Reaper

by Lena North

  “I think I like you better than the rest,” I whispered, and his face softened even further.

  “You can’t like him more than me,” my father said in a voice full of haughty, but phony, annoyance.

  “Sure she can,” Sven said calmly.

  “She likes me the best,” Gramps groused.

  “Not so sure about that, Gid,” Sven said, and I heard how he held back laughter.

  They kept fake-fighting as we entered the house and sat down to eat the food my parents had cooked. The talk through the meal was mostly about Gramps’ horses, and the ones Olly’s grandparents had used for farm work before they retired. Keigh murmured something unintelligible and looked at Olly, who grunted and nodded. I wondered what the heck they were up to but my gaze met Olly’s and I knew that my brothers might think that he was one of the guys, but he would tell me later. When everything was cleared away, Gramps wanted to take a look at the barn, which I assumed meant that he planned to dissect Sven’s rebuilding plans, so they left. My brothers pushed Olly through the door, and I saw them disappear over the lawn. Da leaned back and grinned at me.

  “I like Sven,” he said.

  “I like him too,” I replied.

  “It’s weird, though.”

  “What?”

  “He’s so much like your grandfather I’ve wondered more than once if they’re cloned.” Then he got up with a wide smile. “I think I’ll go and stun them with a litany of random manly man’s words about supporting beams and grout.”

  I smiled affectionately as he left, and heard Ma chuckle.

  “Gid loves your father, sweetie,” she said.

  “I know.”

  “He never understood him, though. Not really, but he still loved him. Having Sven around, grunting and doing outdoorsy, macho-man things with him… It lets Rhys off the hook.”

  “Really?”

  “Your da won’t admit it, but he’s relieved. He also enjoyed discussing books with Sven, and even more when they watched that profoundly depressing, black and white movie.”

  I started laughing because Sven had tried to make me watch the movie four times and I’d fallen asleep each time.

  “He’s a good man,” Ma said. “Raised a good son.”

  “I know.”

  “Are you happy?”

  I turned to her, wondering if she’d lost her mind suddenly.

  “You’re happy,” she concluded with a smile. “It was just a few sentences, Annie.”

  I blinked.

  “The sex talk, sweetie. A few sentences, no details. I would have stopped him if he…”

  She trailed off and looked at me, and I could see that she worried, so I put an arm around her.

  “I know.”

  “You talked about it?”

  “No, Ma, but he’s Olly. He wouldn’t tell anyone that kind of details about us.”

  “We only talked a few times, and I gave him a couple of names of people he could call, but he hasn't. Do you know if…”

  “He talks to Hawker Johns,” I said. “He’s a police officer, they get some training, and he’s a good guy to talk to.”

  Ma blinked and took a step back.

  “You are so full of shit, Annie,” she snapped suddenly.

  “What?”

  “Hawker Johns came to see us the other day. Said he needed to know what kind of protection you’d need and what he would have to do to make sure Norton was a good place for you to live in. That man is not talkative. He grunts. He’s scary and unpleasant. Your father did not like him, at all.”

  She glared at me, but I glared right back.

  “When I got here the first time, Sven was so sad. He'd lost his wife, and he didn't know how to cope. I took him for a walk so they could clean the house, and Hawker scrubbed his buddy's goddamned toilet.”

  “What?”

  “And he came to Gramps’ to find out what he needed to do. For. Me.”

  “Ann –”

  “He might not talk to you guys, but that does not surprise me at all because getting a word in edgewise when you all get going is not an easy task. But he talks.”

  “I –”

  “So, don’t you stand there and badmouth him to me, Ma. Compared to a lot of people Hawker Johns is a fucking SAINT.”

  There was a stunned silence, and then I heard a shuffle of feet behind me.

  Well, shit.

  “Have you been drinking, babe?” Olly murmured.

  I turned slowly.

  “Did Annie just call Hawk a saint?” Sven asked, but no one answered him.

  Humor was apparent on both their faces and knew I'd hear about that comment repeatedly.

  “Your language has deteriorated, Annie,” Ma said after a while. “I distinctly remember telling you that the f-bomb is a no-no.”

  “Oh, Annie, how could you?” Keigh admonished me with wide eyes and an equally wide grin on his face. “The f-bomb? Really?”

  “Shut up,” I snorted.

  “You were right, Keigh,” Gramps cut in from the door. “It’s perfect.”

  Keigh froze with his mouth half open, and then he grinned again.

  “Say again?”

  “You were right, Keigh. It’s perfect.”

  “What?”

  “You were right –”

  Our laughter cut him off and he tried to look annoyed when he realized how he’d said that Keigh was right no less than three times.

  “Right about what?” Da asked, also grinning widely.

  “We’ve been looking at a way to free up space in the stables, and Keigh suggested we’d send a few of the ones we don’t breed anymore here. Olly could take care of them.”

  I blinked. I’d wondered what he would work with in Norton, and this was a fantastic solution.

  “You interested?” Gramps asked.

  Olly nodded, and when I saw the corners of his eyes crinkle a little, I knew that he had totally planned this with my brothers. It might even have been his idea.

  “Excellent. We’ll talk finances later, but –”

  “Don’t want cash,” Olly said calmly.

  “We will pay –”

  “Want two foals.”

  I blinked again and thought that yes. It had totally been his idea.

  “Two –” Gramps cut himself off and narrowed his brows.

  “A mare and a future stud,” Olly clarified.

  “Huh,” Gramps said.

  “You pick them out, and you’ll have six boxes here for your retirees.”

  “Huh,” Gramps said again. The scowl on his face eased off after a while, and he said in voice full of reluctant admiration, “Sneaky son of a b –” He cut himself off and turned to Sven. “Sorry.”

  “She would have laughed her head off right now, Gideon. No need to apologize,” Sven said, holding his own laughter back, although just barely.

  “Goddamn it,” Gramps said and turned to Olly. “You’ll have your foals.”

  “Thank you,” Olly said, and I thought it was kind of him to hide the smugness he surely felt.

  “The worst part is that I’ll have to give you two good ones.”

  “Of course,” Olly agreed affably.

  “Why the hell wouldn’t you?” I exclaimed. “I’ll know if you don’t and I’ll kill you if you –”

  “And there’s the reason I’ll have to pick out two winners and send them here,” Gramps sighed.

  Ah. I got it then, and did in no way hide my smugness when I told him that we looked forward to having horses on the farm again.

  They left shortly after that, and it was the usual mayhem surrounding them as they picked up their belongings, so I was both sad and relieved to see them go. I knew we’d find forgotten things in the next couple of hours, and wasn't the least surprised when the cars stopped halfway up the road and Dough came running.

  “Forgot my phone,” he said with a grin and ran into the house. “Bye!” he called o
ut as he passed us but he was looking at me and didn't see Toby, so he stumbled over the dog.

  It looked like he just nudged him gently on the side, but it spooked Toby, who probably thought he meant to kick him. Images suddenly pushed into my mind, of the work boot, and the green cargo pants. I'd seen them before, but this time I also heard the voices clearly. Someone swore loudly, and a man called out a single word.

  And I froze.

  My brother continued to the car, got in and slammed the door.

  “What's wrong, Annie?” Olly asked, and I forced a smile on my face.

  “Not now,” I murmured through gritted teeth and waved happily as they continued up the road.

  “Annie?” Sven murmured.

  He had crouched down to calm Toby down, and the dog’s images had stopped flooding my brain almost immediately. I was busy filtering through my memories, trying to understand how it all tied together. Trying to find the pattern.

  “They have to leave,” I whispered hoarsely. “I need them to be safe.”

  Both men raised their hands immediately to give my family a wave.

  “They’ll be safe on Gramps’ land,” I murmured to myself.

  As soon as the taillights disappeared, I walked inside.

  “No. No, no, no. It’s too close,” I whispered and went straight to the stairs.

  I heard them following me but kept walking until I was in my office. On one of the walls, there was a huge map of Norton and the surrounding area. I looked at it and tried to swallow the lump in my throat.

  “Annie, talk to us,” Olly said quietly.

  “We played around, Jinx and I. Yesterday.”

  “Yes.”

  “We created a program, just for fun. It would take all kinds of input, randomize it, and come up with the most likely coordinates for where Cameron Strachlan would hide. We did some crazy stuff, added some creative code. Jinx is good. I am too. The program came up with a set of numbers but then Jamie was there, and Dante called out to us that they were leaving so we didn't think more about it. It gave us the coordinates, and we didn't understand.”

  I leaned forward to the map and stretched my hand out to put my index finger on it.

  “Thend.”

  “You’re sure?” Sven asked.

  “Yes.” I sucked in air and added, “You know that Toby shared images with me when I found him. He’s done it a few more times, and he got spooked when Dough stumbled on him just now. I saw it all again, but this time I heard the voices too, and recognized one of them. It also reminded me of the program and what it had told us.”

  I turned to Olly and pressed my shivering lips together.

  “Shit,” he murmured. “This’ll hit Miller and Mary hard.”

  Mary had grown up partially in Thend, unofficially adopted by a couple there, and she’d likely know some of the people involved with Cameron. Maybe even the ones who hid him.

  “I need facts, Olly. I can’t say… I need the facts first.”

  “I’ll call Jinx.”

  “No. I have to do this on my own. Call Hawk and say that we need to meet tomorrow morning. Breakfast. Everyone.”

  He held my gaze for a beat, and then he nodded.

  “Can we do anything to help?” Sven asked.

  I shook my head, already planning what I’d need to do in the coming hours. Then I turned to him.

  “Tell everyone to stay at home tonight, and to be careful. Call Gramps when they’re home again, tell them to lock down the ranch.”

  “Shit,” Olly repeated.

  “Yeah,” I said, walked over to my whiteboard and started writing.

  ***

  I sighed when we climbed off our bikes in front of Hawker’s house. I'd insisted we'd take them because I'd wanted the wind in my face, and it had felt good, but I was cold.

  “You okay, babe?”

  I’d told Olly and his father everything that morning and watched their faces grow hard and angry. It wouldn’t be easier to share with Hawker and the others.

  “I will be when it’s done,” I said.

  We were deliberately a few minutes late, so everyone was waiting for us.

  Hawker and Sloane, Wilder and Mac, Miller and Mary, Dante and Jinx, Snow and Nicky, Kit, and Jamie. Everyone.

  Jinx moved a little when we entered the room but I shook my head, and she leaned back with a frown.

  “Annie,” Hawker said calmly.

  I turned immediately, finding comfort in the hold I had on Olly’s hands and the strength in Hawker’s eyes.

  “I have a few things to say, and you won't like some of it,” I said and looked around the room.

  “Don’t care if I like it or not, Annie,” Hawker said. “I deal with facts just like you do.”

  I nodded and was about to start talking when Olly squeezed my hand again.

  “Let’s sit, babe,” he murmured and pulled me over to the couch.

  “We created a program a few days ago,” I said to Jinx, and watched her frown deepen. “We did it for fun, but I've spent half the night on it, and it's brilliant.” I held her gaze and said softly, “Magnificent in its simplicity. Only a true genius could create something like that.”

  Her face gentled, and she murmured, “Two geniuses, Annie.”

  “It takes a lot of information, handles it in various ways, and comes up with the coordinates for where Cam would most likely hide,” I told the room.

  They watched me, and I swallowed.

  “You’ve focused on the crystal, and how it could generate energy. Maybe it can, and maybe it would generate some kind of income for Cam, but it would be complex, and high profile. You’ve also researched the stolen cups from the swords of the fire dragons, thinking that he’d try to create some kind of weapon from them, but that’s complicated too. I focused on something a lot easier than that,” I said. “Follow the money,” I added and watched Hawker’s brows rise. “It’s always the money, and Cam makes his money from the drugs he’s been smuggling with the Ophidians.”

  I looked around the room and sighed.

  “Thend,” I said, and turned toward Mary. “I’m sorry, but that’s the coordinates we got, and that’s where he’s been hiding.”

  Miller moved, but Hawker raised his hand.

  “Explain Annie,” he growled.

  “It was all in the code sheets Willie Callaghan hid behind a painting. It said to take the goods north and how the swimmers wouldn’t see it. I thought it was about the Islands because they’re straight south of the mainland, but that was stupid. The code sheets came from Paolo Fratinelli, and he lived in Marshes.” I sighed and added, “I’ve been thinking about that for a while anyway because it kept bothering me. Why Paolo? Why Marshes? It’s a small, gated community where everyone knows everyone. It would be a lot easier to bring in the shipments almost anywhere else in our country. So why Marshes?”

  I looked around the room, and Miller was the one who figured it out.

  “The river goes north from Marshes.”

  “Yes,” I said. “Straight north from Marshes, via the river, and into Thend where they had the perfect hiding place.” I turned to Mary, and smiled a little, trying to soften the blow. “The cave,” I said and watched her close her eyes.

  “The cave?” Wilder echoed.

  “I wondered how the Ophidians could know that we’d come to the cave that day, Mary and I. The thing is – they didn’t. They were as surprised as we were, but the drugs were stored in the cave, and they'd just moved it out of there. That’s why access from the front side was closed that day. It was just sheer luck for them that we came when they were done.”

  “You sure?” Hawker cut in.

  “Yes. There’s sand on the floor in the cave. I wiped off Olly’s knives on it. White, soft sand. Snow, you told me about when they bring shipments in via the Islands. They have bags full of wet sand at the bottom of the crates, you said, so they’ll sink quickly if they have to dump them. Some o
f the sand from the Islands is in that cave.”

  “That’s right,” Wilder said. “Remember, Snow? We saw it too?”

  “Yes,” Snow said quietly. “It didn’t occur to me to even think… You’re right, Annie. It could be sand from the Islands.”

  “And only the people from Thend know about the cave,” Mary said, sounding so sad my heart hurt for her. “It's a tight community, so if someone said to stay away from it for a while, they would. They'd know something was going on, but they'd be loyal, and do what was asked of them.” She sighed, but straightened her slim shoulders and stated, “Right. We’ll talk to Reuben. He’ll help us.”

  She’d found safety in the community around Thend after living a year on the streets of Prosper, and had family there. I’d just shared news which had to be a hard blow for her, and she straightened her back and started planning. That took strength, and I admired her for it.

  “What was it?” Jinx asked. “In the program. What did we do that made it draw the conclusion?”

  “We added a lot of details that didn’t matter. Except, by adding all of them, they did.” I took hold of Olly's hand and told them. “My brothers buy hooch from someone down there, and they say he's shady. Deals in all kinds of shit. And someone fooled your niece, Hawk. Hid from her in a way the people in Thend are experts at. Miller and Mary were shot at on their way up the mountain, right outside Thend. Sven’s dog. The receipts from the house by the sea, full of items which are common to eat in Thend. When I see what the program filtered out, the pattern is ridiculously clear. Everything points to someone from Thend being involved.”

  “Sven’s dog?” Hawker asked.

  I swallowed because now we got to the part I didn’t want to have to share.

  “I’ve told you about how Toby sent me images when I found him, and he’s done it a few times since then. There was a man kicking him in the head, but another man was there too, and he shouted something. My brother stumbled over Toby yesterday. It spooked him, so he sent the images again, although this time I got sounds too, and I suddenly heard the voices clearly. And I knew.”

  I had to stop for a second because it felt like there wasn’t enough air in the room, but before they could ask the questions that were visible on almost everyone’s face, I went on.