Stonebrook Cottage

by Carla Neggers

  He was retired now, paunchy, obviously available for the job.

  Sam joined Kara at the window. "This looks encouraging."

  "Wally Harrison. He would not be my first choice." Kara sighed. "Well, it's out of my hands."

  They went out through the front door, and Hatch made the introductions while Billie popped her trunk, rolling her eyes privately at Kara, as if she knew Wally Harrison was the wrong choice.

  "Obviously Wally can't stay awake twenty-four hours a day," Hatch said, "but I think he'll provide Henry and Lillian with the extra level of protection we feel they need right now, without overdoing it."

  "Wally, it's good to see you." Kara smiled, trying to be polite. "We've all just been hanging out here at the cottage this morning."

  Wally had the look of a man who spent a lot of time down at O'Reilly's Pub. His face was ruddy, and he was out of shape, his Hawaiian shirt barely covering his paunch. "It's been a while, Kara. You're keeping the criminals on the streets down in Texas, I hear."

  Kara bristled, but said nothing.

  "Wally will be as unobtrusive as possible," Hatch said quietly. "He won't interfere with your time with the kids."

  She could sense that Sam didn't like this development, but he left her to Hatch and Wally and helped Billie unload several small boxes from her trunk and set them in the shade. "I'm driving Hatch back up to his mom's," Billie said, "so Wally can stay here with his car. I had some fun stuff kicking around I thought the kids might like while they're here."

  "That's great, Billie," Kara said. "Thanks. I'm sure they'll appreciate it."

  Billie lifted out the last box, the largest, and held it on her hip. "I see Charlie's fixed the front steps. I almost broke my damn neck on them the last time I was here. I love it that they call this place a cottage." She grinned. "It's bigger than my house."

  Hatch grimaced at his sister's words. "Where are Henry and Lillian? I want to introduce them to Wally. He hasn't seen them since they were toddlers."

  His imperiousness was getting to Kara. She snatched up a small box from the shade and headed for the front door. Billie was already on the way with her big box. They set the boxes on the living-room floor. Kara noticed cheap feather boas and Mardi Gras beads, drawing pads, a shoe box of crayons, glitter glue, gel pens. She smiled at Billie. "The kids'll love this," she said. "I'll give them a yell and get them down here."

  She called them from the bottom of the stairs. "Henry and Lillian—come on down. Hatch is here with someone he wants you to meet, and Billie's brought you some goodies."

  They didn't answer, and there was no sound of footsteps.

  Kara sighed. "They must have on their Walkmans."

  "I can go up and look," Billie said.

  "It's okay—I'll do it. Thanks."

  Sam came in through the front door with the last box. He set it on the floor, then placed a foot on the bottom step and watched Kara, his intensity unsettling. She continued up the stairs and checked Henry's room first, then Lillian's.

  They weren't there.

  "Kids? Where are you?"

  Maybe they'd gone sullen and uncooperative on her and were hiding. She looked under the beds and in the closets, then peered out Lillian's window and checked the backyard. No sign of them.

  She stood on the landing and, stemming any sense of panic, shouted down the stairs. "They're not up here!"

  But Sam had already disappeared. Kara ran down the stairs two at a time, almost barreling into Sam as he returned from the kitchen. He shook his head. "They're not back there. I checked the bedroom and the bathroom as well."

  "I'll tell Hatch," Billie said, white-faced, and ran out the front door.

  Kara charged past Sam and raced through the kitchen and out the back door, sweat already trickling between her breasts from fear and exertion. She could feel the humidity in the air, the dew point higher than yesterday. There was a light bluish-gray haze on the horizon. She cut across the backyard into the woods, but Sam eased in behind her as she ducked down to the brook. But the places where Henry and Lillian had dunked their feet and looked for frogs were undisturbed, humming with mosquitoes on the hot summer morning.

  "They didn't like the idea of a bodyguard," Kara said, "but I never thought they'd run off on me. Maybe they were more upset than I realized when you told them you'd found their tree house. I don't know…damn it!"

  Sam touched her elbow. "Let's go on back before Corrigan overreacts. Henry and Lillian know this area. No one came in and snatched them." He didn't smile. "I'd have known it."

  She thought of the man the kids insisted had followed them in Texas, and blood pounded behind her eyes, her throat tightening. But Sam had a point. If someone had tried to take the kids right out from under his nose, he'd have known it. Kara pushed a hand through her hair and started back up to the dirt road. "We need to find them."

  They returned to the cottage and found Hatch pacing on the driveway, kicking at the dirt and cursing his niece and nephew. Billie winced as she watched her brother losing control. "Come on, Hatch—"

  "Those damn kids! Where the hell are they?" He gritted his teeth. "I've had just about enough of their nonsense. We have important work to do, but they keep insisting we focus all our attention on them. Christ!"

  Wally Harrison had drawn his weapon, a Smith & Wesson .38. Sam nodded at it. "There's no reason for that, Mr. Harrison."

  "And who the fuck are you—"

  "Holster the damn gun, Wally," Hatch said. "We don't need a goddamn shoot-out right now. Let's just find Henry and Lillian."

  Kara regarded Hatch with fresh insight, noting the spittle on the corners of his mouth and his flared nostrils, the redness in his face. He was losing it. Hatch Corrigan, the cool behind-the-scenes operator. But she didn't have time for shock or contemplation and decided simply to say what had to be said. "Hatch, you and Walter can find Allyson and ask her what she wants to do. Sam and I can look around here. They can't have gone far—"

  "You'll take Wally with you," Hatch said.

  "No," Sam intervened, speaking with finality. "Mr. Harrison will only slow us down."

  Wally snorted. "Just who the hell—"

  "We're from out of town," Sam said, nothing about him softening. "We can't give Governor Stockwell the kind of advice you two can. Henry and Lillian didn't run off until you got here. Maybe we can calm them down."

  Hatch backed off, and Kara saw what Sam had done. Not only had he pointed out Wally's inadequacies and Henry and Lillian's volatility, but he'd played on Hatch's desire to control events. Better to keep the Texans out in the woods than influencing Allyson's deci-sion-making. And if anything went wrong and things got out of hand with Henry and Lillian, the Texans could also take the fall.

  Billie tugged on her brother's arm. "What do you want me to do? I'd just get lost if I tried to find them—"

  "Stay here in case they come back." But Hatch didn't even look at his sister, his unpleasant, nervous gaze on Kara. "We'll stay in touch by cell phone. Wally," he said, not taking his eyes off her, "you're with me."

  Wally spat in the grass. "You're the boss."

  After they left, Billie exhaled in a whoosh and shook her head. "Go on, you two. I'll call Hatch if they turn up here. He can let you know. Wouldn't want to step on his toes." She smiled feebly. "Those poor kids are major-spooked, aren't they?" But she didn't wait for Kara to answer. "Good luck," she said and headed inside.

  Sam was all business. "The tree house?"

  Kara nodded. "That's what I'm thinking."

  Eighteen

  "We're not coming down!" Henry was on his feet, shouting down from the tree house. "Go away!"

  Lillian lay flat on her stomach on the platform, her chin just over the plywood edge. Kara had a strange sense of vertigo as she looked up at them, with the gravel pit descending sharply to her right, the woods off to her left and the clouds and haze shifting, making it seem as if the oak were moving and they'd all fall at any moment.

  "He's the man from
Texas," Lillian said, spitting out her words as if Kara should have known. "That man with Uncle Hatch. He keeps following us."

  Sam cast Kara a quick, hard look but said nothing.

  "He's not here now." She could hear the tension in her voice, her breathing still labored from the fast pace she and Sam had set to get here. "I'll talk to Hatch and your mother, and we'll get this straightened out, once and for all."

  "No!" Henry was having none of it. "They'll all lie to you. They'll say it wasn't him. They'll say we made it up."

  "We don't want him for our bodyguard," Lillian shrieked.

  Kara swallowed, her neck aching. "All right. Consider him fired."

  Sam placed a palm on her back and looked up at Henry and Lillian. "Here's what we're going to do. Kara will call and make sure any search parties are called off. We know where you are. People don't need to be worrying about you. Then she'll walk back to your grandmother's house and find out what she can about this Walter Harrison character. She won't break any promises to you." He paused, but the kids didn't interrupt him. "I'll stay here with you."

  Henry shook his head. "No way."

  "Sorry, kid. That's the way it's going to be."

  Henry fumed but didn't argue. Lillian scooted up onto her knees and sat down with a plop, dangling her feet over the side of the platform. Kara shuddered at the thought of the two of them hauling wood and nails and junk up there, the plunge to the gravel pit just one wrong step away.

  "You'll be all right walking back on your own?" Sam asked her.

  "Of course. This is Connecticut. No lions, no tigers, not many bears and just one kind of rattlesnake."

  He didn't even come close to smiling. "You've known all along Walter Harrison followed Henry and Lillian to Texas."

  "I knew they thought someone followed them. I didn't know if it was for real, and I sure as hell didn't know it was Wally."

  "I could have checked out their story. Jack could have followed up—" But he bit off a sigh. "We'll go there later. You'll be all right?"

  She refused to give in to the quiver of fear she felt and tilted her head back, nodding. "I'll carry a stick and remember my self-defense lessons. You keep the gun." She forced a smile. "You might need it with those two."

  "Kara—"

  "I can shoot a target," she said quickly, "not a real person. I don't have your experience or training."

  His eyes sparked. "A Galway admitting to a weakness?"

  She almost smiled. "Who says it's a weakness?"

  "Be careful." He touched her lips, then started up the rickety ladder. "I'm coming up. You two try knocking me out of this tree, it'll just piss me off."

  They didn't protest, and no rocks fell on his head. Kara started through the low undergrowth along the edge of the pit, stopping partway down the hill to call Hatch on his cell phone. "We found the kids. They're fine. I'll be there in a few minutes." She hesitated. "I need to talk to Allyson."

  "Henry and Lillian aren't with you?"

  "They're with Sam. Look, I can't tramp through the woods and talk at the same time. I'll break my fool neck. Billie's at the cottage—she'll want to know the kids are safe. See you soon."

  He sputtered, but Kara disconnected, continuing down the hill. She thought of Pete Jericho's body sprawled at the bottom of the gravel pit and kept her eyes open for the biggest stick she could find.

  * * *

  The tree house held Sam's weight—not because of its quality construction but because Henry and Lillian didn't weigh as much as a pair of gnats. They seemed impressed by his mobility and agility in getting up there and swinging over to them. He sat cross-legged on the edge of the platform closest to the gravel pit.

  Lillian gazed at him thoughtfully. "Are you an Indian?"

  "Why do you ask? Because I can climb a tree?"

  She giggled, no sign she and her brother had just run off in a blind panic. "Henry and I were just wondering. I have a friend at school whose father's Narraganset. He's awesome. My friend's name is Brook. Isn't that a pretty name?"

  "My father is Cherokee," Sam said, surprising himself. "He's a painter. I've never known him."

  "Is he dead?" Henry asked. He was standing, leaning casually against a branch, close to the oak's trunk, no indication he was aware of the gaping hole of the gravel pit to his left.

  Sam shook his head. "He and my mother were divorced before I was born. He moved to New Mexico, and she never told him about me."

  "My dad's dead." Lillian was matter-of-fact, neither cavalier nor morose. "I don't remember him. Henry does, a little."

  Her brother's brow furrowed as he thought a moment. "I remember riding on his back when we went swimming."

  "Your mother's never remarried," Sam said, neutral.

  Lillian sighed heavily, dramatically. "I think she wants to marry Pete, but she's worried about us."

  "Lillian!" Henry groaned in disgust. "It's a secret." He turned to Sam, speaking gravely. "Mom doesn't think we know."

  "I won't say anything unless I have no choice," Sam said. "Kids always know more than the adults around them think they do. I'll bet nobody realizes what all you know about Walter Harrison. Did you think he was from Texas?"

  "We didn't know. We never saw him before, not until he followed us around at the dude ranch." Henry looked at his fingers, a white, bloodless scrape along the side of one hand, probably from scrambling up the oak. "I saw him first. I didn't want to scare Lillian, but I had to warn her. Then she saw him, too."

  "Sometimes he wore disguises," she added.

  Sam pictured these two kids, mourning their friend, isolated at a Texas dude ranch thousands of miles from home. "You didn't say anything to your counselors—"

  "Kara asked us that, too," Henry said. "No, we were too scared."

  "Because you'd seen Governor Parisi drown from up here?"

  They both nodded, saying nothing more.

  Sam suspected there was more, suspected Kara did as well, but he could see how frightened and troubled these kids were, how difficult it was to get them to talk. "You're sure it was Walter Harrison in Texas?"

  "Yes! We saw him." Lillian managed to be defensive, excited and indignant, all at once. "He parked in front of Aunt Kara's next-door neighbor's house. We saw him get out. He was smoking a cigarette."

  "It was the same guy," Henry said calmly.

  "When did you see him at Kara's house? Do you remember the time?"

  Henry glanced down at him in that Prince of Wales way he had. "We looked out the window when you were there and saw him. I wasn't going to say anything, but after you left, Lillian went and got Aunt Kara."

  "Kara saw him?"

  "Only his car. He drove away while we were watching."

  Sam kept his reaction to himself. He was right there, on Kara's porch, and her two godchildren were in her bedroom scared out of their minds, the man who'd followed them from the ranch a few yards from Sam's car. If he'd known, he could have acted that night.

  But Kara didn't realize that her runaways believed they had a man following them until after Sam left. It was only a small point in her favor, because when she found out and saw how terrified Henry and Lillian were, she smuggled them over to Kevin and Eva Dun-ning's, then to San Antonio and on to Boston and Stone-brook Cottage.

  It wasn't what he'd have done, Sam thought.

  He got out his cell phone. "If I can get through from up here, I'd like to make a call to Jack Galway, Kara's brother. He's another Texas Ranger."

  "We know," Lillian said. "We met him a long time ago."

  Sam wondered what a long time ago was to an eleven-year-old. He dialed Jack's number in San Antonio.

  "What's up?" Jack asked.

  "I need you to check on a retired Bluefield, Connecticut, cop by the name of Walter Harrison— find out if he's been in Texas in the last week or so. Probably flew into Austin, maybe San Antonio. He could have stayed somewhere near the Stockwell kids' dude ranch."

  Jack was silent a moment. "Where are you?"


  "You don't want to know," Sam said. "Harrison probably also rented a car."

  "That's all I'm getting?"

  "For now. I'll get back to you when I have more."

  "My sister?"

  "Like I told your mother-in-law, up to her ass in the lion's mouth. I think that's the way she's used to living. I'm doing what I can."

  "I'm catching a flight in the morning," his lieutenant said and disconnected before Sam could try to argue with him.

  He stretched out his legs along the edge of the platform. "You have a nice view from up here. One pair of binoculars between you?"

  "I have my own," Lillian said, "but I dropped them and lost them."

  "That's too bad."

  She seemed to think so, too. "Big Mike taught us how to recognize bluebirds. Do you know they're related to robins?"

  "I'm learning a lot about bluebirds," Sam said.

  "Big Mike said they like mealworms." Lillian made a face. "That is so gross."

  Henry shared her distaste. "He tried to get Grandma to feed mealworms to her bluebirds, but she said no."

  "She has bluebirds?"

  "Uh-huh." Lillian nodded vigorously. "Big Mike got her to put up boxes, and two bluebirds built a nest and had babies this spring. They were so fun to watch."

  "Two sets of babies," her brother said.

  She sighed. "Grandma says she can't get worked up about bluebirds."

  "I'll bet your friend, Governor Parisi, was excited about them," Sam said.

  "Oh, yes." Lillian beamed, then her eyes filled with tears that she bravely blinked back. "I miss him so, so much."

  Sam nodded. "I know you do."

  Neither child spoke, and Sam realized there was no need to have them confirm or deny what they all now knew. Henry and Lillian Stockwell, ages twelve and eleven, saw their friend fight for his life from their tree house.

  "After the accident on the Fourth of July, it must have been pretty scary out here that day." Sam kept his tone calm and neutral. "But you saw someone else, too, didn't you? Someone besides Governor Parisi and the state troopers who pulled him out of the water."