Dangerous Defiance (12 page)

“But who then?”

She grabbed her laptop and booted it up, finding the copy of Ben’s private file on the case.

“Ok, here are the reports. Someone had sent this in, tipping Ben off. It’s the original—– unofficial—report,” she began, scrolling through and pointing out a few things to Jackson who looked over her shoulder.

“What’s the date on that?” Jackson asked.

She looked. “Eight months ago.”

“Do you have any other reports? Larimer is required to provide them annually.”

She went back through her files and found one other one. “Here,” she said, opening it. They both looked at it. “Most recent official report shows no contamination.”

“Who’s the third party doing the testing?”

“Different one in each case,” she said after clicking through the files.

Jackson’s phone rang. “Sheriff Montgomery,” he said.

It was quiet for a moment and Jess turned to look at him. “I’ll be right there. Don’t touch anything.”

“What is it?” she asked, standing when he turned to grab his keys, his face very serious.

“Two men were found a few miles from town. One was dead.”

“Dead?”

He nodded once. “Shot.”

“Oh my God. What about the other one?”

“Barely alive. The chopper is taking him to the hospital in Langdon, the next bigger town over, now. Carl thinks it’s the men from last night.”

“I’m going with you.”

“You are staying right here.”

“Jackson…”

“At least one other man is dead, Jess.”

“Because of me.”

He inhaled a deep breath. “Look through the files, see if you can find anything you might have missed. There’s nothing you can do there but get yourself into trouble. Stay out of sight, like we agreed. It’s not forever, I promise. Besides, you can’t help Ben by being there. Reread the files. There has got to be something he or you missed.”

“All right,” she said. “I will look over the files again. See what I can figure out.”

He nodded. “I’ll call you when I’m through at the site.”

Jess walked him out and went back inside. Two men shot, one dead. Both likely killers themselves but still, at least one more life lost. She sat back down at her computer and spent the next two hours reading every word on every file but still turned up nothing.

She took a deep breath and rose from her seat, heading to the kitchen to make coffee. She then remembered she needed to wash some clothes; the last clean thing she owned she was wearing and clean was a relative term in this case. She stuffed all the whites in first and started the machine, then found her purse and carried it into the kitchen. She’d at least listen to Ben’s message again.

When the coffee was ready, she poured herself a cup and turned on her phone. Her message light was blinking. She hit the button to retrieve, setting the phone on speaker. The line was too crackly and bad and she went back to listen again, this time putting the phone to her ear. There was no greeting and it took her a minute to understand what she was listening to. She played it a third time, setting her coffee down.

The message was more a clip of a voice recording. The line was terrible but she could make out Hanson’s voice:

“It’s too soon. Give me one more week.”

“No, the contamination report comes out tomorrow. You’ve been stringing me along and I’m finished.”

“I’m just looking out for our best interests.”

“You’re looking out for
your
best interests. Report comes out tomorrow or I expose you for the fraud you are. Clear?”

“Calm down, Royson!”

The message cut off there. She checked the phone number it came from but it was listed as a private number.

Royson. The name rang a bell. Jess sat down behind her computer and scrolled through the files. She looked through one, then another, an older one. Sure enough, there it was. She sat back in her chair as the puzzle slowly came together. Ben had been wrong. He had been wrong all along.

She dialed Jackson’s number from her cell phone, but realized after it went into voice mail that she needed to keep her phone turned off because of the GPS chip it contained just in case she was being tracked. She searched around the house for his home phone but didn’t find one, which didn’t surprise her given the fact so many people only used cell phones now, including herself. She picked up her purse and found the keys to his truck. She considered for a few moments. Surely he would want to know this.

* * *

“Isn’t that your truck, Sheriff?” Carl asked.

Jackson turned to look in the direction of the approaching truck. There were still reporters on site as well as locals even though the body of the dead man had just been removed and the other one had been taken by helicopter almost two hours ago.

“Goddammit!” he muttered, walking toward the approaching truck, hoping she had sense enough to at least stay inside it with the reporters on site.

Jess smiled for a moment when she saw him approach the truck, then looked beyond him at the spectators collected there. He got to the door and opened it, stepping close enough to block her exit.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he began. “Do you ever listen? Do you have some hearing deficiency I’m unaware of, Jess?”

“Jackson, it’s not Larimer!”

“Sheriff?” a voice he did not recognize came from behind him.

“I’ll be right there,” he called out, his eyes on Jess. “I need you to get out of here now before anyone sees you.”

“Didn’t you hear me?” she said. “It’s not Larimer. I had a message on my phone…”

“You turned your phone on?”

“Sheriff?”

The woman again.

“Be right there!” he snapped. “I’m inclined to put you in jail for your own protection. Stay inside the car, Jess. You understand?”

She gave him a sharp look and dug into her purse, keeping her narrowed eyes on his. “I don’t think I’m the one with a hearing deficiency…”

“If I so much as think you might disregard my request, I’ll be doing a whole lot worse to your ass than I’m already planning, got it?”

“Just listen to it! If you want to spank me, fine, but listen, damn it!”

He opened his mouth to speak but by then she had switched on her phone and he was listening to the crackly message. He looked from the phone to her. When it was over, she pushed a series of buttons to replay it.

“The name, he says Royson at the end. Listen.” She played it again. “Royson is the chief financial officer for Bellison Energy. They had also bid on this area but they lost the site to Larimer.”

“Sheriff Montgomery, Angela Shannon from the….”

Christ, these fucking reporters were going to be the death of him. “Stay,” he said, closing the door, his look a solid warning.

“Ma’am,” he began, turning to her. “I’m sorry but we’ve got one dead man and one who is just barely hanging on to life. I don’t have time to field your questions at the moment.”

“Can I help?” Carl stepped under the police tape, eyeing Jess in the car and steering the reporter’s attention toward himself.

“Just a few questions… Deputy?”

Carl looked over at Jackson who nodded his thanks. “I’ll see you at the station,” Jackson said. He then tapped on the glass of Jess’s window so she lowered it halfway. “Follow me to the station.”

“Ok.”

* * *

Jess set the phone back inside her bag and followed the police cruiser back into town. Once there, she parked her car across the street, picked up her purse and ran to where Jackson stood holding the door open for her.

Bill was inside, the phone to his ear while another rang.

“It’s starting all over again,” Jackson said, hanging his hat on the pin by the door and going to his desk to push some buttons.

A few moments later, Bill hung up and looked up at them. “Ma’am,” he said to her, then turned to Jackson, his face showing the stress he was under. “Sir, this has been going on for the last two hours.”

“All right, I’ll take it from here. Why don’t you go up to the site and see if you can’t help Carl.”

“Will do. Any idea who did it?” he asked.

Jess didn’t miss Jackson’s quick glance in her direction. “Nothing yet.”

Bill collected his keys and walked to the door.

“One more thing, Bill. There are a lot of reporters. I don’t want you talking to any of them. Direct them to Carl or me.”

“Sure thing.”

She remained where she was, Jackson’s eyes on hers, until a few moments after Bill left.

“Lock the door,” he said to her, leaning against his desk.

She turned and did as he said. “Look, you can’t be mad. I mean, I tried to get a hold of you but you didn’t pick up and you don’t have a landline for me to keep trying. I didn’t want to use my phone any more than I had to in case there’s a tracking device.”

“I’ve had a long day, Jess. I wish you would have just stayed where I’d left you.”

“I’m an FBI agent. I can take care of myself. Besides, someone left me the voice mail. They must know I’m looking into it.”

“That doesn’t worry you just a little?”

“I can’t be afraid. Not now. Ben wasn’t.”

“I understand that, Jess, I really do. I just don’t want to see you hurt.”

“I know.” And she did know. She just couldn’t not pursue this.

He took a seat behind the desk. “Sit down and tell me what you think you’ve figured out.”

Jess sat. “I don’t think it, I know it, Jackson. It makes perfect sense. I don’t think the formula Larimer is using is causing the pollution. Ben had it tested and it had puzzled him too when the lab had told him it would not cause contamination at a level that could be harmful. What if it was Royson all along? Working alone, or not, I don’t know. But what if he was the one who masterminded the contamination of the water?”

“But why have the reports come back clean?”

“Because Hanson is fixing them! He’s blackmailing Larimer, using faked reports to extort money. He’s crossing both Larimer and Bellison.”

“Go on.”

“Maybe Royson is fed up with Hanson, that’s what I understood from this call at least. Royson knows Hanson is double dipping but his own hands are tied. Or maybe they’re splitting the blackmail money? Who knows? Maybe they figured Ben was too close to figuring this out and that’s why they killed him. That’s why the dam was sabotaged, to cover up their tracks. All evidence is washed away now but if the reports come out about the contaminated water, well, it would still lead right back to Larimer. They’d be out of the game. Hell, maybe they would even reopen the investigation to find Larimer responsible for the dam collapse. I don’t know but this makes sense to me. I think we’ve got to talk to the man who survived. Find out what he knows, who he is working for. Or
was
working for.”

Jackson rubbed his hand across his forehead and closed his eyes. He pushed his chair back from his desk. “All right,” he said.

“All right?” she asked, hopeful.

His forehead was creased, but he nodded. “All right. Let me think.” The phone rang and Jackson answered on the second ring. She could tell it was a reporter, but he managed to give a non-answer to the question and hung up quickly. He turned his attention back to Jess. “Come here,” he said.

Jess looked at him, his expression more tired than anything else. She then looked at his lap and at his hands which he held out to her, gesturing with one when she hesitated. She got up and walked over to stand between where he sat and his desk.

“Take them down.”

“Ugh!” she said, reaching for the button of her shorts, the question of why she was even going along with it and not arguing only a fleeting thought as she stripped off her shorts. “This is because I left the house?”

“Those too,” he said, gesturing to her panties.

“I’m still sore from the last time.”

“Then maybe I won’t have to spank so long and my hand won’t hurt.”

“You’re funny,” she said, pushing her panties down and looking at his lap. “I can’t believe,” she said, moving to lay herself over his thighs when he leaned backward and gestured for her to do so, “you’re going to spank me after what I came to tell you.” She situated herself with her hands down to balance herself.

He pulled her tighter to him. “Hands and feet stay on the floor.”

“I mean,” she adjusted her position again, “it’s not my fault you don’t have a phone in your house. Ow!”

“You’re lucky I’m not using my belt over the existing bruises.”

“Lucky… ouch. That’s me. Christ, slow down!”

“That’s another thing, you cuss like a man, an uneducated one at that.”

“And it’s not like you bother to answer your phone when I do call.” She squirmed around but didn’t reach back to cover herself and he only had to keep one hand on her waist. “Can you please try to avoid… ow… ow, mother…”

“What was that?” he asked, ten blows coming fast one after the other, five on each cheek.

“Nothing. I was just going to ask you,” she grunted, “to please try to avoid… ow!
Those
spots!”

“It’s like a song, you know?”

“What’s like a song?”

He had a gift, the sheriff of New Hope. Talking and spanking at once didn’t seem to cost him any more energy than just doing one at a time.

“Your cries. Settle down, this isn’t even a hard spanking.”

“You might not think so.”

“I’ve decided something,” he said.

“What’s that?” she asked, her tone sassy—on purpose. He was right, it wasn’t hard but it still stung.

He paused, opening a desk drawer. She watched as he retrieved a wooden ruler.

“I’ll just spank you daily and pretty much give up on you actually doing as you’re told. Ever.”

“
As I’m told
…” she said, her tone one of disbelief as she shook her head.

“Shh.”

Fine. She’d be quiet. It was getting harder to talk anyway now that her breath was coming faster.

He lined the ruler up to her bottom and she braced herself, squeezing her eyes shut. He struck with the thing across both cheeks and she yelped. He didn’t speak at this point and Jess’s mind wandered as to her position, mainly the fact that she had willingly gone to him when he’d told her to, had willingly stripped off half her clothes and then willingly had lain herself across his lap! She wasn’t even trying to defend herself as he thrashed her bottom. What was happening to her? Since when had she been so submissive to a man? Not that she had been with many men but of the few she had dated, well, not a single one was even remotely like Jackson Montgomery. With him, somehow, it came naturally. This was just going to be the way it was between them. It was strange and not something she could wholly make sense of or understand but she just knew this was how it was going to be.