Secrets at Cedar Cabin

by Colleen Coble

  Everyone wore masks. That’s what she’d learned in the last few months. A handsome face existed to hide the darkness inside. But was that always the truth? Did she ever dare trust anyone again?

  Her phone rang, and she swiped the screen on. “Hello, Lily, is everything okay?”

  “There was a man outside my window. And lights in the woods. I’m scared.” Lily’s voice quavered, and she began to cry.

  “I’ll be right there. Lock the door.” Bailey ended the call and ran up the steps toward the back door.

  She burst into the house and grabbed her purse to dig out her keys. “Lily called and there’s an intruder. I need to go now.”

  “Ellie and I will go with you. I’ll call the guys while we’re on our way.” Shauna rushed to the coat closet and grabbed their jackets. “Ellie, come here, we need to go!”

  Ellie hurried down the stairs and grabbed her coat as soon as she heard what was happening. Bailey shrugged hers on as they raced for the door and out to her car.

  As she peeled out of the drive, Shauna was already on the phone with Zach. “He’s not answering. I left a message though. I hope the guys already saw whoever is prowling around.”

  Bailey tossed her phone onto Shauna’s lap. “Try Lance. He should be in my Recent Calls list.”

  Shauna scrolled through the screen. “Found him.” She held the phone to her ear for a bit, then shook her head and ended the call. “Not answering either.”

  Bailey’s heart beat double time. For all her rejection of any relationship with Lance, her feelings were already involved. She pressed harder on the accelerator. He might be in danger along with Zach and Grayson. They could be heading into an ambush.

  “You realize whoever is there might be after you,” Shauna said. “I’m not sure heading straight into the hornet’s nest is a good idea.”

  “You might be right, but we can’t let the guys walk into an ambush without warning.”

  She cornered onto her road, and the car fishtailed in the muddy track. She let up on the accelerator a bit, but it was too late. The car veered toward the ditch. Knowing how to drive on slick roads, she turned into the slide and tried to straighten out the vehicle, but the ditch swallowed the front tires before she had time to correct it completely.

  She banged her palms on the steering wheel. “Great, just great.”

  Trying to drive out of the ditch just dragged the car deeper into the muddy trench. She unbuckled her seat belt. “We’ll have to walk the rest of the way. It’s only about half a mile.”

  Half a mile in the rain with no way to escape with Lily. This sounded like the height of stupidity. She tried to raise Lance on the phone again but got his voice mail.

  They had no choice. She couldn’t leave Lily alone, afraid, and possibly in danger. Withdrawing the bear spray from her purse, she clutched it in her hand. “Let’s go.”

  Chapter 32

  The misty rain would mask the noise of them moving through the woods. Lance crept toward the back of the cabin where a light glowed through the window, but it was hard to see with the thick clouds obscuring the moon and stars. Zach was right behind him. Shadows shifted, and he caught a glimpse of Grayson, hair plastered with rain, heading toward the front of the cabin. He’d called Daniel for backup and he should be arriving anytime as well.

  He motioned for Zach to circle around to the right of the back door. The male intruder had to be on the back deck by now, but Lance didn’t see or hear him. His phone had vibrated several times in his pocket, but any calls would have to wait until they took these two into custody.

  The rain began to fall harder, pattering onto dead leaves and splashing into mud puddles. He peered through the curtain of mist, trying to see his quarry. There. Peeking in the back-door window. The man fiddled with the knob and then disappeared into the cabin before Lance could shout for him to freeze.

  He and Zach rushed for the stairs, and Lance reached the back door first. He couldn’t see the man through the window, which made entering more dangerous. “Go around to the front and see if Grayson has the woman in custody,” he whispered to Zach. “I don’t want to be in a position where I might shoot Grayson.”

  Zach nodded and disappeared into the curtain of rain. The door still stood ajar a few inches, and Lance peered through the crack as a figure passed between the door and the table lamp by the sofa. There he was. By now he’d surely have realized that Bailey wasn’t home. The place was tiny, so he must have explored the bedroom and bathroom and found them empty.

  Lance stepped to the right of the door and listened to see if the man would come back this way or open the front door and rejoin the woman instead. Sure enough, he heard the snick of a lock, then the door swooshed open.

  “Cass?” The man spoke softly. “You there?”

  A woman’s sudden shriek shattered the night. “Let go of me! I’ll kill you!”

  “Settle down, lady.” Zach sounded angry.

  “Freeze!” Grayson charged into the house with his gun out.

  Lance kicked the back door open the rest of the way and leaped into the doorway as the man turned and barreled his way. He planted his feet in shooting stance, extended his arms, and aimed his gun at the intruder. “Drop your weapon!”

  The man, in his thirties with an unshaved jaw, stopped and stared at the gun. He started to bring up his gun, but Grayson tackled him from behind. The two crashed onto the floor and rolled around, knocking the table lamp to the ground.

  The room plunged into darkness, and Lance dug out his phone to activate the flashlight app. He kept his gun at the ready, but Grayson had no trouble controlling the intruder. The big guy could take down a bull moose in full charge.

  Grayson yanked the guy to his feet and wrestled his arms behind him. “Got anything to tie him up with?” He sounded as casual as if he’d been out for an evening stroll, and he wasn’t even breathing hard.

  Lance stepped to the light switch and flipped on the overhead lights. He yanked out a drawer and found an extension cord. “This will work.” He lashed the man’s hands together. “What about the woman?” he asked Grayson.

  “I’m sure Zach has her. She’s a handful, but he had her pinned the last I saw. See if you can find another cord.”

  Lance had spotted another one in the drawer. He retrieved it and rushed to the front yard where he found Zach atop a woman. She was on her stomach with Zach’s knee in her back. Her arms were pulled behind her. Her head was angled Lance’s way, and if looks could kill, Zach would be six feet under. Lance knelt and trussed her hands up, then Zach removed his knee. Lance yanked the woman to her feet. Her brown eyes glinted like daggers.

  He flashed his badge. “FBI. What’s your name and who do you work for? Why were you trying to kidnap Bailey?”

  She spat at him, but it landed on the arm of his jacket. When she clamped her lips shut and glared at him, he shrugged. “We’ll see what you have to say at headquarters.”

  “The FBI is interested in simple home invasions now?” Her lip curled and she shook her head. “We thought we might find a little food. We’re hungry.”

  “Don’t tell them nothing!” The man inside the house struggled as Grayson brought him outside.

  Lance tightened his grip on her arm. “I already heard you and your partner talking. This was a kidnapping attempt, not a simple home invasion. You could make it easier on yourself and tell me where you stashed the girls.”

  “What girls?” She batted her eyes and smiled at him, but there was flint in her expression.

  “The girls you’ve stolen for your brothels.” It was all he could do not to wrap his hands around her neck and throttle the life from her. It was bad enough when men abused women, but to do something like this to their own gender, knowing the toll it would take on their psyches, was beyond forgiveness.

  Her eyes flickered. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  She clamped her lips shut again. It was clear she had nothing more to say.

  Slogging
through the mud and rain wasn’t the most fun Bailey had ever had. The goo clung to her jeans and coated her shoes, slowing her steps. Shauna and Ellie kept up with her as they hurried as fast as they could down the road that had turned into a quagmire.

  As they neared Lily’s cabin, Bailey squinted through the rain and saw the cabin door standing open. Her pulse kicked. “Someone’s gotten inside.” She pulled out her phone and tried to call Lance again. Still no answer.

  “Should I call the sheriff?” Shauna asked.

  “Yeah, I think you’d better. But I’m not waiting. Lily might be in danger.”

  Ellie put her hands on her hips. “And if she is, what are you going to do about it? We have no weapons.”

  “I have this.” Bailey held up her bear spray. “I can disable someone with one squirt.”

  Ellie shrugged. “If you get close enough, sure. But if the intruder has a gun, he’ll shoot you before you get that close.”

  Bailey bit her lip. “I can’t just stand here.”

  “Hang on, let me call the sheriff.” Shauna called 911 and told the dispatcher there seemed to be an intruder in Lily’s house. She ended the call. “She wanted me to hold on the line, but I didn’t want to do that. They’re sending a car.”

  “Let’s at least get close enough to see inside the house.” Bailey gripped her can of bear spray more tightly and held it out in front of her as she advanced toward the house.

  Shauna touched her arm. “Don’t go to the front door. Let’s look in a window.”

  “I’ll go around back,” Ellie said.

  Bailey nodded and moved toward the picture window. She and Shauna crouched in the sprawling, wet shrubs, and she peeked up over the bottom edge of the window to peer inside the living room. Her heart nearly stopped when she saw two guys in ski masks standing over Lily who sat cowering on the sofa.

  One of them grabbed the old woman by her arm and lifted her up. “Where is she?”

  When he shook Lily, Bailey nearly cried out, but Shauna grabbed her arm and held her finger to her mouth for quiet. Bailey’s eyes burned. Both men had guns, so she knew Shauna was right, but it felt wrong to crouch here when Lily was being hurt. What kind of man hurt a sweet old lady like that?

  “Well, well, what do we have here?” A gruff voice spoke behind them.

  Bailey toppled into the mud as the man yanked Shauna out of the flower bed first. The bear spray flew from Bailey’s fingers, and she scrabbled for it in the mud. Her fingers closed around it, and as he grabbed her arm to hoist her out, too, she brought it around and squirted him full in the face.

  He screeched as the spray hit his eyes. When he let go of her, Bailey scrambled up and leaped out of the flower bed toward Shauna.

  She grabbed Shauna’s arm. “Go, go, go!”

  Together they ran for the woods. Someone shouted behind them, and a bullet flung a bark fragment by Bailey’s head. A dark shadow in front of them moved, and a man with a gun stepped out from behind an oak with the barrel pointed at Ellie’s head.

  “Stop where you are, both of you, or your friend goes down.”

  Bailey stopped short, and her fingers tightened on the bear spray. “What do you want?”

  “First off, I want you to drop that can.”

  She heard the click as he took off the gun’s safety. “Okay, okay.” Her fingers didn’t want to let loose of the can, but she forced herself to drop it into the weeds and watched regretfully as it rolled out of sight.

  Shauna took a step toward it, but the man waved his gun. “Don’t move.”

  Did she tell the guy the sheriff was coming any moment, or would that make him kill them now and run? She wasn’t sure what to do. “What do you want?”

  “You’re what we want. You’ve been hard to catch, but everyone’s luck runs out sooner or later.” He motioned with the gun. “Let’s go back to the cabin. I’m sure my partner will have a few choice words to say to you.”

  Shauna and Bailey looked at each other. Bailey wanted to make a run for it into the shadows, but she had no doubt the guy would shoot Ellie in the head. Shauna would be next. He might not shoot Bailey herself, but he’d made it clear Shauna and Ellie were expendable. She didn’t want her sister dead before she even got to know her.

  She reached out with cold fingers to grasp Shauna’s hand, and the two of them trudged back toward the cabin behind Ellie, who stumbled slowly beside the man. They reached the front of the cabin, where the man she’d sprayed swore as he splashed his face with a bucket of water. She didn’t see any sign of Lily from here, and she prayed the elderly lady wasn’t harmed.

  How many guys had they sent after her? And why had they come here? Did they know Lily was her grandmother? Wait, not her grandmother. Her kidnapper’s mother would be a more accurate label.

  The injured man shook the water out of his face, then spun toward her with a scowl and clenched fists. “Where’s that bear spray? Let’s see how you like it.”

  “It’s lost,” their captor said. “Get over it. The boss wouldn’t want her hurt until he talks to her.”

  Shauna’s fingers tightened on hers, and they stopped in the yard under the pouring rain. Thunder rumbled overhead too. The man who’d captured them shoved her in the back with his gun barrel. “Inside. I need to see what the boss wants us to do with the extras. Then I want to get out of here.”

  Bailey shuffled with Shauna toward the open door and prayed the sheriff’s car would get here in time.

  Chapter 33

  Was that a yell? Lance shifted toward the woods and listened. He could have sworn he’d heard a man yell in pain or anger. “Did you hear that?” he asked Grayson, who was thrusting their prisoners into the back of Lance’s SUV.

  “I didn’t hear anything,” Zach said.

  “I think I’d better check it out.”

  “I’ll stay with these two yahoos and see if I can get anything out of them.” Grayson angled a baleful stare through the window, and the woman smiled back with a hint of a sneer. “Man, I’ll be glad to see these two charged.”

  “I’d just like to get some information out of them. See what you can do.” Lance set off at a jog down the path that was more mud than road now. Zach came with him.

  Mud caked on his boots slowed his pace, and his wet jeans clung to his thighs. Thunder followed a flicker of lightning, and he flinched at the sound. “Close,” he said, smelling ozone in the air.

  “You sure you heard a scream?”

  “I’m sure.” He stopped at a dilapidated rail fence and looked through the rain toward Lily’s cabin. A light was on, but he didn’t see anyone.

  He glanced at Zach and saw him looking at his phone. “Let’s go.”

  Zach held up his hand. “Hold on, I got a text from Shauna and it isn’t good. She, Ellie, and Bailey are on their way to Lily’s. Bailey got a call from the old lady about an intruder.”

  Lance frowned and stared at the cabin. “I don’t see Bailey’s car. When was this?”

  “Half an hour ago. They should be here by now.”

  Lance remembered his own calls, and he pulled out his phone and listened to the message Bailey had left. “Bailey called me to say they were heading this way. It was a guy I heard yell though, not a woman.”

  “Let’s go.” Zach’s voice held a thread of steely resolve.

  “Stay down,” Lance said. “We don’t know what’s happening here.”

  The two men made their way toward Lily’s house. They had to pass through the Diskin property and the thick trees surrounding it, and he chafed at the delay.

  Lance finally saw the lights of Lily’s house through the trees. There was movement through the window as they neared, and the air stalled in his lungs when he saw Bailey, Ellie, and Shauna sitting on either side of Lily on the sofa. The older woman was crying, and Bailey had her arm around her.

  He held his finger to his lips and motioned for Zach to stay put while he went around to the back of the cabin. If only they had two guns. He pulled out his gun
again and crept around the side of the house. The deck back here was in rough shape with floorboards rotted in places and bowed in other spots. He mounted the broken steps and crept toward the back door.

  He tried the doorknob. Unlocked. The intruders had probably come in this way. He eased open the door and stepped into the utility room, which smelled of detergent, bleach, and fabric softener. The dryer squeaked as it tumbled clothes, which might help mask any noise the floor might make as he crept toward the kitchen. He slipped across the room to the kitchen door and listened. There was a distant sound of voices, but he couldn’t make out any words.

  He eased into the kitchen and flattened himself against the refrigerator. The voices were louder here, and he recognized Lily’s quavery voice.

  “But I don’t want to go anywhere. I have my pajamas on, and it’s raining.”

  “Shut up, you old bat, or I’ll give you something to complain about.” The man’s gruff voice held an edge of meanness that telegraphed that he’d like nothing better than to backhand her.

  Lance gripped his gun and sidled out from the refrigerator until he could look through the opening into the living room. Bailey’s purple hair lay plastered to her head, and she was muddy from head to toe. Everything in him wanted to run to her side. He forced his gaze to the other women. Shauna and Ellie were in the same shape, which explained why there was no car outside. They’d walked here for some reason.

  The bigger man, one with a blond beard, slid his phone into his pocket. “Boss says bring them all. The little lady here might be persuaded to cooperate to spare them.”

  “Look, just tell me what you want, and I’ll do it right now,” Bailey said. “No reason to haul them in too. I’m going to cooperate with whatever your boss wants.”

  “I have my orders, lady. It doesn’t pay to buck the boss’s orders.”

  The other man, younger and slighter built with a clean-shaven face, sported bright-red eyes. “You sprayed me with bear spray like a dog. I hope he makes you suffer.”

  Lance didn’t like the man’s manner. He was probably the one who’d threatened Lily. He read him as someone who liked to inflict pain on others. Lance couldn’t let these two walk out of here with the women or they’d never find them again. He gripped his gun and started forward, but a sound behind made him swing around.