by Sharon Sala
She eyed him coolly as the elevator rose. “Just like you got into your business. I followed in my father’s footsteps.”
Adam’s smile slipped. “Touché.”
The elevator stopped. “I wasn’t trying to make points. Follow me, please,” she said, and got out.
Adam followed at her heels.
She stopped four doors down and went inside the small office where a rather large man was sitting at a desk, diligently working on a computer.
“Agent Ames, this is Adam Pappas.”
Ames stood up as Curran left and pointed to a chair on the other side of his desk.
“Have a seat,” he said.
Adam sat. His heart was pounding, and there was a slight sick feeling in the pit of his belly. He wondered if this was how his mother had felt when she’d come to offer testimony that would send her son to prison.
I’ll make this right, Mother. I swear on your sweet soul, I will make him pay.
Ames eyed the younger Pappas curiously. “So, I understand you’re here to discuss the progress on your mother’s case. You know I can’t reveal any—”
Adam held up a hand. “On the contrary, that’s not actually why I’m here,” he said.
Ames frowned. “Then…?”
“I’m here to offer you a deal.”
Ames frowned. “What kind of deal?”
“I know you believe my father killed my mother.”
Ames said nothing.
“For the record, I do, too, although I can’t prove it.”
Ames suddenly leaned forward, his mind racing with possibilities as to where this was going.
“So what are you saying here?” Ames asked.
“You arrest and convict my father of my mother’s murder, and I will finish what she started. I will testify against Ike Pappas and the organization to which he belongs. I’ll tell you everything I know and help you get proof of all of it. I don’t know how many others you can take down with what I know, but my father won’t be the only one.”
Ames stood abruptly. “Sit tight and let me get someone in here to take your statement.”
Adam held up his hand. “No, no, you aren’t hearing me. I tell you nothing until my father is convicted of murdering my mother.”
Ames frowned. “But if you testify against him, he’ll still spend the rest of his days behind bars.”
“That’s not good enough,” Adam said. “My mother deserves her justice separate from what else he’s done. I want it known what he did to her, and I want him sentenced for the crime. Once that’s a done deal, then I talk. If you can’t do that, there is no deal. I say nothing to you and take care of him myself.”
Ames flinched. “You do know you’re admitting to intent to commit murder.”
Adam looked around. “I’m sorry. Are we taping this conversation? Is something happening here that I don’t know about?”
“No, of course not,” Ames said.
Adam’s eyes narrowed angrily, and for the first time Ames saw the resemblance between father and son.
Adam pointed at Ames in an accusing manner. “I can assure you that I will vehemently deny any accusation that I want my father dead. Everyone knows he has enemies. Now, where are you on Mother’s murder case?”
Ames’s frown deepened. “You know I’m not allowed to tell you that.”
“Then let me tell you what I know,” Adam said. “I know there is a witness named Beth Venable—and my father knows it, too. I know you lost her and that he’s sent one of his bloodhounds on her trail. You better find her before he does, or your case against him won’t stick. If that happens, my deal is off the table.”
Ames’s head was reeling. No wonder they couldn’t take these people down. The Mob had more intel than the Feds did.
“Who’s the bloodhound?” Ames asked.
Adam shook his head. “I tell you, and you blow it by picking him up, alerting my father that you’re onto him, and then he disappears. I didn’t come in here to do your damned job for you. So what do you say? Do we have a deal or not?”
Ames sighed. He didn’t have the power to do what he was about to do, but Adam Pappas was too antsy to wait around for the real word.
“Yes, we have a deal,” Ames said.
Adam nodded. “As soon as you get Ike Pappas in court, we talk again.”
“We could get him there sooner if you’d tell us what you know about the missing witness.”
“I know she’s smarter than all of us,” Adam said, then stood up and handed Ames a card.
“What’s this?” Ames asked.
Adam smiled. “You know what it is. You have all our phones tapped. But just to keep this seemingly kosher, here’s where I explain that it’s my cell number. I often suffer from insomnia, so feel free to call anytime, night or day.”
Ames felt as if he’d just been given the winning lottery ticket as he slipped the card into his pocket.
“I’ll walk you down,” he said, and escorted Pappas to the elevator, then rode down to the ground floor and stood in the lobby as Adam exited the building. After that, Ames made a beeline for his boss’s office. Mac Harrison wasn’t going to believe this.
The tracking program Moe had on his laptop had a range of fifty miles, so wherever James Walker went the next morning, Moe wouldn’t be more than a couple of miles behind. He drove the twenty miles back to Mount Sterling, got a room at a motel on the edge of the city, and then went to the restaurant next door and scanned the menu. This time when he gave the waitress an order it was all vegetarian.
“I’ll have a bowl of tomato soup and some crackers,” he said.
“What to drink?” she asked.
“Iced tea.”
He forgot until after she’d already walked away that the tea would most likely be sweet, but he didn’t mind. In fact, he was learning to appreciate it with sugar, rather than the plain Earl Grey he normally ordered hot.
After he got back to his room, he plugged in the computer, logged on to the tracking system and smiled when he got a clear signal on Walker’s truck. The extra money he’d spent on those CIA knockoffs was worth it. He turned up the volume so that if the target vehicle began moving before he woke up, the pinging would alert him, then rolled over on the bed and closed his eyes. Within minutes he was asleep and snoring.
The weatherman had predicted the possibility of thunderstorms later in the day, and it was already getting cloudy. James was rushing around, trying to get Julie to finish her grocery list so he could leave for Mount Sterling and get everything done, then get back with their groceries and deliver what Ryal had ordered, as well, before the storms hit. He hurried back to the porch and opened the front door long enough to shout, “Hey, honey! Are you finished with that list yet?”
Julie came hurrying into the room with the baby on her hip and Meggie only a few steps behind.
“Here it is,” Julie said, and tilted her head up for the kiss she knew was coming, because James never left the house without kissing her goodbye.
Their kiss was sweet but brief.
“Mmm, good sugar,” James said, kissed the baby’s cheek, as well, then picked up his daughter and gave her a big hug and a kiss. “You be good for Daddy and help Mama with your brother, okay?”
“Are you gonna bwing me a supwise?”
James grinned. “Yes, Daddy will bring you a surprise.” Then he winked at Julie. “I’ll bring you one, too.”
Julie hefted the baby on her hip and rolled her eyes. “That’s okay. I don’t need any more surprises, honey. This little guy was surprise enough for me.”
They grinned at each other, and then moments later James was gone.
It was the ping of the tracking system that woke Moe up. He rolled over, then grabbed his reading glasses and eyed the laptop. The program was active. James Walker was on the move.
Moe jumped out of bed and raced around getting shaved and dressed, all the while keeping an eye on the truck’s progress. When he realized the truck was actually heading toward Mount Sterling
, he grinned. His target was coming to him. How considerate.
He’d only taken the room for one night, so he packed and reloaded his belongings into the rental car, and headed for a McDonald’s drive-through to get breakfast. After that, wherever that truck went, Moe would follow. Even the things that Walker might be buying or the places he visited could be clues. Moe left nothing to chance.
Nearly thirty minutes later, the truck was in the city. Moe pulled up a city map, transposed the program onto the screen and then followed the truck turn by turn until he finally caught sight of both it and the driver.
“So that’s what you look like,” Moe muttered, as he caught a glimpse of James’s profile.
After he followed Walker into the parking lot of a supermarket and the other man got out, Moe took a couple of photos of him, then set the camera under the seat and followed Walker inside.
He grabbed a shopping cart and began following James around the store, taking note of what he was buying. For cover, he began tossing items in his cart without paying much attention to what they were. He was at one end of the cereal aisle and James was at the other end when James’s cell phone suddenly rang. Moe moved closer until he could hear clearly, while making sure to keep his gaze on the shelves.
James was debating about getting one box of cereal or two when his cell phone began to ring. He answered absently as he reached for the shelf.
“Hello?”
“James, it’s me.”
He smiled when he heard his wife’s voice. “What did you forget?”
She sighed. “Toilet paper. That should just be a given every time we go to the store.”
“Toilet paper coming up,” he said. “Anything else?”
“I found the list you made for Ryal on the floor.”
“Dang, are you sure?” he asked, and began checking his pockets. Sure enough, the list was missing. “You’re right. I don’t have it. Good catch, my love. Hang on. Let me get a pen and I’ll write it on the back of our list.” He pulled a pen out of his pocket and then grabbed a cereal box off the shelf to use for a table. “Okay…go ahead.”
Julie began naming the items slowly, giving James time to write.
About halfway through, James stopped her.
“Wait. What was that last one?”
“Band-Aids. I wonder who’s hurt?” she added.
James scribbled as he talked. “Beth is, but I thought I told you. Her hands…remember?”
“Oh…yes. Quinn stopped by Aunt Tildy’s and got some of her ointment. Now I remember. I guess she’s getting better if the sores can be covered with Band-Aids now. Good news.”
“Right. Thanks again, honey. I’m almost through with our list. As soon as I pick up the stuff for Ryal, I’ll be heading home. What’s the weather look like there?”
“Still clouding up. Hurry home. I don’t want you that high up on the mountain when the storm hits.”
“I will. I don’t want up that high, either. Not with lightning all over the place. I’m hurrying. Love you—bye.”
“Love you, too,” Julie said, and disconnected.
James tossed the cereal box he’d been writing on into the basket, then finished filling their grocery list before parking the cart up front and bringing back an empty for Ryal’s list.
By that time Moe was already out the door. He wanted to verify some more information before he assumed he’d hit the jackpot, so he began to boot up the laptop while keeping an eye on the supermarket exit.
He typed in the name Ryal Venable. When he didn’t get a hit on that, he tried Ryal Walker. Within moments he had an entire list of links, including one for Walker’s Handcrafted Furniture.
So a man named Ryal Walker had sent for some groceries via a man named James Walker, and on that list were Band-Aids for a woman named Beth. No way in hell were these names a coincidence.
While he waited for James Walker to return to his truck, Moe ran a search on property owned by people with the last name Walker. To his surprise, he got dozens of options.
Then he searched the local newspapers’ online archives for Beth Venable’s name, and to his surprise there were several old articles in which her name popped up. Most of the articles had to do with school functions, though one was about an annual family reunion and listed all the attendees. But the article that caught his attention included a photo of several attendees at a local turkey shoot right before Thanksgiving eleven years ago. The picture showed the winners of the contest, including a young man named Ryal Walker. The young girl standing by his side and smiling up at him was identified as Beth Venable.
Moe smiled back.
She’d run home to an old flame.
Now all he had to do was figure out where Ryal Walker was hiding his childhood sweetheart, and then he would be on a plane and back in good old L.A. before sunset tomorrow.
Beth was sick of being housebound and had talked Ryal into another walk through the forest, this time to a waterfall he’d promised to show her. It occurred to her that he had a thing for waterfalls—maybe because she’d seen him naked under one—but she kept it to herself.
She’d been trying to make sandwiches to take with them when Ryal had come into the kitchen and taken over.
“I love you to distraction, Bethie, and I mean no offense, but I can’t stomach Aunt Tildy’s ointment on my bread.”
Beth had relinquished the knife she was using to spread mustard with a smile.
“None taken,” she said. “Do we have a sack small enough to pack the food in?”
“Look in that bottom drawer,” he said, pointing to the set of cabinet drawers nearest the back door.
“I found one,” Beth said, and brought it back to the counter.
Ryal had the sandwiches made and wrapped in wax paper. He dropped them in the sack, along with a small bag of cookies, and then rolled down the top to seal it.
“We’re good to go. Wanna use the bathroom before we head out?”
She nodded and hurried back through the house. A few minutes later she joined Ryal on the back porch.
“Should we lock the house?” she asked.
“No. Quinn might need to come in. Besides, there aren’t any other people living up this high anymore.”
He slid his arm around Beth’s shoulders. When she looked up, he kissed her hard and long.
“You sure you wouldn’t rather spend the morning in bed?” he asked.
She shook her head. “As good as you are in bed, I need to get out of the house. The walls are closing in on me.”
He grinned. “I’ll take that compliment and raise you one. You’re the queen of my heart, and I have a waterfall to show you, located in the great outdoors. Might even get in a little skinny-dipping while we’re at it.”
Beth arched an eyebrow. “I knew that was where this was going. Leave it to you to get me naked, no matter where we’re going.”
He grinned. “Hey, I have ten long years of missed quickies to make up for.”
Beth laughed as she wrapped her arms around his neck. This time, she was the one who kissed him hard and fast.
“There’s your quickie,” she said. “Now show me that waterfall.”
They headed off into the woods, talking and laughing as if her absence of the past ten years had never happened and they were safe as houses there on the mountain.
When James got home, he unloaded the family groceries and then, at Julie’s urging, sat down to the noon meal she had waiting. By the time they finished eating, it was a little after 1:00 p.m. Julie put the baby down for a nap and had settled in the big rocking chair with their daughter to read a book as James headed for the front door.
“I’d better get those groceries up to Ryal. I won’t stay, honey, so don’t worry. I should be back in a couple of hours, okay?”
“Okay,” she said. “Let Big Red in the house when you leave, will you?”
James frowned. Normally, Julie was the one who didn’t want him inside.
“Why?”
Sh
e shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m just a little unsettled, maybe because of all this hiding out and hush-hush drama. Just my motherly instincts on alert, I guess.”
James went back and dropped down on his knees beside her chair.
“I’m sorry, sugar. If this is making you upset, I can get one of the cousins to—”
Julie grabbed his wrist. “No. I don’t want you to abandon Ryal and Quinn. It’s important that we help Beth. I’m just being a worrywart, okay?”
James kissed her, then kissed her again. “I won’t be long.”
“Love you,” she said, as he opened the door.
“Love you, too,” James echoed as he let in the dog, and then he was gone.
Moe stayed a good five miles behind James Walker’s pickup truck. He didn’t need to see him to know where he was going. When he realized James had stopped at his home, he pulled his car off the road into the same tree cover that he’d used last night and settled in to wait.
A little over an hour later, the truck was once again on the move. Moe assumed James was delivering the other set of groceries he’d purchased, and while he would have liked to follow to see for himself, the area was so deserted that he feared there was no way he could do that and not be seen by someone.
It was too big a risk to take.
He would just keep on using the area map to track Walker, then take coordinates when he stopped again and get the hell off the mountain while the getting was good.
Sixteen
The woods were dense, the underbrush thick and often hard to walk through, but they followed the sound of the waterfall all the way to the banks of the stream that it fed. They walked out of the trees, startling a doe that had been drinking at the bank. She bounded across the water and into the trees on the opposite side in one leap.
“Oh, no, we scared her,” Beth said.
“She’ll come back when we’re gone,” Ryal said, as he set the sack with their picnic on a nearby rock and pointed to the falls coming over a ledge about ten feet above their heads. It was just large enough to send a spray of water back up into the air, forming its own rainbow.
