Christmas Undercover

by Hope White

  “Bree, Bree, you’re here, too!” Cassie threw her arms around her sister and hugged her tight.

  “Yeah, I thought you heard about—”

  “Where’s Nate?” Cassie broke the hold and looked into her sister’s eyes.

  “In there.” She pointed.

  Cassie dashed toward the examining area as Nate was being wheeled out.

  “Are you okay?” Cassie said. “Where were you shot? Does it hurt? Where are they taking you?”

  “Yes... The shoulder... No, thanks to the pain meds, and I don’t know.” Nate tipped his head toward the orderly. “Where are you taking me? To Hawaii, I hope.”

  Cassie narrowed her eyes at Nate. “How much pain medication?”

  “I dunno, enough?”

  With Claire in his arms, Will walked over to Nate, and Sara followed.

  Nate extended his hand and they shook. “Hey, buddy. Hey, Claire. Your daddy’s a hero, did you know that?”

  Claire nodded. “Miss Sara told me.”

  Nate nodded at Sara. “You talk to the chief?”

  “Not yet. He’s taking David’s statement.”

  “I need to get him upstairs so he can rest,” the orderly said.

  “I’m coming with,” Cassie said, tagging alongside the stretcher.

  “He said rest, Cassie, not answer twenty-seven questions,” Nate said.

  “I’ve never asked that many.”

  “I’ll tell ya what, I’ll start counting.”

  “Why are you being such a wise guy? Do you have a concussion? Have they done an MRI? How’d you get that cut on your forehead?” Her voice softened as they turned the corner.

  “She talks too much,” Claire said.

  “She only talks like that when she’s nervous,” Will said.

  “Why’s she nervous?” Claire asked.

  “Because she was so worried about Detective Nate.”

  “Ooh,” Claire said. “I get it.” She giggled.

  “Yeah? What do you get, huh?” Will tickled her tummy as the three of them wandered back to the lounge.

  “Sara Vaughn?” Chief Washburn said coming down the hall.

  “You ready for my statement?” she asked.

  “Yes. I need you to come to the station with me.”

  Two men turned the corner behind the chief. From Sara’s tense reaction, Will assumed they were LaRouche and Harrington.

  “Can’t she give it to you here, chief?” Will said.

  Chief Washburn approached Sara and Will. “I’m afraid not. David Price has given his statement. He claims Sara shoved him off the trail.”

  SIXTEEN

  Will stood there in shock, devastated by the false accusation. A few hours ago David Price had admitted that Mr. LaRouche shoved him off the mountain, and now he was blaming Sara?

  The only thing keeping Will from blowing a gasket was the fact he held Claire in his arms.

  Sara touched his shoulder, and Will ripped his attention from LaRouche and Harrington’s victorious smirks.

  With a resigned expression she said, “It’s okay. I’ll figure things out from here. Take care of your family.” She reached out and brushed her thumb across Claire’s cheek. “It was nice seeing you again, sweetie.”

  “You, too, Miss Sara.”

  With a sad smile, Sara turned and the chief handcuffed her. Will walked away so that wouldn’t be the last image Claire would see of Sara: being led away in cuffs by the chief of police.

  Will sensed LaRouche’s and Harrington’s arrogance, their satisfaction. Somehow they’d convinced David to change his story and accuse Sara of attempted murder. But how?

  His father-in-law came out of the examining area with Marissa in tow.

  “How’s Mary?” Will asked.

  “She’ll be fine once they get her to a room. She was a little cranky and didn’t want the girls seeing her like that—” he squeezed Marissa’s hand “—so she asked us to wait out here.”

  “Would you mind watching the girls for a few minutes? I need to talk to Nate.”

  “Sure, sure.”

  Will put Claire down. “Stay close to your sister. I’ll be right back.”

  “Okay, Daddy.”

  He hugged both his girls and went to see Nate. When he got into the elevator, he wondered if Nate was the right guy to be talking to right now. Will changed his mind and made his way to David Price’s room.

  Will was unsure what he’d say or how he’d persuade the man to admit the truth. Even if he could, David had given his official statement to the chief about Sara.

  As he stepped into David’s room, he heard a woman’s voice behind the privacy curtain. Will hesitated.

  “Send them away? Why would I send them away, David? They were so worried about you when you didn’t come home. We all were.”

  “Listen to me, Beth. It’s best for everyone if they spend a little time with their cousins over break. I’m also going to hire security to be with them 24/7.”

  “Security? Why?”

  “Our business is dangerous. I know that now.”

  “That woman’s going to jail. She can’t hurt you anymore.”

  “It’s not her I’m worried about,” he croaked. “It’s my criminal partners.”

  “David,” she said, shocked. “What are you talking about?”

  “Abreivtas is dangerous. They knew it and pushed it through anyway. I found out and confronted them. That’s when LaRouche shoved me over the cliff.”

  Will ripped the curtain back. “Then, why are you sending an innocent woman to jail?”

  “Who are you and what are you doing here?” David’s wife said. “I’m calling security.” She reached for the phone.

  David grabbed her wrist. “Don’t.”

  She released the phone and waited.

  “I owe this man my life,” David said, nodding his thanks to Will.

  “Then, tell the truth,” Will countered.

  David sighed. “I can’t.” He squeezed his wife’s hand and shook his head.

  “David?” she said.

  “I can’t risk you having a car accident on the way to Pete’s soccer practice, or Julianna’s skating lessons or...or someone breaking into the house when I’m out of town,” he croaked.

  His wife’s face paled with shock.

  David narrowed his eyes at Will. “Do you have a family, Mr. Rankin?”

  “Two girls.”

  “What would you do if someone threatened them?”

  Will remembered the visceral panic that had coursed through him when he’d heard Mary had disappeared and he’d feared the girls were with her.

  Will had feared the girls had been taken because of his involvement with Sara.

  “Mr. Rankin?” David pushed.

  “I’d do whatever was necessary to protect them.”

  “Then, don’t judge me for trying to protect my family.”

  With a nod, Will left the couple alone. What now? Find Nate? Tell the chief what was going on? Who would believe Will, the man who’d fallen in love with a rogue FBI agent accused of attempted murder?

  Will would contact Royce, one of the best attorneys in the county, to make sure she didn’t go to jail for a crime she didn’t commit. Perhaps Royce could leak damaging information to the proper authorities about Abreivtas.

  “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” he said.

  He’d get the girls settled at home and make his calls. Will did whatever was necessary to protect the people he loved, and Sara was now on that list.

  * * *

  Sara flung her arm over her eyes as she stretched out on a cot in Echo Mountain PD lockup.

  She hadn’t seen Will since the hospital last night. She won
dered if he’d given up on her, not that she’d blame him. Anyone involved with Sara would be sucked into a melee of problems, staring with her own traumatic childhood, and violent career. Make that her former career.

  She’d failed. Miserably.

  It didn’t surprise her that David Price had changed his story. LaRouche and Harrington had obviously gotten to him, probably threatening David’s kids and lovely wife.

  Still, Sara hadn’t thought she’d end up being arrested and going to jail. Being an FBI agent had to carry some weight with a jury, and once Nate testified that David had, in fact, claimed LaRouche threw him over the mountainside, well, that should be enough for reasonable doubt.

  Unless LaRouche and Harrington were able to buy off the jury. No, she couldn’t go there, nor did she want to give up on preventing Abreivtas from being distributed. How was she going to do that from a jail cell?

  She had to stop her mind from spinning, and rely on others for help. Nate had stopped by earlier and praised her for how she’d handled herself in the mountains. He’d said he was determined to clear her name, as was Will, although Nate had asked Will to keep his distance from Sara. She agreed with that decision, of course, but missed him all the same.

  The door to the cell area creaked open.

  “Hello, Sara,” Vic LaRouche said.

  She sat up and glared at him. Ted Harrington stood right beside him. “You’ve won,” Sara said. “Leave me alone.”

  “Not quite,” LaRouche said. “Proving your innocence can be problematic for us. And we know you don’t like problems.”

  “Neither do you, apparently. What did you do to David, threaten his kids or what?”

  “We don’t threaten. Threats are a bullying tactic, and infer you never mean to follow through.” LaRouche leaned into the bars. “We leverage.”

  “Don’t waste your time on me. I’m not fighting the charges.”

  “No, but your boyfriend is.”

  She sighed. “Don’t have a boyfriend.”

  “Will Rankin.”

  She forced a disinterested look on her face. Psychopaths like LaRouche saw right through it.

  “He’s already contacted a top defense attorney. We can’t have that kind of publicity, can we, Ted?”

  “Wouldn’t be good for business,” Ted Harrington agreed.

  “Right, the business of killing people,” she snapped.

  “We don’t kill anyone. We offer approved medications to help people cope with the stresses of life,” LaRouche said.

  “Whatever. I’m going to jail. What more do you want from me?” she said.

  With a maniacal smile, he slipped a photograph through the bars. It dropped to the floor. She glanced down at the smiling faces of Will, Claire and Marissa.

  “Since you’ve been unable to convince Mr. Rankin to distance himself from all this, you leave us no choice. It will be a shame to orphan those adorable girls.”

  She charged the bars to grab him, but he leaned back, out of reach. “Leave that family alone!”

  “Tell you what, we’ll do just that on one condition.”

  She waited, clenching her jaw, wondering how much of this she had to endure.

  “You’ll take our lovely medication and go to sleep with the comfort of knowing the Rankin family will be safe, and the girls will grow up to live long and happy lives.”

  She eyed the pill in his hand. Now what? If she didn’t take it, they’d probably send another assassin, this time to kill Will. The thought of a world without Will’s smiling face and warmhearted laugh was not a world worth living in.

  She had no choice. She’d take the pill, and bury it in the side of her mouth.

  This was going to be a tough sell, yet she had to do it. If she took the pill and something went wrong...

  It would be her last sacrifice.

  To save Will and the girls.

  “Fine.” She motioned with her fingers.

  “Oh, no, lovely. Open your mouth.”

  She hesitated. There was no going back now.

  “Or were you going to trick us?” LaRouche raised an eyebrow.

  She cracked her mouth open. He reached into the cell and grabbed her hair. With a yank, he tossed the pill down her throat and slammed her jaw shut. Her eyes watered. She had no choice but to swallow.

  And she did.

  He released her with a jerk and she stumbled back. Her gaze drifted to the photo on the floor. She kneeled and picked it up. This was why she’d taken the risk and set herself up as bait: to protect Will and the girls.

  “How long were you hunting us?” LaRouche asked.

  She snapped her attention to him and straightened. “What?”

  “We know you’re FBI. We also know you’re unstable, which makes this whole—” he motioned with his hand “—overmedication work seamlessly into our plans.”

  She swayed, gripping the bars. “You can’t—”

  “We already have. The drug will be released to the general public next month.”

  It was having a quicker effect on Sara than she’d expected. She struggled to find her words, make sense of the thoughts going through her brain.

  “How did you get it...get it through testing?” she asked.

  Her eyelids felt heavy and her legs weakened.

  “There she goes,” Harrington said.

  Collapsing on the floor, she stared up at the bright ceiling lights. A low hum filled her ears. She held the photograph so she could see it.

  Will. Will and his emerald eyes.

  She would die without telling him she loved him. And more innocent people would die because Sara had failed.

  “People will die!” she gasp-shouted.

  “Well, you will anyway.”

  She closed her eyes, wanting them gone, wanting her last few moments on earth to be filled with the image of Will and his girls.

  “Sa-ra, oh, Sa-ra,” LaRouche said.

  “Let’s go,” Harrington said.

  “Wait, I’ve got to leave this.”

  “Come on, come on, already,” Harrington said.

  Sara had no idea what LaRouche had put in the cell and didn’t care. She wanted them to leave so she could open her eyes and gaze upon the photograph of a smiling father and his two precious girls.

  A door slammed and she opened her eyes. They were gone.

  She crawled to the toilet, hoping to make herself throw up. Gray fog blurred her vision. She gasped, gripping the photograph in her hand. Willing herself to focus, she held the photograph close, struggled to see.

  “Will,” she whispered.

  * * *

  Will couldn’t wait any longer. He tracked Nate down at Healthy Eats, where Will demanded to see Sara. Nate seemed worn down, probably from the gunshot wound, and he finally gave in. Will felt bad about pressuring his friend, but he needed to see Sara.

  When Will and Nate arrived at the police station, the front office was empty.

  “Spike?” Nate said.

  Will started toward the cell area and Nate yanked him back. “Hang on a second.”

  Nate went to the computer and punched a couple of keys. A visual of the cell came up on the screen.

  Sara was passed out on the floor.

  “We’ve got to—”

  Nate put up his hand to silence Will. Then he rewound the video feed and played it back. There, on the screen, they watched Victor LaRouche shove something into Sara’s mouth.

  Nate pushed Will aside and went to unlock the door to the cell area.

  “Sara,” Will said. “Sara, wake up.”

  Nate unlocked the cell door and called for an ambulance.

  “This is Detective Walsh. Send an ambulance to Echo Mountain Police Station immediately. I’ve got an
unconscious female.”

  Will rushed to Sara’s side and felt for a pulse. “Nate, we can’t wait for an ambulance.” He noticed a pill bottle on the cell floor. “Grab that and follow me,” Will ordered.

  He picked her up and marched out of the cell. When they got into the front office, Spike came in from the back. He was covered in dirt and carried a fire extinguisher.

  “Where were you?” Nate said.

  “A car fire out back. I locked up.”

  “Sit behind this desk and don’t move until I tell you to.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Nate opened the door for Will. “Let’s get her to the hospital.”

  * * *

  Will squeezed his hands together in prayer. Please, God, please let her wake up. Let her be okay.

  They’d given her a drug to counteract the pill LaRouche had shoved down her throat, and the doctor said the next twenty-four hours were critical.

  So Will sat beside her bed. And prayed.

  She’d been still all night, hardly stirring, barely breathing.

  He closed his eyes and continued to pray. Will couldn’t lose her this way. He couldn’t lose her, period. He hadn’t felt this kind of connection since Megan.

  Who would have thought he’d fall in love with a woman like Sara? The FBI agent was determined first and foremost, and had a protective instinct that would scare off a hardened criminal. Such instincts would come in handy with his precocious daughters. That was, if Sara had any interest in a future with Will and the girls.

  Was he assuming too much? Was he the only one who felt the dynamic pull between them, the trust growing each and every day they spent together? He hoped he wasn’t imagining things.

  “You’re praying.”

  He snapped his eyes open. Sara stared at him with a confused frown.

  “And you’re awake,” he said, reaching out to take her hand.

  “I’m not dead?” she said, with surprise in her voice.

  “We got you to the hospital in time.”

  “LaRouche and Harrington?”

  “The truth is out. Nate’s got LaRouche on video, forcing you to take the pill. They thought they’d destroyed it, but Nate had a second feed going to another server, courtesy of Zack Carter, who also retrieved the video off your phone.”

  “That’s great news.”