Jess shut her eyes tightly. The light that filled the van was so bright, sharp and blinding that even with her eyes closed she could see the world lighten beneath her eyelids. Voices shouted. The van spun wildly, careening out of control. Then she felt Travis launching himself at her, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her tight into his chest.
“Hang on!” Travis shouted. “It’s going to get rough.”
But even as he said the words, she heard the loud, screeching sound of metal smashing against metal. The van jolted hard, tossing them sideways. The masked men’s shouting and swearing grew louder. They were panicking, their eyes hurting, and she remembered what being hit by that light for the first time had been like, before she’d known it was temporary. Then she felt the world drop out from underneath them as the van flew off the edge of the bridge and down toward the raging river below.
They struck the water nose-first. The van began to sink.
“Now to get out of here,” Travis said.
She opened her eyes. They were sideways, halfway up the back of the sinking van, their feet braced against the end of the bench. She glanced down to see the two masked men, flailing and disoriented, as their eyesight began to recover. Travis reached up and shoved the van’s back door open. Pale blue sky lay ahead. Sunlight filled her eyes.
“Come on.” Travis wrapped one arm around her waist. With the other he reached up and grabbed the edge of the open door. “You can still swim, right?”
“I can kick,” she said, “but my hands are tied.”
“It’s okay, I’ll help you.”
They pushed off against the seat and Travis shoved his way out of the sinking van, lifting her along with him and leaving the masked men behind as they scrambled for their weapons.
Travis and Jess half jumped and half fell into the water. The river rushed cold and hard around them, threatening to pull them under. But Travis’s arm stayed tight around her waist as he swam with her toward the shore. She felt the ground under her feet as they stumbled together out of the river and toward the muddy slope. The sound of motors seemed to rumble from all sides, growing louder by the moment. She looked around and counted three RCMP rescue boats coming at them rapid-speed down the river and saw two police helicopters cresting the horizon.
Her head shook in amazement. “How did you do all this?”
“It was your team,” he said. “They’re pretty amazing. I probably should’ve listened to you all a lot sooner.”
Travis helped her up the slope and away from the water’s edge. He didn’t stop until they reached the top of the bank and were back on the bridge. There was a gaping hole of twisted railing metal where the van had broken through. She looked down. The van still bobbed in the water, and it looked like all of the masked mercenaries had made it out and were swimming to shore, only to be greeted by armed officers. A sigh of relief left her lungs.
Travis slid his hands down her arms and onto her bound wrists. He cradled her fingers in one of his hands.
“Hang on,” he said. “I have something for that.”
He pulled what looked like a tiny ceramic blade from deep within his pocket, slid it between the zip ties and sliced through. Her arms fell free. She threw them around his neck and he pulled her close.
“How did...?” Her words faltered on her lips as she looked into his deep and fathomless eyes.
“How did I break my own zip ties?” he asked. “A combination of knowing when and how to flex my muscles when they slipped them on me, and some skill in ripping my hands apart. Like I said, I had a lot of free time when I moved here and watched a lot of online videos.”
She laughed and felt him pull her closer.
“I meant how did all of this happen?” she asked. “How did you find me? How did you use a tactical light against them? How did you summon the cavalry?”
“Willow found the Shiny Man,” he said. “It was her teacher, Alvin Walker. There was a cleanup effort at the bookstore this morning and when Alvin put his arms around Willow, she knew it was him instantly. Chief Peters then stepped in to arrest him.
“For some reason he badly wanted to get his hands on her special bedtime storybook. Hopefully, Seth can research it and tell us why. Alvin was coordinating with Braden when he and Cleo took Patricia to the hospital. Seth got hold of Alvin’s phone, used it to track down the Chimera, and put out the word I was willing to trade my life for yours.”
Another RCMP helicopter roared over them, drowning out Travis’s voice. They waited while it passed.
“Liam managed the RCMP side of the operation,” Travis said, “including securing the rendezvous spot. Seth used the Shiny Man’s goodies to rig an explosive light that would pass a metal detector, in case the Chimera’s men scanned me for weapons. Seth is back in Kilpatrick with the kids, coordinating the tech side. He used a cell signal pinging device hidden in the smashed phone to track the Chimera’s signal and triangulate his location. As soon as he gets a location, several RCMP teams are standing by in major city centers to swoop in and take them down. I’m just thankful your team trusted me to be the one to go in and rescue you.”
“You told the Chimera that you were there to trade your life for mine,” she said.
“If all else had failed,” Travis said, “I would’ve. One hundred percent. Surely, you know I’d do anything for you.”
“I do,” she said, “and you know I would for you.”
A grin turned at the corners of his generous mouth. He brushed his fingers along the line of her jaw. He lowered his face toward hers. Their lips met.
“Jess!” Liam’s voice boomed to her right. “Travis!”
They pulled back. Her colleague and friend was pelting down the bridge toward them. The large man paused and glanced at each of them in turn, like he wasn’t sure how to interpret the moment he’d barged into. “We’ve got to go. Patricia Tatlow has woken up!”
An RCMP helicopter flew them straight to Sudbury. Seth and the children were already en route in a different chopper and would meet them there.
Travis and Jess sat side by side in the back, with their fingers linked. He hadn’t let go of Jess’s hand once since they’d fastened their seat belts, and she hadn’t let go of his, either. He had no idea what would happen next. All he knew was that he never wanted to let go of her hand again.
“The RCMP division in Victoria, British Columbia, has made an arrest,” Liam said. He leaned toward them and handed Travis a tablet computer. “Hopefully it’s the Chimera. We need you to make a positive identification.”
Travis glanced at the screen. The face of a stranger with a strong jaw and firm eyes stared back at him. His heart sank. It wasn’t him. Lord, whoever the Chimera is and wherever he’s disappeared to, please may he be caught one day. Travis shook his head and handed the tablet back.
“No, I’m sorry,” Travis said. “Whoever that man is, he’s not the Chimera.”
“Good,” Liam said with a chuckle. “That’s my buddy Jacob. If he was the Chimera, we’d have a big problem. Just had to make sure you weren’t eager to finger the first face you saw.” He flicked the screen and two more faces came up. “How about these?”
More strangers. “No.” Travis shook his head.
Liam nodded and pulled up two more faces. Travis glanced at the screen. This time he didn’t hesitate for a moment.
“This one.” He pointed to the face on the left. “This man’s the Chimera.”
“You sure?” Liam’s eyebrow rose.
“Absolutely,” Travis said. “No two ways about it.”
Liam let out a long sigh of relief and leaned back against the seat. Then he grabbed his phone and dialed a number. “Hey, it’s me. Witness was presented with five photos and identified Alexi Viktor, the man we have in custody.” He grit his teeth as he grinned. “Looks like we finally got him.”
Travis could almost feel the palpable relief that swept over Jess. But Travis felt oddly cold, as he stared down at the man’s face on his screen. He’d only gotten a glimpse of the man before, but now that he could really study his face, he was struck by how bland it was in its ordinariness.
Alexi Viktor, aka the Chimera, was slightly overweight and slightly bald. He had the kind of pale skin that implied he spent most of his life behind a desk and an everyday unattractiveness that made him the kind of person who’d be overlooked and ignored, instead of stared at. It was an incredibly unremarkable ordinariness that had made it so hard for anyone to match the police sketch Travis had provided and thus allowed the Chimera to pass through so many international airports without being noticed.
But there was something else in the face, too. The slight sneer at the corner of his mouth and a glint of arrogance in his eyes that showed he thought whoever the person was who’d snapped his picture during his arrest was so far beneath him they didn’t even count as human. Yeah, Travis had seen that look in the Chimera’s eyes first-hand when he’d missed his shot. He’d never forget it.
He leaned back against the seat as finally the tension he’d been carrying fell from his shoulders.
Thank you, Lord. Just...thank you.
“There’s been a huge sweep of his entire place,” Liam said. “It’s the same holiday complex that Jess was scheduled to work at. Over four dozen people were arrested. We also rescued several others who claimed they’d being forced to work there against their will.”
Liam stretched like he hadn’t slept in days.
“As for the second case you were working, that’s been wrapped up, too,” Liam said. “Looks like Alvin Walker was indeed the man who tipped off the Chimera to where you were, but that’s the only connection between the two cases. Alvin has confessed to being the man behind the Shiny Man persona, after police found respirator masks, construction jumpsuits and chloroform in his car and apartment. Alvin had contacted Braden after hearing Cleo talk about him, figuring he needed a criminal to do the dirty work and give him an alibi. They both wore the masks at different times. Alvin claimed he accidentally killed Braden in an argument.”
“After sedating him with chloroform,” Travis said and shook his head, “and before hanging him in the living room of an abandoned house. I suspect the timing of his crimes is down to the time of year. Just like the Chimera was gearing up his operation for the summer, Alvin was facing down the end of the school year before summer vacation. I would not be surprised if he wasn’t going to be returning to school in September, for whatever reason. Plus he was accepted to a master’s degree program at Queen’s.”
“You’d be right about that,” Liam affirmed. He glanced at Jess, like they were sharing an inside joke Travis didn’t understand. “Apparently the school principal had warned him he’d probably be laid off over the summer when the government announced education budget cuts. That would mean moving back home with his parents in Guelph or taking a job elsewhere.”
“So it was now or never,” Travis said.
Liam nodded. “We still don’t have a motive. Any thoughts on that?”
“Of course we do,” Travis said. “He wanted Willow’s picture book. I’m guessing it’s valuable.”
A wry smile curled at the corner of Liam’s lips. He glanced at Jess. “You were right about him.”
She laughed. “Of course I was.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to get back into police work?” he asked Travis. “Because the ability to close two mostly unrelated cases in less than forty-eight hours, while also dealing with major personal issues, is the kind of thing we look for in a cop.”
“I’m sure.” Travis glanced at Jess and, for one long moment, was lost anew in the endless blue of her eyes. Then he felt her head drop gently against his shoulder. “I’m not saying I’ll never help out on a case again. I like your team and you can count me in if you ever need me. I just don’t want to ever wear a badge again, go back to the life I had, or be the man I was.”
The helicopter touched down on the roof of the hospital. They got out and made their way through the door, down the staircase and along the hallway, until he saw Seth standing outside a hospital room.
“I hear we got our man, both of them,” Seth said. Hope tinged the hacker’s tired smile. “The kids are in there.”
Travis stopped and looked through the window, feeling Jess gently pull her hand from his.
Patricia lay propped up on the hospital bed. Willow sat in a chair next to the bed, her head resting beside her Nan while Patricia ran her hand over the little girl’s head. Her other hand brushed Dominic’s tiny fingers, as a nurse held him by Patricia’s bedside.
Travis waited a long moment as she delighted over her grandchildren. Then the nurse led Willow and Dominic out, and waved that he could come in.
Travis glanced at Jess. “Come with me. I want her to meet you.”
“No, you go,” she said quietly. She squeezed his hand. “You need to have an important conversation and I’ll be right here, waiting for you when you get back.”
He let go of her hand, slipped inside the hospital room and crossed the floor toward Patricia’s bed.
“Hey, Patricia,” he said softly. He dropped into a chair. Her face was pale and her skin seemed more translucent and fragile than ever, but her smile was one of the brightest he’d ever seen. “How are you feeling?”
The words seemed so inadequate for the situation, but for now they were the only ones he had.
“Alive,” Patricia said. “Also blessed and thankful. The doctor thinks I have a little while longer on this earth. Might be months. Might even be a year. But I’ll take whatever the Lord gives me.” The smile on her lips echoed in her eyes. “Did you think about my question? Will you raise my grandkids for me when I’m gone?”
How could she still ask him that? Had no one filled her in? Hadn’t she heard about what had happened in the past few days?
“Patricia,” he said. “I’m a cop. At least, I was. I was a detective with the RCMP for over a decade, taking down some pretty terrible people. I didn’t randomly move to Kilpatrick. I was placed there by Witness Protection. And see that woman outside the window?” He glanced at Jess. “She was my RCMP partner.”
Patricia let out a long breath.
His chest ached. “I’m so sorry, I wish I’d told you sooner,” he said. “But I couldn’t. I love Willow and Dominic more than anything and I’ll do everything in my power to protect them. But I’m not the man you think I am.”
“It’s okay.” She patted his hand. “On some level, I always knew you were a cop. Not officially. But it showed in the way you talked about people and looked out for them. You were like Joe, Geoff and Amber, and that’s why we were so drawn to you, like you were one of us. Are you going to go back to being a cop?”
“No.” He shook his head. “Or if so, not the way I was. I might help on cases. What I’d like is to help raise the kids and run the bookstore.”
“Then I’ll draw up the paperwork and make you their father,” Patricia said. “Just promise you’ll surround the kids with a lot of family who love them and who’ll help raise them.”
He thought of Seth and the crowd of people who’d showed up at the bookstore. “I will, I promise.”
“And the woman you care about, she’ll help love the kids, too?” Patricia asked.
Oh, he had no doubt in his mind that Jess would be an amazing mother to Willow and Dominic, and an incredible wife, but...
“I haven’t asked her to be with me,” he said.
Patricia laughed softly. “Then what are you waiting for?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted.
Because as he turned and looked through the window at the beautiful woman standing in the hospital hallway, he felt like he’d been waiting a lifetime for her already.
“One minute,” he said. He noticed Patricia was smiling as he left the hospital room.
Jess’s head rose. Travis took Jess’s hand without a word and lead her down the hall, until he found an empty room, with table and chairs and a large picture window overlooking the endless trees beyond.
“How’d she take it?” Jess asked.
“Well,” Travis said. “She still wants me to adopt the kids.”
Even as he spoke the words, he still felt stunned. Willow and Dominic were going to be his children?
“Patricia loves you,” Jess said. “When you love someone, you accept all the sides of them, even the hard ones.”
He looked down at Jess’s hand linked through his. Had he really found a woman who was able to accept all the sides of him? Was he ready to step up and be the man she needed him to be?
“I need to tell you something,” she added.
He swallowed hard. “I need to ask you something first.”
And yet, as he felt the words forming on his lips, she squeezed his hand tightly and spoke his name.
“Travis... Don’t... Not now...”
And somehow he knew that she needed him to stop talking.
He pressed his lips together and nodded, even while he felt his own heart urging him to speak.
“Liam’s found a new witness protection solution for you, Patricia and the kids,” Jess said. The sinking feeling inside his chest seemed to mirror the weight he could see in her eyes. “It’s going to take some time to access when it will be safe for you all to return to Kilpatrick. Could be weeks. Could be months.”
Could even be years, Travis thought.
“He’s found you a cottage that’s part of a summer camp about an hour north of here,” Jess went on. “It’s a really nice place. There will be onsite nursing and medical staff to take care of Patricia, in a hospice situation. There’s a helicopter pad, so she can be flown there by air ambulance whenever she’s ready to be moved. There’s a lake and swimming for the kids, along with daycare for Dominic and summer programs Willow can take part in. As far as Willow will know, she’s at camp with her family for the summer. If the situation stretches into September, there’s a good school nearby. Most important, it’s off the grid and you’ll have around-the-clock protection.”
“It sounds perfect,” he said. Except something about the way her lips curved down at the edges told him that it wouldn’t be, because she wouldn’t be there. “What about you?”
“I have to go back to work,” she said. “There’s a lot to be done now that the Chimera’s been arrested, and I’m an expert on the case. Once that’s wrapped up, I have a whole stack of other very important cases on my desk to get to. There are people in trouble who’re counting on cops like me to help, protect and rescue them. As much as I’d love to just spend my summer hanging out with you and the kids at the lakeside, but I just put my job on hold...”
Her words faded on her lips as her eyes look down to his hand holding hers. Then her eyes looked back up at his face and somehow he knew, without being told, she’d have followed him anywhere if only she’d been able to find a way. He wanted to tell her he loved her. He wanted to confess how much he’d missed her and ask her to stay by his side and never leave again.
Instead, words failed him as he opened his mouth and all he could do was nod.
For a long moment, neither of them said anything.
“This is the right outcome,” Jess said. “We’ve wrapped up two cases in three days. We stopped criminals and we saved lives. We’ve always known that, regardless of anything else that we felt for each other, it was always going to end this way.”
But what did this mean for his heart and hers? Would he ever see her again?
Before he could find his voice, she stood on her tiptoes and brushed her lips across his. He kissed her back, briefly and sweetly.
“I love you,” he whispered.
“I love you, too.”
She rested her head against his chest, he wrapped his arms around her and held her there for one long moment. Then she pulled out of his arms and walked back out into the hallway. And he knew, no matter how many professional conversations they had in the next few hours or days as she helped them all relocate before she left, that this would always be their real goodbye.