Shadow of Doubt

by Linda Poitevin

  Jonas didn't laugh. She hadn't expected him to. Restlessly, she scanned the deserted street, watching for the cab she'd called after ending her conversation with Dave. She flinched at the memory of the anger in her partner's voice when she told him their plans for getting across the river. The worry. If she went through with this—

  No. Not if. When.

  When she went through with this, she'd be burning every bridge she'd built in her entire career, and no one—not Dave, not his father-in-law, not anyone—would be able to undo the damage.

  Jonas cleared his throat.

  Kate closed her eyes. Right. The Talk. She did a brief assessment of her remaining internal fortitude, confirmed what she'd suspected about not having any left to deal with this, and held up a hand to forestall Jonas's words. "Can we not?" she asked. "You've apologized. I've accepted. It's done."

  "Kate—"

  "Jonas," she cut him off. "You've made your position clear. You're not looking for a relationship. I get it. So let's just get across the river, find the evidence you need to take down Lewis and Ramirez, and then we can be done, all right? And speaking of getting across the river..."

  She lifted her chin toward a set of approaching headlights, and Jonas turned to look.

  "Saved by the taxi," she told him, her cheerfulness buoyed by sheer relief. Jonas didn't respond.

  * * *

  At one-twenty a.m., the taxi pulled away from the end of a rough dirt road nearly obscured by the night and a tangle of bushes that stirred in the breeze. If it hadn't been the end of October with most of the leaves gone already, Kate doubted they would have seen the opening at all. As it was, the taxi driver had refused to take them any further, leaving her and Jonas with a tight window of twenty minutes to hike the final kilometer.

  The red glow of the taxi's taillights disappeared down the paved road toward town, and the dark closed in on them like a tight fist. Kate shot a look at the sky. There was a full moon up there somewhere, but the cloud cover blocked it. It smelled like rain was coming, too. She shivered, wishing she'd thought to buy a jacket of some kind. And a flashlight.

  "Cold?" Jonas asked.

  "I forgot about it being cooler away from town," she replied, "but I'll be fine. We should get moving."

  She peered into the dark to locate him, but it was no use. While she could hear him breathing, he was nothing more than the sensation of a shadow among shadows. Then his hand brushed her arm, making her jump, and his fingers twined with hers in a strong, reassuring grip. The rich timber of his voice came from a point somewhere above and to the right of her head in the night's blackness.

  "This way."

  Kate felt oddly disembodied as she followed Jonas along the narrow road that was little more than a well-used path. In a dark so deep she couldn't see her own hand if she held it up before her, Jonas’s grip seemed the only link with reality, the only thing that bound her to an earth she knew was there, but couldn't perceive. Well, that and the branches slapping at her face. And the sharp, twiggy fingers tearing at her hair. She was pretty sure she was leaving half her curls behind, dangling blond clumps that marked their path to the river.

  Another branch snapped back from Jonas to smack her cheek and she swallowed a squeak of pain.

  "You okay?" Jonas asked. "That one got away on me."

  Eyes watering, Kate nodded. Then she remembered he couldn't see her in the dark. "I'm fine," she said. "But we should pick up the pace. Lazarus said they wouldn't wait for us."

  Jonas didn't reply, and for a moment, Kate thought he hadn't heard. Then, with an unidentifiable noise deep in his throat, he let go of her hand and slid his arm around her waist, snugging her in against his hard, muscular length. Everything in Kate softened, and only sheer force of will kept her from melting against him.

  "We'll move faster like this," he muttered. Using his body as part bulldozer and part battering ram, he forged ahead, dragging Kate with him, branches snapping beneath his onslaught. But while she stumbled along the rutted, overgrown road, Jonas's steps were unerring.

  The man had the night vision of a cat.

  Fitting, given that he also had the lean, lithe muscles of a panther. She knew that for a fact, because said muscles were molded to her side right now. Or she was molded to them. Or—

  Kate sucked in a quick breath. Jonas's warm, faintly musky male scent filled her nostrils. She stumbled again and would have fallen, but his arm tightened around her, holding her upright. Heat scorched her cheeks.

  Just how far was it to that damned river, anyway?

  The clouds parted to reveal the moon as she paused to disentangle her mess of curls from yet another grasping branch. Through the trees, she glimpsed the white glow reflected on water. The St. Lawrence River. Finally. And somewhere in the distance, fifteen minutes away by boat, the U.S. shore and the land transportation Jimmy Lazarus had promised them..

  "We're here," she said unnecessarily.

  Jonas joined her efforts to extricate herself from the tree's persistent clutches. The moonlight cast his face into a complexity of planes and shadows as it hovered above hers, and Kate's breath snagged in her throat. Traveling with this man under dark's cover this way was beginning to take its toll on her libido.

  Although, if she was honest, she didn't fare much better in broadest daylight when he stood this close to her. She held back a sigh. Maybe he was right to worry about what would happen when they parted ways after this. Maybe she should start worrying, too.

  She felt her hair come free and stepped away from him.

  "We're here," Jonas agreed, his voice grim, "but where the hell is Lazarus’s friend?"

  Kate glanced around. Maybe they had the wrong place? No, she was certain they'd got their directions right. Even the taxi driver had seemed to know exactly where he was going on the drive out. An indication of the number of passengers ferried across here?

  Hell, she certainly hoped not.

  She filed away the idea for future reference—assuming she lived and remained in her job—and focused again on the immediate. No, they had the right place. There was the dock Jimmy had told them about, solid and well maintained, jutting twenty feet out into the water.

  And empty of any kind of a boat.

  Clouds scudded across the moon again, cutting off their only source of light. Kate's heart sank.

  "Still think Lazarus is cool?" Bitter frustration tinged Jonas's hard voice.

  Kate didn't know what to think.

  "One of us had better retain some faith in humanity, don't you think?" she countered, her calm voice belying her crossed fingers.

  "Blind faith is for idiots, Kate. All it will get you is hurt."

  Kate paused. As far as veiled warnings went, that one was a doozy. It hung in the air between them while she debated her response. She decided she couldn't ignore it.

  "Maybe," she replied. "But the way I see it, faith figures right up there with caring, trust, love. The things that make life worth living."

  Jonas didn't pretend not to understand. "You know nothing about my life," he bit out. "You haven't lived it."

  "You're right. I haven't. But I don't see you living it, either, Jonas. You've given up, plain and simple. All you do now is survive."

  There was a short, tense pause before he replied.

  "Survival doesn't hurt as much."

  "Doesn't it?" she asked, and then she tilted her head. From out on the water came the low, steady thrum of an outboard motor, its pulse slowing as it neared the shore. Jonas had heard it, too.

  "Seems you were right," he said. "This time."

  Kate opened her mouth to reply, then snapped it shut as another sound reached her ears. A vehicle engine. No, two—maybe three. The crash of brush being mowed aside. And in the distance, the wail of a police-boat siren.

  "Jonas...?"

  "I heard." Jonas's hand clamped around her arm like a steel band. "Run."

  Chapter 30

  Kate's feet hit the wooden dock a step behind Jonas's
. Over her shoulder, she saw headlights slanting through the trees, bobbing and weaving as the approaching vehicles navigated the almost nonexistent road. Two vehicles. One with a flashing blue and red bar atop it.

  "Cops," she gasped at Jonas.

  "I saw." He skidded to a halt at the end of the dock. Kate teetered beside him, searching the dark waters beyond for the boat they'd heard. The distant siren of the police craft wailed closer.

  A lantern came on, moving gently with the waves fifty feet off shore. Behind Kate and Jonas, car doors slammed, and powerful flashlights beamed into the night, moving their way. Shouts reached them. Jonas's fingers tightened on Kate's arm.

  "Christ!" he muttered. "Get the damned boat over here!"

  The flashlights were just down the shore now, closing fast. The outboard motor thrummed to life again, but the boat didn't move.

  "Can you swim?" Jonas demanded.

  Kate hesitated. Her shoulder already throbbed from Jonas's many attempts to keep her upright on their hike here. Would it hold up to the St. Lawrence's current? She reached behind her to tuck the nine millimeter more snugly into her waistband.

  "Let's go," she said.

  The water closed around her with an icy force that knocked every atom of air from her lungs. Her fingers and toes burned with cold by the time she broke the surface, gasping for air. Frigid didn't even begin to describe the St. Lawrence in late autumn. She blinked the river water from her eyes and scanned the dark, finding the yellow lantern light again. It had moved further away from shore.

  Shit.

  Jonas surfaced beside her. "You okay?"

  She forced a reply through jaws locked against the cold.

  "My jeans weigh a thousand pounds, but I'm fine."

  "Come on, then."

  Matching his powerful strokes to hers, he paced her as they swam toward the bobbing light. As long as she focused on his rhythm, she was able to ignore the ache in her shoulder and the drag of water-logged runners and half-ton jeans. But the insidious, mind-numbing cold was another story altogether, and the current as strong as she'd feared. It took an eternity to reach the boat.

  At last Kate's fingers brushed against fiberglass, and with a last, monumental effort, she lifted herself out of the water high enough to grab hold of the boat's side. The lantern doused, plunging them into dark. Then, from shore, a flashlight captured her in its brilliant beam. She held up a hand against its glare, her heart skipping a beat. They were freaking sitting ducks out here.

  Hot on the heels of the thought, a shot cracked out over the water. Its sharp report reverberated through the still, liquid darkness. Beside Kate, Jonas spat out a curse and heaved himself aboard. The boat bucked in response, and Kate almost lost her grip. Almost slid under. Almost missed the glint of moonlight on steel.

  But it was there. A dull, cold gleam in the hands of one of the men Lazarus had sent. A rifle. Kate lunged upward, catching hold of the gun barrel and dragging it down so it pointed into the water.

  "No guns!" she croaked. "Those are cops out there!"

  The dark eyes of a stranger looked down at her in the moonlight—flat, expressionless. Their owner shrugged. "They shot first."

  He tried to lift the rifle, but Kate clung to it stubbornly.

  "No guns," she repeated. "Just get us the hell out of here."

  The man stared back at her. From the corner of her eye she saw Jonas seated on the floor of the boat, another man at his back—with, she had no doubt, another gun. The blood in her veins chilled. So did her lower body as it continued to dangle in the frigid water. She debated the wisdom of reaching for her own weapon, but didn't dare let go of either the boat or the rifle in her frozen grip. Hell, she didn't dare so much as blink.

  Of all the tenuous positions she'd been in during her years on the force, this one rated right up there as the most bizarre. Cops on the shore ready to arrest her, her wanted-for-murder partner held at gunpoint, and herself half-in and half-out of an icy river, clinging to the side of a boat. A boat that, in all likelihood, belonged to someone she'd devoted her career to taking down. Kate's grip on the rifle shook as she fought off fatigue and a hysterical giggle-snort.

  Now would be a hell of a time to discover that Jonas’s theories on humanity might have merit after all.

  The man holding the rifle relaxed his grip and the rifle barrel dipped, dunking her under the water again. "I'll give you this, lady," he said as she came up gasping. "You've got balls."

  He grasped her under her near-ruined shoulder, hauled her into the boat, and dumped her beside Jonas.

  "Let's go," he ordered. The powerful outboard roared to life as someone opened it full throttle, and the boat leapt forward.

  Violent shivers wracked Kate's frame. Hard fingers closed over her wrist and pulled, and then equally hard arms wrapped her close against a torso almost as chilled as her own. Jonas.

  "You, Kate Dexter, take more goddamned chances than anyone I've ever met," he muttered in her ear. He rubbed his hands over her arms, but the friction did little to warm her. The weapon she'd tucked into her waistband dug into her spine.

  She ignored the discomfort. There were more important things at hand, such as the fifteen minutes it would take them to go around St. Regis Island and across the river with a police boat still coming for them. Not to mention the news she had to share with Jonas. She pushed away from his hold.

  "Wasn't a cop who fired," she mumbled through numb lips and teeth chattering with cold. "Not OPP. Wouldn't shoot at a boat headed for Mohawk territory. Not unprovoked. Too political."

  But whoever it had been was sure as hell traveling in the company of cops, which left little doubt as to their identity. She pulled her arms inside her soaked sweatshirt and wrapped them around herself, looking over her shoulder at a silent Jonas. Moonlight slanted across the hard planes of his face.

  "We'll have to move fast when we dock," he said at last, staring out over the water at the shore they'd left. "They'll already be on their way."

  Kate thought it more likely the head of the local OPP detachment was currently reading Lewis and Ramirez the riot act for that ill-advised shot, but it was easier just to nod agreement. That way, she could focus on keeping her teeth from slamming together. The boat bounced over a wave, and she fell sideways against Jonas's hard, lean length. His arms came around her again, and she settled into them without objection, a dim part of her exhausted brain wishing she had enough feeling left in her body to enjoy the proximity—or at least feel his warmth.

  The police boat screamed into view down the river, its lights flashing in the dark.

  ***

  Outrunning the police boat turned out to be easier than Jonas thought it would be—maybe because their transportation providers had practice at it? For whatever reason, twenty minutes later, he and Kate stood in the woods on the opposite shore, staring at the vehicle Jimmy Lazarus had provided for them. Jonas slanted a look at Kate, finding his own incredulity mirrored in her expressive features—along with sheer horror.

  "You're kidding me," she said at last, lifting her gaze to Lazarus himself, who sat on the hood of the orange and yellow, flame-painted Mustang. "This was the best you could get us?"

  Lazarus shrugged in the glare of headlights from a pickup idling nearby. "You didn’t give me much notice."

  "Freaking hell," Kate muttered.

  Jonas rubbed the back of his neck. "Look at it this way," he said dourly. "No one will be expecting us to drive something like this."

  "Probably because I wouldn't be caught dead driving something like this," she retorted. She returned her attention to Lazarus. "Are you sure it's not hot?"

  "She's clean," Lazarus assured her, patting the bright hood. "And registered and insured. You have my word."

  Jonas looked down as she expelled a breath on an unintelligible mutter. "Why, Kate Dexter, are you beginning to lose faith in your fellow man?" he murmured.

  She fished a soggy wad of bills from her jeans pocket, ignoring him, and tosse
d the money to Lazarus.

  "You'll have to trust that it's all there until it dries out enough to count it," she said. "But you have my word."

  Lazarus turned the wad of bills over in his hand, staring down at the ground. Then he threw a set of car keys to Jonas. "You'd better get your lady out of those wet clothes and warm her up," he advised. "Agent Burke."

  Jonas went ramrod stiff, his gaze seeking out Lazarus's friends in the shadow by the pickup truck. None of them showed the slightest sign of surprise. They'd all known. But if so, why had they helped out? Why not dump both him and Kate into the river?

  "You knew?" Kate asked.

  "A couple of his friends came looking for you guys in the bar about two hours after the OPP did. Gave me the impression you wouldn't be missed if there was an accident of some kind, if you get my drift."

  Jonas got his drift, all right.

  "The locals must have steered them toward the pick-up point," Lazarus continued. "It's no great secret in these parts."

  "So when the OPP talked to you, you didn't—?" Kate's voice trailed off.

  "Nah." Jimmy tossed the money up and down a couple of times, then launched it at Jonas, who caught it out of sheer reflex. "Like you said, Katie. I owed you. And now we’re even."

  He slid off the Mustang's hood, and his booted feet hit the ground with a muffled thud. "There's a phone number in the driver's visor," he said. "Call it when you're done and let me know where to pick up the car. Registration and insurance are in the glove box."

  Without waiting for a response, he and his friends climbed into the waiting pickup truck. A second later, they rumbled down the road. Jonas stared after them in silence for a long minute before he became aware of Kate’s convulsive shivering and remembered his own chill.

  "Come on," he said, twining his fingers with hers. "Lazarus is right. We need to get you warmed up."

  She let him lead her to the car and help her in, even letting him do up her seatbelt. Jonas's jaw tightened as he took in her pinched face in the glow from the dashboard lights. She'd been soaked and half frozen for the better part of an hour. They'd be lucky if she didn't catch pneumonia. He slammed her door shut, headed around to the driver's side, and slid in beside her.