by Jana DeLeon
“Problems?”
Tanner’s voice sounded from the doorway of the house and she jumped. She’d left him inside earlier to have a sandwich and make some phone calls to Wildlife and Fisheries and see if he could get them to move faster on testing the blood she’d found at one of the work sites. She hadn’t even heard him open the door. Now she wondered how much of the conversation he’d overheard.
“Nothing outside of the norm, lately,” she finally said.
“Is your foreman always so rude to you?”
She frowned. “No, but ever since I went from boss’s daughter to boss, his attitude has gone downhill.”
“You think he could be the vandal?”
“No! I don’t... Oh, wow....”
He sighed. “It hadn’t occurred to you yet. I’m sorry I sprang it on you that way.”
She shook her head. “You’re just doing your job. And no, it hadn’t occurred to me, but I don’t think it’s him. I can see where it would look that way, but I can’t bring myself to believe Emmett would betray my father’s trust that way, even though he’s dead.”
“That’s okay. You don’t have to believe it. I’m going to get proof, but I have to tell you, Emmett’s a good place to start. I’ll need to know everything you know about the man, and the rest of the crew, for that matter.”
“Of course. I have personnel files for all of the crew. I’m afraid that’s about the extent of my knowledge of them, but Emmett has been here since before I was born. I can probably tell you anything you need to know about him.”
“Except where he disappears to during the day?”
She blew out a breath. “Yeah, except that.”
He nodded. “If you’ll show me to my room, I’d like to unpack and start on those personnel files tonight.”
“Your room?”
“There’s no hotel in town and I’d rather be on-site until I figure this out. You’re turning it into a B-and-B, right? So I figure you have rooms.”
She couldn’t think of a single good reason to tell him no—at least not one she could openly state without looking like a fool. But the thought of Tanner sleeping under the same roof sent her body tingling in places it had no right to tingle in.
Unfortunately, his idea made perfect sense.
“Sure. I have two rooms ready on the second floor. One on the north side and one on the south. You can have your choice.”
He nodded. “Where is your room located?”
She felt a blush creep up her face. “On the second floor, north side.”
“Then I’ll take the north-side room.”
Her mouth dropped just a bit and she held it there for a couple of seconds, unable to close it or speak. Finally, she said, “You don’t think I’m in danger, do you?”
“Until I can figure out who or what is doing this and their motive, I don’t want to discount any possibilities. If a man is vandalizing your property, then it’s personal, and that’s something I want to explore with you tomorrow. If he doesn’t get you to take whatever action he thinks he’s going to cause, he may escalate. Hiring me may inspire him to escalate more quickly.”
A flood of scenarios that she’d never considered washed through her mind. Locked up in her home with the sexiest man she’d seen in forever or alone with a potential madman or mythical creature on the loose.
She wasn’t sure which was more frightening.
* * *
TANNER ROSE FROM THE small desk that held a stack of personnel files and peered out the bedroom window into the dimly lit courtyard behind the sprawling mansion. On the surface, everything appeared so peaceful, so normal, but he knew something was off balance. He’d felt it in the swamp. Something malevolent was at work below the surface at the plantation.
The personnel files had given him no indication of the problem. The men in the crew were from the area, and Tanner hadn’t found anything suspect on them or Emmett Vernon. Tanner had heard Josie talking to someone out front, but he hadn’t gone to investigate until he’d heard her voice rise and could make out her accusation that Vernon was slacking. Josie had looked startled when he spoke, and now he wondered what had been said that he missed.
Whatever it was, she wasn’t repeating it. Sure, she’d given him some information, but he hadn’t mistaken that flash of fear when she’d realized he was behind her. Whatever had transpired between her and the surly foreman, she didn’t want Tanner to know it all.
He sighed. This was so much more complicated than Holt and Max had made it look. In only two months, they’d already solved several cases the police had deemed not viable. At the rate his level of confusion was rising, Tanner seriously doubted he could contribute even a quarter of the success to the agency that his brothers did.
His cell phone rang and he wondered who in the world was calling him this late. Then he saw the number for Wildlife and Fisheries and knew it was his buddy Tommy. Tanner was convinced the man never slept and lived at the office.
“Tommy,” he answered. “What do you have for me?”
“Not much, I’m afraid,” Tommy replied. “The blood belonged to a rabbit common to the swamp. Without the carcass, there’s no way to determine cause of death.”
“I understand. I don’t suppose you’ve had a chance to check into the records on that footprint cast Ms. Bettencourt sent in before?”
“Are you kidding me? You call and tell me you were hired to track the Honey Island Swamp Monster and we might have a print cast here—heck, I ran straight to storage and pulled it before I did that test on the blood.”
“I was hired to track a vandal,” Tanner corrected. “I’m not making any other assumptions.”
“Yeah, well, that print was creepy.”
“Is that your official opinion?”
“As a zoologist and amateur cryptozoologist, yes, that’s my professional opinion.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. Why was it creepy?”
“Well, everything indicates it’s a bipedal creature, but given the soil conditions and depth of the imprint, we’re talking something between six and seven feet tall and two hundred fifty pounds or more.”
“Bear?”
“With four toes? Dude, don’t even go there. Even with a foot caught in a trap, there’s no way a bear made this track. Besides, it says in the notes that the next partial imprint was over five feet away. What bear has a stride five feet long?”
Tanner frowned, not wanting to admit outright that his buddy’s assessment was correct. “But it could definitely be a man.”
“A man with legs long enough to make that stride, yeah. But you’re talking about constructing a suit that is good enough for Hollywood filmmaking with all the witnesses that are convinced, not to mention someone agile enough to move through the swamp wearing it. If it’s a man, this is the most elaborate hoax I’ve ever heard of.”
“Thanks, man,” Tanner said, and tossed his cell phone on the bed.
More dead ends.
He heard the shower turn on in the next room and realized his bedroom must share a wall with Josie’s bathroom. Stepping back from the window, he sighed. As if he needed the visual of Josie showering playing in his mind. Josie fully clothed, complete with rubber boots and no makeup, was still far more temptation than he’d ever experienced. Picturing her naked might give him a heart attack.
He’d seen her surprise when he pointed out the advantage of him staying on-site and her discomfort when he’d chosen the room closest to her own, but he wasn’t sure what the reason behind it was. She was about to open her house to strangers. Surely, that put her at bigger risk than providing a room to the person she’d hired to protect her investment.
The one thing he was certain of was that it wasn’t personal. As a teen, Josie had never even noticed he existed. Her crowd had been the popular kids—the athletes from the “good” local families. Somewhere in town there was probably a loudmouthed ex-jock who called Josie his “woman” and put her in line behind football, hunting and beer. Maybe not in that o
rder.
The scrawny kid doing odd jobs on her family’s plantation didn’t even catch her eye. Nor did the geeky kid who hid in the back of the classroom. Granted, his mother had moved them to Miel his senior year of high school, so it wasn’t as though he’d been around unnoticed for years, but it had often felt that way.
After his father’s death, his mother had hopped from town to town as often as she’d changed men. The last one, a trucker with a bad temper and a heavy drinking problem—both of which he’d taken out on Tanner—had brought them to Miel.
And that’s where his mother died—holding a bottle of booze and the trucker long gone.
Disgusted that he’d lapsed back into childhood angst and stupidity, he pulled off his boots and lay back across the four-poster bed. He wanted to get an early start tracking in the morning, and it was already close to midnight. If he had any sense left at all, he’d call it a night and turn in.
He stood back up to shed his jeans and shirt, and that’s when he heard a noise outside.
Immediately, he flicked off the lamp next to the bed and slipped up next to the window again. The noise had come from outside, but he couldn’t tell which direction. The patio lights extended only so far into the massive backyard of the plantation, so his field of view was limited. He was just about to decide it was the normal night sounds of swamp creatures when he saw something moving right where the patio lights faded away.
Whatever it was, it was big. And he knew of nothing that big that belonged directly behind the house at this time of night.
He grabbed his pistol from the nightstand and rushed into the hallway to bang on Josie’s door. She opened it a couple of seconds later, with a towel wrapped around her and water dripping from her head.
“What in the world—”
“There’s something in the backyard, just outside the light. I’m going to sneak out the front door and around the house. I need you to lock the door behind me. Do you have a gun?”
Her eyes widened. “Yes, of course.”
“Get it and hurry up,” he said before running down the stairs to the front door.
He heard Josie rushing down the stairs behind him as he slipped out the front door. The hedges across the front lawn provided some cover for him until he was clear of the front porch lights. At the end of the hedges, he slipped quietly across the yard to the barn, which stretched the length of the side of the house, and into the backyard.
It was pitch-black on the backside of the barn. A tiny glow from the moon broke through the dark clouds, but it made only shadows visible and even then, at a distance of ten feet or less, he’d be right on top of whatever was out there before he even knew what it was. Not the best of situations, but it was the one he had.
He inched down the side of the barn, pistol held up near his shoulder, ready to fire, and then drew up short at the sound of dead grass crunching around the side of the barn. Clenching his pistol with both hands, he eased up to the edge of the barn and then spun around the side, gun leveled.
Chapter Four
Josie locked the door behind Tanner and ran upstairs. She grabbed her pistol from the nightstand and checked to make sure it was loaded and ready to fire, then grabbed sweat pants and a shirt and threw them on. She snagged her tennis shoes on the way out of her bedroom, not even bothering with socks.
Socks weren’t necessary for shooting a vandal or a swamp monster.
She pulled on her shoes with one hand while unlocking the door with the other. Then, gripping her pistol, she eased out the door and silently drew it closed behind her. Following the same path Tanner had taken earlier, she edged along the hedges and around the side of the barn. Pausing for a moment, she listened to see if she could pinpoint Tanner’s position, but no sound reached her.
She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, then crept down the side of the barn. At the end of the barn she paused again and stiffened as she heard the crackle of dead grass around the corner. Her heart pounded in her chest and despite the chilly weather, her hand felt clammy as she gripped the pistol. She said a quick prayer, then spun around the corner, gun leveled.
“Whoa!” Tanner said. “It’s me.”
She hadn’t even realized she’d been holding her breath until it rushed out of her in a giant whoosh. She lowered her pistol and tried to will her racing heart into slowing.
“Did you see him?” she asked.
“No, but I found what was moving out here.”
“What is it?”
“Horses. There were two of them wandering around back here. I’ve put one back in the stall, and was going back for the other one when I heard you and came to investigate.”
Panic rushed through her. “My horses!”
She shoved the pistol into her sweatpants, then rushed past Tanner into the open pasture and squinted into the darkness, looking for the remaining horse. Finally, she spotted him about twenty yards away peacefully grazing at the edge of the fence. Softly, she called him and he nickered, then walked over to her, lowering his head to be rubbed. She rubbed his head and then took him by the halter and led him back into the barn.
She flipped the light switch just inside the barn door and flooded the huge structure with fluorescent light. Her heart still racing, she scanned the stalls, doing a mental roll call.
“Are they all there?” Tanner asked.
“Yes, thank goodness.”
“I didn’t know which stall the other horse belonged in, so I just put her in the first one.”
“That’s hers,” she said as she led the other horse to the empty stall.
Her racing heart was starting to slow and she gave the horse another head rub before exiting the stall. As she slid the dead bolt back into place, she looked over at Tanner, her panic now turning into anger.
“If he was trying to piss me off,” she said, “this was the fastest way to do it. The last thing I will tolerate is someone putting my horses in danger, and they did not unfasten dead bolts and let themselves out.”
Tanner nodded, his expression grim. “Don’t worry. I’m going to catch him.”
His voice was so determined that Josie felt her hope rise just a bit. Tanner did not strike her as a man who was good with failure. Maybe with him on her side, she had a chance to get to the bottom of all this.
He stepped close to her and looked directly at her. She looked up at him and forced herself not to take a step back. He was so virile, so male, and being that close to him made her body tingle in ways that had been dormant for a long time. Ways she intended to keep dormant forever.
“You know,” he said, “that a swamp monster did not wander into your barn and turn your horses loose.”
She blew out a breath, forcing herself to shift her focus from the incredibly attractive man in front of her and back to the night’s situation that could have ended badly. “I know.”
“You need to think about who has a grudge against you, no matter how slight, and you need to tell me about every single one of them.”
She nodded. The last thing she’d wanted to do was lay out her personal problems to a complete stranger, but she was going to have to give Tanner enough information to do his job. “I have an idea where to start.”
Tanner looked around the barn. “I don’t think he’ll come back tonight. Let’s try to get some sleep, and we can talk in the morning.”
“Okay,” Josie said. She reached for the light switch, but Tanner reached for her hand before she could turn the light off.
“Leave it on,” he said, still holding her hand. “He’ll be less likely to try something in the light, and if he’s foolish enough to come back, it will be easier to catch him.”
His hand was warm on hers, firm but gentle. The skin on his hands was rough in some places, as she would expect from someone who worked outdoors, but his rough skin pressed against hers made her instantly wonder how those strong, rugged hands would feel on the rest of her body.
She pulled her hand from his and nodded. “Okay, then. I’
ll leave it on until he’s caught.”
Tanner walked out of the barn and she followed behind him and closed the door. They walked silently back to the house, and she couldn’t help wondering what he was thinking. Had he felt the same charge she had when he’d touched her hand?
She hoped not, because if he made a move on her, she was afraid she’d abandon her vow to swear off men. And then she’d regret it.
Getting involved with men always led her to regret.
* * *
TANNER LOOKED OUTSIDE his bedroom window across the silent lawn. The light from the barn windows created a dim glow around it. When he’d told Josie that he didn’t think the vandal would return that night, he hadn’t been lying, but there was an uneasiness in the air that he didn’t like.
Something was out there...watching, waiting.
Someone thought they were being clever, but to what end was the question. Josie was hiding something from him. He’d known that from the beginning. Maybe after the scare with her horses, she’d be willing to part with whatever she was withholding.
He stepped away from the window and shrugged off his jeans and shirt. What he needed to do was follow his own advice and get some rest. He’d just been thinking about a hot shower when he’d heard the noise earlier, but after seeing Josie all wet and wearing only a towel, a cold shower might be more in order.
Even earlier in the barn, she was still gorgeous. No makeup, wet hair, baggy sweats and she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. Over the years he’d seen her in magazine ads, usually for clothes, perfume or jewelry. He knew that usually those pictures were altered with filters and software, but for Josie, it wasn’t necessary. She was just as perfect now as she’d been when she was a teen.
It had been a mistake to touch her. He could have told her to leave the light on. He didn’t have to grab her hand. Certainly, he didn’t have to hold it, but he hadn’t been able to resist making even the smallest contact.
Her hand had been so warm, despite the outside chill. Her skin was soft and smooth, just as he’d imagined it would be, and his body had stirred from that tiny bit of contact. For a moment, she’d stared at him, then looked confused and just a tad nervous. He’d like to think it was because she was attracted to him, but he knew that was a high school fantasy that his overactive imagination had dug up from the place he’d buried it long ago.
