Love Inspired Suspense May 2015 #2 (57 page)

Grayson didn't answer.

He was too busy thinking, reaching a horrible and inevitable conclusion.

He'd spent a lot of summers at Camp Cone. He knew it well. The property was a little wild, a little rugged. He'd hunted squirrel there, hunted turkey, done all the things young boys liked to do.

And he'd done them all with Rick, because the property they spent their summers on, the little cabin where they used to stay, it belonged to Rick's parents. It belonged to Ethan.

He stood, pushing away from the table with so much force, his chair toppled over.

“Grayson?” Laney stood, touched his arm. “Are you okay?”

“It's pretty difficult to be okay when you've just realized that you've been betrayed by one of your most trusted friends.”

“What do you mean?” Kent asked.

“Ethan Conrad owns property near Camp Cone.”

Kent frowned, glancing at the report he still held. “The former FBI profiler? The same one who's listed as a consultant in these files?”

“He's not just listed there.” Grayson set his paper down and pointed to the name. “He's listed here, too. But his name was taken out of the reports when they were tampered with. The hacker didn't want us to know that he was involved.”

“Anyone else find his name in a report?” Kent asked.

“It's here,” Laney said quietly.

He didn't have time to feel sorry for himself. Didn't have time to sit around moping. Ethan was one of the most intelligent men he knew, but even intelligent men made mistakes. “There's a cabin on Ethan's property, and an outbuilding used for hunting—either of those would be the perfect place to keep a bunch of kids,” he said. “Arden, can you print me out a few topographical maps of the Glen Arm/Camp Cone area? And Kent, we'll need a search warrant to go on private property.”

“I'll make some calls.”

“How long do you think it will take?”

“A few hours? Maybe a day, tops—if we can convince them it's necessary.”

“That's a long time if you're one of the kids he's kidnapped.”

“I'll try to put a rush on it,” Kent assured him.

“Good.” Grayson glanced at the name, felt fury clogging his throat. “Because I suspect we found our leak, and the sooner we plug it, the happier I'll be.”

NINETEEN

L
ater that evening, after poring through files with Arden and the FBI agents, Laney retreated to her room, claiming exhaustion.

Earlier, Kent had gone to the precinct to see if he could call in some favors and help expedite a warrant on Ethan's property. Grayson was trying a different tactic. He'd driven away over an hour ago, determined to convince a reluctant judge to issue a search warrant.

He'd left Laney behind.

Grayson had thought it would be safer.

It would have been. If she'd actually intended to stay there.

Low voices and murmurs of activity carried down the hall to her room. Rose was clanging in the kitchen while the others worked in the dining room. Laney carefully removed the screen from her bedroom window. When she was done, she retrieved her small search-and-rescue day pack from the floor beside her bed, shoved a pilfered topographical map of Camp Cone in it, then turned off the light, dropping the pack out the window to the ground. Grabbing her work cell phone from the charger on the dresser, she shoved it into her cargo pants pocket. The sun had just set below the horizon. The grass was damp from the late afternoon showers.

Laney's heart raced. Climbing onto the windowsill, she dropped to the grass. The night was quiet. So far, so good.

Laney knew Grayson would not approve of her intent to give her FBI and MPD babysitters the slip.

She also knew that the chance of Grayson getting a warrant on a respected, retired FBI agent based on the circumstantial evidence they'd collected was slim. She'd heard the agents talking about it being a pipe dream that a warrant would be provided in time to rescue the kids.

But Laney understood law enforcement and probable cause. If she and Jax happened to be hiking in the area and came upon something that could point to the children, Grayson would have all the probable cause he needed for an official search.

She was determined to make sure that happened.

Olivia's life was at stake.

Shrugging the pack onto her back, she whistled twice. She heard the soft pad of Jax's feet in the yard behind the house before he raced around the corner and sat attentively in front of her. “Good boy,” she whispered. Patting her thigh twice, the signal for heel, she started off at a quick jog. Jax kept pace by her side. Laney ran through the trees, sticking close to the edges of the woods.

She needed to get to Aunt Rose's house and borrow her car.

Rose kept the keys to her 1974 Hornet hatchback on a peg in the garage. So as long as the keys were there, borrowing the car would be easy. Laney just hoped the Hornet would make the hour-long drive to Camp Cone. As far as she knew, Willow was the first person to drive the car in months, and she'd taken a five-minute drive to the grocery store.

Of course, it was a bit premature to worry about the car breaking down when she first needed to get into the garage. Laney was counting on finding the spare house key in its usual spot—buried in the topsoil under the decorated stone turtle in the back flower bed. Hurrying across the well-manicured back yard, she found the turtle right where she'd expected it to be. Beside her, Jax's ears perked up, standing at alert. His eyes watched the corner of the house. Someone was coming.

She jumped back into the shadows. There was no time to get the key. The soft sound of footsteps on the grass grew closer. “Laney?” As usual, Aunt Rose's whisper was scarcely a decibel under a yell.

“Shh!” Laney responded quickly. “Aunt Rose, what are you doing out here?” she hissed.

“Looking for you, of course.” Reaching in her pocket, she pulled out a car key on a small fuzzy dice keychain. “I thought you might need this.”

“How'd you know I was here—and why on earth are you carrying around a key to a car you can't legally drive?”

Aunt Rose planted her hands on her hips. “First of all, after the last break-in, I didn't want to leave the key where it could be so easily found—James is a classic, you know?” James, of course, referred to Rose's car. As Rose told the story, she'd purchased it the summer after her husband Peter died, because they'd watched James Bond together and he'd been fascinated by the aerial flip the car performed in the movie. Thankfully Rose had not yet attempted to duplicate that flip.

“Secondly,” Rose continued, “I heard Gray and Kent talking to those agents, too. I'm not deaf, you know. As soon as I heard that they probably didn't have enough evidence to get a warrant, I knew exactly what you were going to do.”

Lifting the stone turtle, Rose buried her fingers in the dirt below, coming up with the spare key to the garage. She absently wiped the dirt off on her pants. “Here you go.”

“Does this mean you approve of the plan?” Laney asked, unlocking the garage and opening it.

Rose shook her head and sighed. “I'm not saying it's the smartest thing to do, mind you, but I know I won't be able to talk you out of it. You have too much of the Travis blood in you. Much more than your mama ever did, God rest her soul.”

Taking the keys, Laney embraced her aunt. “Thanks, Aunt Rose.”

“Honey, I know you've always worried that you might end up like your mother, but even as a girl, your mama was never strong. Not like you.”

Shaking her head vehemently, Laney argued, “I'm not strong, I just try to do what needs to be done.”

“Because you have an inner strength, girl. The grit and moxie your mom never had—that comes from here and here.” She pointed to her head then her heart.

“Mom did her best.”

“No doubt, but she married the wrong man.”

“I know, and the sad thing is, I can see how it happened. My father could be a real charmer at times—you just never know what lies underneath.”

“Laney, I think deep down you know that's not true. Some men are exactly as they seem. For instance, your grandfather—my brother—and my own husband.”

“I'm sorry I never got a chance to meet Uncle Peter.”

“Me, too, but I won't romanticize him—he was far from perfect. God knows none of us are perfect. But he tried to live God's plan for his life. That one simple act of faith made him perfect for me. Maybe you'll find the same to be true with Grayson.”

“Aunt Rose, Grayson and I are just...” What were they? Working together? Friends? At times it seemed she'd known him forever. But really, did she know him at all?

“You can protest all you want, but you can't deny the attraction. But don't you think on it now. God's plan will unfold in its own time.” She gave Laney a quick hug. “Give me two minutes before you start the car. I'll distract them with my new batch of grandma's whoopie pies.”

“I love you, Aunt Rose.”

“I know, and I love you, too.”

Opening the car door, Laney motioned Jax inside. “Jax, place.” Tail wagging, he hopped into the car.

Pausing at the entrance of the garage, Aunt Rose looked back over her shoulder. “Be careful, Laney. And leave the lights off until you get to the end of our drive. That's what I always do.” Grinning, she was gone.

* * *

Grayson wasn't happy. He'd just left the judge's house—
without
a search warrant for Ethan's property. Despite the case Grayson had presented, the judge reasoned that Ethan appeared to have been a legitimate paid consultant on the cases, and that those records could have been doctored by anyone to cast the blame on Ethan. Furthermore, Camp Cone was a public park, backing up to several private properties, and since there was no evidence directly linking Ethan to any of the victims or suspects, the probable cause was not there. The judge sympathized but told Grayson he needed to make a stronger case for a warrant to be issued.

Grayson had a decision to make. He could follow the rules and keep searching for more substantial evidence to link Ethan to the crimes, or he could search the property himself, perhaps finding the kids, but knowing that anything he found couldn't be used in a court of law.

For the first time in his life, Grayson was thinking about breaking the law.

There had to be a way around this. There must be a way to rescue the kids and still bring Ethan to justice.

Ethan, who'd recommended Grayson for the case in the first place, then used his relationship with Grayson to monitor the progress the bureau was making and plan his next move. Grayson tamped down his fury. Rage wasn't going to help him figure things out. It wasn't going to make things easier. He needed to stay calm and cool-headed if he was going to beat Ethan at his own game.

And that must be what this was to his mentor—a money-making game that he had been playing and winning for far too long.

What was worse, logic dictated that this wasn't Ethan's first venture into organized crime. Grayson wondered when Ethan had turned. Had Rick's death sent him over the edge? Or worse, could he have had something to do with Rick's death? And Andrea's?

The thought turned his blood cold. Grayson had always wondered how Ethan had wrapped up the case of Rick's murder so quickly, so cleanly. The perpetrators had died trying to keep from being taken into custody, and there'd been no one to interrogate. There was no telling how deep Ethan's betrayal ran, but Grayson wanted the chance to ask him.

His cell phone vibrated. Kent's name and number scrolled across the dashboard display. He grabbed the phone, his hand shaking with the force of his anger. “DeMarco here.”

“Laney's gone. She took one of the topo maps and Jax with her.”

“What? How? There are four armed law enforcement officers at the house, and her Jeep is still in the impound lot!”

“She snuck out through her bedroom window while the FBI agents were in the kitchen with your sister and Rose. They were going through the case files, and she said she needed to lie down—”

“That should have been their first clue that she was up to something!” he snapped.

“Don't shoot the messenger, DeMarco,” Andrews bit out. They were both tense, both disappointed with the judge's decision regarding the search warrant.

“The good news is,” Grayson said, trying to calm himself down, “she couldn't have gone far without a vehicle.”

“You're assuming she doesn't have one.”

“Where would she get...” Grayson paused, realizing just how easy he and everyone else had made Laney's escape. “Rose.”

“Rose admits to handing over the keys to her '74 Hornet hatchback, then distracting my officers with a plate full of whoopie pies and milk. Both of my guys are now complaining of stomach pains. I swear she's a menace with the baked goods.”

Grayson's grip tightened on the steering wheel. “I'm not sure I care about your officers' stomach problems. How long ago did Laney leave?”

“She's been gone about ninety minutes.”

“She's had more than enough time to get to the Camp Cone area, then. Has anyone heard from her since?”

“No. I tried to call her work cell. No answer.”

Grayson banged the steering wheel, his frustration making him reckless. “What was she thinking?”

“According to Rose, Laney went to get us our probable cause.”

That wasn't what Grayson wanted to hear. It wasn't what he wanted to think about. Laney and Jax searching Ethan's property couldn't lead to anything good.

“I just left the judge's house,” he growled. “I can be at Ethan's property in less than fifteen minutes. I'm turning around now.”

“I'm on my way with two patrol cars. We'll be there in thirty minutes, tops.”

Disconnecting the call, Grayson tried Laney's work phone. Straight to voice mail.

He drove faster than he should have, faster than was prudent, speeding toward Camp Cone. Dozens of memories flashed through his head. All the times Ethan had seemed interested, concerned, helpful, he'd been playing Grayson for a fool.

He managed to make it to Camp Cone Road in thirteen minutes. It wove through an older, established neighborhood and dead-ended at the park entrance, where visitors could gain free public access during park hours. Grayson was betting that Laney would pick that as her entry point.

The access gate would have been locked at sunset, but Laney could easily have parked in the small lot and walked in. From there, she'd have to navigate about twenty acres of heavily wooded parkland to get to the boundary of Ethan's property.

Remembering how quickly and easily Laney and Jax had navigated the trees and brush during the morning's search, he was confident that she was well within Ethan's property line already. He was equally confident that he was ill-equipped to trail her through the woods.

No, he'd need to take the direct approach. He'd enter the property through Ethan's driveway and have a look around. At this point, he had no other choice.

* * *

The conditions were perfect. Temperature mild. A light, consistent breeze. Jax was definitely in scent. According to the compass and topographic map, they were less than fifty meters north of a man-made structure, possibly the hunting cabin that Grayson had mentioned. According to the map, it bordered the southern corner of Ethan Conrad's property. Laney decided that direction was as good as any to start. After all, if Ethan was hiding three children on the property, he'd need a secure place to keep them—a building away from the main house would be the best bet.

Laney didn't use a flashlight and did not turn on the lights on Jax's vest. Luckily, the night sky was clear, the almost full moon illuminating the woods. Jax's head popped up, and he stopped, nose to the wind. Over the light wind rustling through the trees, Laney thought she heard voices.

“Jax, come,” she whispered. For a second Laney thought he wouldn't listen; she could see the reluctance as he looked at her, as if to say, “But the human is right there! Just a few more steps.”

Laney touched her open hand to her chest, reinforcing her voice command with the hand recall command. This time Jax came.