Chapter Fourteen
Liam waited a full day after Nina arrived home before he brought up the idea of setting a trap for her stalker again. “For a trap, you need bait,” she said. “That’s me.”
“We make him think it’s you,” he said. “But you’d be somewhere else. Safe.”
“So you’d use a decoy? Who? And why put someone else at risk?”
“I could be the decoy,” he said.
She laughed. “You! You don’t look anything like me. You’re taller and broader, and no one is ever going to mistake you for a woman.”
He pretended to take offense. “You don’t think if I wore a blond wig and makeup and a dress I could pass as you?”
She laughed harder. “You’d probably make a lovely drag queen, but you wouldn’t look like me. Remember, Nicholson has spent a lot of time studying me. He won’t be easy to fool.”
“We could ask one of your friends to help. Lily might be mistaken for you.”
“She’s at least five inches shorter than me. And I’m not going to put my friends in danger.”
“What about using a dummy?” he asked.
She looked doubtful.
“Hear me out.” He leaned toward her. The idea was taking shape in his mind.
“I’d pack a suitcase and put it in my SUV, then make a big show of leaving, maybe say something about heading to Spain on a photo assignment.
I’d stash the car somewhere and hike back to the house to keep an eye on you, and hide somewhere inside.
We’d set the dummy, dressed in your clothes, on the sofa, watching TV. ”
“All right. Go on. What happens next?”
“The dummy is there on the sofa. Covered with a blanket, as if you fell asleep. You and I are positioned where we can see the sofa.”
“When Nicholson abducted me before, he waited outside my hotel room,” she said. “He didn’t have to break in.”
“Right. But you’ll look so tempting, there on the sofa. Alone and vulnerable. He’ll have to break in.”
She wrinkled her forehead. “How? I’ve got really good locks.”
“We leave a back window unlocked. An oversight.”
“He’ll be suspicious.”
She was thinking of every angle, he had to give her that.
“Maybe not,” he said. “He took risks before. That’s how he was caught.
And he’s been bolder this time—confronting you at the terrain park, and then slashing you in the middle of a crowd.
But he hasn’t yet gotten what we think he wants—to be alone with you.
I think he’ll be willing to take a chance. ”
“All right,” she conceded. “He breaks in. What happens next?”
“We let him get close to the sofa, then I jump him while you call the sheriff.”
She shook her head. “He’ll have a knife. A sharp one.”
“I’ll have a gun.”
“Liam Davies! What are you doing with a gun?”
“I don’t have it yet,” he admitted. “But I’m going to get one.”
“How? You’re not an American citizen.”
“I always hear about how easy it is to get a gun in the US.”
“Absolutely not,” she said. “You could end up in jail. Or he could shoot you. Or stab you.”
“Fine. Then we don’t wait for him to get close to the sofa. We call the sheriff as soon as he steps in the house. And if I get a chance, I come up behind him and hit him in the head. Or throw a net over him.”
“This isn’t a slapstick comedy!” She started giggling.
He pulled her close, laughing, too. “I guess I got a little carried away,” he said. “My default mode is absurdity when things get too out of control.”
“I don’t think everything about the plan is bad,” she said. “But we need better backup. Maybe we should talk to the sheriff’s office again.”
“Right.” He sat up straight and assumed a stern expression.
“Young man, I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job.
We’d be wasting time and money with your absurd scheme.
We don’t even know this person intends to attack again.
He didn’t succeed last time, so he’s probably given up and left town. ”
“I hope that’s not what the sheriff really thinks,” she said.
“But I’m afraid you might be right.” The sheriff’s office hadn’t responded to her requests for more information, and Doug and Marlena weren’t answering her calls, either.
If it wasn’t for her fellow ski patrollers calling and stopping by, she might have despaired.
“We could ask ski patrol for help,” Liam said, as if reading her mind.
“It’s too dangerous,” she said.
“You’re talking about people who handle dynamite and risk avalanches for a living,” he said. “I don’t think they’re easily intimidated.”
“It’s so much to ask,” she said.
“You would do the same for them, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes, but…”
“Let’s invite them over to talk,” he said. “What have you got to lose?”
She sighed. “I guess we don’t really have anyone else to turn to. We’ll ask them. But maybe they can help us come up with a better plan. A safer one.”
* * *
“I’ve never entertained anyone at my house before,” Nina said, as she arranged a tray of canapés in the kitchen two nights later.
“This isn’t a party,” Liam said. “It’s a planning session.”
“We have food and drinks,” she said. “That sounds like a party to me, no matter the reason.” When she had contacted Connor about ski patrol possibly helping her to stop her assailant, she had told him she understood if no one wanted to get involved. Instead, almost everyone had agreed to help.
Chase was the first to arrive, with a six-pack of beer and his girlfriend, Cerise. “I brought Cerise along because she’s tougher than I am,” he said. “And smarter.”
“You see why I keep him around.” Cerise grinned. “But seriously, if you want to keep this ski patrol only, I can leave.”
“No, no stay,” Nina said. “We need all the smart, tough people we can get.”
The others arrived soon after, in twos and threes. Lily brought Scott with her and both their avalanche dogs, Shelby and Hunter. Connor came with his dog, Farley. “I’d have brought my girlfriend but she’s on special assignment somewhere in Eastern Colorado,” Connor said.
“Too bad,” Nina said. “It would have been good to have an FBI agent on our side.” Connor had met Special Agent Stacy Macrae when she worked to track down the bomber who threatened SkyCrest at the beginning of the year.
Raz and Renee arrived together, then Anders showed up with his dog, Darth. As other people and dogs came in, the room filled with conversation, barking and laughter.
“It sounds like morning meeting in here,” Connor said as he settled into one of the folding chairs Nina had placed around the room.
“Get yourselves something to eat and drink, then let’s get started,” Liam called from the living room.
Everyone gradually filtered into the room and settled into chairs or onto the floor. “Thanks for coming out tonight,” Liam began.
“You ought to know patrollers never turn down free beer,” Chase said. Cerise punched his shoulder, and he grinned.
“Nina needs your help,” Liam continued. “The man who injured her at the Mardi Gras parade is still out there, and the sheriff’s department isn’t having any success in tracking him down. Meanwhile, she’s still a target. Most of you know what happened to her four years ago in Lake Placid?”
Heads nodded around the room.
“We don’t want a repeat of that,” Anders said.
“What we want is her back on patrol,” Connor said. Others murmured agreement.
“Then help us catch this guy,” Liam said.
“How?” Brian asked.
Liam turned to Nina. She stood and moved to the center of the room, while Liam took a seat.
They had agreed she should present the plan they had refined since their first discussion.
“We don’t know for certain, but we believe the man who is after me is named Aaron Nicholson,” she said.
“He’s the person who attacked me before.
Since law enforcement can’t find him, we want to try to lure him out of hiding.
By now he probably knows I’m not currently working at SkyCrest.”
“Booo!” someone at the back of the room said.
She smiled. “Believe me, I want to get back on patrol as soon as I can. We think if we make him believe I’m here at the house alone, he’ll see me as an easy target. Except I won’t be alone. A bunch of you will be hiding, waiting until he shows up.”
“We’ll teach him to mess with one of us,” Raz said.
“I don’t need you to beat him up,” Nina said. “Just keep him here until the sheriff arrives.”
“If we can lure him back into the bedroom, we can shut the door and trap him there,” Liam said. “But we need people stationed outside in case he tries to break a window or something.”
“We can overpower him and tie him up,” Anders said.
“He’ll have a knife,” Nina said. “I don’t want any of you hurt. Better to keep your distance.”
“We won’t do anything too reckless,” Brian said. “But the more of us there are, the easier he’ll be to overwhelm.”
“You’ll have to show up here stealthily and hide until he arrives,” Nina said.
“Is what you’re suggesting legal?” Lily asked.
“It’s not illegal to have friends over to my house,” Nina said.
“And we don’t want any guns. And no violence unless it’s necessary to defend yourself.
If Nicholson comes here, he’s trespassing and violating a restraining order and the terms of his parole.
We’re only intent on keeping him here until the sheriff takes him away. ”
“What if he hurts Nina?” Raz asked.
“It’s not going to get that far,” Liam said. “If we can’t detain him without the risk of someone getting hurt, we’ll let him go.”
“What a waste,” Brian said.
“Maybe not,” Liam said. “I’ll have a camera set up to take photographs. I can give those photos to the sheriff to prove he’s violated his parole.”
“One of us could try to follow him if he leaves,” Anders said. “If we can find out where he’s staying, we can give the sheriff that information, too.”
Nina relaxed a little. The idea of trapping Nicholson didn’t sound so far-fetched and risky now.
“One thing to keep in mind,” Liam said. “This person might not be Nicholson. It might be someone else entirely, even someone you know.”
“You mean, like a local?” Renee asked.