Cold Pursuit - Carla Neggers [106]
She pulled out a chair at the table and sat down, irritated when Thomas didn’t even look at her. He stared blankly out at the snow. A.J. had dropped into a chair across from him. A.J. looked serious and hard-bitten, but from what Melanie had gathered, he usually did.
“I just heard from Kyle,” she said with just the right touch of both relief and caution. “He got through to me on my cell phone just before his died. I could hardly hear him, but Nora’s fine. He ran into her above the falls. She didn’t have a clue anyone was worried about her.”
“Oh, thank God.” Thomas flopped back in his chair and almost cried. “Thank God.”
Melanie liked giving him the good news. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it, and she let her eyes fill with tears. “I know it’s a hard time for you, darling,” she said.
“Did he say anything about Jo and Elijah?” A.J. asked.
She shook her head. “No, but he only had a few seconds, really, before his cell phone died.”
A.J. said nothing, and Melanie sensed his skepticism. The Camerons were all so damn tough. The police could check her cell-phone records for proof that Kyle had called her, but they’d have to have a reason. She wouldn’t give them one, and if she did, she’d get out, flee. She didn’t want it to come to that, but she was prepared. She had money stashed. So did Kyle. They could disappear for a couple of years. Let things cool off. Then resurface.
Thomas pushed his cocoa aside and shot to his feet, and she bit back her irritation with A.J. His question had clearly spoiled Thomas’s sense of relief. “Then Jo and Elijah are looking in the wrong place,” he said. “They’re stuck in the storm now, too. What about Devin?”
A.J.’s eyes darkened, but he left the dining room without another word.
Melanie stood next to Thomas and hooked her arm through his. “You’re so warm,” she said, leaning into his shoulder.
“The snow’s piling up. The wind, especially up on the mountain…” He was clearly too distressed to go on.
Melanie slipped his arm around her waist and snuggled into him even closer. He was a little soft in the waist. Not hard everywhere like Kyle. But that was okay. “Kyle’s with Nora. He’ll do what he can for Devin. And Jo and Elijah—”
“I’m not worried about them. They’re both Black Falls natives who know these mountains better than anyone.” Thomas seemed to struggle to make himself sound optimistic. “They’ll do fine up there.”
Melanie felt a sharp prick of fear.
Then she thought—this could be good.
It could work to her advantage if Kyle didn’t come off the mountain, either.
Whatever happened, she’d do what she had to do. Kill Nora. Kill Devin. Kill Kyle, too, if she had to. Jo, Elijah. Thomas.
All of them.
But that was crazy thinking, an overreaction to her circumstances, although she relished how it made her feel, how it relieved her fear and her tension to picture herself killing all the people who threatened her and her happiness with Thomas.
He kissed her on the top of the head. “What would I do without you?”
Melanie squeezed him gently. Everything would work out. She and Kyle had yet to fail, and they understood what they were up against. They’d do what they had to, and that would be that.
Kyle would find a new partner, and she would marry Thomas.
They just had to get through the long night ahead.
Thirty
Grit had spent the day shaking every tree in Washington, and he found his way to the attractive suburban street where Thomas Asher lived just as the sun went down. He’d had to do a combination of bus, cab and walking to get there.
The house was a Dutch Colonial with mature gardens and shade trees. Nice place even in the November gray, Grit thought. Earlier in the day he’d been to the Bruni house in Georgetown. It was smaller but more expensive, more elegant. Law enforcement had already done their thing there, and it was quiet when