Stalking Season

by Sandra Robbins

  “It goes with the job, Cheyenne.” She gave a nod and turned toward the door, but his voice stopped her. “One more thing. Would you mind giving me your cell phone? I’ll have our tech guys check it to see if they can trace where today’s texts and calls came from.”

  “Sure,” she said as she pulled it from her pocket and dropped it in his hand.

  His fingers closed around it. “I’ll get this back to you as soon as I can.”

  “I’m glad for you to have it if it will help any.”

  They didn’t speak again as they walked back to his squad car. The traffic wasn’t as bad as it had been earlier, and before she knew it they’d reached the parking lot where she’d left her truck. When the cruiser stopped, Luke swiveled in the seat, looped his arm over the steering wheel and smiled. “It’s been a pleasure meeting you even if I did almost kill you. I hope we meet under happier circumstances.”

  Her heart gave a small lurch at the way his eyes sparkled as he looked at her. “I hope so, too,” she said. She opened the door and stepped out of his car.

  A few minutes later she was in her truck and driving down the main thoroughfare of town. She looked in the rearview mirror and smiled at the sight of Luke trailing along behind her in his car. When she came to the turnoff to the road that would take her to the ranch, she glanced back again. He flipped the headlights on and then off, as if he was signaling goodbye, and then he drove away toward the police station.

  For the first time in years she felt a small prick of something that might be called pleasure. It had been so long since she’d had anything to be happy about that she almost didn’t recognize it. Then she smiled. If Luke Conrad was any indication of the kind of people who lived in this area, then she was going to enjoy being here.

  As suddenly as the thought struck her, she shook her head and gritted her teeth. There was never going to be happiness in her life until the monster who’d stalked her and killed her parents was behind bars. Maybe then she’d be able to live a normal life like other people. But until then she had to be on her guard every minute. She couldn’t let thoughts of handsome deputies or anything else blind her to the fact that she was never going to be safe until her mysterious stalker was caught.

  * * *

  Luke’s thoughts centered on Cheyenne Cassidy all the way back to the sheriff’s office. He couldn’t get the young woman with the flashing brown eyes and silky auburn hair out of his mind. With her jeans and boots she’d certainly looked like a cowgirl, but there was a fragile quality about her that made his breath catch in his throat.

  He groaned and raked his hand through his hair. What was the matter with him? He would not let himself repeat the mistake he’d made when he’d first become a deputy. He’d been warned not to become personally involved with the people in his cases, but he hadn’t listened.

  He’d let his heart rule his head when he’d taken a special interest in Jasmine after she’d been robbed at gunpoint at the convenience store where she worked.

  She had seemed fragile, too, and she’d turned out to be about as delicate as an 18-wheeler. She’d leaned heavily on him for support in the weeks following the robbery, and he’d fallen head over heels for her. He’d thought she cared for him, too, until the day the owner of the convenience store called to say that Jasmine was missing along with a hefty sum of money from the cash register.

  She and her male companion were arrested a few weeks later in South Carolina. They’d been stopped for a traffic violation and a bench warrant for Jasmine’s arrest showed up when they searched her name. It didn’t take long for her to confess that the man with her was the one who’d robbed the convenience store, and she’d been in on the robbery all along.

  After that, Luke had decided he was going to be careful. His job was to offer professional help—and nothing more. There would be no other Jasmines for him. He liked his life too well the way it was now to put himself through something like that again.

  There was no doubt, however, that Cheyenne needed help, but right now he wasn’t sure how to proceed. He pulled into the parking lot and sat there a moment recalling all the things Cheyenne had told him, then got out and walked inside. Clara still sat at her desk and looked up as he came in the door. When he walked inside, she looked up from her computer and smiled. “Hi, Luke. Are you ready to clock out?”

  “Not yet. I have some reports to finish.”

  “Okay,” she said as she leaned forward in her chair and glanced from side to side as if to see if anyone was listening. Then she spoke in a soft voice. “I noticed when I came in this morning that there had been a call about a domestic disturbance over at Bruce and Linda Carter’s house last night. Ben took the call, but he didn’t say much about it. Did you happen to hear anything today?”

  Luke tried to keep from grinning. Clara had a reputation in town as the local gossip, and she was always on the lookout for more information. Ben Whitman, the sheriff, had warned her several times about questioning the officers about the calls they answered, but it did no good. Clara felt it was her duty to keep the good folks in town aware of what was going on around them.

  “Sorry, Clara, I haven’t heard anything about that. I’m sure if it was anything serious Sheriff Whitman would have told you.”

  She settled back in her chair and pursed her lips. “I suppose so, but I never have trusted that Bruce. He drinks a lot. I don’t know why Linda puts up with it. Now if that was my husband—”

  “Excuse me, Clara,” he interrupted, “but I have some work to do before I leave. I’ll talk to you later.”

  He took a step to leave but stopped when she spoke again. “Did you get Miss Cassidy back to her truck okay?”

  He turned slowly to face her and nodded. “She’s on her way home right now.”

  “That’s good. That poor child looked like she was scared to death when she walked in with you. I hope you were able to calm her down. After all she’s been through it would be a shame if she didn’t get to perform tonight.”

  Luke cocked an eyebrow. “Now why doesn’t it surprise me that you know all about Cheyenne?”

  Clara waved her hand in dismissal. “Oh, I know all about her stalker, and about her parents being killed, and how she’s come here to forget the past and work at the Wild West show.”

  Luke shook his head in amazement. He’d often said that the government should hire Clara as a spy. She could infiltrate a country and have all their secrets in no time at all. “How did you find all that out?”

  Clara crossed her arms as a smug smile curved her lips. “Shorty, the cook out at Little Pigeon Ranch, told me.”

  Luke chuckled and shook his head. “Shorty probably didn’t stand a chance against you once you decided he needed to spill the beans about the new resident at the ranch. But tell me, Clara, did you happen to get her birth date and social security number while you were at it?”

  Her mouth dropped open for a moment, and then she scowled at him. “Are you making fun of me, Luke Conrad?”

  He held his hands up in a defensive move. “Not at all. I’m just in awe of all your interrogating skills. I think Ben needs to promote you to detective.”

  She glared at him. “You are making fun of me.”

  Luke laughed and shook his head. “I’m just teasing. You know I love you like a sister. I just wish that Cheyenne had come to town under different circumstances.”

  “Yeah,” Clara said. “I told Shorty the same thing. He said she’d been real private ever since she got here, acted like she didn’t want to make friends.”

  “Maybe Dean and Gwen can help change that.”

  Clara looked at him, and a sly grin spread across her face. “Are you thinking maybe you could help change that, too?”

  Luke felt his face flush, and he shook his head. “I didn’t say that. The job of this department is to make her feel safe.”
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  Clara arched her eyebrows and rolled her eyes. “If you say so.”

  He started to respond, but he just frowned and huffed out a breath as he turned and strode down the hallway toward his office. When he walked in, he headed straight to his desk and slumped down in the chair behind it. He sat there in thought for a moment before he straightened and prepared to fill out the reports he had to file. He needed to hurry or he’d be late getting home tonight, and that wouldn’t do if he was going to get to the Wild West show. He wasn’t going there to see Cheyenne ride. He would probably need to return her cell phone if the techs had finished with it.

  At least that’s what he told himself as he began to fill out his reports.

  THREE

  Cheyenne drove the truck up the long driveway that led to the main house on Little Pigeon Ranch. She pulled to a stop in front, turned off the ignition and sat there a few moments letting her gaze drift over the rambling structure that now served as a lodge for guests who wanted to experience the adventure of being on a dude ranch.

  She smiled as her eyes moved over the house and the cabins scattered across the fields nearby. After a few weeks this place was already beginning to feel like home, especially since Patches was with her and they had a place to train. It was hard enough leaving her family ranch behind and all the memories of her parents associated with the place. She didn’t think she could have endured it if she’d had to leave her horse, too.

  When her father’s friend and his son had offered her the opportunity to ride in the Wild West show, she thought that would be the answer to getting on with her life and leaving the past behind. Now she wasn’t so sure. The texts and the phone call this afternoon had signaled that the terror she’d lived through wasn’t over after all.

  Even though she’d had trouble believing her parents’ killer was really dead, she’d been comforted by the fact that he hadn’t contacted her in all these months. Now he was back, and this time it seemed worse than ever.

  His threatening words had played over and over in her mind all the way home. No matter how much she tried to convince herself that it might have been a copycat intent on scaring her, she couldn’t bring herself to believe that. For one thing, he had her music box, and for another the guttural voice had sounded the same.

  If he was alive, as she now believed him to be, he had not just murdered her parents, but probably Clint Shelton, too, in order to evade suspicion. If that was true, then Clint had been an unknowing victim in a vicious game that some crazed person had started two years before.

  All the top steer wrestlers had wanted Clint as their hazer. His death had stunned the rodeo regulars, who found it hard to believe such evil could be buried inside a man who was so respected and well-liked. That’s why it had never made sense to her that he would have been her stalker and killed her parents.

  She sighed and shook her head, then climbed from the truck and started toward the house. She stopped when she heard a shrill voice ring out across the yard.

  “Cheyenne! Wait for me!”

  Cheyenne turned to stare in the direction the voice had come from and spotted Maggie Harwell, Dean and Gwen’s six-year-old daughter, with a tan-and-white collie running alongside her from the direction of the barn. She barely had time to brace herself before the child plowed into her and wrapped her arms around Cheyenne’s waist. She looked down into Maggie’s smiling face and hugged her.

  “That’s quite a welcome, Maggie,” Cheyenne said. “If I’d known you’d be this excited to see me, I would have come back sooner.” The collie jumped up on Cheyenne, and she reached out and patted the dog’s head. “I’m glad to see you, too, Bingo.”

  Maggie’s brown eyes sparkled as she looked up at Cheyenne. “Mama and Daddy said they would take me to see you ride tonight. I’m going to yell and clap louder than anybody else there.”

  Cheyenne laughed and released Maggie. “I’ll listen for you.”

  “I’m sure you’ll be able to hear her above everybody else.”

  Cheyenne looked up to see Dean Harwell coming toward them, a smile on his face. She hadn’t been at the Little Pigeon Ranch long, but she had already begun to feel like everybody here was family. Dean and Gwen had accepted her right off and made her feel like this was her home. She and Maggie had bonded right away, and Cheyenne had grown accustomed to seeing the little girl sitting on the ground outside the corral during her practice sessions with Patches.

  She and Maggie turned to face Dean as he came to a stop beside them. “Thank you for coming tonight,” she said. “It means a lot to me that you’ll be there. You’re the only people I’ve really met since I moved here, and you’re beginning to feel like family.”

  “We feel the same. It’s good to have you here,” he said as he reached down and lifted his daughter so that she sat on his shoulders with her legs dangling over his chest.

  Maggie squealed in delight and took hold of her father’s head as the three of them walked up the steps to the house. Once inside he deposited Maggie back on her feet, bent over and kissed her on the cheek. “Why don’t you go see what Shorty’s cooking up for dinner? Cheyenne will need to eat early so she and Patches can get into town and be ready for the show’s grand opening.”

  “Okay,” Maggie said and started to run toward the kitchen. At the door she stopped and looked back at Cheyenne. “Are you going to do the hippodrome stand tonight?” she asked.

  Cheyenne nodded. “Yes, that’s what I’m going to open with.”

  Maggie directed a somber stare at her father. “That’s the one where Cheyenne stands up on the saddle while Patches runs around the ring.”

  Dean arched his eyebrows, but Cheyenne could see the corners of his mouth trying not to smile. “Really?”

  Maggie nodded and turned back to Cheyenne. “What about the side shoulder stand?”

  “I plan to do that one, too.” She smiled at Maggie. “You’ve been watching me practice so much you know all my tricks.”

  A small frown flitted across her face as if she’d just had a troubling thought. “I don’t like the suicide drag. Don’t do it tonight.”

  Cheyenne glanced at Dean and then at Maggie. She walked over to the child and put her arm around her. “I know that trick scares you, but it’s the highlight of my performance. You don’t have to worry. Patches is well trained, and that’s the secret to doing this trick. If it scares you, though, just cover your eyes, and it’ll be over in minutes. Okay?”

  Maggie smiled a wobbly smile and nodded before she turned and ran toward the kitchen with Bingo right behind her.

  Dean didn’t take his eyes off her as he watched her go, then he turned back to Cheyenne. “She’s grown very attached to you since you’ve been here. Thanks for letting her hang around while you train.”

  Cheyenne waved her hand in dismissal. “No problem. I enjoy having her there. I find myself checking my watch to see when she’s going to get off the school bus so I can see her.” She paused for a moment. “I also enjoy being here with you and Gwen and Shorty and Emmett and all the people who work here. I haven’t felt so comfortable in a long time.”

  “We’re glad to have you. There’s something about living in the Smoky Mountains that makes a person think they’ve come home to the place where they were meant to be.”

  Cheyenne nodded. “I know. I’m beginning to feel that way.”

  “Well, you and Patches are welcome to stay here as long as you want.” Dean took a deep breath. “So how did the shopping trip go?”

  Cheyenne hesitated for a moment and swallowed hard before she answered. “I-it was fine.”

  Dean directed a sharp look at her and cocked an eyebrow. “Did something happen?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing for you to worry about.”

  She started to walk away but Dean reached out and touched her arm. “Cheyenne, I used
to be a police officer. I know when there’s something bothering a person. Did you have some kind of problem?”

  For a moment she debated what to say. Dean and Gwen knew her story, but she didn’t want to put them or their child in danger by keeping silent. “I kinda got hit by a car,” she said.

  “Did you have a fender bender? I didn’t see any damage to your truck when you drove up.”

  “No. I walked out in front of a car without looking, and it hit me. Fortunately, I wasn’t hurt.”

  Concern lined his face, and he studied her as if searching for injuries. “Are you sure you’re all right? Gwen is in the kitchen. She can take you to our doctor to get you checked out.”

  Cheyenne shook her head. “That’s not necessary. Luke called 911, and the paramedics checked me out. They said I was fine.”

  “Luke?”

  “Yes, Luke Conrad. He’s the one who hit me.” She bit down on her lip as her face grew warm. “He was in his patrol car.”

  He stared at her for a moment. “Luke Conrad is a friend of mine. I hope you won’t blame him.”

  “Oh, I don’t. It was all my fault. I should have been watching where I was going.”

  Dean studied her for a moment. “I have the feeling that there’s more to the story. What aren’t you telling me?”

  Before she realized what she was doing, she began to tell Dean the story of what had happened in the store. When she finished, she flinched at the grim expression on his face. “I’d say this is serious, Cheyenne, and we can’t take it lightly. We need to find this person whether he’s your stalker or somebody trying to scare you.”

  “I know that, Dean. But I don’t know where to start. Luke made me promise to call if I needed him.”

  “It goes without saying that you can do the same with us. I don’t want anything to happen to you. You’ve suffered enough from this guy. It’s time he was stopped.” He paused a moment. “Maybe you don’t need to ride until we know for sure what’s going on.”