Mercy
Mercy
B.J. Daniels
The hunt for a killer leads to a battle between justice and desire…For U.S. marshal Rourke Kincaid, there's the law… and then there's his law. When the two don't agree, he always trusts his instincts. A killing spree has gripped the Northwest, showing a strange connection that only he sees, and now the old rules of justice no longer apply. Forced to turn rogue, he goes deep undercover to track his mysterious female suspect to a quiet, unassuming cafe in the wild, isolated mountains of Beartooth, Montana. But encountering Callie Westfield complicates his mission in ways he never expected. As suspicious as she seems, her fragile beauty and sexy charm get to Rourke. Then the gory crimes begin anew.With his heart suddenly at war with his instincts, he has only two options. Either turn Callie over to the law, or put everything-including his badge and his life-on the line to protect her.
The hunt for a killer leads to a battle between justice and desire
For U.S. marshal Rourke Kincaid, there’s the law…and then there’s his law. When the two don’t agree, he always trusts his instincts. A killing spree has gripped the Northwest, showing a strange connection that only he sees, and now the old rules of justice no longer apply. Forced to turn rogue, he goes deep undercover to track his mysterious female suspect to a quiet, unassuming café in the wild, isolated mountains of Beartooth, Montana.
But encountering Callie Westfield complicates his mission in ways he never expected. As suspicious as she seems, her fragile beauty and sexy charm get to Rourke. Then the gory crimes begin anew. With his heart suddenly at war with his instincts, he has only two options. Either turn Callie over to the law, or put everything—including his badge and his life—on the line to protect her.
Praise for (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
New York Times bestselling author (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
B.J. DANIELS (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
“Daniels is truly an expert at Western romantic suspense.”
—RT Book Reviews on Atonement
“Will keep readers on the edge of their chairs from beginning to end.”
—Booklist on Forsaken
“Action-packed and chock-full of suspense.”
—Under the Covers on Redemption
“Fans of Western romantic suspense will relish Daniels’ tale of clandestine love played out in a small town on the Great Plains.”
—Booklist on Unforgiven
Mercy
B.J. Daniels
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
I joke that this book tried to kill me. I realize now that the ones that really grab me are the ones that I struggle with and end up loving the most. This one grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. So this book is dedicated to the man who saw me through it, even the three a.m. trip to the hospital with my first migraine.
To my husband, Parker, who takes good care of me so I can just write. I couldn’t be more grateful for your loving support or the wonderful meals you cook me or the patience you have deadline after deadline. I couldn’t do this without you. I love you.
Contents
Cover (#u6ab4859e-84e0-560c-ba0c-fd4e735271e6)
Back Cover Text (#udb40a191-1944-5044-9090-ede6d6e8901d)
Praise for New York Times bestselling author B.J. DANIELS (#ulink_5a10d129-e4f0-54b0-b5d2-fa11520911fb)
Title Page (#uecda76c7-1219-5b7a-a4cd-9a0fce5757c0)
Dedication (#u82a1cdf0-4caf-56ce-852e-c7ff3e622269)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_86883698-2a61-5676-80ff-2a823efadd98)
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_2d1c8eff-48a6-5570-b5ed-a6e9aa8299a3)
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_2e37c287-fc4a-58c1-ab9f-811217779b30)
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_f85ae354-86c4-5e5b-9328-6270aef72206)
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_1b1eeb2a-4b04-5cbf-a89a-c1f82850eff6)
CHAPTER SIX (#ulink_ec81d354-7c6f-5f97-bb55-8536139faa17)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_1ea711ed-1466-5667-8bb9-33bc1ea0f4dd)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_78f958bd-7359-52e2-9d22-ec2c4609ef68)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_edf831d8-66f2-5252-9a3f-7717c747433f)
SWEAT BEADED HIS forehead and upper lip. He tried to catch his breath, but it was impossible with the gag. It stuck to his dry tongue and cut into one corner of his mouth as he’d attempted to cry out for help. The blindfold kept him from knowing what time of day it was. He kicked, but his legs had tangled in the sweat-drenched sheets. His wrists, still bound to the headboard, were chafed raw, his aching arms numb where the restraints bit into his flesh.
He didn’t know how long he’d been like this. The last thing he remembered was having sex and then asking the woman to leave. It had been a mistake picking her up at the bar and bringing her home in the first place.
After that, he must have fallen asleep. He’d awakened in a panic to find himself gagged, blindfolded and bound to the bed. That had to have been hours ago, but he had no concept of time.
He’d tried everything to free himself. But the way he was trussed up, nothing worked.
How long before someone would find him like this? At first all he could think about was the embarrassment. Now he prayed for anyone to stop by, knowing how remote a chance that would be. No one would even realize they hadn’t seen him for days since he’d taken off for a short vacation.
Anxiety filled him, making him fear he was losing his mind. This wasn’t happening. He couldn’t seem to catch his breath. His chest rose and fell, faster and faster.
A sound made him stop struggling. He held his heaving breath. Had he only imagined someone in the room?
A floorboard creaked. She’d come back. Of course she had. She couldn’t leave him like this. This was some kind of sick joke. Something straight out of a horror movie.
It had been his first night of vacation, so he’d thought, why not have a little fun? Maybe he should have been nicer once the fun was over. Too late to worry about that now, though. Once she cut his restraints, she would regret ever pulling this stunt on him.
He tried to remember her name. Something that started with a C. Candy. Cara. Catherine. Cassie. He tried to say Cassie around the gag. It came out unintelligible.
A thought suddenly struck him. It was her in the room, wasn’t it? Who else? But now he wasn’t so sure.
He felt someone move closer. He could hear breathing next to his bed. He thrashed against his bonds, moaning in both pain and terror.
A harsh whisper next to his ear silenced him. It was her all right. He remembered that voice. But at first he thought he’d heard her wrong. Then she repeated the same three words.
“Beg for mercy.”
The gag muffled his screams as he felt the first slice of the knife.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_e3b28dc8-0d82-5935-ac29-b5b7919fcc4b)
IT HAD SURPRISED Laura Fuller when he’d called. Something odd in his voice. That and the fact that she hadn’t heard from him in months. It made her anxious. As she stepped into the small restaurant off Pioneer Square in downtown Seattle, she stopped to scan the place. Maybe it was the cop in her, but she couldn’t help feeling on guard as she spotted him.
He looked good. That thought made her smile to herself. Rourke Kincaid always looked good, all six foot four of him. He had classic dark looks that were almost as amazing as the rich depths of his eyes. If he wasn’t usually so serious, he would have been sinfully gorgeous. Women always noticed him. He, on the other hand... Did he notice other women? Or was Laura’s former partner just unaware of her as a woman?
As she let the door close behind her and moved in his direction, she thought he looked a little pale. The lines around those dark eyes a little more defined. She thought of the first time she’d seen him as she limped toward his table. She had detested the idea of working with someone who looked like him because she’d thought he wouldn’t take the job seriously. She’d thought he was a womanizer, one of those men who had to have the attention of every woman around him. She couldn’t have been more wrong.
Rourke, like her, had been interested in only his job. At least that was how it had been back then.
As Laura drew closer, she saw that all his attention was on the papers he had spread on the table. But when he saw her, he hurriedly tucked them back into the folder and set it on the chair next to him.
He’d brought some case he was working on. Of course that was why he’d called her. It was the only reason he had ever called her, except for the few times to see how she was doing after she’d gotten out of the hospital.
He rose now, hastily getting to his feet. His expression brightened, and he flashed her one of his disarming smiles. Even after bracing herself against it, her heart kicked into gear, all those old feelings rushing at her.
“Laura.” He took both her hands in his large, warm ones and brushed a kiss across her cheek. She noticed then that he wasn’t wearing his U.S. Marshals uniform. Maybe it was his day off. But then, Rourke never really took a day off, especially when he was deep in a case.
To a bystander, he probably looked relaxed in a pair of worn jeans, equally worn boots and a blue chambray button-up shirt, and yet she could tell he was anxious. His Stetson was on the seat with the folder he’d brought. You could take the cowboy out of Wyoming, but you couldn’t take the cowboy out of him, she thought.
“How are you?” he asked, genuine concern in his voice. She knew then that he’d seen her limp, even though she’d tried so hard to hide how bad it was. Rourke missed little. It was what had made him such a good homicide detective and now criminal investigator.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically. “How about you?”
“Me?” He seemed surprised by the question as he stepped around the table to pull out her chair. It was such a gentlemanly thing to do that she couldn’t help but smile. A year ago he wouldn’t have touched her chair. She wouldn’t have let him because they’d been equals back then. But a lot had changed in a year, hadn’t it?
She sat and watched him move back around to his own chair. “What’s wrong?” she asked as she got a closer look at him.
He blinked. “Can’t I ask my former Seattle P.D. partner to lunch without you thinking—”
“Rourke,” she said with a shake of her head as he lowered himself into his chair.
He laughed, his dark gaze meeting hers as he stretched out his long legs. “I forget how well you know me.” His look alone made her pulse purr just under her skin. How long had she been in love with this man? Too long.
“Tell me what I’m doing here besides having lunch?” she said, needing to clarify for herself what this meeting would cover. She knew what she’d hoped it was about, but clearly she’d been kidding herself.
“I’m sure you heard about what happened six months ago,” he said, dropping his voice.
Law enforcement was a tight-knit community. Even if she was no longer one of the gang, she still heard things. Rourke had risen so quickly in his field that she knew there were some who’d enjoyed his fall from grace.
Six months ago he hadn’t waited for backup even though he’d been ordered to do so. The bust had gone badly, a civilian was shot and almost died, and Rourke was reprimanded and pulled off active duty.
She picked up her napkin, unfolded it carefully and laid it across her lap before she spoke. “You have always followed your intuition. It’s what made you such a good homicide detective. Now as a U.S. marshal, well, I would expect you to continue doing what you do best. I would still trust you with my life.” When she looked up, she saw the shine of his eyes and felt a lump form in her throat. Was it possible he missed her as much as she’d missed him?
“You were the best partner I ever had,” he said, emotion making his deep voice even deeper. “Sometimes I miss the Seattle P.D.” His gaze narrowed as he studied her. “If I could go back to that night—”
“I’ve put that part of my life behind me.” Laura couldn’t find words to describe how much she missed it. But not for the reason Rourke Kincaid thought. Even if they could change what had happened that night a year ago, she doubted he would still be with the Seattle P.D. Even back then, she’d known he wouldn’t stay in Homicide long. He was destined to greater things.
“Want a drink before we eat?” He didn’t wait for an answer before signaling the waitress. “The usual?” he said to Laura with a grin. “Scotch on the rocks for my friend. Nothing for me.”
“You’re not joining me?” she asked as the waitress left. “I just assumed you were off duty.”
“Off duty.” He chuckled at that. “Today is my first day of my latest suspension. My boss suggested I take two weeks to reevaluate my career choices.”
She reached across the table and touched his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“He’s probably right. I’m not sure I’m cut out for taking orders. Nor am I so sure I can still trust my instincts.” He took a sip of his water and waited as the waitress returned to place the drink in front of her. “We should probably order. Two cheeseburgers and fries?” he asked, smiling at her again.
Laura nodded even though she didn’t eat like that anymore. Couldn’t. Being on the force, she had worked out all the time, kept active and could eat anything she wanted and did. Now...well, now things were different.
Once the waitress left again, he said, “Six months ago, I was put on cold cases down in the basement.” He nodded. “I know. I was lucky they didn’t send me packing.”
“I’m sure you’ll be back on fieldwork soon. Rourke, you’re too good to leave you stuck away much longer. If you can just hang in—”
He shook his head. “Surprisingly that’s not the problem. They’ve reinstated me for fieldwork. They want me back on the job.”
Frowning, she said, “Then I guess I don’t understand.”
“I found something in an old case file. Something I want to chase.”
This was the Rourke she knew so well. Once he got on the scent, he couldn’t let up until he caught what he was chasing. Wasn’t that why he’d ended up in the basement with the cold cases?
“I’ve been ordered to assist with an asset seizure on a drug case that any fool can handle.”
She stared at him. “This is why you invited me to lunch. You want me to talk you out of whatever it is you’re thinking of doing?” She shook her head, seeing her error as she studied his face. “No, you want me to encourage you to chase it.”
Laura couldn’t help being touched that her opinion meant that much, while at the same time, it really wouldn’t matter what she said. She was sure his mind was already made up. He just wanted that little push and from who better than his old partner?
Her gaze shifted to the file he’d placed on the seat of the chair next to him. What had he found that would make him risk his career over it? “So, let’s see it.”
“Maybe we should eat—”
Laura rolled her eyes. “You didn’t get me down here for the burgers or the Scotch. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
He gave her a sheepish grin as he reached for the file folder. “I found something—some old photographs,” he said with an excitement that would have been contagious when they’d worked together. He opened the folder and leaned toward her. She caught a whiff of his oh, so familiar aftershave. Her pulse thrummed. She loved seeing Rourke like this.
* * *
ROURKE FELT EVEN more anxious as he pulled out the photographs. He trusted Laura’s judgment. Now he worried that she’d tell him he was wrong, that he’d lost his edge. That he was about to make yet another mistake. Only this one would cost him his career and for nothing.
He slid the photographs from the folder and reached into his jacket pocket for the magnifying glass he’d brought. The photos were all of a group of onlookers standing behind yellow crime-scene tape. As he started to hand over the shots, his eye went to the one face, a face he hadn’t been able to forget from the first time he’d seen the young woman—and realized that he’d seen her somewhere before.
Laura took the three photographs and the magnifying glass. “What am I looking for?”
He didn’t answer as he watched her scan one photo, then another until she had looked at all three.
She frowned and studied each again, more slowly this time. “These are from three different crime scenes.”
He smiled. He’d been right to bring this to her. He just hoped she saw what he had—that one face in the crowd. What Laura might have lacked in polish as a homicide detective, she more than made up for in street sense and down-to-earth logic. She didn’t jump to conclusions. She took in information, digested it, considered and then assessed the situation with almost a coldhearted clarity.
Rourke had always trusted her judgment because of it. Not that he’d been happy at first about being partnered with a woman when he’d joined the Seattle P.D. Like a lot of other men, he’d been biased, believing that when the cards were down, even a good woman cop would be weaker than a man or may become emotional and be a liability.
He could laugh about that misconception now. Laura Fuller was tougher, more capable and less emotional in a tight spot than a lot of male cops he’d known. As he had in the past, he wondered now how she’d been raised. She’d never talked about growing up, but at first he’d suspected, because of how tough she was, that she might have been the only girl in a houseful of brothers. She’d never seemed to want to talk about what she offhandedly called her boring childhood, but then she’d mentioned once that she had a sister. He’d gotten the impression that the sister was her only family and that they weren’t close.
As inseparable as he and Laura had been in the past, he realized that he didn’t really know her. His fault, since all his focus had been on his career for as far back as he could remember.
The waiting now, though, was killing him.
He started to say something when Laura hesitated on a corner of a photo where a dark-haired young woman stood just beyond the crime-scene tape. He watched Laura spread the three photos on the table, going from one to the next. He could feel the change in her. She’d seen it!
His relief was almost palpable. He couldn’t help the surge of adrenaline that shot through him. If Laura saw it, then he had to be right. He was onto something.
“It’s the same woman, isn’t it?” he said, no longer able to contain himself.
As Laura studied the woman in the three photos, she unconsciously pushed a lock of her blond shoulder-length hair back behind one ear. He realized that she’d let her hair grow out since he’d last seen her and felt a wave of guilt. After she’d been shot and left the Seattle P.D., he’d checked on her often during the first few months. But since taking the job with the U.S. Marshals, he had gotten so busy he couldn’t remember the last time he’d called her.
She handed back the magnifying glass. “Three different neighborhoods? Three different homicides?”
Rourke nodded.
“And these are the best shots you have of her?”
“Unfortunately. But she’s the key to those three murders. I can feel it.”
“She might just be a murder junkie. Probably has a scanner next to her bed and responds whenever she hears the call.” Laura shrugged and pushed the photos back toward him. “Have you been able to identify her?”
“Not yet. I’ve hired a private investigator to canvass the neighborhoods where the murders were committed.”
She raised a brow in surprise as she realized he had been working outside the U.S. Marshals Service and apparently for some time. “Aren’t you taking this a little too personally?”
He’d already gone rogue, and now she knew it. “I just have a feeling about this one. I can’t let it go.” He looked down at the photos spread on the table, his eye going to the dark-haired woman. Her face had been haunting him for weeks. When he closed his eyes at night...
She shook her head. “What are you doing, Rourke?”
He could hear the skepticism in her voice. He wished now that he’d ordered a drink. He could use it. Laura thought he was looking for a lead where there wasn’t one. Unfortunately, his boss thought the same thing.
He’d never been plagued with self-doubt when it came to his instincts. But after almost costing a man his life...
“Rourke, what am I really doing here?” Laura asked.
* * *
“I NEED YOUR HELP,” Rourke said, leaning toward her conspiratorially. “I remembered that your background was psychology and criminology. Did I hear correctly that you’re doing freelance profiling for the Seattle P.D.?”
Laura shouldn’t have been surprised that he knew this, but she was. Just as she shouldn’t have been disappointed that he’d asked her to dinner because he wanted her help on a case.
“I need to know about this woman and the kind of man who would be in her life,” he said.
“Based on three photos?” she asked, thinking he must be kidding.
“This woman is the connection between the three different crime scenes, but I think there’s more. I think she’s working with a serial killer.”
Laura leaned back in her chair in surprise. She studied him for a moment before she looked at the photographs again. She tried to imagine why this woman was at three separate crime scenes in three separate neighborhoods. It could be as simple as morbid curiosity. Or not.
Profiling was a science based on statistics compiled of criminals. Depending on the type of murder, she could paint a fairly accurate picture of the killer once she had all the information. Or, if Rourke was right about the woman, in this case, co-killer.
Of course, it was much more likely that this woman could be just as Laura had said before, someone with a scanner who lived such a dull life that going to crime scenes was her only source of entertainment.
Had it not been Rourke, she would have dismissed this without a thought. But she’d learned a long time ago to trust him. If he felt he had to chase this, even jeopardize his job to do so, then she had to take it seriously.
She motioned for the magnifying glass again. What was funny was that when she’d first noticed the woman, she’d thought she recognized her. Something about the woman’s face... But when she studied the features, she decided the woman merely had one of those sweet, innocent-looking faces. That didn’t make Laura hate her any less.
She knew it was crazy to be jealous of a woman in a crime-scene photo who was possibly involved in at least three murders. But she could see that no woman had ever captivated Rourke like this one had. He couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off her in the photo.
Laura figured he’d be disappointed when he finally came face-to-face with her. That was if he could find her—and didn’t get himself killed in the process.
Pushing the photos away, she was torn between laughter and tears when she thought how excited she’d been after Rourke’s call. What a fool she’d been, taking forever to get dressed. She’d even put on a little makeup, not that Rourke had noticed. And while she was touched that he’d called her to help with this, she wanted him to see her. Not the former cop. Not the former homicide partner. For once, she just wanted him to look at her and see the woman.
“So, what are you planning to do?” she asked, already knowing the answer.
“Laura, I can’t get these three cold cases out of my mind. I have no choice but to try to find this woman. I know you think I’m a fool to chase this.”
She sighed, seeing his disappointment. He’d hoped she would jump on board just like in the old days when he’d bent the rules and she had gone along with it. But the last time she’d bent the rules, she was almost killed. Her world, as she had known it, ended the day she was shot. She still had the scars, both inside and out.
Now, sitting here with him, she found herself battling a growing anger, more at herself than at him. Not that she thought it made any difference. Picking up her glass, she took a sip of her Scotch, hoping the alcohol would steady her.
“I’ve got two weeks,” he said, oblivious to her mounting resentment. “Once I get this woman’s name—”
“You’re really going to risk throwing away your career for some questionable lead in some old cold cases?”
He waved a hand through the air. “You know the ‘career’ part is the least of it for me. Sure, I love what I do and have worked hard to get where I am, but what is the point if I can’t chase a case that’s gotten into my blood?”
Her blood was on fire now. She could feel it flush her cheeks as she took another drink. The Scotch was like throwing gasoline on a blaze. “You don’t care about a career I would give my left leg for?” She let out a bark of a laugh, trying to keep her voice down when she was raging inside. “Oh, that’s right—I lost my career because of my left leg. Shot in the line of duty. Bang. Career over and you...” She lifted her nearly empty Scotch glass, suddenly at a loss for words. Tears welled and spilled. She wiped furiously at them. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t let him see how messed up she was or how deep her hurt ran.
Rourke looked shocked as he reached for her. “Laura, I’m so sorry.”
She shook off the hand he placed on her arm. He motioned to the waitress to bring her another drink. That was all she needed. Didn’t he realize how close she was to telling him not only how she felt about the loss of her career but also how she felt about him?
“You’re going to do it—jeopardize everything.” Her chest ached with unshed tears. “Why would you do this?” Because of the woman in the photo. Something about that face had gotten to him.
Rourke looked distressed that he’d upset her, but also shocked. “I’m doing this because of you, Laura. I wanted to do this for you, and once I found the lead...”
She stared at him. “What are you talking about?”
“The third murder case? It was yours before you and I became partners.”
“I wasn’t on Homicide until—”
“No, you were still a street cop, but I saw your notes on this case in the original file. You were there, Laura. You took these photographs.”
She shook her head, telling herself this couldn’t be true, but an inkling of a memory fought to surface. Was that why she’d thought she recognized the woman in the crowd, because she’d taken her photo?
“I know it sounds crazy,” Rourke continued, “but it’s the reason I first got involved in this case. I saw your notes, and I wanted to solve it for you. Then, when I found the other two similar murders from the area and the same woman in all of the shots...”
All the fire in her blew out as if doused by a bucket of ice water. For a moment, she couldn’t breathe. This was the Rourke she knew and loved. And wanting to solve this case because of her... Well, this was as romantic as Rourke Kincaid got. At least with her.
As the waitress arrived with their burgers, Rourke quickly pocketed the magnifying glass and slid the photos back into the folder, dropping it again on the seat next to him. The waitress exchanged her empty Scotch glass for a full one.
Laura picked it up, closed her eyes and took a gulp of the icy cold booze.
She couldn’t believe this. He’d gotten involved in the case because of her. But it was the woman in the photograph who had him about to commit career suicide.
Even with her eyes closed, she could see the image of the dark-haired young woman with the angelic face standing behind the crime-scene tape. Rourke wouldn’t be the only one haunted by the woman now.
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_63a4be3f-88f2-58ce-8e95-a62858822dfa)
ROURKE MENTALLY KICKED HIMSELF. What the hell had he been thinking, going to Laura about this?
Had he thought she might want to help him by living vicariously while he solved this one? He’d been more than insensitive, but then again, Laura had also changed. He’d never seen her in tears before—even the night she was shot.
Her wounds had been nearly fatal, but she’d recovered—all except for her left leg. Like him, though, she wasn’t built for a desk job, so he was glad she had gotten into the profiling field. He thought she’d be damned good at it. Which was another reason he’d asked her to dinner.
He’d foolishly assumed, though, that the old Laura, the one who felt like an equal, would show up. This Laura... Well, she was more fragile. He should have realized that would be the case.
They ate their meals, him changing the subject to the weather. It didn’t always rain in Seattle, but still, there wasn’t that much to say.
“Is your food okay?” he asked, noticing that she’d barely touched hers. That wasn’t like her either. One of the things he’d always loved about her when they were partners was that she liked to eat as much as he did. Seattle offered every kind of fare there was, and the two of them had consumed their share.
“I had to quit eating like I used to,” she said, spearing a French fry and taking a small bite.
How had he not noticed that, along with the change in hairstyle, she’d also dropped the weight she’d gained after the shooting? Laura was an attractive woman, not classically beautiful, but striking. At five-eight, she looked strong, as if she’d been working out in spite of her leg. She’d been a blonde for as long as he’d known her, and yet her coloring seemed wrong for the pale shade, making him wonder what her natural color was. Something else he hadn’t noticed until now.
“You look great,” he said, again reminded of how little he really knew about his former partner, when she seemed to know him so well.
She smiled as if she knew he hadn’t really looked at her until that moment.
“So, you’re doing okay?” he asked, worried about her.
Laura was his age: thirty-six. It surprised him that she’d never married again. She’d apparently been married for a short time before he’d met her to a man named Mike Fuller. She never talked about it. Nor did she date much, seeming more interested in her career.
He wondered if there was a man in her life, now that, thanks to the shooting, she didn’t have such a demanding career. In the old days, he might have asked. But a lot had changed since those days, and he didn’t feel close enough to question her about her love life.
“I was glad when I heard you were finishing up your studies to be a profiler,” he finally ventured. “Laura, I know you’ll be a great one.”
She shrugged, looking uncomfortable. “I started doing some studying on my own while I was laid up and realized it might be something I was good at.” She met his gaze. “I can help you with this case, if you’ll let me.” She raised a hand before he could say he’d changed his mind and wasn’t sure it was a good idea. “If I could talk you out of this, I would. But since we both know I can’t...”
This was what he’d hoped she would say. If he hoped to solve these murder cases, he could use her help since all of the resources of the U.S. Marshals’ office were off-limits during his suspension. While he thought profiling could be useful, he knew it was good old-fashioned investigative work that usually solved crimes. But he wanted Laura on his team.
The truth was that he needed her for more than profiling. Lately, he’d been second-guessing himself, no longer sure he should trust his own judgment. He needed Laura’s analytical mind. “I—” But he didn’t get a chance to finish whatever he was going to say.
His cell phone rang, and when he checked it, he said, “Sorry, I have to take this. It’s the P.I. I hired.” He stepped away, relieved for the call as he hurried outside. Laura seemed so fragile right now. Even though he needed her help, did he dare involve her in this?
Outside the café, it had begun to drizzle, the sky a dull gray wash as everything quickly became slick with rain. Seattle had a fairly high suicide rate. He’d never felt that internal darkness as much as he did now, standing under the awning of the restaurant.
“I found something,” Edwin Sharp said without preamble. “I think it could be who you’re looking for. A landlady identified the woman in the photo as Callie Westfield. She worked as a waitress at a café in the neighborhood. The owner of the café required her driver’s license when she started work, so I was able to get a copy. Her full name is Caligrace Westfield. I ran her through the system. I couldn’t find a residential address, but I do have an address where she is currently employed.”
Rourke pulled out his notebook and pen.
“She’s working as a waitress at the Branding Iron Café in Beartooth, Montana.”
* * *
LAURA FELT SICK to her stomach as she left the restaurant. She’d been too upset to eat, but she’d forced herself to consume as much of her meal as she could. Rourke had felt bad enough, without her making him feel worse.
As astute as the man was when it came to solving crimes, he seldom saw what was right in front of his face. Rourke didn’t have a clue when it came to her. He’d really believed that missing her old job in law enforcement was the reason she was upset. How could he not know that she’d been in love with him almost from the start?
“It’s you, Rourke!” she had wanted to scream. “I miss you! I miss the damned force, but it’s because I miss talking to you every day!” Even if it had been about only their latest cases. “I miss being with you.” Days off used to be hell. She couldn’t wait to get back to work. Back to Rourke.
Like him, she’d been on the fast track, moving quickly from a Seattle P.D. officer to Homicide. The sky had been the limit for both of them. They had been called the Dream Team. She could laugh about it now, but back then, she was sure everyone thought she and Rourke were sleeping together. They were that compatible. They could finish each other’s sentences. They were that close. So no wonder they had worked so well together.
And they were good. Between the two of them, they solved cases. Their futures were so bright, they felt like rock stars, she thought bitterly.
Then that night in the alley... She’d gone in alone even though Rourke had told her to wait. He’d had one of the felons on the ground, restraining the man with cuffs. But she didn’t want to wait. She’d felt a singing in her blood. A feeling that she was invincible. She’d gone down the alley not realizing the man was trapped at the end, hunkered down, shot full of drugs, a loaded gun in his hand and his finger on the trigger.
Reaching her car now, she climbed in, her leg aching from either the short walk to her parking spot—or the memory of that night and the impact of the bullet as it struck the bone.
Everyone told her that she was lucky to be alive. Lucky. Sick to her stomach now, heart aching and her mind racing, she didn’t feel lucky at all. She felt scared.
Rourke thought he was chasing a serial killer and was now headed for some town in Montana called Beartooth. He had been quiet after his phone call, and she’d had to drag what little she could out of him. Clearly, he’d changed his mind about involving her, but she wasn’t having any of that. She’d prove to him that he needed her help. She’d put her personal feelings aside and be the cop he needed her to be.
“So, what’s her name?” she’d asked, hating that he’d wanted to close her out.
“This whole thing could blow up in my face. I shouldn’t have involved you.”
She’d given him a sideways look. “But you did involve me, and now you’re stuck with me. I can tell that you have more than just her location. What’s her name?”
He’d relented as she’d known he would. He wouldn’t have brought her the photos if he hadn’t really wanted her help—needed her help. It was that thought that had made the rest of the dinner bearable.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
Her fingers trembled now as she put the key into the ignition. As far as she knew, she’d never heard the name before and yet...
She was anxious to get home, even though Rourke had wanted to put her in a taxi. She’d pointed out that she hadn’t finished her second Scotch and was fine to drive. She was still shaken, blaming it on the fact that she’d gotten her hopes up that the dinner was going to be more than it was.
There was another reason she felt the need to get home quickly. She couldn’t wait to get her hands on her files. From the time she’d started with the Seattle P.D., she had copied all of her notes on the cases she’d worked on and photocopied everything in the files, including making duplicate photos. She didn’t care that it was against protocol. She liked to look at them, study them, see what she could have done differently. See what she might have missed.
If this cold case of Rourke’s really was one she’d worked on—even as a street cop taking photos of the looky-loos behind the crime-scene tape—well, then she would have all the information in her files at home.
The engine turned over. Shifting into Drive, she pulled out without looking. A car horn blared. She slammed on her brakes. The driver of the vehicle swerved around her, barely missing her. Anywhere else but Seattle and the driver would have given her the finger.
Shaken, she looked back to see a second car. This driver had managed to stop in time. The driver impatiently motioned for her to go. She smiled a thank-you back at him and, her heart hammering, pulled out into traffic.
Fortunately, her apartment wasn’t far from downtown Seattle. She navigated the half dozen blocks, concentrating on her driving, still upset from her near accident.
As she pulled into her parking garage and shut off the engine, she tried to calm down. But it was useless. Seeing Rourke again had stirred up a cauldron of emotions that now roiled inside her. Loving Rourke hurt and always had, but she’d thought she had learned to live with it.
Today she’d realized how wrong she was. She smacked the steering wheel with her palm, hating him and the spell some woman in a photo had cast on him. She couldn’t let him jeopardize his career, not for some old cold case. Maybe especially for one he said he was doing for her. But even at that thought, she knew she couldn’t stop him.
The parking garage seemed to close in around her. She had been getting better. Her psychiatrist had said during her last appointment that he was pleased with the progress she’d made.
“I still get scared sometimes,” she’d admitted. “But I’m not so afraid when I leave my apartment now. I still check the backseat of my car. Not as often as I used to, though.”
He’d nodded sagely. “It’s wise to be aware of your surroundings, living in a city. You’re getting out more, then?”
“I’m shopping for my own groceries again and going to lunch occasionally with friends.” The last part wasn’t exactly true. She’d never had a lot of friends. But, unlike some people, she didn’t mind eating alone.
The doctor had studied her openly. “You seem better. Do you feel better?”
She had.
Now, though, she couldn’t catch her breath. She listened for the sound of footfalls in the cool dimness of the garage, suddenly afraid she was no longer alone. Logically, she knew there probably wasn’t anyone crouched in a dark corner of the garage, waiting for her. Just as she had known there probably wasn’t a boogeyman hiding under her bed when she was a child.
But once a boogeyman crawled out from under your bed in the middle of the night... Well, from then on you knew that he could be waiting for you in any dark corner—or dark alley.
For a while, she’d thought her badge and gun were like a powerful shield that would protect her. She’d let herself believe that she’d conquered her fears, that nothing could ever hurt her again as long as Rourke was by her side. He’d made her feel powerful and immortal, when in truth, she was that little girl cowering in the corner of her bed as the boogeyman loomed over her.
Laura let out a sob as she searched the dark recesses of the garage, then hurriedly opened her door and fled to the elevator. She punched the up button, hammering at it, before she dared look behind her. There were street traffic sounds beyond the garage, but no closer, more ominous sounds of footfalls coming from the dark shadowed corners of the garage—at least none she could hear over the pounding of her heart.
She turned back to the elevator, leaning on the button again. She heard the elevator car groan from somewhere inside the building. Her every instinct told her to take the stairs. Now! But with her leg...
The elevator opened noisily, the yawning doors revealing no one inside. She practically threw herself in, hit the ninth-floor button and punched Close a half dozen times before the doors slowly closed.
The breath she’d been holding rushed from her. Tears burned her cheeks. She leaned against the elevator wall for support. She wasn’t better.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_a58b60d9-4099-5e85-a4cb-f67f8d7c687a)
WITH NO TIME to spare, Rourke had flown into the Gallatin Valley near Bozeman, Montana, the next morning, rented an SUV and driven to Big Timber, following a map he’d printed out on the internet. Beartooth proved to be another twenty miles on two-lane blacktop toward snowcapped peaks, which, according to a sign beside the road, were the Crazy Mountains.
The town, if you could call it that, came as a shock even though he’d done a little research on it while waiting for his flight. Beartooth was what was left of a once-thriving mining town back in the late 1890s. All that had survived, other than some old stone buildings, was a café, post office and bar. Apparently, there had been a general store across from the café, but it had burned down last spring.
Thanks to the internet, he’d found a cabin to rent on the mountainside across the road from the café. He could see the cabin through the trees as he pulled into a spot in front of the café. He’d thought about stopping by the cabin first, but he was too anxious to see Caligrace Westfield.
The Branding Iron Café was easy to find, given how few businesses were left in Beartooth. As he climbed out of the SUV, he tried not to get his hopes up. The P.I. had told him that Caligrace Westfield had changed jobs and residences often over the past ten years. For all Rourke knew, she might have already moved on.
A bell tinkled over the door as he stepped into the café and was hit with the combined smells of cinnamon, bacon and coffee. He breathed in, his stomach growling, reminding him that he hadn’t had much to eat. He’d been too anxious. Just as he was now. Anxious and nervous at the thought of finally seeing the woman face-to-face.
He took in his surroundings quickly. A variety of brightly colored quilts hung on the café’s walls. He’d expected a more Western interior, given where the town was located—in the heart of ranching and farming communities.
There were only a half dozen tables arranged at the front of the café, with four booths along one side and a counter back by the kitchen with a half dozen stools. One large table at the front was full of ranchers he took for regulars.
“Sit wherever you like,” a young woman called over her shoulder without looking in his direction.
He chose a table at the front of the café that gave him a view of the whole place. He could even see into the kitchen via the pass-through on the other side of the counter. A thin, pale man—in his fifties, he guessed—was busy cooking to the distant drone of a song on the radio.
The waitress who’d told him to seat himself stood at the pass-through, her back to him. Her long, curly dark hair was pulled into a knot of sorts at the nape of her neck. Loose strands hung at her temples.
Rourke waited impatiently for the woman to turn around, thinking about the latest information from the P.I. he’d hired. Edwin Sharp, a seasoned private investigator who used to be a cop, was in his sixties. Rourke had liked him the first time he’d met him. He needed someone he trusted, and since he couldn’t do his own digging without making his situation with the marshals’ office worse, he’d hired the man.
“I found something,” Edwin had said cryptically when he’d called on Rourke’s journey to Beartooth. “Your...mystery woman didn’t exist until her seventeenth birthday, when she used a fake birth certificate to get her driver’s license and a social-security card.”
“How do you know the birth certificate is fake?”
“She wasn’t born at the hospital on the certificate because it doesn’t exist—never has.”
“Is anything on the birth certificate real?”
“Doubtful.”
“What about the address?”
“Well, that’s where it gets interesting. The address is Westfield Manor.”
Rourke frowned. “An old folks’ home?”
The P.I. laughed. “I have no idea. But apparently, it is in Flat Rock, Montana, about four hours north of Beartooth, where she is now living.”
“How soon can you get to Flat Rock?”
“I would have to fly.” Edwin had told him he didn’t like flying and charged extra if he had to.
“Fly. Call me when you know something.”
Now Rourke waited, willing the woman in the café to turn so he could see her face. She looked about the right height. Maybe slimmer than he’d guessed Caligrace Westfield would be and in better shape. But then again, he was going by a police shot at a crime scene and that one face in the crowd.
She finally turned.
He caught his breath as he got his first good look at the woman who had haunted him for weeks.
* * *
FOR CALIGRACE—“CALLIE”—Westfield, it was just another day slinging hash at the Branding Iron Café in Beartooth. She moved through the restaurant with plates of food and pots of coffee. After a year here, she knew most everyone’s story.
This morning the information came as it always did: in short psychic bursts. The young ranch hand at the first table was hungover and worried he might lose his job. The young mother who’d asked for a high chair was concerned because her husband didn’t spend much time with her and the baby anymore. The old rancher was anxiously awaiting the results of his wife’s biopsy.
Callie had experienced this phenomenon on some level from as far back as she could remember. Since she didn’t want to know any of it, she thought of the constant influx of information as white noise. She’d learned the hard way that she couldn’t take on everyone’s troubles, so she tried to tune it out as best she could. That should have made it easier to live with, but it often didn’t.
The café wasn’t particularly busy this morning—just the usual crowd who couldn’t resist Kate French’s cinnamon rolls warm from the oven. The smell of cinnamon, frying bacon and fresh coffee filled the air. Callie had found all of it comforting over the past year.
She had just finished refilling cups with coffee at the large table at the front of the café where a group of older ranchers met each morning, when she got her first good look at the cowboy who’d come in. She’d felt him staring at her, but hadn’t thought anything of it. She was used to men noticing her. This cowboy was different, though.
His look, as she approached his table, was speculative. Not as if he was wondering whether or not she would sleep with him if he asked her out. No, this was more of a rapt interest that sent a chill up her spine and made her hand holding the pot of coffee unsteady.
He was dressed like the others who came into the Branding Iron. Jeans, boots, Western shirt, all worn enough that he almost blended in. His tan Stetson rested on his sheepskin coat on the chair next to him. There was nothing about the tall, dark cowboy that should have set off warning bells since he looked like the real thing. But her instincts told her he wasn’t just another cowhand.
“Coffee?” she asked as she reached his table.
“Thanks.” His voice was deep, a rumble to it that seemed to reverberate in her chest, making her heart kick up another beat or two.
Her gaze rose of its own accord. The moment she met his dark eyes, she regretted it. They were nearly black. But it was the look in them. She’d found few people looked beyond the surface. This man peered into her as if searching for her soul.
Then he smiled at her, exposing a whole lot of perfect, white teeth. The smile transported his dark chiseled face, making her suddenly aware of how magnificent he was. What surprised her more, though, was her reaction. Chemistry? It had been so long since she’d been attracted to a man, she couldn’t be sure if it was desire or danger. Or maybe a little of both.
She had to suppress a shudder and quickly dropped her gaze, fighting to keep the trembling out of her hand as she poured the coffee. Suddenly she realized that she wasn’t getting a flash of information. Nothing. It was as if the room had fallen silent or she had gone deaf.
That shocked her so much that she wasn’t even aware she was still pouring coffee into his cup until it splashed over onto the table.
“I’m so sorry,” she cried, jerking back.
“No big deal,” he said with a chuckle as he grabbed some napkins and began to mop up the worst of the spill. “Blame it on me. I distracted you.” He gave her a reassuring smile that unnerved her even more.
The cowboy had the kind of good looks that broke hearts. A lock of his thick dark hair had fallen down on his forehead. He hadn’t shaved for a day or two, making her even more aware of his rugged strong jaw. Everything about him said strong, capable and all man. Maybe the cowboy was just what he appeared to be. Maybe.
She didn’t realize she’d been standing there staring at him until her boss, Kate, came over with a cloth to clean up the table. “I’ll give you a few moments to look at the menu,” Callie said and hurried off.
“Are you all right, Callie?” Kate asked when she caught up to her at the back of the café.
“I...I...” No one knew about her “gift.” So there was no way to explain why this stranger had thrown her the way he had. The fact that she’d gotten absolutely nothing scared her. It had happened only a rare few times in her life. Reminded of those times, she shuddered at the memory.
“I guess I’m just clumsy this morning.”
Kate laughed. “Uh-huh. Has nothing at all to do with how handsome that cowboy is,” she said in a conspiratorial whisper.
Callie gave her a sheepish grin as if that was all it was. “Would you mind taking his order?”
Kate gave her a sympathetic look as if she’d been there herself. “Sure,” she said before turning to head for the man’s table. Callie could feel the cowboy’s gaze burning into her flesh, even before she looked in his direction. He smiled, then looked down at his menu as Kate approached.
The whole encounter had taken only a few minutes, and yet the memory of his searching gaze lingered, leaving her off balance. She just prayed her worst nightmare wasn’t happening all over again.
Just then, all heads in the café turned as a large construction truck rolled into town and stopped across the street in front of the burned-out site of the former Beartooth General Store. Callie watched as another truck pulled in right behind it. More trucks, loaded with lumber and building materials, followed.
One of the regulars at the large table at the front said, “Hell’s bells, it almost looks as if Beartooth has been invaded by an army.”
“They must be lost,” one of the ranchers joked. “Either that or Nettie Benton is going to rebuild the store.”
“Not likely,” Kate said as she stared across the street at the activity. “She sold that property to marry the sheriff.”
“Well, something’s coming up over there,” a rancher noted. “But who in his right mind would invest in Beartooth? One good wind and the whole town could disappear overnight.”
As Callie looked around the café, she saw that everyone was watching the men unloading building materials across the street.
Everyone but the cowboy at the table in the corner. He was looking at her.
* * *
ROURKE COULDN’T TAKE his eyes off Caligrace “Callie” Westfield. The blurry police photos hadn’t captured her beauty. She looked angelic, from the wide brown eyes to the freckles that bridged her nose and highlighted the tops of her cheeks.
Not only did she look like an angel, she also had an innocence about her that was almost palpable. She wore jeans, an apron over a turquoise T-shirt and a pair of sneakers. As he noticed earlier, she was slimmer than she’d appeared in the photographs, more athletic and in better shape. Rourke estimated that she stood about five and a half feet tall.
He knew looks could be deceiving. Ted Bundy proved that. But he was still having a hard time believing this woman was a serial killer—or even intimately involved with one.
As the owner, a pretty brunette he’d heard called Kate, took his breakfast order, Rourke told himself that he’d been right to question his judgment about coming here. This case had gotten to him. Or maybe Laura was right and Caligrace Westfield had gotten to him from a few grainy snapshots. But right now, he was more than intrigued by the woman.
He hadn’t anticipated his reaction to her—or hers to him, now that he thought about it. For a moment when their eyes had met, he’d thought she recognized him. It was more than possible since he’d been the lead detective on several homicide cases that had gotten him on the nightly news before he’d left the Seattle P.D.
Seeing her in the flesh made him even more curious about her. According to her history, the longest she’d ever worked in one place was here in Beartooth. His P.I. said she lived upstairs in an apartment over the café. Like the other buildings in town, it had been constructed of stone, stood two stories and appeared to be one of the original businesses in town.
The fact that Callie had moved so many times in the past seemed to indicate that she was running from something. He’d thought he had a pretty good idea from what when he’d left Seattle.
Now he wasn’t so sure. But he’d gotten this far. He wasn’t ready to give up yet. He could feel the clock ticking, though. He was already a couple of days into his two weeks. He needed something concrete—and quickly.
* * *
IT TOOK LAURA FULLER all night before she found the homicide case. While she’d kept copies of all of hers, she hadn’t filed them in any order once she’d moved on to others. So she’d had dozens of boxes to go through. Now spread out on the floor, the papers made her apartment look as if a bomb had gone off. Good thing she didn’t have friends who stopped by unannounced.
Her head hurt, her fear growing with each file she set aside as she worked her way through a history of the career she had loved.
When she found it, her fingers froze an instant before they began to tremble. She moved from the floor to the table. Sitting down, she took a breath and then opened the file folder.
On the surface, it was like any other case.
This one had been before she was made a homicide detective. She’d been assigned to crowd control and hadn’t known any more details than those looky-loos who’d stood gawking behind the crime-scene tape.
Later she got to go door-to-door, asking if anyone had seen or heard anything suspicious. It was always the same. Little old ladies would remember some strange man they’d noticed, but gave vague details or such good details that finding him had only taken her to the local grocery, where he turned out to be the young man who delivered her groceries every week.
Dead ends, all of them.
No wonder she hadn’t remembered the case. While her notes had been in the file with her name on them, it hadn’t been her case. She could see why Rourke had wanted to solve it for her, though. She had worked tirelessly on her own time, trying to track down a witness to the murder.
Amusing, she thought as she read her notes. She hadn’t known anything about the murder victim except that he was a single male, drove the local bus and lived in an old run-down apartment house. No wonder the case had gone cold. She’d put more time into it than anyone else and had gotten nothing. No witnesses. Or at least no one who would talk.
When she’d made Homicide, she’d put it all behind her and wouldn’t have remembered the case at all if not for Rourke. The other two murders that he’d found weren’t in her jurisdiction.
Dumping the photocopied contents of the file onto her table, she sorted through her notes, the reports and the two short newspaper clippings she’d put into the file about the case. She couldn’t help but smile to herself at how much she’d been into all this. She’d wanted desperately to learn, to be the best, to go the furthest.
Ironic that this case would be the one Rourke would stumble across and decide he had to solve. As she reached the bottom of the paperwork, she saw the corner of a photograph and pulled it out.
A shockwave rattled through her. She’d remembered taking photos of the crowd gathered behind the crime-scene tape, but she’d thought she had put them all in the original file at the department. And yet here were more photos. At first they appeared to be identical to the ones Rourke had shown her.
But the closer she looked, she saw that these weren’t duplicates. In fact, there were four photographs instead of three, and several were shot from different angles than the ones Rourke had shown her.
She felt sick. Why had she kept these and not put them in the police file? What had she been thinking?
Shaken, Laura stared at the shots she’d taken. There had to be something about them that had made her do this. But she could find nothing in them that would warrant her basically stealing them from the department.
She quickly looked for the young woman she’d spotted in the photos Rourke had shown her. With a start, she saw her. The woman was looking right at the camera in all four of these shots. Right at Laura.
A chill ran the length of her spine. She hugged herself as she stared at one of the photos and the odd expression on the woman’s face, suddenly filled with a horrible premonition. The woman almost looked as if she—
Her cell phone rang, making her jump.
Let it be Rourke.
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_bf5bf53e-ac99-5cd6-94a4-84b62e772339)
IT WASN’T ROURKE CALLING. The woman’s voice was old and weak, almost a whisper. “Laura?”
Laura glanced at the clock. It was after midnight. She swallowed back the lump that rose in her throat. “Mother?”
“No, honey, it’s her neighbor Ruthie. You don’t know me. Your mother gave me your number and asked me to call you. I’m sorry it’s so late.” When Laura said nothing, she continued, “She’s real sick, honey. She...she says she’s dying.”
Laura was surprised. Not that her mother might be dying, since she’d often complained of being unwell. No, Laura just hadn’t expected anyone to notify her. Most of the time, she felt as if her mother had already died. Hadn’t she once told Rourke that her mother was deceased?
“Thank you for letting me know,” she said, wishing her mother hadn’t given some stranger her number. Why couldn’t she have done them both a favor and just died quietly in her sleep?
Laura recoiled at her uncharitable thoughts. A stranger would think she was a horrible person. A stranger, though, wouldn’t know her mother.
“She wants to see you,” the neighbor said. “Your mother says there’s something she has to tell you. Something you need to know and that it is very important.”
For a moment, she tried to imagine anything her mother could tell her that would be of any interest to her. To apologize for what she’d done and hadn’t done as a mother? Too late for that.
But even as Laura thought it, she knew there were things that her mother could tell her, things she didn’t want to hear.
“She said it has something to do with when you were twelve.”
Laura felt her blood run cold. The last thing she wanted was to relive her childhood. It had been bad enough the first time. She definitely had no desire to talk about the year she’d turned twelve.
“I hope that makes sense to you,” Ruthie said. “She didn’t elaborate. The truth is, I hardly know your mother. I was surprised when she called to ask for my help. She’s always stayed to herself, making it clear she didn’t want to...socialize with any of her neighbors.” Silence. “She really is very upset about this, afraid she was going to die before she speaks with you.”
Her mother had secrets she needed to get off her chest before she died? Laura thought of blanks in her memory, the black holes of time she couldn’t recall. But when she thought of her childhood, she couldn’t have been more grateful for those lost memories. Why open up old wounds?
Even as she thought it, though, she knew there were questions, things she was unclear about, vague shadows of memories that often woke her in the night and made her anxious and afraid. Did she really want to know, though? Weren’t the memories she did have horrible enough?
“Can I tell her that you’re on your way here?” the neighbor asked, almost pleading.
Laura closed her eyes. She could hear the shock and disapproval in the woman’s voice. Ruthie couldn’t imagine a daughter not wanting to see her mother before she died. But then again, Ruthie, in her wildest nightmares, couldn’t imagine a mother like Laura’s.
What was it that her psychiatrist kept telling her? “You aren’t going to get well until you face your past. You’re a strong woman. Put whatever darkness there is behind you so you can move on with your life. Isn’t that what you want?”
Her mother had the key to a past that had been locked away for so long. Just the thought of possibly being able to put those awful years behind her and move on...
“Tell her I’m on my way.” And not to die until I get there, she added silently, because she had a stop she had to make first.
* * *
P.I. EDWIN SHARP hated to fly—especially in a small plane in the middle of a thunderstorm. He stared at the dark clouds around the aircraft, wishing he’d driven. If Rourke Kincaid hadn’t insisted on the urgency of this trip—and paid him triple his usual amount—he would be on solid ground right now.
The small plane found an air pocket and dropped into it, sending his stomach up into his throat. He’d been fighting airsickness since they’d crossed the Rockies. Now the prairie stretched below them in a patchwork of autumn colors. Edwin couldn’t appreciate any of the breath-stealing views.
“You look a little green around the gills,” Pete, his young pilot, said and laughed.
He wouldn’t be laughing if Edwin lost his lunch. He’d chosen this pilot because he was Montana born and bred. “You know the area, then?” he’d inquired when he’d landed at the Missoula, Montana, airport.
“You bet.”
“So you can fly me to Flat Rock?”
Pete had grinned. “I can fly you anywhere you want to go.”
Ahead the clouds parted. Edwin didn’t see a town, but the plane began to descend. “I don’t see the airport.”
The pilot let out a chuckle. “Look closer.”
Closer was what appeared to be a harvested wheat field. “You aren’t going to land there.” But even as he said it, he saw the ragged wind sock and felt the plane hit another air pocket. The ground was coming up fast.
He braced himself as the plane skimmed over the top of the stubble field. The wheels hit the ground hard and the plane bounced up, then settled down on the so-called airstrip. For the moment, Edwin was just glad to be on the ground again.
“What time do you want to fly back?” Pete asked as he taxied the plane to the edge of some old buildings.
“I won’t be flying back. I’ll be renting a car and driving.”
The pilot got a good laugh out of that. “You won’t be renting a car—not in this town.”
“What town? I don’t see anything but a few abandoned buildings.”
“That’s Flat Rock, Montana. What there is of it. Shouldn’t take you long to find out what you need to. We’ll let the storm pass. Why don’t we meet at the café when you’re finished.”
“There’s a café?” He couldn’t help sounding doubtful. The town—if it could really be called that—consisted of a couple of grain elevators and a row of old buildings on each side of a strip of pavement. The buildings he could see appeared to be boarded up.
“If you don’t show up, I’ll just assume you’re planning to hitchhike back to Missoula.”
Edwin waited while Pete secured the plane, and then the two of them walked toward Flat Rock. Even at a glance he could see that there were more empty buildings than occupied ones. He looked around for a large flat rock, wondering how the town had gotten its name.
“What’s that over there?” he asked of a huge, vacant-looking three-story building in the distance. The stone structure had gaping holes where windows used to be and a forlorn look. Probably the tall dead weeds that had grown around it, he thought.
“It used to be a girls’ home.”
“Like an orphanage,” Edwin said.
“More like a home for kids nobody wanted, troubled kids. Folks claim it is haunted now.”
Edwin scoffed at that, but quit when he saw Pete’s expression. “You believe in ghosts?”
“Let’s just say you couldn’t get me in that building after dark.”
He found that amusing, given that Pete seemed to be a daredevil pilot who wasn’t afraid of a thunderstorm or flying within feet of high mountain peaks. But give him an old empty building...
“I’ll see you at the café. Don’t leave without me.” Edwin set out down what he figured was the main drag. As he passed what appeared to be a vacant school building, he saw that someone had spray-painted the words Consolidation of Schools Sucks on the front. He wondered where the children were bused to now. Apparently, another school that wasn’t close since he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of another town from the plane.
He passed more abandoned buildings and cursed his luck. Other than a couple of pickups parked in front of the Longhorn Café, the only other sign of life was a small grocery/gas station at the end of the street.
A woman in her mid-forties stood behind the counter as he pushed open the door. She eyed him over the glasses perched on her nose. “Help you?” She made it sound doubtful.
“I’m trying to get some information on a woman by the name of Caligrace Westfield,” he told the woman.
“Westfield?” she said, one finely drawn-in eyebrow shooting up.
“Do you know the Westfields?” he asked hopefully.
She gave him an impatient look. “The only Westfield around here is the manor.”
“The manor?” He couldn’t believe that he’d hit pay dirt.
“You didn’t see it on the way into town?” she asked incredulously. “Hardly anyone misses that big old eyesore.”
He blinked. “Are you talking about that abandoned girls’ home?”
“Girls’ home?” she scoffed. “Some locals called it that, giving it a fancy name to cover up what a terrible place it was.”
It couldn’t be a coincidence that Caligrace Westfield shared the same name as the girls’ home. “How long has it been closed?” he asked.
“Twenty-five years now. I remember because I was fifteen when it shut down.” She shuddered. “I’ll never forget the night they came to take those girls away.”
“They?”
“The state. Loaded all those girls into a few vans and off they went. Just like that, they were gone and the place was closed.”
“So it was state run?”
She shook her head. “It was privately owned by some big corporation from Michigan or some place. The state finally stepped in.”
“So you don’t know who would have the names of the girls who were there?”
“Names?” She scoffed at that. “Maybe first names. Most of them were dumped there in the middle of the night. Babies left on the doorstep. Older girls brought there in handcuffs from other towns. The sounds that came from that place at night...” She shuddered again. “Then one day the state shows up and takes the whole lot of them, never to be seen again.”
Edwin told himself that the woman was probably exaggerating, and yet he felt a chill move up his spine as he remembered what Pete had said about it being haunted. “Where did they take them?”
“No one ever knew what became of them,” she said, then looked around the empty room as if she thought someone might be listening, before leaning toward him conspiratorially. “I think they got rid of them. Some of those girls were the worst there was.” She shook her head. “There’s a whole lot of country around here where you could dispose of bodies that would never be found. And with at least one of them being a murderer...”
“I beg your pardon?”
She looked surprised that he didn’t know what she was talking about. “That’s why they finally shut the place down. The murder of the young man who worked there.” She grimaced. “I heard it was brutal. Used a knife from the kitchen and cut him up bad.”
* * *
WITHIN MINUTES OF the construction crews arriving, the Branding Iron Café was a madhouse. Callie tried to keep up with the tables, all the time aware of the cowboy. She was glad to see that he’d gotten his order and seemed to be more interested in eating than in studying her. And yet, she suspected he was just as aware of her as she was of him.
“What’s going on?” one of the regulars asked her, surprising her for a moment. She’d thought he’d seen her staring at the stranger at the front table.
“You hear yet what’s going on across the street?” The rancher was seated at a large table by the window where the bunch gathered each morning to discuss cattle prices, the weather and complain about the government over coffee.
“One came in to refill his Thermos with coffee and said they’re rebuilding the store,” Callie told him. She felt disoriented by the clatter of dishes, the roar of voices, the crush of bodies packed into the space. She was doing her best to tune out the flashes of information that kept coming from the construction workers who wandered in and out.
“So it’s not Nettie Benton’s doin’?” another rancher asked.
The Beartooth General Store, which had stood across from the café for more than a hundred years, had burned down last spring. There’d been all kinds of speculation about what owner Nettie Benton would do now.
“Doesn’t take five truckloads of men to rebuild one general store,” another commented as he looked toward the street where more men were unloading materials next to the old hotel.
Callie shrugged. “That’s all I’ve heard.” She moved on, refilling cups, leaving bills and clearing dishes as she went. She’d been as surprised as anyone when she’d overheard one of the construction crew talking about rebuilding the store.
For the year Callie had worked as a waitress at the café, Beartooth, Montana, had looked and acted like a near ghost town. It was one of the reasons she’d taken the job. She had loved that it was twenty miles from the nearest “real” town. She’d loved the isolation, the quiet and the remoteness of the small old mining town.
That the waitress job came with an apartment over the café made it perfect. Callie loved the feeling of being far from everything, as if living at the end of the earth. She’d settled in quickly, liking that people here didn’t ask a lot of questions, and had swiftly fallen into the rhythm of this easygoing life.
Her days all blended together in a familiar pattern. Each morning like clockwork, a group of ranchers would come in and take the large table by the window, order the same thing and talk about the same topics. At lunchtime, cowboys often stopped in from the many ranches around the area.
By afternoon, the quilters would come for pie and coffee and a visit. Some nights they would all gather at the café and change out the quilts on the walls. Callie often came down to the café from her apartment to listen to their chatter. She and Kate agreed they couldn’t sew a stitch, but they loved the patterns and colors and the enthusiasm of the quilters.
The rest of the evenings the café crowd could be large, depending on whatever “special” owner Kate French was serving that day. This was a community of women who cooked. They went all out for potlucks and made huge meals for the help at brandings, cattle drives and harvesting. So eating at the café a few nights a week seemed to be a treat for them.
It was comfortable, living over the café and mixing with the locals of this small ranching and farming community. Callie had found herself relaxing. She felt as if she’d escaped the trouble in Seattle. She’d even thought she might end up staying here.
Then this morning all that changed in more ways than one, she thought, as the cowboy finally got up. She just hoped he kept going and didn’t come back. But as he paid his bill and turned to leave, he tipped his Stetson in her direction. She felt ice cold. Why hadn’t she picked up even the slightest psychic peek as to who he was and what he wanted?
All her instincts told her that she had reason to be scared. It was as if an ill wind had blown into Beartooth, bringing not only change, but also a handsome cowboy with a look in his dark eyes that foretold trouble.
* * *
ROURKE WAS LEAVING the café when he realized with a start that he knew the big older man coming in. He ducked his head to hide his face beneath the brim of his Stetson, shocked to recognize Sheriff Frank Curry. He’d met the sheriff when he’d first started with the U.S. Marshals. It had been only in passing on a drug-seizure case, but Rourke remembered Frank. Who wouldn’t? Sheriff Frank Curry was a large handsome man, about sixty, who looked like an old-timey sheriff, with a thick horseshoe-style mustache, a six-gun on his hip and a Stetson on his thick head of graying blond hair.
Pushing on out the door into the cool fall weather, Rourke hoped Frank hadn’t recognized him. How would he explain what he was doing in Beartooth if the sheriff did? How also would he explain the fact that he didn’t want anyone knowing he was with the U.S. Marshals’ office?
He was almost to his SUV parked to the side of the café, telling himself that there was a good chance Frank Curry wouldn’t remember him, when Frank’s big voice boomed behind him. “Rourke, right?”
Rourke had no choice. He turned and smiled at the sheriff.
“Rourke... No, don’t tell me,” Frank Curry said as he approached, those keen blue eyes intent on him. “Just give me a moment.” He ran two fingers down his mustache and then smiled. “Kincaid. U.S. Marshals’ office.” He frowned as he glanced at Rourke’s SUV, which lacked the logo that would identify him as a U.S. marshal. “What brings you to our little town of Beartooth, Montana?”
CHAPTER SIX (#ulink_88ddb7f3-a8b5-55c2-bc21-a6702ae01f19)
ROURKE STOOD OUTSIDE the Branding Iron with Sheriff Frank Curry, trying to decide how much he wanted to tell the man. If he hoped to keep his identity a secret, then he couldn’t see any way around this other than to confide in Frank. “Can we talk about this somewhere...private?”
The sheriff nodded slowly. “There’s my office in Big Timber.”
“I was hoping for somewhere even more private than that.”
Frank lifted a brow. “I ranch down the road a spell. If you’d like to follow me...”
“I’ll do that,” Rourke said. “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t call my office in the meantime.”
The older man looked a little concerned, but not overly. “I look forward to our chat.”
On the drive to the sheriff’s ranch, Rourke’s cell phone rang. He checked it. Laura calling. He let it go to voice mail, feeling a little guilty. Had she already come up with a profile on his serial killer and possible co-killer? It was hard for him to think of the young waitress he’d met this morning as a co-killer, but he knew she could surprise him.
Right now he was more concerned about whether or not he should have brought Laura in on all this. His instincts told him she wasn’t well enough. The wounded Laura seemed...fragile. He was afraid working on this case might... What? Push her over some edge he hadn’t been aware even existed before seeing her yesterday? He hated the thought that she was that close to an edge that it should even be a concern.
But there was no doubt that she was different. Maybe working on this case would help her, he tried to tell himself. He knew the police department had required her to see a psychiatrist after the shooting. Standard protocol, he was pretty sure. She’d never mentioned it. Was she still seeing someone?
With a sigh, he knew he had bigger worries right now than Laura. He debated for a moment what to tell the sheriff, but his real concern was the P.I. he’d hired. Edwin should be in Flat Rock by now, and yet he hadn’t called. That made Rourke nervous. He was counting on Edwin to come up with more information on Caligrace, something that would lead him to the person who’d committed the actual murders.
He’d done a little homework on women serial killers. Few worked alone. Most set up the victim while their so-called “co-killer” did the dirty work. It was the killer in the shadows he told himself he was looking for, although Callie, if he was right, was a part of it. He just didn’t know what part yet.
True, the crime-scene photos hadn’t done her justice, but still there was something about her in person... He’d been more than a little surprised when he’d gotten a good look at her. How was that possible, given how many times he’d studied the photos of her? Hell, he’d dreamed about that face for weeks.
He hadn’t expected the freckles. Or those eyes so full of intelligence. The woman was even more of a mystery now that he’d met her face-to-face. He couldn’t help being fascinated by her. So few criminals were interesting. Their motives were often clichéd. Jealousy, greed, revenge. Serial killers had their own crazy reasons for killing.
Rourke was convinced that this woman was hiding something and that the something was a man. He couldn’t wait to see the profile Laura was compiling for him. What kind of man would a woman like this find herself drawn to?
He realized the sheriff might be able to shed some light on Caligrace Westfield. Not that he would have gone to the sheriff for help if Frank Curry hadn’t recognized him. Rourke had really hoped to make this a quick trip with as few people as possible knowing what he was doing in town.
As he drove out to the sheriff’s ranch, he thought again of Callie’s reaction to meeting him. From the moment she’d looked at him, she’d been...wary, as if she’d sensed he’d come looking for her. It was almost as if she’d tagged him as being a cop. Was it possible they’d crossed paths in Seattle? Perhaps at some other crime scene?
What if the three murders were just the tip of the iceberg? And maybe even more troubling, what if this woman knew more about him than he did her?
* * *
AS EDWIN LEFT and walked down the deserted main drag of Flat Rock, he tried to make sense of what the woman at the gas-station-slash-convenience-store had told him. Westfield Manor had closed twenty-five years ago. Caligrace Westfield was thirty—at least according to her fake birth certificate. Even if she’d lied about her age, she couldn’t have been one of the bad girls from the place because she would have been only a child.
But her last name and the address she’d given on her driver’s license were proof of a tie-in to the place, weren’t they?
“You’re sure there aren’t any Westfields around? Maybe whoever started the home?” he’d asked before leaving the woman at the store.
“There were no Westfields. The home was located in the west field of Pauper’s Acre. That’s how it got its name.”
“So the manor part was supposed to be a joke?”
“A sick joke. It was always just called Westfield when I was growing up. Then someone started calling it Westfield Manor and it caught on, the way bad jokes do.”
“You must have met some of the girls in school.”
She’d looked appalled at even the idea. “They weren’t allowed to attend our school, and we weren’t allowed to go near the home. I’d see them occasionally playing outside or looking out one of the windows.” She’d hugged herself as she’d shivered. “They were scary. I wasn’t about to go near any of them.”
“What about the people who worked there? Surely some of them are still around.”
She’d shaken her head. “No one around here was insane enough to work there.”
“Any idea who ran the place?”
“No, but I can tell you she was gone just minutes before the raid on the place. I heard she set a fire to burn any evidence of how badly she’d operated things. If she hadn’t escaped when she did, I’m sure she would have gone to jail.”
Edwin had been so hopeful, but now he’d hit a dead end—and after that horrendous plane ride—but he couldn’t bear the thought of flying back to Missoula without something for his client.
“Is there a newspaper in town? There must have been a story about—”
“No paper, no story. The town kept it hushed up and so did the state authorities. We were told not to talk about it. Everyone just wishes that old place would fall down, but the town can’t afford to tear it down. Part of it burned the night they took the girls away, but all the fire managed to do was gut some of the lower floor. It was like even fire couldn’t destroy it.” She’d glanced toward the west field and the dark skeleton etched against the skyline and shuddered.
* * *
“COME ON IN and have a seat.” The sheriff studied him as Rourke Kincaid stepped into his modest farmhouse. “I’ll get us a cup of coffee.” Rourke opened his mouth, no doubt to say he didn’t need any more coffee, but Frank didn’t give him a chance to speak as he hurried out to the kitchen.
He liked to give a man time to think. The U.S. marshal wanting to meet here instead of the sheriff’s department told Frank a lot. He was curious, but he’d learned to take things slow, especially when dealing with people who had secrets. Rourke Kincaid, Frank was betting, had a secret that had brought him to Beartooth. The same one that had the man not wanting Frank to call the U.S. Marshals’ office.
When Frank came back into the living room, he found Rourke standing at the front window, looking out at the crows lined up on the telephone wire.
“Are you interested in crows?” he asked as he put down a mug of coffee on the small table between the chairs and handed the other to Rourke. “They’re part of my family. I lost them for a while....” He couldn’t put into words how desolate that had left him. “I’m so glad to have them back. Crows are fascinating birds. I’ve been studying them for years.”
Rourke looked over at him as if a little surprised.
One of the crows closest to the house seemed to see Frank and let out a loud caw. Frank smiled and touched the window. “That’s Uncle. I think he’s the boss of the family. He has the most to say, anyway.” He turned back to his chair, sitting down and picking up his mug, which disappeared in his big hands.
His guest wandered away from the window after a moment and took the chair he’d been offered. He watched Rourke stare down into his coffee before he took a tentative sip, as if he had a lot on his mind. Frank suspected he did. Local law enforcement often got a little nervous when the feds showed up unannounced. Rourke Kincaid being in Beartooth gave him cause for concern.
Good to his word, though, he hadn’t checked with the U.S. Marshals’ office. He mentioned this now and waited to hear the younger man’s story, hoping it would be somewhere near the truth.
“I’m not officially with the U.S. Marshals’ office right now,” Rourke said. “I have a couple of weeks off.”
Frank nodded. “But you aren’t here on vacation.”
Rourke smiled. “No. I’ll be honest with you, Frank. I’m looking for someone but on my own time. Because of that, though, I’d just as soon no one around here knows my connection to the U.S. Marshals’ office.”
Or the U.S. Marshals’ office know what he was up to. “Maybe if you told me who you’re looking for...”
Rourke took another sip of the coffee and put the mug down on the small table between them. He glanced toward the front window and the crows all still on the line, before he turned back to him.
“I’m investigating a cold case in which one individual’s name came up several times.”
Frank wondered why he was pussyfooting around telling him, but kept quiet.
“I believe I’m looking for someone close to her.”
“Her?” Frank said, lifting a brow.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
“Callie? The waitress at the Branding Iron. I’m familiar with her.” He didn’t mention that last spring his fiancé, Nettie Benton, had told him there might be more to Callie than anyone knew. Now he realized he was not as familiar with Callie Westfield as he should have been if a U.S. marshal was interested in her. He could feel Rourke’s gaze on him.
“Is there something I should know about her?”
Frank cleared his throat. Rourke was certainly not being forthcoming about what had brought him to Beartooth. He hadn’t even said what kind of crime was involved.
“Let me ask you this,” Frank finally said. “What are we talking here?”
“Murder. She is a lead in three separate cases at least.”
That got his attention. “Where were the crimes committed?”
“Seattle area. If you know something about Caligrace Westfield...”
Frank sighed. “I don’t know anything actually. However, last spring a friend of mine hired a private investigator to run a check on Callie.” He saw he’d piqued the marshal’s interest. “My friend was just curious.” That hadn’t been quite the case, but it was close enough. “My friend hadn’t expected anything to come up on the girl.”
“But something did.”
Frank nodded. “The problem is my friend never found out what. The private investigator was killed before he could give his report.” He shook his head when he saw Rourke’s surprise. “The investigator was killed in a completely separate matter. But he told my friend that he found something that would surprise her.” And Nettie Benton, formerly the worst gossip in the county, wasn’t easily surprised.
Rourke seemed to take that information in for a moment. “How long has Callie worked at the café in Beartooth?”
Frank rubbed his jaw as he thought. “About a year or so. As I understand it, she just showed up one day, saw the sign in the window at the café, asked for the job and got it. You know she lives upstairs in the apartment over the place?”
Rourke nodded. “Was there a man with her? A boyfriend? Husband?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. Kate LaFond...sorry, Kate French owns the café. She might be able to tell you. But I’ve never seen Callie with anyone.”
“So she doesn’t date at all?”
“Not that I know of.” He frowned as he remembered overhearing a discussion at the café one morning.
“Did someone come to mind?” Rourke asked.
Frank hesitated before he said, “Carson Grant has apparently asked her out on more than one occasion. He works as a wrangler on his sister and brother-in-law’s ranch. He’s been back a couple of years now. Probably not the man you’re looking for, though.”
* * *
THE LONGHORN CAFÉ was just as small-town local as Edwin had suspected it would be. The narrow building opened into a room with three tables and six stools at a counter. The place smelled of floor cleaner and old grease. The decor consisted of a few photos of cows, and the floor was noticeably out of level.
Edwin felt his stomach turn as he stepped in. Given that it was the middle of the afternoon, the café was nearly empty, but then again, so was the town. He wondered how the café could stay in business—it and that old motel he spotted at the far end of town. But he was reminded of all the cultivated fields he’d seen flying in. Must be ranches around the area for miles. Not to mention, the town was on what Pete had called the Hi-Line—the most northern two-lane highway across the top of the state.
An elderly man sat at one end of the counter, Pete at the other. The older man was slumped over a cup of coffee, head down. Edwin headed for the pilot. Pete was busy putting away a stack of pancakes and a side of bacon. Just the thought of food made Edwin sick again, but he sat down next to him and ordered a glass of milk.
“Milk?” Pete asked with a laugh. “Did you get what you needed?”
“Not really.” He’d gotten more than he’d expected, and yet he still couldn’t prove that Caligrace Westfield had lived in Westfield Manor.
“So who’s this woman you’re looking for?” the pilot asked between bites.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
He frowned. “Never heard of her.”
Not a surprise. Pete was in his early twenties, and while he knew the area, he was from a town farther east along the Hi-Line.
“Whadda you say?” At the other end of the counter, the elderly man had lifted his head from his coffee and was now looking in their direction.
Edwin gave the man his full attention. “Have you heard of a woman named Caligrace Westfield?”
“Caligrace,” the man said and closed his eyes. “Pretty as a Montana morning.”
Edwin figured the old man might be senile, but he said, “Dark hair and eyes?”
“Black as coal sometimes.” Opening his own eyes, the old man said, “But her name wasn’t Westfield.”
Edwin got up and moved down the counter. The man could be full of bull, just wanting attention. Edwin ran into those sorts all the time during an investigation. They were the ones who wanted to contribute—even if they had nothing to offer. They were often happy to make it up.
As he neared the man, he was surprised that on closer inspection, though not shaved and gray of both hair and beard, the man wasn’t as old as he’d first thought.
“Where do you know her from?” Edwin asked.
“That home outside of town.”
“Westfield Manor?”
“Weren’t no manor,” the man said with obvious disgust.
Knowing it couldn’t be possible, he still reached into his pocket and pulled out the photograph Rourke had supplied him with. “The woman I’m looking for, though, isn’t very old. If the home closed twenty-five years ago, Caligrace wouldn’t have been more than—” He was going to say “five.”
“Sixteen,” the man interrupted.
Sixteen? Edwin did the math. No way was the woman in the photo forty-one. He tried to hide his disappointment.
“That her photo?” the man asked and took the enhanced snapshot with his thick fingers.
“It’s not a great photo. But you think you know the woman?” Edwin asked even though he already knew the answer. This man couldn’t have known her. The dates were all off.
“That’s not my Caligrace.”
“No.” Edwin started to take the photo back when he realized the man was crying. He glanced toward the waitress, wondering if he’d been right the first time to suspect this man was unbalanced. But the waitress was flirting with Pete and not paying any attention to this end of the counter.
“She looks just like her mama, though,” the man said, wiping his eyes before he handed back the photo. “It’s good to see that she made it all right.”
Edwin frowned at him. “Her mama?”
“That’s the Caligrace I knew. But she’s buried out at Pauper’s Acre,” he said with a nod of his head in the direction of Westfield Manor.
“You’re telling me that this woman’s mother was one of the girls who lived at Westfield Manor?”
“She’s the spittin’ image of her mother, so I’d say, yeah, I am. The home took the bad girls, but they also took unwed mothers when no one wanted them. Caligrace was pregnant. Had a baby girl.”
Edwin frowned, trying to make sense of this. “So Caligrace and her mother shared the same first name, and this woman in the photo is the baby girl she had after she came to live at the home?”
The man nodded.
“How is it that you know this?” Edwin asked, still not sure he could trust this man—or his information.
The man blew his nose into his paper napkin, took a drink of his coffee, then said, “I saw her the night the bus dumped her off. She was crying. I could see that she was pregnant. She had nothing but the clothes on her back. It was winter. I gave her an old coat I had in the back of my rig. I would have given her more, but...”
“But?” Edwin prodded.
The man looked away. “I was thirty-one, married with a pregnant wife at home and two little kids of my own.” He shrugged, his hand trembling as he lifted his coffee cup again. “I couldn’t help her. That’s just the way it was.”
So the man was fifty-six. He looked a whole lot older. Chalk it up to a hard life, apparently. A married man with a pregnant wife at home and two kids when he met the pregnant sixteen-year-old Caligrace.
“How was it that you were there that night? Did you work there?” Edwin asked hopefully as he tucked the photo back into his jacket pocket.
“I was a sheriff’s deputy returning one of the runaways that night.”
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_67d16986-0dd1-5e77-b68f-a8dc2508e47a)
“WHAT ABOUT THE CHILD Caligrace gave birth to?” Edwin asked after he and former sheriff’s deputy Burt Denton introduced themselves. “What happened to her?”
Burt shrugged. “Never heard.”
By Edwin’s calculations, the Caligrace in the photo would have been about five at the time of the raid. So maybe her birth certificate was right and she was thirty. Apparently, she’d been put on the state bus that had taken the girls away. Unless someone in town had taken her.
“Any chance some couple felt sorry for the little girl and took her as their own?” he asked.
“I would have taken her in a minute, but like I said, I had enough mouths at home to feed, not that my wife would have stood for it.” He shook his head. “No one around here took her in, but someone must have somewhere else since, according to you, she’s still alive.” The man’s eyes narrowed. “You didn’t say why you were looking for her.”
“She might be a witness in a homicide,” he said carefully.
The former deputy merely nodded as if he recognized bull when he heard it. “I hope she has a better life than her mother did,” he said, getting to his feet. He glanced at Edwin. “Is that too much to hope for?”
“No,” Edwin said. “By the way, you wouldn’t have any idea where in that building the two lived, do you?”
The former deputy, in a telling gesture, looked away. “Facing the building, farthest room to the right on the third floor.”
“Did the woman you knew ever tell you her last name?”
Burt shook his head. “She said her family had disowned her. She had no name, and neither did her kid. It broke my heart. I guess that’s why she gave her little girl her own name. It’s all she had to give the kid.” He looked like a broken man as he started to leave. “I really don’t want to talk about this anymore. What’s done is done. Some things are best left in the past.”
Edwin watched the former deputy leave, then joined Pete at the other end of the counter.
“Now what?” Pete asked as Edwin took a stool next to him.
“I have one more thing I have to do,” he said. “You should come along.”
Pete gave him a wary look. “If it’s what I think it is, not a chance in hell.”
* * *
AFTER HIS TALK with Rourke, Frank Curry climbed into his pickup and headed for the state mental hospital. It had been months since he’d seen his daughter. Not that he hadn’t tried to visit. He’d gone up there anyway because he hadn’t known what else he could do.
Unfortunately, after Tiffany had injured a nurse and several guards during a short-lived escape, she’d been locked up in the isolation ward. At first the doctor hadn’t wanted her to have any visitors—maybe especially the father she hated.
But through the use of some heavy-duty drugs, she had been downgraded as a threat and was now able to have visitors, Frank had been told. She just hadn’t wanted to see him the times he’d driven to the hospital to visit.
So he’d been surprised—and with good reason, a little worried—when he’d gotten a call from the hospital saying that Tiffany had asked to see him.
He tried not to be too hopeful. Up until a year and a half ago, he hadn’t known he had a daughter. Tiffany was the secret his ex-wife, Pam, had kept from him to punish him because she’d felt he hadn’t loved her enough during their short marriage. She’d raised the girl to hate the father she’d never laid eyes on. Pam had poisoned Tiffany against him to the extent that when they’d finally met, Tiffany had tried to kill him.
After she’d been sent to the mental hospital for evaluation, Frank had hoped that someone there would be able to help her. Pam had washed her hands of her daughter, making it even more painful for Tiffany.
The last time Frank had seen his daughter, he’d had to tell her that her mother was dead, murdered, and that he was a suspect. Actually, the number one suspect.
But in a turn of events, his name was cleared. Unfortunately, it was too late for Tiffany, who’d compounded her problems by making her escape and almost killing several people in the process.
Now as Frank waited in the sunroom, he wasn’t sure what to pray for. If Tiffany was better, she would be charged with not only her attempted murder of him, but also her attacks on the people at the hospital.
He feared she would be going to prison.
If she wasn’t better...well, then she could end up in an institution for the rest of her life.
He turned at the sound of footfalls behind him. The first time he’d laid eyes on Tiffany, he’d thought she was barely a teen. She had the look of a waif, with long, fine blond hair and pale blue eyes. She’d been seventeen, just out of high school. Old enough to be tried as an adult.
The last time he’d seen his daughter, her long blond hair had been hacked off with a pair of scissors she’d somehow gotten her hands on.
Now her hair was longer. It gave her a softer, sweeter look. For a moment, he could almost tell himself that Tiffany was better.
“I wondered if you would come,” she said, stopping a few yards from him. A male nurse had come with her. He stood a few feet back, there for Frank’s protection. While comforting, it was also another indication that Tiffany probably wasn’t as well as he might hope.
“How could you think I wouldn’t come?” he demanded. “I’ve come every week even though they wouldn’t let me see you at first, and then you refused to see me.” He sighed, hating that he came off so defensive. “Tiffany, do we have to do this?” he said, sounding as tired as he felt. She wore him out, wore him down. He’d never known what to say to her that wouldn’t set her off. No matter what he did, it was wrong. His ex-wife, Pam, in her bitterness, had made sure he would never have a relationship with the girl.
“They wouldn’t let me out to go to my mother’s funeral,” she said, narrowing her eyes at him as if it had been his fault.
“I told you there wasn’t going to be a funeral.” No one would have come for Pam, and he couldn’t bear the town attending in sympathy for him. “Was that why you tried to escape, because you wanted to say goodbye to your mother?”
“Where is she buried?”
He hadn’t known what to do with Pam’s remains. There had been no one but him to handle the arrangements, so he’d had her cremated, figuring her soul was already burning in hell. Her ashes he’d had put in an urn. It sat on a shelf in his barn, since he didn’t want any part of the woman in his house. He’d had no idea what to do with the urn.
“I had her cremated. I thought you might want...” He tried to read his daughter’s expression. She hadn’t cried when he’d told her that her mother was dead. She’d seemed...relieved. He never knew how she would react. Or if her reactions were even real. If he was truthful with himself, he was afraid of her.
“You think that someday I am going to want my mother’s ashes?” She seemed amused by this.
“Wouldn’t you like to sit down?” Frank asked. He’d hoped that one day they could have a normal conversation.
She didn’t move, so he continued to stand, as well.
“Do you need anything?” he asked.
Tiffany cocked her head. “What were you thinking of bringing me? Maybe a teddy bear? Candy?” She shook her head. She was so young. That was what always struck him. She’d turned eighteen on a mental ward. Just the thought of what Pam had done to this girl... He felt his stomach roil. He wondered what he would have done if he’d found his ex-wife before her killer had. He’d often dreamed of wrapping his hands around her throat and choking the life out of her, even though it went against everything he believed in as a lawman.
“Why did you want to see me?” he asked impatiently. He was sick of her games and had begun to question why he still came up here. While the state had run paternity tests and sent him the results, he’d never opened them. Tiffany believed she was his daughter. Did it matter if that was true or not? He felt responsible for the way her life had turned out.
“Didn’t my doctor tell you the news?” she asked. “I’m well enough to stand trial. I’ve hired myself a lawyer. No matter what you think of my mother, she came through at the end. She left me all of her money, money we can only guess at how she came by. But that aside, apparently I am a very rich young woman.” Her eyes narrowed. “I would have been richer, but you had some of the money returned to the woman in Big Timber. Don’t you get tired of always doing what you think is right?”
“Your mother swindled the woman out of her fortune,” Frank said. “I merely made sure the woman got it back.”
Tiffany shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I have plenty of money.”
“I’m happy for you,” Frank said, seeing that the idea of being rich appealed to Tiffany. He’d seen that same glow of greed in her mother’s eyes. He figured Tiffany would use the money to get what she wanted, which apparently was out of here. “So, you’re going to make an effort to get better? I’m glad to hear that.”
“I’m making an amazing recovery,” Tiffany said, smiling. “My doctor said so. He said that my realizing the terrible things I’ve done and feeling remorse is a huge step in my being released. My lawyer thinks that if I throw myself on the mercy of the court...” She smiled, looking sweet and young and so vulnerable—just what a judge and jury would see. She just might walk.
He looked into her pale blue eyes and shuddered inside. He wondered how he played into her future plans. He would have to start locking his doors and sleep again with a gun beside his bed as he had when her mother was alive.
Frank hated to even think what Tiffany would do to the crows he considered part of his family. She’d killed one out of spite, and they hadn’t come back for over a year.
“There is one more thing,” Tiffany said and lowered both her head and her voice as she stepped closer. The male nurse went on alert.
“Mother has been coming to visit me,” Tiffany said, raising her head just enough to meet his gaze. She kept her voice low so the male nurse couldn’t hear her.
Only moments ago, he was thinking that Tiffany might have been faking crazy all these months and that inheriting her mother’s money had made her decide it was time to stop. Now, his blood running ice cold, he saw the psychotic young woman who hadn’t even blinked when she’d pulled the trigger and tried to kill him.
“She sent you a message,” Tiffany said. “‘Tell your father that if he marries Nettie Benton, I will come to your room one night and kill you.’”
Frank took a step back from his daughter and that wild frightening look in her eyes. “Have you talked to your doctor about these visits from your mother?”
Tiffany let out a brittle laugh that quickly died on her lips. Her pale blue eyes darkened. “She will kill me if you marry that woman. You want my death on your conscience, Daddy?”
With that, she turned and left, the male nurse hurrying after her down the hall.
Frank stood watching her go, his heart pounding. What he’d seen in his daughter’s eyes was pure evil. God protect them all if she ever got out of this place.
* * *
“I’M GOING TO look around Westfield Manor, and then I’ll be ready to fly out,” Edwin told the pilot. The last thing he wanted to do was go into that old building, but he needed to verify the deputy’s story if at all possible.
“I’d watch out for rattlesnakes if I were you,” the pilot told him. “Not to mention falling through the rotten flooring or having a beam drop on you. I guess I’m going to have to go with you.” At the detective’s surprised look, he added, “You haven’t paid me yet.”
The afternoon sun fell at a slant across the empty streets as they left the town and walked the quarter mile toward the hulking skeleton of the girls’ home. The land had fallen to weeds; now dried and knee-high, they brushed loudly against their pant legs as they walked. A chill had fallen over the autumn afternoon and seemed to settle in the growing shadows.
Edwin was glad to have the pilot’s company the nearer they got. No sunlight shone behind any of the broken or missing windows. The front door stood open, cold darkness beyond.
“You sure you have to go in there?” the pilot said, stopping some yards away.
Burt Denton had told him that Caligrace’s room was farthest to the right on the third floor. “If you’re too scared...”
“So I’ll wait out here for you.” The young pilot smiled. “My daddy didn’t raise no fool.”
The light was fading fast as Edwin stepped through the doorway. He was instantly struck by the cold and several unpleasant smells as he cautiously moved toward the stairway. He could see where the back of the building had burned. The structure smelled of smoke even after twenty-five years, but only because teenagers had been using the lower floor to party. There were beer cans and bottles strewn around a fire ring in one corner of the room and a stack of old mattresses against another. The blaze had scorched the plastered wall and burned a hole in the floor, but hadn’t spread, as if nothing could destroy this place—just as the convenience-store woman had said.
The stairs felt secure enough. He took them two at a time, anxious to get this over with. The second floor wasn’t quite as littered, but varmints had made nests in the corners. The remains of abandoned metal bed frames and old soiled mattresses with their guts spilled across the floor littered the common area as he took the steps up to the third floor and tried to get his bearings.
The afternoon light had dimmed this far north. Edwin wished he had borrowed a flashlight at the café. In the dusky light, he moved along the scarred wood floor down a long hallway until he found a room that faced town at the corner of the building.
Like the other rooms he’d glimpsed, this one was bare except for the mice nest, part of a bed frame and what was left of several thin soiled mattresses pushed to one corner. He stared at the stark room and wondered why he had bothered. What had he hoped to find here?
“Are you all right?” the pilot called up from the ground below.
He gingerly stepped to the window. “I’ll be right down,” he called back, his voice echoing eerily. As he started to turn away, he brushed the windowsill with his fingers and felt something.
As badly as he wanted to get out of the building as quickly as possible, he turned back to the windowsill. Crudely carved into the weathered wood was one word. CALIGRACE.
* * *
“CAN WE GET out of here now?” Pete asked as the P.I. came out of the old abandoned building. He sounded anxious and a little creeped out.
Edwin felt the same way as he stopped out front to look up at the gaping dark square of glassless window on the third floor. He took a photo with his cell phone for his client, just as he had of the name carved into the wood.
“There is one more place I have to go first.”
“If it’s back inside that building—”
“It isn’t,” he said. “I need to check the cemetery.” They had to move fast. They were losing their light, and Edwin was already dreading the flight. “Are you coming with me?”
Pete glanced around as if trying to decide what would be worse—staying here by himself or going along to the nearby cemetery. “Can you at least tell me what we’re looking for?”
“A grave,” Edwin said as he started toward the small hill. The deceased residents of Westfield Manor had been buried in a small cemetery away from the residents of the town. Old wooden markers leaned into the wind behind the barbed-wire fence. A makeshift gate lay on the ground. Edwin stepped over it and entered. Again Pete hung back, crossing his arms and looking around as if he felt a presence that had him on edge.
Some of the wooden markers had once held names, but the wind and weather had worn them away. He was wasting his time, he thought as he moved through the small cemetery, trying to read even a few letters on the markers. Most of the wood lay rotting on the ground where it had fallen years before.
He almost missed the stone marker because one of the wooden ones had fallen over it. This gravestone was only a slab of concrete, rudimentary in its construction. He figured it was the deputy’s doing. The words on it looked as if they had been drawn into the wet cement with a stick: Finally at peace poor Caligrace. God forgive.
Edwin bent down next to it, ran his fingers over the words, then rose and took a photo with his cell phone. The wind at his back, he looked out across the empty prairie. A few dozen yards away, he saw a small weathered stone angel, the kind often seen on graves. It sat in the middle of the field among the dried weeds.
He shuddered, knowing he would never forget the loneliness and despair he felt at that moment here with these lost souls.
On the walk to the plane, neither man spoke. It wasn’t until they were in the small aircraft ready to take off that Pete said, “The waitress I was talking to? She says her mother knew some woman who knew some woman who took in a few of the girls after the home closed.” He shrugged. “She might be of help.” He handed Edwin a telephone number. “I had the waitress call her mother, who called the woman... You get the idea.”
Edwin had been feeling morose, but now perked up a little.
“The woman lives in Billings. I could fly us there before it gets any darker. We’d have to spend the night. It’s going to cost extra.”
“Not a problem.” Edwin checked his seat belt. “What’s the woman’s name?”
“Leta Arthur.”
He thought about calling Rourke and telling him what he’d found out so far. As Pete taxied the plane down the bumpy wheat field, Edwin decided he’d call after he talked to Leta Arthur. He closed his eyes, held on and prayed as the plane engine revved. He prayed for the girls of Westfield Manor and for the feel of solid ground again as the plane lifted off and turned southeast.
CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_d344000a-7e01-5e8d-b919-e813cbd315b6)
“LAURA?” ROURKE DIDN’T look all that happy to see her as he opened the door of the cabin and found her on his doorstep. Behind him, Laura could see a bag of groceries on the counter inside and his suitcase open on the bed in the small bedroom.
“Nice to see you, too, Rourke,” she said as she pushed past him, angry with herself for coming here. Why hadn’t she just dropped the photos and the preliminary profile in the mail?
“Sorry, it’s just that you were the last person I expected to see at my door,” he said as he shut the door and followed her into the three-room cabin. “How did you find me?”
Laura rolled her eyes and said, “Seriously? I was shot in the leg, not in the head.” She glanced around the cabin at the rustic Western furnishings. They looked authentic. “Interesting digs. It must take you back to growing up in Wyoming. You look as if you never left,” she said, motioning to the stubble at his jaw and the way he was dressed.
He glanced around, before returning his gaze to her. “The cabin suits me since I’m not going to be here long. Laura...”
She could tell that showing up like this had him off balance. It surprised her. In all the time she’d known Rourke, he never seemed to get flustered. It made her all the more tense and anxious about coming here.
“I’d offer you a drink,” he said, “but I just picked up bare necessities so far. I haven’t even unpacked,” he said, motioning to his open suitcase in the bedroom.
“But you’ve met her.” Laura swore he almost blushed. She bit back a curse. “So, what’s she like?” she asked, hating how deep her jealousy cut.
“Not what I expected,” he said, moving to the woodstove.
Laura watched him throw more wood on the fire, his back to her. The Montana night was colder than she’d expected. Seattle weather had spoiled her.
She stared at Rourke’s broad back, despising the rush of emotions that had her annoyed with him. She’d known why he’d come here. To get close to the woman and catch a serial killer. So why was she acting like the jealous girlfriend?
Reaching into her large shoulder bag, she pulled out the manila envelope she’d brought. “You like her.” She shouldn’t have been surprised. Look how far and how much he was risking coming here.
“I find her interesting,” he said, turning to face her. “Just as I do most possible serial killers.” His gaze went to the envelope in her hand. “You did a profile?”
She shook her head. “It’s just preliminary.” Now that she was here, she didn’t want to share the photos. She hated to admit that she’d withheld them from the file. Rourke would be angry. She wished now that she’d called him, that she hadn’t surprised him. That she hadn’t come in with a chip on her shoulder. But it was too late to change any of that.
All she could hope for were a few stolen minutes with him and that neither of them was angry. “I’m not keeping you from anything, am I?”
For a moment, she thought he might say she was. He seemed uncomfortable with her here. He’d been so anxious to talk about the case in Seattle—until her breakdown. She regretted it since there seemed to be a wall between them now. He was treating her as if he had to walk on eggshells around her. She wanted to scream. Or cry. Neither would accomplish what she’d come here for, though.
“I’m not going to blow your cover, if that’s what you’re worried about.” She moved to the table set against one wall. Dropping the manila envelope on it, she removed her coat, hung it over the back of the chair and sat down.
“So, have you found her co-killer?” she asked. Might as well talk about Caligrace Westfield, since she was already in the room and clearly on Rourke’s mind.
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B.J. Daniels
The hunt for a killer leads to a battle between justice and desire…For U.S. marshal Rourke Kincaid, there's the law… and then there's his law. When the two don't agree, he always trusts his instincts. A killing spree has gripped the Northwest, showing a strange connection that only he sees, and now the old rules of justice no longer apply. Forced to turn rogue, he goes deep undercover to track his mysterious female suspect to a quiet, unassuming cafe in the wild, isolated mountains of Beartooth, Montana. But encountering Callie Westfield complicates his mission in ways he never expected. As suspicious as she seems, her fragile beauty and sexy charm get to Rourke. Then the gory crimes begin anew.With his heart suddenly at war with his instincts, he has only two options. Either turn Callie over to the law, or put everything-including his badge and his life-on the line to protect her.
The hunt for a killer leads to a battle between justice and desire
For U.S. marshal Rourke Kincaid, there’s the law…and then there’s his law. When the two don’t agree, he always trusts his instincts. A killing spree has gripped the Northwest, showing a strange connection that only he sees, and now the old rules of justice no longer apply. Forced to turn rogue, he goes deep undercover to track his mysterious female suspect to a quiet, unassuming café in the wild, isolated mountains of Beartooth, Montana.
But encountering Callie Westfield complicates his mission in ways he never expected. As suspicious as she seems, her fragile beauty and sexy charm get to Rourke. Then the gory crimes begin anew. With his heart suddenly at war with his instincts, he has only two options. Either turn Callie over to the law, or put everything—including his badge and his life—on the line to protect her.
Praise for (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
New York Times bestselling author (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
B.J. DANIELS (#ulink_970a2f67-23e9-5572-8ef5-936d8f01bc14)
“Daniels is truly an expert at Western romantic suspense.”
—RT Book Reviews on Atonement
“Will keep readers on the edge of their chairs from beginning to end.”
—Booklist on Forsaken
“Action-packed and chock-full of suspense.”
—Under the Covers on Redemption
“Fans of Western romantic suspense will relish Daniels’ tale of clandestine love played out in a small town on the Great Plains.”
—Booklist on Unforgiven
Mercy
B.J. Daniels
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
I joke that this book tried to kill me. I realize now that the ones that really grab me are the ones that I struggle with and end up loving the most. This one grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. So this book is dedicated to the man who saw me through it, even the three a.m. trip to the hospital with my first migraine.
To my husband, Parker, who takes good care of me so I can just write. I couldn’t be more grateful for your loving support or the wonderful meals you cook me or the patience you have deadline after deadline. I couldn’t do this without you. I love you.
Contents
Cover (#u6ab4859e-84e0-560c-ba0c-fd4e735271e6)
Back Cover Text (#udb40a191-1944-5044-9090-ede6d6e8901d)
Praise for New York Times bestselling author B.J. DANIELS (#ulink_5a10d129-e4f0-54b0-b5d2-fa11520911fb)
Title Page (#uecda76c7-1219-5b7a-a4cd-9a0fce5757c0)
Dedication (#u82a1cdf0-4caf-56ce-852e-c7ff3e622269)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_86883698-2a61-5676-80ff-2a823efadd98)
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_2d1c8eff-48a6-5570-b5ed-a6e9aa8299a3)
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_2e37c287-fc4a-58c1-ab9f-811217779b30)
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_f85ae354-86c4-5e5b-9328-6270aef72206)
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_1b1eeb2a-4b04-5cbf-a89a-c1f82850eff6)
CHAPTER SIX (#ulink_ec81d354-7c6f-5f97-bb55-8536139faa17)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_1ea711ed-1466-5667-8bb9-33bc1ea0f4dd)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_78f958bd-7359-52e2-9d22-ec2c4609ef68)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINETEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_edf831d8-66f2-5252-9a3f-7717c747433f)
SWEAT BEADED HIS forehead and upper lip. He tried to catch his breath, but it was impossible with the gag. It stuck to his dry tongue and cut into one corner of his mouth as he’d attempted to cry out for help. The blindfold kept him from knowing what time of day it was. He kicked, but his legs had tangled in the sweat-drenched sheets. His wrists, still bound to the headboard, were chafed raw, his aching arms numb where the restraints bit into his flesh.
He didn’t know how long he’d been like this. The last thing he remembered was having sex and then asking the woman to leave. It had been a mistake picking her up at the bar and bringing her home in the first place.
After that, he must have fallen asleep. He’d awakened in a panic to find himself gagged, blindfolded and bound to the bed. That had to have been hours ago, but he had no concept of time.
He’d tried everything to free himself. But the way he was trussed up, nothing worked.
How long before someone would find him like this? At first all he could think about was the embarrassment. Now he prayed for anyone to stop by, knowing how remote a chance that would be. No one would even realize they hadn’t seen him for days since he’d taken off for a short vacation.
Anxiety filled him, making him fear he was losing his mind. This wasn’t happening. He couldn’t seem to catch his breath. His chest rose and fell, faster and faster.
A sound made him stop struggling. He held his heaving breath. Had he only imagined someone in the room?
A floorboard creaked. She’d come back. Of course she had. She couldn’t leave him like this. This was some kind of sick joke. Something straight out of a horror movie.
It had been his first night of vacation, so he’d thought, why not have a little fun? Maybe he should have been nicer once the fun was over. Too late to worry about that now, though. Once she cut his restraints, she would regret ever pulling this stunt on him.
He tried to remember her name. Something that started with a C. Candy. Cara. Catherine. Cassie. He tried to say Cassie around the gag. It came out unintelligible.
A thought suddenly struck him. It was her in the room, wasn’t it? Who else? But now he wasn’t so sure.
He felt someone move closer. He could hear breathing next to his bed. He thrashed against his bonds, moaning in both pain and terror.
A harsh whisper next to his ear silenced him. It was her all right. He remembered that voice. But at first he thought he’d heard her wrong. Then she repeated the same three words.
“Beg for mercy.”
The gag muffled his screams as he felt the first slice of the knife.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_e3b28dc8-0d82-5935-ac29-b5b7919fcc4b)
IT HAD SURPRISED Laura Fuller when he’d called. Something odd in his voice. That and the fact that she hadn’t heard from him in months. It made her anxious. As she stepped into the small restaurant off Pioneer Square in downtown Seattle, she stopped to scan the place. Maybe it was the cop in her, but she couldn’t help feeling on guard as she spotted him.
He looked good. That thought made her smile to herself. Rourke Kincaid always looked good, all six foot four of him. He had classic dark looks that were almost as amazing as the rich depths of his eyes. If he wasn’t usually so serious, he would have been sinfully gorgeous. Women always noticed him. He, on the other hand... Did he notice other women? Or was Laura’s former partner just unaware of her as a woman?
As she let the door close behind her and moved in his direction, she thought he looked a little pale. The lines around those dark eyes a little more defined. She thought of the first time she’d seen him as she limped toward his table. She had detested the idea of working with someone who looked like him because she’d thought he wouldn’t take the job seriously. She’d thought he was a womanizer, one of those men who had to have the attention of every woman around him. She couldn’t have been more wrong.
Rourke, like her, had been interested in only his job. At least that was how it had been back then.
As Laura drew closer, she saw that all his attention was on the papers he had spread on the table. But when he saw her, he hurriedly tucked them back into the folder and set it on the chair next to him.
He’d brought some case he was working on. Of course that was why he’d called her. It was the only reason he had ever called her, except for the few times to see how she was doing after she’d gotten out of the hospital.
He rose now, hastily getting to his feet. His expression brightened, and he flashed her one of his disarming smiles. Even after bracing herself against it, her heart kicked into gear, all those old feelings rushing at her.
“Laura.” He took both her hands in his large, warm ones and brushed a kiss across her cheek. She noticed then that he wasn’t wearing his U.S. Marshals uniform. Maybe it was his day off. But then, Rourke never really took a day off, especially when he was deep in a case.
To a bystander, he probably looked relaxed in a pair of worn jeans, equally worn boots and a blue chambray button-up shirt, and yet she could tell he was anxious. His Stetson was on the seat with the folder he’d brought. You could take the cowboy out of Wyoming, but you couldn’t take the cowboy out of him, she thought.
“How are you?” he asked, genuine concern in his voice. She knew then that he’d seen her limp, even though she’d tried so hard to hide how bad it was. Rourke missed little. It was what had made him such a good homicide detective and now criminal investigator.
“I’m fine,” she said automatically. “How about you?”
“Me?” He seemed surprised by the question as he stepped around the table to pull out her chair. It was such a gentlemanly thing to do that she couldn’t help but smile. A year ago he wouldn’t have touched her chair. She wouldn’t have let him because they’d been equals back then. But a lot had changed in a year, hadn’t it?
She sat and watched him move back around to his own chair. “What’s wrong?” she asked as she got a closer look at him.
He blinked. “Can’t I ask my former Seattle P.D. partner to lunch without you thinking—”
“Rourke,” she said with a shake of her head as he lowered himself into his chair.
He laughed, his dark gaze meeting hers as he stretched out his long legs. “I forget how well you know me.” His look alone made her pulse purr just under her skin. How long had she been in love with this man? Too long.
“Tell me what I’m doing here besides having lunch?” she said, needing to clarify for herself what this meeting would cover. She knew what she’d hoped it was about, but clearly she’d been kidding herself.
“I’m sure you heard about what happened six months ago,” he said, dropping his voice.
Law enforcement was a tight-knit community. Even if she was no longer one of the gang, she still heard things. Rourke had risen so quickly in his field that she knew there were some who’d enjoyed his fall from grace.
Six months ago he hadn’t waited for backup even though he’d been ordered to do so. The bust had gone badly, a civilian was shot and almost died, and Rourke was reprimanded and pulled off active duty.
She picked up her napkin, unfolded it carefully and laid it across her lap before she spoke. “You have always followed your intuition. It’s what made you such a good homicide detective. Now as a U.S. marshal, well, I would expect you to continue doing what you do best. I would still trust you with my life.” When she looked up, she saw the shine of his eyes and felt a lump form in her throat. Was it possible he missed her as much as she’d missed him?
“You were the best partner I ever had,” he said, emotion making his deep voice even deeper. “Sometimes I miss the Seattle P.D.” His gaze narrowed as he studied her. “If I could go back to that night—”
“I’ve put that part of my life behind me.” Laura couldn’t find words to describe how much she missed it. But not for the reason Rourke Kincaid thought. Even if they could change what had happened that night a year ago, she doubted he would still be with the Seattle P.D. Even back then, she’d known he wouldn’t stay in Homicide long. He was destined to greater things.
“Want a drink before we eat?” He didn’t wait for an answer before signaling the waitress. “The usual?” he said to Laura with a grin. “Scotch on the rocks for my friend. Nothing for me.”
“You’re not joining me?” she asked as the waitress left. “I just assumed you were off duty.”
“Off duty.” He chuckled at that. “Today is my first day of my latest suspension. My boss suggested I take two weeks to reevaluate my career choices.”
She reached across the table and touched his hand. “I’m sorry.”
“He’s probably right. I’m not sure I’m cut out for taking orders. Nor am I so sure I can still trust my instincts.” He took a sip of his water and waited as the waitress returned to place the drink in front of her. “We should probably order. Two cheeseburgers and fries?” he asked, smiling at her again.
Laura nodded even though she didn’t eat like that anymore. Couldn’t. Being on the force, she had worked out all the time, kept active and could eat anything she wanted and did. Now...well, now things were different.
Once the waitress left again, he said, “Six months ago, I was put on cold cases down in the basement.” He nodded. “I know. I was lucky they didn’t send me packing.”
“I’m sure you’ll be back on fieldwork soon. Rourke, you’re too good to leave you stuck away much longer. If you can just hang in—”
He shook his head. “Surprisingly that’s not the problem. They’ve reinstated me for fieldwork. They want me back on the job.”
Frowning, she said, “Then I guess I don’t understand.”
“I found something in an old case file. Something I want to chase.”
This was the Rourke she knew so well. Once he got on the scent, he couldn’t let up until he caught what he was chasing. Wasn’t that why he’d ended up in the basement with the cold cases?
“I’ve been ordered to assist with an asset seizure on a drug case that any fool can handle.”
She stared at him. “This is why you invited me to lunch. You want me to talk you out of whatever it is you’re thinking of doing?” She shook her head, seeing her error as she studied his face. “No, you want me to encourage you to chase it.”
Laura couldn’t help being touched that her opinion meant that much, while at the same time, it really wouldn’t matter what she said. She was sure his mind was already made up. He just wanted that little push and from who better than his old partner?
Her gaze shifted to the file he’d placed on the seat of the chair next to him. What had he found that would make him risk his career over it? “So, let’s see it.”
“Maybe we should eat—”
Laura rolled her eyes. “You didn’t get me down here for the burgers or the Scotch. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
He gave her a sheepish grin as he reached for the file folder. “I found something—some old photographs,” he said with an excitement that would have been contagious when they’d worked together. He opened the folder and leaned toward her. She caught a whiff of his oh, so familiar aftershave. Her pulse thrummed. She loved seeing Rourke like this.
* * *
ROURKE FELT EVEN more anxious as he pulled out the photographs. He trusted Laura’s judgment. Now he worried that she’d tell him he was wrong, that he’d lost his edge. That he was about to make yet another mistake. Only this one would cost him his career and for nothing.
He slid the photographs from the folder and reached into his jacket pocket for the magnifying glass he’d brought. The photos were all of a group of onlookers standing behind yellow crime-scene tape. As he started to hand over the shots, his eye went to the one face, a face he hadn’t been able to forget from the first time he’d seen the young woman—and realized that he’d seen her somewhere before.
Laura took the three photographs and the magnifying glass. “What am I looking for?”
He didn’t answer as he watched her scan one photo, then another until she had looked at all three.
She frowned and studied each again, more slowly this time. “These are from three different crime scenes.”
He smiled. He’d been right to bring this to her. He just hoped she saw what he had—that one face in the crowd. What Laura might have lacked in polish as a homicide detective, she more than made up for in street sense and down-to-earth logic. She didn’t jump to conclusions. She took in information, digested it, considered and then assessed the situation with almost a coldhearted clarity.
Rourke had always trusted her judgment because of it. Not that he’d been happy at first about being partnered with a woman when he’d joined the Seattle P.D. Like a lot of other men, he’d been biased, believing that when the cards were down, even a good woman cop would be weaker than a man or may become emotional and be a liability.
He could laugh about that misconception now. Laura Fuller was tougher, more capable and less emotional in a tight spot than a lot of male cops he’d known. As he had in the past, he wondered now how she’d been raised. She’d never talked about growing up, but at first he’d suspected, because of how tough she was, that she might have been the only girl in a houseful of brothers. She’d never seemed to want to talk about what she offhandedly called her boring childhood, but then she’d mentioned once that she had a sister. He’d gotten the impression that the sister was her only family and that they weren’t close.
As inseparable as he and Laura had been in the past, he realized that he didn’t really know her. His fault, since all his focus had been on his career for as far back as he could remember.
The waiting now, though, was killing him.
He started to say something when Laura hesitated on a corner of a photo where a dark-haired young woman stood just beyond the crime-scene tape. He watched Laura spread the three photos on the table, going from one to the next. He could feel the change in her. She’d seen it!
His relief was almost palpable. He couldn’t help the surge of adrenaline that shot through him. If Laura saw it, then he had to be right. He was onto something.
“It’s the same woman, isn’t it?” he said, no longer able to contain himself.
As Laura studied the woman in the three photos, she unconsciously pushed a lock of her blond shoulder-length hair back behind one ear. He realized that she’d let her hair grow out since he’d last seen her and felt a wave of guilt. After she’d been shot and left the Seattle P.D., he’d checked on her often during the first few months. But since taking the job with the U.S. Marshals, he had gotten so busy he couldn’t remember the last time he’d called her.
She handed back the magnifying glass. “Three different neighborhoods? Three different homicides?”
Rourke nodded.
“And these are the best shots you have of her?”
“Unfortunately. But she’s the key to those three murders. I can feel it.”
“She might just be a murder junkie. Probably has a scanner next to her bed and responds whenever she hears the call.” Laura shrugged and pushed the photos back toward him. “Have you been able to identify her?”
“Not yet. I’ve hired a private investigator to canvass the neighborhoods where the murders were committed.”
She raised a brow in surprise as she realized he had been working outside the U.S. Marshals Service and apparently for some time. “Aren’t you taking this a little too personally?”
He’d already gone rogue, and now she knew it. “I just have a feeling about this one. I can’t let it go.” He looked down at the photos spread on the table, his eye going to the dark-haired woman. Her face had been haunting him for weeks. When he closed his eyes at night...
She shook her head. “What are you doing, Rourke?”
He could hear the skepticism in her voice. He wished now that he’d ordered a drink. He could use it. Laura thought he was looking for a lead where there wasn’t one. Unfortunately, his boss thought the same thing.
He’d never been plagued with self-doubt when it came to his instincts. But after almost costing a man his life...
“Rourke, what am I really doing here?” Laura asked.
* * *
“I NEED YOUR HELP,” Rourke said, leaning toward her conspiratorially. “I remembered that your background was psychology and criminology. Did I hear correctly that you’re doing freelance profiling for the Seattle P.D.?”
Laura shouldn’t have been surprised that he knew this, but she was. Just as she shouldn’t have been disappointed that he’d asked her to dinner because he wanted her help on a case.
“I need to know about this woman and the kind of man who would be in her life,” he said.
“Based on three photos?” she asked, thinking he must be kidding.
“This woman is the connection between the three different crime scenes, but I think there’s more. I think she’s working with a serial killer.”
Laura leaned back in her chair in surprise. She studied him for a moment before she looked at the photographs again. She tried to imagine why this woman was at three separate crime scenes in three separate neighborhoods. It could be as simple as morbid curiosity. Or not.
Profiling was a science based on statistics compiled of criminals. Depending on the type of murder, she could paint a fairly accurate picture of the killer once she had all the information. Or, if Rourke was right about the woman, in this case, co-killer.
Of course, it was much more likely that this woman could be just as Laura had said before, someone with a scanner who lived such a dull life that going to crime scenes was her only source of entertainment.
Had it not been Rourke, she would have dismissed this without a thought. But she’d learned a long time ago to trust him. If he felt he had to chase this, even jeopardize his job to do so, then she had to take it seriously.
She motioned for the magnifying glass again. What was funny was that when she’d first noticed the woman, she’d thought she recognized her. Something about the woman’s face... But when she studied the features, she decided the woman merely had one of those sweet, innocent-looking faces. That didn’t make Laura hate her any less.
She knew it was crazy to be jealous of a woman in a crime-scene photo who was possibly involved in at least three murders. But she could see that no woman had ever captivated Rourke like this one had. He couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off her in the photo.
Laura figured he’d be disappointed when he finally came face-to-face with her. That was if he could find her—and didn’t get himself killed in the process.
Pushing the photos away, she was torn between laughter and tears when she thought how excited she’d been after Rourke’s call. What a fool she’d been, taking forever to get dressed. She’d even put on a little makeup, not that Rourke had noticed. And while she was touched that he’d called her to help with this, she wanted him to see her. Not the former cop. Not the former homicide partner. For once, she just wanted him to look at her and see the woman.
“So, what are you planning to do?” she asked, already knowing the answer.
“Laura, I can’t get these three cold cases out of my mind. I have no choice but to try to find this woman. I know you think I’m a fool to chase this.”
She sighed, seeing his disappointment. He’d hoped she would jump on board just like in the old days when he’d bent the rules and she had gone along with it. But the last time she’d bent the rules, she was almost killed. Her world, as she had known it, ended the day she was shot. She still had the scars, both inside and out.
Now, sitting here with him, she found herself battling a growing anger, more at herself than at him. Not that she thought it made any difference. Picking up her glass, she took a sip of her Scotch, hoping the alcohol would steady her.
“I’ve got two weeks,” he said, oblivious to her mounting resentment. “Once I get this woman’s name—”
“You’re really going to risk throwing away your career for some questionable lead in some old cold cases?”
He waved a hand through the air. “You know the ‘career’ part is the least of it for me. Sure, I love what I do and have worked hard to get where I am, but what is the point if I can’t chase a case that’s gotten into my blood?”
Her blood was on fire now. She could feel it flush her cheeks as she took another drink. The Scotch was like throwing gasoline on a blaze. “You don’t care about a career I would give my left leg for?” She let out a bark of a laugh, trying to keep her voice down when she was raging inside. “Oh, that’s right—I lost my career because of my left leg. Shot in the line of duty. Bang. Career over and you...” She lifted her nearly empty Scotch glass, suddenly at a loss for words. Tears welled and spilled. She wiped furiously at them. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t let him see how messed up she was or how deep her hurt ran.
Rourke looked shocked as he reached for her. “Laura, I’m so sorry.”
She shook off the hand he placed on her arm. He motioned to the waitress to bring her another drink. That was all she needed. Didn’t he realize how close she was to telling him not only how she felt about the loss of her career but also how she felt about him?
“You’re going to do it—jeopardize everything.” Her chest ached with unshed tears. “Why would you do this?” Because of the woman in the photo. Something about that face had gotten to him.
Rourke looked distressed that he’d upset her, but also shocked. “I’m doing this because of you, Laura. I wanted to do this for you, and once I found the lead...”
She stared at him. “What are you talking about?”
“The third murder case? It was yours before you and I became partners.”
“I wasn’t on Homicide until—”
“No, you were still a street cop, but I saw your notes on this case in the original file. You were there, Laura. You took these photographs.”
She shook her head, telling herself this couldn’t be true, but an inkling of a memory fought to surface. Was that why she’d thought she recognized the woman in the crowd, because she’d taken her photo?
“I know it sounds crazy,” Rourke continued, “but it’s the reason I first got involved in this case. I saw your notes, and I wanted to solve it for you. Then, when I found the other two similar murders from the area and the same woman in all of the shots...”
All the fire in her blew out as if doused by a bucket of ice water. For a moment, she couldn’t breathe. This was the Rourke she knew and loved. And wanting to solve this case because of her... Well, this was as romantic as Rourke Kincaid got. At least with her.
As the waitress arrived with their burgers, Rourke quickly pocketed the magnifying glass and slid the photos back into the folder, dropping it again on the seat next to him. The waitress exchanged her empty Scotch glass for a full one.
Laura picked it up, closed her eyes and took a gulp of the icy cold booze.
She couldn’t believe this. He’d gotten involved in the case because of her. But it was the woman in the photograph who had him about to commit career suicide.
Even with her eyes closed, she could see the image of the dark-haired young woman with the angelic face standing behind the crime-scene tape. Rourke wouldn’t be the only one haunted by the woman now.
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_63a4be3f-88f2-58ce-8e95-a62858822dfa)
ROURKE MENTALLY KICKED HIMSELF. What the hell had he been thinking, going to Laura about this?
Had he thought she might want to help him by living vicariously while he solved this one? He’d been more than insensitive, but then again, Laura had also changed. He’d never seen her in tears before—even the night she was shot.
Her wounds had been nearly fatal, but she’d recovered—all except for her left leg. Like him, though, she wasn’t built for a desk job, so he was glad she had gotten into the profiling field. He thought she’d be damned good at it. Which was another reason he’d asked her to dinner.
He’d foolishly assumed, though, that the old Laura, the one who felt like an equal, would show up. This Laura... Well, she was more fragile. He should have realized that would be the case.
They ate their meals, him changing the subject to the weather. It didn’t always rain in Seattle, but still, there wasn’t that much to say.
“Is your food okay?” he asked, noticing that she’d barely touched hers. That wasn’t like her either. One of the things he’d always loved about her when they were partners was that she liked to eat as much as he did. Seattle offered every kind of fare there was, and the two of them had consumed their share.
“I had to quit eating like I used to,” she said, spearing a French fry and taking a small bite.
How had he not noticed that, along with the change in hairstyle, she’d also dropped the weight she’d gained after the shooting? Laura was an attractive woman, not classically beautiful, but striking. At five-eight, she looked strong, as if she’d been working out in spite of her leg. She’d been a blonde for as long as he’d known her, and yet her coloring seemed wrong for the pale shade, making him wonder what her natural color was. Something else he hadn’t noticed until now.
“You look great,” he said, again reminded of how little he really knew about his former partner, when she seemed to know him so well.
She smiled as if she knew he hadn’t really looked at her until that moment.
“So, you’re doing okay?” he asked, worried about her.
Laura was his age: thirty-six. It surprised him that she’d never married again. She’d apparently been married for a short time before he’d met her to a man named Mike Fuller. She never talked about it. Nor did she date much, seeming more interested in her career.
He wondered if there was a man in her life, now that, thanks to the shooting, she didn’t have such a demanding career. In the old days, he might have asked. But a lot had changed since those days, and he didn’t feel close enough to question her about her love life.
“I was glad when I heard you were finishing up your studies to be a profiler,” he finally ventured. “Laura, I know you’ll be a great one.”
She shrugged, looking uncomfortable. “I started doing some studying on my own while I was laid up and realized it might be something I was good at.” She met his gaze. “I can help you with this case, if you’ll let me.” She raised a hand before he could say he’d changed his mind and wasn’t sure it was a good idea. “If I could talk you out of this, I would. But since we both know I can’t...”
This was what he’d hoped she would say. If he hoped to solve these murder cases, he could use her help since all of the resources of the U.S. Marshals’ office were off-limits during his suspension. While he thought profiling could be useful, he knew it was good old-fashioned investigative work that usually solved crimes. But he wanted Laura on his team.
The truth was that he needed her for more than profiling. Lately, he’d been second-guessing himself, no longer sure he should trust his own judgment. He needed Laura’s analytical mind. “I—” But he didn’t get a chance to finish whatever he was going to say.
His cell phone rang, and when he checked it, he said, “Sorry, I have to take this. It’s the P.I. I hired.” He stepped away, relieved for the call as he hurried outside. Laura seemed so fragile right now. Even though he needed her help, did he dare involve her in this?
Outside the café, it had begun to drizzle, the sky a dull gray wash as everything quickly became slick with rain. Seattle had a fairly high suicide rate. He’d never felt that internal darkness as much as he did now, standing under the awning of the restaurant.
“I found something,” Edwin Sharp said without preamble. “I think it could be who you’re looking for. A landlady identified the woman in the photo as Callie Westfield. She worked as a waitress at a café in the neighborhood. The owner of the café required her driver’s license when she started work, so I was able to get a copy. Her full name is Caligrace Westfield. I ran her through the system. I couldn’t find a residential address, but I do have an address where she is currently employed.”
Rourke pulled out his notebook and pen.
“She’s working as a waitress at the Branding Iron Café in Beartooth, Montana.”
* * *
LAURA FELT SICK to her stomach as she left the restaurant. She’d been too upset to eat, but she’d forced herself to consume as much of her meal as she could. Rourke had felt bad enough, without her making him feel worse.
As astute as the man was when it came to solving crimes, he seldom saw what was right in front of his face. Rourke didn’t have a clue when it came to her. He’d really believed that missing her old job in law enforcement was the reason she was upset. How could he not know that she’d been in love with him almost from the start?
“It’s you, Rourke!” she had wanted to scream. “I miss you! I miss the damned force, but it’s because I miss talking to you every day!” Even if it had been about only their latest cases. “I miss being with you.” Days off used to be hell. She couldn’t wait to get back to work. Back to Rourke.
Like him, she’d been on the fast track, moving quickly from a Seattle P.D. officer to Homicide. The sky had been the limit for both of them. They had been called the Dream Team. She could laugh about it now, but back then, she was sure everyone thought she and Rourke were sleeping together. They were that compatible. They could finish each other’s sentences. They were that close. So no wonder they had worked so well together.
And they were good. Between the two of them, they solved cases. Their futures were so bright, they felt like rock stars, she thought bitterly.
Then that night in the alley... She’d gone in alone even though Rourke had told her to wait. He’d had one of the felons on the ground, restraining the man with cuffs. But she didn’t want to wait. She’d felt a singing in her blood. A feeling that she was invincible. She’d gone down the alley not realizing the man was trapped at the end, hunkered down, shot full of drugs, a loaded gun in his hand and his finger on the trigger.
Reaching her car now, she climbed in, her leg aching from either the short walk to her parking spot—or the memory of that night and the impact of the bullet as it struck the bone.
Everyone told her that she was lucky to be alive. Lucky. Sick to her stomach now, heart aching and her mind racing, she didn’t feel lucky at all. She felt scared.
Rourke thought he was chasing a serial killer and was now headed for some town in Montana called Beartooth. He had been quiet after his phone call, and she’d had to drag what little she could out of him. Clearly, he’d changed his mind about involving her, but she wasn’t having any of that. She’d prove to him that he needed her help. She’d put her personal feelings aside and be the cop he needed her to be.
“So, what’s her name?” she’d asked, hating that he’d wanted to close her out.
“This whole thing could blow up in my face. I shouldn’t have involved you.”
She’d given him a sideways look. “But you did involve me, and now you’re stuck with me. I can tell that you have more than just her location. What’s her name?”
He’d relented as she’d known he would. He wouldn’t have brought her the photos if he hadn’t really wanted her help—needed her help. It was that thought that had made the rest of the dinner bearable.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
Her fingers trembled now as she put the key into the ignition. As far as she knew, she’d never heard the name before and yet...
She was anxious to get home, even though Rourke had wanted to put her in a taxi. She’d pointed out that she hadn’t finished her second Scotch and was fine to drive. She was still shaken, blaming it on the fact that she’d gotten her hopes up that the dinner was going to be more than it was.
There was another reason she felt the need to get home quickly. She couldn’t wait to get her hands on her files. From the time she’d started with the Seattle P.D., she had copied all of her notes on the cases she’d worked on and photocopied everything in the files, including making duplicate photos. She didn’t care that it was against protocol. She liked to look at them, study them, see what she could have done differently. See what she might have missed.
If this cold case of Rourke’s really was one she’d worked on—even as a street cop taking photos of the looky-loos behind the crime-scene tape—well, then she would have all the information in her files at home.
The engine turned over. Shifting into Drive, she pulled out without looking. A car horn blared. She slammed on her brakes. The driver of the vehicle swerved around her, barely missing her. Anywhere else but Seattle and the driver would have given her the finger.
Shaken, she looked back to see a second car. This driver had managed to stop in time. The driver impatiently motioned for her to go. She smiled a thank-you back at him and, her heart hammering, pulled out into traffic.
Fortunately, her apartment wasn’t far from downtown Seattle. She navigated the half dozen blocks, concentrating on her driving, still upset from her near accident.
As she pulled into her parking garage and shut off the engine, she tried to calm down. But it was useless. Seeing Rourke again had stirred up a cauldron of emotions that now roiled inside her. Loving Rourke hurt and always had, but she’d thought she had learned to live with it.
Today she’d realized how wrong she was. She smacked the steering wheel with her palm, hating him and the spell some woman in a photo had cast on him. She couldn’t let him jeopardize his career, not for some old cold case. Maybe especially for one he said he was doing for her. But even at that thought, she knew she couldn’t stop him.
The parking garage seemed to close in around her. She had been getting better. Her psychiatrist had said during her last appointment that he was pleased with the progress she’d made.
“I still get scared sometimes,” she’d admitted. “But I’m not so afraid when I leave my apartment now. I still check the backseat of my car. Not as often as I used to, though.”
He’d nodded sagely. “It’s wise to be aware of your surroundings, living in a city. You’re getting out more, then?”
“I’m shopping for my own groceries again and going to lunch occasionally with friends.” The last part wasn’t exactly true. She’d never had a lot of friends. But, unlike some people, she didn’t mind eating alone.
The doctor had studied her openly. “You seem better. Do you feel better?”
She had.
Now, though, she couldn’t catch her breath. She listened for the sound of footfalls in the cool dimness of the garage, suddenly afraid she was no longer alone. Logically, she knew there probably wasn’t anyone crouched in a dark corner of the garage, waiting for her. Just as she had known there probably wasn’t a boogeyman hiding under her bed when she was a child.
But once a boogeyman crawled out from under your bed in the middle of the night... Well, from then on you knew that he could be waiting for you in any dark corner—or dark alley.
For a while, she’d thought her badge and gun were like a powerful shield that would protect her. She’d let herself believe that she’d conquered her fears, that nothing could ever hurt her again as long as Rourke was by her side. He’d made her feel powerful and immortal, when in truth, she was that little girl cowering in the corner of her bed as the boogeyman loomed over her.
Laura let out a sob as she searched the dark recesses of the garage, then hurriedly opened her door and fled to the elevator. She punched the up button, hammering at it, before she dared look behind her. There were street traffic sounds beyond the garage, but no closer, more ominous sounds of footfalls coming from the dark shadowed corners of the garage—at least none she could hear over the pounding of her heart.
She turned back to the elevator, leaning on the button again. She heard the elevator car groan from somewhere inside the building. Her every instinct told her to take the stairs. Now! But with her leg...
The elevator opened noisily, the yawning doors revealing no one inside. She practically threw herself in, hit the ninth-floor button and punched Close a half dozen times before the doors slowly closed.
The breath she’d been holding rushed from her. Tears burned her cheeks. She leaned against the elevator wall for support. She wasn’t better.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_a58b60d9-4099-5e85-a4cb-f67f8d7c687a)
WITH NO TIME to spare, Rourke had flown into the Gallatin Valley near Bozeman, Montana, the next morning, rented an SUV and driven to Big Timber, following a map he’d printed out on the internet. Beartooth proved to be another twenty miles on two-lane blacktop toward snowcapped peaks, which, according to a sign beside the road, were the Crazy Mountains.
The town, if you could call it that, came as a shock even though he’d done a little research on it while waiting for his flight. Beartooth was what was left of a once-thriving mining town back in the late 1890s. All that had survived, other than some old stone buildings, was a café, post office and bar. Apparently, there had been a general store across from the café, but it had burned down last spring.
Thanks to the internet, he’d found a cabin to rent on the mountainside across the road from the café. He could see the cabin through the trees as he pulled into a spot in front of the café. He’d thought about stopping by the cabin first, but he was too anxious to see Caligrace Westfield.
The Branding Iron Café was easy to find, given how few businesses were left in Beartooth. As he climbed out of the SUV, he tried not to get his hopes up. The P.I. had told him that Caligrace Westfield had changed jobs and residences often over the past ten years. For all Rourke knew, she might have already moved on.
A bell tinkled over the door as he stepped into the café and was hit with the combined smells of cinnamon, bacon and coffee. He breathed in, his stomach growling, reminding him that he hadn’t had much to eat. He’d been too anxious. Just as he was now. Anxious and nervous at the thought of finally seeing the woman face-to-face.
He took in his surroundings quickly. A variety of brightly colored quilts hung on the café’s walls. He’d expected a more Western interior, given where the town was located—in the heart of ranching and farming communities.
There were only a half dozen tables arranged at the front of the café, with four booths along one side and a counter back by the kitchen with a half dozen stools. One large table at the front was full of ranchers he took for regulars.
“Sit wherever you like,” a young woman called over her shoulder without looking in his direction.
He chose a table at the front of the café that gave him a view of the whole place. He could even see into the kitchen via the pass-through on the other side of the counter. A thin, pale man—in his fifties, he guessed—was busy cooking to the distant drone of a song on the radio.
The waitress who’d told him to seat himself stood at the pass-through, her back to him. Her long, curly dark hair was pulled into a knot of sorts at the nape of her neck. Loose strands hung at her temples.
Rourke waited impatiently for the woman to turn around, thinking about the latest information from the P.I. he’d hired. Edwin Sharp, a seasoned private investigator who used to be a cop, was in his sixties. Rourke had liked him the first time he’d met him. He needed someone he trusted, and since he couldn’t do his own digging without making his situation with the marshals’ office worse, he’d hired the man.
“I found something,” Edwin had said cryptically when he’d called on Rourke’s journey to Beartooth. “Your...mystery woman didn’t exist until her seventeenth birthday, when she used a fake birth certificate to get her driver’s license and a social-security card.”
“How do you know the birth certificate is fake?”
“She wasn’t born at the hospital on the certificate because it doesn’t exist—never has.”
“Is anything on the birth certificate real?”
“Doubtful.”
“What about the address?”
“Well, that’s where it gets interesting. The address is Westfield Manor.”
Rourke frowned. “An old folks’ home?”
The P.I. laughed. “I have no idea. But apparently, it is in Flat Rock, Montana, about four hours north of Beartooth, where she is now living.”
“How soon can you get to Flat Rock?”
“I would have to fly.” Edwin had told him he didn’t like flying and charged extra if he had to.
“Fly. Call me when you know something.”
Now Rourke waited, willing the woman in the café to turn so he could see her face. She looked about the right height. Maybe slimmer than he’d guessed Caligrace Westfield would be and in better shape. But then again, he was going by a police shot at a crime scene and that one face in the crowd.
She finally turned.
He caught his breath as he got his first good look at the woman who had haunted him for weeks.
* * *
FOR CALIGRACE—“CALLIE”—Westfield, it was just another day slinging hash at the Branding Iron Café in Beartooth. She moved through the restaurant with plates of food and pots of coffee. After a year here, she knew most everyone’s story.
This morning the information came as it always did: in short psychic bursts. The young ranch hand at the first table was hungover and worried he might lose his job. The young mother who’d asked for a high chair was concerned because her husband didn’t spend much time with her and the baby anymore. The old rancher was anxiously awaiting the results of his wife’s biopsy.
Callie had experienced this phenomenon on some level from as far back as she could remember. Since she didn’t want to know any of it, she thought of the constant influx of information as white noise. She’d learned the hard way that she couldn’t take on everyone’s troubles, so she tried to tune it out as best she could. That should have made it easier to live with, but it often didn’t.
The café wasn’t particularly busy this morning—just the usual crowd who couldn’t resist Kate French’s cinnamon rolls warm from the oven. The smell of cinnamon, frying bacon and fresh coffee filled the air. Callie had found all of it comforting over the past year.
She had just finished refilling cups with coffee at the large table at the front of the café where a group of older ranchers met each morning, when she got her first good look at the cowboy who’d come in. She’d felt him staring at her, but hadn’t thought anything of it. She was used to men noticing her. This cowboy was different, though.
His look, as she approached his table, was speculative. Not as if he was wondering whether or not she would sleep with him if he asked her out. No, this was more of a rapt interest that sent a chill up her spine and made her hand holding the pot of coffee unsteady.
He was dressed like the others who came into the Branding Iron. Jeans, boots, Western shirt, all worn enough that he almost blended in. His tan Stetson rested on his sheepskin coat on the chair next to him. There was nothing about the tall, dark cowboy that should have set off warning bells since he looked like the real thing. But her instincts told her he wasn’t just another cowhand.
“Coffee?” she asked as she reached his table.
“Thanks.” His voice was deep, a rumble to it that seemed to reverberate in her chest, making her heart kick up another beat or two.
Her gaze rose of its own accord. The moment she met his dark eyes, she regretted it. They were nearly black. But it was the look in them. She’d found few people looked beyond the surface. This man peered into her as if searching for her soul.
Then he smiled at her, exposing a whole lot of perfect, white teeth. The smile transported his dark chiseled face, making her suddenly aware of how magnificent he was. What surprised her more, though, was her reaction. Chemistry? It had been so long since she’d been attracted to a man, she couldn’t be sure if it was desire or danger. Or maybe a little of both.
She had to suppress a shudder and quickly dropped her gaze, fighting to keep the trembling out of her hand as she poured the coffee. Suddenly she realized that she wasn’t getting a flash of information. Nothing. It was as if the room had fallen silent or she had gone deaf.
That shocked her so much that she wasn’t even aware she was still pouring coffee into his cup until it splashed over onto the table.
“I’m so sorry,” she cried, jerking back.
“No big deal,” he said with a chuckle as he grabbed some napkins and began to mop up the worst of the spill. “Blame it on me. I distracted you.” He gave her a reassuring smile that unnerved her even more.
The cowboy had the kind of good looks that broke hearts. A lock of his thick dark hair had fallen down on his forehead. He hadn’t shaved for a day or two, making her even more aware of his rugged strong jaw. Everything about him said strong, capable and all man. Maybe the cowboy was just what he appeared to be. Maybe.
She didn’t realize she’d been standing there staring at him until her boss, Kate, came over with a cloth to clean up the table. “I’ll give you a few moments to look at the menu,” Callie said and hurried off.
“Are you all right, Callie?” Kate asked when she caught up to her at the back of the café.
“I...I...” No one knew about her “gift.” So there was no way to explain why this stranger had thrown her the way he had. The fact that she’d gotten absolutely nothing scared her. It had happened only a rare few times in her life. Reminded of those times, she shuddered at the memory.
“I guess I’m just clumsy this morning.”
Kate laughed. “Uh-huh. Has nothing at all to do with how handsome that cowboy is,” she said in a conspiratorial whisper.
Callie gave her a sheepish grin as if that was all it was. “Would you mind taking his order?”
Kate gave her a sympathetic look as if she’d been there herself. “Sure,” she said before turning to head for the man’s table. Callie could feel the cowboy’s gaze burning into her flesh, even before she looked in his direction. He smiled, then looked down at his menu as Kate approached.
The whole encounter had taken only a few minutes, and yet the memory of his searching gaze lingered, leaving her off balance. She just prayed her worst nightmare wasn’t happening all over again.
Just then, all heads in the café turned as a large construction truck rolled into town and stopped across the street in front of the burned-out site of the former Beartooth General Store. Callie watched as another truck pulled in right behind it. More trucks, loaded with lumber and building materials, followed.
One of the regulars at the large table at the front said, “Hell’s bells, it almost looks as if Beartooth has been invaded by an army.”
“They must be lost,” one of the ranchers joked. “Either that or Nettie Benton is going to rebuild the store.”
“Not likely,” Kate said as she stared across the street at the activity. “She sold that property to marry the sheriff.”
“Well, something’s coming up over there,” a rancher noted. “But who in his right mind would invest in Beartooth? One good wind and the whole town could disappear overnight.”
As Callie looked around the café, she saw that everyone was watching the men unloading building materials across the street.
Everyone but the cowboy at the table in the corner. He was looking at her.
* * *
ROURKE COULDN’T TAKE his eyes off Caligrace “Callie” Westfield. The blurry police photos hadn’t captured her beauty. She looked angelic, from the wide brown eyes to the freckles that bridged her nose and highlighted the tops of her cheeks.
Not only did she look like an angel, she also had an innocence about her that was almost palpable. She wore jeans, an apron over a turquoise T-shirt and a pair of sneakers. As he noticed earlier, she was slimmer than she’d appeared in the photographs, more athletic and in better shape. Rourke estimated that she stood about five and a half feet tall.
He knew looks could be deceiving. Ted Bundy proved that. But he was still having a hard time believing this woman was a serial killer—or even intimately involved with one.
As the owner, a pretty brunette he’d heard called Kate, took his breakfast order, Rourke told himself that he’d been right to question his judgment about coming here. This case had gotten to him. Or maybe Laura was right and Caligrace Westfield had gotten to him from a few grainy snapshots. But right now, he was more than intrigued by the woman.
He hadn’t anticipated his reaction to her—or hers to him, now that he thought about it. For a moment when their eyes had met, he’d thought she recognized him. It was more than possible since he’d been the lead detective on several homicide cases that had gotten him on the nightly news before he’d left the Seattle P.D.
Seeing her in the flesh made him even more curious about her. According to her history, the longest she’d ever worked in one place was here in Beartooth. His P.I. said she lived upstairs in an apartment over the café. Like the other buildings in town, it had been constructed of stone, stood two stories and appeared to be one of the original businesses in town.
The fact that Callie had moved so many times in the past seemed to indicate that she was running from something. He’d thought he had a pretty good idea from what when he’d left Seattle.
Now he wasn’t so sure. But he’d gotten this far. He wasn’t ready to give up yet. He could feel the clock ticking, though. He was already a couple of days into his two weeks. He needed something concrete—and quickly.
* * *
IT TOOK LAURA FULLER all night before she found the homicide case. While she’d kept copies of all of hers, she hadn’t filed them in any order once she’d moved on to others. So she’d had dozens of boxes to go through. Now spread out on the floor, the papers made her apartment look as if a bomb had gone off. Good thing she didn’t have friends who stopped by unannounced.
Her head hurt, her fear growing with each file she set aside as she worked her way through a history of the career she had loved.
When she found it, her fingers froze an instant before they began to tremble. She moved from the floor to the table. Sitting down, she took a breath and then opened the file folder.
On the surface, it was like any other case.
This one had been before she was made a homicide detective. She’d been assigned to crowd control and hadn’t known any more details than those looky-loos who’d stood gawking behind the crime-scene tape.
Later she got to go door-to-door, asking if anyone had seen or heard anything suspicious. It was always the same. Little old ladies would remember some strange man they’d noticed, but gave vague details or such good details that finding him had only taken her to the local grocery, where he turned out to be the young man who delivered her groceries every week.
Dead ends, all of them.
No wonder she hadn’t remembered the case. While her notes had been in the file with her name on them, it hadn’t been her case. She could see why Rourke had wanted to solve it for her, though. She had worked tirelessly on her own time, trying to track down a witness to the murder.
Amusing, she thought as she read her notes. She hadn’t known anything about the murder victim except that he was a single male, drove the local bus and lived in an old run-down apartment house. No wonder the case had gone cold. She’d put more time into it than anyone else and had gotten nothing. No witnesses. Or at least no one who would talk.
When she’d made Homicide, she’d put it all behind her and wouldn’t have remembered the case at all if not for Rourke. The other two murders that he’d found weren’t in her jurisdiction.
Dumping the photocopied contents of the file onto her table, she sorted through her notes, the reports and the two short newspaper clippings she’d put into the file about the case. She couldn’t help but smile to herself at how much she’d been into all this. She’d wanted desperately to learn, to be the best, to go the furthest.
Ironic that this case would be the one Rourke would stumble across and decide he had to solve. As she reached the bottom of the paperwork, she saw the corner of a photograph and pulled it out.
A shockwave rattled through her. She’d remembered taking photos of the crowd gathered behind the crime-scene tape, but she’d thought she had put them all in the original file at the department. And yet here were more photos. At first they appeared to be identical to the ones Rourke had shown her.
But the closer she looked, she saw that these weren’t duplicates. In fact, there were four photographs instead of three, and several were shot from different angles than the ones Rourke had shown her.
She felt sick. Why had she kept these and not put them in the police file? What had she been thinking?
Shaken, Laura stared at the shots she’d taken. There had to be something about them that had made her do this. But she could find nothing in them that would warrant her basically stealing them from the department.
She quickly looked for the young woman she’d spotted in the photos Rourke had shown her. With a start, she saw her. The woman was looking right at the camera in all four of these shots. Right at Laura.
A chill ran the length of her spine. She hugged herself as she stared at one of the photos and the odd expression on the woman’s face, suddenly filled with a horrible premonition. The woman almost looked as if she—
Her cell phone rang, making her jump.
Let it be Rourke.
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_bf5bf53e-ac99-5cd6-94a4-84b62e772339)
IT WASN’T ROURKE CALLING. The woman’s voice was old and weak, almost a whisper. “Laura?”
Laura glanced at the clock. It was after midnight. She swallowed back the lump that rose in her throat. “Mother?”
“No, honey, it’s her neighbor Ruthie. You don’t know me. Your mother gave me your number and asked me to call you. I’m sorry it’s so late.” When Laura said nothing, she continued, “She’s real sick, honey. She...she says she’s dying.”
Laura was surprised. Not that her mother might be dying, since she’d often complained of being unwell. No, Laura just hadn’t expected anyone to notify her. Most of the time, she felt as if her mother had already died. Hadn’t she once told Rourke that her mother was deceased?
“Thank you for letting me know,” she said, wishing her mother hadn’t given some stranger her number. Why couldn’t she have done them both a favor and just died quietly in her sleep?
Laura recoiled at her uncharitable thoughts. A stranger would think she was a horrible person. A stranger, though, wouldn’t know her mother.
“She wants to see you,” the neighbor said. “Your mother says there’s something she has to tell you. Something you need to know and that it is very important.”
For a moment, she tried to imagine anything her mother could tell her that would be of any interest to her. To apologize for what she’d done and hadn’t done as a mother? Too late for that.
But even as Laura thought it, she knew there were things that her mother could tell her, things she didn’t want to hear.
“She said it has something to do with when you were twelve.”
Laura felt her blood run cold. The last thing she wanted was to relive her childhood. It had been bad enough the first time. She definitely had no desire to talk about the year she’d turned twelve.
“I hope that makes sense to you,” Ruthie said. “She didn’t elaborate. The truth is, I hardly know your mother. I was surprised when she called to ask for my help. She’s always stayed to herself, making it clear she didn’t want to...socialize with any of her neighbors.” Silence. “She really is very upset about this, afraid she was going to die before she speaks with you.”
Her mother had secrets she needed to get off her chest before she died? Laura thought of blanks in her memory, the black holes of time she couldn’t recall. But when she thought of her childhood, she couldn’t have been more grateful for those lost memories. Why open up old wounds?
Even as she thought it, though, she knew there were questions, things she was unclear about, vague shadows of memories that often woke her in the night and made her anxious and afraid. Did she really want to know, though? Weren’t the memories she did have horrible enough?
“Can I tell her that you’re on your way here?” the neighbor asked, almost pleading.
Laura closed her eyes. She could hear the shock and disapproval in the woman’s voice. Ruthie couldn’t imagine a daughter not wanting to see her mother before she died. But then again, Ruthie, in her wildest nightmares, couldn’t imagine a mother like Laura’s.
What was it that her psychiatrist kept telling her? “You aren’t going to get well until you face your past. You’re a strong woman. Put whatever darkness there is behind you so you can move on with your life. Isn’t that what you want?”
Her mother had the key to a past that had been locked away for so long. Just the thought of possibly being able to put those awful years behind her and move on...
“Tell her I’m on my way.” And not to die until I get there, she added silently, because she had a stop she had to make first.
* * *
P.I. EDWIN SHARP hated to fly—especially in a small plane in the middle of a thunderstorm. He stared at the dark clouds around the aircraft, wishing he’d driven. If Rourke Kincaid hadn’t insisted on the urgency of this trip—and paid him triple his usual amount—he would be on solid ground right now.
The small plane found an air pocket and dropped into it, sending his stomach up into his throat. He’d been fighting airsickness since they’d crossed the Rockies. Now the prairie stretched below them in a patchwork of autumn colors. Edwin couldn’t appreciate any of the breath-stealing views.
“You look a little green around the gills,” Pete, his young pilot, said and laughed.
He wouldn’t be laughing if Edwin lost his lunch. He’d chosen this pilot because he was Montana born and bred. “You know the area, then?” he’d inquired when he’d landed at the Missoula, Montana, airport.
“You bet.”
“So you can fly me to Flat Rock?”
Pete had grinned. “I can fly you anywhere you want to go.”
Ahead the clouds parted. Edwin didn’t see a town, but the plane began to descend. “I don’t see the airport.”
The pilot let out a chuckle. “Look closer.”
Closer was what appeared to be a harvested wheat field. “You aren’t going to land there.” But even as he said it, he saw the ragged wind sock and felt the plane hit another air pocket. The ground was coming up fast.
He braced himself as the plane skimmed over the top of the stubble field. The wheels hit the ground hard and the plane bounced up, then settled down on the so-called airstrip. For the moment, Edwin was just glad to be on the ground again.
“What time do you want to fly back?” Pete asked as he taxied the plane to the edge of some old buildings.
“I won’t be flying back. I’ll be renting a car and driving.”
The pilot got a good laugh out of that. “You won’t be renting a car—not in this town.”
“What town? I don’t see anything but a few abandoned buildings.”
“That’s Flat Rock, Montana. What there is of it. Shouldn’t take you long to find out what you need to. We’ll let the storm pass. Why don’t we meet at the café when you’re finished.”
“There’s a café?” He couldn’t help sounding doubtful. The town—if it could really be called that—consisted of a couple of grain elevators and a row of old buildings on each side of a strip of pavement. The buildings he could see appeared to be boarded up.
“If you don’t show up, I’ll just assume you’re planning to hitchhike back to Missoula.”
Edwin waited while Pete secured the plane, and then the two of them walked toward Flat Rock. Even at a glance he could see that there were more empty buildings than occupied ones. He looked around for a large flat rock, wondering how the town had gotten its name.
“What’s that over there?” he asked of a huge, vacant-looking three-story building in the distance. The stone structure had gaping holes where windows used to be and a forlorn look. Probably the tall dead weeds that had grown around it, he thought.
“It used to be a girls’ home.”
“Like an orphanage,” Edwin said.
“More like a home for kids nobody wanted, troubled kids. Folks claim it is haunted now.”
Edwin scoffed at that, but quit when he saw Pete’s expression. “You believe in ghosts?”
“Let’s just say you couldn’t get me in that building after dark.”
He found that amusing, given that Pete seemed to be a daredevil pilot who wasn’t afraid of a thunderstorm or flying within feet of high mountain peaks. But give him an old empty building...
“I’ll see you at the café. Don’t leave without me.” Edwin set out down what he figured was the main drag. As he passed what appeared to be a vacant school building, he saw that someone had spray-painted the words Consolidation of Schools Sucks on the front. He wondered where the children were bused to now. Apparently, another school that wasn’t close since he hadn’t seen hide nor hair of another town from the plane.
He passed more abandoned buildings and cursed his luck. Other than a couple of pickups parked in front of the Longhorn Café, the only other sign of life was a small grocery/gas station at the end of the street.
A woman in her mid-forties stood behind the counter as he pushed open the door. She eyed him over the glasses perched on her nose. “Help you?” She made it sound doubtful.
“I’m trying to get some information on a woman by the name of Caligrace Westfield,” he told the woman.
“Westfield?” she said, one finely drawn-in eyebrow shooting up.
“Do you know the Westfields?” he asked hopefully.
She gave him an impatient look. “The only Westfield around here is the manor.”
“The manor?” He couldn’t believe that he’d hit pay dirt.
“You didn’t see it on the way into town?” she asked incredulously. “Hardly anyone misses that big old eyesore.”
He blinked. “Are you talking about that abandoned girls’ home?”
“Girls’ home?” she scoffed. “Some locals called it that, giving it a fancy name to cover up what a terrible place it was.”
It couldn’t be a coincidence that Caligrace Westfield shared the same name as the girls’ home. “How long has it been closed?” he asked.
“Twenty-five years now. I remember because I was fifteen when it shut down.” She shuddered. “I’ll never forget the night they came to take those girls away.”
“They?”
“The state. Loaded all those girls into a few vans and off they went. Just like that, they were gone and the place was closed.”
“So it was state run?”
She shook her head. “It was privately owned by some big corporation from Michigan or some place. The state finally stepped in.”
“So you don’t know who would have the names of the girls who were there?”
“Names?” She scoffed at that. “Maybe first names. Most of them were dumped there in the middle of the night. Babies left on the doorstep. Older girls brought there in handcuffs from other towns. The sounds that came from that place at night...” She shuddered again. “Then one day the state shows up and takes the whole lot of them, never to be seen again.”
Edwin told himself that the woman was probably exaggerating, and yet he felt a chill move up his spine as he remembered what Pete had said about it being haunted. “Where did they take them?”
“No one ever knew what became of them,” she said, then looked around the empty room as if she thought someone might be listening, before leaning toward him conspiratorially. “I think they got rid of them. Some of those girls were the worst there was.” She shook her head. “There’s a whole lot of country around here where you could dispose of bodies that would never be found. And with at least one of them being a murderer...”
“I beg your pardon?”
She looked surprised that he didn’t know what she was talking about. “That’s why they finally shut the place down. The murder of the young man who worked there.” She grimaced. “I heard it was brutal. Used a knife from the kitchen and cut him up bad.”
* * *
WITHIN MINUTES OF the construction crews arriving, the Branding Iron Café was a madhouse. Callie tried to keep up with the tables, all the time aware of the cowboy. She was glad to see that he’d gotten his order and seemed to be more interested in eating than in studying her. And yet, she suspected he was just as aware of her as she was of him.
“What’s going on?” one of the regulars asked her, surprising her for a moment. She’d thought he’d seen her staring at the stranger at the front table.
“You hear yet what’s going on across the street?” The rancher was seated at a large table by the window where the bunch gathered each morning to discuss cattle prices, the weather and complain about the government over coffee.
“One came in to refill his Thermos with coffee and said they’re rebuilding the store,” Callie told him. She felt disoriented by the clatter of dishes, the roar of voices, the crush of bodies packed into the space. She was doing her best to tune out the flashes of information that kept coming from the construction workers who wandered in and out.
“So it’s not Nettie Benton’s doin’?” another rancher asked.
The Beartooth General Store, which had stood across from the café for more than a hundred years, had burned down last spring. There’d been all kinds of speculation about what owner Nettie Benton would do now.
“Doesn’t take five truckloads of men to rebuild one general store,” another commented as he looked toward the street where more men were unloading materials next to the old hotel.
Callie shrugged. “That’s all I’ve heard.” She moved on, refilling cups, leaving bills and clearing dishes as she went. She’d been as surprised as anyone when she’d overheard one of the construction crew talking about rebuilding the store.
For the year Callie had worked as a waitress at the café, Beartooth, Montana, had looked and acted like a near ghost town. It was one of the reasons she’d taken the job. She had loved that it was twenty miles from the nearest “real” town. She’d loved the isolation, the quiet and the remoteness of the small old mining town.
That the waitress job came with an apartment over the café made it perfect. Callie loved the feeling of being far from everything, as if living at the end of the earth. She’d settled in quickly, liking that people here didn’t ask a lot of questions, and had swiftly fallen into the rhythm of this easygoing life.
Her days all blended together in a familiar pattern. Each morning like clockwork, a group of ranchers would come in and take the large table by the window, order the same thing and talk about the same topics. At lunchtime, cowboys often stopped in from the many ranches around the area.
By afternoon, the quilters would come for pie and coffee and a visit. Some nights they would all gather at the café and change out the quilts on the walls. Callie often came down to the café from her apartment to listen to their chatter. She and Kate agreed they couldn’t sew a stitch, but they loved the patterns and colors and the enthusiasm of the quilters.
The rest of the evenings the café crowd could be large, depending on whatever “special” owner Kate French was serving that day. This was a community of women who cooked. They went all out for potlucks and made huge meals for the help at brandings, cattle drives and harvesting. So eating at the café a few nights a week seemed to be a treat for them.
It was comfortable, living over the café and mixing with the locals of this small ranching and farming community. Callie had found herself relaxing. She felt as if she’d escaped the trouble in Seattle. She’d even thought she might end up staying here.
Then this morning all that changed in more ways than one, she thought, as the cowboy finally got up. She just hoped he kept going and didn’t come back. But as he paid his bill and turned to leave, he tipped his Stetson in her direction. She felt ice cold. Why hadn’t she picked up even the slightest psychic peek as to who he was and what he wanted?
All her instincts told her that she had reason to be scared. It was as if an ill wind had blown into Beartooth, bringing not only change, but also a handsome cowboy with a look in his dark eyes that foretold trouble.
* * *
ROURKE WAS LEAVING the café when he realized with a start that he knew the big older man coming in. He ducked his head to hide his face beneath the brim of his Stetson, shocked to recognize Sheriff Frank Curry. He’d met the sheriff when he’d first started with the U.S. Marshals. It had been only in passing on a drug-seizure case, but Rourke remembered Frank. Who wouldn’t? Sheriff Frank Curry was a large handsome man, about sixty, who looked like an old-timey sheriff, with a thick horseshoe-style mustache, a six-gun on his hip and a Stetson on his thick head of graying blond hair.
Pushing on out the door into the cool fall weather, Rourke hoped Frank hadn’t recognized him. How would he explain what he was doing in Beartooth if the sheriff did? How also would he explain the fact that he didn’t want anyone knowing he was with the U.S. Marshals’ office?
He was almost to his SUV parked to the side of the café, telling himself that there was a good chance Frank Curry wouldn’t remember him, when Frank’s big voice boomed behind him. “Rourke, right?”
Rourke had no choice. He turned and smiled at the sheriff.
“Rourke... No, don’t tell me,” Frank Curry said as he approached, those keen blue eyes intent on him. “Just give me a moment.” He ran two fingers down his mustache and then smiled. “Kincaid. U.S. Marshals’ office.” He frowned as he glanced at Rourke’s SUV, which lacked the logo that would identify him as a U.S. marshal. “What brings you to our little town of Beartooth, Montana?”
CHAPTER SIX (#ulink_88ddb7f3-a8b5-55c2-bc21-a6702ae01f19)
ROURKE STOOD OUTSIDE the Branding Iron with Sheriff Frank Curry, trying to decide how much he wanted to tell the man. If he hoped to keep his identity a secret, then he couldn’t see any way around this other than to confide in Frank. “Can we talk about this somewhere...private?”
The sheriff nodded slowly. “There’s my office in Big Timber.”
“I was hoping for somewhere even more private than that.”
Frank lifted a brow. “I ranch down the road a spell. If you’d like to follow me...”
“I’ll do that,” Rourke said. “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t call my office in the meantime.”
The older man looked a little concerned, but not overly. “I look forward to our chat.”
On the drive to the sheriff’s ranch, Rourke’s cell phone rang. He checked it. Laura calling. He let it go to voice mail, feeling a little guilty. Had she already come up with a profile on his serial killer and possible co-killer? It was hard for him to think of the young waitress he’d met this morning as a co-killer, but he knew she could surprise him.
Right now he was more concerned about whether or not he should have brought Laura in on all this. His instincts told him she wasn’t well enough. The wounded Laura seemed...fragile. He was afraid working on this case might... What? Push her over some edge he hadn’t been aware even existed before seeing her yesterday? He hated the thought that she was that close to an edge that it should even be a concern.
But there was no doubt that she was different. Maybe working on this case would help her, he tried to tell himself. He knew the police department had required her to see a psychiatrist after the shooting. Standard protocol, he was pretty sure. She’d never mentioned it. Was she still seeing someone?
With a sigh, he knew he had bigger worries right now than Laura. He debated for a moment what to tell the sheriff, but his real concern was the P.I. he’d hired. Edwin should be in Flat Rock by now, and yet he hadn’t called. That made Rourke nervous. He was counting on Edwin to come up with more information on Caligrace, something that would lead him to the person who’d committed the actual murders.
He’d done a little homework on women serial killers. Few worked alone. Most set up the victim while their so-called “co-killer” did the dirty work. It was the killer in the shadows he told himself he was looking for, although Callie, if he was right, was a part of it. He just didn’t know what part yet.
True, the crime-scene photos hadn’t done her justice, but still there was something about her in person... He’d been more than a little surprised when he’d gotten a good look at her. How was that possible, given how many times he’d studied the photos of her? Hell, he’d dreamed about that face for weeks.
He hadn’t expected the freckles. Or those eyes so full of intelligence. The woman was even more of a mystery now that he’d met her face-to-face. He couldn’t help being fascinated by her. So few criminals were interesting. Their motives were often clichéd. Jealousy, greed, revenge. Serial killers had their own crazy reasons for killing.
Rourke was convinced that this woman was hiding something and that the something was a man. He couldn’t wait to see the profile Laura was compiling for him. What kind of man would a woman like this find herself drawn to?
He realized the sheriff might be able to shed some light on Caligrace Westfield. Not that he would have gone to the sheriff for help if Frank Curry hadn’t recognized him. Rourke had really hoped to make this a quick trip with as few people as possible knowing what he was doing in town.
As he drove out to the sheriff’s ranch, he thought again of Callie’s reaction to meeting him. From the moment she’d looked at him, she’d been...wary, as if she’d sensed he’d come looking for her. It was almost as if she’d tagged him as being a cop. Was it possible they’d crossed paths in Seattle? Perhaps at some other crime scene?
What if the three murders were just the tip of the iceberg? And maybe even more troubling, what if this woman knew more about him than he did her?
* * *
AS EDWIN LEFT and walked down the deserted main drag of Flat Rock, he tried to make sense of what the woman at the gas-station-slash-convenience-store had told him. Westfield Manor had closed twenty-five years ago. Caligrace Westfield was thirty—at least according to her fake birth certificate. Even if she’d lied about her age, she couldn’t have been one of the bad girls from the place because she would have been only a child.
But her last name and the address she’d given on her driver’s license were proof of a tie-in to the place, weren’t they?
“You’re sure there aren’t any Westfields around? Maybe whoever started the home?” he’d asked before leaving the woman at the store.
“There were no Westfields. The home was located in the west field of Pauper’s Acre. That’s how it got its name.”
“So the manor part was supposed to be a joke?”
“A sick joke. It was always just called Westfield when I was growing up. Then someone started calling it Westfield Manor and it caught on, the way bad jokes do.”
“You must have met some of the girls in school.”
She’d looked appalled at even the idea. “They weren’t allowed to attend our school, and we weren’t allowed to go near the home. I’d see them occasionally playing outside or looking out one of the windows.” She’d hugged herself as she’d shivered. “They were scary. I wasn’t about to go near any of them.”
“What about the people who worked there? Surely some of them are still around.”
She’d shaken her head. “No one around here was insane enough to work there.”
“Any idea who ran the place?”
“No, but I can tell you she was gone just minutes before the raid on the place. I heard she set a fire to burn any evidence of how badly she’d operated things. If she hadn’t escaped when she did, I’m sure she would have gone to jail.”
Edwin had been so hopeful, but now he’d hit a dead end—and after that horrendous plane ride—but he couldn’t bear the thought of flying back to Missoula without something for his client.
“Is there a newspaper in town? There must have been a story about—”
“No paper, no story. The town kept it hushed up and so did the state authorities. We were told not to talk about it. Everyone just wishes that old place would fall down, but the town can’t afford to tear it down. Part of it burned the night they took the girls away, but all the fire managed to do was gut some of the lower floor. It was like even fire couldn’t destroy it.” She’d glanced toward the west field and the dark skeleton etched against the skyline and shuddered.
* * *
“COME ON IN and have a seat.” The sheriff studied him as Rourke Kincaid stepped into his modest farmhouse. “I’ll get us a cup of coffee.” Rourke opened his mouth, no doubt to say he didn’t need any more coffee, but Frank didn’t give him a chance to speak as he hurried out to the kitchen.
He liked to give a man time to think. The U.S. marshal wanting to meet here instead of the sheriff’s department told Frank a lot. He was curious, but he’d learned to take things slow, especially when dealing with people who had secrets. Rourke Kincaid, Frank was betting, had a secret that had brought him to Beartooth. The same one that had the man not wanting Frank to call the U.S. Marshals’ office.
When Frank came back into the living room, he found Rourke standing at the front window, looking out at the crows lined up on the telephone wire.
“Are you interested in crows?” he asked as he put down a mug of coffee on the small table between the chairs and handed the other to Rourke. “They’re part of my family. I lost them for a while....” He couldn’t put into words how desolate that had left him. “I’m so glad to have them back. Crows are fascinating birds. I’ve been studying them for years.”
Rourke looked over at him as if a little surprised.
One of the crows closest to the house seemed to see Frank and let out a loud caw. Frank smiled and touched the window. “That’s Uncle. I think he’s the boss of the family. He has the most to say, anyway.” He turned back to his chair, sitting down and picking up his mug, which disappeared in his big hands.
His guest wandered away from the window after a moment and took the chair he’d been offered. He watched Rourke stare down into his coffee before he took a tentative sip, as if he had a lot on his mind. Frank suspected he did. Local law enforcement often got a little nervous when the feds showed up unannounced. Rourke Kincaid being in Beartooth gave him cause for concern.
Good to his word, though, he hadn’t checked with the U.S. Marshals’ office. He mentioned this now and waited to hear the younger man’s story, hoping it would be somewhere near the truth.
“I’m not officially with the U.S. Marshals’ office right now,” Rourke said. “I have a couple of weeks off.”
Frank nodded. “But you aren’t here on vacation.”
Rourke smiled. “No. I’ll be honest with you, Frank. I’m looking for someone but on my own time. Because of that, though, I’d just as soon no one around here knows my connection to the U.S. Marshals’ office.”
Or the U.S. Marshals’ office know what he was up to. “Maybe if you told me who you’re looking for...”
Rourke took another sip of the coffee and put the mug down on the small table between them. He glanced toward the front window and the crows all still on the line, before he turned back to him.
“I’m investigating a cold case in which one individual’s name came up several times.”
Frank wondered why he was pussyfooting around telling him, but kept quiet.
“I believe I’m looking for someone close to her.”
“Her?” Frank said, lifting a brow.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
“Callie? The waitress at the Branding Iron. I’m familiar with her.” He didn’t mention that last spring his fiancé, Nettie Benton, had told him there might be more to Callie than anyone knew. Now he realized he was not as familiar with Callie Westfield as he should have been if a U.S. marshal was interested in her. He could feel Rourke’s gaze on him.
“Is there something I should know about her?”
Frank cleared his throat. Rourke was certainly not being forthcoming about what had brought him to Beartooth. He hadn’t even said what kind of crime was involved.
“Let me ask you this,” Frank finally said. “What are we talking here?”
“Murder. She is a lead in three separate cases at least.”
That got his attention. “Where were the crimes committed?”
“Seattle area. If you know something about Caligrace Westfield...”
Frank sighed. “I don’t know anything actually. However, last spring a friend of mine hired a private investigator to run a check on Callie.” He saw he’d piqued the marshal’s interest. “My friend was just curious.” That hadn’t been quite the case, but it was close enough. “My friend hadn’t expected anything to come up on the girl.”
“But something did.”
Frank nodded. “The problem is my friend never found out what. The private investigator was killed before he could give his report.” He shook his head when he saw Rourke’s surprise. “The investigator was killed in a completely separate matter. But he told my friend that he found something that would surprise her.” And Nettie Benton, formerly the worst gossip in the county, wasn’t easily surprised.
Rourke seemed to take that information in for a moment. “How long has Callie worked at the café in Beartooth?”
Frank rubbed his jaw as he thought. “About a year or so. As I understand it, she just showed up one day, saw the sign in the window at the café, asked for the job and got it. You know she lives upstairs in the apartment over the place?”
Rourke nodded. “Was there a man with her? A boyfriend? Husband?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. Kate LaFond...sorry, Kate French owns the café. She might be able to tell you. But I’ve never seen Callie with anyone.”
“So she doesn’t date at all?”
“Not that I know of.” He frowned as he remembered overhearing a discussion at the café one morning.
“Did someone come to mind?” Rourke asked.
Frank hesitated before he said, “Carson Grant has apparently asked her out on more than one occasion. He works as a wrangler on his sister and brother-in-law’s ranch. He’s been back a couple of years now. Probably not the man you’re looking for, though.”
* * *
THE LONGHORN CAFÉ was just as small-town local as Edwin had suspected it would be. The narrow building opened into a room with three tables and six stools at a counter. The place smelled of floor cleaner and old grease. The decor consisted of a few photos of cows, and the floor was noticeably out of level.
Edwin felt his stomach turn as he stepped in. Given that it was the middle of the afternoon, the café was nearly empty, but then again, so was the town. He wondered how the café could stay in business—it and that old motel he spotted at the far end of town. But he was reminded of all the cultivated fields he’d seen flying in. Must be ranches around the area for miles. Not to mention, the town was on what Pete had called the Hi-Line—the most northern two-lane highway across the top of the state.
An elderly man sat at one end of the counter, Pete at the other. The older man was slumped over a cup of coffee, head down. Edwin headed for the pilot. Pete was busy putting away a stack of pancakes and a side of bacon. Just the thought of food made Edwin sick again, but he sat down next to him and ordered a glass of milk.
“Milk?” Pete asked with a laugh. “Did you get what you needed?”
“Not really.” He’d gotten more than he’d expected, and yet he still couldn’t prove that Caligrace Westfield had lived in Westfield Manor.
“So who’s this woman you’re looking for?” the pilot asked between bites.
“Caligrace Westfield.”
He frowned. “Never heard of her.”
Not a surprise. Pete was in his early twenties, and while he knew the area, he was from a town farther east along the Hi-Line.
“Whadda you say?” At the other end of the counter, the elderly man had lifted his head from his coffee and was now looking in their direction.
Edwin gave the man his full attention. “Have you heard of a woman named Caligrace Westfield?”
“Caligrace,” the man said and closed his eyes. “Pretty as a Montana morning.”
Edwin figured the old man might be senile, but he said, “Dark hair and eyes?”
“Black as coal sometimes.” Opening his own eyes, the old man said, “But her name wasn’t Westfield.”
Edwin got up and moved down the counter. The man could be full of bull, just wanting attention. Edwin ran into those sorts all the time during an investigation. They were the ones who wanted to contribute—even if they had nothing to offer. They were often happy to make it up.
As he neared the man, he was surprised that on closer inspection, though not shaved and gray of both hair and beard, the man wasn’t as old as he’d first thought.
“Where do you know her from?” Edwin asked.
“That home outside of town.”
“Westfield Manor?”
“Weren’t no manor,” the man said with obvious disgust.
Knowing it couldn’t be possible, he still reached into his pocket and pulled out the photograph Rourke had supplied him with. “The woman I’m looking for, though, isn’t very old. If the home closed twenty-five years ago, Caligrace wouldn’t have been more than—” He was going to say “five.”
“Sixteen,” the man interrupted.
Sixteen? Edwin did the math. No way was the woman in the photo forty-one. He tried to hide his disappointment.
“That her photo?” the man asked and took the enhanced snapshot with his thick fingers.
“It’s not a great photo. But you think you know the woman?” Edwin asked even though he already knew the answer. This man couldn’t have known her. The dates were all off.
“That’s not my Caligrace.”
“No.” Edwin started to take the photo back when he realized the man was crying. He glanced toward the waitress, wondering if he’d been right the first time to suspect this man was unbalanced. But the waitress was flirting with Pete and not paying any attention to this end of the counter.
“She looks just like her mama, though,” the man said, wiping his eyes before he handed back the photo. “It’s good to see that she made it all right.”
Edwin frowned at him. “Her mama?”
“That’s the Caligrace I knew. But she’s buried out at Pauper’s Acre,” he said with a nod of his head in the direction of Westfield Manor.
“You’re telling me that this woman’s mother was one of the girls who lived at Westfield Manor?”
“She’s the spittin’ image of her mother, so I’d say, yeah, I am. The home took the bad girls, but they also took unwed mothers when no one wanted them. Caligrace was pregnant. Had a baby girl.”
Edwin frowned, trying to make sense of this. “So Caligrace and her mother shared the same first name, and this woman in the photo is the baby girl she had after she came to live at the home?”
The man nodded.
“How is it that you know this?” Edwin asked, still not sure he could trust this man—or his information.
The man blew his nose into his paper napkin, took a drink of his coffee, then said, “I saw her the night the bus dumped her off. She was crying. I could see that she was pregnant. She had nothing but the clothes on her back. It was winter. I gave her an old coat I had in the back of my rig. I would have given her more, but...”
“But?” Edwin prodded.
The man looked away. “I was thirty-one, married with a pregnant wife at home and two little kids of my own.” He shrugged, his hand trembling as he lifted his coffee cup again. “I couldn’t help her. That’s just the way it was.”
So the man was fifty-six. He looked a whole lot older. Chalk it up to a hard life, apparently. A married man with a pregnant wife at home and two kids when he met the pregnant sixteen-year-old Caligrace.
“How was it that you were there that night? Did you work there?” Edwin asked hopefully as he tucked the photo back into his jacket pocket.
“I was a sheriff’s deputy returning one of the runaways that night.”
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_67d16986-0dd1-5e77-b68f-a8dc2508e47a)
“WHAT ABOUT THE CHILD Caligrace gave birth to?” Edwin asked after he and former sheriff’s deputy Burt Denton introduced themselves. “What happened to her?”
Burt shrugged. “Never heard.”
By Edwin’s calculations, the Caligrace in the photo would have been about five at the time of the raid. So maybe her birth certificate was right and she was thirty. Apparently, she’d been put on the state bus that had taken the girls away. Unless someone in town had taken her.
“Any chance some couple felt sorry for the little girl and took her as their own?” he asked.
“I would have taken her in a minute, but like I said, I had enough mouths at home to feed, not that my wife would have stood for it.” He shook his head. “No one around here took her in, but someone must have somewhere else since, according to you, she’s still alive.” The man’s eyes narrowed. “You didn’t say why you were looking for her.”
“She might be a witness in a homicide,” he said carefully.
The former deputy merely nodded as if he recognized bull when he heard it. “I hope she has a better life than her mother did,” he said, getting to his feet. He glanced at Edwin. “Is that too much to hope for?”
“No,” Edwin said. “By the way, you wouldn’t have any idea where in that building the two lived, do you?”
The former deputy, in a telling gesture, looked away. “Facing the building, farthest room to the right on the third floor.”
“Did the woman you knew ever tell you her last name?”
Burt shook his head. “She said her family had disowned her. She had no name, and neither did her kid. It broke my heart. I guess that’s why she gave her little girl her own name. It’s all she had to give the kid.” He looked like a broken man as he started to leave. “I really don’t want to talk about this anymore. What’s done is done. Some things are best left in the past.”
Edwin watched the former deputy leave, then joined Pete at the other end of the counter.
“Now what?” Pete asked as Edwin took a stool next to him.
“I have one more thing I have to do,” he said. “You should come along.”
Pete gave him a wary look. “If it’s what I think it is, not a chance in hell.”
* * *
AFTER HIS TALK with Rourke, Frank Curry climbed into his pickup and headed for the state mental hospital. It had been months since he’d seen his daughter. Not that he hadn’t tried to visit. He’d gone up there anyway because he hadn’t known what else he could do.
Unfortunately, after Tiffany had injured a nurse and several guards during a short-lived escape, she’d been locked up in the isolation ward. At first the doctor hadn’t wanted her to have any visitors—maybe especially the father she hated.
But through the use of some heavy-duty drugs, she had been downgraded as a threat and was now able to have visitors, Frank had been told. She just hadn’t wanted to see him the times he’d driven to the hospital to visit.
So he’d been surprised—and with good reason, a little worried—when he’d gotten a call from the hospital saying that Tiffany had asked to see him.
He tried not to be too hopeful. Up until a year and a half ago, he hadn’t known he had a daughter. Tiffany was the secret his ex-wife, Pam, had kept from him to punish him because she’d felt he hadn’t loved her enough during their short marriage. She’d raised the girl to hate the father she’d never laid eyes on. Pam had poisoned Tiffany against him to the extent that when they’d finally met, Tiffany had tried to kill him.
After she’d been sent to the mental hospital for evaluation, Frank had hoped that someone there would be able to help her. Pam had washed her hands of her daughter, making it even more painful for Tiffany.
The last time Frank had seen his daughter, he’d had to tell her that her mother was dead, murdered, and that he was a suspect. Actually, the number one suspect.
But in a turn of events, his name was cleared. Unfortunately, it was too late for Tiffany, who’d compounded her problems by making her escape and almost killing several people in the process.
Now as Frank waited in the sunroom, he wasn’t sure what to pray for. If Tiffany was better, she would be charged with not only her attempted murder of him, but also her attacks on the people at the hospital.
He feared she would be going to prison.
If she wasn’t better...well, then she could end up in an institution for the rest of her life.
He turned at the sound of footfalls behind him. The first time he’d laid eyes on Tiffany, he’d thought she was barely a teen. She had the look of a waif, with long, fine blond hair and pale blue eyes. She’d been seventeen, just out of high school. Old enough to be tried as an adult.
The last time he’d seen his daughter, her long blond hair had been hacked off with a pair of scissors she’d somehow gotten her hands on.
Now her hair was longer. It gave her a softer, sweeter look. For a moment, he could almost tell himself that Tiffany was better.
“I wondered if you would come,” she said, stopping a few yards from him. A male nurse had come with her. He stood a few feet back, there for Frank’s protection. While comforting, it was also another indication that Tiffany probably wasn’t as well as he might hope.
“How could you think I wouldn’t come?” he demanded. “I’ve come every week even though they wouldn’t let me see you at first, and then you refused to see me.” He sighed, hating that he came off so defensive. “Tiffany, do we have to do this?” he said, sounding as tired as he felt. She wore him out, wore him down. He’d never known what to say to her that wouldn’t set her off. No matter what he did, it was wrong. His ex-wife, Pam, in her bitterness, had made sure he would never have a relationship with the girl.
“They wouldn’t let me out to go to my mother’s funeral,” she said, narrowing her eyes at him as if it had been his fault.
“I told you there wasn’t going to be a funeral.” No one would have come for Pam, and he couldn’t bear the town attending in sympathy for him. “Was that why you tried to escape, because you wanted to say goodbye to your mother?”
“Where is she buried?”
He hadn’t known what to do with Pam’s remains. There had been no one but him to handle the arrangements, so he’d had her cremated, figuring her soul was already burning in hell. Her ashes he’d had put in an urn. It sat on a shelf in his barn, since he didn’t want any part of the woman in his house. He’d had no idea what to do with the urn.
“I had her cremated. I thought you might want...” He tried to read his daughter’s expression. She hadn’t cried when he’d told her that her mother was dead. She’d seemed...relieved. He never knew how she would react. Or if her reactions were even real. If he was truthful with himself, he was afraid of her.
“You think that someday I am going to want my mother’s ashes?” She seemed amused by this.
“Wouldn’t you like to sit down?” Frank asked. He’d hoped that one day they could have a normal conversation.
She didn’t move, so he continued to stand, as well.
“Do you need anything?” he asked.
Tiffany cocked her head. “What were you thinking of bringing me? Maybe a teddy bear? Candy?” She shook her head. She was so young. That was what always struck him. She’d turned eighteen on a mental ward. Just the thought of what Pam had done to this girl... He felt his stomach roil. He wondered what he would have done if he’d found his ex-wife before her killer had. He’d often dreamed of wrapping his hands around her throat and choking the life out of her, even though it went against everything he believed in as a lawman.
“Why did you want to see me?” he asked impatiently. He was sick of her games and had begun to question why he still came up here. While the state had run paternity tests and sent him the results, he’d never opened them. Tiffany believed she was his daughter. Did it matter if that was true or not? He felt responsible for the way her life had turned out.
“Didn’t my doctor tell you the news?” she asked. “I’m well enough to stand trial. I’ve hired myself a lawyer. No matter what you think of my mother, she came through at the end. She left me all of her money, money we can only guess at how she came by. But that aside, apparently I am a very rich young woman.” Her eyes narrowed. “I would have been richer, but you had some of the money returned to the woman in Big Timber. Don’t you get tired of always doing what you think is right?”
“Your mother swindled the woman out of her fortune,” Frank said. “I merely made sure the woman got it back.”
Tiffany shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I have plenty of money.”
“I’m happy for you,” Frank said, seeing that the idea of being rich appealed to Tiffany. He’d seen that same glow of greed in her mother’s eyes. He figured Tiffany would use the money to get what she wanted, which apparently was out of here. “So, you’re going to make an effort to get better? I’m glad to hear that.”
“I’m making an amazing recovery,” Tiffany said, smiling. “My doctor said so. He said that my realizing the terrible things I’ve done and feeling remorse is a huge step in my being released. My lawyer thinks that if I throw myself on the mercy of the court...” She smiled, looking sweet and young and so vulnerable—just what a judge and jury would see. She just might walk.
He looked into her pale blue eyes and shuddered inside. He wondered how he played into her future plans. He would have to start locking his doors and sleep again with a gun beside his bed as he had when her mother was alive.
Frank hated to even think what Tiffany would do to the crows he considered part of his family. She’d killed one out of spite, and they hadn’t come back for over a year.
“There is one more thing,” Tiffany said and lowered both her head and her voice as she stepped closer. The male nurse went on alert.
“Mother has been coming to visit me,” Tiffany said, raising her head just enough to meet his gaze. She kept her voice low so the male nurse couldn’t hear her.
Only moments ago, he was thinking that Tiffany might have been faking crazy all these months and that inheriting her mother’s money had made her decide it was time to stop. Now, his blood running ice cold, he saw the psychotic young woman who hadn’t even blinked when she’d pulled the trigger and tried to kill him.
“She sent you a message,” Tiffany said. “‘Tell your father that if he marries Nettie Benton, I will come to your room one night and kill you.’”
Frank took a step back from his daughter and that wild frightening look in her eyes. “Have you talked to your doctor about these visits from your mother?”
Tiffany let out a brittle laugh that quickly died on her lips. Her pale blue eyes darkened. “She will kill me if you marry that woman. You want my death on your conscience, Daddy?”
With that, she turned and left, the male nurse hurrying after her down the hall.
Frank stood watching her go, his heart pounding. What he’d seen in his daughter’s eyes was pure evil. God protect them all if she ever got out of this place.
* * *
“I’M GOING TO look around Westfield Manor, and then I’ll be ready to fly out,” Edwin told the pilot. The last thing he wanted to do was go into that old building, but he needed to verify the deputy’s story if at all possible.
“I’d watch out for rattlesnakes if I were you,” the pilot told him. “Not to mention falling through the rotten flooring or having a beam drop on you. I guess I’m going to have to go with you.” At the detective’s surprised look, he added, “You haven’t paid me yet.”
The afternoon sun fell at a slant across the empty streets as they left the town and walked the quarter mile toward the hulking skeleton of the girls’ home. The land had fallen to weeds; now dried and knee-high, they brushed loudly against their pant legs as they walked. A chill had fallen over the autumn afternoon and seemed to settle in the growing shadows.
Edwin was glad to have the pilot’s company the nearer they got. No sunlight shone behind any of the broken or missing windows. The front door stood open, cold darkness beyond.
“You sure you have to go in there?” the pilot said, stopping some yards away.
Burt Denton had told him that Caligrace’s room was farthest to the right on the third floor. “If you’re too scared...”
“So I’ll wait out here for you.” The young pilot smiled. “My daddy didn’t raise no fool.”
The light was fading fast as Edwin stepped through the doorway. He was instantly struck by the cold and several unpleasant smells as he cautiously moved toward the stairway. He could see where the back of the building had burned. The structure smelled of smoke even after twenty-five years, but only because teenagers had been using the lower floor to party. There were beer cans and bottles strewn around a fire ring in one corner of the room and a stack of old mattresses against another. The blaze had scorched the plastered wall and burned a hole in the floor, but hadn’t spread, as if nothing could destroy this place—just as the convenience-store woman had said.
The stairs felt secure enough. He took them two at a time, anxious to get this over with. The second floor wasn’t quite as littered, but varmints had made nests in the corners. The remains of abandoned metal bed frames and old soiled mattresses with their guts spilled across the floor littered the common area as he took the steps up to the third floor and tried to get his bearings.
The afternoon light had dimmed this far north. Edwin wished he had borrowed a flashlight at the café. In the dusky light, he moved along the scarred wood floor down a long hallway until he found a room that faced town at the corner of the building.
Like the other rooms he’d glimpsed, this one was bare except for the mice nest, part of a bed frame and what was left of several thin soiled mattresses pushed to one corner. He stared at the stark room and wondered why he had bothered. What had he hoped to find here?
“Are you all right?” the pilot called up from the ground below.
He gingerly stepped to the window. “I’ll be right down,” he called back, his voice echoing eerily. As he started to turn away, he brushed the windowsill with his fingers and felt something.
As badly as he wanted to get out of the building as quickly as possible, he turned back to the windowsill. Crudely carved into the weathered wood was one word. CALIGRACE.
* * *
“CAN WE GET out of here now?” Pete asked as the P.I. came out of the old abandoned building. He sounded anxious and a little creeped out.
Edwin felt the same way as he stopped out front to look up at the gaping dark square of glassless window on the third floor. He took a photo with his cell phone for his client, just as he had of the name carved into the wood.
“There is one more place I have to go first.”
“If it’s back inside that building—”
“It isn’t,” he said. “I need to check the cemetery.” They had to move fast. They were losing their light, and Edwin was already dreading the flight. “Are you coming with me?”
Pete glanced around as if trying to decide what would be worse—staying here by himself or going along to the nearby cemetery. “Can you at least tell me what we’re looking for?”
“A grave,” Edwin said as he started toward the small hill. The deceased residents of Westfield Manor had been buried in a small cemetery away from the residents of the town. Old wooden markers leaned into the wind behind the barbed-wire fence. A makeshift gate lay on the ground. Edwin stepped over it and entered. Again Pete hung back, crossing his arms and looking around as if he felt a presence that had him on edge.
Some of the wooden markers had once held names, but the wind and weather had worn them away. He was wasting his time, he thought as he moved through the small cemetery, trying to read even a few letters on the markers. Most of the wood lay rotting on the ground where it had fallen years before.
He almost missed the stone marker because one of the wooden ones had fallen over it. This gravestone was only a slab of concrete, rudimentary in its construction. He figured it was the deputy’s doing. The words on it looked as if they had been drawn into the wet cement with a stick: Finally at peace poor Caligrace. God forgive.
Edwin bent down next to it, ran his fingers over the words, then rose and took a photo with his cell phone. The wind at his back, he looked out across the empty prairie. A few dozen yards away, he saw a small weathered stone angel, the kind often seen on graves. It sat in the middle of the field among the dried weeds.
He shuddered, knowing he would never forget the loneliness and despair he felt at that moment here with these lost souls.
On the walk to the plane, neither man spoke. It wasn’t until they were in the small aircraft ready to take off that Pete said, “The waitress I was talking to? She says her mother knew some woman who knew some woman who took in a few of the girls after the home closed.” He shrugged. “She might be of help.” He handed Edwin a telephone number. “I had the waitress call her mother, who called the woman... You get the idea.”
Edwin had been feeling morose, but now perked up a little.
“The woman lives in Billings. I could fly us there before it gets any darker. We’d have to spend the night. It’s going to cost extra.”
“Not a problem.” Edwin checked his seat belt. “What’s the woman’s name?”
“Leta Arthur.”
He thought about calling Rourke and telling him what he’d found out so far. As Pete taxied the plane down the bumpy wheat field, Edwin decided he’d call after he talked to Leta Arthur. He closed his eyes, held on and prayed as the plane engine revved. He prayed for the girls of Westfield Manor and for the feel of solid ground again as the plane lifted off and turned southeast.
CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_d344000a-7e01-5e8d-b919-e813cbd315b6)
“LAURA?” ROURKE DIDN’T look all that happy to see her as he opened the door of the cabin and found her on his doorstep. Behind him, Laura could see a bag of groceries on the counter inside and his suitcase open on the bed in the small bedroom.
“Nice to see you, too, Rourke,” she said as she pushed past him, angry with herself for coming here. Why hadn’t she just dropped the photos and the preliminary profile in the mail?
“Sorry, it’s just that you were the last person I expected to see at my door,” he said as he shut the door and followed her into the three-room cabin. “How did you find me?”
Laura rolled her eyes and said, “Seriously? I was shot in the leg, not in the head.” She glanced around the cabin at the rustic Western furnishings. They looked authentic. “Interesting digs. It must take you back to growing up in Wyoming. You look as if you never left,” she said, motioning to the stubble at his jaw and the way he was dressed.
He glanced around, before returning his gaze to her. “The cabin suits me since I’m not going to be here long. Laura...”
She could tell that showing up like this had him off balance. It surprised her. In all the time she’d known Rourke, he never seemed to get flustered. It made her all the more tense and anxious about coming here.
“I’d offer you a drink,” he said, “but I just picked up bare necessities so far. I haven’t even unpacked,” he said, motioning to his open suitcase in the bedroom.
“But you’ve met her.” Laura swore he almost blushed. She bit back a curse. “So, what’s she like?” she asked, hating how deep her jealousy cut.
“Not what I expected,” he said, moving to the woodstove.
Laura watched him throw more wood on the fire, his back to her. The Montana night was colder than she’d expected. Seattle weather had spoiled her.
She stared at Rourke’s broad back, despising the rush of emotions that had her annoyed with him. She’d known why he’d come here. To get close to the woman and catch a serial killer. So why was she acting like the jealous girlfriend?
Reaching into her large shoulder bag, she pulled out the manila envelope she’d brought. “You like her.” She shouldn’t have been surprised. Look how far and how much he was risking coming here.
“I find her interesting,” he said, turning to face her. “Just as I do most possible serial killers.” His gaze went to the envelope in her hand. “You did a profile?”
She shook her head. “It’s just preliminary.” Now that she was here, she didn’t want to share the photos. She hated to admit that she’d withheld them from the file. Rourke would be angry. She wished now that she’d called him, that she hadn’t surprised him. That she hadn’t come in with a chip on her shoulder. But it was too late to change any of that.
All she could hope for were a few stolen minutes with him and that neither of them was angry. “I’m not keeping you from anything, am I?”
For a moment, she thought he might say she was. He seemed uncomfortable with her here. He’d been so anxious to talk about the case in Seattle—until her breakdown. She regretted it since there seemed to be a wall between them now. He was treating her as if he had to walk on eggshells around her. She wanted to scream. Or cry. Neither would accomplish what she’d come here for, though.
“I’m not going to blow your cover, if that’s what you’re worried about.” She moved to the table set against one wall. Dropping the manila envelope on it, she removed her coat, hung it over the back of the chair and sat down.
“So, have you found her co-killer?” she asked. Might as well talk about Caligrace Westfield, since she was already in the room and clearly on Rourke’s mind.
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B.J. Daniels
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: The hunt for a killer leads to a battle between justice and desire…For U.S. marshal Rourke Kincaid, there′s the law… and then there′s his law. When the two don′t agree, he always trusts his instincts. A killing spree has gripped the Northwest, showing a strange connection that only he sees, and now the old rules of justice no longer apply. Forced to turn rogue, he goes deep undercover to track his mysterious female suspect to a quiet, unassuming cafe in the wild, isolated mountains of Beartooth, Montana. But encountering Callie Westfield complicates his mission in ways he never expected. As suspicious as she seems, her fragile beauty and sexy charm get to Rourke. Then the gory crimes begin anew.With his heart suddenly at war with his instincts, he has only two options. Either turn Callie over to the law, or put everything-including his badge and his life-on the line to protect her.