Nate watched Angelina’s face as Tate explained what he’d found wrong with the car. She’d need a new transmission, or at least a rebuilt one; he hadn’t been able to save hers. Of course, Tate, who loved to talk, had to go on and tell her that he’d drained the fluids and cleaned everything out before refilling them, but it was too water-damaged and that hadn’t worked.
He did have a bit of good news, and that was that flushing out the brake and power steering systems had seemed to work, but even though the rotors and drums of her brakes were okay, he would have to replace the pads.
The inside of the car would have to be dried out by taking out the seats, carpets, and insulation or it was all going to mold. Tate would have to disconnect all the electrical connectors as well. The fuel tank might also need to be drained, he just hadn’t gotten that far yet. She looked devastated and Nick’s heart hurt for her. When Tate told her how much it would all cost, her face went completely white. Nate knew that Tate’s estimate was extraordinarily low as well, compared to what she’d have to pay elsewhere. When Tate asked her about insurance and she said she didn’t have full coverage on it, she looked like she might cry. He wanted to offer to help, but he was sure she’d say no.
“I guess I don’t have any choice,” she told Tate in a shaky voice. “How long do you think this will all take?”
“Well, I’ll work on it today. The wife won’t let me work Sundays, but I’ll get back to it on Monday morning. I’d say by late Tuesday, early Wednesday at the latest.”
She swallowed hard like she was trying to force down a lump in her throat and nodded. “Okay. Thank you.”
“No problem. Sorry for your troubles.”
She nodded and walked out toward the truck. Nate stayed behind. “If there are any other expenses, let me know. I’ll take care of them, but don’t tell her.”
Tate smiled and nodded. “You going to the dance tonight?” Nate looked out at Angelina standing next to his big truck. She looked so small.
“Yeah, probably. I’ll see you later, Tate, thanks.”
Once Nate and Angel were in the truck he said, “I’ll take you to Houston tomorrow.”
She nodded. “Thank you. I’ll give you gas money.”
He smiled. “It’s fine, I—”
“I’m not letting you take me if you don’t let me help with the gas.”
“Fine. I need to go up and feed my boss’ dogs. You want to go for a ride?”
“No thanks. I think I’ll just go back to Wanda’s, if you don’t mind.”
“Sure.” They rode in silence the few miles back to the house. Nate drove up in front when they got there and Angelina unhooked her seatbelt and grabbed the door handle of the truck.
“Thank you for…” She stopped trailed off, looking at something over Nate’s shoulder. A frightened look was on her face. Nate turned to look, but he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. When he turned back to her, she said, “You know, a ride might do me good.”
“Are you okay?”
“Fine. I just remembered that I didn’t have anything else to do. I may as well go for a ride, right?”
Nate smiled. She’d seen something that worried her, but she obviously didn’t want to talk about it. Between that, her anxiety, and the scar on her neck, it was obvious there was a lot she didn’t want to talk about. He decided he’d just do his best to put her mind at ease. “Right.” She put her seatbelt back on and Nate asked her, “Do you like dogs?”
“Sure…I’ve never had one, but I like them fine.”
“Cade has four of them.” He maneuvered the truck out onto the main road that led through town and into the mountains where Cade lived.
“Four? Why so many?”
Nate laughed. “Who knows? He collects strays. I think that goes for people as well.”
“What do you mean?”
He talked as he drove. It was nice to talk about something with her that didn’t make her sad or nervous. “Just that those of us who work for him are kind of a bunch of misfits too. Marcus Black is an ex-Navy SEAL. He grew up here in Blossom Hill or, more accurately, up on the mountain. He’s a great guy, really smart, and there is no one that I’d rather have back me up in an emergency…but he’s different.”
“Different how?”
“He grew up spending a lot of time alone up there. He still likes to be alone, and he lives without a telephone or social media. His social skills aren’t the best. He’s been in love with my cousin since they were kids. They just finally got together recently and to be honest, I think it was more her that made the moves than him. They went off on a vacation together recently and we got a call that they got married and were extending the vacation. They should be back next week. It’ll be interesting to see where they end up living. I can’t see Sadie living like a hermit in the mountains, but it’s hard to imagine Marcus in town too. When we’re off on assignment, he’d much rather be pitching a tent than sleeping in a nice hotel.” Nick laughed. “I have to wonder what the honeymoon has been like.”
“What about the rest of your coworkers?” she asked curiously.
“Well, there is Grant. He and Marcus met in the military. He’s from Boston, so he talks funny and dresses funny.”
She laughed. “Dresses funny?”
“Yeah, you know…fancy.” She laughed again and he went on. “He just doesn’t really fit on that mountain…but something about it called to him. He bought a place near Marcus and moved here when he got out of the navy. He seems happy most of the time.”
“So what’s weird about him other than the way he dresses?”
“It’s just odd, him choosing to live way up there in the mountains after spending his whole life in the city. Plus, he never talks about his life before the navy…not much anyways. He says things about partying and clubs and women, but nobody knows anything about his family or his roots, you know? He’s another one you want on your side when things go bad, though. He’s tough and brave and loyal to a fault. I just get the feeling sometimes that he’s not telling us everything.”
“Sometimes there are things in our past that we would like to keep there,” she said. Nick glanced over at her. He could see by the look on her face that they weren’t talking about Grant any longer. He was about to ask about her past when she said, “So it’s you, Marcus, Grant, and Cade?”
“And Billy Joe,” he said. “I don’t even know where to begin with that one. Billy Joe is a native of Blossom Hill. I’ve known him most of my life even though I grew up in San Antonio. I used to come here and visit my cousin Sadie, Marcus’s girlfriend—well, wife now, I guess—and her family a lot, and Billy and I hung out. He’s a hell of a lot of fun. Life is one big party to Billy. He was always in trouble when we were kids because he doesn’t have any boundaries or limitations. He’ll try anything once and if it doesn’t kill him, he’ll do it another ten times. I think he invented the saying, ‘Hold my beer and watch this.’”
Angelina laughed and Nate realized he wanted to keep telling her things that made her do that. The sound was like music and he had a hard time keeping his eyes on the road because the laughter seemed to take away all the stress she usually seemed to carry around her eyes and made her even more beautiful.
“I’m serious,” he said with a grin. “He drives his car full-throttle, he bungee jumps and parachutes, he ziplines and snowboards. He had this old dirt bike when we were kids and he’d build these homemade ramps and go down to the junkyard and jump cars. He climbed about thirty or maybe forty feet up a tree down by the river and fixed a rope to swing out into the center of it with, which might not be so bad except that you have to let go of it at just the right spot or you’ll hit the rocks. His mama used to swear he was suicidal. I think he’s just a little bit crazy.”
“So what does he do for your team?”
Nate laughed. “Anything. Everything. He can shoot, drive, hunt, climb, run…you name it. All those talents coupled with the fact that nothing scares him and he comes in as handy as hell on most assignments. Sometimes he needs to be reeled in a little, but Cade handles him well.”
“And what about you? You don’t seem ‘different’ to me.”
He chuckled. “Thanks. I like to think I’m fairly normal, but there is the fact that I spent three years in college and instead of going back for the last year and becoming a cop like I’d always thought I wanted to, I took a job here with Cade.”
“Why?”
“I guess it just appealed to me, being a part of this band of misfits, going around saving the world. I like to travel, but I also like coming home to this town where everyone knows everyone else. I like the camaraderie of our little group. I like learning things from people like Cade and Marcus and Grant. It’s hard to explain, but I don’t know if you’ve ever known a police officer personally…?”
She looked like she was remembering something and made an unhappy face. Nate wondered what she was thinking. Finally, she said, “Not personally, no.”
“Well, I don’t like to stereotype people, but for the most part, the instructors I had at school all had the same type of personality. Controlling, for the most part, and pushy. They look at things in black and white, no gray areas. With Cade and the rest of these guys, there is nothing but gray areas. There is no one way to do things. There are a million ways, so if the first 999,999 don’t work, you just keep going. Since I’ve been working for Cade I’ve got to travel all over the country and I’ve met movie stars and famous athletes…I’m not sure how Cade knows all these people, but I feel like I’m reaping the rewards.”
She was still smiling at him as they drove up into Cade’s long, muddy driveway. Nate pulled the truck up as close to the front porch of the farmhouse style cabin as he could get it and then told her, “Stay there, I’ll come around and help you out.”
She nodded and didn’t look the least bit suspicious or afraid, which made him happy. Nate was one of those people that almost everyone liked right away so when someone didn’t like him, it confused him and made him unhappy. He realized over the past two days that it felt even worse when it was this little pixie that he hardly knew. He wanted her to like him and the more time he spent with her, the more he was hoping for just a little more than like.
He pulled open the passenger door of the truck and she sat still and let him take hold of her around the waist. He lifted her out onto the porch steps so that she didn’t have to step down in the mud. Nate began to follow her up but as soon as he stepped up on them, an eerie feeling came over him. Angelina must have noticed the change in his face. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing…I’m not sure. This is the first time I’ve ever been here, and I mean ever, that Cade’s dogs weren’t barking up a storm.”
She looked around at the windows. “Are they in the house?”
“No. He keeps them in a kennel out back. But they usually start barking as soon as someone comes up in the driveway.” Nate reached for the doorknob and turned it.
“It’s not locked?”
He shook his head. “There’s no need for it around here. Cade keeps his guns and anything else that might hurt someone locked up in his basement, but no one up here locks their doors, really.”
That statement looked like it terrified Angelina. The fact that Nate stepped through the front door and the dogs still weren’t going crazy terrified him a little bit. Angelina followed him into Cade’s small, comfortable living room and looked around with wide eyes like she expected someone to be waiting for them in there. There was no one there and nothing looked out of place. He walked down the hallway toward the bedrooms, checking the guest room first and then Cade’s room, but still nothing looked out of place. Nate cleaned the mud off the floors the last time he’d been there and they were still clean too. Surely if anyone had been sneaking around out there, they wouldn’t have stopped to clean up their footprints. He turned to go back up the hall and collided with Angelina. She’d been following him step for step.
“Sorry,” she mumbled as she moved out of his way.
“It’s okay. Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” She didn’t look fine. She looked absolutely spooked. He left it alone and went toward the kitchen. She continued to follow him. Everything there was fine as well. It was when he looked out the kitchen window and into the dog kennel that his world began to spin.
“Oh, fuck!”
“Nate? What is it?” Angelina wasn’t tall enough to see out the window over Cade’s sink. For that, Nate was glad. He felt like all the color was gone from his face and what he’d eaten for breakfast was rolling around in his stomach, looking for a place to go. “Nate?”
“I’m sorry,” he said thickly, swallowing the bile that was making its way up through his esophagus to his mouth. “Um…shit. It’s the dogs.”
“What about them?” He suddenly remembered the key to the kennel was on the mud porch. Without answering Angelina, he ran toward it and as soon as he turned the corner he saw the hook on the wall was empty. “Nate, you’re scaring me,” she said shakily from behind him.
“I think they’re dead,” he said flatly. “Jesus, there’s a lot of blood. Something must have gotten a hold of them…” He was still staring at the space where the keys were missing. No animal had opened those kennels and gone in and killed those dogs. Someone had done that…but why?
“Nate?” Angel said again.
He didn’t respond. He was talking out loud to himself now “How am I going to tell Cade?”