Hidden Truth

“Do you see a gun anywhere?” Trevor asked, flashing the light around as he looked for the weapon that could have killed the man.

“No,” she said, but she stood in the doorway staring at the man. She covered her mouth with the back of her hand as though she were going to be sick.

Trevor rushed over to her and wrapped his arm around her. “Come with me. Let’s go back outside. It’s going to be okay. You’re all right. Everything is going to be fine.”

She turned her body into him, letting him pull her into his arms as he moved her out the door and to the fresh air of the forest. He had been right—she would be just fine; from the way she felt in his arms, he was the one who was truly in danger.

Chapter Two

Sabrina had no idea why she had reacted that way. The man was hardly the first dead body that she had come across, and yet it felt like the first time. Maybe it was the way he seemed to be looking at her through those cloudy eyes or the smell of the body that had been left sitting in the heat of the fall, but she just couldn’t control her body’s reaction.

Damn it. Every time she started to think that she was strong, she did something like this.

Although maybe it wasn’t a bad thing that she had reacted as she had. She had gotten to play up the lady-in-distress angle. If she had to be undercover for any amount of time, it was going to be immensely easier if she had one of the brothers under her spell.

She just had to remember to keep him at arm’s length; the last thing she needed to do was let her emotions come into play. Emotions only had a way of getting her into trouble, and she was in enough as it was. They were the reason she was stuck in this place…and out of the direct line of sight of her superiors. Though she was certainly under their thumb.

Trevor was just another case, another investigation she had yet to complete. In a month, if everything went according to plan, she would be out of here and set down in a new little nowhere town in the middle of America investigating another possible threat to homeland security.

Trevor rubbed her back and as he held her, his chest rose and fell so rhythmically that she found herself mimicking his movements. He was like a man version of a white noise machine, and just as soothing.

If she had to guess, between his dark brown hair, his crystalline blue eyes and a jawline that was so strong that it could probably cut glass, he was all women’s kryptonite. He probably was the kind of man who had a woman every time he went downrange.

She pushed herself out of his arms and sucked in a long breath as she tried to completely dissociate herself from him. The last thing she needed was to share anything with him—even his breath.

“Are you feeling better?” he asked, looking at her like she was a bird with a broken wing.

She nodded. “I don’t know what that was about. I’m sorry.”

“That was about a dead man,” he said, shock flecking his voice. “It’s not something one sees every day. I would have been more worried if you hadn’t reacted that way. Shock can be more dangerous than most flesh wounds.”

Crap… She couldn’t give herself away. Of course he would think she was a newbie to this kind of thing. She had to remember the role she had been sent here to play. A role that required that she be seen little and heard even less. What a joke for her superiors to play…they knew just as well as she did that silence wasn’t her strong suit. She wasn’t the kind of woman who was going to let anyone push her around, tell her what to do or require that she “let the men do the real work.”

Her skin prickled at just the thought of the last time she had heard someone mansplain to her.

Trevor touched her arm. “Sabrina, you with me?”

“Huh? Yeah.” She looked at him and forced a smile.

“Why don’t you go and sit down,” he said, pointing toward his motorcycle. “Or I guess you can lean.” He gave her a guilty smile, realizing what an absurd idea that was.

“I’m fine. Do you think you should call the police?” She motioned toward the shack with her chin.

She would rather not have any local officers running around the place and mucking up her investigation or compromising her position.

Yet they couldn’t hide a dead body…

Or could they?

If they swept this under the rug, it would give her more access to Trevor and his family without the threat of outside interference. It would definitely speed things up for her. If the police started poking around, the Martins would clam up and go even deeper into hiding.

And really, who would care about one mountain man who had turned up dead? He was totally off the grid, and as far as the government was concerned he was a nonentity. In fact, the only thing that his brothers, and folks like him, were known for were extremist ideals and a penchant for causing trouble.

Yet she couldn’t be the one to bring up the idea of hiding the very dead Cussler brother.

Trevor stared in the direction of the shack. “We should call somebody…”

The way he spoke made her wonder if he was thinking along the same lines as her. No doubt, he didn’t want anyone poking around, either.

“But?” she asked, prodding him on.

“I bet his family would go bonkers if we brought law enforcement out here. And the last thing this ranch needs is more craziness from the locals.” He frowned. “We are just trying to fit in here. We don’t want to draw unnecessary scrutiny from our new neighbors.”

“Well, if you think that the Cusslers would appreciate us not—”

“Yes, I’m sure they would want to keep this a family issue.” Trevor sounded sold on the idea.

She wanted to point out the possibility that the other members of the Cussler clan may be lying dead somewhere out in the timber as well. Otherwise wouldn’t they have already buried their brother’s body?

Yet she didn’t want to press the issue. Not if it meant there was a possibility he would change his mind and call the police. Not that he would. She had the definite feeling he wanted to sweep this man’s death under the rug just as much as she did.

“I’m going to go back in and take a look around,” he said.

“Why?” she asked, before thinking.

He looked at her as though he was trying to decide how much he should open up to her. “If we’re not going to call someone out here, we need to make sure that this isn’t the work of some serial killer or something. You know what I mean?”

“You think he was murdered?” she asked, trying to play up the innocent and naive angle.

“My hope is that this is nothing more than a suicide. I just need to make sure.”

She doubted that was really why he was going back in. He was probably looking for something more, something that would guarantee they wouldn’t find themselves in deeper trouble if any of this ever came to light.

“You wait here. I’ll be right back.”

She grimaced. He hadn’t really just tried to tell her what to do, had he? If he thought she was some kind of chattel that he could just order around, he had another think coming.

“Okay.” She sighed as she tried to calmly remind herself he wasn’t bossing her around out of some need for control; rather, it was his need to protect. “But be careful in there. If I know one thing about these kind of recluses, it’s that they have a reputation for hating outsiders. They may have set up some kind of booby trap.”

He stared at her like he was trying to figure her out. The look made her uncomfortable. “Got it, but I promise you have nothing to worry about when it comes to my safety. I have experience with this kind of thing.”

His alleged role in peacekeeping and his family’s Blackwater-type company was known, but she was surprised he was admitting any of it to her. Maybe her investigation wouldn’t be as difficult as she had thought. Hell, if things went her way she could have all the answers she needed in a matter of days.

Then again, things would have to go her way, and life hadn’t been playing nicely with her lately.

Trevor slipped back to the shack, holding up his phone as a flashlight as he made his way back inside.

She moved quietly after him. Maybe she could see something that he would miss, something that would prove the brother’s death was nothing more than a suicide so they could put this all to rest.

As she walked toward the shack, she stopped. No. She couldn’t pry. She couldn’t get any more involved with this. If she went in there and did find something, there was a high probability that she would slip up and say something that would give away her background. He couldn’t know anything about her position in the FBI.

She walked around to the back of the shack to where an old push lawn mower sat. There, on the ground beside it, was a puddle of dried blood. Pine needles had collected at the edges, making the pool look like some kind of macabre artwork.

She opened her mouth to call out to Trevor, but stopped. No. She couldn’t tell him.

From the state of the body in the house, there was little possibility this blood belonged to the dead man. If someone had shot him out here and moved him, there would have been drag marks or some indication that the body had been staged. Though she hadn’t spent long in the room with the dead man, she had noticed the blood leaking out of the wound at his temple. If she closed her eyes, she could still see the trail as it twisted down his ravaged features and leaked onto his dirty collar, staining it a ruddy brown. He couldn’t have been moved postmortem. No, the blood pattern didn’t match.

Which meant this blood had to belong to another person. And based on the volume of it on the ground, they were possibly dealing with more than a single death.

Crap.

She stared at the dried blood. Kneeling down, she scooped up a handful of the sharp, dried pine needles that were scattered around. What she was about to do could end up going all kinds of ass-backwards, but it had to be done for her, for her investigation and for her chance at getting her future back. There was nothing she wanted more than to rise in the ranks, and sometimes that meant that sacrifices had to be made.

She threw the needles atop the blood and stepped onto them. She kicked away at the dried blood, earth and needles until there was nothing.

It felt wrong to destroy evidence, but at the same time a sensation of freedom filled her. It was refreshing to break the rules and to make her own in name of the greater good.

Walking around to the door of the shack, she poked her head inside. Trevor took a step deeper into the shadows around the dead body. He knelt down and moved aside a piece of discarded cloth on the floor. He chuckled.

As he stood up, she saw a gun in his hand. He wiped the grip and the barrel down with his shirt, as though he was stripping it of any possible fingerprints.

There was only one reason he’d wipe the gun down—he was trying to protect the person who had pulled the trigger. Maybe that person was him.

Hell, he had probably come in here and killed the brothers in an attempt to get rid of them once and for all. Then he had waited for her to arrive before he rode up on his Harley like some kind of badass playboy.

He’d probably wanted her to see the man’s body first. He’d wanted to come off as innocent. He’d wanted to take her in his arms and act the hero.

And she had allowed the bastard to set her up.

Chapter Three

Trevor walked up the front steps of the ranch house and waited as Sabrina parked her car and made her way over to him. He had told her that she could have the rest of the day off. She didn’t need to come back to the main house with him—she could return to the old foreman’s place, which was hers now—but she hadn’t accepted his offer. Instead, she had only said that she had work to do.

Actually, it was the only thing she had said. The words had rung in his ears the entire ride back to the main house. There had been something in her sharp inflection that told him she was angry about something, something he was missing—and that there was danger afoot—but for the life of him, he didn’t understand.

It was like he was married all over again, his life awash with unspoken anger and resentment. The memory of standing at the front door of his apartment, watching as his wife bedded another man on their once-pristine leather sofa, made a sickening knot rise in his belly.

Once again, just like before, he was forced to be an unwilling participant in things unspoken.

Hopefully this time he would be able to stop his life from falling to pieces in front of him.

She came to a stop beside him, but she was putting off a distinct “don’t touch me” vibe.

He must have crossed some invisible barrier when he’d pulled her into his arms back at the shack, but it hadn’t been his intention to make her feel uncomfortable. He had just been trying to help, to lend a shoulder to a woman in need, not to tick her off.

“Did you talk to Chad yet?” she said, glancing down at her watch like she was checking just how much time he’d had before she arrived.

He shook his head. Truth be told, he had been hoping she would keep driving instead of turning off on the little dirt road that led back to the ranch. It would have made sense, her running away after seeing the Cussler brother rotting in his chair.

And if she had kept driving, he could have had the real conversation he needed to have with Chad without worrying about what she would hear. Now he’d have to play it cool until he could get his brother alone and he had the chance to find out exactly what he knew. No doubt, Chad would have dealt with that man’s remains as he had and left them out there for the Cussler family to handle.

They didn’t need to draw undue attention. They needed to fly under the radar and off the grid for as long as possible.

He cringed at the thought of having to move again.

Getting out of Adana had been a nightmare after Trish’s death. When they made their move to Montana, they sent misinformation on the dark net to make it seem like they were moving east to Thailand. They had no doubt that Turkish mobsters were just waiting for their chance to kill the rest of the family.

As long as nothing came out, they’d be safe for a while. It was the reason they had chosen this speck on the map. Plus, they’d have the cover of the United States and the amnesty that it offered if anything blew back on them. He and his family had done so many covert ops for the former president that they would always have government backup.

Or so he hoped.

Chad came sauntering out of the kitchen, a hot dog in his hand. He glanced from Sabrina to Trevor and gave him a raise of the brow as he stuffed the rest of the hot dog into his mouth, leaving a blob of mustard on his lip.

“I see you’re already living the high life, brother,” Trevor said with a laugh. “You want me to go in and get you a Budweiser, too? Nothing says American like a hot dog and a beer.”

Chad swallowed the bite. “Not all of us developed a taste for world cuisine. You can’t tell me that dolma is better than a good hot dog.” He wiped off the speckle of mustard at the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. “What do you think, Sabrina? You vote American food?”

She shrugged like she couldn’t give a damn less. “Either, so long as I’m not cooking it.”

“And that right there is the reason I hired you. I’ve always liked a woman who was as smart-mouthed as me. You are going to fit right in.” Chad laughed. “Did you guys get the squatters handled?”

“Not exactly,” Trevor said. He cocked his head toward Sabrina in a silent message to Chad.

Chad’s smile disappeared. “Sabrina, do you mind getting started with your cleaning up here in the kitchen? ’Fraid I may have made a bit of a mess in there.”

She opened her mouth to speak, but stopped and instead gave Trevor a look as though she hoped he would step in and allow her to take part in their conversation.

“Uh, actually…” Trevor stammered. “Sabrina, you must be pretty tired. Like I said, if you wanted to head back to your place—”

“No,” she said, taking off her jacket and hanging it in the coat closet just inside the door. “I’ll get started in the kitchen. I have a job to do, and this place isn’t going to get any cleaner if I just go back to my place.”

Sabrina strode into the kitchen and the door swung shut behind her.

“Let’s step outside,” Trevor said.

Chad followed him out and Trevor made sure to close the door behind his brother. He glanced in the front window of the house to make sure that Sabrina wasn’t anywhere in sight. Thankfully, it looked as though she was in the kitchen.

“What in the hell were you thinking sending that woman out there?” Trevor asked, turning back to his brother. “Do you know what the hell I found in that shack? And because you were in some freaking hurry, Sabrina saw. Now she’s a possible loose end.”

“First, you were supposed to get out there long before her. You don’t get to make this my fault. You should have stuck to the schedule.”

“Had I known you were sending someone out behind me, I would have. How about you learn to freaking communicate?” Even as he said it, he couldn’t help but feel that he was the pot calling the kettle black.

“What exactly did she see?” Chad asked, taking a step back from him like he was afraid that Trevor was going to take a swing.

“That damned Cussler guy was splattered all over the walls. Been dead at least two or three days.” He pointed in the direction of the shanty. “I had to convince Sabrina that the dude was better off if we just left him and waited for the family to come back and collect his remains.”

Chad turned around as he ran his hands down his face. He stomped as he turned back. “Are you kidding me? We haven’t been here a week and there’s already a dead bastard in our back forty?”

“You should have just left me to handle my end of things, man. I had this taken care of. All I needed was a little time. But no, you wanted to rush things. To make sure everything was cleaned out and taken care of before Zoey and Jarrod arrive.”

“You know how they can be—they were even more adamant than I was about the absolute need for privacy here. This family is all we have, Trevor.”

“You don’t need to tell me that.”

Chad took in a long breath as though he were trying to collect himself. “So, was the guy’s death a suicide or what?”

“There’s no goddamned way. Someone shot him.” He thought of the handgun he’d left sitting on the ground beside the dead man. “The gun was too far away from the body. No major stippling around the entrance wound, and the bullet had lost enough velocity that it didn’t even travel through the entire skull—there was no exit wound. I’m guessing whoever pulled the trigger had to be at least ten to fifteen feet away.”

“And where did you say you found the man?”

“He was sitting up in a chair, like someone got the drop on him. He didn’t even have time to stand. He didn’t see it coming.”

“What about the rest of the hillbilly clan…did you find them? They alive or dead?”

“Hell if I know.” Trevor threw his hands into the air. “I’m hoping that they just ran off. We don’t need a dead family on our hands.”

“Did you get a chance to look around?” Chad asked. “Wait, did you and Sabrina call in the locals?”

Finally, Chad was beginning to understand the implications of his screwup. If only he hadn’t been in a hurry, they wouldn’t already be compromised.

“Sabrina went along with keeping it quiet, but I don’t know how long she’ll be up for maintaining that.” He glanced back inside, but the beautiful and stubborn woman was nowhere in sight. “She hasn’t been acting right, ever since…” I held her in my arms. He didn’t finish his thought.

“Huh? Ever since what?” Chad pressed.

“Since she saw the body. I’m afraid she may be a liability.”

“What are you saying?” Chad asked. “You think she needs to disappear?”

“No,” Trevor said, almost the same moment his brother had uttered the question. “No. We can’t harm her. She hasn’t done anything wrong. And who knows, maybe I made a mistake in thinking she can’t be trusted. Maybe she won’t be a problem.”

Chad shook his head. “What if she does tell someone? What if it comes out that we tried to cover up a man’s death at our new ranch?”

Trevor stared at his boots. “She wouldn’t…”

“Dude, if she tells anyone… First, we are going to look as guilty as hell. Second, our faces are going to be spread across the world in a matter of hours.”

“She won’t say anything.”

“And how are you going to know if she does or doesn’t? For all we know, she’s in there texting her mother’s brother’s cousin about what you guys found. Hell, she could be sending pictures of the dead guy.” Chad paused. “You know that I don’t want to hurt an innocent woman. Not after what happened in Turkey… And Trish…” Their sister’s name fell off his brother’s tongue like it was some secret code, some unspoken link between past and present.

“Then let’s leave her be.”

Chad shook his head. “No. If you don’t want to neutralize the threat, you’re going to have to watch her like a hawk. Every move she makes, you need to be there… hovering.”

“And what about the squatters? The body?”

Chad sighed. “What about it? Like you said, let that guy’s family handle it.”

“And what if they do, and they call the police?”

“If they haven’t already, they aren’t about to now.” Chad stared at him. “For all we know, one of them is the one who pulled the trigger—or else they’re lying out there in the woods somewhere, too. Either those bastards are on the run or they aren’t going to be spilling any secrets any time soon.”

“Do you think I should go back out there? See if I can find them? Make sure that they’re going to stay quiet?”

Chad stared out in the direction of the main pasture, but Trevor could tell that he wasn’t really looking at anything. “I’ll talk to Zoey and see if we can find out a little more on these Cussler guys. I want to know how many hillbillies were living out there, and who would have wanted them dead. I want to make sure that whoever is responsible for pulling that trigger isn’t about to bear down on us.”

His brother was right. They needed to make sure they weren’t about to be ambushed.

“Most importantly,” Chad continued, “I want you to keep Sabrina quiet. If you don’t…you know what’s at stake.”

“She won’t be a problem.” Trevor paused, thumbing the gun at his side and letting it comfort him from his barrage of thoughts. “Hey…you don’t think these Cussler guys have anything to do with STEALTH, do you?”

Chad shook his head, but from the way his face pinched, Trevor could tell that he was wondering the same thing. “Bayural and the Gray Wolves couldn’t know that we are here. Zoey has made it her business to make sure of it. Everything we did has been in cash, or through Bitcoin. We’re covered.”

“Just because our sister is a computer whiz, it doesn’t mean that we are safe. You know how easy it is to find someone, especially a group like our family. One stupid random selfie with us in the background and we’re in danger. They are using the same facial recognition software that we are.”

“Zoey has this under control,” Trevor said, trying to give them both a little comfort—it had always been his job to keep the peace within the family, a job that had proven harder than ever thanks to his failure with Trish. His mistake was something that neither he nor the rest of his siblings would ever forget. “Besides, Zoey has made it her personal mission to keep them chasing fake hits around the globe. From what she said this morning, she currently has us pinging at a marketplace in Cairo.”

Chad chuckled. “God, can you imagine those bastards’ faces when they realize that they’ve been set up? I would almost pay to see it.”

There was the clatter of pans hitting the floor from inside the kitchen.

Chad bounded up the porch steps and cracked the door. “Sabrina, you okay in there?”

“Fine, just fine!” she called back, sounding harried.

“Where did you find this woman?” Trevor asked, motioning toward the house.

“She came recommended from Gwen when we bought the ranch. They hired her when they were getting the ranch ready for us to take it over.”

“So, just because our cousin—whom we barely know—thinks this woman is trustworthy, you took her word for it?” Trevor was surprised. Chad wasn’t one for details but he was normally careful about who they brought into their lives.

“Brotato chip, you seriously have to pull the stick out of your ass. You’re starting to act like Jarrod.”

He was nothing like their oldest brother. Jarrod had been a lone wolf since the moment he called upon them to take their positions within the business. After he had set up STEALTH he hit the road, looking for assignments from various governments.

“I hope Zoey looked into her background,” Trevor pressed.

“Of course. Zoey said she was clean, nothing too much to tell. Looks like Sabrina had been travelling around the world with her military family until she turned eighteen, just working odds-and-ends jobs since then.”

It was in line with the little Sabrina had told him, but something still felt wrong. Trevor glanced toward the kitchen where Sabrina was working. Maybe someday, if he could just ease himself back into being a civilian, something might start feeling right.

A man could only hope.