Fire Mountain

by Vickie McKeehan

  “But you hear stuff every day about somebody getting ripped off because they trusted someone they met online,” Leia pointed out.

  “Ah, yes. Online dating. Forever immortalized as cute and funny in You’ve Got Mail. Before scammers found their niche.”

  Leia shifted in her seat. “I cringe whenever someone mentions they’re using it to find love. I have a slew of friends who swear what they found is more like heartache and trouble.”

  “Not to rat him out or anything, but before Luke met Lianne, he tried it and got burned. He met this woman on Facebook—who, after only knowing her for a few days online—claimed she needed a thousand dollars for a new phone.”

  “I didn’t know that. Luke never said a word. But I’m not surprised. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just one more story to add to the long list of failed attempts, proving technology is not meant for finding your soulmate. What a joke. Look, in Talia’s case, this could be the worst. If Brandt did do something to her, it’s worse than taking her money. He might’ve gotten rid of her for good. And that idea just horrifies me.”

  “Well. Yeah. Could be. The marriage didn’t last very long, did it? You said she was unhappy. You’re the one who said you’d give it six months.”

  “It barely lasted that long.”

  “Did you say anything to Dale or maybe Jimmy about any of your suspicions while we were gone?”

  “No. And Zeb’s no help at all. He keeps flapping his gums about jurisdiction and how—if it didn’t happen on the reservation—it’s not his deal. Anyway, I knew Lando would be getting back home soon, so I hoped it would jumpstart something.”

  “Jeez, what a crappy Monday. First the plane crash and now this. Want to come in? I need to check on the dogs before I run by the shop.”

  “Nah, I need to get to the restaurant. I’m making smoked salmon with artichoke hearts for a book club meeting at noon. The appetizers have to be rolled by hand and chilled for four hours ahead of time.” She tapped her digital clock on the dash. “As it stands, I’ll barely get in under the wire.”

  “Book club? I didn’t get an invite.”

  “Sure, you did. Check your email. No one would dare leave out the mayor.”

  Gemma found that funny. “Okay but no way am I making it to a meeting where I haven’t read the book.”

  “That’s okay. It was one of those boring Russian classics that make Doctor Zhivago look like a fast-moving romance.”

  Gemma chuckled and reached for the door handle. “Let me guess, Elnora Kidman’s pick. She’s a sucker for those philosophical War and Peace literary discussions.”

  “You weren’t there for it, but War and Peace was soundly voted down.”

  “No surprise there. I gotta run, too. Thanks for the ride. Save me some of that salmon, will you? I’ll try to pull Lianne away for a lunch one day this week—all three of us. Clear your calendar.”

  As Gemma rounded the back of the car on her way up to the double front doors, she saw that Leia had rolled down her window. “What?”

  “Could you mention Talia to Lando?”

  “Why don’t you do it? Send him a text.”

  “Because. I want him to take it seriously. He’ll just blow me off.”

  “He will not.”

  “Please.”

  “Oh, okay. But you and Lando really need to sit down and work out your issues. I won’t play the go-between forever. In fact, I’m tired of it.”

  “I hear you. After the wedding. I promise.”

  “I’m holding you to that. By the way, I brought you back a Maui goodie bag filled with stuff just for you if you’re interested.”

  “Aww. Now you’re just being mean. Bring it by the restaurant after the book meeting.” And with that Leia stepped on the gas.

  Gemma watched her drive away, feeling caught in the middle. And not for the first time. Would brother and sister ever stop their bickering? “They need to stop this petty feud,” she muttered aloud. “You’d think two-thirds of triplets would’ve learned to get along by this time.”

  She turned back to the house and stuck her key in the lock. Since childhood, she could always enter through this vaulted archway and feel like she was stepping into an old mission or church, hacienda-style.

  The dogs always slid on the stone-tile floor to get to her and now was no different. With tails wagging, body bumps from Rufus, and a nuzzling wet snout from Rolo, the dogs greeted her like she’d been away at war and this was the ultimate welcome home.

  She ate it up.

  “Okay, guys, I get it. You’re glad to see me. How about this? We all pile into that old panel truck at the shop and drive around town. It’s good advertising. It also tells people I’m back and ready to get down to business, mayor-wise. Then we’ll stop by City Hall to check out my office, which we’re redecorating like I want. I’ll go dig up some cool stuff out of the solarium, including lots of plants and flowers. I’ll decorate the mayor’s office and fix it up, fill it with greenery and lots of bright colors. I’ll show them all that I’m not some joke. I’ll show all the naysayers that I can do the job.”

  As she went to pick out items from the solarium, she decided she’d be the best mayor Coyote Wells had seen since Paloma Coyote held the office. Which meant she had to take Lando’s advice, sit down with her grandmother to find out all the woman’s secrets for running City Hall like a well-oiled machine.

  Still trampling through the scene of the plane crash, Lando worked multiple issues and scenarios. But nothing added up. The NTSB had already confirmed that the Cessna 340 suffered some type of catastrophic explosion in midair after it had taken off from the airstrip. But was it mechanical or something more sinister?

  While technicians bagged the burned body of Peter Woodson and loaded it into a county van, Lando followed the medical examiner all the way to the vehicle. “Don’t forget to take his fingerprints.”

  Dr. Jeff Tuttle was the county coroner. Approaching forty, Tuttle hadn’t bothered to shave. This morning he had stubble on his face and wasn’t in the best of moods to take advice. He scowled over at Lando. “I know how to do my job, Chief. NTSB wants a copy of whatever it is I find. They already think the plane was sabotaged.”

  “Same thing they said to me. Did you know Peter Woodson?”

  “Nope. Never met him. But Tully Beacham said he worked for the government. Tully and Peter used to throw back a few at the pub.”

  “So, Woodson and the fire chief were tight? I did not know that. I’ll need to track down Woodson’s family and notify them of his death.”

  “Then Tully would be the one to know about next of kin along with more details about Woodson’s job in DC.”

  “Federal agent is the prevailing rumor. But I don’t know what branch of the government Woodson worked for. Do you?”

  “Nope. I’m out of here. The longer I stand around jawing with you, the sooner you’ll start bugging me about the autopsy results. Don’t even think about it until tomorrow. By the way, how was the honeymoon?”

  Lando cracked a grin. “No complaints.”

  “And Maui? I’ve wanted to go there for years.”

  “Maui is a thing of natural beauty. You going alone?”

  “Nope. Got me a new woman in my life these days and she’s pressuring me to take her someplace nice when I get vacation in November.”

  “Where did a dog like you meet a new female, one who hasn’t heard everything about your sordid reputation?”

  “Where else? Online. She lives in Redding. There’s a whole new segment of the population out there just waiting to be tapped. Pun intended.”

  Lando shook his head. “Just get me the fingerprints, lover boy.”

  “Chief, you’ll be the first one I call.”

  “I better be.” Looking around at the thinning crowd, he spotted Zeb strolling through the throng of reporters. He couldn’t believe that the tribal cop would be his brother-in-law in less than a month.

  “What’s the word?” Zeb asked.

&n
bsp; Lando held up a plastic evidence baggie containing a passport-size, leather-bound wallet open to a photo ID and a driver’s license. But the name on the photo ID wasn’t Peter Woodson. Next to the license was a scorched lanyard that held a shiny gold and blue badge with an official seal, including the eagle on top. “ATF-issued ID along with a Maryland driver’s license. Robert Sykes, age forty-eight. Dale found it in a bag that hadn’t been blown apart like the others, stuffed in the side pocket in the one suitcase that held his clothes.”

  “Who is Robert Sykes?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know. That picture doesn’t even resemble Peter Woodson.”

  “Doesn’t sound like Mr. Woodson was going for a nice quiet flight before breakfast, does it? What was he into? And was he on the run?”

  “All beginning questions to a mystery. We are a suspicious bunch, aren’t we?”

  “That’s because we see the darker side of humanity almost daily. Do you suppose it was a bomb that took the plane down?”

  “The NTSB seems to be heading in that direction,” Lando said, glancing back at the wreckage. “The debris field seems to back that up. It’s not like it was a small area where the plane nosed into the mountain leaving a centralized impact in one spot. Instead, we have debris scattered in a wide radius where pieces of the plane fell from the sky when it blew up.”

  “While I was eating breakfast I saw the bomb-sniffing dogs arrive.”

  “The dogs hit on several pieces of airplane near where the engine was located, which raises a whole lotta questions rattling around in my head. Am I looking at the suspicious death of Robert Sykes, a retired ATF agent from Maryland? Or am I looking at the death of Peter Woodson, an ordinary retired guy from Coyote Wells? Don’t ATF agents usually retire to Florida?”

  Zeb grinned. “You wish.”

  “Yeah, well, something tells me you’re mighty glad about this not coming down on your side of the mountain.”

  “Sue me because I don’t like dealing with the Feds.”

  “No, I hear ya. But now I’m stuck with a big mystery and no answers.” Lando noticed Zeb had zoned out. “What’s up with you? Something’s wrong.”

  “Nothing. It’ll all work itself out.”

  “Keep telling yourself that. In about ten years maybe you’ll believe it.”

  “I didn’t want to say anything. But lately, Leia and I are fighting all the time. It’s all we do. And that’s not like us. She’s driving me nuts about this Talia Lewis woman going missing, something that happened while you and Gemma were living it up in Maui.”

  “We lived it up, too. Because we both knew we’d be coming back to chaos. Turns out, we were right. Who’s Talia Lewis?”

  “A friend of Leia’s, married about six months to a tech guy from Silicon Valley, married some rich guy she met online. Lives over on Baffin Bay.”

  “Uh-oh. Red flags and online dating. Did you check it out?”

  “How would I do that?” Zeb snapped. “Why would you ask me that? Coyote Wells is not my jurisdiction. It’s yours. But hey, Leia doesn’t seem to get that either.”

  “Whoa. Is that what you’ve been squabbling about…Talia Lewis going missing?”

  “For a week now that’s all I’ve heard. I’ve seen a side to Leia I’ve never seen before. She won’t listen to reason; doesn’t understand I can’t go banging on the guy’s door just because she wants me to. We fight about it, makeup, and it maybe lasts a few hours until the next row. She blames it on wedding nerves, but I’m beginning to wonder if she isn’t getting cold feet.”

  Lando slapped him on the back. “Bro, no wedding goes off without fireworks beforehand. It builds up. That includes having second thoughts. I’ll check into this missing woman for you. Maybe that will calm down my ill-tempered sister.”

  “What makes it so hard to get along with the person you love before you tie the knot?”

  “No idea. But it’s a ritual you can count on.”

  “If I had my way we’d just run off to Vegas.”

  “Your parents wouldn’t like that any more than my mom would.”

  “And there’s the problem, trying to make family happy.”

  “Welcome to relationship insanity.”

  “What would you know about it? Gemma doesn’t have anything to do with her mother.”

  “True. But there’s still Van, her half-brother, and his family. You should’ve heard Gemma’s reaction when I dared to ask Van a tough question about a body found on his land.”

  “I remember that. I guess it’s territorial…and loyalty. What I can’t figure is why Leia doesn’t seem to get my job? After all this time, she sees cop and thinks I just go knock down doors whenever she demands it.”

  “Ah, unreasonable demands, that’s the Leia I know. Look, give me some details on this missing woman, enough to get me started.”

  “Thanks.” He handed Lando his phone. “This is a picture of Talia Lewis. Her husband reported her missing a week ago. Says they had a fight and claims she walked out of the house, got in her car and left. He hasn’t seen her since.”

  Lando studied the picture of a cute redhead with big green eyes. “The old-wife-storms-out-and-is-never-seen-again story, eh? I’m afraid to ask how it is you know all that?”

  “You know where I’m headed with this. Leia went over to Talia’s house and banged on the door. That was Sunday afternoon before the man showed up to report her missing last Monday. Apparently, Talia hadn’t been answering Leia’s texts or voicemails, so she did something about it. Leia confronted the husband and demanded to know why. It was Leia who not-so-gently got in the guy’s face and suggested he file a missing person report.”

  “So if I check my desk, there should be a file already started?”

  “Should. Yeah. I called Dale about it after Leia came barreling through the door at home yelling about her confrontation with the husband.”

  “Okay. I’ll talk to Dale. What’s the husband’s name?”

  “Brandt Lewis from San Jose.”

  “I see. One thing bothers me right off. You said this guy is rich, right?”

  “That’s what Talia told Leia.”

  “Why then are they living on Baffin Bay? I mean, let’s face it, the houses there are cute, but they aren’t exactly worthy of Silicon Valley types, now are they? In fact, the Baffin Bay neighborhood is what Silicon Valley types would knock down in a heartbeat and replace it with the biggest mansion they could afford.”

  Zeb looked gobsmacked. “Holy crap. You’re right. I’ve been so bummed by Leia’s behavior that I’m not doing my job.”

  “Get real, Zeb. You were right. Coyote Wells isn’t your jurisdiction. Not your problem. If this man did do something to his wife, Dale should’ve been all over it.” Lando looked around for his patrol officer. Spotting Dale, deep in conversation with Jimmy, Lando hollered for both officers to join him.

  “What’s up?” Dale asked.

  “The Talia Lewis case,” Lando began. “Where are we with locating her? Any leads on her whereabouts?”

  Jimmy shifted his feet. “I’m the one who took the guy’s report. Me? I think he’s hiding something.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because I ran a routine background on him. Brandt Lewis has quite the rep for draining bank accounts and leaving them dry. Maybe this time he went too far.”

  “Did you lean on him?”

  “I did. But he lawyered up. Some dude out of Crescent City.”

  “I don’t like what I’m hearing,” Lando admitted, concern in his voice. “Did Brandt Lewis put up posters? Did he even look for her?”

  “Not that I’m aware of,” Dale said.

  Lando set his jaw. “Did we talk to Talia’s family?”

  Dale cleared his throat. “I called and talked to Talia’s dad. He hasn’t seen Talia for two months. According to the father, Brandt had spent the last few months keeping Talia to himself, screening her calls, keeping tabs on her every move. That’s his side, of course. T
alia’s behavior could mean that she didn’t want to have anything to do with her parents. Who knows?”

  “We’re supposed to find out those kinds of things, Dale,” Lando snapped. He pivoted to Jimmy. “I want a BOLO on her and her car. Check every hotel up and down the coast, north and south, for two hundred miles. See if she’s registered at any of them. Then call hospitals and county jails. See if she’s there. We’re a week behind. Now we need to catch up.”

  “Good to have you back, Chief,” Jimmy said before heading to his patrol car.

  “We’re on it,” Dale promised as he trailed off to update Payce on the situation.

  Zeb turned to Lando and let out a sigh. “This might be my fault.”

  “How’s that? Could you have beaten this Brandt guy up for Leia that afternoon to get information out of him before he lawyered up? No, you wouldn’t have done that. It’s crappy circumstances for Talia, Zeb. That’s all it is. It sounds like to me she’d gone missing the week prior to him going to the police. If that’s true, what took him so long to report her gone?”

  “You’re going easy on me. I’m not sure why.”

  “Stop beating yourself up and help me out. Because if Lewis did anything to his wife, we’ll get him. He won’t get away with it.”

  “Love to. Behind the scenes, which is what I’ve done plenty of other times.”

  Lando finally smiled. “We make a good team. Maybe we’ve spoiled Gemma and Leia with our brilliance.”

  Zeb’s lips curved. “I am glad you’re back. You might be the one person who’ll keep me sane during the run-up to the wedding.”

  3

  Gemma walked into the shop and breathed in the sweet smells that came from chocolate-making. Across the room, she saw Lianne behind the counter pouring the latest concoction into molds. A swell of pride moved through her. She’d carried on Gram’s business. She thought of it as a gift. Gratitude was all she could muster at the moment.

  “Are those tears?” Lianne shouted as she put down the confectionary funnel and raced across the store to wrap Gemma up in a hug. “What’s wrong? Did something happen?”