Tim turned toward the man and held out his hands, palms upward. “Well?”
“The registration’s in the vehicle.”
“Let’s go get them,” Tim said.
“I’ll come with you,” Tara said.
“No, Tara. I’ll look in the truck and if it’s Cassie—well . . .” He winked. He didn’t believe her. He thought she was mistaken, but she wasn’t.
“I’m glad you’re okay, ma’am.” Although he sounded polite and friendly, there was something about the man that was off.
“I’m fine,” she said. “I think you’re making too much of this.”
Who the hell was he and what was he doing in Hardship?
Tara started following, but Tim gave her a warning look and she stopped. A wave of nausea washed through her, and she was feeling a little shaky. She was glad to have the other woman’s support as they crossed the street back to the sheriff’s office.
Before they reached the door, they heard someone shouting. It was Tim. He was down on the ground. Tires squealed, and then the pickup truck revved up and sprayed stones and dirt onto him as he struggled to his feet, rubbing his jaw. He ran back to where Tara was standing with her mouth open, her pulse racing.
“Fucking asshole!” Tim said as he rubbed his face. “Sorry, but he sucker-punched me and knocked me down. I have to go. You okay?”
“I’m okay,” Tara said.
Tim grabbed his keys, locked the door, and ran to his vehicle. He peeled out with the siren blaring.
Chapter 22
Jared pulled into a parking space at the Center a few minutes after Tara arrived home. She waited for him to climb out of the vehicle.
“What happened to you?” he said. “Your face has got dirt smudges on it.”
She touched her nose. “I nearly got run down by a truck, but I’m okay.”
He frowned. “Run down? Like it was deliberate?”
“The woman who saw it all said it was and I didn’t believe her at first, but . . . The driver said he was trying to get his phone and wasn’t watching what he was doing. Then he sucker-punched Tim Bowen and took off. I don’t know if they’ve caught him or not.”
“Jesus!” Jared crossed the space between them with long strides and gripped her shoulders. “Are you okay? He didn’t hit you, did he?” He looked down at Tara’s knees.
“I’m just scratched up and a little shaken, but, Jared, he tried to kill me. Oh, my God, it scared the heck out of me.”
“The killer—Tara, he must be the killer. He’s here and he tried to kill you.” Jared put his hands on his head. “Shit! Thank God you’re okay.”
“Tim was trying to get his license and registration. I don’t even know if he managed to memorize the tag number, but he took off after him and I haven’t heard if they got him.”
“Let’s go get you cleaned up.” He indicated the back door. “What did he look like?”
“Cassie was in the truck.” She blurted it out before she could stop herself.
“What?” He half-smiled as if she had made a joke.
“I saw her in the rear passenger seat. Her face was pressed against the glass.”
“What makes you think it was Cassie? You haven’t seen her in years.”
She pushed her hair back out of her face. “I would know my sister anywhere. It was her.”
“So why didn’t you go and talk to her?”
“I didn’t get the chance. Tim went with him to get his registration out of the truck and then he took off.”
“Who was the woman who witnessed it?”
“Rita someone. I don’t know her.”
“Rita Wykoski. Short, blonde hair? There’s only one Rita in town.”
“I think so, but what are we gonna do? He has Cassie. I’m sure it was her.”
Jared frowned. “You sure you’re okay?”
Tara nodded. “I just need to clean up.” She unlocked the door.
“Roberto called me and said he had some sort of problem, but he didn’t elaborate. That’s why I’m here. Let me make sure everything’s okay and then I’ll be with you.” He headed for the barn.
Tara stopped. “What kind of problem? If it’s another horse going berserk, I want Doc Grainger here.”
“I’ll be right back.” She watched Jared leave and then made her way to the bathroom, where she cleaned the cuts and scratches and put Band-Aids on them. She headed down the stairs and made her way to the barns. She could hear Jared and Roberto talking out back, and she followed the sound of their voices.
Jared looked angry.
“Check this out,” he said. “Look at this fence here. The wire strands have been pushed apart, and this one was cut. Someone has climbed through the fence here—see the scuff marks from their shoes?”
Tara stared at the ground. “Kaitlyn?”
“No. Not Kaitlyn. Look—boot tracks from an adult. See them?”
“Oh, shit.” Tara pulled out her cell phone. “I should take pictures.
“The fence isn’t a problem. I’ll fix it, but you should get CCTV or something to monitor this area.”
“I was planning to go into that new electronics store next to Henry’s today and see what they have in stock, but then all the other stuff happened, and I just wanted to come home.”
Tara watched him work on the fence. She felt safe with him there, but the thought of someone sneaking around behind the barns set her teeth on edge. She wished she’d had the chance to price a CCTV system. She had seen some online, but she wanted to be sure she was getting good value for her money, since funds were not in abundant supply. She’d planned to ask Jared to take a look if she had found something that would work for the Center.
Tara felt her phone vibrate and she opened a text from Deputy Bowen.
He got away. Are you all right?
She shook her head. “Darn it. Tim Bowen said he got away—they let him get away.”
“I thought you said he had an old, beat-up pickup. How could he outrun the cops?”
“I don’t know. He had a head start.” She tapped a message back to Tim to let him know she was okay. She had a lot of questions, but decided she would call him in a few minutes.
Jared stood up and said, “All done.” He packed up his tools and looked at his watch. “I have to get to the bank before five to make a deposit, but I’ll be over afterward with dinner. Okay? Will you be all right here on your own?”
“I’ll be okay. Thanks.” She couldn’t help the tremor in her voice. He must have heard it. He set the toolbox down, reached for her, and pulled her into a hug. The tenderness brought tears to her eyes, and she held on to him for a long time.
Chapter 23
Jared looked at himself in the rear-view mirror as he eased the truck out of the parking spot outside Danny’s Pizza. His hair was still a little damp from his shower, and he ran his fingers through it to make it lie down. His stomach rumbled. The pizza sitting on the passenger seat sure smelled good. He’d ordered all the toppings she liked, even though he didn’t care for bell peppers.
They could talk more about what happened to her today. He wanted to know every little detail so he could add it to his database.
As he drove, he wondered when the last time he’d gone to her house for dinner was. He often went there with Miss Lacey, but before that? It must have been the Saturday night before her parents were killed. Almost ten years ago. He turned onto the highway and accelerated. What a fuck-up.
Dinner with her parents was always semi-formal. She would set the table and they would sit together and say grace before they ate. Cory had already left home when he and Tara started going together, but Cassie was always there, with her silly stories that made them all laugh. Her autism made it hard for her to connect with strangers, but with the famil
y, she was at ease. Even though he’d thought about it so many times through the years, he still felt angry when he thought of how their lives had ended.
Jack Ericson had been a comic and had kept them in fits of laughter with his dry wit. Wanda was beautiful and gracious, with the same amber-colored eyes as Tara. She had treated him as a mother might.
Why would anyone want them dead? The question haunted him, as it must have haunted Tara. They didn’t seem to have an enemy in the world. He had wondered if it was a home invader who had randomly selected the Ericsons’ place because having the ranch and all the horses made it appear that they were affluent. But the killer had his blood. How in God’s name had that happened? His blood. Nothing was taken from the house, and the detectives said the nature of the multiple stab wounds spoke of someone who was familiar and had a major problem with them. The pictures of the crime scene displayed at the trial had horrified him; blood spatter all over the walls and ceiling. Poor Tara had seen all of it firsthand.
She’d done her best to shield Cassie from it, but her efforts hadn’t changed anything. The kid had taken off and hadn’t been heard from since. Except maybe for today. Surely it hadn’t been Cassie in the truck that almost mowed Tara down. Surely not.
How could Tara have believed him capable of such brutality? He’d tried and tried to reason that she’d been young and vulnerable—only just eighteen at the time—and the cops and attorneys had worked on her to get her to say incriminating things about him. He knew how tough that could be.
How could he have proven he didn’t do it when the evidence against him was so damning?
He’d spent hours obsessing over the people who were interviewed. None of them matched the profile. None of them had a motive. The cops had said he must have had a falling out—maybe the Ericsons didn’t want him to see Tara anymore. What bullshit. Tara had tried to tell them it wasn’t so, but they thought she was protecting him because of their relationship. The DA needed a motive and that was all he could come up with.
The cops didn’t seem to have made any progress in finding the killer—and now Tim Bowen had let the killer get away. There was no doubt in Jared’s mind that the asshole who had tried to run Tara down was the same person who had murdered her parents. He wanted to strangle him with his bare hands for screwing up his life and subjecting Tara to that horrific scene and everything that came after it—the trial, Tara’s harsh words, prison.
He arrived at the ranch and parked around the back as usual, grabbed the stuff off the seat, and knocked on the back door.
“It’s open,” Tara yelled. He dumped the pizza box on the kitchen counter and found her sitting on the swing seat in the screened porch, a beer bottle in front of her. The dogs lay a short distance away from her. RJ got up and wagged his tail, and Jared bent to pet him and Sox.
His breaths quickened at the sight of her. He couldn’t help it. Her hair was still damp from a shower and she had put some makeup on, which accentuated the size of her eyes. A little pink lipstick had been brushed over her lips. She still wore the same perfume. He couldn’t remember the name of it, but it took him back all those years. Jeans hid her gorgeous legs.
He wanted—ached to kiss her—to pull her into his arms and hold her, and . . . but he knew she wouldn’t want that. He held up the six pack. “I brought some beers.” He took one and went to put the others in the fridge.
“Detective Moore called a few minutes ago,” Tara said. “He asked me a few questions about what happened. I told him everything I could remember, including seeing Cassie. He said he wants to meet with me and talk more about it, but he was tied up with another case and he’ll let me know when he can get here.”
“What did he say about Cassie?”
Tara shrugged. “I don’t think he believed me. What are we gonna do about her? I saw her today, I know it was her.”
“Ah, geez, Tara, I don’t know. That would be a problem for the detectives. Is there anything more you can think of about the attacker? What did he look like?”
“Stocky, big beard, camo cap. I couldn’t see much of his face.”
“That sounds like the dude I saw driving Mrs. P’s Mazda. He was driving like an idiot and acted like an asshole. He said she asked him to fix it. I asked her about it and she told me he walked in and said he needed work. She had a problem with the steering so she let him take a look. She didn’t know much about him. Said she paid him with cash and he left.”
“That must be him! He had a tattoo on his throat.” She touched her own throat. “It was partially hidden by his shirt, but I saw it one time and it is a bull’s head with smoke coming out of its nose.”
“Jesus, Tara! It must be the killer! I’m so pissed Tim Bowen didn’t get that dude’s address or contact information.”
“I know. I called Timmy. He said that pickup had to be seriously souped-up the way it outran the cop cars. They lost him eventually when he turned off the highway and traveled the back roads. I told him about the fence and he’s coming over first thing tomorrow.” She took hold of Jared’s sleeve and shook his arm. “Cassie is here in Hardship. Do you think he could have kidnapped her? I could see her mouth was open as if she was yelling or screaming.”
Jared thought about what Detective Moore had said—that someone who was familiar with horses was most likely the person who was causing them to have those unexplained episodes. “Maybe.”
Tara was quiet for a while, and then she said, “Nine years. How did you do it?”
Alarm bells rang in his head. “Do what?”
“Survive. How did you survive in prison?”
How could he answer that? Prison was a living hell. There weren’t words to describe the pain, the mental suffering. “I felt like I was already dead. They were gonna kill me anyhow, and the thought of that was scary. And then your Aunt Lacey—that amazing woman—managed to persuade the Innocence Project to take a look at my case. You have no idea how it felt to have someone believe in me that much.”
“I should have been . . . should have had more faith in you. I was so disturbed and distraught. Everyone said you did it, and the detectives pressured me, and then Cassie left and I freaked. Everything was so fucking messed up.”
“In the end, my only friend in the world was Miss Lacey.”
He shook his head. “It seemed like the whole world had turned against me and whenever there was a light at the end of the tunnel, a shadow fell over it.”
They were silent for a while.
“I don’t understand why you believed I could do it, but I don’t hold it against you. Everything was screwed up, especially after you saw your parents like that.”
Another moment of silence.
“I didn’t just simply walk away from prison,” he continued. “A bunch of fucking stupid legalities had to be followed, but eventually, almost a year ago, they pardoned me and let me go.”
She was swinging gently on the seat, staring at him. He wished he knew what she was thinking. “I’m worried about you being here on your own. There’s a killer out there, Tara-Grace, and he went to a lot of trouble to set me up. And why? I’ve asked myself a million times, but it’s a fucking puzzle. Who would want you and me to suffer like this? And your parents to have such a horrific end to their lives. I had a lot of time to think while I was locked up, and I’ve never been able to come up with a single name.”
“No one hurt Aunt Lacey.”
“I’ve thought about that, and I don’t know why. Maybe they thought you didn’t care enough for it to be worth their while to hurt her.”
“I should have come to see her. I loved her and I hurt her.”
“I loved her. No one in this town wanted to employ me except Miss Lacey. She convinced me to start a maintenance business and she promised me she would be a loyal customer, and here I am.” His voice had gotten choked up again and he
cleared his throat. This was hard. “She was special. The mother I never had.” He hoped she couldn’t hear the tears in his words.
Tara swallowed and shook her head, and he could see she was also struggling to hold it together.
“I’ll go get the pizza.” Jared placed both hands on the kitchen counter and took a few moments to try and get his emotions under control. He picked up the pizza and went back to the patio where he set the box down on the glass table, pulled two slices onto each plate, and handed one to her. “It’s got all the toppings you like.” He looked at the space beside her but decided it would be better to keep his distance. He didn’t want to scare her off.
“This is so good,” she said with her mouth full. She looked a little more relaxed now.
“Do you believe me when I say I saw Cassie in that truck today? That creepy man said it was his wife and he used some other name, but I know what I saw. The trouble is, I only had a couple of seconds before she was gone, and he wouldn’t let me go to the truck to see for myself.”
“I don’t know. Sometimes a mind can play tricks and if you want to see something badly enough, you see it, even if it’s not there.”
“I knew you wouldn’t believe me. Just forget it. I’ll find her, and you’ll see I was right.”
He thought about reminding her that she hadn’t believed he didn’t murder her parents, but he decided to let it go. He turned his attention to eating the pizza. He glanced across at her, wondering if she was being quiet because she was eating—or was she deep in thought?
He stood up. “I should see what I can do about the guns. The trouble is, they probably need cleaning and oiling, and you wouldn’t want me to do that in the house. Maybe I’ll just get a handgun out and clean the others another day.”
“The key’s behind the door. I haven’t looked in Dad’s study yet, but I guess the guns are still in there.” She pointed to the key hooks at the back of the kitchen door.
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