by Donna Alward
Her hands stilled over the butter dish. There was more? How much more could she possibly take today?
“What could you possibly want to ask of me now?”
Surprise held her still when he took both her hands in his own. She risked a look up; his eyes held apology and understanding.
“You shared things with me these last weeks. Things about your life. And we…we developed an attachment. Yet…” He paused, looked at his toes, then looked up again.
“Just ask what you want to ask, Nate. We’re too far along for niceties now.”
“I find it hard to believe you haven’t been involved with anyone since Tom.”
Maggie’s brows drew together. She couldn’t read his face; he’d switched back into cop mode. What did her sex life, or lack of it, have to do with anything?
“What does it matter?”
The pressure on her fingers tightened. “Damn, I wanted to wait to ask you this at a better time. Maggie, have you been involved with anyone? Say, last summer?”
Last summer? She looked up into his face, her eyes widening with confusion. “You’re asking me if I’ve had a boyfriend since Tom. Specifically about a year ago.”
“That’s what I’m asking.”
“I don’t see what business it is of yours, but no.”
She pulled her hands away and resumed arranging the tray. What reason could he possibly have for delving into her past? It was dry as dust. There hadn’t been anyone since Tom. Not even close, until…
Until Nate. It always came back to Nate.
“You weren’t involved with Peter Harding?”
Peter Harding? This is what this was about? It was the second time she’d heard his name tonight and Maggie’s stomach dropped. Why in the world would he think she was involved with Pete? How could anyone? She had very real reasons to hate the man, not have an affair with him. Her fingers tightened on the edges of the tray.
She looked up at Nate, surprised to find him serious. “I have no use for Peter Harding. None whatsoever. He’s despicable.”
The relief on his face was so profound that suddenly it all fit together. Pete was Nate’s assignment. Pete, the man responsible for Jen’s arrest, had shot Nate today. The thought made her knees go weak but she stood her ground. “He’s who you’re here for, isn’t he?”
Had he thought she was involved all this time? She took a step back.
“Did you seriously think that I had an affair with a man like that?” And suspecting it, had he seduced her anyway? Or had he tried to get close to her so she’d betray Pete? The very idea turned her stomach.
“I believe you when you say you didn’t,” he conceded. “Once I got to know you, I knew it couldn’t be true. But I had feelings that I recognized might be clouding my judgment.” His voice grew stronger. “But Grant is going to ask you and I wanted to give you the heads-up. I thought it might be easier for you if it came from me first.”
Grant, of course. She wondered if that was why he always looked at her with that cold, assessing glare. At least Nate had judged her correctly. She stared down the hall at the entrance to the den, her distrust growing. He’d let Jen go, but he hadn’t been pleasant about it. Now he’d dragged her into this mess once again, when it would be best if it were all forgotten. She simply wanted to go on as if Peter Harding had never existed!
“What has Pete done?” She collected herself and put the plate of muffins in the center of the tray. “After all you’ve put me through, you can at least tell me that.”
“Bring in the coffee, Maggie. We’ll talk.”
She put the carafe on the tray and Nate took it from her hands. This was all happening so quickly. Only this afternoon she’d been humming and folding Nate’s laundry and now she had the RCMP sitting in her den, talking about bringing in fugitives over coffee and muffins.
Nate put the tray down on the coffee table and Maggie poured three mugs of the steaming brew. She sat on the couch, surprised when Nate sat down beside her instead of in the chair closest to Grant, almost as if he were choosing her side. She stared at his thigh, lean and muscled even through the denim. She put down her spoon in time to see Nate meet Grant’s gaze and give a small shake of his head. Grant shifted in his seat.
“Maggie,” Grant began, “first of all I want to apologize for putting you in the middle of this. It was my idea completely. I certainly didn’t mean to cause any upset.”
She wasn’t sure whether to believe him or not. Yet something in his tone rang genuine, something she hadn’t heard before.
“You’re after Pete Harding.” She took a sip of the coffee, trying hard to appear calmer than she felt.
“Yes, we are.” Nate broke in. “Your place was the natural fit. You’re geographically close by, I could stay here legitimately and your known connection to him helped.”
“My connection,” she echoed, lost. “I already told Nate I wasn’t involved with him.”
“Through Jennifer,” Grant said gently.
Maggie turned and looked at Nate. “You did know.” Her heart sank. She’d been aware from the first what he did for a job and she’d wanted to spare him the details of Jen’s arrest. But he’d known all along. Of course he had.
He nodded. “I did. But it didn’t matter. Jen told me about it anyway before she left to go back to school. She felt very sorry about putting you through so much trouble.”
Maggie’s eyes stung. Pete Harding was a waste of space in her opinion. Bootlegging and selling pot, petty stuff to most but she knew how it could cause lasting damage. Jen had been quiet when the whole arrest happened, unwilling to share much information at all and it had scared Maggie to death. She’d wanted Pete pulled in but she’d been informed at the beginning that there wasn’t enough to warrant his arrest, so she’d focused on what was best for Jen. For months she’d lived in the same community resenting his presence and his above-the-law attitude.
She was glad Jen seemed to be on the other side of her troubles now. And yet here was Pete again, front and center in Maggie’s life. She huffed out a breath.
Grant spoke into the breach. “I’m glad to hear there was nothing going on with you.”
Maggie turned her attention to Grant. “Why on earth would you have suspected such a thing? How could you? All I did was try to protect my daughter!”
Grant rested his elbows on his knees. “You’re about the same age, you’ve been a widow for a lot of years. And you were very persistent in dropping the matter last summer when Jennifer was arrested. It looked like you were protecting him. We couldn’t take chances. When we found out who he really was…we had to act.”
Maggie put down her cup. “My only concern was minimizing the damage to Jennifer, and I was as much as told that there wasn’t enough on Pete to charge him with anything. You haven’t been here long, Grant, but if you’d talked to anyone in the community they would have told you point-blank that I’d never have anything to do with someone like Pete Harding.”
“The only thing we had on file for you was Tom, and the questions brought up from his death…on paper it was very plausible.”
Maggie looked at Nate. The eyebrow not hindered by gauze was wrinkled; like he was confused about something.
“Paper isn’t enough.” She turned her attention to her coffee cup.
“I know. Please accept my apologies, Maggie.”
His words, his tone, his expression, were all earnest. Maggie looked at Nate again. He’d been thoughtful enough to ask her about it in private. Perhaps it made no sense in light of recent truths, but if Nate trusted Grant, it was good enough for her.
“Let’s just move on, shall we?”
Nate angled himself on the sofa. “If you have anything you know about Pete that you’d like to share, that would be helpful.”
Maggie couldn’t think of a thing. “I only know he operates off his property. Booze and drugs. Wouldn’t surprise me to find a grow operation on the property somewhere.”
Nate grinned suddenly, the expr
ession lighting up his face. “Oh, we found it. Thanks for the snowshoes, by the way. I don’t think there’s going to be much of a crop this year.”
So he hadn’t been going for walks, either. He’d been haunting the fields. “You were staking him out.”
Nate nodded. “I took what I needed in my backpack and made do.”
His backpack. Maggie now understood that he’d not only carried his lunch but very likely firearms and ammunition as well as surveillance gear. She fought against the sense of the surreal, tried to remain in the moment. It didn’t seem possible that this was happening in her house.
Who was this man? The more she discovered, the more he seemed a mystery. How could he be the same man she’d kissed? The same man she’d told secrets to, the one who’d inspired feelings in her that no man had since she’d been married to Tom?
“You don’t know anything more?”
She shook herself out of her thoughts in time to register the question.
“No, nothing.”
“Then I think it’s time to bring Jen in. If there’s anything she can share that she didn’t last fall, it could be helpful.”
Grant went out and returned a moment later with Jen, who kept her eyes downcast and picked at a fingernail.
“Jen, honey, Constable Simms and…and Nate—” she still couldn’t seem to bring herself to call him a marshal “—just want to ask you a few questions about Pete Harding. You’re not in any trouble. Right?” She aimed the last at Nate, giving him a warning eyebrow.
Nate nodded. “That’s right. You haven’t done anything wrong. Why don’t you sit down, and we can see if you remember anything that might be important.”
Jen sat on the sofa beside Grant and met her mother’s gaze with red-rimmed eyes.
“I’m sorry, Mama,” she said, swallowing.
Maggie’s eyes misted. Jen hadn’t called her Mama for several years and it took her back to those uncomplicated days of her childhood.
“You’re forgiven.”
Why it had taken nearly a year for them each to say those important words, Maggie didn’t know, but as soon as they were spoken, everything changed. Her daughter was back. Really back. The relief hit her square in the chest.
“Jennifer,” Grant began, “Last summer you didn’t give us a lot of details and we think that you may have been afraid to say much of anything. I want you to forget that fear now. Nate is here, and I’m here, to take Peter Harding in for good. He can’t hurt you, Jen. But you can help us so he doesn’t hurt anyone else.”
“What do you want to know?”
Jen’s face was pale but somehow strong, and Maggie realized what a treasure she was. She met Jen’s eyes and nodded.
“Did Pete ever threaten you?”
“He said that if I ever ratted him out I’d be sorry.”
“Anything more specific? Did he use several girls to run his product?”
Jen shook her head. “Not that I know of. At first…at first he was kind of cool, you know? Then he got a little scary. I felt weird around him but by that time I was afraid to walk away. Then he…”
She stopped, turned away and Maggie’s heart stopped.
“Then he what, Jen.” She tried to keep the shake out of her voice but failed.
“He showed me a trapdoor in the barn. It was where he hid his stuff. And he said if I did anything to cause trouble he’d hide me there, too.”
Maggie’s stomach tumbled clear to her toes as the ramifications covered her in waves.
Nate’s mouth fell open and Grant’s face turned red.
“Why in God’s name didn’t you tell me this last summer?” Grant’s elbows came off his knees and his fingers flexed tightly as he raised his voice.
Jen sniffled. “I was too afraid! I figured if I kept on the low it would go away and it would be okay.”
Maggie stood, crossed the room and pulled Jen into her arms. “Oh, baby,” she whispered, holding her daughter close as she sobbed. “You should have told me. We could have stopped him months ago.”
“You were so mad, I didn’t want to upset you anymore. And then you sent me away and I thought that…”
The childlike plea in Jen’s voice touched her. In all this time, she hadn’t considered that Jen might have felt turned away. She’d only considered her daughter’s well-being. The backs of her eyelids burned.
“You thought what? That I didn’t want you anymore?” Maggie put her hands on either side of Jen’s face and looked her dead in the eyes. “Oh, honey, I hated being without you. You’re all I’ve got. But I wanted to keep you safe. To get you away from your troubles. I could never stop loving you! I certainly wouldn’t ever punish you by sending you away!”
Jen’s arms tightened around Maggie’s neck and Maggie closed her eyes, feeling the tears trickle on her cheeks and not caring that Nate and Grant stood by watching. She’d sent Jen off to school somewhere else, tried to pretend none of it had happened and all the while her baby girl had felt the sting of rejection. Had thought she wasn’t wanted, which couldn’t be farther from the truth.
Grant’s voice interrupted quietly. “Jen, if there’s anything else you have to tell us, now’s the time. I wish you’d said something last summer.”
Jen’s voice came out in a hoarse whisper. “He said if I told anyone he’d lock me in there. I didn’t think the cops would take it seriously, they’d think he’d only said it to scare me. But I saw the look in his eyes. I believed him.”
Nate ground out an earthy curse, then the den fell eerily silent.
Whatever Pete had done, it had been enough that the U.S. Government had seen fit to send Nate up to get him. And they didn’t do that for simple bootleggers. Maggie’s body felt like stone; she couldn’t move. Implications of what might have happened to Jen fell on her, heavy and cold. And for the first time, she was glad that it was Nate with her. Glad he was on the job. Grateful and…proud. Her arm tightened on Jen’s shoulder as they faced the men together.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I have to know. What is it he’s done? What’s he charged with?”
After a moment’s silence, Nate answered. His tone was clear, strong and the words sent an icy chill up the backs of her legs.
“He’s charged with three counts of kidnapping and sexual assault, and one count of murder.”
A cry escaped her throat as she crumpled, sliding away from Jen. Nate’s arm reached out, supporting her as shock rippled through her body.
Harding’s threats didn’t seem so harmless now. Delayed fear pulsed through her veins at what she could have lost. She’d lost everyone else. She couldn’t have borne losing her baby girl, too. And she’d come closer than she’d thought possible.
Nate ignored Grant. Instead he put a finger under her chin and lifted it. When she looked up into his face, ashamed of what she’d done, frightened of what she’d just heard, what she saw in his eyes warmed her soul.
He would do whatever it took to make things right. He would protect her. He would protect Jen. She knew it in her heart. How could she hate him now for hiding the truth? Now that she knew all of it, she understood.
“It will be over soon, Maggie, I promise. Peter Harding will be gone from your life forever. You won’t have to be afraid. Jen won’t have to be afraid.”
She closed her eyes briefly. “Thank you.”
He pressed his lips to her forehead and she let herself lean into it, just for a moment, gathering a little strength.
After a few minutes, she squared her shoulders. Nate had said that things were moving fast. That meant he and Grant had to be planning how to make the arrest. Her heart beat erratically, nerves bubbling over. Nate would be in danger. The best thing she could do now to help was make sure they had the time and space to plan, to prepare. To ensure there would be no mistakes.
“We’ll leave you to talk now. You must have things to discuss.”
“Maggie?” Grant’s voice interrupted. “Jen isn’t staying. I want her away from here, and safe
. I have an officer ready to take her back to Edmonton as soon as we’re finished here. I’m sorry.”
“But…” Maggie looked up at Nate, then back to Grant. It would sound silly, insisting that she’d only just gotten Jen back. But now that she knew everything, she didn’t want to let her go.
“Can’t I stay here, with Mom?”
Nate’s hand squeezed Maggie’s and he looked down into her eyes. “It would be useless to ask you to leave, I know that. But we can keep Jen away from it. It would be one less thing for us to worry about.”
Maggie knew that right now it was more important to keep Nate focused on his job. She looked up at Jen, raised an eyebrow. Jen looked stronger now, less frightened. Nate had a way of doing that and she loved him for it.
Jen wrapped her arms around herself. “It’s okay, Mom. Once it’s over I’ll come home. I promise.”
Maggie rose, her thigh tingling as Nate’s free hand lingered over the fabric of her trousers. “I’ll come and get you myself.” She held out her hand and Jen took it. Maggie’s knees trembled but she made herself take one step, then another, to the door. She avoided Grant’s gaze as she left the room with Jen, closing the door behind her.
She leaned back against it. Yes, Peter Harding would be gone for good. But so would Nate.
And the thought of being without him made her very lonely indeed. She hated it almost as much as she hated the fact he’d be putting himself in danger.
A half hour later, after a quick cup of tea and a restorative, albeit brief conversation with her daughter, Maggie heard voices in the hall; heard Nate say “that’s it then.” Maggie put down her teacup and held Jen’s hand as she went to see Grant—and her daughter—away. She’d been remiss in her manners earlier, but she saw things differently now.
Very differently. Knowing what Pete had done, knowing how much trouble Jennifer could have been in…Grant deserved her gratitude and respect, certainly not the curtness she’d treated him to on his arrival.
When she walked toward the front door, Grant’s eyes seemed to smile at her. She was no longer intimidated by his size, his bearing. Instead she was oddly reassured that he’d do everything in his power to make sure things turned out the right way. The animosity she’d felt for him all these months evaporated.
