Maverick

by C. J. Snyder

  “You said you’d never cut your hair.” Megan’s nose wrinkled and she tried for nonchalant. “Too many bad dye jobs. It all kind of broke.” She lifted the duffle bag in her left hand and caught Melissa’s hand close in her right. “Let’s go. I’ve got to be at work in an hour and we’ve got an hour-and-a-half drive.”

  “Why didn’t you have me get off the bus in Glenwood Springs? It’s much closer, you know. We went right by New Castle on the highway—right after Glenwood. It seems silly to stop in Glenwood, drive another hour, and drive back.”

  That’s why we don’t live in the same state . Melissa didn’t get it. Melissa wouldn’t ever get it. Megan squeezed her hand and pulled her along. Melissa’s chatter kept time with the staccato pops of her ridiculous heels. Megan rolled her eyes and rounded another corner. In the middle of the block, after another quick glance around, she opened a hatchback and tossed her sister’s bag into a small economy wagon. The battered relic was on its last legs when she’d purchased it a year ago.

  Melissa looked dismayed again. “Is it even safe?”

  Megan grinned. “Safe enough, sis. Let’s go. Derek’ll have my hide if I’m late.” A purely predatory smile curved Melissa’s lips. “You told him I was coming, didn’t you?”

  A groan, suspiciously similar to the engine she tried to coax to life, escaped. “Didn’t you learn anything last time?” Melissa’s eyes were technically brown, just like Megan’s, but Melissa’s encompassed thirty shades of color—from rich dark chocolate running in a ring at the outer edges to honey butter around her pupils. Men had been known to melt at the sight of them. They stared dreamily at Megan now. “I remember how good he was. . . the man can kiss. . .” Melissa sighed.

  The engine roared to life. “What about Colby?” Megan pulled onto the road and checked her watch. Late. When Derek was grouchy, the whole world went south. “Colby?” Considering Colby was the man Melissa was going to end her life over not three months ago, her sister sounded amazingly calm. “Colby’s history.”

  Megan tossed her a dubious glance. “I thought Colby was the one.”

  “He likes to fish.” Melissa inspected a perfectly manicured nail before glancing at her older sister. “Then he brings them home.” She suppressed a delicate shudder. Megan laughed. “And wants you to help clean them?”

  “You know, I think he actually did. He didn’t quite ask me, but—“ She shook her head. “Anyway. I’m looking forward to seeing Derek again.” Derek was as anxious as Melissa. He’d taken one look at her taller little sister last year and fallen hard. Not surprising. Men always fell hard for Melissa, which was fine with her. Mopping up the bleeding hearts her sister left in her wake—that she could do without.

  “Is he working tonight?”

  “He works every night, honey. He owns Shipwrecks.”

  “He didn’t work every night the last time I was here.”

  “He should have.” She pulled onto the highway “Listen, Melissa, you’ve got to remember now. I’m Megan Chase here.” “Anything new in New Castle?”

  Megan ignored the question and waited. Melissa’s answer was too important.

  Melissa finally sighed. “I promise. I thought you’d be over this by now. It’s been two years.”

  If I was “over it” I’d be in jail. But Melissa didn’t know about the why. Megan didn’t want her to know. “Billy was family, Melissa. Would you forget me in two years?” “Probably.” But she rested her head on her sister’s shoulder. “You’re right.” She sighed. “You’re always right. I’ll be careful. I really will. And of course I wouldn’t forget you.” She sounded like a thoroughly chastised little girl.

  Megan sighed. She pretty much was a little girl. It didn’t bother Melissa what her sister thought. She did manage to hold onto her retail sales job at a large department store in Chicago—loved her work, in fact. But one of the things she loved was the lack of responsibility. Show up to work, looking beautiful, of course, and sell the pretty ladies the creams and powders that kept them all looking that way. Megan shook her head, then smiled. She’d worked very hard so Melissa could just go right on loving her job.

  *** An hour and a half later, Megan pulled up to the converted vacation cabin she called home. Before the condos had gone up along the mountain, the cabins had rented for premium dollars. That was fifty years ago. About the only improvements made since then were the new front steps Megan had put in herself and the large claw-footed tub that devoured the tiny bathroom. She’d done the plumbing for that as well, and traded hot meals for the labor necessary to haul out the old tub and bring in the new. At the end of a long, hard shift, it was her most prized possession. She couldn’t count the nights she’d fallen asleep in that heavenly tub.

  She scurried inside her little cabin, peeling off her worn blue denim shirt. A t-shirt with a ship sinking in an impossible ocean across the back went over her head. The picture matched the one on the baseball cap she smashed low over her eyes. She was back outside in thirty seconds. Melissa passed her on the stairs, hoisting her heavy duffle bag. She dropped her luggage to catch Megan’s arm. “Thanks for sending for me.”

  Megan wrapped her in a secure hug, reveling in her sister’s nearness, in her own vacation from choking worry. Only during Melissa’s once-a-year visits did she know for certain her sister was safe.

  Megan jogged the three blocks to Shipwrecks, the neighborhood bar where she waitressed. “Sorry,” she murmured to Derek, but he wasn’t even scowling. Rare indeed for her boss. “She here?”

  Megan nodded, wrapping a small red apron around her waist. “She’ll be down later.”

  Derek was a burly six-foot-two. With hair more red than brown and a beard to match, he reminded Megan of a lumberjack. He spared one brief smile for her news. Then it was gone. “Two Buds and a Heineken to table four. Harry’s got a tab going and he got paid today, so make sure he closes it before he leaves. Oh, and Sally’s not coming in. She’s got cramps.” Derek made it sound like the sniffles, but Megan frowned. She knew why Sally’s “cramps” were getting worse each month, even if Derek didn’t. Hopefully she could find time for a break later and call her to see if she was all right.

  “Hey, Megan! We’re thirsty over here.” She waved her hand over her head in acknowledgment. Sam and Terry were regulars. She started two drafts going, whipped a round tray to the top of the bar and loaded the three bottles Derek had opened as well as the two drafts. Harry’s tab went into her pocket. It was the slowest time of her long evening. And it was only Sunday.

  *** On Monday morning, two thousand miles away, Special Lieutenant Jack Myles opened a digital photograph file. A Texas native, he didn’t much care for the long, cold Connecticut winters. But he liked the spring just fine. Back home the thermometer already inched over ninety. He flipped through the five photos slowly, enlarging portions of them. For all the advances in digital technology, a stationary camera shooting a moving object still made for a blurred picture. And they were all that way—almost clear enough, but not quite.

  Except the last one.

  Jack smiled.

  He’d had all the information he needed on Maggie Chambers within weeks of her holding that gun to his back. Five foot seven, one hundred ten pounds, very long dark hair and those luscious brown eyes that haunted him still.

  A bank robbery. Four perpetrators so stupid he still couldn’t believe they’d pulled it off. Hours and hours of sleepless investigation—and one of the perps suddenly fell right into their laps. Within minutes, Daria Kettleman, his partner and friend for three years, was dead. He’d channeled his furious grief into more hours of careful set-up.

  And Maggie Chambers blew it all up in less than ten minutes.

  She’d amused him at first. An untimely mugging. Even with Daria’s death still scalding him, he could appreciate the irony. Until she went for the key. Not a mugging after all. A counter sting.

  A successful counter sting.

  Two years and it still rankled.

  She�
�d played him—beaten him. How she’d pulled it off—or why she’d done it...he still didn’t understand. Before that night, Maggie Chambers had never even been pulled over for a speeding ticket. When he did catch her, she’d be facing several felony charges. State and federal felony charges. Jack was determined to make her pay.

  For everything.

  ***

  Her long, dark hair started them on her trail. With the bright halogen lights he’d called for, the crime scene was lit like a dentist’s office chair. He’d borrowed a blanket from the first squad to arrive, knotted it at his side and started right where she’d left him.

  He lifted the first strand of hair near the grate where she’d stooped to toss in Frank’s keys. The second one he found around the corner in the alley. Three more were caught in the brick wall about ten feet down. And five of the long beauties were tangled in the ski mask on top of their clothes in a Dumpster at the end of the alley. All their clothes, his gun—and Frank’s untouched wallet. But not his favorite shirt. That rankled too.

  With ten strands of her silky hair, and liquid chocolate eyes that were forever seared into his soul, he’d started his search. Every waking moment for two weeks—on and off duty—he spent searching motor vehicle identification pictures. And suddenly, there she was.

  Margaret Ruth Chambers, with an address on West Pine. The landlady let them into the modest apartment, terrified of what they’d find. They found a life interrupted. Mail was piled high in her box, but her bills had been paid up to the day she’d held a gun on him. Her untouched-for-two-weeks checking account held exactly five hundred three dollars and twelve cents. Correspondence revealed she went by Maggie.

  A grocery receipt on her desk agreed with the spoiling contents of her fridge. She’d shopped the day before the incident, stocking up on sale items. Either she hadn’t planned on her involvement in grand theft, or she was smart enough to know they’d identify her—and she wanted to make it look like she hadn’t planned it. He still didn’t know which.

  Her clothes—those that weren’t tossed haphazardly in the laundry basket in the bathroom—hung neatly in her closet. A suitcase was carefully stored on the top shelf. Everything they found suggested she was out for the afternoon. They found everything just the way she’d left it. The hair tangled in the brush in her bathroom confirmed her as the perpetrator.

  They didn’t find Maggie Chambers.

  Or the key.

  Or his damn shirt.

  Her reasons for busting up his little sting operation had vanished right along with her. Along with incriminatory evidence against the thieves.

  Six weeks later they’d discovered she had a sister, Melissa Susan Chambers. But they couldn’t find her, either.

  Until now.

  Jack’s slow smile became a rapacious grin and his blue eyes glittered with anticipation. As of four o’clock yesterday afternoon, Mountain Daylight Time, Maggie’s little sister Melissa was in Grand Junction, Colorado. Jack was willing to bet she wasn’t there alone. He swung the telephone up to his ear. “Hello, darlin’. Tell the Captain I want to see him, would you? And what’s the number of that travel agent y’all use?” When Jack stepped off the small jet at dusk on Monday, the Grand Junction heat hit him first—reminding him sharply of Austin and home. He scowled, but it didn’t alter the determination in his eyes. He wanted a drink. And the bus station. Long fingers patted his breast pocket, feeling for the slight bulge of pictures. He had two weeks. He doubted he’d need one day.

  *** Tuesday morning, Megan awoke with her sister’s sobs ringing in her ears. Eyes flying open, her startled gaze landed immediately on her sister. Melissa slept soundly, snoring softly in the twin bed identical to her own. She wasn’t crying. Just the old dream—no bearing in present reality. Watching her sister sleep, her features softened. to ease the worry she carried as a heavy shackle around her heart. close enough to touch didn’t stop the dreams.

  Having Melissa here helped

  But even having her sister Only ten o’clock, early for Megan to be awake. Melissa wouldn’t be up for hours. Her sister had closed down the bar, flirting outrageously with Derek. He’d been quite the grouch when he finally figured out she wasn’t going home with him. Megan smiled. Men, especially Melissa’s men, were certainly dense. For all her sister’s flirting, she was amazingly discriminating about who she actually took to bed. And Megan knew for a fact that she was fastidious about protection. No hot night of passion would leave her with any life-altering STDs. Megan worked hard to encourage that part of her sister’s vanity.

  Megan flipped on the coffee she’d readied the night before and went out to her front porch for the paper. The weather was cloudy and chilly this morning—too chilly for her porch swing. She carried the paper back inside. Sweetened coffee at her side, she began her morning ritual, reading the Denver Post from cover to cover. She skipped only the comics, and paid special attention to the national obituaries. On her day off, she would make a trip to the library in Glenwood Springs and search the internet for a recent mention of the names on her list. Nathan Mitchell. Kevin Cormack. Paul Cormack. And Jack Myles.

  She’d never forget the morning she found out he was a cop. It still sent a shudder up her spine. That ratty motel in New Jersey had faded into the background as she stared at the grainy photo in the newspaper. Special Lieutenant Jack Myles, at a press conference, asking for help to find the woman who held him at gunpoint. Just exactly what was a “special lieutenant” anyway? She still didn’t know.

  Maggie took great comfort in the fact that the description he gave of her wasn’t anything like her. After the fact, she realized she should have stuffed her long hair into her shirt before starting her endless walk down that alley, but Special Lieutenant Myles seemed to be under the impression that she was blond, and quite a bit shorter than her five foot seven. Later, when she searched on the internet for the interview and actually watched it, she wondered. She could swear he looked right into the camera—right at her.

  “I’ll know her when I see her. I’ve got a thing for eyes.” Megan felt a chill now, remembering. The chill intensified as she turned to the national classified ads. His ad was there. Somehow she knew it would be.

  Maggie. . . Time’s almost up, baby.

  She tossed the paper as if it had suddenly become a many-legged crawly creature. Maggie could feel him—almost see him smiling at her reaction. The ads ran once a month, as they had for the past twenty-three months. Everyone of them—even the two she’d missed in the beginning—were in a box under Melissa’s bed. Not that she needed the box to read the clippings in her mind. They were scorched into her brain.

  Special Lieutenant Jack Myles had a vile sense of humor.

  And he knows exactly how to spook you.

  Maggie’s eyes narrowed. She bent and resolutely retrieved the paper from the floor, carefully placing it on the crate that served as a coffee table.

  Jack Myles didn’t know her at all. She didn’t even know for sure he was the one placing the ads. Or that she was the Maggie they referenced.

  “I’ll know her when I see her. I’ve got a thing for eyes.” After watching the interview, Maggie headed west within the hour, settling in Chicago, where she and Melissa had lived when they were younger. Melissa was over the upset by then, and tired of living in motels. With a constant eye on the papers and television, Maggie stayed six weeks, long enough to learn waitressing and get Melissa an apartment and a job. Maggie calmly ignored her sister’s pleas that she stay in Chicago. Melissa was safe, as long as Maggie stayed out of sight. The third ad appeared the day before she left Chicago.

  Maggie. . . Come home. I’m waiting for you. She moved for the next ten months—never more than two weeks in any one place. She used more than a dozen names, twice as many social security numbers, and held every mean and nasty job imaginable. Once a month, a new ad appeared. Maggie could almost laugh them off. They irritated her more than anything. She imagined they were serving his purpose.

  A y
ear ago she landed in New Castle, a small town outside of Glenwood Springs, the gateway to Aspen, winter playground for the rich and famous. Derek never asked her for a social security number. He paid her in cash, every night, right out of the register. The tips weren’t great, but she was getting by—Melissa would be surprised to know she was literally sleeping on top of a few thousand dollars.

  The box with the money—and the newspaper clippings— was under a loose board in the rough, uneven floor. The box also held a thick pouch crammed with official papers. Those papers were the reason Melissa was still alive.

  Chapter 2

  Jack Myles frowned into his double whiskey. His eyes sought the darkness outside, visible over the hotel’s curving center-of-the-room bar.

  Three days. Three damn days and not a single clue. Melissa Chambers definitely arrived at the bus station on Monday—plenty of people remembered the beautiful blond. Some remembered her figure, some her hair, but all of them remembered her eyes. Having seen Maggie’s, Jack could understand. What Melissa did after her arrival was still a mystery.

  An platinum beauty in a slinky, low-cut top peppered in gold sequins sat down next to him. She smelled like a gardener’s dream—all exotic flowers and moonlight. She reached past him for a book of matches, managing to brush an ample breast up against his arm. When he glanced at her, she gave him a come-and-get-me smile. Jack returned an absent-minded one before he scowled into his whiskey.

  He slammed down the rest of his drink, curling his fingers tight around the short, fat glass. In the beginning, the mystery of Maggie Chambers intrigued him. Now it drove him crazy. So crazy he was using his vacation time to track her down.

  He could have legitimately made the trip to Colorado on the government’s dime. Find her, arrest her and bring her in. His plans for Maggie went further. In between finding her and arresting her, she would pay. He intended to be on his own time when she did.