#0004 White Out

by Calle J. Brookes

  “Ok, that leaves three others. We’ll figure that out once we’re all safe. Do you know which way your uncle went?” Making an assumption, but not one TJ contradicted. It had been Troy out there, then.

  “No. He just ran one way and yelled at us to go another. The bad policeman followed him.”

  “Ok.” But both men were still out there somewhere.

  Her job was to get the kids back down to where she could get them into a vehicle—and to safety.

  And she had to find Al.

  Something didn’t feel right.

  Al should have caught up to her by now.

  Paige turned back toward the blue lights. “Stay right next to me, TJ. We have to go back down.”

  They hadn’t made it fifteen yards when the bullet struck a tree—right behind Paige’s head. She grabbed TJ and shoved him toward the nearest boulder with one arm. She followed him with the little girl quickly. Then huddled against the rock, covering the two children with her own body.

  In the dark, she couldn’t see who was shooting. Or where they were.

  The little girl fussed. Paige kissed her hair and whispered reassurances she knew just weren’t true.

  Chapter 57

  Cody saw the silhouette of the man with the gun and the larger silhouette that she assumed was Paige and the two children. She could hear the little girl crying—she sounded so much like Lucy it went through her like a knife. “Don’t move! Federal agent! Put down your weapon!”

  He almost turned on her. Cody pulled back the slide. “I said do not move!”

  “Cody?” Paige called.

  “Put your weapon on the ground and then place your hands on your head. Slowly. Where I can see you.”

  Cody shined her light on the deputy.

  Carroll.

  Why did it surprise her that it was Carroll? He’d been an ass to everyone from the very beginning.

  “Don’t do anything stupid, Carroll. Do you really think I’m up here alone?” She was, but he didn’t need to know that right now.

  She’d heard the sounds of sirens in the distance.

  He had to have heard them, too. “Think about this. You know what could happen. They’ve taken cover. And I have my weapon pointed right at the back of your head. Think I won’t pull the trigger if I have to?” She kept her voice as cool as possible.

  “If she doesn’t, there are others here who will,” Allenski said from somewhere nearby. Cody almost fell to her knees in gratitude.

  But she didn’t. She kept her cool.

  Finally, Carroll’s gun was lowered to the snow next to his left knee. “You have made a mistake. I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m just out here searching for a murderer. This FBI bitch has overreacted. I think she got scared out here in the real world.”

  “You have the right to remain silent…” Cody began the litany, but Allenski finished it, as he slapped flex cuffs on his colleague.

  Cody kept her gun trained on Carroll until he was completely secure.

  “Paige! You can come out now!”

  Paige did. Arms wrapped around a little girl the same size as Cody’s Lucy. Cody stepped forward and took her into her own arms. “Paige, I think TJ needs you now.”

  Paige turned to the little boy who was practically falling apart next to them, crying and shaking.

  Paige wrapped him up close, holding him almost the same as Cody held the little girl.

  She carried him back down the hill while Cody carried Ashley.

  Allenski led Carroll down nowhere near as gently.

  They came out near the blue lights of the squad cars—just as two more squad cars arrived, along with the rental SUV she recognized as Sebastian’s.

  Once he was halfway to her, Cody started shaking. “Now you decide to show up?”

  “Did the best we could.”

  “Where’s Al?” Mick demanded.

  Chapter 58

  Paige saw Al first. The other woman was with Deputy Jacobs, near the rear of his squad car. She didn’t look good. Paige disengaged from TJ and headed toward her partner. Al held up a hand.

  “I hate the snow.”

  “I’m sorry we got separated out there.”

  “Don’t be. The kids are safe. She looks like my niece.”

  “She does. What happened? Cody said…”

  “I was hit, I think. Seriously, Paige, no guilt. We both made the decision to go after those kids.”

  That was exactly how Paige had been feeling. She shouldn’t have gotten so far away from Al out there. No matter what the justification. “Cody found Troy Linsey in the woods. He’ll live. He had a gun with him. A .38. And she found another .38 in Jon’s locker.”

  “One will likely be our murder weapon. Help me into the car, before Mick realizes I got clobbered. He’ll be insufferable if he finds out.”

  Paige complied quickly. It had been her fault Al had been injured. She shouldn’t have rushed headlong into those woods. If she hadn’t, she would have been nearer to Al.

  Of course, Carroll would have seen her. Possibly killed her.

  Then who would have saved those kids in time?

  Paige didn’t know how to feel.

  Not unusual after a case like this.

  But it was over. Now all they had to do was connect the dots and tie it up for official reports. Tell the sheriff and mayor of this little town that everything was finished now.

  And it was time to take TJ back to his mother.

  After everyone took a trip to the hospital.

  Paige stayed with the children. TJ hadn’t let go of her hand, and Ashley had fallen asleep on Cody’s shoulder. The other woman had practically assigned herself to Ashley from the moment she’d seen her. No doubt Cody was thinking of her own little girl.

  “Is it over?” TJ asked, still whispering. “All of it.”

  “Except for your dad’s funeral. And a trial for the man who hurt him.”

  “It was that policeman. Uncle Troy and Grandma Tracey were arguing about it. And then he was there with his gun. He shot Uncle Troy when he was trying to get the back door open on the van to get me and Ashley out. I watched from the window. Then Uncle Troy turned around and shot his gun.”

  For him to have seen that in the dark, it had to have happened closely. Crime scene reconstructionists would determine for sure.

  But they had Carroll now. He’d talk eventually.

  If not, the evidence would.

  And Troy Linsey might still live. Between him and Nick Delasi, they should be able to piece together what had happened.

  Chapter 59

  Mick drove Sebastian and Agent Cody to the hospital, a few car lengths behind Deputy Jacobs’s squad car. He shot a look at the woman in the seat next to him. “What happened out there?”

  “Allenski and I came up on the Linseys’ van and Deputy Carroll’s squad car. We followed the footprints up the hill, until we found Al. Once we made certain she was alive—”

  “What?”

  “He hit her in the head, and she was unconscious, Mick,” Agent Cody told him. “Allenski carried her to his squad car while I went looking for Paige.”

  Sebastian cursed. Mick’s was only a second earlier. “How badly is she hurt?”

  “You shouldn’t have gone in by yourself. You should have stayed with Allenski,” Sebastian started lecturing. “And called for backup.”

  “There wasn’t time. And I’m glad I did. He was shooting at Paige—and the kids. I came up behind him and secured him. I’m not an idiot, Seb. I’ve been field trained, you know that.”

  “But I still don’t like the idea of you going out in the dark against an armed suspect. Hell, I don’t like the idea of Paige and Al doing it either.”

  Mick agreed wholeheartedly. Apparently, Merrick Cody was more reckless than she appeared. “So we can all agree on that.”

  “Allenski was a few yards away. He cuffed Carroll, and now here we are. And the kids are safe.�
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  “Did Carroll kill Tracey Linsey?” Mick asked.

  “From what I saw, she most likely died on impact. She wasn’t belted in.”

  “What did the kid say?”

  “He’ll only talk to Paige,” Cody said. “But he doesn’t seem hurt. Traumatized, but no physical injuries. Same for the little girl.”

  “Tracey and Troy are the only family that little girl had. Other than Angela and TJ,” Sebastian said.

  Mick winced. Poor kid, to be so alone as young as she was.

  Finally, they made it to the hospital. Emergency personnel had already surrounded Deputy Jacobs’s squad car.

  Jacobs was helping Al from the front seat, then to the gurney.

  Mick parked and then tossed the keys to her team leader. He hadn’t missed the red on his sister’s head in the harsh lights of the ambulance bay.

  Chapter 60

  TJ was starting to be really achy, and he wanted to cry. His grandma Tracey was dead. His uncle Troy might be. But he and Ashley were ok.

  She’d woken up in the car and been really whiny, but Agent Paige had cuddled her until she’d settled down. TJ had snuggled her, too. And Agent Paige kept touching his hair sometimes. He liked it. It made him feel a little less scared.

  He didn’t think he’d been hurt in the accident, but he felt a little achy. Kind of like when he had the flu last time. No doubt, Ashley was feeling the same. Only she was so little, she had to be really, really scared.

  “It’s ok, Ash. I promise. My mom will be coming for us. I promise.” His mom would make everything ok again. She had to.

  Agent Paige held Ashley on her hip on one side and kept TJ’s hand in hers as the doctors ran at them like they sometimes did on TV.

  TJ was going to be brave. For Ashley. Her dad was inside and hurt. She needed TJ to help take care of her.

  The way TJ’s dad had taken care of TJ’s mom. It was what you did for someone you loved.

  The doctors took him and Ashley to the back. To separate places. He didn’t like that.

  The pretty lady who had carried Ashley earlier stayed with her, while Agent Paige stayed with him.

  For a moment TJ wondered if all ladies at the FBI were that pretty, but that was a silly question.

  He had other things to thing to think about.

  When his mom came running in to the ER, she was calling his name.

  TJ hopped off the exam bed and ran toward her. “Mom!”

  He’d yelled it so loud everyone stopped to look at him.

  He didn’t care. His mom was holding him again. Everything was going to be ok now.

  Grandma Margie was there, too. And Aunt Candace.

  They all wanted to hug him and hold him. He looked over his mom’s shoulder.

  Ashley was there, with the pretty lady holding her.

  She looked so little. And so scared.

  Without Grandma Tracey and Uncle Troy, Ashley wasn’t going to have anybody but him and his mom to love her now.

  TJ pulled in a deep breath and stepped away from his mom.

  She just looked at him. “TJ? Do you have something to say, sweetheart?”

  Yes. He did. “Mom, we got to take care of Ashley now.”

  His mom hesitated, then looked at his cousin. A weird look went across her face. TJ half understood.

  Uncle Troy had been a part of what happened to his dad. That had to feel weird for his mom. But his mom was nodding.

  She walked to the pretty brown-haired lady and reached for Ashley.

  Then she had her arms around both of them.

  TJ looked up—and at Agent Paige.

  She smiled at him and nodded.

  He was going to be ok. He’d miss his dad forever, but he was going to be ok somehow. All of them.

  Epilogue

  Paige slid open the letter and smiled. The sender didn’t write to her often, only every few months or so, but she had always enjoyed receiving the letters. At first, they had broken her heart, the pain she sensed between each line. But gradually, they’d shifted.

  TJ had started to heal.

  He still sometimes mentioned what had happened, and she’d write him her opinion if he had direct questions. But now they were mostly filled with childish news and plans.

  TJ was a big planner.

  He reminded her of another extremely bright little boy. He and Simon, the teenager she was now raising, were within six months of each other in age. And both were advanced for their ages.

  Both had been traumatized by the violent deaths of a parent.

  The similarities hadn’t been lost on her.

  With permission from TJ’s mother, she’d put the two boys in email contact. So that they would both know they weren’t alone in what they’d experienced. She’d run it by her mother-in-law, a retired child psychiatrist, first.

  Meredith had agreed it was an excellent idea.

  Someone lumbered up behind her and covered her stomach.

  Her husband kept doing that.

  She half thought he was worse now than when she’d been carrying their first.

  Now that they’d been told it was twins a week earlier, he was hovering.

  Driving her nuts.

  And they still had more than six months to go.

  “Good news?” Mick asked, near her ear.

  “Yes. TJ Heathers wrote again. His mother is remarrying.” She’d signed off on Mick’s internal audit yesterday. When she’d made it into the office, the letter had been in her mail. TJ always wrote her care of the Complex Crimes Unit. He thought the FBI was cool.

  She made certain to mail letters back to him from her office, too. Paige hadn’t had a chance to read the letter until now, at her mother-in-law’s, waiting for dinner to begin.

  “That’s good.”

  “She’s marrying Sheriff Jacobs. We’ve been invited. He’s going to officially adopt Ashley, and be a stepfather to TJ. Angela will be adopting his two children from his previous marriage. TJ is debating whether he wants to be adopted, too. Angela has left the decision up to him.” Deputy Jacobs had become Sheriff Jacobs six weeks after Carroll had been arrested. Carroll’s stepfather had stepped down after what had happened. From what she understood, Jacobs was bringing good changes to the town. And cleaning up the drug problem.

  “Good. He’s a good guy. And Simon will finally get to meet TJ face-to-face.”

  “I’m glad Angela is healing.” Paige understood how hard healing could be.

  She’d had a long way to go herself back then. Mick had helped her see that less than ten months later.

  She smiled. Mick’s eyes heated like they always did when she looked at him like that. Then he was kissing her.

  He didn’t stop until someone started fussing behind them.

  Paige didn’t have to look. It wasn’t her son. He tended to bellow loudly, much like his father. Mikey was still sleeping. This time, it was Al’s baby. Her former partner was off somewhere with her own CCU team, and Meredith had the baby for the night, until Al’s husband made it in. Paige’s team was on stand-down for a few days. She was enjoying the rare time with her family.

  She had a family now. And it was growing every year, it seemed.

  Sometimes it threatened to overwhelm her, but she was dealing.

  Everything had changed in the CCU since that case in Kentucky. And it was still changing every day.

  She didn’t mind. Things were exactly as they should be.

  Curious about Paige and Mick and how they figured

  each other out?

  Check out their full-length romantic suspense novel:

  REVEALING

  Book eight in the PAVAD: FBI Romantic Suspense series.

  Sometimes the past didn't stay in the past.

  Secrets had a way of coming out.

  Paige Daviess had built herself a new life, a good one. One with meaning and purpose. As an agent with the best FBI division in the country, she kn
ew she was good at what she did. She was making a difference, protecting vulnerable children from the horrors she'd faced when she was young.

  One of those horrors had returned to haunt her. He was determined to take from her everything she had earned. And make her suffer while he did it.

  Mick Brockman wasn't about to let that happen. They'd fought each other from the moment they'd first met, but the Internal Affairs agent would do whatever he had to in order to protect the dark-eyed woman who pushed his buttons faster than anyone he'd ever met.

  Anything.

  Including bending—breaking—the rules he'd sworn to uphold. No matter what.

  PROLOGUE

  HE watched the car as it pulled out of the college parking lot. It was a small school, an offshoot of a main campus, and focused on performing arts. The woman looked like the sister she didn’t know she had. Long legs, long hair, dark eyes, and a thin build. A beautiful laugh. A sweet soul. That made this even harder.

  He was about to shatter this young woman’s trust in a way he would never forgive himself for. But what other choice did he have?

  He could not lose his family; he had already lost his soul several months earlier. He’d never thought he’d betray the company he’d worked for since he was in his mid-twenties. It had provided for his family for over thirty years now. It had sent three of his four children through college, and it had paid for his wife’s cancer treatment until her death three years ago.

  It had been good to him.

  But it was his job that had brought him to this low point. The job and his fourth child. His son had made some seriously bad decisions since his mother’s death. And now he had to bail the boy out again.

  He’d made a decision four months ago when the first telephone call came—give over the information the caller wanted or watch his son go to jail for a decade or more for his latest stupidity.