"That's why I called. Come on in."
Tanner led the way back into the house. Jason was obviously a seasoned agent. He didn't even flinch at the gruesome scene.
"I've seen this before. In Miami and also in Kansas City. Your town is on a drug route to Canada, and people are fighting over it. Maybe more than a few organizations want it. We need to shut them down."
Sam shook his head. "What's so special about this area?"
"It's remote, off the beaten path. Not too many cops or state troopers. Just the drug mules and the cattle." Jason turned to Tanner. "I've got another guy in the copter, but I wanted to talk to you first. He's a forensics expert. Would you mind if he came in here and gathered evidence?"
"I wouldn't mind at all. Our resources don't run to something like that. We usually call in the state."
"I've got a call into them," Sam said. "I secured the scene and made sure no one else came in. They said they'd call me back with an ETA."
"Call them and let them know the Feds are here."
Sam grinned. "That ought to chap their asses. They hate that shit."
Jason finally smiled. "We're used to being reviled." He stuck his head out of the door and waved. "Trust me. They'll show up anyway so they can see what's going on."
"What can we do to help?" Tanner asked.
"Let us gather whatever we can find here. Run it through the lab. It may match other open cases. How about you and I get some coffee and I'll fill you in on what we already know and you can do the same? We can let these men do their jobs."
"Sounds good. We can take my truck. I'll drive you back here when your guy is done." Tanner turned to his deputy. "Sam, keep the place secure. I don't want the perp coming back to the scene of the crime."
"Got it. I'll keep the Fed safe, don't worry."
Tanner and Jason exited the house, passing the forensics agent who was heading in.
"I'll buy the coffee," Tanner said. "Let's go."
They loaded into his SUV and headed to town. He was glad he'd called in Reed's friend. This shit needed to end. Tanner took the safety of his town seriously. Nothing would happen to the people of Springwood on his watch as long as he had breath in his body.
Tanner was sure the drug cartels would be happy to relieve him of his responsibilities. They'd be glad to see him dead, just like the poor bastard in the kitchen.
Chapter Four
"I want you to stop this nonsense," Madison said, pulling a book from the shelf. It was another Monday night at the library with Sherry and surprise, surprise, Tanner was also there. He'd disappeared back in the stacks but she knew he was around. "This is getting ridiculous. It's like the whole town is conspiring against us."
Sherry grinned and Madison slapped her forehead. "Oh my Lord, you have the whole town working with you? I'm so stupid. Did they take up every table at the coffee shop on Saturday so Tanner would have to sit with me?"
Sherry laughed. "You have a suspicious mind. Why do you think that?"
"Because there was no one in there when I arrived and no one when I left. But when it came time for him to find a table, suddenly the place was packed. How are you doing this?"
"I'm amazing," Sherry declared. "It turns out the town wants Tanner to be happy. We all think he'd be happy with you."
"He's not interested in me."
Sherry tapped her chin. "Interesting. You said he's not interested in you, not that you weren't interested in him." Sherry waggled her eyebrows. "I think you like him."
Madison slammed the book back on the shelf, barely looking at the cover. "This is not third grade. You are not going to pass him a note asking him whether he likes me." A horrible thought occurred to Madison. "You aren't, are you?"
"I hadn't thought about that tactic but it's not a bad one. Direct and to the point."
Madison studied her shoes. It felt like the walls were closing in on her. "Please," she whispered. "Don't do this. Stop, Sherry. I just can't."
Sherry clutched her arm. "Hey, it's going to be okay." Madison looked Sherry in the eye.
"You don't know that. I'm a mess when it comes to the opposite sex. I don't know what to do, what to say. I'm fine alone."
"No, you're not." Sherry shook her head. "Eventually Dan is going to marry me. I'm going to have kids. I don't want you to be alone when that happens."
"We'll stay close. Besides, I have my dad."
"Everyone always says they'll stay close, but you know we'll spend less time with each other. We won't be able to help it." Sherry squeezed Madison's shoulder. "And I hate to say it, but your dad won't be around forever. You need someone to love you."
"I have my work," Madison argued. It sounded pathetic, but it was true. She loved being a doctor.
"You do." Sherry nodded. "What else?"
She didn't have anything else but Sherry and Dad.
"I could get a dog."
Sherry smiled. "Tanner already has one."
"You're not giving up then?"
"Never. One date. Would it kill you?"
It might. She didn't have any fond memories of past dates. They'd all been pretty awful.
"I'm not talking about this anymore. I'm taking my books to the checkout desk so you and I can go for dinner."
Madison headed for the front desk and the smiling librarian, Sally. She had been a few years behind Madison at school. "I'll take these, please."
She set her stack of books on the desk, and Sally bit her lip. "Well, the thing is, I can't check those out yet."
Madison frowned. "I'm not following. What do you mean yet?"
Sally took a deep breath. "I can't do it now. I need to wait."
"Oh, the computer is down? I can wait." Someone came up behind her and Madison stepped aside, gaping as Sally proceeded to check out the other woman's books. The woman headed for the door and Madison stepped back to the front of the desk. "Can you do mine now?"
Sally shook her head. "I can't."
Madison leaned forward. "What are we waiting for?"
"It should only be a few more minutes," Sally said. She looked really uncomfortable. Madison was about to abandon the books and head for the exit when Tanner walked out of the stacks area. Suddenly, everything was clear.
"Sherry?" she asked Sally.
Sally nodded. "You two would make a nice couple." She reached for Madison's books and very slowly and methodically began checking them out. Tanner saw her and tipped his hat.
"Sally. Madison. How are you ladies this evening?"
"Fine," they said in unison. Madison noticed the stitches were out of his forehead.
"When did you get your stitches out? You cancelled your appointment this morning."
Tanner leaned against the desk. "Your dad took them out this afternoon. I had an emergency call this morning. Sorry I had to cancel."
Sally handed Madison her books. "It's okay. We were slammed with patients anyway. There's a flu going around."
Madison didn't know what to say next. She'd never been good at small talk, but Sherry was suddenly at her elbow. "Sheriff, how nice to see you. We were just headed to get some dinner at the pizza place. Would you care to join us?"
Madison was going to tie Sherry to a chair and make her watch horror movies. Sherry was a total wuss when it came to scary things. Then Madison would make Sherry eat something healthy.
Tanner looked back and forth between them as if to gauge the sincerity of the offer. "That's kind of you. I was going to eat dinner alone, but company sounds good."
"That's great," Sherry enthused. "I'm starving. Let's go."
At least Sherry would be there. She always knew what to say and could be counted on to fill the silence. Madison wouldn't need to chat or be entertaining. Unless Tanner found bowel resections entertaining, he wasn't going to be charmed by her conversation.
She kept repeating to herself the whole way to the restaurant. It's only pizza. It's only pizza.
No one could make her go out on a date if she didn't want to. She was a grown wo
man and she made her own decisions. She wouldn't be railroaded into something she didn't want or need.
* * * *
Madison was wrong. She could be railroaded into something she didn't want to do. She was currently sitting across from Tanner in the restaurant and Sherry was long gone. She'd received an "important" phone call as soon as they sat down and had quickly left Madison alone with Tanner.
They'd ordered a large with sausage and extra cheese, and talked about the cold weather. Madison was officially out of topics. This was going to be one long excruciating meal at this rate. She played with the paper napkin on the table and tried to calm her fast beating heart. He smelled really good. Kind of woodsy and warm. It was male without being overpowering, and it made her palms sweat with fear.
"So what was the emergency this afternoon?" she asked, grabbing at any topic she could.
Tanner leaned back in the booth. "Murder. Some guy got hacked up in his kitchen." He scraped his hand over his face. "Shit. I'm sorry. Sometimes I forget how to talk in polite company. Please accept my apologies."
Tanner's cheeks were a dull red. She felt better knowing she wasn't the only one uncomfortable. "Relax. I'm a doctor. We can talk about all sorts of gross topics and I'll be able to eat dinner. I have a cast iron stomach."
"Still, I should be careful. Not too many people like to discuss death and dismemberment over their supper." Tanner shook his head, still looking discomfited.
"I think what you do is very interesting, actually. Do you know why he was murdered? Do we get a lot of murders in Springwood?"
"Not until recently," he answered, thanking the waitress when she brought their drinks. "Our humble town appears to be on a drug route to Canada and the cartels are fighting over it. Hence the recent rise in drug related crime and also in dead bodies. Today was the third."
"And they cut him up? Most of the gang activity I saw in Chicago involved guns. You wouldn't believe what a semi-automatic weapon can do to the human body."
"I would, actually. I was in the military."
She hadn't known that. "Did you see action?"
He nodded. "The first Gulf War. I left the Army in 1996."
"I'm not a big fan of war. Most doctors aren't."
"I'm not either. There weren't many casualties in that war but I did see my fair share. Not a pretty sight. You must have seen some ugly things in Chicago."
"I worked in an emergency room at a city hospital. On the weekends it was like a war zone. Endless streams of bodies. Kids too young to be carrying a gun, let alone know how to use it. Innocent people caught in the crossfire."
The conversation was easy and comfortable. She and Tanner had something in common. She told him stories from the ER and he told her stories about being in the Middle East. By the time they'd eaten their way through more than half of the pizza, she'd realized she was having fun.
Tanner was a nice man. Because he was, he deserved to know what Sherry and the town were trying to do. It was only fair to warn him.
"Tanner," she began, not sure how to say what needed to be said. "Sherry is...well, trying to be a good friend. She's trying...” Madison couldn't find the words.
He scratched his chin. "Sherry's a sweet girl. Dan should marry her."
"He should." Madison nodded, starting to lose her courage. She wasn't brave about men at the best of times. "Sherry doesn't like that I'm alone." Madison tried again.
Tanner sighed. "A young woman such as yourself shouldn't be alone. It can be hard to be on your own."
"Sherry doesn't think you should be alone either. Neither does the town."
Tanner narrowed his eyes. "The town has an opinion about my life? Why am I not surprised? They have an opinion about everything."
Madison shredded her napkin. "She thinks we shouldn't be alone. Together." She said the words quickly and braced herself for his laughter. It was surely a joke to him that anyone would think he was even slightly interested in her.
He frowned. "Together? As in you and me?"
She nodded. "Yes. Sherry and the town are conspiring to throw us together. Haven't you thought it was strange that we keep running into each other? That there were no tables at the coffee shop? That Sherry suddenly got an important phone call and left us here together? They're plotting against us, Tanner."
Her voice had gone up an octave and Tanner seemed to recognize her distress. He held his hand up. "Calm down. I have seen quite a bit of you, but are you sure? The entire town couldn't organize a trip to the bathroom."
"Sherry can. She can orchestrate the perfect day for a bride without a hitch. Now she's organizing you and me. Sally wouldn't check out my books tonight until you were around. I wasn't going to be allowed to leave the library without seeing you."
Whatever reaction she had expected, the one she got wasn't it. Tanner laughed. He was still chuckling when the waitress brought the check. "The town honestly believes a beautiful young woman like you would want to be with a broken down old lawman like me? Holy hell, I'm at least ten or fifteen years older than you, divorced with two kids, one of which hates my guts. You could do a hell of a lot better than me."
He needed to take this seriously. "You're not broken down and old. You're a nice man, which is why I told you. Forewarned is forearmed."
His blue eyes twinkled. "Forewarned? Are they going to force us to fall in love and get married? We're adults, Maddie. I think we can handle them."
She hadn't been called Maddie since she was a kid. "You think this is something to take lightly? We're here together, aren't we? They can engineer anything they want if we don't pay attention."
Tanner rubbed the back of his neck. "You have a point. Although having dinner with a pretty lady isn't something I would normally fight. It's you I feel sorry for."
Madison slapped the shredded napkin down on the table. "Stop. You're not old and I am not to be pitied because I'm having dinner with you. The fact is this was quite pleasant."
Well, crap, she hadn't meant to say that out loud.
"It was. I usually eat dinner alone."
"Me too. Something frozen and microwaved."
The corners of his mouth tipped up. "I know those dinners well. Sometimes I just eat standing up with the fridge door open."
Her eyes widened. "I've done that too."
He chuckled. "Now you know why they're trying to fix us up. We have a few things in common."
Madison wasn't so sure about that. She'd never told Sherry about her predilection for eating dinner over the kitchen sink.
"They should still mind their own business. But when Sherry decides something, well, it's almost impossible to change her mind."
The waitress came up and picked up the check along with Tanner's credit card. She hadn't been paying attention and now he was stuck with the bill. "You folks having a good evening? It's a nice night for a romantic stroll. Lots of stars." The woman smirked and headed to the cash register.
"See?" She rolled her eyes. "The whole town is in on it."
"Even if the whole town is in on it that doesn't mean we're going to be forced to date. We have free will."
Madison sighed. "You're right. I'm just being paranoid. They can't force us to do anything."
"Exactly. All we need to do is simply ignore them. They'll get tired of this and move on to something else before long. Small towns are full of gossip. Somebody is bound to do something that snags their attention."
"That's true." Madison smiled at Tanner. "You are a nice man. I thought you'd be appalled but you took the news really well." She reached for her wallet and extracted a twenty. "Here's my share of the pizza."
His eyebrows shot up. "Woman, if my father knew I let a lady pay half the check he'd have my hide. Dinner is on me."
Stubborn cowboys.
She thought about arguing but she could see from the set of his jaw she wasn't going to win. She relented, stuffing the bill back in her purse. "Thank you then. That's very kind."
The waitress dropped off the receipt. T
anner signed it and then stood, shrugging on his jacket. She pulled hers on and felt his warm hands at the collar, helping her.
"Let me walk you to your car."
She couldn't think of a blessed reason for him not to, so he walked with her down the sidewalk to where she'd parked her car. He waited, standing there, while she started her engine and drove away. She forced herself not to give into the urge to look into her rearview mirror.
Chapter Five
If it weren't for his daughter Emily, Tanner wouldn't have even come to the Valentine's dance tonight. She wanted him to meet her new boyfriend, Tyler Givens. She'd met him in an art class she was taking in Billings, and he was supposedly "awesome" or some such word. Now he was here and Emily hadn't shown up yet. So he had staked out some real estate by the food buffet and made small talk with the townsfolk who wandered by.
The Ladies Auxiliary had really gone all out this year for the annual fundraiser. The Civic Center, which was really just a converted warehouse for town council meetings and the occasional non-denominational wedding and reception, looked like Cupid had exploded. Hearts and snowflakes, clearly all handmade from red, white, and pink construction paper, hung from the ceiling while the tables were covered with red paper tablecloths and white paper lace doilies.
There was also a spot for photos with a splashy red and gold background that would have made Venus blush. They were charging ten bucks a pop but you couldn't pay Tanner to stand in front of that mural that was obviously designed by a horny teenage boy. Shit, even the angels had silicone boobs and lascivious expressions.
All in all, it was a banner year and the turnout was going to make the children's wing of the nearby hospital very happy. There was a crush of bodies on the dance floor and a steady stream of newcomers through the door. There wasn't much to do in a small town so when something went on it usually ended up packed with people.
"Tanner, I didn't expect to see you here tonight. Are you on duty?"
Tanner winced at the familiar sound of his ex-wife's voice. Since the kids were now grown, he tried to stay out of her orbit as much as possible. It wasn't easy in a town the size of Springwood but a determined man could make things happen. Abby was a good woman and mother, but she had a way of grating on Tanner's nerves. He was pretty sure it was on purpose.
Justice Healed Page 4
