Cold Ridge

Eighteen

Carine climbed onto her favorite rock on the lower ridge trail and looked out at the valley and mountains, the view that had captivated her since she was a little girl. It was midmorning, the trees, even the evergreens, almost navy blue against the bleak gray sky. If only she could stand here and let her worries and questions float out on a breeze, dissipate into the wilderness.

She remembered Gus taking her and her brother and sister onto the ridge after their parents died. She'd dreamed about that day for years. She spotted an eagle and swore she saw her mum and dad flying with it in the clear summer sky. The image had been so vivid, so absolutely real to her.

But, so had her dreams, her images, of her life with Ty. So vivid, so real.

She half walked, half slid down the curving granite, rejoining him on the narrow, difficult trail. They'd gone far enough. Neither had the attention span for a long hike. They'd loaded up a day pack after breakfast and set out, crossing the meadow, climbing over a stone wall, then walking up a well-worn path to the trailhead. The dirt access road was quiet, the parking lot empty, not atypical of November. It was Saturday, but still early.

There was a threat of light snow and high winds above the treeline. They weren't going that far, but Carine had gone back to her cabin and dug out her lighter winter layers for the hike. Thermal shirt, windproof fleece jacket, windproof pants, hat, gloves. Her hat and gloves were still in the day pack. She wore her new hiking socks. No cotton-she'd even banned it from her summer hikes.

Ty had approved of her wilderness medical kit, but he'd raised his eyebrows when she tucked the manual into the pack. "Look at it this way," she told him. "If I fall and hit my head, you won't need the manual. If you fall and hit your head, I'll need the manual."

"Only if I'm unconscious."

"Of course, because if you can talk, you'll just tell me what to do."

"If I'm conscious," he said, leaning toward her in that sexy way he had, "I'll treat myself."

She told him she had treating blisters down pat. She knew CPR and basic first aid. She'd have done her best if Louis Sanborn had still been alive when she found him. But Antonia was the doctor in the family-Carine didn't like blood and broken bones, people in pain. Not that Antonia, or Ty, did, but they had a calling when it came to medicine that she simply didn't have.

Of course, Ty's calling also involved guns, diving, fast-roping and the insanity of HALO-High Altitude Low Opening jumping, where he would depart a plane at very high altitudes, with oxygen, a reserve chute, a medical kit and an M16, the bare necessities to survive the jump and get to a crew downed in hostile conditions.

Not that he thought HALO was insane. Just another tool in his PJ tool bag of skills, he'd say.

Carine respected his skills and abilities, his nonchalance about them, but she wasn't intimidated, perhaps because they seemed so natural to him, integral to who he was.

She'd spent an hour last night in his kitchen answering questions from the two Boston Police Department detectives, who had been sent to take possession of the memory disk, camera and camera bag. It hadn't occurred to her to have an attorney present. After they left, her brother called on Ty's hard line, which meant Ty could listen in on the extension as Nate told her in no uncertain terms to go mountain climbing today. He wouldn't go into detail about anything he'd found out, but Nate wasn't one to overreact. Although he never said so directly, Carine received the strong implication that her brother had talked to his law enforcement sources and had good reason to make sure his friend and his sister stayed out of what was apparently not a simple case of murder.

After she hung up with Nate, Ty tried to call Manny, got his voice mail and almost threw his phone into the fire. He tried Val Carrera, also without success.

Carine had her Nikon with her on the hike and took several pictures, anything that struck her eye. Ty had said little all morning. In action, she thought, was getting to him. She knew he wanted to be in Boston, pulling information out of Manny Carrera, a syllable at a time if he had to.

She slipped the camera into an outer pocket of the day pack, strapped to his back. "Hiking can be a substitute for my run," she said.

"Nope. You hike, then you go back and do your run."

"Says who?"

He grinned over his shoulder at her. "That's something we hear a lot in the military. 'Says who?'"

He was teasing her, a good sign his mood had improved. "Fortunately, I'm not in the military. I'm just a simple photographer who wants to run a mile and a half in ten minutes and thirty seconds or less."

"You can do it. How close are you?"

"Twelve minutes. Well, once, anyway. I'll get there. I told you, it's the swimming that kills me. I always get water up my nose." She zipped up the compartment and patted him on the hip. "Tell you what, Sergeant, if you run with me, I'll do my mile and a half after we get back."

"Think I can't?"

"I think you need to burn off more excess energy than this little hike of ours will accomplish. You're not sleeping, Ty. You were up at dawn again this morning."

"Dawn's not that early in November."

"You're preoccupied, worried about Manny-and Val-"

"Having you down the hall isn't the greatest sleep-inducer, either."

She sighed. "Ty, it's not always about sex."

"It's not?"

"I am trying-"

He winked at her. "I know you are, babe. Don't worry about me. I'm doing just fine." He started down the trail, moving easily over the roots and jutting rocks. "One thing, though. You're not a simple anything, but you're sure as hell not a simple photographer. You're a brilliant photographer."

"You don't have to say that."

"Yes, I do." He held out his arm for her to grab as she jumped off a two-foot rock in the middle of the trail. "You have the talent, the skills, the drive. I look at your pictures-I can't explain it. There's something going on there. I know it's nothing I or most people could do with one of those little throwaway things."

She was taken aback. "I appreciate that. Really. Thank you."

He continued down the trail, not taking any time to enjoy the scenery. "When we get back, I'll try Val again. Then I'm heading down to Boston to see Manny. You can hang out with Gus and Stump. It's the slow season. You two can wax skis. Argue about squash recipes."

"I'd rather go to Boston with you."

"I know you would."

"I could get my car, water my plants-"

He glanced back at her. "You don't have any plants."

She kept up with his killing pace, no more pauses to check out the view or pick up the perfect fallen leaf. The steep pitch of the trail eased into a long, gentle downward slope, the trail widening as it took them over a stream and back out to the parking area. When they reached the meadow, the wind gusted and howled down the mountains from the north, blowing an icy snow in their faces.

But the snow ended abrupty as they crossed into Ty's backyard and didn't even cover the ground. The sun beamed white through a thin cloud. Dark, lumpy clouds shifted over the valley, and the long, looming ridge with its high summits. Carine, more aware of the sky than she'd ever been in the city, tried to remember various cloud formations-stratocumulus, lenticular, cirrostratus. Each was associated with its own particular weather, but she was rusty on which was which.

Ty left the back door open for her, and she didn't linger outside. The wind blew into the kitchen, where the fire was almost out. He set the day pack on the table. When the phone rang, Carine, who was closer, picked it up. She didn't even get a chance to say hello. " Tyler? It's Val Carrera. The police are at my damn door with a search warrant."

"Val, it's Carine. Ty-"

Val didn't seem to hear her. "I'm sorry I didn't call back last night. At first I was too stunned, and then I fell asleep at the computer. I tried this morning but didn't get through-Jesus, Ty, he's got all kinds of garbage in these files. PJ stuff. Football scores. I told you I'd find football scores. At least I didn't find any porn."

"Slow down, okay? Let me get-"

She was talking rapidly, breathless. Ty made a move for the phone, but Carine was afraid they'd miss something important if she tried to transfer it to him with Val so oblivious to who was on the other end.

"He's got your e-mail address here. I'm sending you the file I think we're interested in. Jesus, will they break down the door if I don't answer?" She yelled, away from the phone, "I'm coming! Hang on a sec!" Then she returned, adding in a lower voice, "They'll haul off his hard drive. You know damn well they will."

In spite of her tough language, Val sounded panicked and fragile. Carine held up a hand, stopping Ty from ripping the phone from her. "I'll tell Ty-"

"It looks like Manny suspected Louis Sanborn was using an alias and having an affair with Jodie Rancourt, maybe extorting money from her. Something. I haven't gone through it all. I hope it doesn't get Manny into hotter water with the police."

Carine went still. "Manny suspected Louis and Jodie were having an affair before he got to Boston?"

"Yeah. I think so. Carine? Is that you?"

Ty snatched the phone. "Val, what the hell's going on?" He listened a moment, then said, "Open the damn door for the police. Do what they tell you. For Christ's sake, don't argue with them. Do you have a gun in the house? Val-" He glared at the phone then sighed at Carine. "She's gone."

"Did you get anything more out of her?"

"I need to check my e-mail. Jesus, those two." He looked ready to kick something. "We don't know what Manny's told the police. Goddamn it, we don't know anything."

Carine knelt down to see if she could revive the coals in the fireplace. She blew on them, and a few glowed red. She lifted a skinny log out of the woodbox and laid it on the coals, trying not to suffocate them, the familiar work only a partial counter to her tension.

She'd found Louis dead, but the Carreras were Ty's friends more than they were hers. He and Manny had been in combat together.

"Go on," she said. "Check your e-mail for what Val sent. I'll join you in a minute."

But Ty came behind her and hooked an arm around her waist, lifting her to her feet and kissing her softly, unexpectedly.Hethreadedhisfingersgentlythroughher hair. "This'll all work out. You know that, don't you?"

She wondered if he was trying to convince her or himself, but she nodded. "Manny's a rock. Val, too, in her own way."

He headed to the den, and Carine returned to the fire, the log catching with no additional effort on her part. Nate could have called last night and encouraged her to go mountain climbing because he'd found out Louis's murder involved blackmail, extortion, an adulterous affair-people with connections to her and Cold Ridge.

She set another log on her reborn fire, then made her way down the hall to the den. With the gray sky, it seemed more like late afternoon than midday. Ty didn't look up from the monitor. "I downloaded Val's file. It looks like some kind of personal log Manny kept."

Carine resisted the temptation to read over his shoulder. "I'll leave you to it."

She returned to the kitchen and put another larger log on the fire, then stood in front of it, her fingers splayed out over the flames. She remembered those crazy few days last November with the shooting and the Ran-courts' rescue, Ty grinning at her and calling her babe, telling her she had pretty eyes, as if he'd never noticed her in all the years they'd known each other. He and Manny Carrera sneaking around after the shooters and pulling Jodie and Sterling Rancourt off the ridge like it was no big deal-and Hank Callahan, the retired air force officer, the senate candidate. They'd all gathered in front of the fire here in Ty's kitchen and eaten chili and drunk beer, talking late into the night-she remembered Ty insisting on walking her back to her cabin as if it wasn't something she'd done on her own a thousand times when his mother was alive. It was cold and so still they could hear their footsteps on the dirt driveway, and when they got to her door, he kissed her good-night.

That was when she should have fled to Boston, not six months later after the damage was done.

He walked into the kitchen and pulled out a chair, turning it so that he could face the fire. He sat down, sighing heavily, collecting his thoughts. "Manny figured going into business for himself would be good for Val and Eric, that it'd give him more freedom to make his own schedule. But he hates it. He doesn't like the work, he doesn't like the people he has to work with. He'd have given it up if the Rancourts hadn't hired him."

"Funny how these things work out sometimes," Carine said, still on her feet.

"He was in Cold Ridge in September to visit Eric. I wasn't here. Neither were you. Gus was on a hiking trip. While Eric was in class one morning, Manny drove up to the Rancourt house to see if anyone might be up there, get the lay of the land so he could make recommendations. It was just something to do, really." He paused, glanced up at Carine. "Guess who was there?"

"Jodie? She's come up here on her own a number of times."

Ty nodded. "Yep. She was here. With Louis Sanborn."

"In September? But the Rancourts only hired him two weeks ago. I didn't realize they already knew each other. Louis acted as if they didn't-"

"Sterling Rancourt didn't know Louis. Only Jodie."

"Oh." Carine sank onto a chair, wincing at the implications. "Ouch."

"Somehow or another, the rescue last fall made Sterling feel vulnerable, so he started paying more attention to his personal and corporate security. He hired Gary Turner, then Louis Sanborn. He got Manny in to consult."

"If Jodie and Louis were already having an affair, you'd think she would have tried to stop her husband from hiring Manny."

"For all we know, she tried. Manny met with Sterling Rancourt, Gary Turner and Louis Sanborn in Boston a few days after Sanborn was hired. He realized right off the bat that Sanborn was the same guy he met in September."

"Did Sanborn say anything?"

Ty shook his head. "And Manny was pretty sure Jodie Rancourt introduced Sanborn under a different name. Tony something. Italian."

"Jesus-so she knew he was using an alias? Then why hire Manny? If he'd already met Louis under a different name why take the chance? Unless there's an innocent explanation for the alias and no one was worried about it."

"Manny couldn't swear to what Jodie told him in September, at least according to the log." Ty sighed, leaning back in his chair. "You should see this thing. He's not a talker on a good day, but there are places he's downright cryptic. A lot of it's in military lingo. No wonder Val couldn't make much sense of it."

"He must have told the police all this."

"I'm not making any assumptions at this point. He decided something wasn't on the level and started digging into Sanborn's background. Nothing added up. He already knew the guy sure as hell wasn't southern-"

"That was an act?"

"According to Manny. He's a Texan. He thinks he can smell a Yankee at a thousand yards."

Carine smiled. "Why isn't the reverse true?"

"Because we Yankees don't give a rat's ass." But Ty's humor was strained, and he leaned over and, without getting up, grabbed a log and pitched it one-handed onto the fire. It landed hard, the sparks just missing Carine's toes. He went on, settling back in his chair. "Manny thought Sanborn might have a Cold Ridge connection."

She shook her head. "I'd have recognized him if he did, wouldn't you think? The way he acted, I'd be surprised if it had occurred to him I might recognize him- I'm sure it didn't. He played the southern guy who thinks fifty degrees is cold. How far did Manny get in his background research before he went up to Boston?"

"Not far enough."

Ty was silent, and the fire hissed, one of Carine's logs breaking up into red-hot chunks. She watched it, trying to piece together different conversations she'd had with the Rancourts in the weeks since she'd started working for them, with Louis-or whoever he was-before he was killed. But there was nothing. She'd had no idea anything was going on beneath the surface until she walked into the library on Wednesday afternoon and found Louis dead. And even then…

But she realized Ty had drifted into silence. "What else?" she asked quietly, knowing there was more.

"Speculation."

"What kind of speculation?"

"Carine-it could all be nonsense. We don't know."

"Okay, with that caveat, what kind of speculation?"

"If Manny's right…" Ty sank back in his chair and rubbed a hand over his head, then sighed, plunging on. "He made a note in his log about the weapons the Ran-courts have up here. Expensive rifles. Bolt action and semiautomatic. Scoped. Jodie Rancourt had them out, showing them to Louis the day Manny met them up here. Sterling told him about the guns when he discussed what training he wanted Manny to do."

"A lot of people up here have guns, but I had no idea the Rancourts did."

Ty rose, his back to the fire as he started unloading the day pack. "Manny intended to get to the bottom of whatever was going on with these people. Nothing was going to stop him."

"It makes sense if it was his job-"

"Not because of his job. He has a kid up here. And there's you."

She took her wilderness medical kit off the table where Ty had laid it and slipped it into her coat pocket. "Because I worked for the Rancourts?"

But she knew that wasn't the whole answer, even before Ty spoke. "And because you're from Cold Ridge, and because of last November."

The shooting. The burned-down shack, the missing smugglers. "Manny can't think the Rancourts had anything to do with that smuggling operation. Louis? Could he have been-" She stopped herself, not wanting to phrase the question. Could Louis have been involved? Was that why he came up with an alias? "The police don't have any suspects."

"Not that we know of."

"Nate-he'd know."

Ty shook his head. "He won't tell you even if he does know. Neither would you in his place." He lifted a water bottle out of the pack and set it on the table. "I won't be going to Boston. I see now why Manny put me on Carine Winter duty. You're not on the sidelines, babe. Whatever's going on, you're right in the thick of it."

North split wood until he'd worked up a blister on one hand. He thought about letting Carine treat it. But he was sweating, irritable, ready to jump out of his damn skin. He'd decided to give Val ninety minutes before calling her back. It seemed like enough time for the cops to execute their search warrant and clear out of the Carreras'apartment.

He'd debated heading back up the notch road to ask the Rancourts to explain their relationship with Louis Sanborn, aka whoever, but he'd had a good dose of the Rancourts yesterday. And there was Carine.

There was always Carine.

She sat on the back steps, bundled up in a moth-eaten wool blanket she'd dug out of a hall closet, so old it might have been left behind by one of her ancestors.

"Doesn't the wool scratch?" he asked her.

"Not that much. It reminds me of being a kid."

"I think that's the same blanket Nate and I used when we rolled you and Antonia up and sent you down the hill over by the road."

"I remember that. We almost got run over."

He sat next to her, smelling the damn blanket. Mothballs, dust, that musty wool smell. "You didn't almost get run over. Gus just said that when he yelled at us, and it stuck in your mind.You were, what, six or seven?You didn't know enough not to believe everything your uncle said."

Even then, there'd been an unspoken rule in his life. Never get involved with the little sister. Nate was his friend. The Winters, in many ways, were his family. Ty had violated the bond between them by falling for Carine-never mind that she hadn't exactly been dragged kicking and screaming into bed with him. He'd still made the first move. It was his doing more than hers.

And there was no undoing it. He'd learned that in the last few days. Even now, it wouldn't take much for him to carry her and her moth-eaten blanket upstairs for the rest of the afternoon.

Maybe Gus was right, and he needed to sell the house. If not for the damn trust fund, he would have had to by now, anyway.

He could sell the house, quit the air force, buy a boat and sail away.

Or go find other mountains to live in.

Carine had placed his cell phone on the steps. He grabbed it and clicked onto his phone book, found Val's number and hit the button for an automatic dial. She answered almost before it rang, static making her hard to understand. "Ty? They're gone. They took the computer, a bunch of folders he had-he doesn't have an office yet, so he's been working out of here."

"You okay?"

"I just wolfed down cold pepperoni pizza, right out of the refrigerator. You'd have thought I was starving. It was disgusting. All that coagulated grease."

Ty smiled. "Val, you're a trip and a half. Anything out of Manny?"

"Are you kidding? He's lucky I don't drive up to Boston and shoot him myself."

She was handy with a gun. Ty wouldn't put it past her, except he'd never seen a couple more committed to each other than Manny and Val Carrera. "He must be cooperating with the police. He has nothing to hide. If it turns out Louis Sanborn traces back to the shooting here last year, we'll know it. Law enforcement will put the pieces together."

She sighed, deflating. "This past year-it hasn't been easy. He did good work as a PJ, you know? He loved it. Then Eric got sick, and I went kerplooey on him-"

"Kerplooey?"

"Yeah." He could almost feel her smile. "It sums up what happened to me rather nicely, a very nasty mix of clinical depression, burn-out, stupidity and guilt."

"Manny says you just need a job."

"He does better with other kinds of head injuries than the kind I had. He got sucked into this Rancourt mess, Ty. He's not going to let go until he's got it sorted it. That's the way he is."

North nodded. "I know."

"This business thing wasn't a great idea. I saw that crap in the file about doing it for me. Bullshit. I think- " She swallowed, no hint of any good humor coming through from her end now. "I'm not sure he likes the idea of being alone with me for the rest of his days. With Eric away at school-"

"Val, don't do this to yourself, okay? You two are going to the home together. You know that."

"I keep thinking-" Her voice quavered. "I don't know, if I could just do something to bring order back to the universe."

Ty tried to smile. "It's not your job to bring order to the universe, Val. Jesus. Some days it's enough just to get in three meals and eight hours of sleep."

But she didn't relent. "Haven't there been times in your life when you've felt as if you're under siege and nothing's ever going to go right again?"

"You bet, Val," Ty said gently. "We've all had those times."

When he hung up, Carine eyed him, obviously curious about what Val had said, but he put her off and dialed Hank's cell phone, remembering the Pave Hawk pilot he'd flown combat missions with just a few years ago was a senator now. But his voice-mail message was unchanged-"Hi, it's Hank. Leave a message…"

"Check on Val Carrera if you can," Ty said. "She's had a bad day. The cops searched-ah, hell, Hank. You're a senator. You can't get mixed up in this mess. Forget it. Val will be fine. So will Manny." He clicked off and tossed the phone onto the steps. "Gus and I agree on one thing. Cell phones should be banned."

Carine slipped her hand out of her blanket and placed it on his thigh. "Val knows she has to hang in there. She will."

He covered her hand with his, noticed that even without the blanket, his was warmer. "You do realize your brother-in-law is a senator?"

"It's sinking in. I'm not registered to vote in Massachusetts -isn't that awful? I didn't even vote for him." She lifted Ty's hand and examined his blister. "I've still got my first-aid kit. I can treat it."

"It hardly even counts as a blister. Share a corner of your blanket with me?"

She tossed a section of it over his shoulder, and he scooted in closer to her. But the thing didn't make him feel nostalgic at all. It stunk, and it scratched. He put a finger through one of the holes. She smiled. "Waste not, want not. Saskia got that part of living up here. I tried to explain to Louis that we Yankees are frugal, not cheap. There's a difference." She took a breath, her voice cracking almost imperceptibly. "Except he wasn't southern after all."

"We don't know that for a fact. We just have Manny's notes."

She shook her head. "Ty, I never would have guessed he wasn't on the level. Never. He was funny, irreverent, nice. Jodie-she lied, too. I never would have guessed they were having an affair. I must not be a very good judge of character."

"Louis could have been funny, irreverent and nice and still not be on the level."

"Not nice. That's what Manny said to me on Wednesday before the police got there. Louis Sanborn wasn't a nice man. I guess he was trying to warn me."

Ty said nothing, just leaned back against the step, taking Carine with him in the blanket. She laid her head against his shoulder, the smell and the roughness of the old blanket apparently not fazing her. He kissed her hair, which was soft and smelled of some citrusy shampoo, not mothballs, and if he smelled like sweat and sawdust, she didn't seem to mind.