Dangerous Reunion (Love Inspired Suspense)

by Robbins, Sandra

  Brock shook his head. “Are you saying that it’s possible that Calvin can be out of prison in less than five years?”

  Kate pushed to her feet. “That’s the law, and Calvin knew it. He denies that he and Mike are involved in the other murders on the island, though, and I believe him.” Kate adjusted her duty belt and sighed. “Now I’ve got to go arrest Mike Thornton. It’s not going to be easy. His father is going to try and stop me. Sheriff Baxter is faxing a copy of the search warrant for the Thornton house. I’m sure the judge who is signing these for us will be glad when we’re through.”

  “Did you list the other two agents and me on the search warrant?” Austin asked Kate.

  “I did.”

  “Good. Then let’s go.” He glanced at Brock. “Detective Gentry, why don’t you join us on this one? You can’t go inside, but you can watch from the sidelines.”

  Brock smiled and pushed to his feet. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

  He followed Kate from her office. As they passed Lisa’s desk, he noticed that Lisa wasn’t there. He knew she had come in earlier and had heard her talking with Kate. He pointed to the dispatch area. “Where’s Lisa? I saw her earlier.”

  “She went home. She’s very upset over Calvin’s arrest,” Kate responded. He waited for her to explain, but she didn’t say anything else.

  When they were seated in Kate’s squad car, Brock swiveled in the seat and stared at her. “Kate, I’m glad you’ve uncovered the burglary ring and the answers to Jake’s murder. But have you thought about the fact that we still don’t know who’s been targeting you?”

  She sighed and turned the ignition. “I have. Mike couldn’t have been watching from the fishing skiff that morning at the beach and shooting at me at the same time. And I saw him at the store when the fireworks truck exploded. I’ve tried to think who else it might be. Sam Burnett has a hooded sweatshirt, and Clay Phillips was nearby when the killer left a note in my car. Those suspicions aren’t enough to prove anything, though.”

  Brock stared at her profile. The muscle in her jaw twitched, and he reached over and squeezed her arm. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure it out.”

  She glanced down at his hand on her arm, and then her gaze drifted up to stare into his eyes. “We will, but all we can do is take care of one thing at a time. Right now I have to arrest Mike Thornton. After that, we can concentrate on finding out who has committed four murders on Ocracoke.”

  He settled back in the seat and fastened his seat belt as the car pulled into the street. His heart raced at the word she’d used. We. It sounded as if she wanted him to help her, and the thought sent ripples of happiness through him. Together they would find this crazy killer.

  Sheriff Baxter’s office had been shorthanded before all the problems on the island. Now Kate was the only deputy left. The ATF agents would be here for a few days yet as they investigated the fireworks explosion, but it might take longer than that to discover who wanted to kill Kate.

  Brock glanced out the window as the car sped toward the Thornton house, and a thought that had been drifting through his mind took root. He still had several weeks of vacation left, but it didn’t matter how long it took to find this guy. He wasn’t leaving this island until he was sure that Kate was safe. Then he’d leave, but only if she wanted him to.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Brock studied Kate all the way to the Thornton house. He wondered what she was thinking. There wasn’t a flicker of emotion on her face.

  That was one of the things about her he’d always admired and yet at times despised. In an emergency she could respond without her personal feelings interfering. However, when they had faced their breakup six years ago, she had buried her emotions so deeply at times that he couldn’t reach her. Now she was on her way to arrest a young man she’d known ever since he was born. He wondered how she really felt about that.

  She stopped the car in front of a large Victorian home and took a deep breath. “This is the Thornton home,” she said. “When I was a child, I thought this was the most beautiful house on the island. I love the gingerbread trim that gives it so much character.”

  Brock didn’t know what to say. He glanced over his shoulder at the sound of another car coming to a stop. “Austin and the agents just got here.”

  She started to get out of the car but frowned and turned back to him. “Brock, I appreciate all you’ve done to help me, but…”

  He held up a hand and smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ll stay out of your way. I’m not about to jeopardize any evidence you find. I don’t want a defense attorney getting it thrown out because an unauthorized person joined the search.”

  She smiled. “Thank you.”

  They stepped from the car, and Kate led the way up the flagstone path to the house’s wraparound porch. Kate assumed an official-looking stance and knocked on the door. Within seconds Ean Thornton appeared in the doorway. He frowned as his gaze flitted over Kate and the three officers behind her. “What do you want now, Kate?”

  She held up the paper in her hand. “I have a warrant for Mike’s arrest and another one to search your house, cars and any buildings on your property.”

  Ean’s eyes grew wide and then clouded with dark anger. “Arrest? Have you lost your mind? You can’t come into my house and arrest my son.”

  “Yes, I can, Ean. And if you don’t stand aside and let us do our duty, we’ll arrest you for obstruction of justice.”

  The man glared at Kate. His fists clenched at his sides, and he pulled his shoulders back as if he would stop anyone attempting to get past him. Austin stepped up beside Kate. “Mr. Thornton, we appreciate your feelings, but we will arrest you, too, if you interfere any further.”

  Ean’s face turned crimson, and his eyes bulged. Kate took a step closer, and he slumped against the wall. “Then come in, but while you’re searching, I’ll be on the phone with my lawyer.”

  Brock watched as Kate and the officers disappeared into the house before he dropped down in a chair a few feet from the door. He wished he could be inside, but he really had no choice. He’d seen too much evidence thrown out by judges who ruled that search warrants had been violated.

  An hour later the sound of the front door opening jerked him from the edge of sleep. He jumped to his feet and stared as Kate and Austin exited the house. Mike Thornton, his hands cuffed behind him, walked between them.

  “No, you can’t do this!” Ean’s wail came from inside the house.

  As the trio moved down the front steps, Ean ran from the house and stopped at the edge of the porch. Tears ran down his face. “Don’t worry, son,” he shouted. “I’ll have you out of jail by tomorrow. My lawyer’s already working on it.”

  The other agents walked from the house and stepped around Ean. They carried several boxes in their hands. Brock followed them and arrived at the cars just as Austin opened the back door of his car and motioned for Mike to get in. One of the agents handed Austin the box he held, climbed in beside Mike and shut the door. The other agent and Austin walked to the back of the car, popped the trunk and placed the boxes inside.

  Brock turned to Kate. “What did you find in the house?”

  “We found a gun in Mike’s room, a laptop and several cameras that fit the description of stolen items. We’ll send the gun to the lab in Raleigh to determine if it’s the one that killed Jake, and we’ll check the serial numbers of the items we found to see if they match the ones on our list. We also found a rifle in the trunk of Mike’s car. Since we didn’t find any shell casings at the beach, we can’t prove it’s the one used to shoot at Grady and me. I don’t think that will be a problem because Calvin will testify that Mike told him he shot at us.”

  Brock gave a low whistle. “It sounds like you may have enough evidence for a conviction.”

  She nodded. “Yeah. I talked to Sheriff Baxter. He and one of the deputies are coming from the mainland on the emergency helicopter. They’ll take Mike to the jail on Swan Quarter and collect the evidence.”
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  He turned back to the car. “Then we’d better get going.”

  She walked to the driver’s side of the car but stopped and stared over the top of the vehicle at the Thornton home before she opened the door. “Like I said, I always loved this house when I was growing up. It gleamed when the sun struck it, and I thought it looked like a place where a princess would live. It seemed so pure. Too bad that didn’t reach to the family members living in it.”

  She shook her head and climbed into the car. Brock cast one last look at the house before he joined her. He couldn’t help but think how the beautiful home had hidden the answer to a man’s murder and other crimes.

  The person who had targeted Kate could be just like that. Maybe they saw him and talked with him every day and had no idea of the evil that lived inside him. His mouth went dry at the thought. Who was he and what motive did he have for tormenting Kate? The answers to those questions lay somewhere on Ocracoke, and they needed to find them before tragedy struck again.

  Brock rubbed his eyes as the squad car stopped in front of Treasury’s bed-and-breakfast. The clock on the cruiser’s dial displayed a few minutes before eight.

  By now Treasury had been up for hours, and the breakfast she would serve her guests sat on warmers in the dining room. The thought of her biscuits made Brock’s stomach growl. He hoped he could stay awake long enough to eat.

  Kate pushed the gearshift into Park and exhaled. “It’s been a long night.”

  Brock had seen her tired at times since he’d been back, but he’d never seen her as drained of energy as she appeared this morning. He unfastened his seat belt and reached for the door handle. “You are going home to sleep, aren’t you?”

  She propped her elbows on the steering wheel, closed her eyes and massaged her temples. “I’m going to try. With everything that’s happened, I may be too wired to sleep.”

  He released the door handle and settled back in his seat. “Last night had to be upsetting for you. It’s never easy to arrest someone you’ve known for years, but I thought you handled Ean Thornton well.”

  She exhaled, and her shoulders slumped. “I knew he would be angry over the search warrant and wouldn’t want to let us in his house, even though he really didn’t have a choice. But I didn’t expect the change that came over him when we found that gun in Mike’s room. I think for the first time Ean realized there was nothing he could do to make this go away.”

  Brock nodded. “I have to say I felt a little sorry for the guy when you were leading Mike to the car. I know it must be hard to see your son arrested.”

  Kate turned to stare at him. “I felt sorry for him, too, but then I got to thinking. If Ean had set some rules for Mike years ago, this might never have happened. I think Mike had gotten to the point he thought he could get away with anything.”

  Brock shook his head in disgust. “I see it all the time in my job, too. A young life wasted because he thought he was above the law. Now Mike doesn’t have anything to look forward to but a lifetime of prison.”

  “If he’s convicted.”

  “Don’t worry. No jury is going to let him off. Not with the evidence you’ve put together.” Brock opened the car door, stepped out and leaned down to stare into the car at her. “I’m glad Sheriff Baxter sent that deputy over to relieve you today. Now go home and get some sleep. I’ll meet you back at the station at five this afternoon when you go back on patrol, and I’ll ride with you all night.”

  She nodded and shifted into gear. “That sounds good. I’ll see you there.”

  Brock stepped back onto the curb and watched as Kate’s car disappeared down the street. He was about to walk toward the house when he spotted Dillon McAllister and Sam Burnett jogging toward him. Dillon ran about two paces in front of Sam, who seemed to be having trouble keeping up.

  They came to a stop next to him. Perspiration poured down Sam’s face, but Dillon’s orange Tennessee Volunteers T-shirt and running shorts looked as if they’d just come from the laundry. Sam bent over, propped his hands on his knees and wheezed. Dillon grinned and jerked a finger in Sam’s direction. “Sam and I went for a short run, but I think it’s about done him in.”

  Sam straightened and glared at Dillon. “Short? I feel like we covered half of the island.”

  Dillon laughed and slapped Sam on the back. “Half of the island?” He rolled his eyes at Brock. “We ran to the Sandwich Shop and spent most of the time sitting in there and waiting for Sam to catch his breath.”

  Brock glanced from one to the other and chuckled. “Next time just tell him you’ll meet him there, Sam.”

  “There won’t be any next time with this guy,” Sam muttered.

  Brock tried to stifle a yawn, but he couldn’t. He placed his hand over his mouth. “I’ve got to go, guys. I was up all night with Kate on patrol. I need to get some sleep.”

  Dillon nodded. “I can understand that. From what Grady said, it was a busy night.”

  Brock’s eyes widened. “Where did you see Grady?”

  “At the Sandwich Shop,” Dillon said with a shrug. “There were a lot of island residents in there, and he was telling everybody about the police arresting some boy last night for that murder on the beach. He said the emergency helicopter came from the mainland a while ago and brought a deputy to cover for Kate today while she’s getting some sleep.”

  Brock frowned and propped his hands on his hips. “What else did he say?”

  “That they took the boy back in the helicopter to the jail over at Swan Quarter. He said something about the boy’s father being upset.”

  Brock sighed. “Well, I guess the whole island knows by now about what happened last night.”

  “I expect you’re right,” Sam said. “The place was full of people. So, Kate’s gone home to sleep, but what about you? What are you going to do today?”

  Brock yawned again. “I’m going to bed and sleep, I hope. Then I’ll meet Kate late this afternoon to ride patrol with her again tonight.” He glanced at his watch. “So I think I’ll go upstairs and get in bed. Maybe I’ll see you later today.”

  Brock turned and walked across the yard and onto the porch of the bed-and-breakfast. As he opened the door, he glanced over his shoulder at Sam and Dillon. He could hear Dillon trying to persuade Sam to take one more jog down to the end of the street and back. Sam shook his head and limped toward the front porch. Dillon laughed and trotted down the street.

  Brock chuckled under his breath as he went inside and climbed the steps to his room. He stopped about halfway to the second floor and thought again about what the men had said about Grady talking to the crowd in the coffee shop.

  By now the word was out that Jake Morgan’s killer had turned out to be Mike Thornton, a kid who came from a family with deep roots on Ocracoke. All the time they had been so close to Jake’s killer and didn’t know it. The thought that they might also know Kate’s adversary worried him.

  Solving Jake’s murder had reinforced something he’d learned as a rookie policeman. You can’t overlook anyone in an investigation. Sometimes the one you least suspect turns out to be guilty in the end. That might hold true for the person who’d been terrorizing the island.

  From now on, no one was above suspicion.

  FIFTEEN

  At five o’clock that afternoon Kate walked through the door of the police station. Her head thudded like a bass drum behind her aching eyes. She came to a halt as she entered and stared at Lisa behind the dispatch desk.

  Lisa propped her elbow on the desk and tried to shield her eyes with her hand but not before Kate caught sight of the red eyes and swollen face. Kate eased across the floor and stopped beside her desk. She put a hand on Lisa’s shoulder. “Are you all right?”

  A wail escaped Lisa’s mouth. She folded her arms on her desk and buried her face in them. “I can’t believe it, Kate. Calvin, a thief and involved in Jake’s murder.”

  Kate flatted her hand between Lisa’s shoulder blades and rubbed in small circles. “I know,”
she crooned. “It’s hard for me, too, but it’s true. Calvin made his choices, and now he has to pay the price.”

  Lisa jerked her head up, and anger flashed in her eyes. “How could I have been so stupid? I thought he was the most wonderful man I’d ever met. I think I loved him, but I keep asking myself how I could have when he’s nothing but a…but a…”

  Kate nodded as Lisa searched for a word to describe Calvin. “He’s a crook, Lisa, and you have to remember that. He broke the law and violated the trust that the citizens of Ocracoke and the law enforcement community put in him. Keep that in mind.”

  Lisa pulled a tissue from a box on the corner of her desk and wiped at her eyes. “I’m trying, but it’s so hard. Maybe in time.”

  Kate thought of how she’d been trying to forget Brock for the past six years, and she hadn’t succeeded yet. She hoped Lisa had better luck than she had. She smiled. “We’ll get through this, Lisa.”

  The ringing of the telephone on Lisa’s desk startled Kate. Only nonemergency calls came in on that line, and Kate sighed. In the past few days she’d had to respond to more violent crime scenes than she would ever have believed. She could use a quiet call without any seriously injured victims.

  Lisa grabbed the receiver. “Ocracoke Sheriff’s Office. How may I help you?” She listened for a moment, scribbled something on a pad and nodded. “We’ll have an officer there right away, sir.”

  When she hung up, Kate leaned over to see what she’d written. “What was that?”

  Lisa handed her the paper she’d written on. “The man on the phone was calling to report a fender bender at the corner of Oyster Road and Forest Lane.”

  “Did he say who was involved in the accident?”

  “No. He said it wasn’t too bad, but he would need a police report for the insurance claim.”

  Kate turned and headed toward the door. “I’ll go take this report and be right back. Brock is meeting me here. When he arrives, tell him where I’ve gone and that I’ll be back as soon as I can.”