was dirty. But why? Because he’d owned a bar he hadn’t told them about?

  “Is he there now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Forcing you to make the call.”

  “Yes.”

  Brady had found the mole. He’d provided Maria with a picture of the man behind it all. Pop. Sarge. A picture to turn over to her lawyer.

  And Brady had left Rick with the information, too. In the form of a matchbook.

  “Is he listening?” Rick asked the questions he knew were important. Information he’d be expected to look for.

  “Yes. He has Erin and Steve, Rick.” Sarge’s voice contained just the right amount of calm. And intensity. Was he acting? Or was he victim, not mole?

  “What does he want?” That was what Rick needed to know. Didn’t so much matter who “he” was at the moment. Sarge or someone else.

  “You have something he wants.”

  “He can have it.” It was in his pants pocket. The matchbook was no longer useful to anyone. Rick knew the truth and had no further reason to hide the clue that had eventually revealed it.

  “Hold on,” Sarge said.

  The phone rustled. Rick heard voices. Could be Sarge talking to himself. Or not.

  “You know what he wants,” Sarge said.

  “The proof Brady left for me.”

  “And you have it.”

  “Yes.”

  “Hold on…”

  Air crackled as the phone was moved—roughly.

  “Bring the proof to the bridge off Route 23 near Rogers City,” a man’s voice barked. “Seven o’clock tonight. Come alone and don’t be late or all three of them will die.”

  Seven o’clock. After dark. Giving him time to make his way back to Michigan from Miami, where he was still supposed to be.

  Sarge didn’t know he’d returned. It was all the edge Rick was going to get.

  The weight against her chest was too heavy. Boots wasn’t that heavy. But it wasn’t Boots.

  And then consciousness came slowly back. With the bitter onslaught of memory. It wasn’t Boots sleeping against her. It was Steve. They were downstairs in the cabin cruiser. She’d made a game out of getting their hands untied during the night.

  That had helped a lot. Steve was much calmer when he was playing games. And almost happy once his hands were free. He didn’t like the chain on his foot, but the fact that Erin had one, too, that she was playing the same game he was, satisfied him. For now.

  She’d searched the boat and found pitifully little. No tools. No silverware in the kitchen. The fridge didn’t work. There was no running water.

  Their captor had said there was food. She’d found saltine crackers and peanut butter. And bottled water.

  She recalled from their lunch at Lakeside that Steve liked peanut butter.

  He liked her, too. He had to be touching her at all times, either holding her hand or leaning on her, and oddly, that was more comfort than irritant. When she’d decided there was no more she could do until daylight, when she’d run out of the energy to play games, she settled with Steve on the padded bench in the cabin, took him in her arms and ran her fingers through his hair until he fell asleep.

  Her father had done that for her once. She’d had strep throat and been afraid she’d suffocate if she slept.

  Steve had been asleep within minutes. She hadn’t expected to sleep. She’d figured she’d sit there quietly and make a plan. But the boat’s gentle rhythm, coupled with her emotional and physical exhaustion, had lulled her into slumber.

  How long had she been asleep? Minutes? Or hours. The cabin was still dark, but she could see a sliver of dim light beneath the door she’d closed and locked.

  Dawn had arrived.

  And chain or no chain, Erin had to find that bomb. And hope to God she could get it away from them without detonating it.

  The first thing she was going to do was pull up the anchor. With Steve’s help they’d be able to do that, at least. And if she could figure out a way to get to the bomb, to remove it without setting it off and drop it in the bottom of the lake… And if they drifted far enough…

  Maybe they could get to shore or pass another boat, attract someone’s attention.

  One way or another, she had to save their lives.

  Or this would be the last dawn either of them would ever see.

  Rick drove too fast, ran a red light, double-parked in the sheriff’s office lot and stormed inside the building he’d hoped never to visit again. Sheriff Johnson was sitting behind his desk, a cup of coffee in hand. Rick pushed past the people who tried to stop him, and into the glass-walled space that set the sheriff apart from the rest of the room. He shut the door.

  “I need help.”

  Sheriff Johnson came around the desk. The fact that he didn’t immediately reach for his gun was a good sign. “You’re in trouble?”

  “Not the kind you mean, and more than you can imagine. Look, Sheriff, we don’t have time for long explanations. I was a government agent, part of a covert ops team. I retired a year ago. Since then, the other two men on my team have been murdered. A girlfriend’s been murdered. And a bartender we knew. I believe Charles Cook’s murder is part of this, too. I’ve just found out that the man behind all this was our superior officer, my sergeant—or at least he’s involved. I don’t know why. And I don’t know who else is working with him or for him. They’ve got Erin Morgan. And Steve Miller.”

  The older man’s face was a rock, his gaze intense. “Got them. How? For what?”

  “I got a call. My sergeant said he’s being held, too, and that they made him call me. I don’t believe him. But he wasn’t alone. They’re convinced that one of my peers left me some evidence that will point to their involvement with an illegal arms dealer. They want that evidence. If I don’t deliver by seven o’clock tonight, they’re going to kill Erin and Steve.”

  Sheriff Johnson took Rick’s arm, leading him out of the room. If the man thought he was going to lock Rick up now, he was—

  “Roberts,” he shouted as he charged through the office. “Get every available deputy in here and wait for my orders. And call Fitzgerald, too.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Rick barely heard the answer as he raced beside Sheriff Johnson outside into the bright morning sun.

  “We’ll take your truck,” Johnson said, heading toward the trunk of his car. He pulled out a duffel bag. “My car would be a dead giveaway.”

  So would the man’s uniform. But Rick had a feeling Johnson already knew that. Hence, the duffel.

  Instead of approaching Rick’s truck, Johnson turned to the back of the building. “Come on,” he said.

  Rick followed as the sheriff led him through a private door into a special holding area. Not where Rick had been jailed. This space held one cell.

  He was shocked to see Halloway sitting inside.

  “Sheriff.” Halloway, wearing standard dark blue jail garb, stood immediately. And then, noticing Rick, stepped back. “What’s going on?”

  “Tell him what you just told me,” Sheriff Johnson demanded, looking at Ri
ck.

  Not sure what was going on, but knowing he was out of time—and options—Rick did as Johnson ordered.

  Once silence had fallen, Johnson faced Halloway. “And now you’re going to tell me who you were working for,” he said, steely determination in his tone.

  What the hell?

  “Halloway broke into Erin’s office,” Johnson explained, staring the deputy down. “He claims that he was working on a top-secret assignment through Washington. For someone with high government clearance.”

  After one more glance at Sheriff Johnson and then at Rick, Halloway straightened his shoulders. “I’m not just claiming,” he insisted. “I know this man was legitimate.

  His name’s Sergeant Randall Wyatt. I saw his identification.”

  Randall Wyatt. Sarge’s given name. His official army name. Goddammit. Rick knew he’d been right.

  Keeping all emotion in check, Rick stepped forward. “Who was he working for?”

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  “Did he mention any other names? Or speak to anyone in your presence?”

  “No. I only saw him once. He just showed up here. He was waiting outside for me one night when I got off shift. He showed me his ID. Told me the Department of Defense needed a local man and I was their guy because I’d been in the army reserves. That was about two months ago. All our other communication was over scrambled phones.”

  “Before Cook’s death.”

  “Yeah.” Rick’s instincts clicked into high gear.

  “Wyatt killed Cook.”

  “He said Cook was a traitor, part of an arms conspiracy in the Department of Defense. He said that when he confronted him, Cook came after him and in the ensuing scuffle was stabbed.”

  Cook was no more a traitor than Rick was. “If Wyatt had been on official business, he’d have identified himself as an agent and when Cook came after him, he’d have shot him.” Rick’s voice was low.

  Time was running out. A lifetime of work and he was down to hours.

  “You planted the knife at my place.” Rick was only guessing, but he made sure he didn’t sound like it.

  “Wyatt called me. Said they knew you were involved with Cook but that they didn’t have enough on you yet to get an indictment. They were going to hold you on Cook’s murder until they could gather the rest of their intelligence, build a strong enough case to put you away for good this time. That’s why he had me search your place again, later, when he had you out on a boat. I was looking for evidence.”

  “This time?” Johnson asked, peering at Rick. “Put you away for good this time?”

  “I’ll explain in the truck.” They had to get going. Seconds were ticking away. Seconds that could make a difference between life and more death.

  “This Wyatt—just to be sure we’re not dealing with a stolen identity—he wouldn’t have been wearing a black jacket with khaki slacks, would he?”

  “Yes, he was.”

  Rick took out his wallet, retrieved a bent-up old photo he’d kept in the storage compartment in his truck. A photo left from regular army days. He held it out to Halloway. “This him?”

  Rick and the rest of his platoon were in the photo. But there was no mistaking who their leader was.

  “Yeah, that’s him.”

  Erin didn’t know a lot about bombs. But she knew enough to realize that if a light was blinking, she had a greater chance of staying alive if she didn’t disturb anything.

  Leaning over the boat as far as her chain would allow, she stared at the blinking red beacon and tried not to cry. Her tears would unhinge Steve. The man-child was not at his best this morning. He wanted to fish.

  “If Rick really knew I was here, there’d be a fishing pole,” Steve said petulantly from just behind Erin. He was leaning against her back.

  Steve was the smartest five-year-old she’d ever met. And if she wasn’t careful, he was going to be a very frightened and panicked five-year-old in a six-foot-two male body.

  They had another problem. The bomb wasn’t directly attached to the hull, but to a chain that was attached to it. And just below that, the chain continued down into the water.

  It was attached to the anchor.

  Bottom line, if she pulled the anchor, they’d explode.

  36

  Sheriff Johnson dispensed jobs to every person on his payroll. All the shifts. And he called in private contractors, as well, at the insistence of Ron Fitzgerald, who would foot the bill. A forensics team to cover Erin’s place. Investigators to cover every inch of Temple and the surrounding areas.

  Deputies went door to door. A picture of Sarge was sent by cell phone to every single law enforcement official on the search.

  APBs were launched.

  The FBI was on alert.

  Johnson called law personnel in Ludington, who were already conducting a full investigation at Lakeside. With one man dead and a patient missing, the FBI was also on the scene. Private investigators were covering the area with pictures of Steve and Sarge, trying to find a trail from Lakeside, from Ludington, to know what direction Sarge had taken.

  They had to find out where he was holding Steve and Erin before Rick was due to meet with him.

  In between phone calls, Rick had filled Sheriff Johnson in on a few things. His jailtime in Arizona, his alias and everything he knew about the way Sarge’s mind worked. They needed that information.

  And Rick needed help. He couldn’t do this alone. He had to trust someone and that someone was Huey Johnson. Rick had made his decision. He didn’t second-guess himself. He focused on the job.

  “I’m assuming you’ve got the evidence on you,” Johnson said as Rick drove north. With others scouring the state in various directions from Temple and Ludington, he and Johnson were heading toward the rendezvous point. Their thought was that Sarge would keep his hostages close enough to get to them.

  Rick couldn’t think about Steve and Erin. He wouldn’t be able to rescue them if he weakened his focus.

  “What evidence?” Rick asked. Both hands on the wheel, he kept his gaze firmly on the road.

  “You don’t have anything to give them?”

  “Not really.” He reached into his pocket. Pulled out the memento Brady had left. “Just this.”

  “A used matchbook?” It wasn’t much. But it had done what Brady had intended it to do. Eventually.

  “That’s all I’ve got.”

  “Then why do they think you have something they want? Something that can incriminate them?”

  “Two reasons.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “First, because I told them I do.”

  “Understandable, considering the fact that they were making a ransom call. You couldn’t very well tell them you didn’t have the ransom.”

  Johnson, now in jeans, a flannel shirt and boots, attire similar to Rick’s, with a gun at his waist and another, smaller pistol and a knife strapped to his ankles, was a good man. And a smart one. “Right,” Rick said.

  “What about the second reason?”

  In as few words as possible, he told Johnson about the week on the yacht with Brady. About his friendship with the other agent. About Maria. And Guardano. And…the matchbook.

  Ending with his trip to The Resting Place the night before.

  “And then I figured it out,” he said. “Brady knew what was going on. He knew the players. He just didn’t have the proof. And he couldn’t go to anyone without it. Sarge would cover his tracks and hang Brady out to dry. We were covert, remember. Sarge was the only official agent among us.”

  “A dangerously vulnerable position for you young men to be in.”

  “Which is why it paid so well,” Rick said dryly. He’d been in it for the money. For Steve.

  And for his country. His life hadn’t seemed worth much, but doing such dangerous work, something few could or would do, had given him a sense of value.

  “Sarge obviously worked out that Brady was on to him. He had Maria arrested. And had someone on the i
nside keeping track of her.”

  Rick was silent a moment until Huey nudged him. “Go on.”

  “He also knew that Brady had left something for me. He expected to find it when he cleaned out Brady’s room. He would’ve been looking for anything that would implicate him.”

  “But we still don’t know exactly what he’s guilty of. And while I agree he’s likely responsible for several murders, and now we suspect he’s behind the kidnappings, we still don’t have anything solid. He could be a hostage himself right now, just like he said.”

  “We know he killed Charles Cook. We have Halloway’s testimony.”

  “I assume you have a plan.”

  “I trust Brady implicitly,” Rick said. “He knew that if he left me that matchbook I wouldn’t let it go. He knew I’d keep searching until I found out what it meant. Sarge owned the bar. Maria was his woman. Segura has an inside contact who lets him walk away from everything he’s ever done, even though we know without a doubt that he’s dealing illegal arms on a worldwide scale. And…he has a souvenir from Wyatt’s bar, The Resting Place.”

  “I’m not disagreeing that Wyatt’s involvement is obvious, or that his guilt is pretty clear. Only that everything’s circumstantial and we don’t have time to do anything about it.”

  “There’s something Brady knew that we don’t. Something Sarge thinks we can prove,” Rick said. “Brady couldn’t come to see me in prison. It would’ve compromised both our covers. So it makes sense that he left me whatever proof he had. I plan to let Sarge think I can hang him—but that I’d rather die, and would rather let Steve and Erin die, than give it to him.”

  “You figure I’m going to let you walk in there alone? With nothing?”

  “I know you are,” Rick said. “Even if I had the evidence he wants, especially if I had it, the man’s going to kill Erin and Steve. Why wouldn’t he? As long as they’re alive to testify, he’s a kidnapper. And if I give him what he wants, he has no further use for me, either.”

  “But holding out on him is also going to get them killed.”

  “Not if we beat him at his own game.”

  “And how do we do that?”

  “I’m going to tell him I’ve left the evidence in an FBI safe to be found in the morning. That I knew he’d kill Erin and Steve, anyway, so I did the right thing. The only thing I could. I protected my country by exposing him.”