Sweet Dreams Boxed Set (134 page)

Before Nick could respond, Taylor returned. “I found them!”

Chapter 19

Lucy settled Megan on a settee on the front porch of the mansion. She couldn’t tell what color it was in the dark, but it sported the lovely, balanced lines, and classic design of a Southern plantation house, complete with twin staircases leading down from the columned porch.

“You’ve got water, blanket, rations if you dare to eat them—they taste like sawdust—and the laptop has almost a full charge, so as long as you don’t use it for anything else, you should be able to stay in contact with Dad.”

“I already turned on the messenger app—it will take up tons less power than video conferencing and be just as fast. Plus you can message me from my phone.”

Okay, learn something new everyday.

“I’ll be fine,” Megan said. “Go save Mateo.”

Lucy hesitated. The tide was coming in. She could hear the waves growing louder from the back of the house. There were no lights to be seen, she’d be leaving Megan alone in the dark. Vulnerable. And she hated that.

“Maybe I should stay. Let the sheriff handle things.”

“No. Mom, do your job. Please.”

Still, Lucy had doubts. Should she change her mind and leave the Remington with Megan? No. Odds were the next people Megan saw would be law enforcement: either Hayden’s men filled with Lord only knew what tall tales the chief had spun for them or a sheriff department’s hyped-up emergency response team. Last thing she wanted to risk was trusting them to think first and shoot second if Megan made the wrong move with the shotgun.

No. This was the best way, the safest way. And the hardest damn way.

Megan got up, the blanket still wrapped around her, and threw her arms around Lucy. “Thanks, Mom.”

“For what?”

“For believing in me. For trusting my instincts about Mateo. For treating me like an adult.”

Was that what she was doing? She squeezed Megan back. Didn’t mention that if she was wrong about all this, if Fleming really was the victim and Mateo their actor, then she’d be the one destroying Mateo’s future.

Except… she did trust Megan’s instincts. And her own. Ever since her injury, fighting back physically and mentally, she’d been second-guessing every choice. But not now. Now she was certain she was right.

She kissed Megan’s forehead—would have kissed the top of her head like she did when Megan was little, submerging herself in the perfume of baby shampoo and innocence, but Megan had grown too tall for that.

“I’ll see you soon,” she promised. “Everything will be all right.”

A double promise. Tempting Fate. But for once, Lucy didn’t care. The confidence of knowing she was right and that she’d keep her word surged through her.

Lucy let Megan go and turned, jogged down the steps, barely feeling the thud of pain echoing through her bad ankle. Everything was going to be all right—because she was going to make sure of it.

She sped off in the Subaru, watching Megan in the rearview, a tiny shadow draped in deeper shadows of the house and the moonless night. For the first time in longer than she could remember, she didn’t feel a pang of regret or fear by letting her daughter out of her sight.

Megan would be fine. She was a smart girl—no, not a girl, not any more. A smart young woman. Brave and strong and she had her father’s intuition about people and her mother’s pig-headed stubborn refusal to give up and her own savvy, sly instincts that combined the two.

Lucy smiled. God help anyone who dared to go up against her daughter. Megan’s black belt would be the least of their worries.

***

“Don’t tell me you’re getting squeamish now,” a woman’s voice pierced the haze surrounding Mateo. He couldn’t stay awake; the drugs were still messing with his mind. They’d returned him to the boat’s storage compartment, a wide cupboard with a door that opened out. He tried kicking at the door but his legs were asleep and he couldn’t pull them back far enough to get any leverage. At least he’d been able to see that Pastor Fleming was still alive.

They had to get out of here, soon. Pastor Fleming had looked awful. He wasn’t going to last much longer.

“When you called me for help, it didn’t include murder,” a second woman answered. They were moving about up on the deck, making the boat shimmy and shake.

“It’s not murder if it’s natural causes. Diabetic ketoacidosis. That’s what the autopsy will show.”

Mateo froze. They were talking about killing Pastor Fleming. Funny, part of him had imagined that the man he’d heard earlier was Pastor Fleming—that he was the one who’d given Mateo the drugs and dragged him onto the boat. He still wasn’t sure how he’d been drugged; he remembered a glass of iced tea and nothing after that, but even that memory was foggy. Was that iced tea something he’d drunk with Megan? Or maybe with his family during lunch? Time was all confused. It was like looking through a crazy kaleidoscope, hard to tell what was real with so many fragments that didn’t fit together.

“I’m not talking about Robert and you know it.”

“Kid’s own damn fault, meddling where he had no business.”

There was a pause and the sound of something heavy being dropped with a thud. A body? Was Mateo next? He squirmed, trying to push against the cupboard door.

“Tell me one thing. Robert faking his death, that was his plan. Was killing him yours from the beginning?”

“Fool expected me to wait until the courts declared him dead so I could collect the life insurance. While he took the money and ran. This way I get it all—”

“Except you’re not. Can’t you see how wrong it’s all gone? Technically, you haven’t broken any laws since it was Robert who took Mateo. Let me call it in. We’ll be the heroes.”

Pastor Fleming had brought Mateo here? Impossible—or was it? Mateo strained to remember, but the only thing he was certain of was the blood he’d found at Pastor Fleming’s house.

“And the money?” The first woman’s voice had turned sharp, demanding. It was tantalizingly familiar but between the drugs and the way the voices were distorted by the wall separating Mateo from the women, he couldn’t place it. “I’m giving you a lifeline, your chance to save your home, clear all the debt Jack’s illness racked up. But what’s in it for me?”

“I don’t care about any damn money. We need to stop this before it goes too far. While I can still salvage my career and you can stay out of prison.”

“No.” The other woman’s voice was determined. Mateo felt as if a death sentence had just been passed. “The kid’s seen too much. And if Robert lives, he’ll figure out that I swapped his insulin for water. He loves me but not enough to forgive me for trying to kill him. We need to get rid of them both. Tonight.”

Chapter 20

“Fleming’s pump is at the nature preserve on the west side of the island. According to the satellite maps,” Taylor told Lucy as she drove toward the location. “The reason why that area is uninhabited is because it’s basically a maze of inlets and tidal marshes. Perfect place for a boat to hide.”

“And faster for a boat to flee from, disappear into another section of the marsh or vanish out to sea.”

“Especially Fleming’s boat. Only has a fourteen inch draft, so the tide’s not much of an issue.”

Damn. Could nothing go right tonight?

“How long for the sheriff’s men?”

“They’re about forty minutes out.”

The sign for the nature preserve appeared on her right. She slowed and turned into the parking lot. There were two other vehicles already there: Shelly Fleming’s and Chief Hayden’s. “I’m here now.”

No answer. Lucy glanced at the phone. No Wi-Fi signal here in the nature preserve and the cell tower was still down. Guess she was going it alone.

She grabbed her Remington and left the car. On the other side of the parking lot, there was movement in the tall grass leading out to the marsh. She aimed her flashlight just in time to spot an alligator slipping through the grass.

Great. One more thing to worry about. But she was more concerned about the human predators than the reptilian ones. A map at the end of the parking lot revealed several trails braided through the preserve. One of them twisted around the inlet where Fleming’s boat was anchored. She’d have to go cross-country for the final approach, but it would get her close.

She swapped her flashlight for her thermal night vision monocular, scouting the trail ahead. It was amazing how much more detail the monocular could pick up than her own vision even aided by a flashlight. The trail she’d chosen was narrow, maybe four feet wide, with thick foliage on either side, including knee-high, sharp-leafed palmettos that sliced at her bare legs. Crowded pine trees and gnarled live oaks, Spanish moss dangling from their limbs, created a claustrophobic atmosphere. It didn’t help that the sulfur smell of decay overrode the more pleasant scent of the pine needles that cushioned the hard-packed surface of the trail.

The forest wasn’t quiet; instead, it was filled with random noises ambushing her from every side. Squawks of birds or maybe frogs, deep-throated notes that came from frogs or maybe insects, splashes that Lucy hoped were fish or birds and not alligators.

She was using her monocular when sudden movement sparked through the thermal sensors. Something darted from the brush and stopped on the path. It was a strangely shaped image—too short to be a gator. It turned to face her. An armadillo, complete with prehistoric armor, blinked at her. Then it scurried away, the plants rustling behind it.

She kept moving. The trail twisted around a lagoon that gave a hint of the wider stretch of water beyond, then a boardwalk appeared. According to the map at the trailhead, the boardwalk headed in the direction she wanted to go, so she moved across it. The stench grew worse as she walked above the marsh. The clicking noises of crabs scurrying across the mud below made her wonder if the tide was low enough for her to cross through the mud, sneak up on the boat. When she turned to scan the area between the boardwalk and the sound, she could make out several birds walking over the mud and caught sight of another alligator as it slinked along the bank.

One more curve and the tree branches thinned enough for her to see the boat. It was at anchor in an inlet surrounded by trees and mud on three sides. A few tiny slits of light were all that made it through the cabin windows—black-out curtains, she guessed. Thick grass rippled in the night breeze, making it appear as if the boat were moored in the middle of a hay field. She was tempted to climb over the boardwalk’s railing and simply walk up to the boat.

No way it would be that easy. Movement caught her eye as an alligator she hadn’t spotted before glided past, following an unseen current through what had appeared to be solid ground. Swamp. That’s what this was.

Okay, so how did Hayden and Shelly Fleming get to the boat? Lucy continued on the boardwalk, moving slower and bending low to keep out of sight. A cluster of trees got in the way, but then the boat came into view once more, only twenty feet or so away from the boardwalk.

A Zodiac type of motorized raft was lashed to the railing at the stern. Question answered. She judged her options. The boardwalk continued on but turned inland, away from the boat. She made out several heat signatures in the boat’s cabin but they were so close together it was difficult to be certain how many there were. Four, she hoped, because that would mean Mateo was still alive.

Several sprawling limbs from a live oak reached out toward the boat, one stretched over the raft. She eyed the tree. Its trunk emerged from the mud a good three feet from the boardwalk. Lucy mapped it out in her mind: climb the railing, leap onto the trunk, shimmy up to the branch, then over the branch to the raft, lower herself down… No sweat if she were ten years younger and didn’t have a bum ankle to worry about.

The boat began to rock. Light speared the night as the cabin door opened. Two figures emerged, one carrying a large duffle. Lucy couldn’t make out their faces, not at this distance, but they definitely were both women.

She focused her monocular on the cabin. Now the two heat sources left behind were easier to make out. Both were low, on the deck, but not spread out like they were lying down, rather balled up and not moving. Restrained? Perhaps shoved into a compartment? She hadn’t had a chance to view any plans for Fleming’s cabin cruiser, but the ransom video made it look a lot like the inside of a RV or camper.

If the two heat sources were Fleming and Mateo, why would they both be restrained? Why wasn’t Fleming up and about if he was the mastermind?

Had Lucy gotten this all wrong?

Chapter 21

For once, Megan didn’t mind being left behind while Lucy went to work. She wasn’t even resentful that she’d been relegated to the sidelines. And for the first time in a long time, she wasn’t worried about her mom.

Something had broken inside her mother a few months ago when she was injured. Megan had diagnosed PTSD and a reactive depression—from the way her dad acted around Lucy, she guessed he agreed. But today, Lucy was back, the confident posture, the quick thinking, piecing together almost invisible clues to come up with the answer while everyone else was still figuring out the right question to ask.

She smiled and pulled the fleece blanket tighter around her. Definitely warmer than Pittsburgh, but the wind was coming right at her here at the front of the house. After a few moments of shivering, she got to her feet, gathered the laptop and water bottle, left the package of rations, and strolled to the back of the house. Definitely less windy here.

The back yard was fenced in with gates at the drive where Megan stood and at the path leading out to the dunes—probably because it had a pool and spa. Wouldn’t want anyone wandering off the beach falling in.

She raised the latch and walked past the pool to the deck area beside the rear wall of the house. There were chairs and chaise lounges scattered around and the area was sheltered above by the overhang of the upper deck, making it much warmer than the front porch. She curled up on a lounge chair, set up the laptop on a table beside her, and snuggled under the blanket. The sound of the waves was hypnotic and there was something in the salt air that made her drowsy.