Ominous

by Lisa Jackson

  But she didn’t pick up her phone.

  *

  Blair Kincaid watched the plume of dust that followed Kat’s Jeep down the long drive that led to the ranch. He was a mass of conflicting emotions, which really pissed him off. The credo of his life had been to be a rolling stone, and when he’d accepted his older brother’s invitation to work the ranch with him, Blair had turned a corner he hadn’t been sure he wanted to turn. But he’d dug in, side by side with Hunter, and together they’d brought the ranch back to its glory days … well, maybe not quite that far, but it had been in real disrepair until the Kincaid brothers had gotten to work, and now it was a whole lot better.

  Blair had given up smoking … and drinking to excess … and women with great bodies and no interest in him beyond a one-night stand. Not that he’d been anybody’s idea of a catch for most of his adult life, although the way some of the single gals around Prairie Creek were looking at him now said they’d noticed the change.

  Or maybe they just knew he was in charge of the Kincaid ranch, and he rattled around the house all by himself now that Hunter, Delilah, and baby Joshua had moved to a house in town. Hunter still worked the ranch, but he still had one foot with the Prairie Creek Fire Department, a job he kept trying to quit and one that kept dragging him back with offers of promotions. He’d actually turned the fire chief’s job down twice, but Blair expected they’d be asking him again.

  He stretched and closed his eyes, tamping down a feeling of frustration entirely new to him. Katrina … Little Kat … She’d gotten into his blood. He’d known it before the whole baby discovery.

  A baby … his baby … He knew it damn well was his. Had to be. No matter what she said.

  God.

  He opened his eyes, staring at the dissipated dust that still hung in the air in the wake of her leaving. Was that how it was? One day you were just gobsmacked by a woman, one who didn’t act like she even liked you?

  The Byrds and Brinkmans returned and called his name from the back porch. He went back to meet them and help shepherd them through his house and to their vehicles. They seemed to have worked things out with Hal Crutchens. Blair suspected money had changed hands because that’s what would be required to get Crutchens to not take the matter to the authorities. Old man Byrd’s face was red with suppressed anger, and the Brinkmans looked worn out and anxious to just leave and put it all behind them.

  Blair was glad to be rid of the lot of them, although the incident had brought Kat back to the ranch, the only way it would happen since she didn’t want to have anything to do with him.

  Mike had returned to the back porch, nearly finished with his whittling of a tiny dog, which looked like some kind of Lab. “Nice people,” he remarked with faint sarcasm.

  Blair snorted.

  “Katrina Starr’s a bit of all right,” Mike admitted.

  Blair slid him a look, wondering how much he’d overheard. He’d wandered off the porch when the Byrd/Brinkman entourage had headed toward Hal’s place, but he could have wandered right back and maybe overheard when he and Kat were arguing on the front porch. Blair hadn’t shut any doors and windows, and sound traveled …

  “She the same gal you had over here that night awhile back?” He held up the wooden dog and blew across its back, removing dust.

  “What makes you think that?”

  He eyed the little dog and gave a grunt of satisfaction. Then he set the figurine near the porch post nearest Blair. “For the baby,” he said, then strolled back toward the barns, whistling tunelessly.

  Two days, Blair determined. He would give her two days, and if she hadn’t contacted him, he was going to go find her and have it out with her.

  *

  “Helicopters scoured a lot of the forest land behind the Donovans and the Tates and beyond,” Ricki said to Kat the next morning, “and haven’t turned anything up. We need more manpower for trekking, and we just don’t have it.”

  “You think he’s keeping Addie somewhere around here. Maybe where he kept Courtney. Where he would’ve kept Ruth, if she hadn’t gotten away.”

  “Isn’t that your theory?”

  Kat nodded. Yes, it was her theory. Her mind was just so full of her own problems that it sometimes helped to reiterate their thoughts on the case precisely. So far, Rhianna Byrd hadn’t shouted Kat’s pregnancy to the rooftops, but then, she’d never admitted to it, either. She could’ve been picking up that kit for someone else. That wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. And Blair hadn’t taken things further, but then it had only been one day …

  “It’s been a lot of years since Ruth’s rape,” Ricki said. “Could be a different guy, I suppose. I don’t want to assume too much. But if it’s a different guy, then maybe he did take Addie away. Pretty dangerous to keep doing what you’re doing with all this attention.”

  “Unless you think you’re smarter than everyone else.”

  “There’s that,” Ricki agreed.

  Kat not only believed it was the same guy, she also believed it was someone on her father’s list. And Ricki believed it too. She was just making sure they didn’t jump to one conclusion.

  “I don’t think it’s Rafe,” she said. “Not because he’s a Dillinger. Like I said, I just don’t think he’s made that way. I know. Totally unscientific and arbitrary. Just a gut feeling.”

  “I don’t think it’s Rafe, either.”

  “I’ve talked to him and talked to him, and all I’ve done is piss him off, which I don’t care about, but it just doesn’t read right.”

  Kat wondered if her father had interviewed him, like he’d said he was going to. “I’m going to talk to Cal Haney. Ruth had a run-in with him, and he scared her.”

  “What kind of run-in?”

  “Haney lives with his wife near Ruth’s parents’ place, and Ruth felt he was a little too familiar with her daughter and Jessica Calderon. Turns out Haney is Jessica’s newish uncle. He married her mother’s sister. Haney was spraying the girls with a hose, and they were screaming. Ruth ran to where they were, panicked, and apparently Haney acted like she was a crazy woman.”

  “Hmm.”

  “I know it seems like Ruth overreacts, but Cal Haney is too familiar, as a rule. I don’t know him well, just of him.”

  “He is a little smirky,” Ricki agreed. “You going out there today?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Maybe you should take someone with you.”

  “You just said we don’t have enough manpower. I’ll be fine,” Kat said. “Reverend McFerron and his wife are right there, and Haney’s wife too, probably. I’ve got my cell. I can always call for backup, if need be.”

  “If he’s the guy, he’s dangerous,” Ricki reminded.

  “Oh, I know.”

  Her mind returned to those moments in the clearing, when the bastard had looked up from raping Ruth and Shiloh had thrown the rock at him. She shivered. If this guy wasn’t Ruth’s rapist, he was just as bad or worse.

  *

  Kat was getting ready to head home when she got a phone call from Hank Eames that was so blistering it felt like it took the top layer of skin off her ear. “… Sneaky little bitch! I’ll get her credentials yanked!” he practically screamed. “I didn’t have anything to do with that girl’s disappearance, and the one that’s dead too. Pearson. And I wouldn’t touch Ruth McFerron if you paid me a million dollars a year! Not then, not now, not ever! You tell your dad to stay away from me!”

  “Ruth didn’t say anything about you, Mr. Eames,” Kat assured him. “We’re interviewing lots of people.”

  “I didn’t hurt nobody. I told her that. It was all consensual!”

  “Mr. Eames—”

  “You Starrs think you’re better than the rest of us. You …” He couldn’t seem to find his voice for a moment, then flashed, “You tell your little friend to stay out of my way. She’s a lying bitch who probably spread her legs for that guy and now wants to cry rape!”

  Kat replaced her receiver car
efully, feeling how fast her pulse was racing. Patrick had told her he’d met with Eames, and that the man hadn’t been happy about the questions he’d posed. But Jeez Louise.

  Her father had also told her that he’d had some questions for Rafe Dillinger, and the man had gotten in his face. “First Ricki, now you. I been checking things out. Found out when that girl disappeared. I was putting in a shift at Big Bart’s at that time. Everybody says she was doing the Croft kid. You should be looking at him, not me.”

  Patrick had added that Rafe was fairly colorful about what he could do to himself, then added somewhat ruefully, “Checked his alibi, and it holds up. You know who vouched for him? Darla Kingsley … can’t think of her married name. By all accounts, she doesn’t like him much anymore. Rafe never was much of a father, not that she apparently cares anymore. Anyway, she works at Big Bart’s part-time, and Rafe was there the day Addie disappeared for all the hours that matter.”

  An alibi for Rafe Dillinger. Maybe it could be broken, but Kat also knew that Darla had no love for Rafe, so she was inclined to believe it.

  At least Dad knows Blair wasn’t the one who got Darla pregnant.

  Small comfort, in the scheme of things.

  Kat picked up the phone to call Ruth. Might as well warn her about what Eames was saying before she was blindsided. She didn’t get through, though, so she left a message on voice mail for Ruth to call her, and then as she headed out of the station, her cell phone rang and she fished it from her purse and saw it was Ruth. “Good thing you didn’t call me back at the station, as I’m just heading out,” Kat said as a hello.

  “Call you back? Was I supposed to? No, I’m calling for a different reason.” There was suppressed excitement in Ruth’s voice.

  “What?”

  “You know I have a number of callins on my hotline who keep checking back with me. One of them, ‘Lily,’ is ready to talk to the police. Kat, she’s alluded to the fact that her rapist is from around Prairie Creek, and I’ve tried to get her to go to the authorities for a while, but she couldn’t make herself. But she saw my story, and now she’s ready to talk!”

  “That’s great, Ruth.”

  “I told her you were with me when I was attacked, and she only wants to talk to you,” she rushed on. “But she lives out of town, and she won’t come back to Prairie Creek. Can you get away for a day, drive maybe to Jackson to meet her?”

  Jackson was quite a ways. Kat had already missed a day and a half of work, and though this could be construed as related to their investigation, she didn’t want to have to ask for time off. “Any chance she could come closer? Say Saturday? Maybe Wheeler City?” The town was about an hour away. “I’m off that day.”

  “I’ll ask her,” Ruth said. “And see what her schedule is.”

  “Good.”

  “You were trying to call me, you said?”

  “My dad interviewed Hank Eames as a potential suspect, and Hank, uh, thought you’d given him up.” Kat then related what Hank Eames had said about Ruth. She absorbed the message in silence, then thanked Kat for telling her.

  “I wouldn’t give him up. You know that.”

  “I know it. And my dad knows it, but Hank doesn’t.”

  “He wasn’t on my list because I couldn’t talk about him. Was he on Patrick’s?”

  Time to come clean. “Um … more like my father has been seeing a little of Goldie Horndahl, whose furniture store is right across the street from your office. If you know Goldie, she’s not known for holding back.”

  “I know Goldie,” Ruth said dryly.

  “Dad might’ve initiated that friendship to see who was going in and out of your building.”

  “Might’ve?” Ruth asked, though there was a trace of humor in her voice that encouraged Kat.

  “Oh, he’ll pay the price for it, believe me. Goldie’s not the kind of woman you have a couple of dates with and then let go.”

  “I’ll tell your brother,” Ruth said, a smile forming in her voice. “Ethan and I can handle Hank. I’m relieved it’s out there, to tell the truth, and I’m just so happy Lily’s finally coming forward.”

  They ended the call on good terms, and Kat headed to her Jeep feeling better than she had all day. She parked in front of her apartment—an older home that had been converted to a four-plex, with two units on the ground floor and two on the upper floor. Kat was on the ground floor in the back, and she walked down a narrow walkway to the rear entrance and let herself inside.

  She immediately made herself a peanut butter sandwich. She seemed to have developed a craving for peanut butter over the past few days, and she was trying to balance it with a few salads, with limited success. She was mulling over calling her gynecologist. She needed an initial appointment, but like Goldie spying Hank Eames entering Ruth’s building, someone would surely see her if she stopped in at Dr. Cady’s office. She could claim it was for an annual appointment, but with the Byrds already alerted and Blair aware she was pregnant …

  “Oh, hell,” she muttered, placing the call. She got Dr. Cady’s receptionist, asked if she could have an appointment ASAP, and was informed that Dr. Cady was on vacation and would be back the week after next. Kat scheduled the first time available and hung up in relief. One more hurdle to put off a while longer.

  But how long will Blair wait?

  She gritted her teeth and shook her head. No use borrowing trouble. He wasn’t completely sure the baby was his, so maybe he would leave things alone for a while. She knew better than to believe he’d let it go completely.

  All I need is a little time to figure things out. After Addie’s found, I can think about myself. And Addie has to be found soon. She can’t suffer the same fate as Courtney Pearson.

  Her thoughts spurred her to action. She’d called the Masseys while still at work and spoken to Joleen, who’d said her husband wasn’t around, but that she would give him the message. So far he hadn’t returned her call.

  But there was still Cal Haney. She’d told Ricki she was going to interview him, and Cal lived closer in than the Masseys.

  No time like the present …

  She headed back to her Jeep and drove through the early-evening shadows toward Cal Haney’s place. Ricki and Sam were dealing with Skip Chandler, who, much like Hank Eames, had been affronted and furious that anyone would dare impugn his character when Ricki had convinced him to come to the station.

  Kat’s cell rang just as she reached Cal Haney’s place. Seeing it was Ruth, she took the call and learned that their meeting was a go for Saturday.

  “She’s really nervous,” Ruth added. “This is hard for her, and I can definitely relate.”

  “Glad she’s going through with it. When was she kidnapped?” Kat asked, eyeing the leaf-choked leaves of the Haneys’ gutters.

  “A while ago. She had a daughter who’s a tween now, I think. She hasn’t been totally upfront. She’s scared.”

  Kat didn’t tell her friend where she was. It was police business, and she didn’t want to involve Ruth and earn herself another reprimand. And in that arena, Shiloh and Beau weren’t helping her cause. They’d taken it upon themselves to interview Bryce Higgins, the missing Erin Higgins’s brother, who’d been so vocal and energized when his sister had first gone missing, then had stopped speaking out, like someone had turned his spigot off, almost as if he knew his sister was never coming back. He’d been affronted as well, and Shiloh had been frustrated in her attempts to get any information from him.

  “Kind of an asshole,” had been her report to Kat, who’d once again told her nicely to stand down.

  Haney was a wildcatter who, by all accounts, spent more time at The Dog and Big Bart’s bending an elbow than he ever did making a living. Kat drove up to his place and could feel adrenalin rush through her veins. It would have been a lot better meeting with him at the station, but though he’d been invited several times, he’d showed no inclination to do the deed. So now she was here.

  She stepped out of the car and looked
around. There was a garden of sorts to her left. She didn’t believe Cal had anything to do with growing vegetables; it just wasn’t in the man’s DNA. She concluded the ragged rows must be his new wife’s doing.

  And then she saw the ten-by-four mound of dirt near the garden. It looked as if the ground had been bulldozed and then tamped down. It looked, in fact, like a grave.

  Her heart started pounding in her ears. Addie Donovan? No. Surely, if he’d killed her, he wouldn’t bury her body in his own backyard!

  The front screen door screeched open and slammed shut, and Cal Haney, all six foot two of him, stood on the concrete porch and glared down at her.

  “What’re you lookin’ at?” he demanded.

  “Is this your wife’s garden?” she asked.

  “Well, it sure ain’t mine.”

  She swallowed. “Then you didn’t dig up that part of the yard and fill it in with dirt?” She pointed.

  His gaze landed on the suspicious mound, and he blinked several times. A dark flush crept up his neck and cheeks, and he said in an ugly tone, “I don’t know what you think you know, but you get that right outta your head. I was building me a patio, but the dickhead landlord told me no. So that dirt’s just sitting there. You wanta dig into it, be my guest. There’s nothing there but more dirt.”

  She believed him. He was too sure of himself, and she didn’t think he was bold enough and stupid enough to risk burying a body in his own backyard. But it didn’t mean he was innocent.

  “I know why you’re here. That scaredy cat, Ruthie, told on me for spraying her kid with the hose. She was with my niece. I was just playin’ with ’em.”

  “We’re asking people to help us find Addison Donovan, who’s been missing for—”

  “You think I did it. That’s why you’re here.”

  “Mr. Haney, we’re just trying to find her, make sure she’s all right.”

  “Don’t lie to me! You think I took her? Go ahead and arrest me. Take me to your Fearless Leader.” He held out his wrists and glared at her. “Do it, or get the hell off my property!”