Bones Of Contention: The McKinnon Legends - The American Men Book 3

by James, Ranay

  He had to start over, but what did he care? He had lived in this God forsaken world since long before the coming of the Christian messiah. He had seen prophets come and go and come again. He had lived here long enough to see the rise and fall of all the great empires. What was another month or even a year? He had learned patience by force, if not by choice.

  Only this time, he would fight the forces with a vengeance. Perhaps the single sacrifice he presented five years ago for each phase of the moon had not been enough to gain repentance and favor of the Goddess Sanguine, or Jamie must have masked herself using some unknown magic to thrust her image onto an innocent woman. That was the only explanation for his mistaking the Williams woman for his true target.

  This time he would sacrifice four for each phase of the moon. That should be enough to gain his ends, his twisted mind raced. Blood of the innocent would be spilled to gain him reentry to the dwelling place of all the mysterious creatures. He wanted to return, no he needed to return to the fourth dimension of space and time. It was a place he longed to return, as he too was one of the creatures. He did not belong in this world, yet he had been exiled here topside since before the time of the Macedonians and Mesopotamians of the ancient Middle East.

  Glancing at his wall calendar, he saw he had to act quickly. Tonight was a new moon.

  The terror was coming back, and this time he would do it right.

  In the ensuing days following the revelation of his killing the wrong woman, local police in four different counties of two different states had found victims number five, six, seven and eight. Too bad none of the agencies realized it.

  Chapter 8

  “Dr. Gillman?” Jamie’s student assistant buzzed her office.

  “Yes, Leslie.” Jamie tried not to sound perturbed. She was on a tight deadline, placing the finishing touches on a paper she was preparing for the publishers.

  “There is a man out here who claims to have found your car.”

  “Found my car? What are you talking about? Oh! My car!”

  She slammed the phone down. Not bothering with the elevator, she took the stairs down the three flights to the first floor waiting area. She saw her lab assistant demurely smiling up at someone. Leslie was a very shy girl around good-looking men. Whoever this was must be a lady killer.

  She waited for the stranger to turn around before acknowledging his presence.

  “May I help you? I’m Dr. Gillman.” She extended her hand.

  “I’m Trey Jackson. Can we go someplace private?” the handsome stranger asked.

  “Yes, of course. Leslie, I’ll be in my office. Hold all my calls, please.”

  “Even the Sheriff's?” Leslie asked.

  She hesitated. “In this instance, even the Sheriff McKinnon's,” she tossed over her shoulder as the elevator doors opened.

  “I have your car,” Trey divulged after she closed her office door, leaning up against it momentarily before pushing off and gesturing her guest to have a seat.

  “Really? How did you come by it?” Jamie was a little suspicious of the timing. After five years both Debbie’s body and her AWOL car turn up just a little over a week of each other. It was just too coincidental and sudden. The probability factor was astronomical as she made the calculations in her head. She had a better chance of being struck by lightning not only once, but twice.

  “I purchased a hundred-acre tract of land about ten years ago off Highway 349 and have been an absentee owner. I am living in Florida at present. The only reports I get are updates and a few aerial shots of the outer acreage every couple of years.”

  “You don’t do a visual inspection?” Jamie asked surprised. She would never dream of buying land and not keeping a closer eye on it than a few reports now and then.

  “No, because it really does not matter what condition the old buildings are in at present. I’ll eventually bulldoze them anyway. I bought it more for the mineral rights than the development prospects.”

  “So, why now after ten years did you finally decide to take a closer look?” she asked point-blank, suspicious of the timing.

  “I wouldn’t have except I received the aerial shots a week or so ago and noticed something had changed from the ones taken two years ago. I went back and took a look at the shots for the last five or six years and the changes were subtle, but there none the less.”

  “Changes? What kind of changes?”

  “There was sufficient damage to the old barn in the last wind storm a couple weeks back. That damage allowed us to get a look inside. Yesterday, I decided to go out and have a look around. The roof was almost totally gone and one door was blown off. Low and behold, what do you think I found?”

  He was toying with her.

  “My car.” She smiled thinking how this man was quite engaging.

  “Your car was still partially covered up with an old tarp, so I figured it was abandoned or forgotten. By the way, I love the steering wheel cover,” he smiled winking in a conspiratorial manner.

  Damn, she thought. He is one very slick operator, cute, but slick. Aging well too, she thought. In his early fifties, he still looked very nicely maintained, tanned, and toned. He had great teeth and full hair graying distinguishingly at the temples.

  She asked how he knew it belonged to her.

  “I tracked you down using the old insurance card still in the glove box.”

  She wondered how he tracked her down to the university.

  “I saw the reports on the national news about your friend. I’m sorry for your loss. That is how I knew you were here on the campus. You know, you are much more attractive in person. Will you have dinner with me tonight?”

  Damn, she thought for a second time. He was forward, too.

  “Is my car still in your barn?” she asked dodging the question.

  “No. There was some slight water damage due to the exposure, but other than that it still runs like a scalded dog. I parked it right outside. Dinner? Yes?” he asked smiling mischievously at her.

  She declined gracefully claiming she had other plans. She did. She needed to paint the inside of her house. He acknowledged it was short notice. They settled on the following Tuesday, agreeing to meet him for lunch. Dinner was too formal and too soon.

  “I’ll call you soon and firm it up,” he said, dropping the keys on her desk along with his business card and left saying he was looking forward to their lunch engagement.

  Reaching out, she lightly touched the keys resting on her desk. She remembered tossing this very ring to Debbie who waived bye and thanked her with a promise to put gas back into it before she got home from work.

  Jamie never saw her again.

  Life was fragile, she acknowledged with a sigh, and like it or not she needed to call Josh. It was going to pull him right back into the fray, something she was trying to avoid for his sake. However, the car was part of a murder investigation. She had no other choice.

  Chapter 9

  It had been a long twenty hour stretch on patrol, and Josh was definitely looking forward to his lounge chair and some sleep watching the six o’clock news. He was pulling into his driveway when Sissy called him on his cell patching Jamie through.

  “Hey, I’m glad you called. Are you all right?” Josh asked genuinely concerned.

  “I’m better. Thank you for asking,” she lied. She had been having nightmares.

  Josh did not quite believe her. There was something in her voice that told him she was not better. “I’ve tried to call to check on you, but you never called me back. You’re beginning to give me a complex,” he teased softly.

  She was feeling just a little guilty for not returning his calls. It was her way of avoiding him. She had just figured it out now that she had a few days to step away from the events in her office. That was usually not like her. She probably owed him an apology.

  “I know, I’m sorry. I’ve been busy,” she offered the lame excuse.

  “I’m glad to hear you say you’re better. At the risk of sounding li
ke a total ass after a full week of avoiding my calls and e-mails, why have you called me now?”

  “You are not an ass, Josh. If anything, I have been.”

  “No, Jamie. You have just had a lot to digest. This is a nice surprise, though. I figure that after a week of you avoiding and dodging my attempts to see you again that you would be the last person to call me,” he said idling in his driveway. “Obviously, you have been on my mind a lot this week. I’m worried about you, and I’m very glad you have finally called.”

  She was not quite sure how to take him. “You are right. Under normal circumstances, I usually do not call men. I’m still just a little old fashioned that way, Sheriff. However, this is not about me. It is about solving Debbie’s murder so my feelings of what are proper and improper are secondary.”

  Josh was disappointed. “So, I’m gathering from this you have some other reason besides calling just to talk? You know that is the only way for us to get to know each other better.”

  He heard the silence on the other end and wished he could start this conversation over, moving his sunglasses to the top of his head to give him access to pinch the bridge of his nose. Working nights never agreed with him. It usually turned him into a walking zombie, and the art of seduction had never been his best hand.

  “My car has returned. It is sitting in the faculty parking lot.”

  Josh did not like this turn of events one bit. The timing was too coincidental.

  “Are you in your office?” he asked feeling a sharp surge of fear for her safety as he made the u-turn in his driveway and headed back toward Lubbock. Instantly, any hint of softness was gone.

  “Yeah, why?” she asked puzzled at his change. She could feel the tension crackle through the phone.

  “Stay there. I’ll be there as quickly as I can. Lock your door, do not go outside to look at it, and do not let anyone into your office. Understand?”

  “Josh, you are overreacting. The guy who brought it back is legitimate,” she argued. Yet, his reaction brought out the fears she was subconsciously suppressing and not allowing to bubble to the surface.

  “How do you know that for sure, Jamie? Tell me. How do you know, damn it?” Josh was almost yelling into the phone.

  “Because, he doesn’t fit the profile, that’s how, damn it!” she said mimicking him.

  “Please, Jamie, stay put. Don’t take any foolish chances. You don’t know that the car is not bait. I’ll be there as quickly as I can get there.”

  Josh gunned his truck. It would take him over an hour to get there. He hoped she stayed in her office. If not, then he would take drastic measures.

  Calling the F.B.I., Josh let them know Jamie’s car had miraculously turned up. If what he suspected were true, there were a string of murders from Florida to Texas. This guy was crossing back and forth across the southern part of the United States. He just happened to be making his way back to Lubbock, again.

  That was, if he wasn’t already here.

  Chapter 10

  Jamie was not about to stay put. She wanted more information and the only way to get it was to meet with Trey. He was the last known connection to Debbie’s murder.

  She could not involve Josh any further. As much as she might want an ally in this fight, it could not be Josh. He had a child to consider. This was her fight and the more information they had the more likely the outcome would be in their favor.

  She picked up the card Trey left on her desk and called the cell number listed. It was twice in one day she had called a man who was not a colleague. Maybe, she could learn a few new tricks.

  After a quick conversation she agreed to dinner, figuring her painting could wait another day. He seemed genuinely pleased at her change of heart promising to meet her at seven o'clock that evening.

  “Are you sure I cannot have my driver pick you up? It would be no imposition, I assure you,” Trey offered.

  “Thank you. Let’s take this one step at a time. Shall we?”

  He agreed it was fair enough.

  She had less than two hours to get home, change, and make it back across town to the restaurant.

  Stopping by the reception desk, she dropped off the keys to her old car to Leslie along with instructions for Josh.

  “Tell him also, I’m sorry, but I could not wait for him. Also, tell him I’ll be out tonight. He can call me later if he has questions.” She wrote her home number down with instructions for him to leave a message. She would catch him when she got home from her date.

  Driving across town, she dashed into the grocery store to pick up a few items. She wished she had time to stop at the post office to pick up her mail, but she realized it would have to wait until later. Checking her watch she had exactly forty-five minutes to feed the dog, shower, change, and then get to the restaurant. She was cutting it close.

  Turning onto her street she could not miss Josh casually leaning up against the hood of his truck. He was not happy. His expression was dark.

  “I see you listen to me about as well as my daughter,” he said flatly while pushing off the grill of his truck.

  She did not reply, taking out the bag of groceries from her back seat and then shutting the door with her hip. “How did you find my house?”

  He was not about to tell her that he or one of his deputies had been watching her all week as a precaution. “I have connections.”

  Jamie just stared at him in wonder.

  “Did you bully Leslie?” she asked shaming him.

  “Not exactly.” He scuffled his feet with his hands in his pockets. “I looked you up in the faculty directory on your desk." He had, the first day he was in her office. "It showed a post office box."

  “Josh, she is just a kid. You were wrong.”

  “Maybe.”

  She cocked her head sideways with a look that told him she did not believe him.

  “All right, ok. So, I may have come on a bit strong with her, but I have every right, Doc.” Josh was convinced, and she was not going to change his mind. “I am an officer sworn by the State of Texas. I swore by the oath of office making my job to protect and to serve. I’m a peace officer, Doc, not a diplomat.”

  “You have no jurisdiction in Lubbock.” She was not sure if she was flattered or angry. Maybe, she was a little of both.

  “I’m not trying to arrest you, so screw jurisdiction. Can’t you see? I’m trying to protect you.” He could feel the muscles in his jaw tighten. At the rate she was pushing him, he could well turn her over his shoulder and drag her off just to make a point. So much for gentlemanly ways, he admitted. His mother would be appalled. He was appalled.

  “I do not need protection. I also do not have time for this, Josh. I’m late enough as it is.”

  “Jamie, please, will you just listen to me?” he softened taking the bags from her. “Your car showing up like this stinks to me. It is just too coincidental, and if you weren’t being so headstrong about all this you would see it, too.”

  She already did.

  “I know it does,” she agreed. “Why do you think I called you?” she said looking at her watch.

  “We know nothing about the man who brought your car back. He could be anyone.”

  “He is not just anyone, Sheriff. He is a real estate broker in Florida.”

  “Are you going some place? You keep looking at your watch,” he asked feeling uncomfortable with her obvious plans.

  “Yes. I have a date with Trey, and I’m going to be very late at this rate.”

  “A date with Trey?” He calmed his breathing. To push her would gain him nothing. “Fair enough. However, you are not going anywhere without an escort, and I need to know where you are going in advance so I can secure the area beforehand.”

  He knew he was being pushy and he could not have cared less. He needed to take things under his control and having her out in an unsecured area without the benefit of a bodyguard was potentially suicide.

  He watched her stop in mid-motion of slipping the key into the deadbo
lt lock. Slowly, she looked up at him.

  Uh’oh, he thought. He had just stepped into a minefield.

  “An escort? You mean as in a bodyguard?”

  So, she thought, he does not want me going out alone and unguarded. She guessed the fact she had lived her whole life alone had slipped past him somewhere along the road. She was used to dealing with crises by herself. Therefore, this was no different. It was not the first time her life had been threatened. However, in all fairness to Josh, he did not know that to be the case.

  She informed him in no uncertain terms she could go to dinner with anyone of her choosing without his permission and without his company.

  “I’m not saying you need my permission.” Josh's insides were tied up in knots. She was an intelligent woman by all accounts. He was failing to comprehend why she was digging in her high heels.

  “Your connection to Debbie places you in danger even if you hadn’t been the one to identify her, but you did identify her. Please, don’t sit down on this one. Choose something else to fight me on, but please not this. Please, rethink this date with Trey.”

  “I have given it thought. I may be blonde, but I’m not stupid, Lawman.”

  “I know that, Jamie. You are a very intelligent woman. What I’m saying is this guy may not be the killer, and probably isn’t. You’re right in he doesn’t fit the profile. Yet, he may be endangering you by having brought you the car, and I’m saying he could be just as much a target as you now that he has touched this case.”

  This was something she had not considered.

  “I refuse to live my life in fear.”

  “I don’t blame you one bit and no one is asking you to either. I’m just saying we need to use our heads and move cautiously. At least until we solve this thing.”

  She was not as concerned as Josh. She had moved since Debbie’s disappearance. She lived in a safe neighborhood where everyone looked out for each other. “I’m going to be fine, Josh. Trust me. I know what I’m doing.”