Hidden Motive

by Alexander, Hannah

  “There’s no sign of the car, and this water’s powerful,” came a tight deep voice. “Find the car and get it out of the canal. There’ll be two dead people inside.”

  “What if there aren’t?” one man asked.

  “You think they were driving with the windows open in this weather?” came the harsh reply. “Moron! Tomorrow we’ll release the news that the fleeing killers paid for the murder with their lives.”

  The light retreated, voices fading as the men walked away. When Murph heard the last echo of engines, he tightened his hand on Sable’s arm and tugged her fully from the water. In the blackness of the night he could see little. The storm had passed, taking the lightning.

  “They’re gone.”

  “So c-cold.” Sable’s teeth began a rhythmic chatter as her breath misted the air.

  “We’ve got to warm you up or you’ll get hypothermia.” Murph helped her climb to a more secure position on the steeply sloped bank.

  “Freezing,” she said with a shudder. “I’m f-freezing.”

  He opened his coat and drew her against him, wrapping her as completely as he could away from the wind. Despite the fact that the coat was soaked, it was made for warmth. It held his body heat. “You heard them?”

  “M-most of it.”

  Awkwardly, attempting to keep them both encased within the folds of his coat, Murph helped Sable along the bank until they reached a muddy track.

  “We've got to get out of here,” Murph said grimly. “I'm going with you to Missouri.”

  Sable stiffened, her teeth still chattering. “How?”

  “We can take a bus from Freemont,” Murph said. “They’ll be watching my Bronco. Right now they think we’re dead. We want them to keep thinking that, at least until we’re away from this place.”

  “D-didn’t you m-move here from Wichita?” Her voice rose and fell as her whole body shook. “You're not a p-part—”

  “I’m part of it now,” he said. “And stop trying to talk. You need to focus on warming up.”

  “Medically speaking, wh-whether or not a patient talks—”

  “Dr. Chamberlin, be quiet.”

  “We’re not in the office anymore.”

  “Sable. Got it. Old habits die hard. You’re in no position to argue with me right now.” He snugged the coat more tightly around her. He had to go with her whether she invited him or not.

  “Do you have money?” Sable asked. “I have an ATM—”

  “We can’t use credit or ATM cards. They can be tracked.”

  “You don’t think we could be tracked if we take a bus?”

  “Unless you want to steal a car, we don’t have a choice. We can only hope they continue to believe we’re dead in the canal. I have cash in the lining of my coat for emergencies.” He didn’t tell her about the weapon.

  She looked up at him. “Why are you prepared for an emergency?”

  “I’m always prepared. Let’s get to Missouri.”

  Chapter 3

  The southwestern Missouri weather, known for its February fickleness, was acting out in the Ozarks. The thick layer of clouds had pursued Sable and Murph from Freemont, hovering at each bus stop, taunting them with further delays when they checked the news at the stations. That news was all they had after their phones were lost to the canal. There’d been no mention of Noah’s murder. Not yet.

  Sable leaned back. If only she could close her eyes for a few moments…

  They had reached Joplin late last night but their layover had been delayed by weather. While Murph had made a futile attempt to rent a car, Sable had pretty much stood guard at the station, expecting either Noah’s killers or the police.

  They’d boarded this bus at three-thirty in the morning. Sable still couldn’t sleep. She’d studied the four other passengers who boarded with them, including an innocuous looking teenaged boy and a woman past middle age with silver-white hair.

  By the time they reached Cassville near the Missouri-Arkansas border, the temperature took another plunge, freezing rain on the windshield. Her tension increased. This could be dangerous.

  They wound through the wilderness area of the Mark Twain National Forest, the bus lumbering around the curves and hills of Highway 86. The engine muffled the sound of rainfall. The methodic swish of the wipers could lull one into a trance…

  The driver's alarmed grunt startled Sable. The red-headed woman worked the steering wheel, her thick arms taught with tension. The roads were already opaque with ice.

  The driver was a friendly sort. She’d introduced herself as Jerri and held conversations with everyone on the bus as if she were a social butterfly. She’d make a good tour guide or party hostess but her driving suffered for it.

  Sable straightened in her seat and looked up at Murph beside her. “We're getting close. Only a couple more miles.” She wasn’t aware of her tightly clenched hands until he gently touched them.

  “It won’t help to try to drive the bus for her.” His steady baritone held reassurance.

  In fact, Paul Murphy had been a calming influence since the day she’d met him—a good quality for a paramedic to have when there were multiple emergency situations daily. It was an especially good quality to have right now.

  “I’ll feel better once we’re off the road.” She forced her hands to relax, flexing her fingers and breathing deeply.

  Murph nodded. “This storm didn’t show up on the weather reports or we’d still be stranded in Joplin.”

  “Sudden weather changes happen a lot in this area,” she said.

  “It’s the same in Kansas.”

  “I hope the rain stops soon because we’ll have to walk to the house.”

  Murph looked at her. “There’s no one we can call to pick us up?”

  She shook her head. “I tried calling and got voice mail. My mother must have gone to Eureka Springs to stay with my youngest brother after the funeral.”

  “That isn’t far from here, is it?”

  “Immediately over the state line in Arkansas but it won’t do us any good. My brother doesn’t need to try driving here. These roads are bad.”

  Fortunately, she had spoken to Jerri before they left Joplin. The bus driver had agreed to drop them off at the end of the quarter-mile drive to Grandpa’s farmhouse.

  “This place we’re going is your childhood home?” Murph asked.

  “Not exactly childhood.” Sable winced when the driver battled the steering wheel once more. If she jerked any harder the bus would go into a spin. “My father died when I was sixteen. Mom moved here with me and my two brothers. This has been home ever since.” She instinctively wrapped her fingers around the pocket watch that dangled from a chain around her neck. Sadness overwhelmed her.

  “You’ve worn that since I first met you,” Murph said.

  “Grandpa gave it to me at Christmas.”

  He frowned at it. “The time isn’t correct.”

  “When I was little I loved to sit on my grandfather’s lap, wind this watch, and listen to it tick. It doesn't tick any more but the memories are the same.”

  “Hold tightly to those memories.” Murph glanced out the window but he didn’t seem to be looking out the bus window, but perhaps another window…perhaps in his past?

  She watched him for a moment and then her gaze was drawn to the red welts on his neck. “I’m so sorry about those, Murph.” She gestured to the welts. “I feel awful—”

  “That’s your third and final apology.” He touched the scratches. “You have a few skills. I could show you more effective techniques if you promise not to use them on me.”

  She grinned. “Identify yourself before you grab me next time.”

  Before Sable could be embarrassed by the way those words came out, the driver muttered under her breath. The bus did a little fishtail. Sable’s hands clenched so hard they stung.

  “At least this weather might prevent anyone from following us,” she whispered.

  Murph didn’t reply.

  She look
ed up at him. His expression told her she wasn’t the only one suspicious of the others. She’d thought she was being unreasonable.

  “You can’t think the thugs in Fremont have caught up with us already,” she said under her breath.

  “I admit I’ll be relieved when we make it to the house.”

  “Me too.”

  “But you heard them at the canal last night,” he said. “They know where to look.”

  She wished he hadn’t reminded her. “Don’t borrow trouble.”

  “I won’t borrow it but I want to be prepared for it.”

  She glanced out the window. “If only I knew more.” She flashed back to the memories of her arrival at her friend’s house. “I wish we hadn’t been forced to leave Noah’s body the way we did.” She still felt the shock of his murder.

  Murph nodded, silent. There was no missing the tautened jaw, his closed eyes, the flaring of nostrils. Suppressed emotion.

  “You and Noah really took to each other, didn't you?”

  Murph paused. “He was a Godly man in an ungodly place.” He looked at Sable. “He did not believe your grandfather was guilty of fraud.”

  “I know. He talked to you about that?”

  “This past week everyone’s been talking about it.”

  “Noah was right,” she said. “Grandpa wouldn’t have defrauded his friends. It’s true that he’d been in debt for years but he was almost solvent again.”

  The bus slid, this time in a longer arc. Sable’s hand closed around Murph’s forearm. Flashes of trees and rain skidded around them through the windows. It was dizzying and terrifying. After an uncertain moment, the bus glided to a stop at the road’s edge. Sable released her grip on Murph. How she wished the state of Missouri required chains in bad weather, but not even chains would work on ice like this.

  Another mile or so and they would be off this bus. She’d rather walk in the freezing rain than risk an accident on the cliffs up ahead.

  And yet…what would happen to the others on this bus?

  “Josiah wasn’t a prospector, was he?” Murph asked softly as the bus driver eased her foot from the brake.

  Sable glanced at Murph. She knew he was only trying to distract her from the road but she’d overheard several comments around Freemont about Grandpa’s intentions when he went into debt again to purchase the Seitz mine.

  “He didn't salt that mine.” She kept her voice low. “He and Noah were misinformed about the layout of the land before they purchased it. They should have checked it out, but they didn't plant ore in it later to save their own money.”

  “Didn’t their third partner have some input?”

  “That would be Otis Boswell. Our employer,” she stressed. “The man practically owns Freemont, so why pull a shoddy deal like that for a few more bucks? It would make no sense.”

  “How well do you know him?” Murph asked.

  Sable shrugged. “His land adjoined ours. He and Grandpa went hunting together sometimes. Grandpa never turned down a hunting trip.” Her voice caught.

  Murph laid a hand on hers.

  She looked up at him. “Why did you come with me?”

  For a moment he didn’t reply, and again she saw the tautening of his expression, that quiet caution.

  “I couldn't let you try to get here by yourself,” he said. “What if you'd been followed?”

  “You've known me what, six weeks? You didn’t have to get tangled up in this.”

  “What kind of man would leave you alone after what I witnessed tonight?”

  “One who will be alive after this is all over.”

  He shook his head. “They’ll be after both of us once they discover we didn’t die in that canal, if they haven’t discovered that already. We’re safer together.” He glanced out the window. “How is your family home set up for security?”

  “We’ve never needed it. This is all wilderness. The house is built over the mouth of a cave and if there had been a home invasion I suppose we could have escaped into the caverns below.”

  “At the station you told me about some evidence your grandfather gathered. Evidence about what? About whom?”

  “Good question. It’s lost in the canal and back at Noah’s. I never had a chance to look through it. Noah did say the papers looked like copies.”

  “So you think there could be originals?”

  “I can only hope.”

  “Wouldn’t he have left something like that in a bank safety deposit box?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know of one. He often came home on weekends. If he had documents of any kind he would’ve brought them with him. No banks are open on weekends.”

  “So they could be in the house somewhere.”

  “Maybe. There’s an old safe upstairs in the attic but no one except Grandpa knew the combination. He could be very secretive about some subjects.” Her dear stubborn grandfather.

  “We have to find out what happened,” Murph said. “We need to see if there are originals. Would your family know something?”

  She spread her hands. “I don’t know.” She glanced outside, studied the line of the forest, got up. “I'd better go tell Jerri we’re getting close.”

  Murph pulled their damp coats from the overhead compartment and followed Sable as she made her way to the front. Four rows up, a chubby man whom the driver had called Perry snored softly, his arm flung out in front of them.

  The bus lurched and Sable grabbed the seat beside her, earning a startled look from the man who sat there. Simmons was his last name if she remembered correctly.

  With a quick apology, Sable continued forward with Paul Murphy behind her.

  The driver glanced into the wide rearview mirror as they approached. “It’s getting worse. Better sit down.”

  Sable took a place beside the white-haired woman seated behind the bus driver. “You can drop us off around the next curve past the speed limit sign.”

  The driver nodded.

  Sable’s seatmate flashed a smile and reached out a hand. “You’re getting off at the old Kessinger Cave?”

  “You know of it?” Sable asked.

  “Who doesn’t? I lived in the area years ago.” She held her hand out. “I’m Audrey Hawkins.”

  “Sable Chamberlin.”

  The bus lurched sideways in a long icy glide. The darkened tree line swept toward their window in a smooth arc. Sable knew the ground dropped steeply here. She held her breath as the bus slid toward the precipice with almost casual grace.

  Jerri’s face was white in the rearview mirror as she wrestled the steering wheel and finessed the brake. The bus slowly straightened, once more parallel with the center line when it came to a stop.

  Again, Sable thought about the cliffs ahead. The next time the bus lost traction they might not be so fortunate.

  “If there was another way to get where I'm going,” Audrey murmured softly, “I'd have taken it.”

  “What is your destination?” Sable asked.

  “My great-nephew is getting married near Eureka Springs,” Audrey said. “Thorncrown Chapel. His bride wanted to be married on Valentine's Day.” She shook her head and murmured under her breath, “Far be it from me to question the girl’s intelligence. I’m just the elderly great-aunt.”

  The muscle-bound passenger—Simmons—came down the aisle. “In case you hadn’t noticed,” he said to the driver in a gravel-barrel voice, “This road is dangerous. If they’re getting off here, so am I.”

  “Agreed,” came the high-pitched, nervous voice of the chubby man behind them. “I don't relish plunging to an early death in these hills. Couldn't we park until this blows over?”

  Jerri shook her head. “Do you folks really want to camp out here for two or three days? It could take that long or longer before the road is cleared. I have a responsibility to get my passengers to their destinations, and—”

  “Alive,” Simmons said. “Doesn’t your job description say anything about that?” He peered at the photo ID displayed at the fro
nt of the bus, then frowned more deeply. “That’s not your license up there. It isn’t your picture.”

  “The driver who was scheduled for this run called in sick,” Jerri explained. “I’m the last-minute substitution.”

  Sable shot Murph a quick look.

  “Have you driven this route before?” Perry asked.

  Jerri hesitated, then said, “It’s a new route for me.”

  “You don’t know where you’re going?” Audrey exclaimed.

  Perry groaned and closed his eyes. “I didn’t need to know that.”

  “Let me get this straight,” Simmons snapped. “It’s raining Popsicles, we’ve got a road that bends like a pretzel, and a driver who doesn’t know the route. There’s not another car on this road unless you count the pickup in the ditch.”

  Sable cleared her throat, hesitated, shook her head. She had no choice after that last slide. “Perhaps we should stop for a while.” She glanced up at Murph and saw the resignation in his eyes. “I know this road. I’ve seen cars after they plunged off the cliffs up ahead.”

  “We can’t pull over and stop with nowhere to go,” Jerri said.

  Sable said a quick and silent prayer—something Noah had taught her a few months ago. She had been hoping for at least the past thirty minutes that this wouldn’t turn into the typical ice storm they so often suffered here, but she couldn’t let these people risk their lives.

  “Our drop-off place is only a couple hundred feet ahead,” she said, “before we reach the cliffs. You can’t tackle the cliffs on this ice.” Sable hesitated, then gave in to the inevitable. “There's room at the house for everyone.”

  Chapter 4

  Paul Murphy had long ago learned to cover his apprehension with a look of calm detachment. It would be criminal to allow the bus to continue on this impossible road. He knew the invitation Sable issued was necessary. He only wished it hadn’t been, because as events played out he suddenly distrusted everyone on this bus.