Shattered Secrets (Cold Creek #1)(71)
*
Tess knew her left wrist was cut, but she didn’t care. As they limped along past a small, ramshackle back building, she gasped, “That’s where they hid their car—one woman and three men.”
“Can you ID them?”
“Two of them—a young woman and the guy who tied me up. His name is Hank. But they said someone named Jonas tipped them off that ‘the law’ was coming, and that’s why they took off. I ran too, and Hank caught me—threw my backpack with my phone and car keys over there somewhere.”
He swore under his breath. They finally stopped at the edge of the open field and sucked in breaths of damp air while the light rain seemed to wash them. They sank to the ground, holding tight, her sitting with her back to his chest between his spread legs. His trouser leg was torn. He tore her scarf in half. She wrapped his bloody ankle, then he tied the rest around her wrist.
“The walking wounded,” he said, giving her a hug. “Tess, some good news in all this. Marian Bell’s daughter’s been found living with her father in South America.”
“Oh, that’s great! You were right about her! I’m sure Marian’s ecstatic, even if she doesn’t exactly have her child back.”
“And that might be another battle,” he admitted as he took out his cell phone.
Still shaking, Tess caught her breath while he called his deputy and told him to stop entry traffic on both ends of Blackberry Road, except for the fire trucks, and to tell people there could be a gas explosion in the deserted Green house.
“No,” she heard Gabe tell Jace. “We’re both all right and can walk out to our cars when the fire guys get here.” He put his phone away. “If the meth lab doesn’t blow, I’ll need a BCI tox crew in the morning to clean it up, get evidence, so I’ll call Vic,” he said. “And that’s bad news about the call from Jonas, if it’s Ann’s brother, because she’d be his source. As for you, coming here like this...”
“Don’t start.”
“I’m going to start, because it could have finished you. But maybe it was worth it to hear your confession of how you feel about me. It was probably only the fact that I have the same feelings that made me crazy enough to try to save you.”
“You do? I thought maybe it was just that you need me.”
“I do need you, and not just the way you’re thinking.”
“For getting me out of there—I’ll never be able to thank you enough.”
“When this mess is over, we’ll find a way,” he said.
“Maybe my so-called confession of love was just in the heat of the moment.”
“Maybe there’s heat in every moment we’re together,” he muttered, and turned her in his arms to hold her sideways across his lap. He tipped her head back and kissed her hard.
She threw her good wrist up around his neck and held his lips to hers. His mouth opened, moved against hers. His beard stubble rasped her chin and cheeks, but it felt so good. Her back balanced against his good leg, she held to him, breathing to match his ragged breaths, kissing him back. His hand gripped her waist, slid up her rib cage to cup and finger a breast, then dropped to squeeze her thigh through her jeans. She leaned into him, her wrapped hand grasping his back. It was the most beautiful, stunning thing that had ever happened to her, as if the entire world was on fire...golden lights...the noise in her head and heart pounding...
It took Tess a moment to realize the meth lab had blown.
They sat up, clinging to each other as orange-red flames belched into the air and heated their faces. They blinked and ducked in the sudden brightness, before Gabe pulled her down, flat in the cold soil of the field, and covered her with his body. But they were far enough away. The ground shuddered with a second blast.
Finally, when the explosions stopped, they watched the old house burn. He spoke loudly to make sure she could hear. “I’m cursed when it comes to preserving evidence. I came looking for a kidnap site and got this.”
“There’s no way this can tie to the kidnappings. Those people weren’t smart enough to pull those off, I can tell you.”
“Except there’s the drug connection. I’d still bet on Dane for drugging his kidnap victims. Still, I suppose you could have had meth or some version of it in your wine to cause your hallucinations. And I never could figure how I kept missing the cookers by just a couple of minutes when I’d go to check a place. At least now I’ve got Jonas and Ann to interrogate, and they may give up names.”
“Could Ann have tipped off Dane that you had your search warrant and were heading for his place, so he panicked and killed himself?”
“Everything’s up for grabs. But panicked over what, since we found nothing in his house or the vet buildings? Ann volunteered to come in tomorrow even though it’s Sunday, because so many people will be in town for the evening church service, candlelight vigil and march to the gift shop. I’ll decide what to do about her then.
“Tess,” he went on as they watched the flames dance and crackle, “I’m sorry if it puts you in danger again, this time with the Simons clan if they find out you’re my witness. I swear, I’m gonna have to lock you up. I’d chain you to my bed, except I’m seldom in it.”
He held her tight as they finally heard the distant sounds of the volunteer-manned fire engine. They sat, arms around each other, as if they were watching a big bonfire on an autumn night. Even when the rain got heavier, it didn’t seem to calm the blaze. The old wood fed the fire like a giant torch in the damp, black night. But by that light, Tess saw something that convinced her even more that this could have been the house where she was kept prisoner.