by Joanna Wayne
“You’ve got a deal.” He also opened a couple of beers and set them on the table. “There may be wine if you’d rather have it,” he said. “I only like grapes in jelly, so I’m not sure what Esther keeps in the vino department.”
“I’m not much of a drinker, but a cold beer sounds good right now.”
She was halfway through her sandwich and he was on his last bite before either of them started a new conversation.
“This may be the best sandwich I’ve ever had,” she said.
“More likely, you were famished.”
“That, too. This is the first time I’ve had any kind of appetite since I got the call that my sister was missing.”
“And I’ve done nothing but eat since getting to the Double K. Cooking is one of Esther’s great joys. Fortunately, she’s terrific at it.”
“I can tell she thinks of you and your brothers as family.”
“We all three feel the same about her. She and Charlie didn’t just give us a place to live when our parents died. They gave us a home.”
“I felt the love in this house the first time I walked through the door.”
“My brothers and I were drowning in grief when we arrived for the first time, but I’m guessing we felt the love, too. I have countless great memories from the ten months we were here.”
“And now your brothers have come back here to settle down and raise a family. Do you ever think of moving here permanently?”
“I haven’t really considered moving anyplace permanently.”
“So you just ramble from town to town and ranch to ranch?”
He knew she was only making small talk as an escape from the horrors of her life. No reason to lie about his profession but he wasn’t going to pile his problems on top of hers.
“I drive from rodeo to rodeo for most of the year,” he said. “I’m on the PBR circuit.”
“I have no idea what that means.”
“I’m a professional bull rider.”
She choked on a sip of beer. “You ride bulls for a living?”
“For a living. Such as it is.”
There were years he’d struggled to come up with the entry fees. However, he had no complaints about his earnings this year.
“I’ve come across bull riding a few times while channel surfing,” Sydney admitted. “It looks incredibly dangerous.”
“Does that mean you have never been to a rodeo?”
“Afraid so.”
“We’ll have to change that.”
She managed a smile. “Maybe we will.”
He’d love to take her to a rodeo, though it might not be him atop the bull.
“Is Charlie Kavanaugh the one who got you interested in bull riding?”
“Charlie introduced my brothers and me to everything there is to know about the cowboy life. How to avoid getting kicked by your horse and to always drink upstream from the herd,” he joked.
“And how to ride a bull, at age twelve?”
“The bulls were tamer than the kind of monsters I meet on the circuit, but you gotta start young if you want to be good at it.”
“What else did Charlie teach you?”
“How to shoot and handle a gun. Branding. Proper care of our horse. The list goes on and on. Basically, he made damn sure we learned about honor and the cowboy code.”
“What’s the cowboy code?”
“Basic rules to live by.”
“Such as?”
“Never leave spur marks on a horse’s flesh. Women should be respected and protected. Put away your horse before you put away your dinner. There were lots of them, but the one at the top of the list was a cowboy always keeps his word.”
“Charlie sounds like a man among men.”
“Yep. He and Esther. Good folks. That’s what they call people like that around here. Charlie was one of the best. He had friends among the richest ranchers in these parts and the poorest. Treated them all the same.”
“Who is the richest rancher in this area?”
Her tone grew serious and he knew her focus had moved back to Rachel. Her mind had likely never left there.
“Dudley Miles has the most land and the most cattle. I can’t vouch for his bank account, but I hear he burns dollar bills instead of wood in their five fireplaces.”
She smiled and took another sip of her beer. “Not only a bull rider, but a BSer, I see.”
“Burning bills is a slight exaggeration. The house with five fireplaces is fact.”
“Is that the same Dudley Miles who went to prison for the death of his grandson?”
“Yeah. Were you in on that investigation?”
“No. The local police handled that, but it was on cable news 24/7 at the time. Refresh my memory. Exactly how did that go down?”
“Dudley and Millie’s bratty, irresponsible daughter, Angela, had a baby. It never came out who the baby’s father was, but from all accounts Dudley and Millie were raising the kid. Angela was not big on dependability.”
“Spoiled?”
“Totally, and had a drug problem. One weekend Angela was home alone with the two-year-old. She overdosed on cocaine and passed out. When she came to, she found the toddler on the kitchen floor, not breathing.”
“Now I remember,” Sydney said. “Angela Miles got scared and dumped the kid’s body in a wooded area. She told her parents and everyone else he’d been kidnapped.”
“Right,” Tucker said. “Then when the body was found and the kidnapping lie lost all credibility, Dudley took the blame to protect his daughter, claimed he was totally responsible.”
“But now the grandfather is out of prison and Angela is serving time for neglect leading to death and lying to the authorities to cover it up.”
“About time. It’s a long, tragic story for another night, but there’s a reason why I know so much about that event. A few months back, Dani and Riley played an unintended role in Angela’s finally going to prison. In the process, Dani was almost killed. Get her to tell you that story someday.”
“I will.” Sydney stared at the half-empty beer bottle she was rocking back and forth. The remaining fourth of her sandwich apparently forgotten.
“Where was the boy’s body found?” she asked.
“A few miles from Dudley’s spread, probably not far from where the news reporter said Sara Goodwin’s body was found.”
“Who owns that land?”
“An investor out of Los Angeles owns the land where Dudley’s grandson was found. He’s not from around here, and if I’ve ever heard his name, I don’t remember it. I only know that much because Dudley has been trying to buy it from him for years. It borders the west side of Dudley’s spread.”
“Do you think he also owns the land where Sara Goodwin’s body was found?”
“I’m not sure if his land extends that far west or not.”
Syndey stood and carried their plates to the kitchen. “I want to see the area where both their bodies were found. Do you think you can locate those spots?”
“I can take you right to the area where Dudley’s grandson’s body was found. I only have a general idea of the other crime scene, but we can probably find it. I’m sure it’s roped off with police tape.”
Tucker wiped down the range and counter while Sydney rinsed the dishes and slid them into the dishwasher. “I’d like to be there by daybreak,” she said, “before either area is barraged with reporters.”
“That’s manageable.”
“I don’t expect you to get involved, Tucker. You can drive me into town to pick up my car, and then I’ll follow you to the locations. You can stay in your truck while I look around.”
“What do you expect to find?”
“Whatever’s there to be found.”
He suspected that would be deer, rabbits and possibly a rattlesnake or two. But intensity burned in Sydney’s eyes again, the urgency to find her sister riding her nerves.
“You need to get some sleep,” he said. “Dawn comes early. Come on. I’ll walk you back to your bedroom.”
She didn’t put up an argument.
She stopped at the door to the guest room and turned to look up at him. Her bluish-green eyes glowed from the emotional fire that blazed inside her. Her full sensuous mouth opened in a slight smile.
“Thanks for helping me make it through the meltdown,” she whispered.
“My pleasure.”
She trailed the fingers of her right hand down his arm. Her touch released a stampede of desires, all hitting him right between the thighs.
He’d never wanted to take a woman in his arms more.
He held back, knowing the timing was probably all wrong for her.
“See you at sunrise,” she whispered. And then she opened her door and disappeared behind it.
* * *
“IT SHOULD BE light enough to see by the time we get to the first spot,” Tucker said. “If not, I have a superbright flashlight in my truck bed with all my other gear.”
“Which one do we hit first?” she asked.
“The spot where Dudley’s grandson’s body was discovered, if that works for you. We’ll come to it first.”
“Okay.” She sipped from the travel cup filled with strong black coffee Tucker had handed her on their way to the truck.
“It may be a waste of time,” she admitted. “There’s no reason to think there’s any connection between where Angela Miles dumped a body and the current crimes.”
“For what it’s worth, I concur with you on that.”
“Still, it’s hard to ignore the strange coincidence of two bodies from unrelated crimes turning up in such close proximity, especially on the outskirts of such a quiet, safe town like Winding Creek.”
Trust your instincts. Always pay attention to anything that just doesn’t feel right.
She’d learned that early in her FBI career and found it to be true more often than not.
“I know you’ve considered all the odds and know far more about this than I do,” Tucker said. “But isn’t there a strong chance that Rachel’s disappearance isn’t connected to any of this? A chance that she might not have been abducted at all? I mean, you read books where people have a minor stroke or fall and hit their head and get amnesia.”
“Anything is possible.” Her heart and her brain were convinced otherwise. Besides, the FBI would continue to explore those options for all four of the missing women.
It was the chance that Rachel and the others were in immediate and deadly danger that drove Sydney. That wouldn’t abate until the missing were found.
They drove the next few miles in silence. Tucker was still basically a stranger, but she was glad he hadn’t let her talk him out of coming with her.
The blacktop road took a sharp curve and then began a steady incline. Tucker slowed and turned right onto a rutted dirt road that quickly disappeared into a heavily wooded area. The canopy of leaves and lush pine needles shut out the dawn’s light, turning everything the dark purplish color of an ugly bruise.
The road began to disintegrate, becoming more rock than dirt. Eventually, it vanished completely in front of a crumbling chimney where a house had once been.
“This is the end of the line,” Tucker said as he killed the engine. “The body was found somewhere between here and the waterfall.”
Sydney didn’t see a waterfall, but as she climbed out of the truck she heard the splash and gurgle of moving water.
Tucker retrieved the flashlight and a machete from the back of the truck. He handed her the flashlight. “I’ll walk ahead of you and try to clear you a path through the worst of the undergrowth.”
“Is it this dense all the way to the waterfall?”
“No, but don’t expect too much from the waterfall. It may not be much more than a trickle at the end of a scorching summer.”
“I didn’t realize you were that familiar with the area.”
“I’m not, but it’s starting to come back to me now that we’re here. Charlie brought us deer hunting in here a couple of times. Pierce got his first buck here.”
“Shooting and riding bulls as a boy of twelve. I’m starting to see how you chose such a dangerous way to make a living.”
She aimed the flashlight’s beam at the ground in front of her as she maneuvered over and between clumps of prickly brush, snakelike vines and fallen limbs. Without Tucker wielding the machete, the old path would be almost impossible to navigate.
She felt something crawling on her arm. She shivered and looked down at the biggest spider she’d ever seen. Her heart seemed to stop as she knocked the dark, hairy monster off her arm and into the thick brush at her feet.
She hadn’t expected anything this creepy. The howling of coyotes and the husky croaks of bullfrogs provided the soundtrack for what felt like a scene from a B-rated horror movie.
Yet a young mother had chosen this spot to dump the body of her toddler son, and then let her own father go to jail for her callous crime.
When Rachel was safe again, Sydney would make a trip to the prison to visit Angela Miles. She’d be an interesting and no doubt informative case study for profiling.
The trees thinned out and the sky lightened to a pale gray. Sydney turned off the flashlight and picked up her pace.
“Watch for loose rocks,” Tucker cautioned. “There’s a sharp drop-off just before you reach the waterfall.”
“I will.”
She reached the falls before him. She looked back to see what was keeping him.
He held up the machete. A headless rattlesnake dangled from the blade. “Watch out for these, too,” he said. “Fortunately, my machete found it before it found me.”
She heeded his advice, holding tight to the slim trunk of a leaning mulberry tree as she stretched over for a better look at the tumbling stream of water and the rocky area just beyond it where the body had been found.
Two deer stepped out of the trees and into the pool beneath the waterfall for a cool drink. And just past them at the edge of the woods was what looked like a scrap of red cloth, possibly an item of clothing.
“Tucker, come take a look at this.”
“Be right there.”
She let go of the tree trunk and took a step toward the edge. The ground shifted, tipping her off balance. She grabbed for a limb that was just above her head.
Her hand scraped the spiny wood as the branch splintered and split. She fell on her backside and went sliding across the surface of the hard, angled rocks, finally landing in the mud at the edge of the falling water.
Blood dripped from her skinned elbows and her back felt like she’d been sleeping on hot coals.
But from this vantage point she saw far more than the red scrap.
Her blood ran icy cold.
Chapter Nine
Tucker half crawled, half tumbled down the rocky ravine in his haste to get to Sydney. He’d seen the large, angular stone shift. In a split second he’d dropped the machete and reached for Sydney, but it had been too late.
His hand missed her arm and the soft fabric of her blouse slipped right through his fingers.
By the time he reached her, blood dripped from her elbows and her left hand.
He stooped down beside her and turned her hand palm up so he could judge the depth of the scratches. “We have to get you to a doctor.”
“I don’t need a doctor. Help me up,” she ordered.
“You may have broken a bone or two.”
“I don’t think so. My rear hurts more than anything else. Just give me a hand or move so I can get up by my
self.”
He ignored her demands and instead ripped off his shirt. He grabbed a bottle of water from his backpack and poured about half of it over his shirt.
“Let me have that hand again. I can at least try to clean the worst of the wounds. You’ve got blood running down your arm from cuts on your elbows, too.” She finally cooperated and he slowly poured the remaining water over her hand and arms.
Blood still oozed from a couple of jagged scratches on her hand. He fashioned a makeshift bandage with his shirt and wrapped it around her hand, leaving the thumb free.
“Thanks,” she murmured.
“This doesn’t eliminate seeing a doctor.”
“All it needs is some antibiotic ointment. We’re staying on a ranch. Esther is bound to have a first-aid kit around there somewhere.”
“You may need a tetanus shot.”
“I had a booster two months ago. The FBI sees to things like that.” She scooted away from him and tried to get up without putting pressure on her hand.
He took her right hand and helped her to a standing position. “What was it you wanted me to see before you fell?”
She brushed off the seat of her jeans and pointed to a scrap of red that seemed to be caught in the low branches of a persimmon tree.
“Stay here, and I’ll go check it out,” he said.
Unsurprisingly, she didn’t stay but followed him as he splashed through the shallow water to the other side of the ravine.
She pulled the material from the tree and held it up in front of her. “It’s a women’s blouse. It hasn’t been here long enough to turn black from the elements.”
“It’s summer,” he reminded her. “It could have been left here by teenagers having a little summer fun beneath the falls.”
“It could be,” she said. She folded it and handed it to him. “Put it in your backpack for now in case the blood seeps through my fancy bandage.”
“Are you ready to tackle the trek back to the truck?”
“Not yet.”
She scanned the area around the falls and then started walking away from the side where she’d fallen. The gorge was not as steep on that side but the trees were and the underbrush was thicker. Worse, his machete was at the top of the other side of the ravine.
