Cold River Read online

  “Maybe so.”

  Sean felt the familiar rush of grief mixed with guilt, anger and regret when he thought about his father and how he’d died, but he allowed it to wash over him and didn’t, this time, drown in it. He wanted to get his hands on whoever had hired the two killers to leave an old man to die alone in the cold. He wanted it as much as he’d wanted anything in his life, and he wasn’t a man easily deterred once he’d put his mind to getting something.

  Hannah stared out her window without speaking for a couple miles.

  “How’s law school?” Sean asked when her silence finally got to him.

  She shrugged. “I’ve finished.”

  “Studying for the bar?”

  “Yes.”

  “Any job prospects?”

  She continued to sit rigid in her seat without glancing at him. “Not yet. I’m looking into a clerkship. With Toby in California for a few months…” She paused. “I’ll have time on my hands.”

  What would she do when she found out Devin was heading to California, too? Sean tried not to think about how alone she’d be. She had her friends, the café, her budding law career, and she’d just be irritated if she thought he was feeling a little sorry for her.

  “You can manage the café and a clerkship?” he asked.

  “I managed law school and the café.”

  The late December sun was very low in the sky. An arc of bright, harsh afternoon light hit the windshield. Then it was gone, disappearing behind the hills as he took a tight turn down close to the river, just a few small pools of clear, fast-moving water not yet frozen in the winter cold.

  Sean assumed Hannah’s short answers were a clue she didn’t want to talk, but he didn’t care. He wanted to know more about her reasons for going up the mountain so suddenly on her own. “The café seems to be doing well,” he said.

  She smoothed a finger over the soft fabric of his scarf. “It is, thanks.”

  “Holiday season was busy?”

  “Yes.”

  “A.J. says reporters and investigators made up for the drop-off in tourists at the lodge after the violence. I imagine it was the same at the café.”

  She nodded again. “It was.”

  “Hannah…” Sean turned onto Cameron Mountain Road, which would take them up from the river to the long, picturesque ridge where Black Falls Lodge was located and where he and his brothers and sister and the Harpers had all grown up. “You know, I wouldn’t have to ask so many questions if you’d work with me here.”

  “Maybe I’m tired after my long hike and don’t want to talk.”

  “You could just say so.”

  She turned to him finally and smiled. “I’m tired after my long hike and don’t want to talk.”

  He grinned at her. “Could have told me eight miles ago.”

  She seemed to relax slightly. “I guess I could have.”

  Not that she hadn’t made it obvious. He’d just ignored her signals.

  He passed his sister’s little house and continued down to Harper Four Corners, the oldest settled section of Black Falls, where Cameron Mountain Road and Ridge Road intersected. On the corner to his right was a former early-nineteenth-century tavern, rumored to be haunted. To his left was an abandoned post-and-beam barn. On the corners directly across the road were a cemetery and a small, white-steepled church.

  Sean turned right, onto Ridge Road, heading past snow-covered fields and stately, bare sugar maples that grew along stone walls constructed by long-ago farmers who’d cleared the rocky, inhospitable land.

  He resisted the temptation to push the private, guarded woman next to him about her reasons for hiking up to the cabin—what they had to do with Bowie O’Rourke, why she wouldn’t just say what was on her mind. She’d never been one to knuckle under to pressure. It just had a way of getting her back up.

  They came to Black Falls Lodge, a string of rustic buildings at the top of a sloping, snow-covered meadow dotted with evergreens. The views of the endless mountains, blue and white in the December afternoon, were the subject of countless postcards and tourist photographs.

  On his most tortured nights since April, Sean would lie awake in his bed in Beverly Hills and picture standing with his father on the lodge’s stone terrace. Drew Cameron had lived in Black Falls his entire life, marrying there, pulling together parcels of land on the mountain named for his ancestors, opening the original lodge with his wife as a young couple. He’d never expected her to die first. He’d had enemies—people he’d irritated over the years—but Sean couldn’t think of anyone who’d hated his father enough to have him killed.

  “Sean?”

  He glanced at Hannah and realized she’d seen his pain. He quickly masked it and turned into the lodge parking lot, the truck’s tires crunching on the packed ice and snow as he pulled in next to her car.

  A.J. and Elijah walked out the side door to the main lodge. They weren’t wearing coats, just heavy sweaters. Jo would be on the premises, and Lauren, A.J.’s wife. Lauren worked at the lodge, but it wouldn’t have mattered. A.J. had kept his family close since two hired assassins had turned up and been killed, one of them within sight of the lodge.

  Hannah unfastened her seat belt. “Not going to complain about the cold in front of your brothers, are you?”

  Sean looked over at her and laughed. “Not a chance.”

  She touched the door handle. “Thanks for the ride. Stay warm. You’ll be back in Beverly Hills soon.”

  Her tone was cool, reserved, and he knew he wouldn’t get anywhere with her, not with his brothers watching, not with her on high alert. He smiled instead. “I can’t persuade you to stay for hot chocolate?”

  “Hot chocolate and the third-degree. No, thanks. You all know where to find me if you have any specific questions. I have to check on Toby and his packing. He’ll remember all his mountain-biking gear and forget his driver’s license.”

  “Toby’s old enough to see to his own packing.”

  “So he is.” She pushed open the door, letting in the frigid air. Her gaze settled on a spot out on the plowed, sanded parking lot. “I wasn’t here when Melanie Kendall’s car blew up. It was after the search-and-rescue team brought Nora and Devin down off the mountain. I was with Devin at the hospital.”

  “She had a bad end coming, but no one wanted to see her murdered.”

  “Jo and Elijah witnessed the explosion. He got Nora out of Melanie’s car before it blew up. I hear from her every now and then—she’s in Washington with her mother. Her father, too. It’s tough, but she’s talking about going back to school.”

  The blast that killed Melanie Kendall, Sean knew, could have killed his brother, or Jo Harper, or anyone else who’d been at the lodge that day. “I should have been here,” he said. “I was drinking damn mojitos by the pool—”

  “No one knew we had two killers in our midst. Guilt will eat you alive, Sean,” Hannah said, her voice deathly quiet. “Believe me, I know. Don’t let it.”

  Sean suddenly was aware of the afternoon shadows and the lavender shade of the sky as dusk slowly settled over the mountains. His life in California almost seemed to belong to another man, not to him.

  “I’m glad I didn’t witness Melanie or Kyle’s deaths, or see their bodies.” Hannah seemed to draw herself in against the cold as the heat seeped out of the truck. “If I’m going to be a prosecutor, I have to learn to steel myself to what I’ll have to see.”

  “This was different. You met them. They tried to frame Devin for stalking Nora Asher and stealing from her, the café, the lodge.”

  “Melanie was attractive and personable. I never would have pegged her as a killer.”

  “That’s what she and Rigby counted on.”

  “Her own people killed her. Right here.” Hannah shook her head as if she were telling herself she had to stop now, before she could spin out of control. “Rigby was already dead. Jo figured out that Melanie was Rigby’s partner, but whoever triggered the bomb in her car didn’t necessarily k
now that. It wasn’t why she was killed. Nora and Devin were still alive. Melanie had screwed up, and she had to die.”

  Sean stayed where he was behind the wheel. He saw the tremor in Hannah’s lower jaw. Next, her teeth started to chatter. Her eyes were wide, focused, he knew, not on the present but on the images of what had happened five weeks ago.

  He reached over to her and touched her elbow. “Hannah. Breathe.”

  His words, his touch, seemed to penetrate whatever was coming at her, and she exhaled and turned to him. “Sorry. Every day’s better, but I still…”

  “I know,” he said softly.

  “The police have cleared everyone who was at the lodge when Melanie’s car exploded. The killer could have had a spotter, but why make two calls when one would do? This is a practical, calculating killer.”

  “It’s also one who will take tremendous chances if necessary.”

  “A man? A woman? A team?”

  Sean shook his head. “I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t even guess.”

  Hannah looked out toward the mountains in the distance. “Even up here, it’s easy to go unnoticed. Who’d remember a car parked on the side of the road, or a cross-country skier out enjoying the first snow of the season? Make a discreet call and…mission accomplished. Melanie Kendall is dead.”

  Sean saw his opening and took it. “What if whoever’s behind this network had an accomplice here in Black Falls? An unwitting accomplice, perhaps. Someone who was used or manipulated into helping to set off the bomb.”

  Hannah shifted her gaze from the view, her pale blue eyes reflecting a hint of the lavender in the sky. “Do you have anyone in mind?” she asked, her self-control back in place.

  “I don’t.” His eyes narrowed on her. “What about you?”

  “It’s your theory,” she said, “not mine.”

  “You’re letting the police run the investigation, aren’t you, Hannah? You’re not a prosecutor yet.”

  Her look was unreadable now. “I’m familiar with who does what in a criminal investigation.”

  She pushed open the door and climbed down out of the truck. Sean nodded back toward his brothers. “A.J. and Elijah will want to know you’re all right after going up to Pop’s cabin. They know being up there can be emotional. Why don’t you come into the lodge with me and we all have a drink?”

  “I really can’t,” she said, grabbing her pack, snowshoes and ski poles.

  Sean leaned across the seat, ready to charge after her. “Hannah, what did you figure out up there?”

  “That I should have done a better job of protecting my brother.”

  “You have a law degree. You’re smart. You see everything. It’d be natural to have questions—”

  “Yes. Devin almost getting killed definitely sparked questions.”

  Her arms loaded, she shut the door with her knee and made it to her car without dropping a snowshoe or poking an eye with a ski pole. She managed to get the passenger door open and dump in her pack and snowshoes, then went around to the driver’s side and climbed in.

  Sean could have gone after her, but he got out of the truck and headed across the parking lot, trying to ignore just how tense and aggravated he was. He’d sit across a negotiating table with the worst of the sharks he’d encountered in Beverly Hills before taking on Hannah Shay.

  No one, he thought, had ever gotten to him the way she did.

  He could feel the approach of dusk in the cold, still air. Nightfall would come early. He had never noticed the relentless winter dark as a kid, only later, when he’d come home for the holidays. He’d had no intention of returning to Vermont to live, but he’d always thought he could.

  Now he wasn’t sure. His father’s death…Hannah…her brothers…

  His brothers.

  Sean waited until Hannah’s old car was rattling down the road before he joined A.J. and Elijah on the walk.

  “Let’s go inside,” he said to his brothers. “We need to talk.”

  Seven

  Hannah smiled as Lester and Gloria McBane both came to answer her knock on the side door of the old Four Corners tavern. They were in their eighties, white-haired and noticeably frailer in recent months. Reverend McBane had performed the funeral service for Hannah’s father but had already retired when her mother died. He and his wife, a former librarian, had attended her funeral and supported Hannah’s decision to become her brothers’ legal guardian. The run-down tavern had been their home for the past twenty years. They liked to say the place was as comfortable and familiar as a worn-out pair of slippers. Hannah had heard rumors that Sean Cameron had his eye on it, but she couldn’t fathom what he needed with another property in Black Falls.

  She held a small box that she, Dominique and Beth had packed last night. Hannah had set it in her car before bed, figuring she’d make her way up here at some point during the day. She hadn’t imagined it would be after hiking up Cameron Mountain. She handed the box to Gloria McBane. “We thought you might like a few goodies for a cold winter night. Beth says she got the coffee cake recipe from you.”

  “You all are much better cooks than I ever was,” the older woman said. “I hardly cook anymore these days. Won’t you come in and have some with us?”

  Suddenly aching with the cold, Hannah glanced down the road for a Cameron on her tail. None so far. She turned back to the McBanes. “I should get back to town. I’ve been hiking.”

  Lester McBane pointed a thin finger at her. “I can see that. Your face is chapped from the wind and the cold. Were you hiking with Sean Cameron?” The old man smiled. “You look surprised. Gloria and I saw you two in Elijah’s truck a little while ago.”

  “Ah.” Hannah laughed. “No secrets in a small town.” But she felt herself blush and added quickly, “Not that Sean and I…We just ran into each other up at his father’s cabin and he gave me a ride back to the lodge.”

  “It’s terrible, what happened out there before Thanksgiving,” Mrs. McBane said, setting the box of goodies on a counter behind her. She was a small woman, her fine white hair neatly curled. “We only get out twice a week in the cold weather. We haven’t seen any of the Camerons since before Christmas. How are they? And how are you, Hannah?”

  “Everyone seems to be coping. My brothers and the café keep me busy, and I’ve just started to study for the bar. Devin had a rough time with those killers, but the Camerons lost their father.”

  Reverend McBane nodded thoughtfully. “It’ll take time.”

  “It would help if the police could figure out who triggered the bomb in Melanie Kendall’s car.” Hannah didn’t mince words. The McBanes had been through plenty in their lives and were well aware of what had happened down the road at Black Falls Lodge. “If you were the one watching and waiting for her to get in the car, where would you be? Would you be out in the open and subtly dial your cell phone? Or would you hide? Those are the kinds of questions everyone’s asking.”

  “We’ve been thinking about that,” Mrs. McBane said. “Lester and I have come up with dozens of options ourselves.”

  He immediately warmed to the topic. “Cell-phone service is spotty up here,” he said. “I suppose the killer could have found a landline to use. We didn’t see anyone out here. We were in watching television when the bomb went off.”

  Mrs. McBane buttoned her sweater, baggy on her thin frame. “I remember the storm the night before. We drank brandy in front of the fire and went to bed early.” She shuddered. “I’m just glad those two killers were the only ones who ended up dead. How’s your brother?”

  “He’s still working at the lodge,” Hannah said. “He had a room above the shop there, but he’s moved back with Toby and me for now.”

  “A.J.’s been good to him,” Mrs. McBane said.

  It was just an innocent comment by a kind woman, but Hannah automatically felt herself go on the defensive and realized how on edge she was. She pushed back any irritation. “Yes, he and Lauren have both been great. Devin works hard.” She smiled again a
t the older couple. “I shouldn’t keep you standing here in the cold. It’s perfect weather for tea and a few goodies.”

  “You’re all good to think of us,” Reverend McBane said.

  He and his wife had done the same for other people for dozens of years. Now it was their turn to need a helping hand, which they accepted graciously, without any hint of the stubborn pride or defensiveness Hannah had to fight when people offered to help her and her brothers.

  She wished them good-night and headed back down the well-sanded walk to the driveway, glancing down the road again. She only saw leafless sugar maples silhouetted against the slowly darkening sky. There was no question in her mind that Sean, A.J. and Elijah had gathered in front of the lodge’s big stone fireplace to discuss what she was up to and how they could get it out of her.

  She’d never been good at lying or pretending. She’d always found she did best when she looked at life straight on.

  But this was different.

  Sean knew she was holding back. But she wasn’t, really. She didn’t know anything the police didn’t. She’d answered all their questions fully. They and the Camerons and their friends had all crawled through Drew’s cabin after Kyle Rigby’s assault and subsequent death. Any one of them could have wondered how and if Drew had managed to reconstruct the old foundation on his own.

  Just as any one of them could have wondered if Bowie O’Rourke had helped Drew with his secret project on Cameron Mountain.

  If, by whatever means, for whatever reason, Kyle Rigby and Melanie Kendall had found the cabin because of Bowie.

  As she came to her car, Hannah heard the muffled barking of a dog across the road. She peered out at the cemetery, slabs of gray headstones standing out against the white of the snow. The air was frigid and still. There were no lights or cars at the church on the corner opposite the cemetery. Four Corners Burying Ground, it was called. Its oldest grave—that of a Harper—was dated 1796.

  The barking continued. The dog sounded agitated. Hannah walked out to the end of the dirt driveway, wondering if deer or wild turkeys were crossing the cemetery and driving the poor dog nuts. She noticed a van parked just down Cameron Mountain Road next to the stone wall that bordered the cemetery.