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The same carousel of questions ran endlessly around her mind. What had she really seen? What sort of thing would involve so much blood, the docks and the local sheriff’s department? Did the man giving chase recognize her? If so, what would happen next?
She’d watched the news on the edge of her seat, waiting for reports of whatever had happened at the docks, but there were none. Nothing in the morning paper, either.
A sharp pounding on the front door nearly sent her out the back. She inched across the living room and peeked through the curtains. Her little brother, Ryan, stood on the porch rubbing his palms together and puffing into his hands. The temperature must’ve dropped after she’d left the docks.
She opened the door with a forced smile, then jerked him inside. “Hey, what are you doing here?” She secured the door behind him and flipped the lock, hoping to look more normal than she felt.
He dragged his gaze from the locked door to her. “You said I could borrow your truck. My new roommate is moving in.” He tented his dark brows, green eyes flashing in suspicion. “Are you okay?”
Ryan was nineteen and a sophomore at the university one town over. He was a full seven years her junior, with a misplaced big brother attitude. She’d helped raise him, and not the other way around.
“Yep.” She tugged her ear and hefted a passing cat into her arms. The sight of her feline family usually brought her great comfort, but today they only delivered flashbacks of the docks.
“I thought you didn’t have to be at work for an hour,” Ryan said.
“I don’t.”
He scanned her freshly straightened living room, the result of too much time and anxiety with zero sleep. “Since when are you up and dressed by now, and why is your place so clean? What’s going on?”
Rita’s cheeks ached from the forced congeniality. What she wanted to do was cry. “Nothing.” She dropped the act and pinched the bridge of her nose with one hand while cradling her kitty with the other. “I had trouble sleeping. Can I get you some coffee? Are you hungry?” Her gaze jumped again to the hands of the clock that never seemed to move. Going to work early wasn’t a bad thing. It was normal, really. Not for her, but lots of other people did it. Maybe she could finally make some headway with the files on her desk, and the distraction would keep her mind off the slew of questions that she had no way of answering.
Ryan’s hand danced before her. A US Army key ring swung from one finger. “Did you hear anything I just said?”
“What?”
He cocked a hip and dropped his arm. “Did someone hurt you?”
“No. Of course not.” That was funny. Self-defense was a mandatory course of education in the Horn family, had been even before they’d lost their mother. Though no amount of self-defense training could’ve saved her from the drunk driver who’d taken her from them.
Rita dropped the cat on the couch. “Let me grab my purse.” Her breath caught as she pulled back the zipper, revealing the pen she’d found at the docks inside. She’d considered throwing it away when she found it in her coat pocket, but decided to keep it until she knew what had happened. Maybe it was evidence.
“Give me one more minute,” she called into the living room.
Rita grabbed a sandwich bag from the lazy Susan and wrapped the pen in tissues before stuffing it inside. If being trampled by thirty cats at an abandoned dock wasn’t contamination enough, one night in her disaster of a handbag had surely ruined the pen’s chances of being useful. But with technology these days, maybe someone could do something with it. If only she knew who to give it to or if she should. She rubbed her forehead and swallowed a lump of emotion. Was it evidence? Was she crazy? Maybe both. She sealed the bag and stuffed it back into her purse.
“Found it.” She dropped the bag on the couch beside her white Himalayan rescue. The other two cats leaped onto the sofa and stuck their noses into her bag.
She presented the key to her new truck on one palm. “Take care of my baby.”
He made the trade with enthusiasm, dropping the key to his twenty-year-old yellow hatchback into her newly empty hand. “And you take care of Suzie Sunshine.”
Rita snorted and dragged one finger in a small X shape over her heart. “Do you need money for gas or lunch? How are your grades?”
Ryan backed toward the door. “I’m good. Grades are fine. I am meeting the guys for a cram session, though. So I should get going. I’ve got two morning exams. All those professors want me to learn things.” He pretended to choke himself.
Rita clapped slowly, and a genuine smile formed on her lips. “The future of America, ladies and gentlemen.” Education had always been high on Rita’s priority list, but never on Ryan’s. It had been all she could do to convince him to get a degree before enlisting in the army alongside their father. With a degree he could at least enter the service as an officer and be prepared for a career afterward.
He turned for the door.
“Wait.” Rita pried the pile of cats from her handbag and set them aside. “I’ll walk you out.” She stroked the kitties’ heads and scratched their chins. “Try to behave.”
A thick fog had settled in after the night’s heavy rains, making it impossible to see the stop sign at the end of the block and adding a Hitchcockian feel to her already pear-shaped world.
Ryan angled her silver Ford smoothly out of the driveway.
She coaxed his rusty hatchback to life. The stench of exhaust bit her nose and the air.
Ten minutes later, she set her purse on the municipal building’s security scanner and nodded at the guards. She collected her things on the other side and walked quickly away, feeling irrationally conspicuous, knowing the pen lay inside.
Her heels snapped and cracked against polished marble as she crossed the cavernous foyer and climbed the wide, sweeping staircase. Cade County wasn’t small, but it was rural, and the population was low, making one grand building a sufficient hub for the courthouse and local government offices, including hers at the County Treasurer. Oil paintings of the governor, senator and US presidents lined the second-floor hallways.
Rita ducked into her office and dropped onto her rolling chair with determination. Once she cleared the clutter from her head and desk, she’d give the sheriff’s department a call. Anonymously. She’d been trespassing, after all, and she wouldn’t be in this predicament if she’d obeyed the law and heeded the sign. She dropped her head into waiting palms. What would she say? She suspected that something bad happened? The storm had surely erased any evidence, and hadn’t a deputy been there last night?
Why, yes. He had. And she’d run from him. A groan escaped her lips.
“Good morning, Rita!” A perky voice split the silence.
Rita jerked upright. “Hello.”
The receptionist stared expectantly. “You’re here bright and early.” She fluffed giant blond hair and straightened a spray of stiff bangs.
“Hoping to catch up.” Rita motioned to the pile of folders on her desk.
“Any luck?”
“Not really.” She shouldn’t have come in today. The office didn’t feel like a distraction. It felt like a prison. “I think I’m going to make a coffee run before I get started.” Maybe a little fresh air would help. “Can I get you something?”
The woman raised her steaming mug higher. “Kinda got that covered.”
“Right. Sorry.” Rita grabbed her coat and purse. “I won’t be long.” She straightened her white silk blouse and black pencil skirt, then hustled downstairs, taking the side exit into a public garden to catch her breath.
A slight drizzle forced her to stay near the door, where a small overhang served as shelter. The benches were wet. The ground waterlogged. Narrow puddles filled the spaces between walkway paving stones. She inhaled the cool, misty air and shook her hands out at the wrists. She didn’t need fresh air or caffeine. She needed answers, and the only way she’d get them was to call the police like she should have done last night. It was better to report something that turned out to be nothing than to not speak up and find out later that her call could have helped someone.
She marched back inside with resolve and climbed the stairs to her office. Her steps slowed at the sight of a deputy speaking with the receptionist inside her glass office doors. If she truly planned to report what she’d seen, this was the time, but her muscles seemed to atrophy at the thought. There was something unsettling about his stance. She hadn’t seen the faces of the men at the docks, but this deputy seemed familiar in a way that raised the hair on her arms.
She slipped into an alcove and waited. When the deputy reappeared on the steps to the building’s front doors, she dialed the main line to the receptionist.
“Cade County Treasurer. This is Cyndi.”
“Hi, Cyndi, this is Rita.”
“Rita? Talk about timing! A deputy sheriff was just in here looking for you. Did he find you? I told him you went for coffee. Probably at that diner around the corner. Is that where you went?”
A cold sweat broke over Rita’s brow. “Yes. Did he say what he wanted?”
“No. Only that he’d hoped to catch you.”
“Did you get his name?”
Cyndi paused. “No. Honey, are you in some kind of trouble?”
Rita moved double time down the rear staircase. “No. Not at all. I’m feeling sick, though. I think that’s why I was so distracted earlier. It’s really hitting me now.”
“Oh, well, then you should go home. I can’t afford to get sick. Remember when I got that stomach flu last spring?”
How could she forget? Anytime anyone complained about so much as a headache in Cyndi’s presence, they were reminded of her personal near-death experience in March. “Mmm-hmm. You know what? I think I have that.”
“Oh, dear.”
“Yep. I’m going to head home. Rest.” Rita jogged through the door and across the employee lot toward Ryan’s decrepit compact. “Cyndi? I’ve got to go. I think I’m going to be sick.”
“You need lots of fluids.”
“Okay.” She dropped behind the steering wheel and gunned the little engine to life. What she really needed was to go home and pull herself together. “Thank you. Goodbye.”
The phone rang in her hand, and she tossed it aside. The only person she’d answer for today was Ryan, and that wasn’t his number. Everyone else could get in line.
She made a bunch of paranoid and probably unnecessary turns before arriving on her street almost twenty minutes later. Several neighbors stood on her lawn beside a cruiser in the driveway. Fear and panic bubbled in her core.
She cranked Ryan’s window down and hooked an elbow over the frame. “Mrs. Wilcox,” she stage-whispered. An elderly woman turned to face her. The woman hustled in her direction.
“What’s going on?” Rita asked, sinking low in the driver’s seat. Her tummy bubbled with anxiety at the sight of a cruiser at her home.
“Betty was jogging past and saw the cats in your yard.” She pointed to a woman in hot pink running gear and a matching sun visor. “She recognized them because they spend so much time in your window.”
“My cats were outside?” Rita gasped. “Are they okay?”
“Well, yes,” she said, glancing back at Rita’s home. “Betty collected the little lovebugs, then knocked on your door and it opened. The whole place was a mess, so she dropped them inside, pulled the door shut, then came to me, and I called the cops.”
A rock formed in Rita’s throat. “My house is a mess?” she croaked.
The older woman bobbed her head. “Trashed. The deputy was here in minutes. Must’ve been in the area.”
Her heart hammered and her pulse beat in her ears. Someone had been in her home.
Anda deputy was in there now.
Chapter Three (#ub3f5438b-1665-5899-846f-dd74f072bd4c)
Cole had gritted his teeth and dragged his heels when the call came in from Dispatch about a possible B and E on Maple. Leaving West alone with an active murder investigation seemed irresponsible, but one of the problems in a department with only six deputies was coverage. The next man’s shift wouldn’t start for two hours unless West called him in sooner. Meanwhile, the homeowner on Maple had left work early and wasn’t answering her phone. Cole had reluctantly made the trip to check on things.
The front door was unlocked with no signs of tampering, but the place had been destroyed. The neighbors hadn’t seen or heard anything out of the ordinary, but every item in sight was upended, overturned or partially disassembled. Bookshelves were emptied. Drawers were dumped. Yet the television and computer were completely untouched.
Not a very effective robbery. So why break in? And where was the homeowner? He double-checked the name on his notepad. Rita Horn. Maybe this was revenge. Something personal. Maybe the work of a jaded ex or wronged family member.
Whatever it was, it was weird.
He scrubbed a palm over his face. First a body had turned up in the river, and now there was a break-in east of the railroad tracks. In a neighborhood known for its distinct lack of crimes. His exhale was long and slow. What was going on with this day?
The tip of his boot nicked a fallen photograph, and he pulled the thick white frame off the floor. “Well, what do you know?” He grinned. He’d recognize those smart hazel eyes anywhere.
The jaw-dropping redhead worked at the municipal building. He’d taken notice of her last fall while delivering a criminal to court through the rear alley entrance. She’d been handing out homemade sandwiches and bottled water to a throng of homeless people at lunchtime. Her floral wrap dress and high heels had been a stunning contrast to the dirty and disheveled men and women in her care. If memory served him, she’d called several of the people by their names.
He set the frame on the fireplace mantel, feeling much better about leaving West at the docks.
“Here she is!” A voice called from the lawn. “She’s okay!”
Cole turned on his heel and went to save the day.
“Miss Horn?” He strode in the direction of a rusty yellow car. “I’m Deputy Cole Garrett. Can you please park your vehicle?”
She nodded behind the driver’s-side window.
Her white-knuckle grip and wide eyes worried him. Current circumstances aside, Rita was the poster child for calm and centered. He’d started noticing her every time he made a trip to the courts after that day in the alley. Unfortunately, they’d never made eye contact, and unlike most women in town, she didn’t seem to know he existed.
The car rolled slowly to the curb and idled several moments before the engine settled.
She got out, closed the door and moved cautiously in Cole’s direction. “What’s going on?” Her gaze darted nervously over the scene, catching on his cruiser, then the patch on his jacket.
A gray-haired woman popped up at her side. “I was scared when you didn’t answer the phone. Your office said you’d left, but you didn’t answer.”
“I’m sorry, Doris.” Rita soothed the elderly woman. “I wasn’t feeling well. I’m not myself today.”
“I just thank my stars you weren’t home when this happened,” Doris said.
“What happened, exactly?” Rita asked again, moving her attention to Cole.
“Your neighbors reported a possible break-in about thirty minutes ago. When did you say you left the municipal building?”
Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know I was at the municipal building?”
Cole put on his most charming smile, hoping to soothe the sudden alarm in her tone. “I’ve seen you there.”
Her cheeks darkened, but she didn’t comment.
It was none of his business, but Rita Horn didn’t look sick. In fact, she looked fantastic. Her skirt and blouse fit in all the right places, accentuating her curves without giving away the details.
Man, he would love to know her details.
She crossed her arms over her chest, drawing the silky material of her blouse tighter.
Dear Lord.
“I went in early.”
Cole swept a hand toward her front door and forced his gaze there, as well. “Would you like to see if anything is missing?” He moved onto the stoop, hoping she’d follow. Honestly, she looked like she might get back in her car and flee. “Any chance you forgot to lock the door this morning?”
“No.” Her sweet voice sounded behind him. “I even double-checked the knob.”
