Swept Aside

by Sharon Sala

  She hit Mute on the remote.

  “What?”

  “They found the missing delivery van and driver.”

  It was the expression on his face that told her there was more, and that it wasn’t going to be good.

  “And…?”

  “And he’s dead. His clothes are gone, and the prison jumpsuit Drake was wearing was beside his body.”

  She couldn’t control a shudder.

  “This ups the ante considerably,” Nick said. “Drake has nothing to lose anymore.”

  Amalie covered her face with her hands. She couldn’t think—she couldn’t breathe. It felt as if someone was sitting on her chest.

  “Don’t, baby. We’ll get through this,” he said.

  She shook her head, crawled onto his lap and hid her face against his shoulder.

  Nick silently cursed as he wrapped his arms around her. She was shaking so hard he could feel it. He couldn’t quit thinking that this was all his fault. He was the one who’d found this house. He was the one who’d led three desperate men into her life and nearly gotten her killed for it. And just when he thought everything was finally over, this had to happen.

  “I’m sorry, Amalie…so, so sorry.”

  She didn’t move. She couldn’t speak. She was holding on to the only bit of sanity she had left.

  The house grew silent. Nick’s phone didn’t ring. There was nothing more to be said. They were all waiting—waiting for a killer. Would he come? Or would he disappear? Would she spend the rest of her life looking over her shoulder?

  She was still in Nick’s lap when the sun went down.

  Seventeen

  Lou charged through the underbrush, holding tight to his weapons. He was desperate to check out Amalie’s visitors and see how their appearance impacted his plans. By the time he reached the tree line surrounding the house, the men were just getting out of the Jeep. As he’d thought, they were dressed like soldiers, and unless they were just stopping here to ask permission to go hunting on her property, it seemed an odd choice of clothes.

  Suddenly the front door opened. He leaned forward, expecting to see Amalie Pope emerge. Instead a tall, dark-haired man wearing gray pants and a red knit shirt came out onto the veranda.

  Lou grunted as if he’d just been punched in the gut. Unless his eyes were deceiving him, the man looked like Aroyo. He even moved like him. But how was that possible? He’d watched the Feds take Aroyo into custody. He wanted to get closer but didn’t dare. Even the slightest movement could call attention to himself, and then it would all be over.

  He kept watching, expecting to see the woman come out. But she never showed. The idea crossed his mind that maybe he should just discard this notion of revenge and get out while the getting was good.

  But no one had ever accused Lou Drake of being an intelligent man. He’d operated on gut instinct and knee-jerk reactions his whole life, and he wasn’t about to change. If he didn’t get satisfaction for what Amalie Pope had done, he knew he would regret it the rest of his life.

  When the men got back into the Jeep, he expected them to drive out the way they’d come in. Instead they circled behind the house, at which point he lost sight of them. Then he realized the dark-haired man was gone, too. The front door was closed again, and instead of answers, he was left with more questions.

  Muttering beneath his breath, he quickly circled the house, taking care to stay deep within the trees. He wanted to see where these men were going and what they were up to. But by the time he reached a point where he could see the backside of the house, the Jeep was already out of sight. Frustrated, he started to retrace his steps when he saw the men emerge from behind the barn, only this time they were on foot and carrying rifles.

  This did not look good.

  As they paused, he tensed, then watched as the three men split up and headed into the woods at three different locations. When he realized one of them was coming his way, he panicked and ran deeper into the trees. When he was finally satisfied that he’d found a safe place of concealment, he settled down to wait until dark. Obviously they were set to guard the place. He assumed to protect her from him.

  But instead of letting that throw a kink in his plans, Lou grinned. He liked a little competition. It should be an easy task to slip through the woods after dark. He knew the place and the house better than they did, and he had a few tricks up his sleeve. He would have preferred some firepower, but would gladly settle for the long wicked knife with the serrated edge and his nice sharp hatchet.

  Right now his plan was to get inside the house, dispose of the guy who looked like Aroyo and then have a little fun with that bitch before he cut her in pieces.

  A phone rang.

  Amalie jerked, blinking in confusion as the deep rumble of Nick’s voice sounded above her head. The last thing she remembered was crawling up onto his lap, where she’d obviously fallen asleep. What touched her was that she was still there. No telling how long he’d sat, quietly holding her safe within his embrace.

  She listened long enough to know he was talking to Edwards again, then got up, waved goodbye and blew him a kiss before leaving the room. After a quick trip to the bathroom, she thought about making them some supper. Sunset had come and gone, and the moonless night promised to be a long and tense one.

  She dug around in the pantry, then the refrigerator, before deciding on hamburgers. They would be hearty and quick, and she had some chips to go with them.

  She washed her hands, then got to work, and was taking the last burger out of the pan when Nick came into the room.

  “Smells good,” he said.

  “Thanks. You might have had better fare if you hadn’t let me sleep so long.”

  He kissed the back of her neck as he passed.

  “You needed the rest, and I wasn’t going anywhere.”

  Amalie began putting the burgers together as Nick washed up at the sink.

  “Mustard, right?” she asked.

  “Right, and onions if you have them.”

  “Absolutely,” she said. “If we both eat them, then it cancels out the smell.”

  He laughed, then made their drinks and got out the chips as she carried their plates to the table.

  Nick dug into his food with relish, but Amalie only picked at hers. She kept glancing out the windows into the darkness and wondering if Lou Drake was out there somewhere, just waiting for his chance to get revenge.

  “Eat, honey,” Nick said. “The team is out there, and I’m in here. There’s no way he can get on your property without us knowing it.”

  “Right,” Amalie said, and made herself eat.

  “Feel like talking?” he asked.

  “Absolutely,” she said. “About what?”

  He shrugged. “Stuff.”

  She smiled. “So what stuff are we talking about?”

  “Like…what’s your favorite color…your favorite flower…your favorite holiday? You know…the kinds of things we would know if we’d done this the right way.”

  It touched her to realize he was serious, and so she treated her answers the same way.

  “My favorite color is blue. My favorite flower is lilac. Christmas is for sure my favorite holiday. What about you?”

  “I like red, I guess. I love Christmas, but I think Thanksgiving is my favorite. It comes with my mom’s pecan pies.”

  Amalie’s eyes widened. It was the first time he’d ever mentioned family.

  “How much family do you have?” she asked.

  “My dad’s been dead since my senior year of college. Heart attack. He was a cop in St. Louis. Mom lives in Miami now, not far from my condo. I have a brother who’s an electrical engineer. He has a wife and four kids, and lives in Denver. I have a younger sister who lives in Oregon. She and her husband are teachers. They don’t have any kids. And there are the usual number of aunts, uncles and cousins scattered around the country.”

  “Wow! You do have family…. And you have a condo in Miami, as in Florida?”


  “Yeah, that’s where I live when I’m not on a case. As for my family, they’ll be your family, too,” he reminded her.

  The thought of belonging to a clan like that was comforting. “I can’t wait to meet them,” Amalie said.

  “As soon as we get this mess behind us and you feel like taking a trip, I’ll take you back to Miami with me. I need to either put the condo up for sale or see about renting it out.”

  Amalie realized he was about to reorder his life to fit hers and was touched that he understood her bond to this place.

  “What about your job?” she asked.

  “I’ll still be DEA, but I can do that from anywhere.”

  “And the undercover part?”

  Nick frowned. “No. This one put a bad taste in my mouth that I’m not willing to ignore. Enough is enough.”

  “You’re sure? Because I don’t want you to have regrets later and blame me.”

  “That’s not going to happen. Besides…what kind of a father would I be if I was gone all the time?”

  Amalie grinned, her cheeks a little pink.

  “Father?”

  “You do want kids, don’t you? I mean…you being a teacher and all, I just assumed—”

  “Of course I want kids. It’s been a long time since children lived here. It’s time this house had some noise and laughter beneath its roof again.”

  “This whole place is amazing.”

  “It is, isn’t it?” Amalie said.

  Nick’s phone rang again. This time it was Babcock.

  “It’s my boss,” he said.

  She waved to indicate she was giving him some privacy and left the kitchen. Making sure all the doors and windows were locked would give her a measure of confidence. For now, it was all she could do.

  Lou was beginning to fidget. It was time to make his move. He’d already found the location of the guard closest to him and made sure to give the man a wide berth when he headed for the house.

  And there was no moon—a fact that helped his plan along.

  It was as if the world was accommodating his needs as he moved through the trees and then across the clearing to the house. He could only assume that the guard who was inside had already taken care of locking the windows and doors.

  But there was one window in a very small room that he had found during his days of enforced inactivity that he would bet money no one had checked. He didn’t know what the room’s initial purpose had been, but it was now an empty closet, with nothing but an assortment of wire and wooden hangers and a few boxes of old clothes stacked up beneath the window. He knew it would be unlocked because the lock was broken. The fact that it was on the ground floor and at the back of the house made things even better.

  Careful to stay away from the rooms that were lit, he made his way around the house. When he got to the window and pushed, it slid part of the way up, then stuck. He pushed a little harder and grinned when it rose the rest of the way without a hitch.

  Bingo.

  So far so good. Taking a chance that the boxes would still be under the window, he dropped his hatchet and fillet knife inside, heard them land with a soft plop on top of the clothes, then hefted himself up and through the opening.

  The room was just as he remembered. He used his memory and sense of touch to maneuver around the boxes as he pulled down the window. Then he slipped the hatchet between his belt and the waistband of his pants before palming the knife as he moved to the doorway. Once he opened the door, he would be in the utility room just off the kitchen. After that, it was just a matter of finding the guard.

  His hand was on the doorknob when he heard a deep voice and realized the guard was in the kitchen. He listened closer, his ear against the door, to see if he could hear what was being said. But it wasn’t what was being said that shocked him. It was when he recognized the voice.

  Son of a holy bitch!

  It was Aroyo who he’d seen!

  What could this possibly mean?

  He needed to hear what was being said, and ever so slowly he turned the knob and cracked the door—

  Nick was at the counter, writing as fast as he could, taking notes as Babcock talked.

  “Yes, sir, that’s right. The last shipment that French sent off went via a man named Armentrout. The last payment came in via a man named Curtis. No, I don’t know if Curtis was his first name or his last. And I only saw him once. Most of the time a man named Prejean made the drops.”

  The floor creaked behind Nick. He turned, a smile on his lips, expecting to see Amalie. It was the creak that saved his life.

  Lou Drake was coming at him with an upraised hatchet and a look of unadulterated hate on his face.

  “You son of a bitch! You turncoat son of a bitch!” Lou screamed, and chopped downward, catching the edge of Nick’s shirt and cutting into his shoulder.

  The blow was deep and painful, knocking Nick backward off his feet. He fell, taking a chair down with him. The phone clattered onto the floor as he reached behind him for his weapon, only to remember that he’d taken it out of the back of his jeans when he sat down on the sofa. It was still in the living room, right on the end table where he’d put it.

  Blood was pouring from his shoulder, and he was fighting not to pass out from the pain. He kept scrambling backward in an effort to get out of Lou’s reach and get back on his feet, but Lou kept coming, swinging the hatchet and cursing.

  “How did you do it?” Lou screamed, as he kicked over a chair and swung again, this time cutting a slash through the sole of Nick’s boot.

  Nick felt a sharp sting and knew that the blade had cut through enough leather to draw blood, but he didn’t have time to worry about how deep or how much. He rolled over onto his hands and knees, and crawled beneath the kitchen table, pulling it with him as a shelter.

  Lou followed, chopping downward and splitting the tabletop in half. The salt and pepper shakers fell onto the floor and shattered, along with the plates and the leftover food, scattering even more debris.

  Lou kicked another chair out of the way. It hit the wall with a bang.

  “You and that bitch were in it together from the start! You’re the one who found the house for us to shelter in. You knew she was here. You kept us pinned down until Tug was so sick you knew he wouldn’t make it. Then you helped her get away and gave us up. I’m gonna take you down, and I’m gonna make you watch while I fuck her till she bleeds. Then I’m gonna kill you both.”

  Nick’s blood ran cold. He had to get the upper hand. He couldn’t let Drake leave this room alive.

  Edwards had his cell on vibrate, so when the call came in, he almost missed it. He answered just as it was about to go to voice mail.

  “This is Edwards,” he said softly.

  It was Babcock, and he was yelling.

  “Drake is inside the house! Nick and I were talking when I heard him break in. From what I could hear, he’s armed and Aroyo isn’t, or there would already be gunfire. Get inside as fast as you can and call me when it’s over!”

  “Yes, sir!” Edwards said, and then grabbed his handheld and radioed the others. “Target is inside the house. I repeat. Target is inside the house. Move! Move!”

  He couldn’t believe it as he started running. How had the man gotten past them? But that was a question that would have to wait. He had unfamiliar territory and a lot of trees and ground to cover. All they could do was hope Nick would be able to hold his own until they could get there.

  Amalie was on her way down the stairs when she heard a man shout. At first she thought it was Nick, and then she heard chairs crashing and things breaking, along with more shouting and cursing, and that was when she knew.

  The devil was back, and he’d come for her.

  Her first instinct was to run—to hide in the secret room inside her closet until all the shouting was over. She was already turning for the stairs when it hit her. Not only had Nick not fired his weapon, she hadn’t even heard his voice. Something had gone horribly wrong. And that was when s
he ran for her rifle.

  Nick had managed to get to his feet and was trying to maneuver himself to the doorway. Even wounded, he knew he could outrun Drake. All he needed was time to get to the living room and get his gun, and this would be over.

  But Drake wasn’t stupid. The moment he’d realized that Nick wanted out of the room, he’d positioned himself between the door and the hall, the hatchet in one hand and the fillet knife in the other.

  Nick could have run out the kitchen door, but that would have left Drake in the house with Amalie, and that wasn’t going to happen.

  “There are agents in the woods. They’ll be here in seconds,” Nick said.

  Lou laughed. “No, they won’t, because they don’t know I’m even here. I moved right past the stupid bastards, and they never knew it.”

  Nick feared Lou was right, but he wasn’t going to admit it.

  “You’re wrong,” he said, trying to buy some time and hoping Amalie had heard enough of the ruckus to hide.

  “No! You’re wrong!” Lou screamed. “You’re a back-stabbing, two-faced bastard, and this time I’ll make sure to finish you off before I move on to better things.”

  Nick’s arm was beginning to go numb. He didn’t know if it was from blood loss or if some nerves had been cut. But he was bleeding too damned much. He had to do something—and fast, before he passed out.

  He made a run for the counter, intent on grabbing a butcher knife from the knife block and arming himself.

  Lou roared and started running, the hatchet raised for a final blow.

  The shot came out of nowhere.

  It echoed within the walls of the Vatican as if someone had just set off a cannon.

  Nick froze, staring in disbelief as blood began to bubble and run from Lou’s mouth and down the front of his shirt.

  Lou didn’t know what had happened.

  His chest burned, and he could no longer feel his hands. The weapons he’d been carrying tumbled to the floor as he turned to look behind him.

  “You are a stupid man,” Amalie said, as she moved into the light. “You never did know when to stop. You should never have come back into my house.”