by Hinze, Vicki
“Don’t be ridiculous. The man I loved doesn’t exist. Maybe he never did exist. I don’t know. What I do know is that I was crushed and devastated and he—he promised to love me—and instead he blamed me. He severed all ties, divorced me and left me standing in an airport not knowing a soul with no one to call and nowhere to go. I had no one, Paul. My son was dead, and I stood there alone with absolutely no one. Could you still love someone who’d done that to you? Someone who was supposed to love you forever?”
“That’s not the question, Della. This isn’t about me. All this is worth hearing, but it doesn’t tell me what I want to know. Let’s keep it simple. Do you still love him?”
“No.” She spat out the word. “I don’t love him. I’m not waiting for him to change his mind and come get me. If he tried, which he won’t, I wouldn’t let him.”
“Okay.” Paul paused a moment as if letting that sink in. “So the cottage is bare because...?”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “Do we have to discuss this now? I’m tired, I’m scared, I’m lost and I’m so angry at being violated like this I can barely breathe. Why are you pushing me now?”
“Because I have to.” He whipped off his glasses.
She looked into his eyes and saw this was not about Jeff. It was about her—and Paul. And what she saw in his eyes sent chills racing through her. She saw the one thing she never thought she’d see. Doubt.
It knocked her back in her seat. Hurt in ways she couldn’t have expected it would hurt. “You think I’ve slipped over the edge or something and arranged all this. You—you think I’m making it happen.” She couldn’t believe it. “You stood up for me, but you’re not totally sure I didn’t hire someone to help me pull this off.” Mentally reeling, she sucked in a staggered breath. “Do you think I leaked word to the press about the Nest, too?”
“Unbelievable.”
“Paul?” She couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She’d trusted him. Believed in him. Dared to let him into her world when every instinct in her body warned her to never let anyone in again. “You do.” Outraged, devastated all over again, she reached for the car door’s handle, jerked it open.
“No, Della, wait. You’ve got it all wrong.”
“I don’t think so. I had it all wrong, but I’m totally clear now.” She looked at the store beside Publix. A-1 Car Rentals. “I’m going to pick up my sedan and—”
“And then I’m going to follow you to the ranch.”
“Uh, no. No way.”
“Stop. Think. There’s nowhere else to go. Madison’s? Mrs. Renault’s? You said yourself you’d be putting them in more danger. The ranch has the best security.”
“I don’t want to be around you right now. I might not ever want to be around you again.”
“You’re not being fair. Do I get to explain? This isn’t what you think, Della.”
“It’s exactly what I think.” She shook, gripped the shoulder strap on her purse and squeezed. “Do you think I’m blind? I see the truth in your eyes.”
“Truth, maybe. But not the truth you think.”
“I thought you trusted me.”
Hurt rippled over his face. “You’re taking this all wrong.”
“Sure I am.” She slammed the door and walked off.
He jumped out, yelled over to her, “I’ll be waiting.”
She didn’t slow down or look back.
SIX
Man, had he botched that one!
Paul thumped the steering wheel with the heel of his hand and kept his eye on the front door of A-1 Car Rentals’ brick building. She’d jumped to conclusions he hadn’t expected—one that infuriated him. He couldn’t believe she’d think any of that for a second. Three years, and she still didn’t trust him. Wasn’t she ever going to heal? At all? A little? Did she even realize her insult? He hadn’t responded immediately. At first he’d been too stunned and then too angry. Before he recovered, she stalked off. Just stalked off, refusing to listen to his side of things. That shocked him again.
He sat, fumed and lost himself in his reeling thoughts.
When he next glanced at the clock, he was still chewing himself alive inside and was stunned to see forty minutes had passed. A-1 wouldn’t be winning any customer service awards. No, something was wrong.
He rushed out of the car and hurried toward the front door.
You should have just told her.
The accusation in his mind chafed emotions already raw.
She thinks you’ve betrayed her, too.
When he pushed down deep, past all the clutter, hadn’t he betrayed her? Hadn’t he? He’d done the one thing he knew she didn’t want. He’d fallen for her. She’d trusted him, and he’d blown it. She’d seen doubt in his eyes, all right. But it wasn’t about her guilt or innocence. It was about his own.
He’d failed her. In a different way than Jeff had, but he’d failed her all the same.
She wasn’t waiting for Jeff anymore. That was the good news.
She now doubted Paul, considered him the same kind of betrayer as Jeff. That was the bad news.
If she really understood his doubt, she’d resent him even more. That was the worst news, and there seemed nothing Paul could do about it.
The green sedan she was supposedly getting still sat parked two cars over. What were they doing to her in there? He yanked the door open and went inside.
The place was empty of customers.
A man walked out of an office and into the reception area. Thin, a white shirt, gold-wire glasses. “Where’s Miss Jackson?” Paul asked.
“Oh, she left a good bit ago.”
“She left?” Paul’s voice elevated a full octave. “In what? The green sedan—”
“She didn’t want it.” He stammered, unsure why Paul was so upset. “She took the red CRV out back.”
“A good bit ago?” Oh, Lord, no. She could be anywhere. Her stalker... “Can you track the car?”
“No, sir.”
“You don’t have tracking devices on your vehicles?”
“Not the CRV. It’s new to the fleet. We haven’t installed it yet.”
“Give me the tag number.”
“I—I can’t do that.” He frowned, backed up a step. “Are you a cop?”
“No.” Rather than wasting time arguing or pleading, Paul called Detective Cray. He had the clout to get the vehicle information most quickly. “I need some information on a rental vehicle.”
“And you’re calling me because...”
“You can get it.”
“Why would I get it?”
“Because Della’s in the vehicle.”
Cray’s voice turned serious. “You were supposed to be watching her.”
Guilt rammed into Paul. “I was trying to. She ditched me at A-1 Rentals.”
“So she could be doing this to herself.”
“No, she’s not. She got upset over a personal matter. It had nothing to do with the case.” Paul grimaced. “Look, she’s got a healthy lead and I’m worried.”
“Personal, huh?”
“Yeah.”
Cray’s voice changed, sobered. “Her stalker’s been too active. She’s vulnerable, Paul.”
“I know that, and they won’t give me the tag number, which is why I’m calling you. Can you help me, or what?”
“I’ll take care of it. Hold on.” In the background he issued the order to someone, then returned to Paul. “Still there?”
“Yeah.” Paul turned his back to the counter, stared out the window. Where would she go?
“While we’re waiting on that, I’ve got an update on her ex, Jeff Jackson. We checked with the locals in Tennessee. They did some digging and just got back to us. Best they can tell, Jeff hasn’t been seen up there for over a week.”
“This has been going on longer.”
“Well, he could have been out of pocket longer. The woman he sees was away for a couple weeks before that, visiting family. So she’s talked to him but hasn’t see
n him for over a month. Neither have his neighbors, but that’s not unusual, they say.”
“So he could be her stalker.”
“It’s possible, though it seems he’s settled into a new life with this new woman. She says he’s put the past behind him. Doesn’t talk about it or anything. They’re planning on getting married at Christmas. She’s always wanted a Christmas wedding.”
He hadn’t changed his mind, and there wasn’t a sign of regret. Relief and new fears merged and roiled in Paul’s stomach. He could be just as angry as the day he served her divorce papers in the airport, when she returned from Afghanistan. “We have to find Della.”
“In a big way,” the detective agreed. A-1’s phone rang. In short order, the detective relayed the red CRV’s tag number to Paul, then added, “I’ll put out an APB on her.”
An all points bulletin would tick her off even more. “Can we keep this low-key and just locate her? The stalker seems wired in to me. You issue an APB and he knows we’re out of touch with her. That could make him even bolder, and considering he’s gutsy enough to strike her bedroom with a whole team of cops in the house...”
“Valid point. Low-key is safest for her.” Detective Cray paused, then added, “You going to tell me what ticked her off enough to skate out on you?”
Shame washed through Paul. He watched a woman holding a toddler’s hand walk down the sidewalk through the window. A lump formed in his throat. “I doubted her.”
“You think she’s—”
“Not about any of this. No way.” A twinge hitched in his chest. “About her still being in love with her ex.”
“Ah, I see.”
Paul figured he really did.
His tone changed, grew more trusting. “Any idea where she’d go?”
“I’ve been thinking about that as we talked, and unfortunately, no.” He frowned at a spot on the wall, still trying to get inside her head. “She wouldn’t put anyone else in jeopardy, so that knocks out where she works and those there. That’s all she does. Other than the Lost, Inc., staff, all she has is me.”
“What about her neighbor?”
“Miss Addie? She and Gracie are away. Della insisted it was safest since Gracie saw the guy mowing the lawn.”
“Wise move on Della’s part,” Cray said. “Where are they?”
“Out of state.” No way was Paul telling anyone the exact location.
“You’re sure Della wouldn’t join them?”
“With Gracie there? No way. She’d never endanger any child.”
“It’s awful, what happened to her son. Seeing that bottle rattled her. I can’t see her doing anything to put a kid at risk, either.”
“Wouldn’t happen.” Paul was as certain of that as the need for his next breath.
Cray exhaled. Static crackled through the phone. “Any other ideas?”
“Not even one.” The truth in that doubled Paul’s fear.
* * *
She needed to rest and think.
Della drove down Highway 98, crossed the bridge to the island and then drove on to the pier. She parked the CRV in the first available slot and cut the engine. With the festival behind them, the season was over. Tourists had gone home and snowbirds hadn’t yet arrived. Normally, the hustle and bustle at the beach was welcome and quieted the noise in her mind, but today she hungered for isolation. So much had happened; she needed a breather to clear the buzz from her head and sort through everything methodically. That was her only hope of making sense of events. She rubbed on some sunscreen, gathered her purse, dropped in the keys and locked the car, then hooked her shoes on her handbag and headed down to the water’s edge.
The sand warmed her bare feet. The waning sun still shone bright, glaring through her shades. Near the water, waves broke into ripples and frothy white curls teased the sugar-white shore. She sat down just beyond the water’s reach and looked out on the horizon. The deserted beach was serene and calm, perfect for a rattled woman with a lot on her mind.
Who was her stalker? That was the key question. The answer would determine who was trying to set her up, duping or hiring someone to pose as her and ship the package. Whoever he was, his intentions clearly had turned deadly. One bloody knife in the package she’d supposedly shipped from Tennessee. One bloody knife stabbing her bed. Definitely deadly.
It was true that neither Dawson nor Crawford fit Tommy Jasper’s description of her stalker. Yet appearances could be changed. But had they? No evidence of it.
There ain’t ever evidence of something until there is.
Miss Addie’s words haunted Della. Her cases had come up dry, and neither she nor Paul could see anyone on their team doing this. That left one person on her possible stalker list. Jeff. Yet something inside her refused to believe he would do any of this. He hated her. That was obvious. But hating her was easier than hating himself. He’d never harmed anyone. He was a gentle man. True, he hadn’t looked or acted gentle at the airport the day she’d returned from Afghanistan, and Jimmy was right. People could snap. They could slip or experience something that pushed them over the edge and snap like a cracker.
But it’d been three years. Surely he wasn’t the same now as then, either. Surely he’d gotten some of his sense back. He’d lost his son, but would harming his son’s mother bring him any relief? Of course not. He was an intelligent man. He’d draw that same conclusion—once he broke free of the mighty jaws of grief. If he broke free. Some people got stuck and never broke free. Was Jeff one of them?
She thought about it. About how he processed trials and challenges. He worked through them, prayed over them. No, the man she knew wouldn’t get stuck. He’d face grief head-on and get through it. He might want to hurt her, but his idea of hurting her was the kind of thing he was doing in withholding photos of Danny. Not doing what her stalker had done with Tommy Jasper or planting bombs in her garaged car and on Paul’s SUV or stealing her underwear, or breaking into her cottage and slitting her bed or mailing her a package with a bloody knife. Him refusing to send her photos of their son was a long stretch from all this. Too long a stretch.
So if not Jeff, then who was left?
The Nest.
She dug her toes deep into the sand. It was odd that this whole stalker scenario was happening at the same time as a security breach at the Nest. Was that a coincidence? Or was it deliberate? She lifted her face to the weak sun and stiff breeze, and mulled that over. General Talbot’s appointment. Colonel Dayton’s promotion. Men had done far worse things to achieve far less. Madison’s analysis fit. The stalker had planned, and he’d gone to a lot of trouble to find a woman to pass for Della, shipping that package. Was that woman involved or was she a victim, too? An innocent bystander like Tommy who had been used and had no idea what she was doing?
Gulls cawed overhead, flying in huge circles down the edge of the beach. Used to tourists feeding them, they were nudging Della into tossing them some bread. Unfortunately she didn’t have any with her. “Sorry.”
She lowered her gaze back to the horizon and rested her chin on her arms, draped on her bent knees. It was odd, the effect the beach had on her. When she had been stationed at the Nest, shortly after her arrival, there had been a serious hacking attempt on its computers. For fourteen hours straight she’d combatted the attack, at war with an unseen enemy in a keyboard battle that had taken all of her skills and knowledge and every ounce of stamina and strength she’d possessed. It’d been a high-stakes chess match, where she’d had to think five, six, at times even seven steps ahead, and she had risen to the challenge. The commander and his vice had watched the entire attack play out, battle by battle, and only once had either tried to interfere and direct her defense. She’d objected, shouted why the suggestion would fail three moves ahead, and they’d left their fate in her hands. She’d launched an attack that had turned the tide, requiring the hacker to defend himself, and she’d won. Victory was sweet, even if no one outside the ops center would ever know of it. Yet it had taken its toll. Wrun
g out and limp, she hadn’t dared to go home in that condition. Jeff would have worried himself sick. So she’d come to the beach. Stared out on the horizon. The tension had left her body and she’d talked through her fears with God. She’d sat there until the sun dipped below the horizon and sank into the gulf. And she’d left feeling renewed and refreshed and gone home.
Then Danny had died. Jeff blamed her. She blamed the computer skills that had taken her away from them. And she’d dropped them flat. The only other skills she had left were those she’d acquired in the intelligence realm, so she’d used them, getting her Class-C license as a private investigator.
When she’d returned to North Bay, she had come to the beach, hoping to recapture that sense of balance and serenity, some inkling of tranquility. At best, she’d achieved mixed results. She hadn’t talked to God. She hadn’t felt tranquil or serene or calm or refreshed or restored. But she hadn’t wanted to crawl in a hole and die anymore, and that was a step up. So she kept coming back to the beach. Again and again. Each time she’d come, she’d found comfort in leaving, not wanting to die.
Mixed results. It wasn’t much. But it was all she had left, and she was grateful for it. When you’re alone and empty, something is better than nothing.
She drew in a deep breath, lifted her face to the glow still visible of the sun just above the horizon. It warmed her cheeks. The breeze kicked up, blew her hair back from her face, tugged at her eyelids. She dared to close her eyes, to let her mind wander through the facts. General Talbot had told Madison about the press leak exposing the facility, the reporter having accurate information only an insider would have. Talbot clearly knew that everyone who worked at Lost, Inc., had an ax to grind with the military. Madison was a former POW. Jimmy lost his best friend, Bruno, because of orders to execute a mission without the proper equipment. While Doc had been deployed in Iraq, his wife had been murdered in a home invasion. Mrs. Renault’s husband fell victim to a heart attack and died at his desk. And Della had lost her son, her husband, her career and her faith. As potential sacrificial lambs went, Lost, Inc., was a rich target. A case could be made against any of them with little effort. So why her? And what about Paul?
