Holly watched as Noah stepped back and took the call. She could feel her heart pounding in her chest. Had that really happened? Had she just come close to blurting out to Noah that she was attracted to him? Had she really stood there in the snow, holding his hand like they were teenagers, when there were so many more important things going on? She turned and walked a few paces, gazing toward the wintry horizon and hoping Noah would think she was just giving him privacy for his phone call.
Help me, Lord. I don’t understand my heart or my mind now. All I know is they’re tugging me toward this man I’ve just met and am only starting to get to know.
She turned back and looked at his strong, handsome form silhouetted against the sky.
He ran his gloved hand over the strong lines of his jaw. “Okay, I’ll see you there.” Noah clicked off the phone and turned back. “So, as you likely heard, that was Seth. Long story short, he thinks he might’ve figured out where Snitch5751 sent his messages to the Imposters from. But it’s raw data and he’s still processing it. He’s hoping by the time I get there he’ll have something more concrete for me.”
Relief flooded his face. He glanced to the sky and she watched as the words Thank You, God moved across his lips. Then he turned back to her. “I think we’ve got a lead, and I’m going to go check it out.”
“We’re going to check it out,” she said.
He’d already taken two steps toward the house when the sound of her voice made him stop. “No, I’m going. You’re staying here. You were in an accident and you’re still recovering from a concussion.”
“Yes, and I’ve been recovering.” She crossed her arms. “Anne said I was okay to go on short drives.”
“Around town!” His hands flew up in the air. “To get coffee! Not to go see someone in witness protection about locating a pair of cyber terrorists!”
“Who is sitting in front of a computer in a safe house!” She mimicked his gesture, as if they were both fighting an invisible enemy that had suddenly materialized between them. “Please, Noah, I’ve been stuck doing nothing for seventy-two hours. I’m the only one of us who’s seen the Imposters, so I’m the only one who will recognize them if they run into you.”
Noah’s head was shaking. She knew what he was about to say.
Couldn’t he see how much she needed to get out of the house and do something, even if it was just sitting in a truck for half an hour and listening to whatever intel Seth had dug up?
“What if the Imposters spot you and try to kidnap or kill you?” he argued.
“Then you’ll be there to have my back!” she said. “You think I’m going to be safer here without you?”
She watched as his jaw clenched and his eyes rose to the sky. The long pause that followed was punctuated only by the whistling wind and her own chattering teeth.
“Yes!” Noah said finally. “I think you’ll be safer here alone then coming to see Seth with me. Because I think the Imposters don’t know you’re here. I think they’re much more likely to find you if we go out in the world. So I think you’re wrong. Totally wrong.”
Was she? She’d thought she’d been pretty convincing, actually.
“What do I have to say to convince you?” she asked.
“I don’t think you can!” Noah said. Then as she watched, his shoulders fell. “But I also recognize that you’re a soldier. You’re clearly plenty tough and strong enough to handle yourself. You’ve got a better sense of how your head is feeling than I do, and you’re not a prisoner here. As you know, the fact that you didn’t report into witness protection and get assigned a new officer after Elias died means technically you’re not even in witness protection anymore! So I don’t actually have any right to tell you what to do.”
Wow. She rocked back on her heels.
For a long moment he didn’t say anything. Neither did she. What could she say? She’d been gearing up for a fight and he’d just dropped his hands and stepped out of the ring.
“Thank you,” she said at last, not knowing what else to say. “Trust me, I’m not about to do something stupid or risky.”
“I believe you.” He crossed his arms. “Even though you climbed out a window.”
“Three days ago!” She cut him off. “Before I realized I had a concussion, and then saw a doctor and took three days’ prescribed rest!”
“I’m not fighting you on this,” Noah said. “Just because I don’t think you’re right doesn’t mean I don’t think your points are valid. I actually agree that leaving you isn’t ideal, either.” He blew out a long breath. “Okay, here’s what I want to do. I want to ask Anne if she’s okay with it. If not, we’ll find another solution. I’d also like you to take it slow and not push yourself past the breaking point. If anything dangerous or even suspicious goes down I’m turning around and bringing you back here, okay?”
She nodded. Yeah, all that was fair. And he was actually being nicer about it than she probably would’ve been if the tables were turned.
“Also, you’re going to need a disguise. Not a makeshift Seth disguise. An actual good one.”
“Deal.” For a moment she was even tempted to reach out and shake his hand.
“Good,” he said. “Because I would really hate it if something bad happened to you.”
“I’d hate it if something bad happened to you, too.”
A flicker of that smile she was really growing to like turned up the corners of his lips again.
“Right. Then we first go talk to Anne. After that we’ll see what we can do to make you look less like yourself.”
They started back toward the house.
Noah seemed resigned when Anne cleared Holly to go, with pretty much the same restrictions he had placed—like paying attention to her symptoms, taking it slow and resting if the headache came back. Then Noah led Holly upstairs and knocked on Drew’s door. The young man opened it and Holly realized it didn’t actually lead to a bedroom, but a stairwell leading up to an attic room above. Drew’s eyebrows rose in an expression that reminded her of his uncle.
“Holly needs a disguise,” Noah said. “Something simple that makes her not look like herself. I was wondering if you had something she could borrow.”
Drew’s lips turned up quizzically and a smile crinkled the corners of his eyes. “All right, come on.”
They followed him up the stairs and came out in a long space with slanting walls. She gasped. It was a workshop. Elaborate masks of alien creatures and animals smiled, snarled and stared at her. Jars and tubes of paint and an array of brushes spilled across a large table.
Holly pressed her hand to her lips. She knew Drew wanted to get into movie special effects makeup and had seen the pictures in his portfolio. But she’d never imagined he was capable of anything like this.
For a long moment Drew just stood there with his arms crossed, somehow managing to look both a lot older and younger than seventeen at the same time. Then he turned to his uncle. “Give us twenty minutes?”
Noah nodded. “Sounds good. I have some phone calls to make. Don’t make her look like a goblin or an elf.” He glanced at Holly. “Meet you downstairs.”
When he’d left, she frowned at Drew. “Tell me he’s not going to leave without me,” she said.
“He wouldn’t.” The youth shook his head. “Uncle Nah is a really good guy.”
He pulled a stool over to the table and waved her toward it. She sat.
“Why do you call him Uncle Nah?” she asked.
“It’s my dad’s nickname for him.” Drew shrugged. “No-Nah. I think it goes back to when they were teenagers, because he tried to stop him from doing anything fun.” His shoulders rose and fell, like he wasn’t committing to either side of the argument.
Caleb. Even after all the time she’d spent in the house she didn’t know much about him, including why he wasn’t home with his family for Christmas.
“I think you’re better off with extensions than a wig,” Drew said. “Wigs fall off, and extensions can last for days. It’s what movies use for more serious stunt work.”
“Sounds good.” She’d never had long hair and never wanted it. And it wasn’t like Noah was about to be okay with her doing anything that would remotely qualify as a stunt. Still, anything was better than another wig.
“All I’ve got is special effects movie makeup,” he said. “It’s a lot thicker than regular makeup, but applied the right way it can be even more effective than a fake nose or plastic appliance. Again, those tear and fall off, too. My mom will no doubt have clothes you can borrow. And I have some contacts that will change the color of your eyes.”
So she really was going to look nothing like herself.
She watched as he busied himself setting up the hair extensions.
“Your work is incredible,” she said.
“Thank you.” Again, she noticed that although his lips were slow to smile, pride hovered behind the guarded shield in his eyes.
“You’re Corporal Hildegard Asher, aren’t you?” he asked. “I’ve been following the inquiry into General Bertie online.”
Her heart stuttered a beat. “You haven’t told anyone, have you?”
“Of course not.” Drew rolled his eyes. “The internet says you’re somewhere in British Columbia, eloping with some guy named Smith and going to England?”
She snorted. “Don’t believe everything you read online.”
“Lizzy’s apparently telling everyone at church and preschool that you’re marrying Uncle Nah,” he said. “And Mom just told me you needed help. Is that why you’re here? Because people want to hurt you for telling the inquiry Bertie gave weapons to people overseas?”
She nodded. “It’s a lot bigger than that now. But yeah, that was the start of it.”
He opened another drawer and started pulling out various pots of makeup, heavier and brighter than anything she’d ever worn before.
“I had problems with some kids at school,” he said, again not quite looking at her. “Really bad stuff. Everybody knew it was happening, but nobody would admit it.” He shuddered as if trying to shake off the memory. “But my mom would notice bruises and stuff, because she’s a doctor, right? Then she’d go in and raise a fuss. And finally one kid came out and said yeah, I was being hurt. And it was hard to explain, but it was one of the best moments of my life, right? Because the bullying was out there. It wasn’t hidden anymore. And I figure what you’re doing is really brave. Because everybody loves General Bertie. People talk about his service record and huge charity Christmas parties like he walks on water. And you’re pointing out he made mistakes. And that takes guts.”
“Thank you,” she murmured, not knowing what else to say. “I’m sorry kids at school were mean to you.”
“Thanks.” He nodded. “Some people think it’s weird for a guy to be this into the arts and creating movie creatures.”
“Or a girl to be into the army,” Holly said.
This time a genuine smile flashed across his lips and for the first time his eyes really met hers. “Yeah, I guess that, too. Uncle Nah was really supportive. Mom was great, too.”
“And your dad?” she asked.
“He doesn’t understand me, and he doesn’t get me,” Drew said. “But he loves me and that’s good enough for now. Lizzy told him you and Uncle Nah were getting married on Christmas Eve, and Mom had to set him straight.”
The mental image of Noah standing by an altar in a tuxedo with a ring in his hand crossed her mind. She shoved it away. “Well, that’s ridiculous. And why Christmas Eve?”
“I think she overheard something my mom and Noah were saying about how Christmas Eve is the big event.” He paused and looked up at her. “I’m guessing it’s not a good event?”
“No, it’s not,” she said. “In fact, it’s a very bad thing. You and your family are safe. But other people could get very hurt.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?” he asked, and her heart ached for this earnest young man and everything he’d already been through.
“You already are.”
“Cool.” He opened a small box. Six flat vials of colored disks lay inside. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to put your contacts in first.”
Twenty-five minutes later she was standing back in the front hallway of the farmhouse staring in the mirror at a person she’d never seen before. Smooth and strategic lines of thick movie makeup had made her cheekbones look both sharper and pinker. Another shade of pink made her lips look shiny and fuller. Long cascading locks of dark hair fell around her face and shoulders, all the way to her back. Bright turquoise eyes blinked out at her under dark fake lashes.
She slid her arms through the sleeves of another one of Anne’s coats. This one was a bright green and made her think of lime candy, with a hood of fuzzy fake fur.
Come on, Holly. You have a job to do. An outside is just an outside. It has no bearing on who you really are.
The door opened, and she stepped back.
“Holly, you ready to go?” Noah said. “I got new license plates on the truck and the snow brushed off, and—Whoa.”
Noah’s words caught in his throat. He stood there for a moment and watched as he struggled for words.
“Wow.” He ran his hand over the back of his neck. “I thought Drew might lend you a wig or something. But this is... Yeah, sorry. You look really different.”
She shoved her feet into her boots. “I know, I look ridiculous.”
“No, no, not at all,” Noah raised his hands, palms up. “I didn’t mean that at all. You look pretty, actually.”
Pretty. The word hit her like a punch to the gut. No man in her entire life had ever told her she looked pretty before. Was that all it took? A ton of paint on her face? Fake hair and lashes? But as her eyes searched his face, she saw something there that made it even worse.
Detective Noah Wilder was blushing.
Oh, no. Through all those hugs, walks and long conversations. All those times he’d reached for her hands and her for his... Why hadn’t she seen it before?
The man she was attracted to liked her back.
Only he was attracted to a fake version of her, who wasn’t who she really was at all.
Well, Noah, of all the dumb things you’ve ever said in your life, that was definitely the dumbest.
Noah was still mentally kicking himself as they drove silently down snowy Ontario back roads toward the safe house. The look on her face as he’d foolishly blurted out that he thought she was pretty had told him everything he needed to know. She’d looked offended. Worse than that, she’d looked hurt. And every awkward apology he’d attempted since then had only made the awkwardness between them worse, until he’d given up, gotten in the truck with her and started driving.
Pretty? Was that the best he could come up with? She was way beyond pretty. Whatever she was, that word didn’t even come close. She was fierce. She was strong. She was dynamic. She was a force to be reckoned with. And she was beautiful, too, in a way that shone through all the ridiculous gunk on her face.
And he couldn’t begin to let himself think about her that way.
Houses decked in Christmas decorations streamed past the window. Strings of unlit lights wove around the trees. It seemed everyone had collectively decided a few years ago that huge, inflatable, billowing Christmas figures were the must-have thing, and now most lawns were littered with the flat corpses waiting to be inflated again at night.
Four days until Christmas. Three days until the auction went live.
He prayed Seth’s lead would change all that.
“Drew told me about the trouble he had in school,” Holly said, after a silence so long and excruciating it had seemed to stretch out forever. “I get the impression it was a lot worse than he was letting on.”
Yeah, Noah’s heart still twisted in knots when he remembered. “He was bullied pretty badly. He’s a tough kid, but no one should go through that.”
“I’ve always wished more kids who had trouble at school, like Drew, or at home, like Anne, were encouraged to join the military cadets,” she said. “The army has been such a great family to me. At its best it teaches teamwork, self-esteem, independence, service to others...” Her voice trailed off in a sigh. “Which is why it really hurt to see what it can be at its worst.”
Noah nodded. Yeah, he could imagine. “When I applied for that promotion I was considering inviting Drew to live with me during college,” he said. “Just to give him one less financial worry.”
“That’s kind of you,” she said.
Was it? Well, it wasn’t going to happen without the promotion to Ottawa. Not while he was still crisscrossing the county helping vulnerable witnesses, a countless number of which were now on the verge of losing everything.
“Can we ask Seth to get a message to my parents?” Holly asked. “I imagine he has some encrypted, untraceable way of sending emails. They weren’t expecting to see me this Christmas. They knew I was going into witness protection. And we never tended to do much to celebrate the holiday, because it was also my birthday, and my dad was usually working. But I’d still like to wish them a Merry Christmas and let them know I’m safe and thinking of them. Oh, and to ignore any online rumors Seth planted about my getting married.”
“I’m sure he can do that,” Noah said. “Where are they?”
“Right now, my mom’s in Vancouver and my dad’s on a base in Germany. But they both said they were going to come to Ottawa for the inquiry when it’s my turn to testify.”
He blinked. “I had no idea your parents were on opposite sides of the world.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” she said. She settled back in the seat and looked out the window, and he lost sight of her face behind the ridiculously fluffy hood and mass of hair. “My dad’s always served in the Canadian military. Like I told you, he met my mother when he was home on leave. She was running a small garden center at the time. She’s a horticulturalist. It was whirlwind, gut-punch, love at first sight.” Holly sighed, as if thinking about more than she was saying. “She gave everything up to follow him around the world and be an army wife.”
“And you said it didn’t work out?” he asked.
“No, it didn’t,” she said. “My mom tried very, very hard to be the best possible army wife she could, for years. But the constant moves were draining. She missed working. She missed her garden. She missed putting down roots—metaphorically and literally. When I enlisted she moved out to Vancouver to help friends with their garden center business, and never came back. Now they’re separated.”
“How many times did you move, growing up?” he asked.
“Nineteen,” she said. “But at least I always felt at home in the military. Not everyone has that.”
Funny, he’d never thought of her as someone who’d had a rough childhood, but he’d known a few individuals who’d moved that many times or more. In his experience, it made people slow to trust, slow to open up and even slower to believe anything permanent could be possible.
They lapsed back into silence again and he thought about Caleb, and why in all the conversations he and Holly had, he’d never really opened up about his foster brother. He’d caught enough snatches of telephone conversation to know that Lizzy had fully and enthusiastically informed her father that he was there, and he knew Anne had talked to him, too. But Caleb had yet to ask to speak to Noah, and he hadn’t asked to talk to him, either. Despite Anne’s pleas to let Caleb sell the gym they owned together, Noah hadn’t visited the property or agreed to meet the potential buyers. He’d meant to visit the gym, he really had, not to sell it as Anne wanted, but to see what state his brother had left it in.
Bros Gym was a painful monument to Noah’s attempt to do right by Caleb, and how very badly that had gone wrong.
Caleb had always been the kind of man who needed a little help to keep his life on track, and the gym was supposed to give him that. Time and time again, Caleb had squandered or gambled away whatever money he’d earned, borrowed or won in self-destructive ways, racking up debts and draining his bank account no sooner than money had come in. When Noah’s parents had decided to leave Caleb an inheritance, it had been in the hopes he’d use it to make something of himself. They’d hoped owning his own business would give him accountability, stability, purpose and a goal.
At least that had been the plan.
Noah would become the silent partner in the venture and Caleb would be able to use the money Noah’s parents had left him to fulfill his dreams, run a business he loved and support his family. Noah had taken his life savings, plus the money he himself had inherited from his parents, and invested it in helping Caleb, Anne, Drew and Lizzy have the best possible shot at life. It’s what Noah’s parents would’ve wanted.
In exchange, Caleb would keep on top of the mortgage and all the bills. He’d go back to rehab for his gambling addiction and take college business courses. He’d make good on Noah’s investment in him.
Only he hadn’t. Three years on and the gym lay empty and abandoned, with utilities cut off from lack of payment, a mortgage in arrears and creditors sending notices to Noah demanding their money.
If it wasn’t for the painful knowledge of how Caleb would blow his share of the money once the building sold, robbing his family of the one major asset they had, Noah would’ve divested himself of it in a heartbeat. The gym and his relationship to Caleb were now a liability he’d have to disclose in order to get the higher level security clearance a promotion would require. That could lead to investigators poking into Caleb’s life to see what kind of man Noah was in business with, and to determine if the gym left Noah vulnerable to either criminal activity or bribery. Now Anne wanted Noah to give up, sell the property and let both himself and Caleb have the share of money they’d invested into it back. And how was that responsible? To give up on his foster brother’s best lifeline to turn his circumstances around, and instead give him a lump sum of cash to gamble and party away?
Maybe Anne had given up on Caleb ever changing his mind, coming back, reopening the gym and becoming a better man, but Noah hadn’t.
Noah pulled off the rural highway and onto a smaller road, following the GPS directions Seth had given him. A series of dilapidated structures came into view, scattered along the roadside like the remnants of some toy building set that someone had forgotten to tidy up. Then he saw the hangar, old and abandoned, with the carcasses of long-neglected motorboats scattered around the yard. The parking lot lay cold and empty. He didn’t much like knowing that Seth had been staying out here all alone for the past few days, without anyone babysitting him. But witness protection was about setting someone up in a safe and secret life, not about providing around-the-clock security. And Seth had never been one for being babysat.
Noah pulled in and dialed Seth’s number. It rang. There was no answer.
“You think something’s wrong?” Holly asked.
“Hopefully not.” He turned off the truck and got out, with Mack’s gun in the holster by his side and Holly one step behind him. He watched as her hand twitched toward him, and he realized she probably missed carrying a weapon. But could she shoot one? “Now, stay behind me, and keep a lookout, okay?”
She nodded. He led the way across the parking lot to a plain metal door in the wall. It swung open easily when he grasped the handle, and they stepped into a wood-paneled room that he guessed had once been an office. The place was stifling, as if a dozen space heaters had been turned on full blast. He coughed and raised a hand to his face.
“Seth!” he called. “Hey, are you here?”
No answer.
The room had been both trashed and tossed. Broken monitors, smashed computers and shards of glass covered the floor. The smell of gasoline hung heavy in the air. He stepped farther into the room and she followed, their feet crunching on broken glass. Then he saw Seth’s bag, slit end to end as if by a knife, and his clothes and belongings scattered around the room.
“Dear God, please have mercy.”
Noah heard the sound of Holly’s voice praying behind him, and his own heart felt momentarily too stunned to put what he was thinking into words.
Then he saw the blood, fresh and red, pooling on the floor.
And he found the only words he could pray were God, no... Please, no...