Murder Under the Mistletoe

by Terri Reed

  Her thoughtfulness touched him. The moon’s glow illuminated the night enough for them to walk side by side to the box truck. He pulled on the gloves and opened the door.

  “Whew!” Heather pinched her nose. “Wow, I never realized how stinky the trees could be.”

  With his gloved hand, he grasped the tree with the cut. Shining his penlight on the trunk, he asked, “Is this normal?”

  “No. That’s odd. Does the cut go all the way through?”

  “Good question.” He tugged, and it loosened. Slowly, he pulled and twisted until the very end of the trunk popped off like a cork. “Well, what do we have here?”

  Stuffed inside the hollowed-out trunk was a package wrapped up airtight in plastic and duct tape.

  “Is that cocaine?”

  “I’d say yes.” He stuffed the package back inside and jammed the butt back on.

  “Hey, what are you doing?” Heather asked. “I thought you wanted to find the drugs so you could bust the ring. Aren’t you going to confiscate it?”

  He pushed the tree back into place. “Not yet. We don’t know who put it there or when or if that’s the only tree. The other truck has yet to be loaded. We’ll need to catch them in the act.”

  Heather sighed. “When will this be over?”

  Giving in to his need to reassure her, he put his arm around her shoulders and hustled her back to the house. “Not long now. Do you know where that truck is headed?”

  “Not offhand, but I’m sure Don will have the itinerary.”

  “Can you get a hold of him and ask?”

  “Sure. Though what reason do I give him for asking? I’ve never been involved in that part of the farm.”

  “Just say you’re curious. Or better yet, your new business partner is curious.”

  “Right. My business partner.” He heard a smile in her voice. “I can do that.”

  They went inside where it was warm and smelled like cinnamon and vanilla.

  Heather slipped upstairs to make her call. Tyler joined Colin in the living room to watch a holiday cartoon. Taking a seat on the couch, he looked at the television and said, “Hey, I remember this from when I was a kid.”

  Colin got up from the floor where he’d been lying on his belly and climbed onto the couch right next to Tyler. “It’s my favorite.”

  Affection flooded Tyler as the boy snuggled against his side. Colin was so trusting and innocent. Blake’s words came screaming back to Tyler.

  Someone’s gonna get hurt. They always do.

  That kid’s growing attached to you.

  The last thing he wanted to do was harm this boy in any way. But for the life of him, Tyler couldn’t push the child away, nor did he want to move away from him. Sitting like this was so foreign yet so comfortable and natural.

  Heather returned a few moments later and stopped in the archway to the living room. Tyler locked gazes with her. The tenderness in her eyes and the small smile on her lips had his heart thumping in his chest. It wasn’t good to get her hopes up, either.

  He wasn’t father material. He didn’t know how to relate to children, and he didn’t know how to parent. He had no role model to fall back on. Though he’d had his grandparents, they had overcompensated for their daughter’s failings by being lenient with him, making his time with them seem more like a vacation than an actual home.

  Regretfully, he extracted himself from Colin. Heather gestured to the front door. They stepped outside.

  Brimming with excitement, she said, “The one already loaded is headed for Calgary. The other is headed east.”

  “Okay, now we’re getting somewhere.” Anticipation revved through his veins. “Who’s driving the trucks?”

  “Don said he was going to assign drivers to the trucks tomorrow. He said he has three volunteers to drive the one across the border. And another three volunteers to drive the other truck.”

  Tyler stroked his jaw, contemplating the implications. “Six drivers willing to transport the trees. Question is do they know the drugs are inside the trees? I want those six names.”

  “The thing is we give bonuses to the drivers on Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve. So they may be eager for the bonus rather than having anything to do with the drugs.”

  That poked a little hole in his hope that one of the six would be the guilty party he sought. Still, they were closer to their objective than they had been. At least now they could confirm that Seth had been telling the truth. They’d found the drugs in the tree. How many more trees held packages of cocaine?

  If they could only find the journal, then they could end this for all their sakes.

  “Do we have info on the company taking possession of the trees in Canada?”

  She handed him a piece of paper. “Don gave me names and contact info.”

  “Good. I’ll pass this on to my boss.”

  Before he could step down the front stairs, Heather placed her hand on his arm. “Thank you, Tyler.”

  “I’m doing my job, Heather. Nothing more.” He deliberately infused an impersonal tone into his voice.

  Hurt bloomed in her eyes, and the look instantly tore at him. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and soothe her worries away. But that would be a mistake.

  He wasn’t there to play house, and she needed to understand that reality. So did he. He was there on a mission, and he would leave when the mission was accomplished. Tyler couldn’t let his feelings for the pretty widow derail this operation by letting things become personal.

  He couldn’t lose his focus. If he let down his guard, he might miss something that could blow this case wide-open. He had to stop letting Heather and Colin be a distraction to his end goal.

  With a quick nod, he hurried to the carriage house for privacy to call his boss, who was excited by the new development. “You’ve done well, Agent Griffin. Now we need to catch these smugglers in the act.”

  “We’ll sit on the trucks tonight,” Tyler assured him. “When the second truck is loaded in the morning, we’ll round up the employees. They won’t have any choice but to cooperate. Then Blake and I will drive the drugs north. I’d like to leave Nathanial here as protection for the Larson-Randall family.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Granger said. “I’ll coordinate with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and be ready to move in once the trees are delivered.”

  “Great. Thank you, sir,” Tyler said before hanging up.

  When he returned to the farmhouse, he drew Heather into the hall and whispered, “Can you have Liv take Colin upstairs without raising any questions?”

  Concern darkened her eyes. “Yes, what’s up?”

  “I need to talk to you and the guys, privately.”

  Though he could see she wanted more information, she pressed her lips together and strode back into the kitchen where Liv, Nathanial and Blake were busy cooking. The place was a disaster zone.

  “Liv, would you be willing to take Colin up and get him ready for bed?” Heather asked.

  “Of course.” Liv dropped the dough she was kneading onto the wooden cutting board, whipped off her apron and washed her hands before hurrying from the room.

  “You didn’t have to ask her twice,” Nathanial observed.

  “She loves Colin,” Heather said. Turning to Tyler, she put her hands on her hips. “So tell us. What’s the plan?”

  He quickly outlined what he and Granger had decided.

  Heather frowned. “You’re leaving?”

  He didn’t like the guilt clawing up his neck, but there was no help for it. He had a job to do. “After the feast tomorrow. I promised we’d help you with that.”

  “Hey, I’ll be here,” Nathanial said. “Once these lugs leave.”

  She sent him a polite smile. “That’d be great.”

 
When she swept past Tyler, she shot him a half bewildered, half hurt look that constricted his chest. In her eyes he was letting her down. And that realization hit him harder than the knowledge that he’d let things get too personal between them and that it had to stop.

  NINE

  Heather paced her darkened bedroom Thanksgiving eve. The house was quiet. Colin slept soundly in his bed, and Liv was asleep in Seth’s room. Heather had been surprised by how well Liv was holding up. After her initial tears, Liv had been energetic in helping the guys prepare for the Thanksgiving feast. She’d bathed Colin and put him to bed after reading him several stories.

  Heather was thankful Colin liked Liv, but she couldn’t help worry that one day Liv would move on with her life and leave them behind. It seemed everyone left her behind. Ken, her parents, Seth. Now Tyler.

  He, too, was leaving. It would be too much to hope that he’d be the one to return her truck. Most likely he’d stay to wrap up his investigation by arresting whoever took possession of the drugs.

  She’d known he would eventually leave, but she’d thought, hoped, he’d stay long enough to see that she and Colin were safe and the drug smugglers were no longer a threat. He’d promised he would. Apparently, his promise wasn’t something she could count on.

  And it wasn’t that she didn’t trust the other man, Nathanial. She did. It was just that... She couldn’t put to words the reason why Tyler leaving so soon felt like he was abandoning her. Them.

  She let out a frustrated breath, irritated at herself for being so foolish. He was only doing his job. His promise was to protect her, and if leaving was his way of doing that, then she needed to buck up and deal with his absence. Yes, Tyler leaving was for the best; she’d begun to rely on him too much, to look forward to seeing him and wanting to share her thoughts with him. Things she’d missed since Ken’s death.

  Pushing back the curtain, Heather peered out at the farm. Another layer of snow had fallen to make the world outside bright with the moon’s light reflecting off the white powder. She couldn’t see Tyler or the others. The guys had left the house an hour ago. Heather had heard them talking about staking out the trucks in the hope that whoever had put the drugs in the harvested trees would come out to check on their stash. If they caught someone, then what?

  Would that be the end of it?

  She prayed so.

  Her breath fogged the window. It was cold out there.

  She left her room and silently made her way downstairs to the kitchen. She didn’t dare let her mind question what she was doing as she made three thermoses of hot cocoa. With the thermoses in hand, she hesitated. How did she get them to the guys? She couldn’t very well go marching across the farm calling out their names.

  She figured Tyler would be positioned in a spot where he could watch the truck and the house. Or at least one of the men would be. She hoped.

  After putting on her parka, she slipped out the front door, carrying the hot thermoses. She stood in the shadows, unwilling to venture farther into the moonlight. For a long moment she waited. Then, feeling silly, she shook her head at her own ridiculousness. Even if Tyler could see her, he wouldn’t break cover to retrieve hot chocolate.

  She reached for the doorknob, intending to go back inside where it was warm and no one could see her embarrassment.

  “Heather?” Tyler’s whisper floated in the air.

  She froze for a long moment, and then slowly turned to find Tyler standing at the bottom of the stairs. She recognized the set of his shoulders and the way he stood with his legs braced slightly apart. Her heart thumped. She was glad he couldn’t see her face because she was sure her cheeks were bright red.

  “I made you hot chocolate.” She held up the thermoses. “And some for the guys.”

  He vaulted up the stairs to stand beside her. Though it was too dark to see his expression, she could feel his energy swirling around her, stirring up her senses.

  “That was sweet of you,” he whispered. “You really should go back inside.”

  “I wanted to apologize.”

  “For?” He’d moved so close his breath tickled her ear.

  Her mouth went suddenly dry. She forced her words past her parched throat. “For not being gracious earlier. You’re doing your job, which is to stop the drug ring. Of course you should go with the trees and drugs to Canada.”

  After taking the thermoses from her, he set them down on the porch, then took her hand and led her to the stairs. They sat on the top one.

  “I’ve decided I’ll be staying here with Nathanial.”

  She tamped down the spurt of joy filling her. “But who will drive the second truck?”

  “Unless something changes tonight, only the one truck has trees filled with contraband. We’ll put a tracker on the other truck to monitor it in case it makes any unscheduled stops, and we’ll inspect the truck when it returns, but for now we only need one driver.”

  “I’m glad you’re staying.”

  “Me, too.”

  She bit her bottom lip to keep from asking him why he wanted to stay.

  “Even if we stop this shipment of drugs, it won’t shut down the cartel. We need your brother’s journal.”

  Of course. He was staying for Seth’s notebook, not for her. That made sense. Then why did knowing she wasn’t the reason he was staying sting so badly?

  “Tomorrow we can search more of the village,” she whispered, thankful her tone didn’t reveal her upset. “Seth hid the bills in one of the shops. Stands to reason he probably hid the journal in one, as well.”

  Tyler suddenly stood up. “I’ll be right there.” He pulled Heather to her feet. “You need to go inside and lock the door.”

  Confused and scared, she asked, “What’s happening? Who are you talking to?”

  “Someone’s approaching the trucks.”

  She glanced out at the rows of trees. The trucks weren’t visible. “How do you know that?”

  “I have a com device in my ear,” Tyler explained. His hand grasped hers and tugged her toward the door. “Go inside and stay away from the windows.”

  She moved quickly, slipping inside and closing the door. With shaky fingers she slid the lock into place and said a prayer of safety for Tyler. And the others, too, of course.

  * * *

  Slipping on his night vision goggles, Tyler made his way through the dark toward where the trucks were parked. He’d been surprised when he’d seen Heather step outside the front door. She’d stood in the shadows of the eaves for such a long moment he’d been concerned something was wrong. He’d been hiding where he could watch the house and the path leading to the trucks, while Blake and Nathanial had taken positions closer to the trucks.

  She’d made hot chocolate. That was so thoughtful of her, a little inconvenient considering they were in the middle of a stakeout, but thoughtful just the same. She was a generous, compassionate woman. One he was finding hard to resist.

  Holding her in his arms while she’d cried had nearly torn his heart apart. He hated that she hurt so badly. She’d suffered so many traumas and yet she willingly took care of everyone else. His admiration and respect for her swelled inside of him.

  He’d made her a promise that he’d protect her and Colin. He intended to see that through. Making the decision to stay hadn’t come lightly. There was still a chance the empty truck would be a viable way to get a lead on the drug cartel. But Tyler’s commitment to finding Seth’s journal and protecting Heather and her son outweighed the slim chance that the second truck would bear any fruit. He’d called his boss back, and he’d agreed that it was more important for Tyler and Nathanial to remain at the tree farm.

  The communication device in his ear crackled. Then Nathanial’s voice came through clearly. “Tyler, heads up. The unidentified subject has veered away from the trucks and i
s making his way toward the house.”

  The news sent a burst of alarm into Tyler’s midsection. “Copy that.”

  He ducked behind the nearest bushy tree since there was no way he’d make it back to his position in time to stop the guy’s advance. Tyler waited, calming his breath and slowing his heart rate, preparing to take the guy down before he got anywhere close to the house.

  All was quiet. No nocturnal noises from beast or fowl. Wait. The faint rustling of feet slogging through the newly fallen snow reached Tyler. He estimated the intruder was ten feet to his right.

  Staying low in case the guy had his own set of night vision goggles, Tyler moved around the backside of the tree, the pine needles tickling his nose. He saw a figure pass by. Sure enough the man had on a pair of night goggles, and he carried a gun in his hand.

  Fearing for Heather, Colin and Liv’s safety, Tyler knew he couldn’t let the man reach the house. As soon as the man broke the tree line and started across the wide expanse of lawn, Tyler rushed at him, driving his shoulder into the man’s back, wrapping his arms around the intruder and letting momentum carry them both down to the snowy ground.

  “Tyler!” Blake’s voice blasted in Tyler’s ear. “On my way.”

  “I can handle this,” Tyler huffed out as he and the intruder scuffled for control of the gun, rolling across the wet, cold ground, trading punches and exerting energy in an effort to subdue each other. Moonlight glinted on the ring the guy wore on his middle finger seconds before he landed a hard right cross. Tyler absorbed the blow and, with a deep growl, threw an uppercut and a quick jab aimed for the bridge of the man’s nose. He heard the crunch of cartilage breaking, giving Tyler the momentary advantage, which he capitalized on by knocking the gun from the man’s hand. It went sliding away.

  Lights flooded the yard.

  The intruder let out a roar of pain and twisted away from the bright glow of the house’s floodlights. Momentarily blinded, Tyler ripped off his night vision goggles with one hand while the other hand grasped the man’s jacket. The man had also taken off his goggles and was working to dislodge Tyler’s hold.