Cop by Her Side (The Mysteries of Angel Butte) (23 page)

“Shit,” he said again, and grabbed his cell phone. “Raynor?” he said a moment later. “I think you need to move on Stillwell Trucking. Now.”

Relief transformed Jane’s face.

“You found the girl?” Raynor asked.

“We think so. One way or another, they’re going to know in the next two minutes that we’re onto them. I suspect Stillwell is on his way back to the office to begin that shredding we talked about.”

“Then we’ll beat him there.” Chief Raynor sounded satisfied. “Good luck.”

“Thanks.” Clay raised his eyebrows at Jane as he stowed the phone. “You ready?”

“Yes!”

Clay grabbed her, kissed her hard, then said, “Let’s do it.”

No one was visible now through the window upstairs. He saw no movement behind any others. He turned and ran, hearing Jane close behind. He stopped to one side of the open garage door and waited until she flattened herself on the other. Then, weapons drawn, they went in together.

The garage was utterly silent, a couple of overhead bulbs on, a small square of sunlight at the far end where there was a window. A white SUV was parked on the other side of the Lexus. At the back of the empty bay was a closed interior door.

Clay jerked his head toward it. Jane nodded. They moved swiftly and silently across the concrete floor. There were two steps up to the door. Clay went first, turning the knob slowly, easing the door open a crack. All he could see was a white interior wall.

“Arnett?” a man called, voice sounding hollow in the way they did in a building with high ceilings. “That you?”

“Yeah, I’m on my way up.” The second voice wasn’t coming from far away.

Clay opened the door and stepped into a hallway, turning with his weapon held ready in both hands. Jane followed. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her flatten a hand on the door to make sure it closed slowly and silently.

Clay didn’t even have to signal. They both moved down the hall to where they could see open space. A living room with vaulted ceiling, a vast kitchen and a slate-tiled entry all converged with a staircase.

In theory, he and Jane should clear this floor, make sure they weren’t leaving anyone behind them, but a driving sense of urgency told him they didn’t have time. He kept remembering looking at Glenn Arnett and
knowing
on a subliminal level that the guy was utterly cold-blooded. He might not want to murder a child; he’d raised two of his own after all. But he’d see the act as what he had to do to protect his children, his wife, the privileged life he had built.

The staircase was clear. Clay could hear voices upstairs now. Two? More?

He raised two fingers. Jane frowned and held up three. After a moment, Clay grimaced. They’d find what they found.

Too bad this wasn’t a mansion with a back staircase for the servants. They had no choice but to openly climb the stairs and hope no one hovered above in the hall.

Yeah, and hope Arnett didn’t head straight for wherever he had Bree stashed and shoot her before Clay and Jane could get that far.

The two of them climbed side by side. A faint creak came from under his feet, or maybe hers. They both froze momentarily. Heard nothing from above but low male voices.

Would
Arnett go for something as messy as a gunshot? This was his parents-in-law’s house. He was sophisticated enough to know it was difficult to impossible to ensure no trace of blood had seeped into a crack behind molding or soaked the carpet pad and subflooring beneath it.

Maybe he’d carry her out with the plan of doing it elsewhere.

There was a creak and a scraping sound. Somebody swore.

Jesus,
Clay thought. Chilled, it occurred to him that one twist of Arnett’s hands would break a seven-year-old child’s neck. From the alarm Clay saw on Jane’s face, she was thinking something similar.

Taller than her, he was the first to see the hallway. Empty.

“Clear,” he mouthed to her, and they took the last few steps faster, then started down the hall.

“Man, I don’t want anything to do with this,” a man’s voice said, close enough to raise the hair on Clay’s nape. “I thought we were going to let the kid go.”

“Yeah? You sure she hasn’t seen your face?”

The barrel of Jane’s Ruger swiveled toward the last doorway on their right. Master bedroom, Clay thought. It would have its own bathroom. Logical place to stash a hostage. Usually en suite bathroom doors didn’t have even a push-button lock. The door would open inward, though. The men had blocked it somehow from the outside. Removing that impediment was taking them the minute or two that kept them too distracted to watch out for anyone else entering the house.

Clay reached the door. Flattened himself against the wall beside it, Jane hovering. After a moment, he took a quick look. Only two men were visible. One—Arnett—had his back to Clay. The other had stepped aside, but had his head turned to watch Arnett, who was shifting a piece of plywood away from the doorway.

“This is a damned nuisance,” Arnett was grumbling.

“
You
think it’s a nuisance?” the second man said. “You’re not the one who had to drag that chest of drawers back and forth.”

Clay held up two fingers to Jane, but bent his head and murmured in her ear, “Can’t see the whole room.”

She nodded.

“I’ll go for them. You sweep the room.”

Another nod.

Clay went fast through the doorway to clear the way for Jane. “Police!” he said loudly. “Put your hands in the air!”

A gun went off. The bullet slapped into the wallboard so close, Clay felt the sting of wood and gypsum shrapnel. He didn’t let himself take his eyes from the two men who were his targets. At his back, Jane fired and Clay heard a grunt of pain. She was yelling something, but he ignored that, too.

The man with Arnett was snatching a handgun off the bed.

“Put the weapon down,” Clay ordered as he crossed the width of the bedroom. It lifted toward him and he squeezed the trigger. Once. Twice. The son of a bitch went down, the gun falling from his hand. Glenn Arnett had flattened himself with his back to the bathroom door and his arms over his head.

“Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot!”

“Down,” Clay snapped. He used his foot to shove the big black handgun under the bed, where no one could dive for it. “On the floor. That’s it. Spread-eagle.”

Once Arnett was facedown, his fingers gripped the pile of the oat-colored carpet tight enough to rip fibers free.

“You have cuffs?” Jane asked.

“Back pocket.” The scum sprawled a few feet away from Arnett was bleeding, but he wasn’t dead. Clay kept his weapon trained on both men.

He felt Jane’s hand slide into his pocket and pull the plastic handcuff ties out. Too bad he only had one set.

A moment later, he heard her voice. “Backup requested.” She was on the phone. He listened as she gave the address, told the dispatcher that two men had suffered gunshot wounds, aide cars requested.

The next moment she raced past Clay and around Glenn Arnett and reached for the bathroom doorknob.

Clay moved so he could cover all three men.

“Bree?” Jane called, her voice shaking. “Are you in there? It’s Aunt Jane. I don’t want to scare you coming in.”

The silence chilled Clay. He didn’t even want to know what it did to Jane.

What if she wasn’t here? What if—?

“Is it really you?” came a small voice.

A sob of relief escaped Jane and she shoved the bathroom door open. “Bree. Oh, Bree. Oh, my God. Look at you. Oh, Bree.” Tears thickened her voice. Clay saw her fall to her knees and then all but crawl to where a small figure was squeezed behind the toilet.

Clay felt a sting in his own eyes. Only the rage that filled him kept him from breaking down.

“You’re slime,” he said gutturally, when Arnett turned his head so he didn’t have to watch the reunion taking place within. “Your life as you know it is over.”

“I came to see what was going on in the house,” he cried. “This wasn’t me. It was Stillwell. He knew the house was empty and he’s been using it. I saw somebody upstairs—”

“Save the bullshit for your attorney.”

The first, distant sound of a siren came to Clay’s ears as he began, “You have the right to remain silent.”

* * *

J
ANE
SAT
ON
the bathroom floor, her back to a wall, and held her niece who clung to her as if she was a lifebuoy in a raging ocean.

Bree cried in horrible, gulping sobs of terror she had been suppressing. “I thought you’d
never
come!” she wailed at one point.

Jane knew her own cheeks were wet, too. “It took us a long time to find you,” she explained, then went back to murmuring things like, “Oh, Bree. I’ve been so scared.”

In her first, sweeping assessment, she hadn’t been able to tell whether the little girl had been hurt. Bree had looked so small, so skinny, her hair tangled and wild, her expression torn between disbelief and hope. And then she’d wriggled out from behind the toilet and thrown herself at Jane, the small body smacking against Jane’s and knocking her back on her butt.

Since then, all Jane could do was hold her and wait for the storm to abate. Thank God, Clay had remained in her line of sight, most of his attention on the three men he held at gunpoint, but every so often his gaze shifted to hers and she saw everything she felt in his eyes.

“Oh, sweetheart. Your mom and dad have been so scared, too. I can hardly wait to tell them you’re safe and coming home.”

Bree went very still before she rubbed her face on Jane’s T-shirt and cautiously peered up from between swollen lids. “Mommy isn’t dead?” she whispered. “I thought she was dead.”

“No.” Jane bent her head and kissed her forehead. “She was knocked out, and it was days before she woke up and could tell us what she remembered. But she’s going to be fine, Bree. I promise.”

“Oh.” The wiry body in her arms sagged and Bree laid her cheek back against Jane’s breast.

Voices brought her head up. The bedroom suddenly swarmed with EMTs and uniformed deputies. Glenn Arnett was pulled roughly to his feet, handcuffed and led away. The medics applied bandages to the two injured men, shifted them onto gurneys, lifted them and then they disappeared, too.

Jane realized with a funny feeling of panic that she had lost sight of Clay. But no sooner did she think that than he filled the bathroom doorway, something in his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Brianna Wilson,” he said, in an astonishingly gentle voice. He held out his phone. “I kind of thought the two of you might want to make a call.”

A spurt of tears blinded Jane. Coming into the bathroom and crouching right beside them, Clay gave a low chuckle. “How about if I get Bree’s daddy on the line for you?”

Jane’s head bobbed. Bree was staring at Clay with that same look of dazed hope.

A moment later, Jane heard a ring, then a second. On the fourth, Drew answered.

“Sergeant Renner?” His voice sounded far away.

Clay carefully wrapped Bree’s fingers around the phone. She raised it to her ear.

“Daddy?” she whispered. “Daddy, it’s me.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“J
ANE
FOUND
B
REE
.” Drew stood beside his wife’s bed. His voice was rough with emotion. “She’s okay, Lissa. She’s safe.”

She stared at him incredulously. Tears welled in her eyes and began to overflow, dripping toward her ears and the pillow. “Then it’s all over?” she whispered.

“Over?” He really never had known this woman. It was odd to feel such a strange detachment where she was concerned. “It’s not over for Bree. Who knows what they did to her? What aftereffects she’ll suffer?” He made a gruff sound. “For me? No, I think it’s safe to say nothing will ever be the same for me. It’s not even over for your sister, or for Sergeant Renner. They both shot and wounded men to rescue Bree. They took some chances today and their careers may be impacted.” His jaw muscles flexed. “And it’s especially not over for you, Liss. You admitted to extortion. Chances are good you’ll be arrested, tried and convicted. No juror or judge is going to be sympathetic, not after hearing that you knew your employer was running illegal drugs and, instead of going to authorities, you decided you deserved a cut of the money he was earning.”

Her mouth worked. Shock and the sheen of tears made her eyes even more beautiful. Drew was not moved.

“But...I thought...”

“What? That Sergeant Renner would feel sorry for you because you got banged on the head and had to worry about your daughter for a few days?”

He didn’t remember ever stunning her speechless before.

“I’ve got to go,” he said. “Bree’s being brought into the emergency room. Jane wants her checked over. I need to be there when she arrives.”

Jane herself wasn’t coming with Bree. Because they’d discharged their weapons, she had explained, both she and Clay had to stay on scene. A young female deputy was bringing Bree. Jane had promised to follow as soon as she could.

“Will you bring her...?” Lissa pleaded.

“Yeah. Bree will want to see you. She told me she thought you were dead.”

His back was to her when she said, “I thought I was doing the right thing for us.”

Drew closed his eyes for a moment, swallowed and turned. He felt so much he couldn’t identify it all, and yet at the same time was curiously empty of the emotions he might expect to feel.

“Nothing you did was for us.” Her face was stricken, stunned again; he wondered if it was all an act. “There hasn’t been any ‘us’ for a long time, has there, Lissa?”

“But...does this mean you’re...you’re
leaving
me?” The way she had to fumble for words, he could tell this much shock was genuine.

Until now, he hadn’t even known he’d decided. Not that long ago, he’d thought if she regained consciousness and Bree was home safe, he could forgive Lissa anything. He’d been wrong.

“Yes, I am. Not right away. As long as you’re out on bail, you can stay at the house. In the guest room. We’ll try to figure out how to pay for an attorney for you. But the house is going up for sale as soon as I can get it listed. The next decent job offer I get, I’m taking. And when I move, the girls are going with me. You’re not a fit mother,” he finished, flatly.

“You can’t—” Washed with tears, her face contorted.

“I can,” he said, and walked out on her. It was like ripping away a body part. Excruciatingly painful, and yet...freeing.

They had been married for nine years, and she was a stranger.

He left ICU, his steps hastening until he was almost running. Bree was safe. He would soon be able to hold her.

Miracles happened.

* * *

S
EVERAL
EXHAUSTING
HOURS
LATER
, night had fallen when Clay walked Jane to her SUV, which had been moved by a deputy from the neighbor’s property to the long driveway of the Taylor house.

Things would have gone much worse, she was convinced, if Alec Raynor hadn’t arrived to support Jane by his mere presence and to assure Clay’s lieutenant that, yes, he had loaned Lieutenant Vahalik to a joint operation. He kept repeating that he knew it was unusual to allow her to participate in an investigation on a matter pertaining to her own family, but he had felt confident she would maintain her professionalism. He’d explained that, in conjunction with Sergeant Renner and Lieutenant Vahalik’s recent actions, Captain McAllister and a team had moved on Stillwell Trucking and Glenn Arnett’s home, using already secured search warrants. He had added that he understood Mr. Arnett’s laptop computer was providing a wealth of information that suggested illegal activities, or, at the very least, evidence that considerable income had been hidden from Internal Revenue Service scrutiny. Word had gone out to the state patrol in five states suggesting that any trucks belonging to the company be stopped and thoroughly searched, preferably using drug-sniffing dogs.

She and Clay had been asked to explain every move they had made over the past several days, every decision made, every thought, then had to repeat themselves. And do it again. She had a suspicion they would both have been in deep shit were it not for the obviously successful result of their impromptu rescue operation. Bree was safe with her father. After the length of time she’d been missing, nobody had really believed she would be recovered alive.

It helped, too, that all three men she and Clay had brought down were vociferously blaming each other and James Stillwell. Or that Jane and Clay both had heard one of the men insist he wanted no part in hurting Bree, while Arnett had retorted, “You sure she hasn’t seen your face?”

Stillwell had been picked up and, of course, was proclaiming ignorance of all activities concerning Melissa Wilson, her missing child and the evidence that his company’s trucks had been moving unnamed cargo on a regular basis. He insisted Mrs. Wilson was lying, that the checks he had written to her were loans, as he had described to Sergeant Renner. Nobody was very interested in his denials. How much of the extra income had made its way into his own bank accounts would be uncovered by forensic accountants.

Arnett’s wife was reportedly in shock.

Thank God, Jane and Clay had finally been allowed to leave. She didn’t remember ever having been so exhausted. Her knees were actually wobbly. Alec Raynor had walked partway out with them, bent his head in what looked like respect and said, “Good work tonight, Jane, Clay,” after which he’d gotten into his SUV and departed.

Clay had asked her for a lift to his Jeep, which was still tucked away somewhere down the road. Thus Jane turned right out of the driveway rather than toward town. A moment later, her headlights picked out the glint of metal, where his vehicle was pulled into a mostly overgrown track that went nowhere.

She pulled in behind it.

Clay looked at her, the dashboard lights doing little to illuminate the craggy planes of his face. “Will you come home with me, Jane?”

“I promised Bree—”

“You can’t tell me she isn’t tucked into bed by now.”

“And there’s Lissa,” she said weakly.

Clay didn’t say anything.

Somehow she hadn’t expected the moment of truth to arrive so soon. She’d dimly thought Clay would call tomorrow and ask her out. But
her
truth was that she wanted nothing else in the world right now so much as to go home with him. To climb into bed with him, make love with him, wake in the morning with him.

“Let me call Drew,” she said, then waited a suspicious moment to find out whether Clay would get bullish and possessive.

He only nodded.

Drew answered right away. “Bree’s asleep,” he reported. “She asked Alexis to sleep with her. They’re all cuddled up together.”

“She’s really all right.”

“Yeah.” He sounded as bemused and jubilant both as she felt. “According to the doctor, there’s no sign she was molested or that anyone hit her. She lost some weight. Sounds like they only fed her once a day. Given that she was in a bathroom, she did a pretty good job keeping herself clean. She even found a toothbrush. No hairbrush or comb, though. It took me a while to work the knots out of her hair.”

“Did Lissa get to see her?”

“It was quite a reunion.” He was quiet for a moment. “Our marriage is over, Jane.”

Understanding tangled with grief. “I thought it might be.”

“I told her she can expect to be arrested. I’ll do my best to help with legal expenses, but otherwise I’m done.”

Despite everything, tears stung Jane’s eyes. “I don’t blame you.”

“I expected to hear from you sooner. You’re not in trouble, are you?”

“I’m not sure yet,” she admitted. “But I don’t think so. Clay might be in more trouble for letting me get involved the way he did.”

“Tell him thank you,” her brother-in-law said, voice husky. “If not for him—”

“I’ll tell him.” Her decision wasn’t all that hard to make. “I’m spending the night at his place.”

“I thought you might be.” She heard resignation in Drew’s voice. “Bree’ll want to see you in the morning.”

“I want to see her, too. Um...you know she’ll probably have nightmares.”

“They’re both tucked into my bed. I wanted them close tonight.”

“I’ll see you in the morning, then.”

“I owe you thanks, too, Jane.”

“No. I love Bree, you know that.”

“I do know.” His voice had softened. “See you.”

She ended the call and looked at Clay. “Okay.”

“Good.” He smiled. “Follow me?”

She nodded dumbly, even as she wondered what had happened to all her doubts about him. Did she really believe he’d changed so much from the man who’d stood in the bull pen summing up the size of her breasts with his hands while verbally reducing her to nothing but a sex object?

He leaned over, kissed her cheek and got out, striding into the deeper shadows where he had parked.

Yes.
Yes, she trusted him.

Jane didn’t even want to think about how much he could hurt her if it turned out she was wrong.

* * *

“I
S
IT
CRASS
of me to tell you I’m starved?” Clay asked, as soon as he let them in his front door. He wanted her desperately, but something told him they both needed to decompress.

“I gave thought to detouring through a fast-food place. Lunch is a distant memory.”

“Let me see what I’ve got.” He led the way to the kitchen, conscious of a deep sense of satisfaction that she was here and apparently prepared to stay the night.

Was it too soon to ask if she’d stay
every
night from here on out?

Was he sure that was what he wanted?

Stupid question; he was pretty sure he’d been a goner from his first sight of her face. Look how long he’d been celibate, waiting for her.

They decided on a lasagna from the grocery store freezer case, agreeing that the speed it could be heated in the microwave trumped all other considerations. Jane made a salad while he sliced a loaf of sourdough bread, buttered it and rubbed it with a clove of garlic he’d crushed.

Watching him, she smiled impishly, that small dimple appearing. “And here I thought you were the kind of man who’d use garlic salt.”

“Gourmet all the way, that’s me.”

She made a face at him. “Is this the moment to confess that, ninety percent of the time, I eat microwaveable meals?”

“Too late. I know you can cook.”

“You know...? Oh, the spaghetti.”

“Gave yourself away.” The microwave dinged and he slid the lasagna in its disposable plastic container onto a cork-backed tile and carried it to the table.

A minute later, they were both dishing up and diving in. Clay kept an eye on her, glad to see the stress falling away as she ate and also sipped cautiously at the merlot he’d opened.

She’d eaten only half the food on her plate when she suddenly set down her fork. “I can’t believe we found her. I wouldn’t let myself consciously think it, but—”

Even now, she couldn’t say it.

“You thought she was dead. That we were too late.”

“Didn’t you?”

Clay shook his head. “No. You put your finger on it when you pointed out that Stillwell and Arnett were amateurs, in a way. They were committing a crime, but bloodlessly, from a distance. Add some extra truck runs, turn a blind eye, put the money through some gymnastics so its origins weren’t obvious. Your sister didn’t use her head when she thought she could manipulate them, though. They only had three choices at that point—pay her, potentially forever, shut down the illegal part of the business and lose that really nice extra money, or shut her up. Even then, I’m betting they were too squeamish to talk about killing her. ‘Take care of her’ was probably as blunt as their vocabulary got.”

“It was Arnett who was supposed to do it, wasn’t it?”

“That’s my guess,” he agreed. “Don’t know if anybody has found a gun yet, or whether he had something else in mind. Maybe figured he could make her death look like an accident. When she didn’t keep the rendezvous and instead kept right on going, he probably panicked. Seeing her go off the road, that must have looked like providence. Given just a minute, he could have smashed her head a little harder against the glass, broken her neck, who knows.”

Jane shuddered. “But instead, he discovered she hadn’t come alone.”

“Worse yet, Bree must have jumped out when she saw her mom unconscious and bleeding and scrambled up to the road. He might have killed her, too, tossed her down the bank, then finished off your sister. Only instead, he’s suddenly got these hikers popping out down the road and running along the shoulder toward him. Another car’s coming. All he can think to do is grab Bree, stuff her in the trunk and take off. He’s sweating and praying Lissa is dead.”

“But then they find out she’s not.”

“Right. They deluded themselves that Bree was insurance, until reality sank in and they realized there was no way they could ever let this kid go. Bree probably did see Arnett before he grabbed her, and she might even have recognized him from one of those company picnics.”

“I’m assuming somebody has asked her questions by now.”

“It doesn’t really matter whether she recognized him or not. How could he be sure? What if he’d screwed up and there was something in the bathroom, like an old prescription bottle with his mother-in-law’s name on it? As frantic as he was by then, I doubt he did much but toss her in there, figure out how to keep her from getting out and then call his boss to confess to a disaster in the making.”