LITMIR.BIZ

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the windows. It got dark early now. November. No more daylight savings. North put a log on the fire. The fireplace supposedly was made from stone that Abraham Winter had pulled off the ridge when he carved the main ridge trail, still almost intact, almost two hundred years ago.

      Ty felt the flames hot on his face. His mother had never minded living out here, even after he’d gone into the air force and she lived in the big house all alone. She said she was proud of him, but he doubted she really knew what the hell a PJ did.

      “I understand you,” she used to say. “I understand you completely.”

      Whether she did or didn’t, Ty had no idea, but he had never come close to understanding her. When she died, she’d left him the house and fifty acres, which he’d expected.

      A trust fund. He used to make fun of people with trust funds.

      For five years, he hadn’t touched a dime of it except what he needed to hang on to the house.

      He lifted his gaze to the oil painting his mother had done in those solitary years here. It depicted the house and the meadow on an early summer day, daises in bloom. She hadn’t put Cold Ridge in it. She’d never said why. As far as he knew, she’d never climbed any of the hundreds of trails in the White Mountains.

      He wanted to call Carine. He wanted to be in Boston. Now.

      His telephone rang. His hard line. He thought it might be Gus, changing his mind about wanting to shut him out. He got up from the fire and picked up the extension on the wall next to the refrigerator.

      “North? It’s Carrera.” Manny Carrera’s normally steady, unflappable voice sounded stressed, tightly controlled. “I’ve got a problem. I need you here.”

      “D.C.?”

      “Boston.”

      North didn’t let himself react. “Why Boston?”

      “I flew up here last night to talk to Sterling Rancourt about Louis Sanborn, his new security hire. By the time I got to Sanborn, he was dead.”

      “Manny—”

      He took a breath. “You’ve heard.”

      “Carine just called Gus. I don’t have the details. She found this guy shot to death? What happened? Where the hell were you?”

      “There. I don’t want to get into it now. We both gave statements to the police. They want me to stick around in case they have more questions. Which they will. I figure I don’t have long before they slap on the cuffs.”

      “Cuffs? Manny, you didn’t kill this guy—”

      “It’s not that simple.”

      North stared out the kitchen window into the darkness. The fire crackled behind him. Manny Carrera had surprised everyone when he retired from active duty in August, but North didn’t fault him. Manny had done his bit, and he had different priorities nowadays: a son who’d almost died and a wife who was on edge.

      But North wasn’t going to coddle him. Manny would hate that. “What’s not simple? You either killed him or you didn’t kill him.”

      “I’m not going there with you.”

      “Then what about Carine?”

      “She doesn’t know the police have their eye on me. When she finds out—”

      “She’ll want to spring you.”

      Carine had always liked Manny Carrera. Everyone did. He’d show up in Cold Ridge from time to time for a little hiking, fishing and snowshoeing. Even Gus liked Manny. The air force tried to tap him as a PJ instructor, but he was determined to retire and go into business for himself. He was in the process of getting a Washington-based outfit off the ground, which trained individuals and companies in a broad range of emergency skills and procedures—not just self-defense and how to treat the injured, but how to think, how to respond in a crisis, before a crisis. He wanted his clients trained, prepared, able to help themselves and others if something happened. Ty didn’t know how it was going or what kind of businessman Manny would make. Manny Carrera was a hard-ass, but he was fair, scrupulous and, at heart, a natural optimist.

      He also had the skills and worldwide connections to disappear before the police got to him—just melt away. If he put his mind to it, he could probably even gnaw his way out of a jail cell.

      Except he had a fourteen-year-old son with severe asthma and allergies at the prep school just outside the picturesque village of Cold Ridge.

      “What do you want me to do?” Ty asked.

      “Make sure Carine doesn’t pursue this thing. She knew Louis Sanborn. She liked him. She found him dead. Plus,” Manny added pointedly, “she had her life pulled out from under her not that long ago. She’s ripe for trouble.”

      “She’s a Winter, Manny. She’s always ripe for trouble.” What Manny didn’t say—what he didn’t need to say—was that Ty was the one who’d pulled her life out from under her. “Is she in danger?”

      “Five minutes sooner, she’d have walked in on a murder. Anything could have happened. For all I know, it still could. Just keep an eye on her, North. That’s all I’m asking.”

      Ty was silent a moment. “You’re not telling me everything.”

      Manny almost laughed. “Hell, North, I’m not telling you anything.” But any humor faded, and he asked seriously, “You’ll do it?”

      As if there was a question. “If Gus doesn’t let all the air out of my tires before I can get there. If Carine doesn’t kill me when I do. I haven’t seen her since I left her at the altar.” North sighed heavily, feeling the fatigue from his long day. He hadn’t quite left her at the altar. At least he’d come to his senses and called off their wedding a full week in advance. It could have been worse, not that anyone else saw it that way. “Manny, Jesus. Murder—what the hell’s going on?”

      “Looks like Carine and I are shit magnets these days. Jesus. Look, Ty. She found a dead man this afternoon. I should have made sure that didn’t happen. I didn’t, so now I’m asking you to do what you can to make it right.” He groaned to himself. “Ah, screw it. You’re on a need-to-know basis. It’s the best I can do. Just get down here.”

      “I’ll be there tonight.”

      Manny hesitated. “I saw the story about the rescue you did today on the news. My son—”

      “Eric wasn’t involved. He’s only a freshman. These guys are seniors.”

      “Geniuses, from the sounds of it.”

      “Ivy League material. They’ve got their applications in. Watch. They’ll all be running the show when we’re in the home.”

      “Scary thought. Ty—”

      “Forget it. It’s okay.”

      But Manny Carrera said it, anyway. “I know I’m asking a lot. Thanks.”

      Three

      After throwing up for a third time, Carine staggered into her kitchen. She hoped that was the last of it. Nerves, she thought. Fear, disgust, grief, horror. Poor Louis. Dead. Murdered. Why?

      She found the little bag of oyster crackers the Boston Police Department detective had given her when she’d almost passed out on him. He’d said she looked green. At least she hadn’t thrown up then. She’d given her statement, read it, signed it and, when told she could leave, got a cab and came straight back to her apartment. She didn’t know what else to do. The Rancourts were with the police. Manny was with the police. And Louis Sanborn was dead, his body transported to wherever the medical examiners performed autopsies.

      Her hands trembled, and she couldn’t get a good hold on the package of crackers to pull it open. Finally, she grabbed a fork from the strainer and stabbed the cellophane, and little round

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