Cold Case Affair (12 page)

Muirinn sat back in the seat, a sense of looming, unavoidable disaster ahead as they came in to land at the Safe Harbor airstrip.

“I’m going to fly you out,” Jett said suddenly as the plane taxied to a stop on the grass.

“What?”

He helped her down from the plane. “I want you to pack your bags, and then I’m going to fly you to Anchorage, see if we can get you on standby to New York.”

“Why?”

He led her back to his truck. “Because this is more serious than I thought, Muirinn. And it would be safer for you and your baby to go home until this is settled.”

He yanked open the cab door, waited for her to get in. But she just stood and stared at him, dumbfounded. “Jett,” she said, “I told you, I’m not going back to New York. I’m staying in Safe Harbor for good. This is my
home
.”

Jett swallowed, tension beginning to roll off him in hot dark waves. “Please, get in.”

She climbed into his truck, her mind racing, and he slammed the passenger door closed.

He started the engine and drove her back to Mermaid’s Cove in unnatural silence, his features gray. “Please,
talk
to me, Jett,” she demanded. “What the hell is going on with you?”

“Nothing. I just want you and the baby to be safe.”

Urgency bit into Muirinn as he ushered her into his house. And she couldn’t take it anymore. She swung around to face him as they entered his house. “Jett—”

He waited, laser eyes burning into her.

“You don’t want me in New York because it’s safe,” she said, feeling as if she were going to the gallows with her next words. “You want me way out of the way while you deal with this, because you think your
father
might be involved.”

“Look, Muirinn, if you’re thinking my dad had anything to do with that bombing just because he has a limp, you’re way off base!” He tossed his flight jacket onto the sofa and thumped his shotgun onto the table. He was nervous. Edgy. He aimed his index finger at her, eyes glinting cold. “My
father tried to
save
your dad, but the security and the cops wouldn’t let him and his mine rescue crew in.”

“Why wouldn’t they let Adam in?” she urged softly.

He glared at her.

“Because he was a union stalwart, okay? I didn’t understand that when I was twelve, but I learned later it was because Adam Rutledge was a shop steward, and he was vehemently anti-scab labor. That made him an enemy of Troy O’Donnell, and an enemy of all those other men who crossed the picket line daily to earn a dollar to support their families, and to stop the banks from foreclosing on their mortgages.”

He vibrated with anger, eyes darkening at her accusations.

“There was a court injunction against Adam and the union executives, prohibiting them from being on Tolkin property, Jett. Remember that? And
that
is why they wouldn’t let him in to allegedly save my father.”

Jett lowered his voice dangerously. “That doesn’t make him a
murderer
, Muirinn.”

“So what size boots
does
he wear, Jett?”

Silence.

“How tall is he?”

Pulsing, darker silence.

“Jett, it does fit. Your father was an explosives expert. He worked that section of the mine before it was closed. And Chalky Moran had latched onto him—Adam was Chalky’s mentor, you said so yourself. Chalky could have been the accomplice, Jett. You also said Moran blood runs thick in this town. Think about it—why would Ike Potter, a rookie cop at the time, sit on those photos? Because it must have been a Moran who took them. And a Moran was also police chief at the time. Bill Moran could have destroyed Ike’s career. And
after Ike had left it so long, he must have gotten scared, because he’d have been implicated in a conspiracy to cover up mass murder if he’d come forward at a later stage.”

Jett paled, his skin tightening over his bones, his eyes growing dark and hollow. The clock in the kitchen ticked loudly, and Jett felt sick. All that old crap resurfacing from that dank hole in the earth.

Too many goddamn secrets.

Why had she come back anyway—just to dredge up all this old stuff again?

“Jett—” she reached to touch his arm, but he drew back sharply and shook his head. “Do not touch me, Muirinn.”

Hurt arrowed through her eyes. “I’m sorry, Jett,” she said softly. “I was just connecting the dots. The limp, the left leg injured—”

“No! No freaking way, Muirinn.”

“There’s one way to find out, Jett. You could at least speak to him.”

He swore again. Muirinn was forcing his mind to go where it didn’t want to go, where he
couldn’t
allow it to go. So he fought back instead, lashing out at her because he needed to strike out at the very idea itself.

“My father wouldn’t do it. He’s just not a murderer.”

“And what makes you so damn sure? Just how far might
you
go to protect
him?
As far as…” she paled suddenly as the implication hit her. She instinctively placed her hand over her belly. Jett’s expression tightened.

“What were you going to say, Muirinn?”

She shook her head, looking ill.

“You were going to say as far as trying to kill Gus? To shoot at
you?
”

Her mouth opened in protest.

But he raised his hand. “Don’t even
think
it, Muirinn. My dad is a savior, a
rescuer
—”

“Maybe your father is the reason Gus did not go straight to the FBI with Ike’s photos, Jett. Have you considered that? Maybe he wanted to be sure. Maybe Gus didn’t want to hurt you or your family. And his hesitation got him killed.”

Jett watched her hand on her belly, tore his eyes away and fixed them on her face instead. “My father,” he said very quietly, “could not have blown up the men he used to sit elbow to elbow with in the Miners Tavern—”

“He didn’t drink with those men during the strike, did he? When things started to get bad, when the town was divided, I’ll bet Adam started drinking down at the union hall, along with the other stalwarts.”

“Dammit! He did not try to cover this up! It’s inconceivable. My father would never, ever hurt Gus. Or you.” He stalked to the window, paced, dragging his hands over his hair. “For God’s sake, Muirinn, there is just no way in hell my dad would try to murder his own grandson’s mother!” He stalled as he realized what had just come out of his mouth.

He swung around, staring at her.

Her mouth opened slowly, and her face went ghostly white.

Time stretched, her eyes growing into huge dark-green pools of shock, horror.

“What did you say?” Her words came out hoarse.

He inhaled deeply, then released a heavy shuddering breath. “I said, my father would not harm his own grandson’s mother.” He paused. “The mother of my son.”

M
uirinn felt the blood rush from her head.

“I…I don’t understand.”

Desperation twisted into Jett’s face, and Muirinn’s gaze slid slowly over to the photo on the wall. She stared numbly at the image of a smiling Troy sitting on Jett’s lap in the cockpit of his de Havilland Beaver.

“Troy?” It was a rough sound that came from low in her throat. A sound she didn’t recognize as her own.

Jett said nothing, grief, angst, agony wrenching his powerful features. And Muirinn knew.

“How?” It was all that would come out.

“You gave him away.”

“How did you
know?
” she whispered hoarsely.

“After you told Gus that you were having a baby and had agreed to a private adoption, he called and told me. He gave me the name of the lawyer the adoptive couple was using.”

She swayed, catching the back of the sofa for balance, unable to speak, face muscles in a vise.

“I sold everything I could, Muirinn—my bike, my fishing gear, my boat—and I flew down to Nevada, and I fought for my son. I wasn’t going to see my boy, my own flesh and blood go to another family—”

“But
how
did you do it? How did you get him?” The words were barely a whisper.

He inhaled deeply. “I told the lawyer that I was the real father, that my child was being given away without my consent, and that I would fight for my rights every goddamn step of the way. The lawyer informed the adoptive couple, and they decided not to contest me. They didn’t want a child on those terms, Muirinn. And they released the baby into my care.”

Her stomach turned to water.

“And Kim?”

“I’d met her just after you left town—she’d come up here for a nursing job. We started dating, and she offered to fly with me to Nevada to get my son. I was grateful for her help, Muirinn. I was a twenty-two-year old guy who knew zip about infants. But Kim did.”

Emptiness, exclusion clawed at Muirinn’s insides. She’d been so terribly desperate, so alone and hollow after giving up her child. Missing her baby so terribly much. Meanwhile, Jett and some young nurse had him, warm in their arms. Without her knowledge. Tears swam into her eyes, blinding her, and they rolled down her face. She didn’t care.

Their son. Troy. Living here with his real dad in Safe Harbor all these years, right next door to her grandfather. The lost years, the lost potential, the sense of betrayal—it was too vast, too painful to comprehend.

“So my grandfather
knew
that Troy was my son, and living
here?” She couldn’t quite grasp that Gus had not once, not ever, told her any of this.

“Yeah, Muirinn, he knew. Gus told me you were having our baby because he didn’t want his grandchild being raised by some other family. He wanted to give me the tools to make my own choices, because he felt it was my right as a father. I think, Muirinn, that Gus truly believed I would contact you, talk some sense into you, bring you home and make things right. But I married Kim instead, while we were in Vegas. And when Gus found out, he let things be. He was just happy to be able to watch his grandson growing up next door, anonymously.”

The sheer scope of the deception—of Gus’s deception—was suddenly suffocating, drowning her.

“Why…why didn’t Gus tell
me
you had our son?”

“Maybe he would have if you’d ever bothered to come back to Safe Harbor to visit.” The bitterness in Jett’s voice sliced into Muirinn like a knife. “Or maybe he didn’t tell you because I ended up marrying Kim, and Gus didn’t want to mess with my marriage for Troy’s sake. Kim was a good mother, Muirinn. Maybe Gus didn’t want to force you to return out of some misguided sense of obligation and break up our family. Hell knows. Gus was different. He did his best. He wanted the best for you, too. He knew how desperate you were to escape this place, to ‘grow,’ he called it. He just wanted you to be free.”

“Why
did
you marry Kim?” she whispered, feeling utterly defeated. “So soon.”

“She loved me. I loved her back in my own way. I never thought I’d ever love anyone again the way I loved you, Muirinn. And I really needed her help with Troy. It was her idea to get married in Vegas, to return to Safe Harbor as a family, and it seemed right at the time.”

“And your parents?”

“They know. I told my mom and dad. How else was I going to explain the sudden appearance of a tiny baby in my life?”

Muirinn’s grip on the back of the sofa tightened as she felt her legs beginning to buckle.

“What about everyone else in town?”

Jett’s eyes pierced hers. “Safe Harbor has clearly been pretty damn good at keeping secrets and minding its own business. I personally never said anything to anyone, and no one ever asked anything about the baby, even if they did have their suspicions. Dr. Callaghan knew Troy wasn’t Kim’s child. But everyone treated her as his rightful mother.”

“Oh, God.” Muirinn moved around the sofa, and slumped weakly down onto it. She looked up through her tears. “What about Troy, what does
he
know?”

“He thinks Kim is his mother.”

“You lied to me,” she whispered, then lurched back to her feet. “You bloody hypocrite.
That’s
why you have custody of him, and Kim doesn’t! She isn’t his
mother.
”

“Don’t—” He pointed his index finger at her. “Do not go calling
me
a hypocrite.
You
hid Troy from me. You gave him away to strangers. You have no right to call
me
a liar.”

“How could you not tell me, even after we made love!”

“I needed to be sure.”

“Of what?”

“He’s ten years old, Muirinn. If I tell him that Kim is not his mother, everything he has thought to be true in his life will have be reevaluated. I’m not ready to turn his entire world upside down only to have you walk out on us again.”

“I told you I was going to stay!”

“Muirinn,” he said quietly, his hands trembling. “I still don’t know for sure that you mean it. God knows you felt nothing leaving before.”

She stared at him. “What do you want from me, Jett? What more can I do to make you trust me?”

He came up to her, took her hands in his. “I wanted time, Muirinn. Time to be sure that I wasn’t making a mistake in opening that door to talk to you about Troy.” His eyes bored hotly into hers. “And maybe part of me deep down felt that you needed to come clean first, and tell me what was my
right
to know—that you’d borne my child and given him up for adoption.”

“And
my
right?”

“What right? You
chose
to leave. You chose to give him away. You never tried to find him again.”

“I wasn’t allowed to! It was part of the adoption arrangement. What was I supposed to do, Jett, when I found out that our last night together made me pregnant? I had no choice. I was alone. I had nothing. You told me you hated my guts, and never wanted to see me again.”

“I said those things out of blind fury because you were abandoning everything we had, Muirinn!”

Her mouth tightened, and with the sense of betrayal surged anger. “All these years I could have watched him grow,” she said quietly, bitterly. “Stolen away because no one told me.”

“You didn’t come home. You never once looked back—”

“That doesn’t mean I didn’t regret having done what I did! Giving my baby away was the worst mistake of my life, and I have never stopped regretting it. If…” her voice hitched. “If I’d only known there was a way back, a way to set things right…”

His eyes glistened, emotion ripping at him, daring him to crumble and break.

She swore softly. “So it’s okay for you to have secrets, but not me?”

“I didn’t want to hurt Tr—

“Do you
honestly
think I’d hurt Troy?” she snapped. “Do
you think I wouldn’t move heaven and earth trying to do the right thing by my son? Do you think I purposefully set out to hurt you, or
anyone
else? If that’s the case, then to hell with you, Jett. Because I never stopped loving you.” Tears streamed fresh down her face as she pushed past him, stalked to the spare room, grabbed her bag and started shoving her things into it.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he said from the doorway.

“Getting out of your hair. Once and for all.”

He grabbed her arm as she marched past him. “Muirinn, wait. We need to talk about this—” but she shook him off with force. “Get your hands off me!”

He let her go, undeniable rawness shimmering in his eyes. Yet under all the pain, she could still see his love. And that made it hurt all the more. She felt like crawling into the abyss that had yawned open at her feet, and just curling up and dying.

She stormed into the living room and grabbed a shotgun and a box of shells from his gun rack.

“Muirinn—”

She slung her bag over her shoulder, flung open his front door and stormed out in the purple northern night.

“Muirinn, dammit, don’t be so stubborn. Get back in here!”

She halted in the driveway, turning around. “
Stubborn
?” She raised her hand palm up, warning him not to move one step in her direction. “If you come after me, Jett, I
will
shoot you.”

“It’s not safe out there.”

“And I’m safer with
you
? You’ve hidden my son from me for ten years, Jett.” Her voice shook. “What else are you hiding? The fact that your father killed my family?”

“My father is not involved, Muirinn.”

“Oh? Then you shouldn’t have any trouble asking him about it. Or are you going to just ignore it, sweep that under the carpet, too?”

“You’re doing it again, Muirinn! You’re running away instead of facing things—facing me—working this out with me!”

“Oh, be a man, Jett, and face your own damn father before you can talk about facing me!”

She stomped off down the path and disappeared into the grove of woods between their properties.

Panic seared through Jett, followed by a crushing wave of sheer desperation. He knew Muirinn’s temper—she
would
pull the trigger if he went after her now.

And he was worried about her baby, the stress he’d inadvertently put her under. Guilt beat at him. He still had to keep her safe, and he couldn’t call the cops. This thing had spiraled way out of control, and he had no idea who might be involved.

So he called one man he did trust—his friend, Hamilton Brock, an ex-Marine who’d served in two Gulf wars. More than anything, Jett trusted Brock with his life. Brock also volunteered for Safe Harbor Search and Rescue and he’d put his life on the line for the team more than once.

As always, Brock was game to help Jett out, and said he’d be right over. Jett thanked him and hung up the phone, thinking about how his father had also regularly put his life on the line for men trapped in the mine.

Then you shouldn’t have any trouble asking him about it. Or are you going to just ignore it, and sweep that under the carpet, too?

Muirinn was right. He had to talk to his father. Now. No matter what he discovered, he had to face this.

Jett waited in his truck at the top of Muirinn’s driveway for Brock to arrive. He wound down his window and stuck out his elbow as he saw Brock’s SUV approach.

“I left a message on her voice mail to say I was sending someone around. She didn’t pick up, but I’m pretty sure she heard it. She should be expecting you.”

Brock gave his twisted grin. “No problem.” He hesitated. “You okay, bud?”

“Yeah. You just keep an eye on her, okay? I’ll explain later.”

Brock reached out his window, smacked his palm on the hood of Jett’s truck. “No worries. She’ll be waiting for you, safe and sound when you get back.”

Jett drove to his parents’ house. The northern night was dusky, but not dark. There was no moon, and an eerie stillness.

He slammed on the brakes suddenly as a coyote darted out from a bush and froze in his headlights.

Heart hammering, Jett waited for the animal to gather its wits and trot into the trees before putting the truck in gear.

But the incident had rattled him further.

What else are you hiding, Jett? The fact your father killed my family…you going to sweep that under the carpet, too?

The deep gut-honest truth was that Jett
had
thought briefly of his father when Muirinn first showed him Ike’s photos, when she’d mentioned his dad’s kinship with Chalky Moran. And Jett
had
brushed those thoughts right under his mental carpet. He didn’t want to think it remotely possible that his dad might be the bomber, even though all the signs had been staring him in the face.

Could he have seen it years ago?

Had he subconsciously avoided facing the truth?

And how much better would that make him than the rest of the people who’d tried to bury the evidence—like Ike Potter or the cop who’d removed the photos?

Jett pulled his truck into his parents’ driveway and sat for a moment, fighting his worst fears.

He
had
to ask his father outright. No matter what the consequences. Because he’d said it himself to Muirinn, the time for secrets was over.

Jett banged on the door.

His mother opened it, belting her robe around her waist.

“Jett? What is it? Goodness, you look awful. Come on in.”

“I need to speak to Dad.”

Worry flared in her eyes. “What’s going on?”

Jett stepped past his mother and into the mudroom. He lifted up one of his father’s work boots just as his dad came through the living room.

“Jett?”

He didn’t reply. He turned the boot over, read the size on the Vibram sole. Size 10. His chest tightened.

He looked at his father.

Adam Rutledge stared at the boot in Jett’s hands, then lifted his eyes slowly and met Jett’s gaze. He said nothing, but Jett’s heart sank at the expression on his father’s face.

He put the boot down, marched into the living room, straight for the booze cabinet. “Want a drink, Dad? Because I sure as hell need one.” He poured two fingers of scotch and downed the shot. Eyes burning, he poured another.