Authors: Allison Brennan
“True. But there’s a reason Patrick usually handles law enforcement when you’re working a case.”
“I’ll be fine.” He hugged her, but his mind was elsewhere.
Tim walked in and said, “I don’t know why Deputy Weddle acted that way. I tried to talk to him, but he’s adamant that we’re to stay away from the mine.”
“It’s on your property,” Sean said, taking Lucy’s hand.
“My property surrounds it, but the mine itself is still on a ninety-nine-year lease to the Kelley Mining Company. Though the mine used to be in my grandmother’s family, the estate sold it long ago.”
“We should find out who owns the mine, what they have planned, what it’s worth. It could be they have plans for the area that your resort would hinder.”
Tim looked skeptical. “Certainly nothing’s been going on with the mine since I came back from Boston.”
Lucy shook her head. “Except murder.”
FIFTEEN
I kept quiet after my pet cop told me what had happened at the Kelley Mine. I didn’t know what made me angrier: that Tim Hendrickson’s friend was a private investigator or that someone had tried to kill the two interlopers
.
I’d taken over my brother’s office, such as it was. Made a few aesthetic adjustments to suit my taste, rearranged the furniture so no one could sneak up behind me through the door or window. Ian had arrived that morning and watched from the corner. He didn’t like Tyler Weddle any more than I did
.
“Who fired the shots?” I asked my cop
.
Tyler’s Adam’s apple bobbed unsteadily. “I-I don’t know. You made it clear—”
“Yes, I made it perfectly clear that you all were to stand down. I’m giving the Hendricksons time to do the right thing, and I’m confident they will. The fire was a dumb move, but what do I expect from idiots?”
I didn’t bother waiting for an answer. “It’s Friday. We have two days”—I looked at the clock—“just under fifty-eight hours to make sure the resort project is dead. Now a private investigator is snooping
around. You think shooting at him is going to scare him off?”
“I didn’t—”
“And what is this so-called evidence left in the mine?”
“The girlfriend works at a morgue, apparently. She noticed things no one else would have noticed.”
“What things did she fucking notice?”
Tyler shifted his feet. He knew better than to sit without an invitation, and I hadn’t issued him one. “Some hair and, um, some bugs she said were on the body.”
“And were they from the bitch’s body?”
He actually turned green. “Yeah.”
“You didn’t clean up your mess very well, did you?”
“It was Jimmy—”
I put up my hand. I wasn’t going to discuss Jimmy with anyone. He was the thorn in my side. I couldn’t kill him and I couldn’t let him live. Not when everything I’d been working toward for six long years was finally happening in two days. I swear, that bitch was haunting me from her grave. I should have cut her up and fed her to the pigs like they did in the good old days. I might just do that to Jimmy. And Tyler. Hell, I should fucking buy stock in a hog farm!
“You were supposed to make sure the job was done, and you let him go down there alone. That makes it your fault and your responsibility.” I stared him down. He was sweating. That made me as happy as I could be considering the mess in front of me. “What, are you scared of the mine? Of the dark? Ian, look at the big, bad cop who’s scared of the dark.”
Ian grunted, his eyes on Weddle
.
“It’s all taken care of, really.” Tyler glanced at Ian, then faced me
.
I didn’t like what I was hearing
.
“What do you mean?”
“I heard on the scanner this morning that Jimmy’s truck was found in the reservoir.”
I froze. My heart just about stopped. “What?”
“They have to drag the bottom because his body wasn’t in the car, but—”
“Go back. What did you do?”
He backtracked. “It wasn’t me, I just heard about it. Carl said he had to clean up some loose ends, and I assumed—”
Carl Browne
.
After we inked the deal Sunday, Carl Browne was a dead man
.
I looked Tyler in the eye and pictured him dead, too
.
The images calmed me
.
“Get rid of any evidence still in that mine today and I won’t punish you,” I lied smoothly
.
“I will. I promise. Thank you.”
“Did the girl and her P.I. take anything with them?”
“No.”
“You know that for sure? Like you ‘knew’ Jimmy had dumped the bitch in the Hell Hole?” The Hell Hole was the deepest exploration shaft, drilled in the 1940s during the height of World War II. An accident resulted in three men falling to their deaths—more than 150 feet. My daddy used the Hell Hole whenever he needed to disappear someone. I suspected skeletons were stacking up down there like cordwood
.
“They would have told me,” Tyler said. “I threatened to arrest them for obstructing justice.”
I simply didn’t believe that Tyler had any skill in reading people. If he had, he would know he was already dead
.
“Good. Take care of the evidence and report to me when it’s done.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Go.”
“Ian,” I said after the fool left. “I’m not happy.”
“I can see why. What do you want me to do?”
“I need you to discreetly search Jimmy Benson’s house. No one can know you were there. Anything you find that even remotely connects back to me or my family, bring to me.”
“Of course.”
I had no need to tell Ian the entire truth. If he found what Jimmy had on me, he would instantly think traitor, and that would suit my purposes, but I didn’t think he’d find anything. I’d already had Jimmy’s place searched after my brother turned on me, and found nothing. But I had to believe the threat—and if Jimmy was dead, the information could be leaked
.
My instincts were on fire. Something was wrong. I needed to know everything going on in town, starting with the strangers
.
“I want everything on the P.I. Sean Rogan and his bed buddy Lucy Kincaid,” I told Ian. “Start with how they know Tim Hendrickson, and then move into their backgrounds. What kind of cases he works. What the bitch does at the morgue. Where they live, siblings, parents, everything.”
“Not a problem.”
Nothing was a problem for Ian. He was perfect for me. Young, beautiful, strong, smart—and he did everything right the first time I told him. I’ve gone through so many personal assistants I’ve lost count. The longest running was Zachary, who was with me almost two years before I found him screwing a cheap whore. It pained me to kill him. What a waste
.
Ian had been with me for seven months, and was amazing in all parts of his job. After my one failed marriage, I’d never again give control to a husband. Killing husbands was a messy business because there were official marriage records and crap like that. A hired, under-the-table assistant was far preferable
.
“We’re going to have some fun tonight.”
His blue eyes sparkled. “The cop?”
I grinned. Ian got the same thrills I did
.
“May I kiss you?”
My skin tingled. “You may.”
He came around the desk and kissed me. I reached down and touched him between his legs. He was already growing hard
.
I pulled away. “Save it. We’ve got a lot of work to do today.” And no way was I wasting time screwing
.
Ian walked over to the couch and opened his laptop. “Sean Rogan. Lucy Kincaid. Let’s see what I can find.”
“While you do that, I have people to punish.”
I couldn’t tell from his look if he was concerned about my safety or merely disappointed he couldn’t participate
.
“I’ll be fine,” I assured him, “and I promise to let you help with the fun punishments later.”
“You’re so good to me.”
SIXTEEN
Lucy showered until the hot water turned cold. Her head ached from both lack of sleep and the friction with Sean.
She was drying her hair when her phone rang. It was her brother Patrick, Sean’s partner at RCK.
“Luce, I emailed you a link to the missing persons reports I pulled.”
“I’ll look through them right now.” She put her phone on speaker and quickly gathered her damp hair into a ponytail.
“I used your criteria—Caucasian women between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-five who went missing in the Northeast during the last nine months. I narrowed it down to forty-seven women, blond or light brown hair, between five foot four and five foot eight. Since the files are large, I posted them to my server and you can view or download them from there. I can broaden the search if necessary.”
At Sean’s computer, she logged into her email. “I hope she’s here.”
“I just got off the phone with Sean; he told me what happened. I got a seat on the last flight to Albany tonight, then a commuter plane first thing in the morning. This was supposed to be a vacation for you two.”
“This is the second vacation I’ve had where a dead body has turned up. Maybe I should stay home.”
She was half-joking, but Patrick was serious. “I started the background checks Sean asked for. The Swain family popped immediately. The father died in prison—he got twenty-five-to-life for killing his girlfriend. The oldest brother, Paul Swain, is in prison for manslaughter and drug trafficking. They tried to make a case against his brother Butch, but nothing stuck. Butch was suspected of bribery, extortion, and manufacturing methamphetamines.”
“Do you know if there’s an active investigation?”
“I called around to the usual places, didn’t hear of anything ongoing, but that doesn’t mean squat half the time. The word is when Paul Swain was sent away, his operation dried up. Nine people went to prison. He was the brains, Butch was the brawn.”
“Where’s Butch Swain now?”
“His legal address is in Colton, about twenty miles from Spruce Lake. There’s a younger sister, Roberta, who went to college in Florida, and I can’t find anything on her since then.”
“Really?” Lucy teased. “You’re stumped?”
“Hardly. I’m digging. I think she probably got married, which is why I have nothing on her maiden name. I can’t find a marriage record in Florida or New York, so I’ll broaden the search. Anyway, I wanted to make sure you got my email with the missing persons records. Let me know if your mine lady’s not there, and I’ll broaden that search, too.”
“Thanks, Patrick.”
“Watch out for Butch Swain. Even though word is he isn’t a sharp tack, he could have acquired a new partner. I told Sean the same thing.”
“Does anyone think the little brother has a new meth lab up and running?”
“I called Noah, and he’s putting a feeler out with the DEA about drug activity in St. Lawrence County. There was nothing on the FBI radar, at least with the Swain name or Spruce Lake attached. They’re focusing on labs in Massena now, which they believe picked up the slack when the Swains went out of business.”
“Take one down, two more pop up.”
“Got that right. Luce, I don’t know what’s going on in Spruce Lake, but keep a low profile until Sean gets back. I wish he hadn’t left you alone.”
She sighed. Long ago she realized that she’d be forever coddled by her family. “Patrick, I’m not alone. Tim and Adam Hendrickson are both here. And do you remember I’m practically an FBI agent? When I have my badge, will you still tell me to be careful?”
“Yes.”
She laughed. “Fair enough.”
“And you’d better have your gun on you now.”
She glanced across the room to where her Glock was partly hidden on a bookshelf. Sean had given her security measures to follow since they became involved, many of which she’d already learned from her oldest brother, Jack, a former army sergeant. There was another gun hidden in the bathroom and a third under the cushion on the couch.
“I have it covered,” Lucy told Patrick. “Nothing we’ve found indicates the vandalism on the resort is drug related. Did you run the other names Sean gave you?”
“There’s nothing much on Jon Callahan. He’s originally from Montreal, but after his father died when he was twelve, his mother sent him to live with his Uncle Henry in Spruce Lake. He went to college in Connecticut, became a naturalized citizen—easy because his dad was an American—and settled in Spruce Lake. He owns a lot of property—most of the town, in fact, that isn’t owned by the Hendrickson estate.”
“How did he make his money?”
“He’s a lawyer specializing in international law—no criminal law, all civil. He’s with a major firm based in Montreal with a U.S. office in New York City, very respectable, seems to work primarily in intellectual property rights, contract law, estate planning. I’m going to look at the type of work he specializes in.”
“But how can he practice law living in the middle of nowhere?”
“With technology these days, he wouldn’t necessarily have to go into an office. He gave you the creeps?”
“No. He seemed to be the most normal person I’ve met here; maybe that’s why he stood out. Very smooth, like a good salesman.”
“Absolutely, we need to
especially
watch out for the normal people.”
“Very funny. What about Reverend Browne or Callahan’s uncle?”
“Henry Callahan worked for the Kelley Mine as a young man. Married Emily Richardson when they were both nineteen, right out of high school. They have no children. When the mine closed, he enlisted in the army, served five years stateside as a mechanic. Opened his own shop in Colton. It went under a few years later and he retired early.”