Cold River (27 page)

G
rit, Jo and Myrtle arrived back in Vermont and took a table at O’Rourke’s. Grit knew the call coming in on his cell phone—although the screen didn’t say so—was from the son of the vice president of the United States. Charlie Neal was supposed to be back under the thumb of an ever-watchful Mark Francona, who’d told Grit he would personally arrest him if he had anything more to do with any of the vice president’s offspring.

Grit answered anyway. “I’m right,” Charlie said. “There’s a firebug out there.”

“Lots of firebugs.”

“It looks as if Kyle Rigby and Melanie Kendall were responsible for the bulk of the hits Lowell Whittaker arranged. Lowell hired them to kill Myrtle Smith’s Russian friend, Andrei Petrov, on behalf of a former KGB agent. Did you know that?”

Grit was aware of Jo Harper frowning at him in that Secret Service–agent way of hers. He chose his words carefully. “Just heard.” In fact, he thought, Jo had been the one to tell him. He said, “I have to go.”

Charlie sighed. “Agent Harper’s there, isn’t she? Okay. Just listen, then. The KGB agent could have done the job
himself but he didn’t want to take the chance. Have someone poison Petrov’s toothpaste. Keep things simple.”

“Sometimes simple works. Sometimes it doesn’t.”

“Only no one expected Myrtle. Ms. Smith, I mean,” Charlie said. “She was closing in on the assassins’ network. Lowell had our firebug torch her office to destroy her notes.”

Grit didn’t argue. “Okay, fine.”

“The police can’t pin the fire on Kyle Rigby or Melanie Kendall because they weren’t responsible for it.”

“Right.”

“Jasper Vanderhorn was killed by this firebug.” Charlie paused to take a breath. “I’m serious. It won’t matter that this network’s been shut down. Firebugs don’t like to stop. They prefer to work alone.”

“Where are you now?” Grit asked him.

“Conor and I are setting up for another airsoft game. Dad’s letting us play again. He thinks it’ll keep us out of trouble if we have something to focus on.”

“Will it?”

“This firebug is a murderer, Petty Officer Taylor.”

“So when you get the wrong answer on a test, do you argue with your teacher until she proves you wrong?”

“Only if I know I’m not wrong. Want to come play airsoft with me sometime?”

Grit heard a sudden tentativeness in the kid’s voice and realized the invitation was sincere. “Yeah, sure. Be good in the meantime.”

“Always.”

After Charlie disconnected, Grit set his phone back on the table. Jo was eyeing him as if she were a split second from whipping out handcuffs and arresting him. He said, “I meant lightning bugs. I don’t know why I said firebugs. Lots of lightning bugs out there in the Vermont wilderness.”

“Not in January, Grit.”

“Buy you a beer, Agent Harper?”

She relaxed some. “I’m not conflicted,” she said quietly.

He knew what she meant. “Okay.”

“Elijah and I will figure out what’s next. Together. Lives, careers, families. Half the fun is the complexity of it all.”

“You weren’t even tempted to move back to your low ceilings and dead plants and forget him? Hit the reset button on your life?”

“No.”

“You thought about it, though.”

“I’ll take that beer, Petty Officer.”

Grit noticed he had another message from Admiral Jenkins suggesting he report for duty at the Pentagon in three days. A suggestion from a four-star admiral was another way to say “order.” Grit texted him back: Aye-aye. He hit Send, then texted him again: Sir.

If he were about to start work at the Pentagon, some things had to get straightened out right from the start. He wasn’t the same Navy SEAL he’d been a year ago. It wasn’t a question of better or worse. Just different.

Myrtle joined him and Jo at their table. Myrtle had on leather gloves the color of her eyes and was bitching about the cold. “Seriously, Myrtle,” Grit said, “I’ve got to get you to the Florida Panhandle and introduce you to tupelo honey.”

Sean, Elijah, A.J. and his wife, Lauren, and Beth and Zack Harper all turned up, dragging chairs over so that they all could sit at the same table. A few minutes later, Hannah arrived on her own. Sean rose immediately and pulled a chair up to their table for her. She thanked him. She was reserved and quiet but not as self-conscious as Grit had seen her since he’d first arrived in Black Falls. She just, he thought, wasn’t sure she belonged there with the Camerons and Harpers.

“My father told me about your father,” Jo said, less com
bative. “I didn’t look him up. He also said your dad’s death was an accident.”

Her comment seemed to come out of the blue, but not, as far as Grit could see, to Hannah. It was something she seemed to need to hear and Jo seemed to need to tell her. “Your father, Jo—”

“He was the first law enforcement officer on scene after the accident. Your dad wasn’t in any trouble and hadn’t been since your brothers were born. I know you know that,” Jo added. “I just want you to know that I do, too.”

Liam O’Rourke delivered a round of drinks on the house. “Your dad was the love of your mom’s life, Hannah. She missed him, but she carried on without him.”

Hannah finally spoke. “My mother, Devin, Toby and I all had some good times together.” She seemed to consider whether she should reveal this much of herself. “Before she died, she asked us to remember her and love her always but to have good times again. We have, too. We’ve had some great times.”

Grit understood what she was saying, and he thought everyone at the table did, too. The people who’d known and loved Drew Cameron best, especially his four children, would miss him, but they’d have good times again.

Liam set the glasses on the table and addressed Hannah. “I remember you out on the common with Devin and Toby when you were first trying to get them under control. You had the snowball fight from hell. They had you outnumbered, and they were sneaky little rascals, but you didn’t back down.”

Elijah raised his glass and grinned. “That’s our Hannah.”

She said nothing, just smiled as she sat close to Sean, his two older brothers right there.

Jo glanced at Grit, then grinned at the three Cameron brothers. “Speaking of snowball fights…” she said, taking a sip of her beer and rising. “Who’s game?”

Elijah was the first to his feet and led the way, all of them ending up on the town common, across from Three Sisters Café.

Snow was falling, just wet enough to hold together.

Grit knew who threw the first snowball, but he was an outsider and didn’t say. Even Myrtle joined in with her purple gloves.

Rose arrived a few minutes after the snowball fight started and walked across the common with her golden retriever. She didn’t say a word, just scooped up a handful of snow, fashioned it into a fist-size snowball and hurled it, striking Sean in the shoulder. He pivoted and nailed her with a snowball of his own.

Ranger obviously loved snow and dived into the fun.

Grit didn’t love snow, but when he got beaned by an unrepentant Jo Harper, he made his first snowball.

When he threw it at her, he realized they both were laughing.

Bowie entered O’Rourke’s. Sean had spotted him after the snowball fight had broken up, with no clear winners, and come over by himself. It was late, and he was tired. Hannah had gone home to take a hot shower, complaining—teasing—because her apartment didn’t have a bathtub.

Liam tapped a thick finger on the bar. “Any punches thrown in here will be mine. Understood?” He turned back to his work before either Sean or Bowie responded.

Bowie sat on the stool next to Sean. “You’re thickheaded, Cameron, but you and your brothers didn’t do anything stupid that night.”

“None of us would have let Hannah get hurt.”

“Or hurt anyone,” Bowie said dryly. “Thanks for saving my life today.”

“I like to think you’d have done the same for me.”

“Yeah.” Bowie grinned at Sean. “Probably.”

“My father didn’t come to any of us with his concerns. My brothers, Rose, me. You. I wish he had. He was in Washington talking to Ambassador Bruni and never said a word to Jo, just had her go with him to see the cherry blossoms.”

“What could any of you have done?”

“Hiked up the mountain with him in April. Been there when those two came after him. Stopped them.”

“Yeah,” Bowie said. “You could have done that. Me, too.”

Sean hesitated, knowing he was on difficult ground now. “I need to ask you, if my sister were in danger, would you tell me?”

“In a heartbeat.”

“Those cretins that night weren’t just talking about Hannah, were they?”

“I don’t give a damn who they were talking about.”

Sean decided to leave it there. “So why am I ‘thickheaded’?”

“Hannah. You’ve been out of reach for her since you were kids. She only had to prove herself to herself. The rest of us know she’s too damn good for you.”

“It’s true.”

“You may have left Black Falls, but it’s never left you. I figure you had some proving to do. I also figure you made all that money for a reason.”

“And that would be?”

Bowie grinned. “To spoil Hannah Shay.”

January 8—Black Falls, Vermont

H
annah delivered warm shepherd’s pie to the McBanes, then walked across the road to the cemetery. Sean had once again returned to California. She could have gone with him, but in light of everything that had happened, she wanted him to have a chance to get his head clear back in the place he’d lived since college. She ached to see him again, and she was downright desperate to see her brothers, but the practicalities of her own life had swarmed over her.

She needed to hire help at the café, and she needed to start some serious studying for the bar.

There was also that to-do list of house repairs to tackle.

She found Bowie collecting the last of his stuff from outside the crypt. “Need any help?” she asked him.

“Sure, Hannah. Pick up that hundred pounds of granite over there and carry it to my van, will you?”

“Funny, Bowie.”

He grinned at her. “Grit Taylor was up here, and he and Reverend McBane and I were talking, and we figured out that some women are like sisters. It’s just the way it is.
Some aren’t.” He looked at Hannah and winked. “You and Rose? For me? Sisters.”

“So who would be under ‘not sisters’?”

He sidestepped her question with another grin. “Judge Robinson thinks Southern California could be a good place for you to study.”

“Do you know everything that happens in this town?”

“I didn’t know we still had killers on the loose, but everything else? Yeah.”

When Hannah arrived back at the café, Rose, Dominique, Beth and even Jo were gathered in the kitchen. Rose grabbed a folder and opened it up on the worktable. “I have airline points. I know you don’t do tips here, but people insisted. Liam O’Rourke even got in on it with tips from his place. Anyway, we’ve pooled our resources, and we’ve made our decision. We’re sending you to Los Angeles.”

“You leave tomorrow,” Beth said.

Hannah was overcome. “Thank you. You’re all too generous.”

“None of us wants to go to Los Angeles,” Rose said, then added quickly, “Sean would arrange for a private plane for you—”

“This is perfect,” Hannah said.

Dominique produced an envelope. “And here’s cash for a shopping spree on Rodeo Drive. We expect receipts. No sneaking off to a discount store—and no spending it on your brothers.”

“It’ll be a minor shopping spree compared to some Rodeo Drive has witnessed,” Beth said. “But have fun. We’ll handle the café. It’s been quiet.”

“Thank you again.”

“I can help stand in for Hannah here at the café,” Jo said. “Beth and I really are sisters, so we’ll uphold the name.”

“No.” Beth was horrified. “We’d kill each other. Back to D.C. with you before the Secret Service fires you. You’re not done, and neither is Elijah. Vermont is here. Lake, home, cabins, land. None of it’s going anywhere.”

Rose said, “Myrtle Smith suggests the two of us switch off subbing as the third sister.”

Dominique pointed her knife to the cash. “She contributed to the shopping spree and included a note on stores she recommends.”

Leave it to Myrtle, Hannah thought, amused. Myrtle had surprised everyone by not returning immediately to Washington. Grit Taylor was gone, at least for the moment, rumored to be assigned to the Pentagon.

There was even a note in Rose’s folder from Everett Robinson telling Hannah she could e-mail him with study questions, unless she decided to do something else with her life. “Want what
you
want, Hannah,” he wrote, “not what you think you should want, or what someone else wants. Including me.”

What she wanted right now, more than anything else in the world, was to be in Southern California with her brothers—and, she thought, a certain smoke jumper turned multimillionaire.

January 10—Beverly Hills, California

“T
his isn’t the right hotel,” Hannah said.

“Yes, it is.” Nick Martini stopped at the front door of the Beverly Hilton, a sprawling hotel built in 1955, its “retro chic” decor calling up glamorous images of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. “The one you picked out is a fleabag.”

She’d insisted on booking a motel for herself. She wasn’t entirely sure of the effects of being back in California on Sean, if he felt the same way about her. She didn’t want to box him in. Or herself.

“I don’t care,” she told his fellow smoke jumper, who was, she’d duly noted, in his own way as irresistibly sexy as Sean was. No wonder Rose was doomed.

Martini ignored her and typed on his iPhone.

“Who are you texting?”

“Sean,” Nick said. “I’m telling him your coach is about to turn back into a pumpkin and I’m out of here. You’re from the sticks. You like pumpkins, don’t you?”

Hannah wasn’t succumbing to his charms and said, nonchalant, “Rose says hello.”

“No, she doesn’t.”

“You’re right. She doesn’t.”

Nick kept typing.

“Her brothers don’t know about you two,” Hannah said. “Sean included.”

“Blackmailing me?”

She sat up straight. “Wait. Maybe
I
don’t know.”

He grinned at her. “Some kind of hanging judge you’ll make.”

“Rose is one of my best friends. She doesn’t tell me everything, but enough. I just want to say her brothers wouldn’t be pleased if someone took advantage of their grieving sister.”

“By ‘wouldn’t be pleased’ you mean ‘kill dead.’ How is Rose?”

His dark eyes had softened. Whatever had gone on between Rose and Nick, he was worried about her now. Or doing a decent job of pretending to be. “I don’t know,” Hannah said. “She keeps to herself a lot these days.”

“I would, too, with three older brothers and all that’s happened this past year. All set. Climb out. Enjoy yourself.”

“I can’t afford to stay in this place for two hours, never mind one night.”

Martini grinned at her. “No, you can’t.”

Hannah realized her mistake. “I’ve been set up, haven’t I?”

“Nice to meet you, Hannah. I hope you never have to prosecute me for so much as a speeding ticket in Vermont. How cold is it there?”

“Seven degrees when I left.”

He grinned at her. “You’re going to love Southern California. Welcome.”

Hannah got out and grabbed her suitcase from the back. A sign in the elegant lobby indicated that many of the well-dressed people streaming out of the hotel had just attended a fund-raising dinner for volunteer firefighters.

Sean appeared behind an older couple. Her breath caught at the sight of him in his tuxedo. This was another Sean Cameron from the one she knew. He smiled at her. “Am I seeing things, or is that Hannah Shay?”

“Hello, Sean.”

He picked up her suitcase. “You’re staying with me.” When she started to protest, he shook his head. “No argument. I’m irritable enough being in this damn tux. Let’s go.”

“Sean, I appreciate the gesture—”

“Let’s go.”

She grinned at him. “Ah, yes. I know these Camerons when they get that stubborn set to their jaws. No point arguing.”

Sean softened his expression. “I’m trying to be hospitable.”

“Hospitable is ‘Hannah, I’d love to invite you to stay at my house.’”

“Hannah,” Sean said, repressing a smile, “I’d love to invite you to stay at my house. I have plenty of room, and it’d be a pleasure.”

She laughed. “That’s better, but I can’t—”

“You can,” Sean said.

“For Devin’s sake, then. I think he’s a little homesick.”

“He’s gone mountain biking with Toby for a few days.”

Hannah smiled in amused disbelief. “Okay. So he’s not even a little homesick.”

“Nick and I encouraged him to see some of California and get in shape if he wants to be a smoke jumper. Toby doesn’t want to admit how excited he is to have you here for his upcoming race.”

“I’m excited, too.”

The valet brought Sean’s car, and he opened the front passenger door for Hannah. She hesitated, but he put his arm on her shoulder and she got in. A woman who obviously knew him waved from the walk as she switched from her high heels to a pair of running shoes. “That’s the way
to do heels.” Hannah looked over at Sean. “You fit right in with that tux.”

“Different uniforms for different occasions.”

“I don’t have that many excuses to dress up. It’s fun sometimes. We’re having a Valentine’s Day celebration at the café. I’ll dress up for that.” Her eyes sparked with sudden humor. “I might even buy a pair of ruby-red high heels on Rodeo Drive and wear them.”

“It’s not helpful for my driving,” Sean muttered, “picturing you in red high heels.”

“Beth and Dominique want us to wear red aprons. Red aprons and red high heels. Kind of sexy, don’t you think?”

Sean cleared his throat and kept driving.

Devin had described Sean’s house in detail, and Hannah was prepared. He showed her to a quiet room on the first floor, and she set her suitcase in the middle of the floor and looked restless. “If you packed a swimsuit,” Sean said, “feel free to make use of the pool. It’s heated.”

Sean waited, restless, by the pool. Finally Hannah walked out onto the terrace in an oversize T-shirt, with her slim, pale white New England winter legs. It was a warm night for Los Angeles in January but still relatively cool. She didn’t seem to notice as she dipped a toe in the pool. Her toenails were painted watermelon-pink.

Sean smiled. “You knew what you were getting into coming out here.”

“So I did.”

Without a second’s hesitation or a hint of self-consciousness, she dove into the still, blue water. Sean watched her breaststroke underwater, her movements strong and sure. She surfaced, splashing him, laughing.

“You’re going to ruin my tux,” he said.

“Then maybe you should take it off.”

He needed no more encouragement and was out of it in seconds and into the water, swimming to her, his mouth finding hers. “Don’t say anything,” he whispered.

She eased her arms around him. “I have to say this one thing.” Her eyes held his as she continued. “I’d never have made it these past seven years without the support I received from so many people. Sean…” She kissed him lightly. “I often thought I was alone, but I never was.”

He couldn’t breathe. “Hannah…”

“I love you,” she said. “In some ways, I always have.”

He smiled. “I know what you mean. Latin class…” He was aware of her slipping off her swimsuit and was glad they were in five feet of water and not ten, or he was sure he’d have drowned. “I love you, Hannah. I want to be with you. Here, Vermont—wherever you are.”

“Home is Vermont,” she said, “but this is good. The pool, the bougainvillea, the sunshine.
You
.” Her swimsuit was gone now, and she wrapped her legs around his hips and sank onto him. “This is very good.”

“It is,” Sean said, knowing there was nowhere he’d rather be at that moment than right where he was, with Hannah Shay in his arms.