Mistaken Identity
Autor
Shirlee McCoy
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HarlequinOne
Trinity Miller didn’t scare easily, but she was scared now.
It wasn’t the darkness of the woods that stretched out to either side of the old dirt road that had her rattled. It wasn’t the full moon hovering over mountain vistas. It wasn’t even the silence in her old Jeep Cherokee that was getting to her.
It was the weird feeling she had.
The one that seemed to be telling her to turn around and leave. If she’d told either of her brothers about it, they’d have said she should listen. Of course, she hadn’t told Jackson or Chance what she was doing. They both thought she was on a weekend jaunt to New England to see the fall foliage, eat the crisp, ripe apples. Decide what direction she wanted her life to go.
All of those things were true.
There just happened to be a couple of tiny little details that she hadn’t offered. Like the fact that she was going to pay a visit to a man who was notoriously private. Like the fact that he lived in Middle-of-Nowhere, Maine.
Like the fact that she hadn’t told Mason Gains she was coming or asked permission to drive down the road that had been clearly marked with no-trespassing signs.
Yeah. She’d skipped a few details when she’d been explaining things to her brothers. They’d been too busy with their work and their families to notice she was hedging around questions and offering minimal details. Twelve hours ago, when she’d left her Annapolis home and headed north, she’d been happy about that.
Now, with fear sitting like a hard rock in her belly, she wouldn’t have minded having one or the other of her brothers sitting beside her.
Go home.
That’s what they’d have wanted her to do. Knowing them, they’d have found a way to send her packing so they could handle the situation themselves.
Whatever the situation was.
She frowned. It wasn’t like she was heading into a hostage rescue mission. She was going to talk to a guy who made prosthetic limbs for a living. How dangerous could it be?
Unless Mason Gains had a gun and decided to shoot first and ask questions later, Trinity should be just fine. She’d done her research, used her computer forensic background to find out everything she could about Mason. She hadn’t found any hint of violence, any indication that he’d been in trouble with the law. He’d served his country, gone to college, gone into business doing something that could enhance the lives of wounded warriors.
He was a hero.
Heroes didn’t shoot unarmed women.
She hoped.
If they did, there were sure a lot of places to hide a body around here.
At least Bryn knew where Trinity was. If she didn’t return home, she could count on her best friend to let everyone know where she’d been and what she’d been up to.
By that time, it would be too late, of course.
Trinity would be buried somewhere in the forest, her body concealed under layers of dirt, dead leaves and fallen pine needles. She frowned. That was not a good direction for her thoughts to go. Not when she was already scared.
“You shouldn’t be scared,” she muttered, breaking the eerie silence.
Sure, she was in the middle of nowhere. Sure, there was nothing but trees and mountains as far as the eye could see, but she’d been hiking in rougher areas. She worked search and rescue, and she’d been out on rainy nights and snowy ones, serving as a flanker for K-9 teams. She’d trekked through mountains and wetland, and she’d done it without even a shiver of alarm, so she had no reason to be sitting in her locked Jeep, her heart pounding with fear as she drove down a pitch-black mountain road.
She leaned forward to ease the tension from her lower back. She’d been driving for hours, just stopping long enough to gas up and move on. Mason Gains didn’t like being interrupted. He had important work to do, and he couldn’t be bothered with unexpected visitors. He’d made that clear in a couple of interviews he’d done. Both had been taped several years ago. Since then he’d been quiet, living and working—according to his company website—somewhere in New England.
It had taken just under two weeks for Trinity to figure out exactly where that was. For the first time in longer than she cared to remember, she felt like her expertise in computer forensics was paying off in a way that would really matter to someone she cared about.
In ten days Bryn’s son Henry would have surgery to remove his left leg. The cancer that was growing in his bone could almost certainly be stopped that way. So could his running dreams. An all-star athlete, he’d been training for Junior Olympics and Bryn had been told that he’d go even farther than that. Henry had his Navy SEAL father’s drive, but he didn’t have his father. Rick had been killed in Iraq when Henry was a toddler. Bryn had been working her butt off ever since, trying to be mother and father to their son.
This newest blow had shaken her, and Trinity was doing everything she could to buoy her.
This journey was part of that.
It was possible Mason would turn her away at the door. It was possible he’d refuse to hear her out. It was even more possible that he’d listen and then tell her what she already knew—he only made prosthetic limbs for veterans. He didn’t work with kids.
She’d still had to come. She’d had to try.
She’d just rather not die doing it.
She eyed the dark trees, the distant mountains and the road that stretched out in front of her. Not a light. Not a house. Not any sign of civilization. Maybe she should turn around; return when the sun came up.
“Five minutes,” she whispered because the silence was starting to get to her and the only thing she was getting on her radio was static. “If I don’t see something by then, I’m turning around.”
The wind howled, sweeping through the forest and swirling along the road. Normally, Trinity loved storms, but if one was blowing in, she didn’t want to be on a dirt road in an area with spotty reception. Even Jeeps could get stuck in mud or crushed by falling trees.
So, that was that.
She was turning around.
She’d drive the fifty miles to Whisper Lake and find the little bed-and-breakfast she’d reserved a room in. She’d get a good night’s sleep and she’d come at the problem fresh in the morning. Obviously she’d miscalculated the distance to Mason’s property. For all she knew, she wasn’t even on the right road. Aside from the no-trespassing signs, the road wasn’t marked. She had no idea what the street address for the house was. She didn’t even know if there was one. All she knew was what she’d found by accessing public records—Mason Gains owned two-thousand acres of land somewhere very close to where she was driving.
She slowed, trying to find a wide enough spot to turn around, and caught something in her periphery. A light glimmered through the trees to her left.
A window? It looked like it, and if there was a window, there had to be a house.
Her pulse jumped and she accelerated again, following the curve of the road through the trees and out into the open. The road ended there, stopping abruptly at the edge of a grassy field.
A mile out, a house jutted up against the blue-black sky, the forest pushing in behind it, crowding close enough that Trinity couldn’t see where the house ended and the forest began.
That had to be Mason’s house.
At least, she hoped it was his house.
If it wasn’t, she was about to walk across a field and knock on a stranger’s door.
Who was she kidding?
Mason was a stranger.
He wasn’t going to be happy to see her. She was going, anyway. She’d promised Bryn that she’d try, and that meant giving her best effort.
Hopefully it wouldn’t get her killed.
She shoved her phone and keys in her jacket pocket and got out of the Jeep. The early fall air already held a hint of bitter winter, the moisture in it biting and cold. Lights spilled out of several windows of the ranch-style house. She could see the details more clearly as she approached—the wrap-around porch, whitewashed and gleaming. The black door and gray siding. No shrubs or bushes butted up against the house. No trees. No fences. Nothing that would impede the owner’s view of the road and the field.
That didn’t make Trinity feel any more comfortable with the situation. Mason had served three tours overseas. He’d been a helicopter pilot and had seen his share of combat. It was possible that—like so many of the men and women he worked with—he had PTSD. If he did, he might be even less likely to appreciate a random stranger showing up at nine in the evening.
She walked up the porch steps, pulling her cell phone out of her pocket as she went. She didn’t know if she had cell reception, but she felt better holding on to the possibility.
She knocked, the sound echoing through the night. A bird startled from a tree, a critter scurried under the porch, but no one came to the door.
She knocked again, thought she saw one of the curtains in the front window move. Someone was there. She could feel him watching as she stepped back off the porch.
“Mason?” she called, surprised at the tremor she heard in her voice.
Nerves weren’t her style any more than fear was.
No response. Just the same silent house and that little flutter of curtain movement.
Someone was definitely in there.
Since he hadn’t shouted for her to leave or pointed a gun in her direction, she was going to keep trying to get him to open the door. Bryn was waiting for the mission-accomplished call and Trinity planned to make it. Mason Gains was the best at what he did. His prosthetic devices were used by some of the highest level athletes in the world. Getting him to agree to make one for Henry would lift the tween’s spirits and give him back the hope he’d lost the day he’d been told he was going to lose his leg. That was what Bryn wanted more than anything, and it was what Trinity wanted for her.
She walked around the side of the house. The windows were dark there, the moon the only light. The backyard was a tiny stretch of grass that bumped about against deep woods. To the right, a section had been cleared for a large workshop and a three-stall garage. An SUV sat in front of one stall, its windows tinted.
Washington, DC, license plate.
Mason must have visitors.
Good. He’d be less likely to shoot her and dump her body if there were witnesses around.
“Not funny, Trin,” she muttered as she walked up the three stairs that led to a small deck.
She planned to knock on the back door, but it was open, a screen the only thing separating her from the room beyond. A kitchen, maybe. She thought she could see the outline of a refrigerator in the darkness, see what looked like a table and chairs, and something else. A person? It looked like it. Not moving, just hanging back a few feet from the screen, watching her the way she was watching him.
She didn’t call out again, didn’t move closer.
Something was off. She could feel it in the frigid air and in the frantic pounding of her heart.
She stepped back, quietly, cautiously, eyes glued to person behind the screen.
The stairs were right behind her and she felt for them with her foot, afraid to turn away. Afraid that if she did, whoever was on the other side of the screen would attack.
She found the first step and moved down, her hair suddenly standing on end, her nerves alive with warning. The person didn’t move. Not an inch, but the air vibrated with energy.
Everything inside told her to run and, this time, she was going with her gut.
She swung around just as a quiet click broke the silence.
She knew the sound as well as she knew the sound of her mother’s voice. A gun safety being released.
She had seconds, and she used them, her feet moving almost before the sound registered. She leaped to the left, landing hard on thick grass. She stumbled, kept going, racing toward the trees as the first shot rang out.
The bullet whizzed past, slammed into a tree a few feet away, the trunk splintering, bits of it flying into Trinity’s face as she ducked and kept running.
The woods were there, and she dove into thick foliage, the sound of footsteps following her. A man called out, another answered, and she knew she was in bigger trouble than she ever could have imagined.
She’d ignored all the internal warnings, all the little shivers of doubt and fear, and she’d walked in on something she shouldn’t have.
Like an idiot.
Like a kid who didn’t know what she was doing or how to take care of herself.
Someone snagged the back of her jacket and she fell back, her phone flying from her grasp as she fought to free herself.
Elbow to a soft stomach, fist to a nose. She palmed the guy in the chin and finally broke free of his grasp. No plan except to escape. No destination but the forest with its thick trees and dark shadows. She had no idea where she was going or what she’d do once she got there. She just knew she had to keep moving.
She raced through heavy brambles, thorns catching on her skin and clothes, tearing at her hair. Blood seeped from a long scratch on her cheek, but she didn’t take time to wipe it away. She could still hear branches breaking, feet pounding, someone closing in.
Please, God. Please get me out of this, and I will always tell the entire truth instead of keeping little pieces of it to myself. I promise. Just help me, she prayed, bargaining in a way she hadn’t since she was old enough to understand how useless and silly it was.
God didn’t bargain.
He didn’t only come around when someone was in trouble, either.
He worked in His way and in His time, and Trinity was cool with that.
She wasn’t cool with dying.
She knew her eternal destiny, but she’d rather not have her body buried in the woods in Maine, her family spending the rest of their lives wondering what had happened to her the way they had always wondered what had happened to her older sister.
Behind her, someone called out, the voice deep and masculine. There was an answer from somewhere to her left, and she knew they were trying to pen her in, come at her from two sides. Or maybe even three.
She ran down a steep slope, nearly tumbling into a creek that burbled over rocks and old logs. She jumped over a narrow section, her feet sinking into mud on the far bank. She didn’t stop to smooth the prints away. She could hear her pursuer charging through the woods. Closing in. And she had no way of calling for help, no one flanking her, making sure she survived.
She was alone.
The way she’d wanted it, because she’d been tired of standing in the shadows of her brothers.
Now she wished they were here.
She wished she’d been more honest about her reasons for traveling to Maine and told them exactly where she planned to be. She wished a lot of things, but wishes were about as useful as umbrellas in hurricanes.
She sprinted uphill and found herself on a narrow path that skirted a ledge. A hundred feet below, dark water shimmered in the moonlight. A lake! And, beyond that, house lights. She wasn’t sure how far. A couple of miles away maybe. If she could make it there, she could knock on a door, find a phone, call for help.
If she could make it.
Someone barreled onto the path a few hundred feet to her left. She didn’t think, didn’t hesitate. She lowered herself over the ledge, grabbing tree branches to stop her momentum as she scrambled down. If she’d had all the time in the world, she could have made it, but time wasn’t on her side, and she was rushing, moving from one handhold to the other, not checking to see if they would hold her weight. She felt one give. The earth was moist from recent rain, the roots probably barely clinging to the side of the steep hill.
She kept moving, listening to the sudden silence. The thickness of it pulsed in the air, as alive and real as her terror. Had the guy pulled his gun? Did he have night-vision goggles? Was he aiming his gun at her?
She grabbed a pine sapling, her feet slipping in her haste to escape. The sapling gave, pulling away from the ground and tumbling toward the lake, Trinity tumbling with it.
And, she knew it was over.
If the fall didn’t kill her, the gunman would, and then she’d be another statistic, another tragedy, another sorrow for her family to bear.
* * *
Going to an old friend’s funeral hadn’t been fun.
Attending his own?
Not something Mason Gains intended to do.
He moved silently through the forest, following the trail of broken branches that led away from his house and workshop. Two-thousand acres of Maine wilderness usually kept people away. That was how he liked it.
Tonight, someone had infiltrated his sanctuary, trespassed on his property and fired a shot that he’d heard loud and clear as he was returning home. If he hadn’t had the windows down, letting cold air sweep away the memory of blood and gunpowder and death that had chased him from Afghanistan and Iraq, followed him across continents and through years of therapy, he might not have heard the gunshot.
But he’d had the windows down, cold air cooling the sweat that beaded his brow, and he’d heard it. He’d known exactly what it was, and he’d known it didn’t belong. This was private property bordered by a state park. No hunting allowed there. Even if there had been, it wasn’t hunting season, and he was certain he hadn’t heard a rifle. He’d heard a handgun. One quick, sharp, report and then silence.
He’d parked the truck on the side of the long driveway, partially hiding it behind a patch of thick shrubs he’d planted with just that purpose in mind. Then he’d taken off on foot, skirting the edge of the driveway, keeping to the shadows as he made his way to the house. He’d noticed the lights first. Then, the SUV parked near his workshop; the open back door, a light shining beyond it. He’d called the police, and then done a sweep of the exterior. There’d been a Jeep parked at the far edge of the field near an old logging road that no one ever used. No other vehicles. No sign of anyone wandering around close to the house. He’d gone inside. Quietly. Just like he’d been trained to do in the military.
There’d been one person inside the house, trying to push aside the built-in book shelves that served as a door to his office. It had taken about six seconds to disarm and apprehend the guy. Youngish with a beer belly and pasty skin, he’d blabbered on about not wanting to die. Funny how people were most remorseful after they’d been caught.
Or not.
He’d asked a few questions, made a few idle threats. Handguns were dangerous, and they were convincing. Mason always carried one, and the kid had spilled enough information to let Mason know that there were two other men. They were in the woods, hunting for Mason’s girlfriend.
There was one problem with that.
Mason had no girlfriend.
So...three unknown people were wandering his property.
The police were on the way, but Mason didn’t believe in waiting around for others to do what he could. He’d already tied up the kid and left him trussed like a Thanksgiving turkey, lying on the floor near the bookshelves.
Now he was going to find the other players in the game.
It shouldn’t be hard. They’d left a noticeable trail, and he was having no trouble at all following it. He eased through thick undergrowth, moving along the edge of the creek that cut through his property. There were footprints in the bank. Large boots and smaller sneakers. The woman who was supposed to be his girlfriend?
She’d headed up the embankment. He followed.
The steep rise led to a ledge that looked out over Whisper Lake. Beyond that, she’d have seen the lights of Whisper—the closest town. Just a pinprick on the map. Fifteen hundred residents on a good day, and exactly the kind of place Mason would have lived if he’d wanted to live close to civilization.
He shopped in the little grocery store there.
When friends came to visit, he took them to the tackle shop, the diner, the ice cream place. There wasn’t much in Whisper, but it was plenty to keep the residents happy.
A pretty little place, but it was nearly fifty miles away. No way could anyone reach it on foot from his property, but he doubted his unwanted visitor knew that. If she’d been running from someone, she probably hadn’t even cared.
He could hear sirens in the distance. Other than that, the woods were silent and still, eerie in their quiet. He’d bought the property for its solitude and for its view of the lake. He’d spent plenty of time sitting in the darkness, looking out over the water, praying for answers to questions he wasn’t even sure he could give voice to.
He hadn’t found any, but he still enjoyed the view.
He didn’t enjoy having people interrupt his work.
He had three prosthetic limbs to design and create. His team would be there Monday morning. Just like always. Mason had planned to return Sunday night but John’s funeral had been a sad event with a handful of mourners, no church service, no celebration of life. Just the graveside service and John’s wife, Sally, crying quietly. She’d wanted Mason to stay for a couple of days. She’d offered him a room in the single-wide trailer she and John had shared. She’d actually begged Mason to stay, but their Nyack, New York, home had seemed claustrophobic.
Or, maybe, it had been the memories that had penned him in.
It didn’t matter.
He’d returned two days early and someone was on his property.
Someone who’d been able to disarm the state-of-the-art security system. Someone who’d known there was an office behind the bookshelves.
That narrowed the list to maybe three or four people who worked for him, a close friend who happened to be the town sheriff and John.
He’d betrayed Mason once. It was more than possible that he’d done it again before he’d died.
Mason skirted the ledge that looked out over the lake, eyeing the foliage below, the dark water beyond it.
A small sneaker print was pressed into the path. He used that as his guide, easing himself over the ledge and finding his footing against the rock and damp earth.
He could see evidence of hands grasping branches—snapped twigs, scuff marks in the earth. Toes pressed deep into dirt.
She’d made it about halfway down when she’d fallen. He could see the uprooted sapling, the slide of her body in pine needles. He stopped, listening to the wind rustling in the leaves, the soft lap of water against the shore below him, the sounds of the sirens drawing closer. No branches breaking. No footsteps. He felt alone. Just like he should be.
He took out his light, aiming the beam down the steep slope. He could see the direction her body had taken, the dirt and rocks that had tumbled with her.
Near the bottom, the light fell on pale skin, light brown hair. Jeans. Jacket. A woman for sure. Motionless.
Dead?
He hoped not. She might be a trespasser, but she didn’t deserve to die for that. He tucked the light back in his pocket and the woman jumped up.
“Hey!” he called. “Hold on!”
She’d heard. He was certain of that.
She didn’t listen.
She ran toward the lake, moving quickly enough that he wasn’t all that concerned about her being injured.
He scrambled down the rest of the slope, racing across pebbly earth. She was yards ahead of him, illuminated by moonlight as she waded into the water and dove below its surface.
If he didn’t get her out, she’d die there, the cold stealing her strength and her life before she even knew it was happening.
He moved along the shore, his light dancing across the dark lake. She’d gone down, and she hadn’t come back up, but he could see the small ripples on the surface of the water, subtle signs that she was moving beneath it. He shrugged out of his coat, his handgun zipped into an interior pocket, unbuttoned the dress shirt he’d worn to John’s funeral and dropped that on top of it.
He waited until she surfaced, her head popping up as she gulped for air.
That was it. All the opportunity he needed.
He waded into the frigid water and went after her.
