Seeing Red(50)

“Trapper.” Her expression turned sorrowful, almost pitying, and he couldn’t countenance that.

“Doesn’t matter,” he said with terse emphasis. “He said what he thought, and it was ugly, but I didn’t want to see him dead. Since he refused to listen to reason, I resorted to another means of shutting him up.”

“What?”

“Blackmail.”

She flinched.

“I’m not proud of it,” he said.

“What did you blackmail him with?”

“Mom’s journal.” Kerra blinked but didn’t say anything, so he went on. “He denied she kept one. I asked how he would know, since on every page she wrote about the other side of Major Franklin Trapper, the one who neglected his wife and son while he went off heroing for weeks at a time. I told him that if he signed this book deal, I’d make a deal of my own with the tabloids and shatter the myth of how fucking fabulous ‘The Major’ was.”

“Would you really have done that? I think he loved your mother.”

“I know he did. But that didn’t keep him from making her a distant second to his celebrity.” He stared into middle distance for several seconds, then said, “Anyway, he took the threat to heart. He stopped. Cold.”

“Until I came calling,” she said softly.

“You dangled the carrot. He didn’t have to take it.”

“It’s clear to me now why you tried so hard to get rid of me. You’re still protecting him.”

“Yes. Whether or not he ever speaks to me again, I’d prefer him to die of natural causes at a ripe old age, still a hero in everyone’s eyes. But he’s not the only one who needs protection, Kerra. You showed up out of nowhere and announced your intentions, and my gut dropped to my boots.”

He reached across the console and brushed his thumb over her beauty mark. “You had a jewel of a secret and couldn’t wait to show it off. But you were setting a deathtrap for yourself. This somebody never worried about that little girl in the photo. Didn’t even know her name until Sunday night. She turns out to be not just a grown woman with a memory, she’s famous. A newscaster, no less. A reporter who gets to the bottom of things.

“When he learned that, he wasted no time, did he? You and The Major were on TV talking about your shared experience, then hours later two gunmen showed up to silence him forever. They failed. Worse, they squandered an unexpected opportunity to kill you, too.”

“I’ve told you, I’m no threat to anyone.”

“He won’t see it that way. He’s got to be nervous about what you and The Major discussed when the cameras weren’t rolling. What did you two talk about? Will you make another startling revelation during tomorrow night’s interview? If not tomorrow night, when?”

He reached for her hand. “Kerra, do you get what I’m telling you? You’re like that egg timer to him. He’s not going to let it blow up in his face.”

Her eyes were wide and still. They gazed into his as though she’d been hypnotized. Before either of them spoke again, his phone rang, causing her to flinch.

“That’s probably Glenn calling to ask if I’ve seen you.” He pulled his phone from his coat pocket. It was Carson. Trapper clicked on. “Is this important? I’m busy.”

“Two things. First. Did you know about Thomas Wilcox’s kid?”

Trapper shot a glance over at Kerra, whose ears perked up when she heard the familiar name. “His kid?” Trapper said. “No, what about him?”

“Her. Died a year and a half ago.”

“How old was she?”

“Sixteen. Light of his life. Apple of his eye. Pride and joy.”

“Died how?”

“That’s the interesting part. Nobody’s really saying.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I don’t know. I’m not the investigator, you are. But her manner of death was murky, and it was kept very hush-hush, which is why you didn’t know about it.”

Carson was right. That was interesting. “Send me what info you have. Dare I ask how you came by it?”

“Better not. If you’re ever put on the witness stand—”

“Understood. What’s the second thing?”

“It’s about the SUV.”

Trapper didn’t want to tell him that its rear end was presently in a ditch. “Sorry to be keeping it so long. Did you tell the guy I’ll pay him a rental fee?”

“That’s not the problem.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“The vehicle is sort of, uh …”

“Sort of what?”

“Sort of stolen.”

Just then Trapper’s attention was drawn to the horizon, where he saw one, possibly two, police units braving the icy conditions, running hot, and coming in their direction.





Chapter 15




As he did most nights after his wife, Greta, had gone to bed, liberally dosed with vodka and Xanax, Thomas Wilcox sat on the edge of his late daughter’s bed. He was anchored there by guilt.

Tiffany’s room had been preserved like the tomb of a pharaoh. Everything she had loved and valued remained where she had last placed it. Their housekeeper had been given strict instructions not to touch or move anything, to dust around every item: a snow globe with a carousel; the picture of the high school dance squad, of which Tiffany had been captain; the trophies and ribbons from the riding academy where she had excelled at dressage. Her goal had been to make the U.S. Olympic team.