Seconds to Live (Scarlet Falls) (7 page)

Chapter Nine

Stella blinked and turned away as Mac tugged his shirt over his head. Staring at the man’s bare chest, no matter how fine, was beyond inappropriate.

It was, however, perfectly professional to be excited about the prospect of a real conversation with the mysterious Mac Barrett, one in which he did not spend every second evading her questions. She’d been exhausted when she’d left the Millers’ house, but the prospect of getting to know Mac better had energized her. A little caffeine would keep her going for a couple of hours, long enough to satisfy her curiosity. His family seemed to think he was scatterbrained, but Stella knew there was more to Mac than he allowed to show on the surface.

A nurse came in with discharge papers and a small prescription bottle. Mac ignored the bottle and shoved the folded papers in the back pocket of his cargo pants. As he headed for the door, Stella picked up the medicine.

“I won’t need those,” he said over his shoulder.

Stubborn man.

“But you’ll have them if you do.” She slipped the bottle into her pocket.

He was in front of her, so she felt rather than saw his amusement.

They left through the sliding doors. The rain had stopped, but humidity hung in the air. Crickets chirped as they crossed the parking lot and climbed into her cruiser.

Stella started the engine. “When did you get in from Brazil?”

“Left Manaus yesterday. Flew into New York today.”

In the course of two days, he’d been shot, traveled from one hemisphere to another, lost his father, and crashed his car. How was he still conscious? Exhaustion was fuzzing Stella’s brain. She checked the dashboard clock. Nearly midnight. With Missy’s case turning into a homicide investigation and Dena Miller’s strange disappearance, Stella’s day had been long
before
she’d run into Mac.

“Do you have coffee at your place?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I haven’t been home yet.” He eased the seat belt across his torso and clicked the latch. “Do you know were my Jeep was towed?”

“Probably to Thompson’s Garage. I’ll call in the morning.”

“Thanks. My phone and bags are still in it.”

At the edge of town, Stella pulled into a strip mall and went thru the drive-thru of a Dunkin’ Donuts. “Coffee?”

“Coffee would be great.”

Stella’s stomach rumbled, and she assumed Mac hadn’t eaten recently. “Food?”

“I’m OK.”

She added three sandwiches and a dozen donuts to the order. Even if he wasn’t hungry right this minute, she bet he would be soon. “Well, I’m starving.”

“Sounds like it.”

The cashier handed Stella the food, and she passed the bags and box to Mac. Back on the road, he directed her to the rural highway where he’d crashed. The only sign of his accident was a muddy path of bent weeds and a few broken pine trees.

She drove a mile farther and pointed to a turnoff on the right-hand side of the road. “I live down there, on the river.”

“We’re practically neighbors, though you live on the developed side of the road,” said Mac.

“I live with my grandfather. My sister and her three kids live there, too.”

“Sounds crowded.”

“I don’t mind. They’re family.” Stella took the coffee cup he handed her. “Morgan’s husband was killed in Iraq. She and the kids need us.”

“I’m sorry.” From a military family, Mac would understand.

“I wish I could help more, but I can’t grieve for them.” Sadness spread through Stella’s limbs, weighting them down.

“No, you can’t.” The news quieted Mac. He didn’t speak again until they’d driven another two miles. “Take the next left. Watch the mud. My lot is a little more rustic than yours.”

Stella had neighbors around the lake. Mac had no one close to him.
She
might be his closest neighbor.

She slowed the car. Her cruiser splashed and lurched down the rutted dirt lane. “Some road.”

“Keeps out the riffraff. I like it quiet.”

“You must.” Stella’s teeth snapped together as the car lurched through a lake-size puddle.

The narrow lane ended in a small clearing. Her headlights swept over a log cabin. Except for the beams of her headlights, the clearing was black as pitch. She could see the dark outline of a small outbuilding behind the cabin. “You really like your solitude.”

“I do.”

She fished her flashlight from her glove box, but Mac was already out of the car and striding into the darkness. Clicking on the flashlight, she followed him up onto a wooden porch. He dug keys out of the front pocket of his pants and opened the door.

The overhead light went on, illuminating a cozy but dusty combined kitchen and living area. The air was stuffy and hot. The scents of must and mildew tickled Stella’s nose. She sneezed.

“Sorry.” Setting the food on the kitchen table, he went to the kitchen window and wrestled it open. The wood groaned. “The place has been closed up for weeks.”

“No air-conditioning?”

“Nah.” He opened three windows in the living area. “I spend a lot of time in the jungle. I’m used to serious heat, and I like the sounds of the forest at night.”

Warm and humid air flooded the cabin, and the scent of pine freshened the room. Something moved in her peripheral vision. A gigantic brown spider skittered across the floor. Stella jumped sideways.

“There are always a few squatters when I get home from a trip.” Mac laughed. “Relax, he won’t hurt you. He’s probably terrified.”

“You could saddle that thing and ride it.” Stella didn’t take her eyes off the spider for fear that it would move out of sight, and then she wouldn’t know where it was. Somehow that would be worse than having it right in front of her. Goose bumps rose on her arms.

“Wolf spiders only bite if they feel threatened, and they eat a lot of other insects.” He picked up a magazine, scooped up the spider, and released it on the porch.

“They can balance the ecosystem
outside
.”

Mac contemplated the food. “Would you mind if I took a quick shower?”

Stella gestured toward the discharge papers he’d tossed onto the table. “You should read those. The doctor said you’re not supposed to get your stitches wet for forty-eight hours.”

He sighed. “I
need
a shower.”

“Do you have plastic wrap?”

“Probably.” He opened a kitchen drawer and seemed surprised to find some. He handed her the box.

“Take off your shirt.” She probably should have phrased that differently.

“Yes, ma’am.” Humor glinted in Mac’s clear blue eyes, but his movements were slow and careful as he eased the shirt over his head.

Stella refused to admire his impressive physique as she began to wind clear plastic around his ribs. Not one bit. Except maybe the hard ridges of his tanned twelve-pack.
Eyes up.

“You’re pretty good at that.”

“My mother was an ER nurse, and my brother was a regular customer. He didn’t grasp the concepts of gravity or mortality until our dad died.” She walked around him, keeping the wrap snug and her gaze
off
his muscles. Mostly.

“When was that?”

“He’s been gone fifteen years.”

“Must have been hard.”

“Yes. I still miss him every day. Dad was a great guy. He was an NYPD detective. Killed in the line of duty.” Stella swallowed the grapefruit in her throat.

Mac tilted his head. “I bet he’d be proud of you.”

How did he know the exact question she’d asked herself every day since the shooting? Would her dad be disappointed that she’d missed the opportunity to stop a killer before he hurt more innocents?

“I hope so.” She tore off the plastic, smoothed it against his hard belly, and tucked in the tail. “That should keep the stitches dry if you’re careful.”

“I’m not a very careful man.” Mischief lit his eyes again.

“No kidding.” She stepped back and pointed to his bandage. “Keep the spray on your other side.”

He reached forward. Stella froze. Part of her wanted him to touch her very, very much. But her sanity questioned her judgment. This man had too many secrets.

He tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, draped his bloodstained T-shirt over his shoulder, and sauntered down a hallway. A minute later, she heard more windows opening, then the rush of water through pipes.

She definitely needed air-conditioning.

Keeping one wary eye on the shadows, she popped the top off her coffee cup and sipped with gratitude. Her day had been long, and it didn’t appear as if she’d see her bed any time soon. The thought of bed brought Mac’s ripped body to mind, but the only things she would be eliciting from him tonight were answers.

Dust coated every surface in Mac’s little cabin. Stella unwrapped a chicken sandwich and ate it while she snooped. His fridge was empty except for condiments, and the cupboards contained only canned goods. Wildlife magazines were stacked on the counter. She picked up the latest issue,
not
the one covered in spider cooties. The mailing label read Dr. McClellan Barrett.

“Find anything interesting?”

Stella turned. Mac stood in the doorway, dressed in a soft blue shirt, unbuttoned over a pair of low-slung jeans. His damp, shaggy blond hair hung well past his ears, and he obviously hadn’t shaved for weeks. Holy hell, the man could work ruggedly handsome like nobody’s business.

She raised the magazine in her hand. “I didn’t know you were a doctor.”

“I’m not.”

“You have a PhD.”

“Yes.” The admission seemed to embarrass him.

“Considering you had a troubled youth and likely didn’t spend much time on schoolwork in high school, your PhD is pretty impressive,” Stella said. “Is your real name really McClellan?”

He crossed the room. “It is. My father was a Civil War buff.”

“Hence your brothers, Grant and Lee.” Stella sipped her coffee. The caffeine was working its magic on her brain.

“Exactly.” He reached for a sandwich and ate it in three bites. “Where does Stella come from? That’s not a name you hear very often.”

“I was named after my grandmother.” She handed him another without a word. When he’d finished it, he went to work on three glazed donuts and downed half a cup of coffee. Once she was satisfied he wasn’t dying of hunger, Stella got down to business. “Now tell me about the woman you saw tonight.”

Mac wiped his mouth with a napkin, balled it up, and tossed it into a trash can in the corner. “I only saw her for a couple of seconds as my headlights hit her. The road was wet, and I couldn’t stop. I didn’t have any option but to swerve into the trees.”

“Anything you can remember will help.”

Mac rested his forearms on the table and closed his eyes. “She was naked and sprawled on her back.” He opened his eyes. “I wasn’t close enough to see her face, but her body was thin. Her hair was short. Don’t know what color since it was wet. She wasn’t moving. At the time, I thought she was dead. But I suppose she wasn’t.” Confusion lowered his brow. “Unconscious maybe?”

A thin woman with short hair . . .

Dena Miller?

It couldn’t be.

“If she was dead or unconscious, how did she disappear?” Stella asked.

“That’s the important question, isn’t it?”

Dena Miller went missing after a violent altercation. Why would she be lying across a rural road, miles from her house? And if she was, how did she get there? Mac’s story was plain crazy, but what were the chances a thin woman with short hair disappeared and he saw another thin woman with short hair under equally strange circumstances the same night?

Stella shifted gears. “How did you get shot?”

He closed the donut box and sat back in his chair. “I spent the last few weeks in the Amazon on assignment. My partner took some photos of coca dealers. They didn’t appreciate it.”

“But you study river otters.”

He studied her face for a few seconds. “Not exactly.” He set his coffee down, and his eyes turned serious. “Do you trust me, Stella?”

“In what way?” A vague sense of discomfort tossed the sandwich in Stella’s belly. What had Mac gotten himself into?

“You’re going to find my story a little hard to believe, but I need your assistance.”

She planted both palms on the table and held his gaze. “If you’re in some sort of trouble, you need to be straight with me. I can’t help you if you’re holding back important information.”

Mac leaned his forearms on the table and leveled his eyes with hers. “I’m a DEA agent.”

Chapter Ten

Mac needed her help to find that woman and prove he hadn’t imagined her.

If he was really going to be honest with himself, he wanted Stella to know he was one of the good guys. Since he was a teenager, he’d been unable to shake his reputation. He’d been clean and sober for twelve years, and his family still doubted him.

Tonight it felt suddenly and inexplicably important that Stella believed his story.

“I thought the DEA had a strict policy of not hiring anyone with prior drug experience.”

“I didn’t ask for the job. They came to me.” Mac knew the DEA’s policies. “I had a particular skill set they needed.” Lately, he’d wondered if he was listed as a disposable asset. His former boss had sought Mac’s help, but the region was under new management. Mac’s new boss didn’t want to give up a valuable source of information, but he didn’t seem to mind putting Mac into dangerous situations. A few years ago, Mac hadn’t cared, but Lee’s death had changed his perspective.

Her lips pursed. “Dangerous job.”

His hand strayed to his bandage. He probably shouldn’t have told her, but he couldn’t take back his admission now. Maybe that was the point.

Stella frowned, deepening a vertical line between her brows. “How long?”

“Three years.”

“Three years of hanging out in the jungle, snooping on drug traffickers, and pretending to be studying otters?”

“Well, I actually do observe the otters. I’ve published several papers on family group behavior. Local kids are always wandering into camp. It’s important that my cover be well-established.” Mac sank back into his chair. “And I like otters.”

She deadpanned.

“What?” He raised a hand, palm up. “Otters are badass.”

“Seriously?” Stella shook her head in disbelief.

“They eat piranha. Once, I saw four adults kill a young caiman that showed too much interest in their den.”

“That’s not what I meant.” She stabbed the table with a forefinger. “When I first met you, everyone treated you as if you were a space cadet, but I knew it was an act. You’re smart, and you were too good at planning that search last November. Now it all makes perfect sense.”

Mac felt heat rise into his face.

“Do your brother and sister know about the job with the DEA?”

“No.” He shook his head. “I didn’t want them to worry.”

Her head tilted. “Why did you tell me?”

Good question.
The first time he’d met her, Stella Dane had left an impression on him that he hadn’t been able to shake. But he could hardly tell her that. “You’re a good cop, and I want you to take this disappearing woman seriously.”

Her face turned solemn. “I would have anyway. I only asked for a drug test because your story was so strange, and I was concerned.”

She’d been worried about him. The idea pleased him. Most people simply assumed the worst, but Stella was different, which brought on a whole other set of concerns. Mac would be heading back to Brazil in eight weeks. He was spread thin trying to establish a connection with his family. But Stella . . .

She made him think about things he’d never considered before, like not coming home to an empty house. Like having someone to share a late-night meal.

Or his bed.

“So that’s what you were doing when you were shot? Investigating drug traffickers.”

“I’ve been working in that region studying wildlife since I was an undergraduate. I know many of the villagers. Until I went to work for the DEA, I was a simple wildlife biologist studying the effects of deforestation and pollution on giant river otters. Now my expeditions are funded by a fake university that’s actually a front for the DEA. Before this trip, I always worked alone, but my new boss wanted me to have a team.” In reality, his new boss hadn’t trusted him. “So this time I was paired with a special agent and a guide. We were only supposed to observe,” he said. “There’s been an increase in traffic on the Amazon River from Peru and Colombia into Brazil. Our job was to report who was moving what.”

“How did you end up with the DEA?”

“I
am
a wildlife biologist, but three years ago, I accidentally ran into drug traffickers who’d captured two agents. They were in the process of torturing them. I couldn’t walk away.”

“You saved them?” Stella slid her cardboard cup back and forth between her hands.

“I set the place on fire. When the traffickers left the men inside to burn, I went in after them.”

“Interesting tactic.”

“I was outnumbered twelve machine guns to my machete. Not good odds.” Mac traced a scar in his oak table. Even if he’d failed and the agents had burned, a quick death by fire would have been better than an entire night of having their bits and pieces lopped off one by one. Mac had known from personal experience that drug traffickers were the bane of humanity, but seeing them in action had flipped a switch inside him. Before that night, he’d never taken a life. But he’d killed three men, easily, almost automatically, as the Colonel’s training and Mac’s muscle memory had taken over his body.

Respect crossed Stella’s face, and maybe a little shock, as if the true risk of his job was just sinking in. Was that why he’d told her? To impress a pretty girl? She wasn’t just a pretty girl, he reasoned. She was a cop. They were on the same side. Maybe it was time he gave up being the Lone Ranger.

“So the DEA recruited you?”

“It felt good to strike back at the people who flood our country with the poison that ruins lives.”

“Like yours?”

“Yes. Like mine.” And everyone else in his family who’d been affected by his bad choices.

Stella nodded. “What happened to the rest of your team?”

“My guide conveniently disappeared, and my partner was killed.” In his mind’s eye, Cheryl reached out to him through the rain. He blinked it away. In his heart, he knew the bureaucrat who’d assigned an inexperienced field agent to his team was to blame, but that knowledge didn’t ease his conscience.

“I’m sorry.” She digested that tidbit for a minute. “Was your cover compromised?”

“I don’t know.”

“If it was, going back there would be suicide.”

And it wouldn’t be a pleasant way to go. The drug cartels liked to make examples of people who crossed them. Mac was attached to all his bits and pieces. “I haven’t decided yet. But I’m pretty tough. Thanks to the Colonel, I could probably survive a zombie apocalypse.”

But his joke didn’t erase her worried frown.

“I don’t want anything to happen to you,” she said.

Mac tapped his bandaged side with his fingertips. “I have at least eight weeks to think about it.”

“Don’t take any stupid risks. No job is worth that.”

Three years ago, Mac had thought making a dent in the drug trade was worth his life. But two things had changed since then. His efforts had very little effect on drug trafficking, and Lee’s death had made him feel new connections with his remaining family.

“You could always go back to being a biologist—a badass biologist,” she corrected, her eyes teasing.

Had a woman ever made him blush? No. Stella was definitely an original.

But Mac couldn’t think about his future. Not yet. “So you’ll look for the woman?”

“I told you I was already looking for her.” Irritation sharpened her voice. She clasped her hands on the table. “Earlier today I caught the case of a missing woman. Thin. Short dark hair. Possibly taken from her house while she was showering. We’ve had a BOLO alert out since this afternoon.”

The relief that swept over Mac was staggering. He
hadn’t
imagined Cheryl’s body was lying across a dark, rainy road. He
hadn’t
gone crazy. The woman he’d seen was real. “I want to help.” The offer was out of his mouth before his brain had a chance to consider it. “Please. I need to.”

“I don’t know. I’ll have to clear it with my boss. In order to do that, I’ll have to tell him everything. Brody, too. And I’m sure he’ll tell Hannah . . .”

Hannah would tell Grant. The only question remaining was how early all the fan-hitting would happen and could he get out of bed and escape into the forest before the family drama ensued. And there he went again, trying to avoid the people in his life who cared about him. No more running. Tomorrow he was going to be straight with his siblings. He owed that to Lee. He owed it to all of them.

“I’m tired of secrets,” he said. “You know I’m going to look for this woman with or without your help.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything else. You are a Barrett.” She yawned. “I’ll call you in the morning.”

“My cell is in my Jeep, and I don’t have a landline.” He ducked back into the kitchen for a notepad but settled for the back of an envelope. “If you give me your number, I’ll call you when I get my phone back.”

“You’ll be stranded here.” She wrote down her number.

“I have a bike in the shed. I can ride into town. But I plan to be unconscious for the next eight hours.” He rolled his shoulder. His body ached from the accident and everything else he’d put it through over the last two days.

Stella reached into her pocket and pulled out the vial of pills from the hospital. She set it on the table. “In case you want a decent night’s sleep.”

The woman could read his mind. Her gaze lingered on his face. Would it be too rude to ask her to come and wrap him in plastic again tomorrow? Probably.

“Get some rest,” she said.

Walking out onto the porch, he watched her get into her car and then drive away. The forest loomed deep and dark around his cabin. An owl hooted. A few seconds later, the high-pitched death squeal of a small creature pierced the humid air. Isolation closed around him. Usually, he considered solitude his best friend, but not tonight.

His back ached, and he studied the prescription bottle. Maybe he should stop punishing himself. He filled a glass with water and swallowed one tablet. Then he put fresh sheets on his bed and checked under the bed and behind the headboard in case any brown recluses had decided to make a new home. He respected spiders, but he didn’t want to sleep with one. Stripping off his clothes, he stretched out on the cool sheets. Warm night air and forest sounds drifted over him.

He must have fallen asleep because when he opened his eyes, pale gray light brightened the room. A scratching sound in the front of his cabin sent a burst of adrenaline into his veins. He raised his head, reaching for the knife he kept in his nightstand, just as his bedroom door squeaked open and a hulking figure shadowed the doorway.