Larger Than Life

by Alison Kent

  He dropped down, crouched in the wedge of space between the car and the open door, feeling helpless to do more than stand by. He was only just back from meeting with Rabbit. He'd had no time to process the smaller safeguarding measures they'd outlined. Only the priorities had been handled.

  He bloody well hoped that was enough. That and the fact that K.J. had come through with a command for a remote system wipe. Doing little beyond mouthing the words, Mick asked, "There's no reason they should, is there? That place took me by surprise."

  "I know," she said, and shivered as if she were cold. "But then you weren't looking for it. And they are. If they take a measuring tape to the attic, I'm so screwed."

  He placed one hand in her lap, squeezed her thigh. "Can you trust me on this? And not worry?"

  "Yes. And no," she admitted softly and with a touch of wryness to her voice. "I'm trying not to worry. But I am, of course. And I do want to trust you—"

  "But you don't."

  She placed her palm over his hand on her lap, stroked him, rubbed him. "No. I do. I think," she said, and gave him a tender grin.

  "It's hard to explain, Mick. You're here, and I love that you are. But I've always known I'd be the one to bear the brunt of our discovery. No matter what you can do, that's one thing you can't change. This is my crime to pay for. My failure to live with."

  About that much, she was right. If he'd gotten here sooner, been here longer, had a body in better working condition and a mind not on the fritz . . . yeah.

  He was doing a lot of good here, wasn't he? A bloody fucking lot of useless good. Jaw taut, he dropped his gaze to the ground, then looked off into the distance, the view marred by Holden Wagner leaning against the grill of his car looking rumpled and smug.

  Mick indicated the other man with a lift of his chin. "There's got to be more of a story with him."

  "Holden? He's tried repeatedly the last year to get inside. It's been like an obsession with him. My house. The barn."

  Mick looked over. "Your bed?"

  She shook her head, caught his gaze briefly before glancing toward Wagner. "I don't think so. Our relationship has been either reserved or antagonistic. There has definitely never been any heat. In fact, this bizarre plan of his to marry Liberty makes no sense. He's the most asexual man I've ever met." Lips compressed, she shrugged. "A shame considering his looks."

  That last comment was one Mick preferred to ignore. "So he's not marrying her for sex."

  "From the gossip I've heard, he's not involved in Pastor Straight's church except in a legal capacity." She collapsed back against the seat, exhaling her frustration. "I don't see him buying his salvation with numerous wives."

  "Then he's buying something else." Mick shifted his weight to his other leg, his nape tingling. "Like a ticket out of town."

  "Or out of trouble." Neva's eyes narrowed. "What could a seventeen-year-old girl like Liberty Mitchell possibly offer a man like Holden Wagner?"

  Mick turned to study the other man. "Or what could she be holding over his head? You've told me about him, but what exactly do you know about her}"

  She didn't have a chance to answer. At the sound of approaching footsteps on the gravel drive, she looked beyond Mick's shoulder. He pushed to his feet, stifling a groan as he did. Neva climbed out of the backseat of the car, crossing her arms as Sheriff Munroe came toward them.

  Hands at his hips, his calculated gaze taking in more of Mick than of Neva and paying no attention to Wagner at all, the lawman cocked his head to the side and spoke. " We're going to take a look at the barn now. You can walk down with us, but you'll both have to wait outside. Or you can stay here. It's your choice."

  "I'd just as soon be there," Neva said, lacing her fingers through Mick's when he offered.

  Munroe hesitated as if he had more he wanted to say, then turned away with nothing but a nod. He and his deputies started up their cars and drove the short distance to the barn. Holden slid behind the wheel of his own vehicle and followed. Still holding Mick's hand, Neva started forward on foot, tucking herself behind his arm.

  They hadn't gone but ten steps when she said, "According to Liberty, her family's lived in Earnestine less than a year. Her parents moved there for their children's souls, or so she claims they say. She hates it and wants more than anything to go back to California. She was dating Jase Bremmer, and you know the rest. So I don't know much at all."

  Mick's ears pricked. Rabbit's digging had produced intel connecting Wagner to California. His parents had been missionaries and had died there. It was a stretch, but Mick had worked stranger and iffier connections all the way to the ground. He'd work this one, too. But first he had something pressing he needed to do.

  The conditions were finally right. He had time, space, and no hovering goons in the way. He pulled his hand from Neva's, reached into his pocket for the transmitter Rabbit had delivered earlier from K.J.

  "Hang back a second," he said, and she slowed her steps. "Don't look at me. Keep looking down the road."

  "Okay." She even brought up a hand to her forehead to shield her eyes from the midday sun. "Are you going to tell me what you're doing?"

  "Later," he said, palming the transmitter, extending the antennae with his index finger and thumb. He kept walking, kept his chin and head up, kept watching as the other men parked and bailed out of their cars.

  Only his eyes cut down to his hand. The transmitter's red light blinked steadily. Mick put his thumb to the button and pushed. The blinking stopped. The red light glowed, darkened, then started pulsing again.

  That done, he whistled for his dog. FM looked up, lumbered out of the field where he'd been sniffing every inch of ground, and trotted out to meet them on the road. Mick ruffled the fur of the mutt's back with one hand, used the other to slip the transmitter into one of the slits in the leather collar, then started walking again.

  At his side, Neva reached for his arm and held on. "Now are you going to tell me what you were doing? And what that business with the dog was all about?"

  "No can do."

  She jerked at him lightly. "Why not?"

  He covered her fingers where they gripped him. "There are some tricks of the trade mule deer hunters like to keep to themselves."

  Fifteen

  They reached the barn in time to see the sheriff and one of his deputies disappear through the side door into the studio. The second deputy, having finished his search of the showroom, walked out a few minutes later and followed.

  A few minutes after that, Candy flounced through the same door onto the patio and growled, "Why are these people back?" she asked, shoving her goggles to the top of her head. "Did they not get what they came for the other day?"

  At Mick's side, Neva started to speak before Holden Wagner walked up and cut her off. "Things have changed since then, Ms. Roman. This is now an official police investigation. The sheriff has a warrant to search the premises. I'd suggest you not interfere unless you want to face charges."

  "Neva, what's going on?" Candy waved her hand in front of Wagner's face. "There's a pesky fly bothering me, and I didn't hear what you were trying to say."

  Mick chuckled under his breath and glanced at Neva, who had to fight back a grin before she answered. "It seems Liberty never made it home. And someone in an official capacity managed to convince Judge Ahearn that even though we weren't hiding her last time, this time there is probable cause that we are."

  "Jesus Lord, why can't those pesky buzzing flies leave a body minding its own business alone," Candy said with a huff and a pointed glance in Wagner's direction. "Makes a girl just want to swat 'em flat to the ground."

  Holden didn't budge. He didn't say a word. Simply stood still and stared until Candy pulled her goggles from her head and turned back to Neva. "If you need me, I'll be at home watching Oprah. The sheriff and that cute Deputy Jason said they shouldn't be long. They're working their way through the studio and shipping center."

  "Where's the other deputy?" Mick asked. The more cu
rsory the search and the quicker the three finished, the less likely any of them would stumble across the safe room.

  She pointed overhead. "He's in the attic. Digging through five years of files and other accumulated crap."

  Mick heard Neva's alarmed hiss of breath before she quickly recovered from the surprise to complain, "That place is a mess unless you know what you're looking for. He'll be up there forever."

  "Not to mention he'll come out smelling like a mothball." Candy shrugged—consummate actress that she was— then headed for the back of the barn and the door to her apartment, calling, "Wake me up when they're done so I can get back to work. I've got orders going on three weeks and I'm not happy about it."

  Neva walked away from the patio and began to pace, leaving Mick alone on the covered porch with the attorney. He used the advantage of his sunglasses, staring until the other man backed up a step, stopping him from moving farther by saying, "I understand congratulations are in order, mate."

  "Excuse me?"

  "I hear you'll be tying the knot with the missing girl. If you can find her. And manage to keep her from running off again."

  "My intentions toward Ms. Mitchell are none of your business, Mr. ..." He waited expectantly for Mick to fill in the blank.

  Mick didn't. He boosted himself up to sit on the nearest table, braced his boots on the seat, leaned into his knees. "No worries. Just thinking you two are getting a good start, both of you coming from San Francisco, sharing that background and all."

  Holden bristled. Or tried to. He looked more like a leaf shaking in the wind. "You don't know a thing about our backgrounds."

  Mick glanced off into the distance, glanced back. "I know you both were raised by religious zealots. And you both ran away. Liberty figured it out a lot sooner. You stuck around long enough to see your parents killed."

  This time it wasn't just a leaf that was shaking. It was the whole bloody tree. "I don't know who you are—"

  "But I know who you are." Mick pulled off his sunglasses, met the other man's gaze directly, and yanked him up by the roots. "And I know what you're doing. Give me another few hours, and I'll know what you did."

  Wagner tumbled. A redwood felled by a mightier wind. He stepped back, unspeaking, expressionless, then turned and walked off the patio toward his car. He didn't run. He didn't rush. He just left, defeated, flattened, done in by the destruction of Mick's promise.

  Neva returned to the patio, approached Mick where he sat, placed her hands on his knees. "Please tell me how you managed to run him off. I'll take notes."

  "Trade secret," he said, looping the sport strap of his glasses over her wrists, binding her to him. "I'd tell you, but then—"

  "Stop." She pressed fingertips to his lips. "You're already killing me here. You and all this private non-profit business making you not a very nice man who I don't know what I would do without."

  He started to tell her everything, to assure her men didn't come nicer, that she'd never find a good guy wearing a whiter hat. But the door from the studio opened, and the sheriff walked through, his deputy on his tail. The duo never said a word. They just headed toward the back of the barn.

  "Candy's place," Neva said, and Mick pushed off the table to follow. He heard Wagner's car door slam but didn't give the man any satisfaction by looking back. Instead, he slowed enough that he caused the other man to do the same. Point made, point taken, and he'd never uttered a word.

  When they caught up with the sheriff, it was to find Candy blocking her doorway, one hand at her hip, the other handing the warrant back to the deputy. "This is not Neva's residence. Nor is it part of the Big Brown Barn. This is my home, and it's not included in your warrant."

  The sheriff looked from Candy to his deputy and back to the warrant, folding it and slapping it against his palm. "She's right. We're done here."

  "No, Sheriff. You are not done here," Wagner boomed from behind them.

  Munroe turned, pointed a finger, stopped inches from jabbing it into the other man's chest. "This is my search, Wagner. Not yours. I'm allowing you here as a professional courtesy only. Don't think that means I won't cuff you if you get in my way."

  "Uh, Sheriff?"

  At the question from his second deputy, the one who'd been searching through the attic and was just now catching up, Munroe turned. The younger man dusted dirt from his shoulders and cobwebs from his hair before shoving his hat on his head.

  "What is it, Levi?"

  Levi jerked a thumb back toward the direction from which he'd come. "The back wall on the second floor? It's not the back wall. I mean, it is. But there's an inconsistency in the construction. It doesn't quite fit."

  "Bloody fucking hell," Mick muttered, hearing Neva catch her breath.

  Munroe frowned. "Fit? What're you saying?"

  The young deputy nodded, adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "The age, the materials. The rest of the attic is original. The back wall is more consistent with the newer construction downstairs."

  Mick had to give the sheriff credit. Munroe ignored Wagner's gloating chuckle and turned. "Neva? You want to tell me what Levi here is talking about?"

  She shrugged, shook her head. "I had different contractors in and out during the original remodeling of the barn. One of them replaced rotting wood in several places. I'm assuming that's it."

  "Uh-huh." Yancey turned back to Levi. "Find a way through the wall. Take out a board if you have to. I want to know what's behind it."

  "Sheriff, please." Neva stepped forward, her hands clenched and held to her chest. "Searching is one thing. Destroying is another. This is my place of business. My livelihood."

  "Which is why I'm keeping it to one board," he emphasized, holding up one finger. "I won't make it two unless I have to. And I won't have to take out the one if you can prove that wall is just a wall."

  Neva cut her gaze toward Mick. He heard what she was asking, gave her an imperceptible shake of his head. No reason to volunteer ammunition. Let them find what they might find on their own. He hated to have her place turned upside down. But cleaning up later made for a much better option than rolling over now and playing dead.

  Neva sighed, crossed her arms, and said, "Do what you have to do, Sheriff."

  "I'll take that as your consent," he said, and she nodded, though it hardly appeared a willing concession.

  Ignoring Mick as had been the case since arriving, Munroe held her gaze for several more seconds, seeming to deflate as he gave a go-ahead nod to his deputy and followed the younger man back toward the studio door. The second deputy and Holden hurried to catch up.

  Mick looked over to where Neva stood hugging herself tightly and staring into the distance. Hands at his waist, he let his gaze fall to the ground, bit off words he never said aloud. He'd been upstairs in the safe room. The wall Sheriff Munroe was on his way to tear down opened into the rear of the dormitory.

  Neva was aware of the same thing and obviously making a mental run-through of the room as she'd left it. She had no way of knowing nothing was the same. That he'd been there since she had. That the arrangements he'd made with Rabbit meant the sheriff wouldn't find a thing. And that much, at least, she deserved to know.

  He crossed to where she was standing, took hold of her hands, waited until she looked into his eyes, then whispered his demand. "Trust me. They're not going to find a thing tying you to Liberty or any of the girls."

  She huffed, a laughing sort of exhalation that he wasn't sure whether to take as a yes or a no. "They'll find the room. And that's enough. That's all they'll need. I'm done here," she said before she turned and headed back to the patio, not even waiting for him to catch up.

  He did, and they entered the studio, took a left instead of a right, and made their way beyond Candy's work area to the main staircase rising to the barn's second floor. The steps and railing here were new, matching the build-out of the rest of the structure, the ascent less steep than that of the flight hidden behind the shipping center.


  Once in the attic, however, the newness quickly wore off and old took over. As they picked their way in and out and around a half decade of storage, the clutter of boxes and shelving and bins, Mick realized how an addition to the main structure could easily stand out. And when they reached it, how much it did.

  "I can't believe this," Neva muttered at his side, standing back and watching the young deputy take a crowbar to a vertical two-by-eight in the center of the wall. "I was looking for an old order of Candy's, digging through boxes. I didn't even think about putting them all back."

  "Boxes wouldn't make any difference." The wall was aged, yes, but not to the degree of the rest of the attic. "It's obviously not original."

  Neva looked caught between anger and exhaustion, her skin pale, her freckles in high color, bright enough to stand out in the overhead light that was dim and slanting in through the walls, spotlighting dust motes. "Why didn't I paint it or stain it or something?"

  The woman amazed him, the way she never gave herself a break. The way she had to take all the blame, carry all the burden. The way she leaned on him one minute, seemed to forget in the next that he was there to help.

  "That's not a hard one, Neva. You were more concerned with what was going on on the other side." A what, Mick realized straight away, that everyone and their daddy was another two-by-eight from finding out.

  The deputy handed the first board to the sheriff, who authorized a second to be pried away. A third followed, the gap wide enough now for even Munroe to wedge through once his underling used the crowbar to pull back the layers of cotton candy insulation.

  Or it would've been wide enough. Except then Levi ran into the back side of the Sheetrock. The sheriff shook his head, turned to look at Neva. "You still telling me this is nothing but a wall?"

  "Looks like a wall to me," she said and shrugged.

  He glared, glanced at Levi, and held out a hand for the crowbar. The deputy passed it over. Munroe took a step back and swung. Powdery white dust sprayed and settled as he swung again and again. Chunks of wall tumbled. The sound echoed off the rafters overhead.