Stella let herself look at him, even though it was difficult. She had to know. She wasn’t a coward. It wasn’t as if his expression ever changed. He was a master at giving nothing away.
“I’m broken, Stella, and I don’t let anyone near me. It’s not a good idea. But you … you managed to work your way in. Maybe because we’re both a little broken. You never ask. You never push. You don’t mind silence. You just accept me. I came to these mountains and found the first true peace I’ve had in years. And then the mountains gave me you. Just being close to you brings me peace. If that’s all I ever get, I’ll take it. You offer more, and I’ll go for it in a heartbeat and never be stupid enough to throw it away.”
As romantic declarations went, it wasn’t up there with Shakespeare, but Stella didn’t need a poet. Sam kept his word. If he said he’d stay, he would. If he declared she was it for him, he meant it.
She nodded her head, the smile back. “I want you to stay, Sam. I’m not sure how good I’ll be at any kind of real relationship other than what we have, but I’d like to try.”
“Wasn’t planning on leaving you, Stella, unless you kicked me out or you took on a man. You do know that Sean and Edward are both certified scuba divers and Jason and Bale have been taking lessons from them.”
She hadn’t known that. “Great. Maybe they’re all serial killers.” She rubbed her cheekbone. “It would be like them to decide to murder a bunch of people just to see if they could get away with it.”
“We have to call the sheriff and let him know what happened,” Sam said. “You’ll need to write down as many details as you remember and sketch out what you can. I’ll write out as much as I can remember too.”
“Sam, will your ID hold up?” She really hated asking.
He nodded. “Yeah, no problem. It’s all good. I am Sam Rossi.”
CHAPTER SIX
Griffen Cauldrey was the local sheriff’s deputy who came out to take their report. Stella knew him very well. Over the last few years, she’d had her share of calls to the sheriff. Dead bodies turned up at various locations in a resort the size of hers, mostly drownings. Alcohol and water didn’t go very well together.
Griffen had been with his wife, Mercy, fifteen years, and they had twin sons referred to by their father as the “little hellions,” but it was always said with affection. The boys were ten now and could be a handful, but they were respectful and definitely minded their parents, especially Griffen, when he called them to order. Like most families in Mono and Inyo Counties, they loved outdoor sports, and Griffen and Mercy brought their children up with the rules of safety.
Griffen examined the scene in his usual meticulous way, asking them both questions and doubling back without seeming to. He took several pictures of the back of Sam’s head and then insisted that he get medical attention, wanting it documented.
“You know better, Stella,” he chided. “He should have been seen immediately.”
She nodded and indicated Sam with her chin. “Tell him, not me. I figured he might listen to you better than me. He’s tough as nails.”
“I’ve called on Search and Rescue to help with searching boats and rigs for scuba gear and also to talk to anyone who might have witnessed someone coming out of the lake in scuba gear. The chances of finding them at this point are pretty slim, but maybe we’ll get lucky and someone will have seen something. We just don’t have the manpower for something like this. It’s all volunteer, and by the time they get here and I get them organized, this man is going to be long gone. You have enemies, Sam?”
Sam shrugged. “Not that I know of.”
“Tell me again why you came out so early in the morning.” Griffen looked around the campsite with all the tents set up.
She sighed. It was her third telling. “We were going to camp here and we’d set up our tents and left everything here, but we went to the Grill last night. Vienna and Harlow had a shift at the hospital and didn’t get off until late, so they weren’t going to join us until morning, but Raine, Zahra, Shabina and I were supposed to stay here last night. I realized we were all drinking too much, so I asked Sam if he’d be our sober driver and gave him the keys to my rig. I woke up early, talked to Bernice at the boat rentals and she told me Sam spent the night here in order to make sure none of our things were taken. I felt really awful that he had to do that when he already had to drive us back to the resort and we were a little out of control.”
She made a face and sent a look of apology to Sam, hoping she hadn’t made too big a fool of herself. As always, there was little expression on his face, although there could have been a hint of amusement in his dark eyes. If there was, it was gone almost immediately.
“I got here, let Bailey out and was hurrying toward the lake. Mostly, I was concerned with getting coffee. I hadn’t had any yet and Sam always makes some. He was fishing and was out wading in the reeds. He suddenly went down hard and then was underwater. I didn’t think, I just went in. That’s when I realized someone else was in the water, holding Sam under. He was wearing a wet suit. He hit me here.” She pointed to her cheekbone. “And kicked me here.” She pointed to just under her breasts. “Then he was gone. I wasn’t even thinking about identifying anything on him. Just getting to Sam. I thought he might be unconscious.”
She didn’t want to relive those moments again, under the cold water when she thought Sam was drowning and that dark sinister figure had loomed large, rocketing toward her so fast she had nearly somersaulted backward. He had been gone before she’d had time to think.
“Why didn’t he try to kill me, Griffen?” She sat up straighter, frowning. “It wouldn’t have been that difficult. He had on scuba gear. He could have held me underwater.”
“I wasn’t unconscious.” Sam provided an answer. “I’d pulled my knife from my belt. Granted, I was slow, maybe a little disoriented from the blow to my head, but I was aware of the attack and him going after you.”
She hadn’t even seen the knife in Sam’s fist. Now that she tried to pull up details, she realized it was Sam who was really the one dragging her out of the water, more than her dragging him out.
“I guess I wasn’t all that heroic.” She sent Griffen a little grin and wrapped her hands around her to-go mug. “I hadn’t had my coffee yet or I would have been much sharper.”
Griffen spent a few more minutes with them and then left to organize a search for the assailant. Local volunteers were used to coming together to help law enforcement when needed for various tasks. In this case, they would work in pairs, both on and off the water, searching for anyone who might have seen anything that would lead to the identification of the assailant.
HARLOW ARRIVED AT the campsite to take a look at the knot on the back of Sam’s head. “Vienna is helping Griffen send all the volunteers out. Denver and Bruce are really upset that they weren’t here. Denver says he was supposed to be fishing with you this morning, Sam, but he was a little hungover. He set out to come but had to stop several times because he was sick.” She tried not to laugh as she said it. Everyone knew Denver wasn’t at his best if he drank too much.
She had a little first-aid kit with her, which she opened and handed to Sam. “Naturally, the two of you would just be sitting here as if nothing happened, drinking coffee. Does anything faze you, Sam?”
“If Stella doesn’t get her coffee in the morning.”
There was a brief silence. Harlow looked up from where she was gently moving her fingers around the swelling at the back of Sam’s head. “Did you just make a joke? I don’t think I’ve ever heard you make a joke.”
“It isn’t a joke if Stella doesn’t have coffee.”
“That’s so true,” Harlow agreed.
“I’m right here, in case anyone hasn’t noticed,” Stella pointed out. “Sheesh. A little crack on the head and Sam thinks he’s a comedian.”
“I’ve always been funny,” Sam said without a change of expression. “It didn’t take a knock on my head to make me that way.”
Harlow burst out laughing. She shook her head. “I had no idea. I can’t wait to tell Vienna. The mere idea that Sam can crack a joke is going to slay her.”
“Don’t encourage him, Harlow.” Stella put her head back and looked up at the drifting clouds. It was good to be alive. “And Vienna doesn’t even have good sense. She’s a cat person.”
That made Harlow laugh more. “What does that mean? Cats have way more sense than dogs do. Bailey would have jumped into that cold water to save your ass and so would my silly little beagle, Misha. Vienna’s cat, however, would have turned her nose up in pure disdain. She would have known better.”
“She’s got a point,” Sam said. “Bailey would have.”
Bailey lifted his head and looked up at Stella with his brown eyes. She scratched behind his ears. “Because you’re so loyal, right, boy? You would have saved me. That cat of Vienna’s would have let her drown.”
“Are you talking baby talk to that huge animal?” Harlow demanded. “Isn’t he supposed to be some badass protection dog?”
“I don’t talk baby talk to my dog,” Stella denied. She did, all the time.
“She does,” Sam confirmed, and reached out to take her hand right in front of Harlow.
His hand was warm. His fingers strong. Whatever Harlow was going to say was cut off mid-sentence when she saw him take Stella’s hand. It was the first time Sam had actually made any kind of real public claim on her, if one could call hand-holding a public claim. Sam didn’t seem the type of man to hold hands. He was just too reserved for any kind of public acknowledgments or displays of affection.
Harlow bent her head closer to Sam’s wound. “This isn’t as bad as it could have been. Head wounds tend to bleed a lot and make things seem far worse than they are. Do you have blurred vision?”
“No. A bit of a headache at the back of my head where the knot is. It’s centered right there. More of a throbbing, like I can feel my heartbeat there.”
Stella was surprised that Sam was so forthcoming and matter-of-fact. Harlow asked him a few more questions and he answered, but now his thumb moved over the back of Stella’s hand, feathering back and forth in a little caress that sent strange little darts of fire running through her bloodstream straight to her deepest core, making her all too aware of him. Just that small gesture.
She didn’t dare look at him. It had been too long. Way too long. She didn’t do relationships and she wasn’t certain how to react. The questions Harlow asked Sam seemed far away. Stella heard Harlow say she didn’t even have to use glue to close the cut, but after that, Stella concentrated on the way the single gesture, so small, made her body come alive. Or maybe it was the fact that she could sit in her camp chair in the early morning hours with the sun shining on Sunrise Lake, bathing the water in gorgeous colors, knowing Sam was alive. Knowing the killer didn’t get his way and the man she cared about wasn’t his first victim. There was no first victim.
“Earth to Stella,” Harlow called. “That lake mesmerizes you. I need you to listen to me. Sam never does and he needs to take antibiotics. All of them until they’re finished. We don’t know what was on that rock or in the water. I’ve given him a shot to get started and put antibiotic cream on the wound to be safe.”
She held out the tube to Stella, forcing her to pull her hand away from Sam or put down her coffee. Sam solved her dilemma by letting her hand go. She took the tube from Harlow.
“You need to put this on the cut a couple of times a day for two days. Then you want it open to the air.”
Sam reached out almost lazily and nearly managed to get the tube of antibiotic cream from Stella before she realized his intent.
“Woman.” There was a growl in his voice.
“Man.” She glared at him. The growl had an effect on her, but it wasn’t intimidation.
“I’m not five.”
“That’s the problem. Harlow knows you can’t be trusted to take care of wounds because you think you’re some kind of manly man who doesn’t need things like antibiotics the way normal people need them. I’ll just keep control of this and supervise you taking the pills too.”
Harlow burst out laughing as she took the first-aid kit from Sam and closed it up. “I’ve got to write up a report on you and then do the same on your injuries, Stella. But this is great. I’ve never heard the two of you interacting like this before.”
“I don’t have injuries,” Stella objected, frowning at her friend. “Griffen has misled you. The would-be killer punched me, but underwater, it isn’t like he could really hurt me that much. It was more that I was startled and it pushed me back and away from him. That allowed him to bring his legs up to his chest and drive his feet into me. He had fins on, but he still got me hard and drove me backward.”
Her hand went to her cheekbone. Why did her cheek hurt? It shouldn’t have. The water would have slowed the assailant’s punch. He couldn’t get enough force to really hurt her, yet she felt bruised. It wasn’t swollen, but it did feel tender. She brushed her fingers over the exact spot where the would-be killer had connected with her face. There was a small spot that hurt. Not really bad, but it was definitely a little sore. What did that mean? He’d been wearing gloves, but was he wearing a ring beneath the gloves? Something heavy that would have landed just right on the bone like that?
She looked at Sam. His eyes met hers. He knew. That would be another clue. Not an obvious one, but if he had been wearing a ring, it was a heavy one, not a wedding ring. They would have to write that down and she would have to think about how that felt. What shape it might be. Maybe find a way to sketch it.
Harlow’s fingers were gentle as she probed over Stella’s face. Stella did her best to keep from showing any kind of emotion, mostly because she could feel Sam’s gaze on her. She knew he didn’t miss much and she wasn’t very good at covering her feelings, not the way he was. She didn’t want him to know she was hurt, mainly because there was something that lurked behind his dark eyes, an emotion she couldn’t quite grasp, that scared her a little.
“Babe,” Harlow said. “He hit you right here, didn’t he?” Her thumb slid over Stella’s cheekbone. “Weird that he could hit you hard enough underwater to leave you sore. There’s no real bruising, but I can tell you’re very tender here. I’ll need you to stand up so I can look at your stomach and ribs.”
Stella was reluctant to show her in front of Sam. She found herself putting her coffee down on the ground and nearly shoving her knuckles in her mouth the way that five-year-old child had done so long ago, as if reminding herself not to talk. That was one of those habits she had worked hard to overcome, and now a few nightmares and she was right back to having to fight those old hated patterns.
She pulled up her sweater. “There’s really nothing to show. He just kicked me hard enough to get me away from him so he could swim away from us. He clearly wasn’t going to be able to drown Sam, and with two of us there, he must have decided to get away fast.”
Again, Harlow probed along Stella’s ribs and along her stomach and then under her breasts, where she’d taken the brunt of his feet connecting. She did her best not to react when Harlow found the exact place of impact.
“Underwater he couldn’t really hurt me with a double kick like that,” Stella reaffirmed. “I’m sure it was more to shove me away than anything else.” She dropped her sweater back in place.
“I don’t understand why he didn’t just use a spear or a weapon like that,” Harlow said. “He really put himself at risk. Now most of the county is on alert. You know just about everyone carries a gun. The warning went out on Facebook to fishermen. It won’t stop anyone from fishing, in fact the lake will be packed tomorrow, both with boats and with men and women fishing around the lake. All of them will be packing.”
Stella sighed. “I know.” She certainly carried a gun. She had since she’d been old enough to learn how to shoot. She’d never stopped practicing. The images of the terrible things her father and the other serial killer had done to the
ir victims had been burned into her mind. No matter how hard she tried to forget those terrible nightmares, she couldn’t. The worst of it was, she knew they were real. Human beings had done those things to other human beings. Her father, a man who was supposed to love and protect her, had done those things to other people’s loved ones. How could she ever fully trust anyone again?
She had the feeling the killer was someone who visited the county often, perhaps fishing or hunting on a regular basis. He might even stay at her fishing camp, or one of the many campsites or RV sites she rented out. She could be harboring the killer. He had to be close to her, or she wouldn’t be having nightmares.
Bailey gave a short bark of warning to announce the arrival of another vehicle. Sam immediately stood and gathered his gear as Zahra and Shabina leapt out of Shabina’s RAV4, neither looking as if they had been up most of the night partying.
“Where’s Raine?” Harlow asked.
“Search and Rescue was called to help look for whoever tried to kill Sam this morning,” Shabina said, looking Sam and Stella over. “She’s checking boats for scuba gear and talking to everyone out on the water, hoping someone might have seen something strange. Are you two all right?”
“Harlow has pronounced both of us just fine,” Stella said, following Sam to his rig. “Are you certain you’re okay to drive? I can take you back and have one of the others come with us.” She tried to keep anxiety out of her voice.
Sam had the door to his rig open and his gear already tossed on the passenger seat. He turned back to her and unexpectedly framed her face with his hands, sending her stomach into a roller coaster of loops and somersaults.
“I’ll be fine. Got work to do. You have fun with your friends, Stella, and don’t think about anything for a couple of days. It will do you good. I’ll look after the resort.” He bent his head and brushed his lips over hers.
It was the briefest of contacts, but hot as sin. A million butterflies took wing. The somersaults in her stomach increased so that she pressed her hand tight there, wondering why she’d never had that reaction in her life to any man she’d been around, or dated. He hadn’t really kissed her but it hadn’t seemed to matter.
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