The Masked Man

Pierce laughed with only mild amusement.

“I’m sure you’ve heard that Trevor Forester was murdered tonight,” Pierce said.

So much for small talk. “Trevor Forester?”

Pierce smiled. “I saw your truck at the party, but I never did see you.”

Mac took a sip of his beer, wondering what Pierce was doing here. More importantly, what his interest in Forester was, or in himself, for that matter. “You hanging out with people like the Foresters?” Pierce had always been an old-money snob. Sure, the Foresters had money, but it was new and not nearly as much as the Pierces’. It was like the difference between a hot dog and beluga caviar.

“It’s a small community,” Pierce said in answer.

Not that small.

“I’m curious what you were doing there.” Pierce took a swig of beer and smiled as if enjoying the taste. Not likely.

“I had an invitation.” Mac put his feet up on the coffee table and downed half his beer, telling himself he was nothing like the man sitting in his recliner. True, they looked alike and were both thirty-six. At six-four, Pierce was a couple of inches taller, carried a little more weight and his hair was blonder, his eyes bluer.

And they came from the same backgrounds. Mac had tried to overcome his. He’d chosen the worst possible career and lived on his houseboat on one lake or another or in the camper on the back of his truck. He kept a small office in Whitefish, Montana, where his sister lived, and he checked in every week or so, taking only the jobs that interested him.

He drank beer, dressed in old blue jeans, ragged T-shirts and Mexican sandals. Most days he was as close to happy as he could get, all things considered.

Clearly Pierce found all of that amusing, as if he thought Mac tried too hard to disguise who he was. A rich kid from old money. Just not as rich as Pierce.

Nathaniel Pierce loved being rich and flaunted it—when he wasn’t slumming, like tonight. He believed it was the privileged’s duty to acquire more wealth.

Mac, on the other hand, liked working for a living. He didn’t require much. What he did require was a purpose in life. He thrived on challenging himself, both mentally and physically. That was why he’d gotten into private investigation.

“What is it you really want, Pierce?” he asked, deciding to cut to the chase.

“I told you, I want to know your interest in the Foresters. I wasn’t aware you even knew them.”

Mac smiled as he got to his feet. “It’s late. I’m tired. I’ve had a big night.”

Pierce didn’t move. “I have a job for you, Mac.”

“I already have a job.”

His old friend lifted an eyebrow. “I’ll pay you double what you’re getting from your current client.”

Mac smiled at that. His current client was dead. “You know waving money at me is a waste of time.”

Pierce nodded, smiled and slowly pushed himself to his feet. “I do know that about you, Mac.” He said it as if he found that to be a flaw in Mac’s character. “Why don’t you come out to my ranch, say in the morning about nine? I have a little place down the lake where I raise a few buffalo.”

Little. Right. Mac sighed impatiently. “I told you—”

“You’re already on another job. Yes, you told me.” Pierce picked up a plain black videotape from beside the recliner. Mac hadn’t noticed that Pierce had put it there. “Take a look at this. If you still aren’t interested…” Pierce shrugged and tossed Mac the tape.

Mac caught it and watched Pierce leave. He stood there, listening to Pierce retreat down the old wooden dock until the footfalls became too faint to hear. Then he looked down with apprehension at the videotape in his hand.

What the hell was on this? Something that Nathaniel Pierce was confident would change Mac’s mind about the job offer.

That alone was enough to make Mac nervous as hell. But to find Pierce sitting in the dark on the houseboat drinking beer, waiting…

Mac walked over to the VCR, turned on the TV, popped in the tape and hit Play. The images were blurred, everything a grainy black and white. The tape appeared to be a security surveillance video.

In the soundless recording were three people. Two wore ski masks, one of whom carried a sledgehammer. A third stood just out of the camera’s view, but part of that person’s shadow could be seen against the side wall.

Mac watched as the one with the sledgehammer worked to break through some expensive-looking wood. The other man in the ski mask had his back to the camera. The third appeared to be just watching, but the other two would glance back at him from time to time and say something Mac couldn’t make out.

After a few minutes the hammer had made a large hole in what appeared to be a hidden compartment in the wall. The other masked man pushed the one with the sledgehammer out of the way and took a metal box from inside the compartment. The box looked to be about eight inches square and three or four inches deep. There didn’t seem to be anything else in the hole in the wall because the men turned and left, disappearing from the camera’s lens.

The videotape flickered, and the setting changed to outdoors. An old Ford van, dark in color, sat with the engine running, and the driver’s face was captured on film. He was watching out the windshield, looking very young and very nervous. He was the only one not wearing a mask.

An instant later the two men in ski masks emerged from the house and ran toward the van. As they ran, they ripped off their masks. Mac’s heart stopped.

One of the men was Mac’s nineteen-year-old nephew Shane Ramsey, who was supposed to be in Whitefish with Mac’s sister.

The other man running toward the getaway van was Trevor Forester.

Chapter Three

Mac couldn’t sleep. He lay sprawled on his back in the bed, staring up at the ceiling, afraid to close his eyes. When he’d closed them, his thoughts closed in on him, an unsettling mix of pleasure and pain.

Even the pleasure was painful. He’d promised himself in his youth that he wasn’t going to be one of those men who had regrets. Not like his father. Or his father before him. That was why he lived the life he did. On his own terms.

What a joke. He knew regret as keenly as he knew sorrow. And tonight would be a night he knew he would live to regret.

He gave up on sleep, got up, pulled on his jeans and, taking a cold beer from the fridge, wandered out on the deck to sit in the cool darkness.

The marina was dead quiet. The lake was calm under a limitless sky of dark blue velvet and glittering stars. He closed his eyes and tilted the mouth of the bottle to his lips. The glass was cool and wet, the beer icy cold as it ran down his throat.

He opened his eyes. It was the darkness, he realized. The blackness behind his eyelids that stole any chance of sleep. The same kind of blind darkness that would always remind him of the intimate inkiness inside the cottage—and her.

He smiled to himself wryly, remembering. He’d been lost the moment his lips touched hers. She’d stolen his breath, taken his pounding pulse hostage and carried him away to a place he’d sworn to never go again. Never find again even if he’d been tempted to look.

And what surprised him was that she’d seemed as blown away by the experience as he’d been. Something had happened tonight in the cottage, something that scared the hell out of him, because it made him feel as if he’d boarded a runaway freight train that couldn’t be stopped. And now all he could do was wait for the inevitable train wreck.

He’d known that in one split second, one moment of weakness, life could irrevocably change. Mac had seen his father go from wealthy to piss poor in one of those seconds. The man’s reputation ruined. His life destroyed. How many times had his father wanted to take back that instant in time?

Mac had always sworn he wouldn’t end up like his father. He’d live his life, take on little baggage and never care too much about anything. He’d screwed up once and it had cost him more than he could bear. He wouldn’t let it happen again.

He’d slipped up tonight in the cottage. He just hoped to hell he could weather the storm he feared was coming because of it. Every action had a consequence. The moment he’d kissed her. The moment he saw his nephew and Trevor Forester on that videotape. Both life-altering in ways he didn’t even want to think about.

And now he was working for Pierce. He swore. Mac had few ways he could be coerced. His sister and nephew were the only family he had.

Mac swore as he looked out over the dark lake and thought about his nephew, a spoiled kid who’d hated his grandfather for losing the family fortune. Thanks to previous Cooper generations, though, both Mac and his sister had substantial trust funds. Just enough, it seemed, to make Shane crave real wealth. Apparently the kind Nathaniel Pierce had.

Mac took another long drink of his beer, dreading what Pierce would tell him in the morning. There was a reason Pierce hadn’t called the sheriff when he’d been robbed. Mac knew Pierce hadn’t done it out of some loyalty to either Mac or his nephew. Not Pierce. No, Pierce didn’t want the cops knowing about the metal box. Now why was that?