Dangerous Secrets

by Lyn Cote

  In contrast, Ridge felt as if he were a motor set on high idle. “Miss Hendricks,” Ridge addressed her, keeping his tone even, “I need to talk to you about something very important. I need your help.”

  “I want to tell the truth, all of it. I can’t carry it all inside me anymore. It makes me…feel sick.” The girl shivered once very hard.

  He took out a small handheld tape recorder. “I will be tape-recording this.” He repeated the Miranda to her just to be on the safe side and asked her if she understood it.

  The girl looked at him then and she nodded, pressing a hand control. The bed hummed as it elevated her head and shoulders. “I know you,” she said, adjusting to the sitting position. “You were with the sheriff when he questioned me and you were there when Jim robbed Ollie’s store.”

  This news stiffened Ridge’s spine. He approached her. The psychiatrist hung back just inside the door, leaning against the wall. “Jim? You mean it was Jim Leahy, your stepfather, who robbed Ollie’s?”

  “Yes, it was Jim. I recognized him even though he had the mask on. I mean, I know his voice. That’s why I didn’t give him the money right away. I was so shocked.” She spoke without emphasis, stringing words together. “And then you were chasing him. And I didn’t want you to catch him. So I ran after you. I picked up a stick and I hit you over the head with it. It was a big stick, almost as thick as a log. You didn’t hear me running after you.”

  Ridge sat down in the bedside chair. Abruptly. “Why did you hit me?” Ridge kept his voice very calm. But the back of his head tingled where he had been struck. “Why didn’t you let me catch him?”

  “He was my supplier. If you caught him, I wouldn’t get any more stuff.”

  “I see. That makes sense.” Ridge’s hands curled into fists. “Sylvie Patterson visited you Friday. Do you know that she has been kidnapped?”

  “Yes, I saw it on the TV news. Jim must have kidnapped her.” The girl’s voice was serene, flat.

  “Jim?” Ridge’s fists tightened. “Why would he kidnap Sylvie?”

  “Because she’s his last chance. He has to get that money.” Now her voice picked up a slight momentum. “He didn’t find it in any of those houses or apartments. Not in that dead girl’s apartment. Or the bookshop. Or in that house, that house that belonged to Ginger’s mom, Shirley. She’s nice.”

  “What money?” Ridge moved to the edge of his chair.

  “The money from the winning lottery ticket. My grandpa was so mad because he knew someone had bought a winning lottery ticket at his store last fall. But they never turned it in. So he didn’t get his percentage of the winnings. He said he could have retired and lived well for the rest of his life on it.”

  Thoughts bursting like popcorn in his mind, Ridge forced himself to just sit quietly and let it all come out. Any questions from him might stem the flow.

  “Then that girl, that Ginger, stopped at the store and told me that she had bought the winning lottery ticket last fall. But she hadn’t known it. Because she was away, in Alaska, I think it was. Anyway, she read it in a newspaper in Superior on her way home. So she came in all happy and said that she had all her lottery tickets from last year in a hiding place and that she would come back in tomorrow. She’d come to Ollie’s the next morning and turn it in. And she’d be a millionaire. But then she couldn’t, because she died.”

  All this was said in a singsong voice, but the quickening tempo showed the girl’s stress rising. Could he believe her? Could Ginger’s murder and every break-in have been caused by that winning lottery ticket that had never been turned in? It was ridiculous. Outlandish. But it all made sense. Someone had been looking for something. Something worth killing for. And a lottery ticket worth millions could cause all of that. He finally had the motive.

  The flow had stopped. He must prime the pump. Again, he kept his voice even as he asked, “Tanya, did Jim kill Ginger?”

  Tanya folded her arms around her knees and started rocking back and forth. “I wanted that money. Then I could leave this awful little town. And then I could have my life back. I don’t like being poor. Mom said she’d send me money. But I would have to wait. She said my new stepfather would send me to college.”

  She rocked harder. “She’d persuade him. I just had to wait. But I haven’t heard from her for a long time now. Maybe my new stepfather hasn’t agreed to give her the money. Or maybe she doesn’t want to share it with me. So I’m stuck in this awful place. I mean, my grandpa is okay, but…this isn’t my life.”

  The psychiatrist walked farther into the room and rested a hand on Ridge’s shoulder, silently asking for restraint.

  Ridge nodded. “I’m sorry that you haven’t heard from your mother. But did Jim kill Ginger?”

  Tanya looked him right in the eye and ceased rocking. “I went there to see if I could find the winning ticket. That girl told me she would be out all night with her cousin, that Sylvie who came to see me. I remember crawling in through a window.” She began rocking again. “And I was pulling books from the shelves, and then I had a flashback, you know, a bad trip. When I woke up, I was lying at the bottom of the steps on top of her.”

  Tanya began rocking very fast, very hard. “I don’t know what happened.” Her voice rose, shrill, frantic. “Maybe she came in and I was having a flashback and we might have struggled together and then fallen down the stairs. I was at the bottom of the stairs on top of her when I woke up but I can’t remember…but Jim must’ve been there, too.” She moaned and bent her forehead to her folded knees.

  Watching this young girl distressed him. She shouldn’t be here. In this condition. In his mind, he pictured the girl’s mother as he had known her in high school. Right now he wished that she were here so he could tell her what he thought of her mothering skills. “But…did you tell Jim? Tell him you knew he was after the lottery ticket?”

  “No, but I know Jim was at the convenience store that night,” Tanya said. “He’d just bought some liquor and was walking out the back door when that Ginger, that girl from Alaska, came and started blabbing about the winning ticket. Why did she tell us? Why would she blab about it to a stranger like that?”

  Because she was an honest person and honest people don’t think like dishonest people. Ridge coaxed her to go on. “Tanya, where would Jim take Sylvie? We’ve searched his house. But she wasn’t there and neither was he.”

  Tanya stared at the ceiling, her eyes wide. “There’s a place…a place south, it’s where he picks up drugs. It’s an old bar…it’s been closed up for years. Behind it, his supplier brings the stuff. Jim took me with him once. Because I was bugging him. And he had to go.”

  Again, she looked directly into Ridge’s eyes. “Jim’s not a bad guy. But he lost all his money. Bad investments. And they’re about to foreclose on his place here. My mom left him. He started gambling. And he owes some really scary people a lot of money. A lot. He had to have it. He’s not a bad guy. Really.”

  The psychiatrist squeezed Ridge’s shoulder hard. Ridge understood. He rose and offered his hand to Tanya. “Thank you, you’ve helped me. Now we can find Sylvie.”

  She let him press her hand once. “I’m sorry I hit you. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  “I know. Get better now.” Ridge turned and walked out the door, leaving the psychiatrist to deal with the sad, abandoned girl.

  He nearly ran to the elevator, and on the first floor, he hurried out the door nearest the parking lot, his boots slapping through about three inches of sloppy wet snow. He flipped open his phone and speed-dialed the sheriff. Wet snow splashed him in the face and the wind roared around the building, pounding, beating him. Unlocking his door, he climbed inside and slammed it against the wind.

  Keir came on the line. Ridge interrupted him, “I know where Sylvie is. You know that abandoned bar on the highway halfway between Washburn and Ashford? Tanya told me. She also said Ginger was killed because of a lottery ticket. But she thinks Jim’s taken Sylvie to that old bar. I’m going there now
. Meet me.”

  The sheriff barked questions, but Ridge couldn’t waste time on that. “I’m heading there now. Meet me.” He started the SUV and roared out of his parking spot. The fierce wind buffeted the vehicle as if it were a mere paper boat on a windswept stream. Set on high speed, Ridge’s windshield wipers batted at the pelting snow, sliding over his windshield.

  Ridge’s pulse kept pace with the wind. The fear that Jim might accidentally kill someone again, kill Sylvie, set his teeth on edge. A nice guy. Yeah, right.

  Sylvie hated this fuzzy, awful feeling.

  “I’m going to leave you now,” the man above her said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I’ll go to the hiding place and get what I need. And then when I can, I’ll call and tell them where you are—”

  Then Sylvie heard the door open hard, then footsteps, coming toward her, vibrating on the floor, not leaving. A rush of cold, wet air along the floor made her shiver. The man standing above her turned; she could hear the soles of his shoes grate on the gritty floor beside her head. Had help come?

  “Why did you bring him along?” the man standing above her asked, sounding shrill and worried.

  “Because he’s tired of waiting for the money,” another voice, low and menacing, replied.

  Sylvie was glad that this person wasn’t speaking to her. He didn’t sound like a man who would take no for an answer.

  “I’ve got two more days,” the man who’d brought her here objected, sounding even more shrill.

  “Well, things change,” the low, menacing voice replied. “And anyway, how are you going to come up with numbers like that in two days? And I was in the neighborhood. I won’t need to make a special trip.”

  “Now, wait a minute. I’ve just got information that I’ve needed, that I’ve been looking for! I’ll have the money in two days for him.”

  Another male voice asked, “Who’s the chick on the floor?”

  “Don’t bother about her. She hasn’t heard or seen anything. She won’t be able to testify against me.”

  “You brought her here?” the low, menacing voice asked him. “Why?”

  “She had the information I needed.”

  Sylvie wondered why a childhood hiding place was so important to this man and what money he he talking about.

  “So,” the menacing voice said, “I have to take care of two of you.”

  “No!” The man who had brought her objected, sounding panicked. “She doesn’t know anything. And I told you—”

  The sound of sirens buffeted Sylvie’s hypersensitive hearing. She stiffened where she lay. Would they kill her? Dear Father! Save me!

  A gun exploded above Sylvie. She screamed. A heavy weight fell across her middle. She screamed again. Footsteps ran away.

  THIRTEEN

  In his SUV parked behind a clump of trees, Ridge heard first the siren and then the gunshot from inside the derelict bar. Inside, someone had heard the siren, too. Someone who had a gun. Who was the idiot who was arriving at a hostage situation with siren blaring? It forced his hand. He’d been waiting for backup. Now Ridge jumped out of his SUV. The wind wailed around him. He slid on the wet, sloppy snow. Sylvie was inside. Sylvie might be…

  He charged toward the door. One good kick and the hinges gave way from the rotted wood. He wrenched off two boards that had been nailed across the doorway. “Police!” he bellowed.

  He halted inside, instinctively seeking shelter in the shadows, getting his bearings in the darkened building. As his eyes adjusted, he looked across the room and saw that the room was empty. Or was it? Then more gunshots came from outside behind the tavern. Backup must have arrived.

  Sylvie heard more gunshots. But from farther away. From outside. She panted, straining to breathe against the weight compressing her diaphragm. Still, she was afraid to move. Something too horrible to name was wetting her body from the soft but heavy thing that lay over her. She didn’t want to think, wouldn’t let herself think what it was. But it made it so hard to breathe. She tried to roll it off but was still hampered by having her hands tied behind her.

  More sirens. Noise. Shouts. Sylvie steeled herself. She began praying the only scripture that came to her, the Twenty-third Psalm.

  “Sylvie!” Ridge’s voice came to her through the darkness.

  “I’m here, Ridge!” she shouted. “I’m here. Help me. Oh, please.”

  She felt his footsteps vibrate the floor as he ran to her. The weight was rolled off her. The blindfold was ripped off her head and she looked up into Ridge’s eyes. “Oh, Ridge, Ridge.”

  He untied her numb hands and, lifting her off the floor, he laid her on what must have once been a bar. There was almost no daylight. But from above, snowflakes sifted down onto her face. The pins-and-needles sensation flared in her hands that had been bound. She gasped with the pain of it.

  “Are you hurt? You look like you’re bleeding.” Ridge ran his hands lightly over her as if searching for injuries.

  “I’m fine.” She tried to remember, to bring up the words the man who’d kidnapped her had said. “Ridge. Is he dead?”

  “I don’t know. Can you sit up?”

  “No. Everything hurts, aches. I’m pins and needles all over.”

  “Lie still. I’ll be right back. I have to check him.”

  After that, everything became a blur. Everything except the fact that she was in Ridge’s arms. And, as she knew she had been all night, in God’s arms.

  Hours later, Ridge insisted on carrying her, wrapped in a blanket, up the steps to the Patterson apartment. She’d insisted on going home from the hospital, but would go in to her doctor for a visit in the morning. At the door, Milo and Ben greeted them. For a few moments, there were only hugs and tears. Ridge laid Sylvie on the sofa in the living room. She gazed out the large windows at the dark sky. The wind still slapped against the glass, dashing ice particles against it. But the snow had stopped. The eye of the storm had moved on.

  Sylvie was wearing fresh, faded green scrubs that had been given to her at the hospital. The clothing Sylvie had been wearing had been taken as evidence. She’d taken a shower at the hospital and also given a blood sample to tell if there was any evidence of drugs in her system. She sighed, a great contentment stealing over her. “I feel like I’ve been to China and back again twice.”

  “We were worried,” Ben admitted. “Real worried.”

  Milo stood beside the young boy and put an arm around his shoulder. “Yes, we were. But everything is all right now. Come on, Ben. Let’s go in the kitchen and warm up the pot of soup from yesterday. Sylvie looks like she could use a bowl and so does Ridge.” Milo shepherded the young boy out to the kitchen and closed the door behind them.

  Ridge gently lifted Sylvie’s head and shoulders and sat down as her pillow. He stroked her hair back from her face, upset by the few scratches and scrapes on her cheeks and forehead. Again, the fear of losing her welled up inside of him. It must’ve shown on his face because Sylvie whispered, “It’s all right, Ridge. I’m all right.”

  “I should be comforting you.” His rough voice scoured his throat. I almost lost her.

  She reached up and stroked his cheek, just as she did that day in her kitchen in the back of her shop. But the effect was even more powerful now. Would the unnerving image of Jim Leahy’s dead body lying on top of Sylvie ever be blotted from his mind?

  “It’s really all over then, right?” she asked.

  “Yes, the two suspects who have priors on drug trafficking were caught at the bar and are in custody,” Ridge said, but he continued to stroke her hair back from her face, her beautiful face. I’ll never get tired of looking at you, Sylvie. Never.

  “It’s just so bizarre.” Sylvie sighed. “It was all about a lottery ticket. I didn’t even know that Ginger bought lottery tickets.”

  Her light blond hair glimmered in the dimly lit room. The shadows cast from the lamplight outlined the fine bones of her face. “I guess it was her secret vice. I’m still having trouble putting it all t
ogether in my mind.”

  With his palm, he smoothed out the worry lines from her forehead. “I know what you mean, but as soon as Tanya told me about the lottery ticket, everything snapped into focus,” Ridge said. Nothing could disrupt the deep peace he felt with Sylvie so near, not even a discussion of murder. “That lottery ticket was the missing clue. The motive that explained the break-ins and Ginger’s death.”

  “Tell me again.” She stroked his cheek again, her eyes probing his. “I’m having trouble keeping it all straight.”

  He kissed her palm and then, lifting her shoulders, bent to press a kiss on her forehead. He lowered her back to his lap. “According to Tanya, Ginger stopped—that first night back in town—at Ollie’s convenience store probably to pick up those groceries we found in her refrigerator. Somehow Ginger had found out that she had purchased the winning numbers on a lottery ticket that was due to expire on the twenty-eighth of this month. I think Tanya said Ginger read a newspaper on the way home.”

  “I’ve read stories like that. Stories about lottery tickets that are about to expire but that no one has claimed,” Sylvie murmured, turning her body slightly more toward Ridge.

  Cradling her hand in his, Ridge nodded. “Ginger couldn’t resist telling Tanya about it. After all, she had bought the ticket at Ollie’s.”

  Sylvie’s eyes closed. “I can see Ginger doing that. I can see her bubbling over with the news. That was the big wow surprise she had for me.” Her voice cracked on “surprise.”

  Ridge grunted in agreement and stroked her palm, the soft mound below her thumb with his. “But unfortunately she told Tanya and indirectly Jim Leahy, who was about to go out the rear entrance, that she would be out all evening with you. And that the ticket was in her hiding place.”

  “Do you think that they went together? To search for the ticket?” She rubbed her cheek against his hand. He read in her face that she was experiencing the same pull to touch him as he felt for her.