Dangerous Passage

by Lisa Harris

  She felt herself slowly relaxing for the first time all day. For their first date, he’d brought her a red rose. By their second date, he’d somehow discovered her favorite flower was a white rose, and he’d brought her two. Simple. Elegant. She loved the fact that he was a gentleman and even a bit old-fashioned. She pressed her lips together and sighed. Something told her this guy was a keeper. And it wasn’t just his good taste in dessert.

  “This is delicious, but we’re never going to make it to dinner if I don’t quickly change. Five . . . ten minutes tops.”

  “Take your time.” He followed her across the porch to the front door. “Tess told me that next time I come by she’d introduce me to her conglomerate of pets, so that should keep me occupied.”

  “The donut will help too, but don’t count on too much bonding tonight. She’s mad at me for missing the tryouts and liable to take that out on anyone who happens to be in the same room.”

  “Give her some space. I grew up with a hormonal sister. Eventually I discovered she was a bit like the Texas weather where we grew up. Wait a few minutes and her mood will probably change.”

  Avery laughed. “You’re right about that.”

  Solidarity between her and Tess had been the one redeeming outcome of Ethan’s death. The weeks and months that had followed their loss had created a stronger bond between them, forcing them to survive what life had handed them together. It was something she prayed they never lost.

  Upstairs, it took Avery ten minutes just to figure out what she wanted to wear. The pants and top she’d laid out this morning seemed too stuffy. Three outfits later she finally settled on a green print sundress Emily had picked out with her and a missing pair of silver sandals. She hollered at Tess to see if she knew where the shoes were, then remembered she’d worn them Sunday for church and taken them off in the basement.

  Avery hurried downstairs, hesitating at the top of the basement stairs to listen to Tess talk to Jackson about her pet mice. With a dog out of the equation because of their busy schedule, Tess had somehow managed to talk her into a variety of low-maintenance alternatives that now included three female mice, an African clawed frog, a hamster, and a Birman cat named Tiger.

  Tess laughed at something Jackson said. Avery let out a soft sigh of relief. At least they seemed to be getting along.

  In the basement that she’d converted into an office, she paused in front of the crime board she’d put together, like she’d done a thousand times before over the past four months. Each time reminding her that Michael was never coming back. Each time praying that this time, something would jump out at her so she could find his killer.

  She’d studied the photos and files of her brother’s case until she’d memorized every detail. Witnesses’ photos, suspect photos, crime scene photos, lab reports. It was all in front of her like a jumbled collage that made sense only to her. This was truly her domain. The only place in the entire house with no trace of Tess’s presence.

  “Avery?” Jackson stood at the bottom of the stairs, carrying her missing pair of sandals and wearing a sheepish grin as if he were unsure that he should be here. “Tess sent me down here with these. They were in her room.”

  “Thanks.” Avery plopped down onto her old leather couch to slip them on. “My daughter loves to borrow my stuff.”

  She smiled, unsure when her little girl had found time to morph into a full-fledged preteen. Or, for that matter, when she had become old enough to have a preteen daughter.

  Jackson shoved his thumbs into his jeans’ front pockets. “I came down here for another reason. I feel like I should offer you a rain check on dinner. You’ve had a rough day, and I know you’re tired. If you need to cancel tonight, we can do this another time.”

  Avery hesitated. He was right. Fatigue had settled in, making part of her long for nothing more than a hot bath and a good night’s sleep. But on the other hand she’d been looking forward to tonight for a long time.

  She looked up at him and felt her stomach quiver. “I think I’ll be fine as long as you promise not to keep me out too late.”

  “I think I can manage that.” His smile hinted relief. “So this is how you wind down?”

  He looked around the room, seemingly in no hurry to leave.

  “Working on cases . . . ,” she glanced at the easel set up in the far corner of the room, “and painting when I can find the time.”

  “Watercolor?”

  She nodded. The only splash of color in the room—besides the crime scene photos—was the purple spray of wildflowers she’d started painting a couple weeks ago.

  “You’re good.” He turned back to her. “And I’ve just uncovered yet another layer of a fascinating woman.”

  Avery felt her cheeks flush as she looked around the sparsely decorated room, trying to see it through Jackson’s eyes. But while refurbishing the house had become an ongoing task—like the still-needed visit from the plumber—remodeling the basement had dropped to the bottom of her to-do list. For now, the bare room didn’t hold much more than a chair, desk, some filing cabinets, and the old leather couch from her college years she’d patched using duct tape.

  “I suppose this room could use some fixing up, but for now its purpose is more functional. I don’t exactly have the kind of job I can leave behind when I head home, so this gives me a place to work away from the precinct.”

  “I don’t know. I always pictured you relaxing at the end of a hard day with a glass of iced tea and a good book.”

  “A glass of iced tea, yes, but a good book?” She let out a low laugh. “I don’t even remember the last time I read something other than a police report. Besides, if I’m really going to unwind, I prefer a fast-paced workout at the gym, or even better, rock climbing with Tess.”

  Of course, who was she kidding about unwinding? Lately, between leading murder investigations, looking into Michael’s death, and trying to balance her personal life, her nerves were—more often than not—strung tighter than the piano wires on Mama’s polished Steinway.

  Jackson stopped in front of her crime board. “You’ve told me you’re investigating his death, but you’ve never spoken much about your brother.”

  “Losing Michael was—and still is—very personal.”

  She crossed the room and ran her fingers across the last photo she’d taken of Michael at her parents’ home, feeling the familiar sting of sadness the memory brought with it. She’d meticulously arranged the photos beside the timeline and key points of the case. Five more boxes of paperwork sat filed away in the corner of the room. Suddenly, the threads of information surrounding her brother’s death seemed too on display. She didn’t even let Tess hang out down here. She started to flip the board, but Jackson caught her hand.

  “Wait.” He squeezed her fingers gently, sending shivers up her arm. “I know this is personal, but I also don’t want you to feel as if you have to hide who you are for me. I’ve learned over the past few weeks what’s important to you. Your faith, your daughter, family, your job—these are the things that make you who you are. And I like that. I like the fact that you go rock climbing with your daughter, paint in your free time, and loved your brother enough to find out the truth about what happened to him.”

  A fresh flood of tears burned her eyes. They’d buried Michael just a few months ago in the spring, and as much as she longed to go back and erase that moment, she knew she was going to have to accept what had happened. And it wasn’t just the loss of Michael. Her mother’s slow spiral into depression after a difficult year of loss had triggered Avery’s need to make things right again. Finding Michael’s killer might not bring him back to life, but finding answers would help bring the closure they all needed.

  Because while Michael Hunt might have been one of their own, sometimes she was convinced that the department had given up on finding his killer. Not that they would ever admit that. Even her father’s influence hadn’t been enough to bring the killer to justice. Which meant that unless she could discover t
he truth, her brother’s death would go unsolved. A murderer would go free. And her brother’s name would be marred forever.

  7

  Jackson watched Avery’s expression flicker from grief to determination. Leading a murder investigation was one thing. Needing to find answers for the death of a family member had to have stretched her emotions to a whole other level.

  She sat back down on the couch and drew her feet up underneath her. “How much have you heard about Michael’s case?”

  He moved to sit down beside her. “I know that two officers were killed in an explosion in a warehouse. One of them was your brother.”

  She fiddled with a loose thread on her hemline. “Michael and his partner, Blake Watson, had been working undercover for months, assigned to infiltrate a group suspected of dealing in arms and drugs in the area. They were making inroads, but then something went wrong. Michael’s handler got a distress signal from Michael about three in the afternoon. Thirty seconds later the building blew up. They found the remains of their bodies, but no evidence of the weapons or drugs they were there to buy.”

  “Someone found out who they really were?”

  “Presumably. The FBI was later able to match the bomb signature to a known terrorist bomb-maker. Which is why we believe Michael had stumbled onto something bigger than just a local arms dealer. So not only did someone find out who they were, they clearly didn’t want them to dig any further.”

  She leaned against the back of the couch, lips drawn tight, and let out a slow breath. “I don’t know what else you’ve heard, but there’s more to the story than just two decorated officers killed in the line of duty. While the case is still officially unsolved, Michael is suspected of being a department leak.”

  Jackson gauged her expression. Clearly there was a lot of pain wrapped up in the accusations that to her must seem like betrayal by the department. He’d heard the rumors surrounding the case but had decided to ignore the media’s version and wait until she was ready to tell him herself. “I thought everything was still inconclusive.”

  “The department knew someone was peddling lists of informants in return for large sums of cash. Some of it was intelligence gathered by Michael in several key undercover operations that had given him access to information that potentially could be worth something to the right person . . . if he’d wanted to sell it. ”

  “So things point to your brother, and he is the one blamed for the leak.”

  “They also found a laptop hidden in the apartment where he was living while undercover that contained what the department has only described as sensitive information. But evidence can be planted.”

  Jackson caught the frustration in her voice. Fear of someone’s betrayal was often harder to accept than death. He’d experienced that firsthand. He pushed back his own cloudy memories of his mother’s infidelity. “I take it you have a theory?”

  “Yes, though no one has bought into mine.”

  “What do you believe?”

  “If you go through all the evidence—and believe me, I have—there is one person who can be linked to almost every incident, but the department doesn’t agree.”

  “Who is that?”

  “Michael’s handler, Mason Taylor. I might have known Mason for a long time and thought of him once as a friend, but I knew my brother better. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Michael wasn’t the kind of man who would sell out for money.”

  He sat quietly beside her and waited for her to continue. With the department on the “other side” and her family ready for closure, there weren’t a lot of people she could turn to.

  “This list of accusations is another reason it’s been hard to let go of Michael. To listen to the rumors and the lies being spread about his character. Things that I know aren’t true.” She reached up to rub her temples. “Something about today made me relive Michael’s death all over again. I guess it’s because I’ve spent weeks on our last Jane Doe case, and all I ever came up with was a pile of dead ends with every suspect and every witness. Facing the same situation again with our latest victim just rubs it in, and reminds me of my brother’s case—another unsolved crime.”

  “It’s hard when so many of the pieces are out of your control.”

  “My family seems to think my determination to find the truth about Michael’s death has become more of a vice than a help. That it’s dragging out the grieving process for all of us, when instead it’s time we accept what has happened and simply let him go.”

  “Something you’re not ready to do.”

  “No.”

  Jackson searched for something to say. “My grandfather would quote Lincoln right about now. ‘It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.’”

  Avery’s smile surfaced again. “I like your grandfather already. Tell me about him.”

  “He’s a Civil War buff who actually remembers stories his grandfather told him about fighting in the war,” he began, willing to let her guide the conversation. “He’s quirky, smart, and managed to raise me since I was twelve.”

  “Your parents? Were they a part of the picture?”

  Jackson paused. They’d talked briefly about their past over their first two dates, but he had enjoyed their slow pace of getting to know each other. Because while many of the scars from his childhood had—for the most part—healed, even time hadn’t completely erased the sting of his mother’s abandonment. “My mother decided early on that a family was too much responsibility, and she’d rather be out partying. Eventually she left us for good. My father loved my sister and me, but couldn’t handle being a single parent. He worked as a commercial fisherman, which meant lots of time at sea, so I can’t really blame him. It was the only thing he knew how to do. He eventually sent my sister and me off to Texas to live with our grandparents. Right after I started college, while my grandmother was still alive, my grandfather’s job transferred to Atlanta.”

  “Do you ever get to see your father?”

  “He came to visit every Christmas, and eventually we became close after college. He died in a fishing accident about five years ago.”

  “I’m sorry. I’d like to meet your grandfather someday.”

  “I’d like you to meet him. He was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, which, as you know, is the reason I moved here to Atlanta.”

  She caught his gaze, her eyes full of question. “You’d want to know the truth, wouldn’t you?”

  Jackson only had to consider her question for a brief moment. “Yes. I’d say that your brother deserves more than an obituary in the newspaper. Your family deserves—you deserve—to know the truth.”

  “That’s what I want to give him. I’m just looking for closure. For proof he was innocent like I know he was. And for answers for my family and for me.” She shook her head and grinned. “How did we get so serious?”

  “It’s been one of those days that reminds you just how vulnerable each of us really are.” He reached out and grasped her fingers. “Are you still hungry?”

  “Yes, though a part of me is content just to sit and talk.”

  “Me too.” He loved the blush that crept up her checks, the way she ducked her head as if in doing so she could hide her most intimate thoughts. The way she bit the edge of her lip when she finally looked back up at him.

  He could get used to coming home to her every night. He loved his grandfather, but being with Avery beat listening to nightly tales of Abraham Lincoln and William Sherman by a long shot.

  From the first time they met, he was drawn to her fiery spirit—and now her vulnerable side. He’d never met anyone so focused. She knew how to throw herself completely into an investigation while somehow still managing to not let the day-to-day tragedies of the job harden her.

  He laced their fingers together and rubbed his thumb across the back of her hand. He was close enough that he could breathe in the sweet scent of her perfume. Close enough to kiss her. He tried to read her expression as he reached out to brush he
r hair from her face.

  A moment before he leaned forward to act on his impulse, he felt her tense and pull back. Her gaze dropped.

  “Avery, I’m . . .” He stopped short of saying he was sorry. He wasn’t sorry for wanting to kiss her. Or sorry for wanting her to be a part of his world.

  She stood up and walked toward the basement window. “I wanted to be ready for this.” The setting sun filtered through the glass, casting a soft light across her face as she turned back to him, but he couldn’t read her expression. “I thought I was ready for something more to develop between us.”

  “And now?”

  “Today, I missed lunch with my mom along with my daughter’s swim tryouts because of a murder investigation. I know you are looking for more than just a casual dating relationship, but the bottom line is that I don’t know if I have enough of me to give right now.”

  “I know your life is full, and I’m certainly not trying to demand more of you.” How did he fight for her without pushing her away in the process? “But neither of us are walking into this blindly. We both know what it takes to make a relationship work. And while I realize it’s too early to know where our relationship will end up, all I know how to do is be honest with you. I miss coming home to someone. I miss someone to share my heart with, to wake up to, and snuggle with in front of the fireplace at night.”

  “Which is exactly the problem. I’m not sure I can be that person you want.”

  “Maybe you’re right. Maybe you’re not that person, but I had hoped we could at least see if it were possible.”

  The heartache he’d experienced over losing Ellie resurfaced. There had been so much loss coupled with her death. Marrying his college sweetheart had seemed perfect. They’d planned to start a family, giving him a chance to become to his own children everything his parents had failed to be.