Free Cowboy Undercover by Alice Sharpe Page B

what needs to be done and extract my kid without getting him hurt.”
    “Lily will know I’m ready to do whatever I have to in order to get my money back. If she’s there, she’ll turn me in as a liar the moment she sets eyes on me.”
    “Not if you take care of her first thing,” Block said softly.
    Chance had come here hoping to get a lead on finding Charlie and by default, Lily. But he wasn’t prepared for what he thought he’d just heard. “Are you talking about killing her?” he said.
    Block shrugged. “I have a bottle of her barbiturates. Assuming she’s there, all you have to do is get the pills down her throat. It will appear she committed suicide. But if something goes wrong and she does finger you, off you go, no harm, no foul.” He cleared his throat. “I don’t expect you to risk yourself for nothing. I’ll give you what she stole from you and a bonus, too. If she still has your cash on her it might be best to leave it with her so no one gets suspicious. When you bring Charlie back to me, I’ll add another twenty grand.”
    Chance whistled. “Murder, though. I haven’t killed anyone since the army.”
    “And you did it then because you were fighting a war. This is war, too. The victory is freeing a child. Do you have a gun?”
    “Not on me, but I can get one. Where do I find Lily and all the rest of these people?”
    “An area called White Cliff.”
    Bingo
, Chance thought. Confirmation. Lily was right. Hell, she often was which was just another irritating thing about her. “Where’s that?”
    “Up in Idaho’s panhandle, almost to the border. It’s one of those commune things. The leader is a guy named Roberts. He’s a fast talker and a hard hitter but I heard he’s not around the place as much as he used to be. There’s a woman up there who runs a small store located outside the walls of the community. She calls herself Maria Eastern. If Charlie is living there, she’ll know about it. You can’t ask her straight out, though, and you can’t mention my name or she’ll put a bullet through your brain.”
    “The price just went up ten thousand,” Chance said. Block opened his mouth to speak but closed it without saying anything. “And I’m going to need more cash up front,” Chance added. “I have to buy the gun I told you about and my truck needs a tire. I don’t plan on spending my own money.”
    “I’ll add another thousand,” Block said.
    “Two thousand,” Chance countered.
    Block gritted his teeth. “Be warned that these people are heavily armed and know how to handle themselves.”
    “Sure.”
    “Wait for me in the entry.”
    Chance had already folded the tiny shot glass in his fist and took it with him when he left the office. Block soon appeared and handed over an open envelope stuffed with cash Chance assumed he’d retrieved from a hidden safe inside the office. There was also a slip of paper with a crude map naming roads and estimated distances. In the end he was supposed to look for a red no-trespassing sign.
    “There are going to be a million of those,” Chance said without touching the note.
    “Look at the spelling.”
    Trespassing had been spelled
tresspassing
. “That’s intentional,” Block added. “That’s the sign that points out the right road or so I’m told.”
    “Is this place some kind of secret?”
    “Not at all. It’s located close to a town called Greenville but the less you show your face or ask directions, the better for you if things go wrong.”
    Chance stuffed the envelope of money in his pocket. “You must really love that kid,” he said.
    “He is my son. Once I have him back, I won’t lose him again even if I have to send him out of the country to school.”
    “Then nobody better get caught,” Chance said, implying, he hoped, that this meant him, too.
    “You’d be smart to keep something in mind,” Block said. “I’m an important man in this state. If it comes to whose word will be believed, it will be mine, not