Cold River - Carla Neggers [8]
Scott ordered coffee, which he took to the largest of the café’s tables.
Zack Harper, Beth’s younger brother and a local firefighter, arrived next and ordered coffee, a cranberry-nut muffin and a scone. “Did Jo get you out running this morning already?” Hannah asked cheerfully. With their Secret Service agent sister back in town, both Zack and Beth liked to complain that Jo was killing them with exercise.
Zack shook his head. “Grit Taylor did. Guy’s got one leg, and he’s up at oh-dark-thirty to do three miles along the lake.”
Hannah had met Ryan “Grit” Taylor, a Navy SEAL, several times at the cafe. He and Elijah Cameron had both been wounded in combat in Afghanistan in April, around the same time Elijah’s father had died of the cold in Vermont. Shot in the femoral artery, Elijah had managed to tie a tourniquet on his thigh and save his own life. He’d eventually made a full recovery. Grit’s progress was slower. He had helped find an eyewitness to Alex Bruni’s murder in Washington, D.C., and had joined Elijah in Black Falls after Kyle Rigby and Melanie Kendall were dead. He’d been back and forth to Washington since mid-November, with no apparent official role in the investigation.
Zack took his coffee, muffin and scone from Hannah and headed over to Scott’s table. As a firefighter, Zack was primarily interested in the particulars of how Melanie Kendall’s car had blown up. Who’d placed the crude pipe bomb in her car? Who’d set it off? Were there other bombs tucked away in Black Falls for future use?
Zack and Scott were followed by Jo Harper and Elijah Cameron. Jo, two years older than Beth and a Secret Service agent, happened to be in her hometown in November when Kyle Rigby and Melanie Kendall had targeted the two teenagers. She and Elijah had stopped them, and Jo had been assigned to the joint federal, state and local task force investigating the tangle of crimes.
Jo might be stuck in Black Falls, Hannah thought, but she was stuck there with Elijah. Their rekindled romance amid the violence in November was the talk of the town.
Of all the Cameron brothers, Hannah had the easiest relationship with Elijah. “What’s good today?” he asked.
“Beth and Dominique did all the cooking,” Hannah said, “which means everything’s good.”
He laughed. “Then I’ll have one of each.”
Jo rolled her eyes, but she was obviously amused. “He’s trying to learn charm from Sean. Speaking of whom—” She nodded to the main entrance. “Here he is right now.”
Hannah felt the draft from the open door as Sean walked into the café and approached the glass case. Unable to stop herself, she noted the shape of his shoulders and hips and the cut of his dark hair. He had on his mountain man jacket, not his long black cashmere coat, and, like his older brother, was bareheaded.
Hannah cleared her throat and saw that Elijah had noticed her sudden awkwardness, but he made no comment. If Jo noticed, she didn’t show it. Hannah handed them two mugs of coffee and two plates with muffins and scones, and they retreated to the table with Zack and Scott. Investigators had made the café a regular stop, but this morning’s gathering was more one of family and friends than anything official, never mind that it included a local firefighter, a state cop and a federal agent.
And an experienced Special Forces soldier. According to Beth Harper, the shots Elijah had fired to stop Kyle Rigby from killing him, Devin, Nora and Jo on Cameron Mountain five weeks ago had been dead-on.
Hannah hadn’t been up to the spot yet where her brother had nearly died. She knew she’d go. It was just a question of when.
Sunlight was spreading into the café, sparkling on the snow-covered river,