What Lies Below, page 6
“There is some high-stakes land grabbing out here, isn’t there?” West raised an eyebrow in his direction. “Are you sure your company isn’t involved?”
Heath let that go. At least the sheriff wasn’t accusing Bradford and Son of murder...yet.
Dr. Jaimie and Sheriff Chandler wrapped up at the same time, and pulled away from Willow’s property one right after the other, leaving Heath alone with Willow, crouching over the dogs.
“Let me at least get the mutts comfortable.” Before she could protest his help, Heath scooped up Apollo and carried him to a bed near the cabin’s porch. He followed suit with Luna, placing her down gently on the sheepskin. “They’ll probably be thirsty when they wake up.”
“At least they’re going to wake up.” She pushed open her damaged door, and Heath peeked inside the cabin, his eyes widening.
“They did a number on your place. Do you need help cleaning up?”
Wedging a hand on her hip, she looked him up and down. “First the security camera, now the cabin cleanup. Do you feel guilty or something?”
“I just wanna help.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “And I’m going to start with that door. You need to get it fixed before night falls. Is Gem Hardware still in town, or are you going to have to get a door from the mainland?”
“Gem is still there.” Her tense shoulders finally dropped. “Why are you so invested in helping me?”
“I don’t see anyone else stepping up.”
“You’re assuming I can’t handle cleaning up and getting the repairs done myself.”
“Why should you do it alone?” He squeezed past her and inspected the doorjamb. “Someone kicked this in or used some kind of battering ram to break it apart.”
“That’s what West figured.” She waved a hand behind her at the disheveled cabin. “I don’t think they were looking for anything, or at least, I can’t imagine what they hoped to find. I believe this is just an intimidation tactic—sell the land or else.”
“There are several interested parties here, not just Bradford and Son.” He held up a hand and ticked off his fingers. “Ellie and Garrett are mad enough to take some kind of action. Then there’s the Samish. It’s in their best interest for Bradford to develop this land for the casino.”
“The Samish are going to build that casino with or without the adjacent land.”
“True, but they’ll realize bigger profits from the casino if Bradford can add some hotels, restaurants and infrastructure to support it.” He stepped into the room and plucked up a throw pillow. “I’ll start with the easy stuff.”
He darted around the room, stuffing cushions back onto sofas and chairs, righting tables and stacking papers. He picked up a few books pulled from a shelf and slotted them back in place. Several framed pictures on the shelf had been knocked down, and he studied one photo as he turned it over.
Tapping the unbroken glass on the frame, he asked, “Is this your mother?”
“Yeah, before she took off for greener pastures.” Hugging a pillow to her chest, Willow stood on her tiptoes and peeked over his arm.
“D-did she disappear, or do you know where she is? Have you had contact with her since she left?”
Willow dropped down to her heels, barely reaching his shoulder. “Of course I know where she is...or mostly. She’s in Central America right now. Costa Rica, I believe. I’ll have to check her blog to find out for sure.”
“Your mother has a blog?”
“A vlog, actually. A travel vlog for single women of a certain age.” She tossed the pillow onto a love seat. “It’s quite popular, actually. She even earns enough to support herself.”
“Good for her, I guess. Not so much for you.”
Pushing her hair back, Willow made a sad face. “It hurt when I was little. Now? Not so much. Your mom left when you were older, right? When you were living on Dead Falls.”
“That’s right, but the difference is I never heard from her again. She disappeared.”
Willow’s mouth dropped open. “What do you mean, disappeared?”
“Exactly that. She left one day, leaving a note for us, and we never heard from her again. At least, I didn’t.”
“Did your father?”
“I don’t know. He won’t talk about it, but a few years ago after no contact, he had her declared dead.” Heath choked on the words and coughed to hide it.
“That’s...that’s terrible.” She rested her hand on his back with a featherlight touch. “What did the note say?”
“It said she was going to end her life.”
“Heath, no.” She covered her mouth. “Do you think she was serious?”
“My mom suffered from depression. She’d been in therapy, had medication, but nothing seemed to work. My dad thought being back on Dead Falls would help. It didn’t.”
“But suicide.” Willow’s eyes shimmered with tears. “Her body was never found? Did she leave the island?”
“The sheriff at the time conducted a cursory investigation. A ticket purchased shows she took a ferry back to the mainland, but she’d left her phone at home. Her purse and credit cards were gone, but she never used them.”
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea at the time. I guess I’d heard that your mom left, but I didn’t know the details.”
He rubbed a hand across his mouth. He hadn’t meant to get into this with her. “Nobody did. My dad kept things pretty quiet.”
“I thought losing a mom the way I did was bad, but at least I can visit her vlog to check on her.” She patted his back awkwardly. “If you want to pick up that door at Gem Hardware, I’ll give you my debit card, and you can knock yourself out. Hell, if they have a home security camera there—the low-tech kind—you can pick up one of those while you’re at it.”
A smile stretched his lips. “Do you think I told you that sad story so you’d let me help you?”
“I don’t know, but it worked.” She snatched the frame from his hand and adjusted it on the shelf.
* * *
HEATH SPENT THE afternoon making Willow feel better—or at least more secure. While she finished putting her place back together, he drove into town and purchased a replacement door, which he loaded into the back of his truck, and a security camera that fed to a hard drive.
When he got back to her place, the dogs were stirring. She helped him hang the new door and install the camera above it. She insisted on treating him to pizza from Luigi’s for dinner to reward his efforts. It almost felt like a date, and his pity party had softened her stance toward him—not that he intended that result.
He hadn’t meant to spill his guts at all about his mother. All anyone knew around these parts, if they remembered at all, was that his mother disappeared in the fall and never returned. His father sold the house on Dead Falls Island a few years later, but Heath never forgot it.
Apparently, Toby Keel had never forgotten it, either.
Heath collected their plates and brought them to the kitchen. “Thanks again for the pizza.”
“Thanks for everything else.” She joined him at the sink and held up his half-full wineglass, the red liquid catching the light and reflecting it in her eyes. “You sure you don’t want to finish this off?”
“I have some work to do tonight in my hotel room, and I need a clear head for the numbers.”
“I have my new door, new locks, new camera, refreshed dogs, and I don’t need a clear head for anything.” She tipped his glass back and gulped the rest of the wine.
He laughed. “Don’t get too tipsy to handle that rifle.”
“I’d probably need a few more glasses to actually shoot someone coming through the door.”
“Just remember what they did to Apollo and Luna.” He flicked the empty glass with his fingernail.
“You’re right.” She growled. “Bring it on.”
“That’s better.” He loaded the last of the dishes in the dishwasher. “You have my number now. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call me.”
She stood with her back to the counter, her hands loosely clasped in front of her, her lush lips stained with red wine. “Are you doing all this to get my property?”
The hell with the property. He had completely different motives now. He dragged his gaze away from her pout. “Told you I could be persuasive.”
She showed him to the door, and he paused on the porch. “Be careful, and I mean that. Call me for anything.”
Saluting, she said, “You got it, Bradford.”
He cuffed Apollo’s ear and loped toward his truck. As he backed up, he waved out the window. He left it open for his drive and inhaled the fresh air. He needed to clear his mind for the business at hand.
The drive to the other side of the island took longer in the dark, but he didn’t want to get pulled over for speeding. Not that carrying a pick and shovel were illegal or even suspicious on Dead Falls Island, but he didn’t want to draw attention to himself or his mission.
He flicked on his wipers as he crossed the bridge, the falls to his right sprinkling his windshield. Then he made the hard turn left to Misty Hollow and the cursed property.
He pulled his truck into position, facing the two big-leaf maples, and left his headlights beaming into the dark. He thumbed on the dome light and pulled the scrap of paper from his pocket, its edges soft and worn. He held it under the light and read the words aloud for the hundredth time. “‘You’ll find your mother where the mist meets the earth, between the giant maples.’”
The mist met the earth here, and two huge maple trees towered in front of him. Even though Toby Keel hadn’t lived long enough to verify his riddle, Heath felt confident he’d found his mother’s resting place.
He jumped from the truck and peeled back the tarp he’d bought at Gem Hardware today to reveal his tools. He hoisted the shovel and pick from the truck bed and strode toward the space between the two trees.
Then he plowed the shovel into the ground and started digging.
Chapter Seven
The following morning, Willow sprang out of bed to check the video footage from the night before. She scanned through the recording, noting the night critters that darted in and out of view and the mist that rolled across the ground. Nothing human crept up to her cabin.
Sighing, she slumped in her chair. Anyone could spot the camera above her porch, so it might work more as a deterrent than a spy.
Luna called her to the front door with a scratch, and she pushed up to her feet to rescue the dog.
Willow stood on the front porch, her toes curled over the edge of the top step, as she watched the dogs go about their business. They didn’t seem any worse for wear after their ordeal yesterday. Who ran around drugging dogs?
She glanced over her shoulder into her cabin. The intruders must’ve been trying to spook her with their break-in. As far as she could tell, they’d taken nothing of value. Their tactic didn’t make much sense to her, though. A few thugs ransacking her summer house were not going to suddenly convince her to sell her land...or Toby’s.
Had they been looking for something else? When Dad died and she’d come back here that first summer after her freshman year in college, she’d cleaned out a lot of his items—but not everything. Maybe his papers contained something of value that she’d missed.
Dad’s family, the Sandses, did have a lot of wealth and property at some point. Mom had told her that Dad had sold it all off except this plot and the one he eventually sold to Toby. But Mom didn’t always know all of Paul Sands’s business.
Dad’s will had kept things simple. He’d left all his worldly possessions to Willow, and he’d already put her on the title for this property, so there was no paperwork to go through at the time of his death, except to remove his name from the title. He didn’t have stacks of cash or stocks or Swiss bank accounts—as far as she knew.
But maybe someone knew something she didn’t.
Rubbing the back of her neck, she strolled into the house. She’d have to dig out Dad’s old stuff to see if she could find something. The trespassers had gone through some papers, as they’d strewn the evidence across her floor, but they probably hadn’t gone through the old suitcase where she’d stashed most of her father’s paperwork.
She filled the dogs’ bowls with food and refreshed the water in the tub outside. Then she made herself a smoothie for breakfast and carried it to the small bedroom. The cabin had only two bedrooms—the large one, which she’d taken over from her father after his death, and the smaller one, which had been her room growing up.
She placed her breakfast drink on the white nightstand with flowers painted on the drawer and sat cross-legged on the floor beside the double bed covered with a yellow comforter. The invaders had tossed this room, too, but mostly for show. They’d rifled the bookshelf, knocking over a few vampire books from her teen years, and had pulled a couple of items, mostly sports gear, from the closet.
Flipping up the comforter, she felt beneath the bed until her fingers found the handle of the battered suitcase that had belonged to her father. She curled her fingers around it and dragged the bag from under the bed.
She’d never put a lock on the suitcase but figured it had been a step up from the cardboard box where she’d found most of her father’s business. He’d left the only important paper, his will, in a kitchen drawer, and had made sure she knew where to find it. She’d grabbed handfuls of this other irrelevant paperwork and shoveled it from the box into this brown suitcase.
Flipping the suitcase open now, she studied the paperwork scattered in the bottom. Did it seem like there were fewer papers in here? She wouldn’t have a clue. She’d tossed these items in here, helter-skelter, figuring if someone asked for something important later, she could go through it at that time. Nobody ever had. She grabbed a piece on top, scanning a letter about brush clearance from the Forest Service. How would she know if someone had gone through this mess?
Dropping the Forest Service letter on the floor, she noticed her dirty fingerprints on the page. She hadn’t dragged this suitcase from its hiding place for years, and it was dusty. If someone else had been here before her, there should be more fingerprints.
To avoid leaving more prints, she grabbed the shredded silky lining inside the lid of the bag and tugged it down, removing her fingers at the last second when it closed. A few eddies of dust floated upward with the closure, caught in the rays of sun from the window, but not a lot.
She squinted at the top of the suitcase, making out her fingerprints on the edge of the lid, left when she’d opened the bag. But her marks in the dust weren’t the only ones there. Larger swaths of dust had been removed, as if other prints were left in the general area of hers, but then wiped out with a sleeve or a cloth. Or perhaps the thief had worn gloves and had cleared the dust off with his hands.
Her nose tingled with the release of the dust in the air, and she rubbed it with the back of her hand. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
The intruders had found this case and opened it. Whether or not they’d taken anything would have to remain a mystery, as Willow had no idea what she’d shoved in there.
Should she tell West? She played out that absurd conversation in her head and rejected it. The strangers, in the course of going through her cabin, had also looked into this suitcase, but she didn’t know what had been in it or if anything was now missing. She pushed the case back under the bed and wiped her hands on her pajama bottoms.
The dogs started barking out front, and the growl of an engine carried into the cabin. Willow grabbed her smoothie and scurried to the front door, which she’d left wide open.
When she spied Heath getting out of his truck, her heart still beat furiously, but in a different kind of pattern. It seemed as if they’d just parted company hours ago, and here he was again. He either really wanted to see her, or he wanted to keep applying some subtle pressure on her.
She plucked at her flannel pajama bottoms but took some pleasure in the fact that his hair stood on end and he needed a shave. She could put down her own appearance to a couple of glasses of wine the night before, but he’d pretty much abstained. What was his excuse for his tired appearance?
Cupping a hand over her eyes, she said, “What brings you out here so early? I’m still not selling.”
“Early?” He rubbed the top of Apollo’s head. “It’s almost eleven o’clock.”
The dogs had barked at the arrival of his truck, but he’d already earned their trust and devotion. Once they saw Heath get out of the truck, they’d stopped barking.
“Is it?” She took a sip of her drink and caught a drop of the thick smoothie at the corner of her mouth with her tongue. “I swear, I haven’t gotten any work done out here.”
“What’s been going on hasn’t exactly been conducive to cataloging flora and fauna.” He made a circling motion in the air. “Everything go okay with the camera setup?”
“I looked at the footage this morning, and except for a skunk drinking from the dogs’ water dish, nothing much happened.”
“That’s good to hear. Just wanted to make sure the security system was in working order. It’ll at least function as a deterrent.” Heath clapped a hand over his mouth and yawned.
“You must’ve had a lot of work last night.”
Dropping his hand, Heath jerked his head up. “Why do you say that?”
“Um, because you told me you had work to do, and this morning you can barely keep your eyes open.” She tipped her head toward her open door. “Would you like some coffee? I haven’t made it yet. Clearly, I haven’t done much of anything this morning, but it’ll just take a few minutes.”
“I’ll take you up on that. The coffee from the hotel lobby was so vile, I couldn’t stomach it.” On his way to the porch, he crouched down to give Luna a hug.
