by Alice Sharpe
Sheriff Inkwell’s car was parked by the barn and as Adam slowed down, he saw the sheriff make his way through the gathering and climb into the open bed of one of the ranch trucks. Cody’s dog, Bonnie, jumped up with him. The sheriff stood with his hands on his waist, staring out at everyone.
Echo had her door open before the truck had stopped moving and Adam followed quickly.
He immediately looked around for his Uncle Pete and found him standing next to Adam’s father with J. D. Oakes on his other side. His uncle met his gaze for a second before looking away anxiously.
“Glad you made it,” the sheriff called to Adam. He narrowed his eyes and stared at Echo. “I thought you were headed back to California, Ms. De Gris.”
“I changed my mind,” she said. “I can’t leave until I know what’s going on.”
“Stop the chitchat, Clayton,” Birch called. “Did you find out if it’s Melissa?”
Beside him, J.D. patted his arm. “You know the sheriff, Birch. He’ll get there in his own time. Be patient.”
“I’ve been patient for too many years,” he said.
Inkwell made a point of making eye contact. “Are you sure you want to discuss this out here in front of everyone?”
“Hell, yes. These are my friends and family. Most of them knew Melissa.”
“Well then, I won’t make this any harder on you folks than it already is. It’s her, all right. The dentist is positive. And we might as well get this part over with, too. There was a second bullet down there and indications it passed through Melissa’s rib cage and spine. We’ll know more when there’s a full examination of the remains. We’re calling in a forensic anthropologist.”
A collective hush swept through the crowd.
Adam met Cody’s gaze. His face looked about the same as always, but the expression in his eyes was different and when he looked from Adam to their father, the distrust that blazed in them stunned Adam. And then it was gone and it might have been a trick of light or Adam’s imagination.
As for their father? He looked like a man who had been told he had a week to live.
Echo’s fingers slid against Adam’s. He didn’t dare meet her gaze.
One worry was over. His mother wouldn’t have shot herself through the ribs if her intent was her own death which meant she was murdered. Somehow that was better than finding out she was a killer.
Had she been running away or coming back? Had she gotten as far as Canada before returning only to meet her death? Adam looked at his uncle again. He had to know why Pete had stolen that card.
The sheriff was speaking again.
“I can’t tell you all how sorry I am. I knew Melissa, too. Not well, but she was a hard woman to miss. There’s more you need to know, though, such as the identity of the man down in that crevasse with her.”
“David Lassiter,” Adam whispered to himself.
“His name was Edwin Day.”
The silence this time was complete until Adam’s dad tore his hat off his head. “Who in the dickens is Edwin Day?”
The sheriff consulted a small notebook he took from his shirt pocket. “Edwin Day, born in 1956, a native of Hamlin, Montana.” He looked up as he added, “Mr. Day was an only child of an only child, no sisters, no brothers, no aunts or uncles or cousins. In fact, he was raised on his elderly grandparents’ farm when his parents died prematurely in a car crash. At the time of his death, he was about as alone in the world as a man can get.”
“Then what the hell was he doing in our cave?” Birch demanded.
“We don’t know that. Right now it appears Mr. Day was shot in the head and his body was thrown into the crevasse where it landed on that ledge. After a while, nature took its course. Eventually, a tremor of some kind rattled the bones enough that most of the skeleton fell to the bottom. Our resident archaeologist says it appears Melissa’s remains were already down there because her bones were found beneath his. Preliminary study of the skeletal remains indicate that both individuals died around the same time.
“Today my team scoured the bottom of the crevasse. In with a few ancient remains and some rotting cloth and shoes of a more recent nature, they found one more bullet, same caliber as the one we found in the skull. And they uncovered an old wallet. The leather isn’t much good, but some of the items inside had been protected with a plastic coating including two driver’s licenses. One was for Edward Day. The other was for David Lassiter. The photo on both pictures is of the same man. And there’s no record of anyone named David Lassiter, but there was an Edwin Day who disappeared about the right time.”
“Then this Day fellow signed on here using an alias?” Jamie said.
“Apparently.”
“So what?” Birch said. “Lots of folks use a fake name when they’re down on their luck. Rules weren’t as tight back then as they are now. Lassiter or Day or whatever his name was knew his way around cows and could ride a horse. That was good enough for me.” He looked around and focused on his pals. “He even helped you out before he came to work for me, didn’t he, Del?”
“And J.D. before that,” Del said. “Remember, J.D.? That first year or two you were here?”
“I remember,” J.D. said. “And he worked for Lonnie before that. That was back before Lonnie lost his ranch in that card game.”
The sheriff spread his hands as he focused a laserlike glare at Adam’s dad. “I’m not worried about him using an alias to get a job, Birch. All I want to know is who shot him and Melissa and hid their bodies in your cave. That’s all.”
“WE CAN’T JUST ASK PETE IF he stole that postcard,” Echo said when she and Adam finally found a place to talk without fear of being overheard.
“We have to,” Adam said. They had walked to the lake where Adam had pulled a small boat off the shore and rowed them more or less to the middle. A warm breeze stirred the water and Echo would have enjoyed the ambience if it wasn’t for—well, just about everything.
As it was, sitting still proved to be something of a burden and being stuck in the bow with Adam’s back to her was getting on her nerves.
“Anyway,” he continued, “aren’t you the one who said we had to talk to him?”
“That was before we knew for sure about your mother.”
“What does that change?”
She didn’t know how to explain it to him so he would understand. She wasn’t even sure she understood. But she’d watched Pete today as the sheriff spoke. He’d looked as if he was a breath away from taking a nosedive into the gravel. She’d experienced a wave of unanticipated sympathy for him that surprised her in its intensity.
“Echo?”
“Pete and I were never really close,” she began. She’d taken the concho from her pocket and rolled it now between her fingers as she spoke. “He was devoted to my mother. Her needs were so great, especially in the last few years, that he and I rarely interacted. I think he asked me to come on this trip with him because he wanted to find a way for us to be closer but he doesn’t know how to do it. Frankly, I don’t, either. If I start questioning him now about something this hideous, we’ll never find a way. He’s all I’ve got and I’m all he has left of my mother. Does that make sense?”
“Not if it means my father rots in jail for something he didn’t do,” Adam said, his voice very firm.
The concho caught the fading light. “If he killed her—”
“Wait, wait just a damn second.” Adam turned partway on the seat and she closed her fingers around the metal disk. “Didn’t you tell me that I needed to keep faith in him? Now that it might be your stepfather, you’re ready to sell my dad down the creek?”
“He’s your uncle,” she pointed out.
“Yes, I know that.”
Echo could not sit another moment. It was like fire ants raced in her veins. She popped to her feet. “Okay, I’ll talk to Pete myself. Let’s go.”
“Sit down,” he snapped as the boat rolled.
“No. I can’t sit. I have to act. You’re right. If Pet
e knows something we have to find out what, damn the consequences. Move over, I’ll row.”
“No, I’ll row,” he said as he plunged the oars into the water and took a herculean pull. Unfortunately, Echo was in the process of stepping onto the seat beside him. She scrambled for footing as the boat rushed forward. Arms waving, she toppled overboard with a splash. The momentum of her fall pushed the boat the opposite direction.
She came up at once, sputtering.
Adam sat several feet away, almost as wet as she was, staring at her. “Are you okay?”
“If I had a dollar for every time you’ve asked me that, I’d be rich,” she spat.
“It’s not my fault you’re an accident looking for a place to happen.” He started rowing toward her.
“Don’t bother,” she called. “I’ll swim back to shore.”
He stopped rowing, extended a hand. “Echo, come on.”
“I’ll swim. I could use the exercise.”
He took a couple pulls away from her. Then he yelled, “Don’t worry about the long, slippery green things in the water. Three-fanged lake snakes are said to be nonvenomous.”
Echo looked into the deep, dark water, and then she smiled. The sudden dip had washed the fight right out of her. The concho was still in her hand. She paddled closer to the boat and this time accepted his help. He pulled her from the water though it took a little work on her part to struggle over the gunwale. She landed in the bottom of the boat like a fish.
He looked down at her. “I think we’re on the same side. We should be trying to work together, not arguing.”
“I agree, oh wise one,” she said. She crawled up on the stern seat and plopped down facing him, pushing wet hair out of her eyes. “There are no such things as three-fanged lake snakes, are there?”
He leaned across the seat and whispered, “Nope,” against her mouth before kissing her. His lips were warm and tasty, igniting a fire she knew there would be no opportunity to extinguish.
“I have to show you something,” she said softly.
His smile faded at the ominous tone of her voice. She opened her hand to reveal the concho.
“Where did you get that?” he asked at last.
“Willet Garvey’s house. And before you accuse me of being crazy, tell me something I don’t know. I recognized what it was and where it came from almost at once. It was right by Willet’s body. I knew I should leave it where it was, but considering his dying words, I knew I couldn’t.”
She stopped talking. He picked up the concho and closed it in his fist.
“He told me that he lost the hat sometime within the past few weeks. He can’t remember when he had it last. He replaced it with a straw one for the summer.”
“Why would Willet mention a hat as he lay dying?”
“He’s not the only one who mentioned it. Hank Garvey did, too, the night he attacked us. He said his father knew it was a Westin because of the hat. A black hat they took to be mine. What if someone took Dad’s hat and wore it out to Garvey’s place?” He looked from the concho to Echo. “I don’t know what this was doing in Garvey’s house, I just know Dad didn’t murder Willet.”
“Adam, we have to prove your father is innocent. And mine, too.”
“How do we do that?”
“I say we find out about Edwin Day. He has to be the key.”
Adam pocketed the concho and picked up the oars. “What do you mean?”
“That dip in the lake woke up my brain. We’ve all been assuming your mother was killed because of some man and yet your father has been adamant all along that she liked to flirt but that’s as far as it went. If he’s right, then what was Edwin Day doing in that cave with her?”
“I’ll tell you what Inkwell thinks. He thinks Mom and this guy were having an affair and that my father caught and killed them.”
“You’re right, he does.”
“And I have to admit that it looks that way to me, too. Except for the postcard. Dad didn’t leave the ranch after Mom disappeared. I remember that, so he couldn’t have sent it. Maybe Mom went to Canada and then came home and was killed before she got to the house. Honestly, Echo, I don’t know what to think or where to start.”
“Your father said a cousin came by a few months after Day vanished. But the sheriff said Day was an orphan with no living relatives. So, who was the cousin?”
Adam nodded again, this time with some enthusiasm.
She didn’t speak again until they rowed past the beached yellow shack that Adam had told her would be hauled onto the ice come winter. “When this is all behind us, will you take me ice fishing?”
His gaze settled on her. Maybe it was her imagination, but she seemed to sense the same yearning for a future in his eyes that she felt growing in her gut. It would do neither of them any good, but try telling a heart it shouldn’t feel what it feels.
“There’s a history to that little building,” he said. “I’ll tell you if you come back.”
Come back? Sometimes it seemed to Echo like she’d never get out alive.
Chapter Seventeen
They found Birch sitting alone on the porch steps, his head in his hands. It was a rare thing to see him like that, especially when there was still daylight, grass to be mowed.
He looked up as they approached. His expression didn’t change.
As Echo excused herself to put on dry clothes, Adam sat down next to his father. “Where is everybody?”
“Cody took a call in the office. Pauline is cleaning her already clean kitchen and Pete went back to the cabin about an hour ago. Does it seem to you that he’s been acting strange?”
“Everybody is under a lot of strain,” Adam said evasively. “I have to ask you a question.”
“I’m just about questioned out.”
“This will be quick. Have you had any luck remembering the name of the man who came hunting for David Lassiter aka Edwin Day after he disappeared?”
Birch shook his head. “The sheriff asked me the same thing. I’ll tell you what I told him. I think it had Rock in it. Like Rockwell or Rockhill or something.”
“Can you remember anything else?”
“Let’s see. Me and Lonnie were treating calves for scour, so that means it was late winter, early spring. Said he was vacationing nearby and just thought he’d stop by and see if I could help him figure out where his cousin went. That’s about it.”
“Lonnie Nielson was here at the ranch when this guy came by?” Adam asked, a glimmer of hope lighting a little corner of his heart.
“Yeah. It was back before he lost his big spread. We used to help each other out—oh, I get it. Maybe Lonnie would recall a name. It’s possible.”
“What did he want today?”
“I never talked to him.”
“He was here. We saw him leaving.”
“I know. He was at the house when we all came back, waiting for me I guess. But when he saw the sheriff, he took off without saying anything. I tried calling him a little while ago to ask him what’s up, but he wasn’t home.”
“Call him again. Ask him about the cousin.”
“As soon as Cody gets off the phone. Lonnie’s number is in the office.”
Adam got to his feet and offered his father a hand. “Dad, did you ever figure out what happened to your black hat with the concho band?”
Birch shook his head. “Pauline thinks I left it at Lonnie’s house a few weeks ago. I’ll ask him about that, too. Hate to lose that band. Your mother gave it to me. It’s about all I have left of her.”
Lonnie. Lonnie who was acting “squirrelly” and obsessing about Willet Garvey’s death…?.
Cody was just hanging up the phone when they entered the office. His face was a mask. He jerked his head at Adam and the two brothers left their father to call Lonnie. What now?
“I have to leave,” Cody said. Bonnie stood by his leg, gazing up at him, panting. His fingers grazed her head. The dog sensed something was up.
“Where?”
&nbs
p; “I’m not saying. And before you ask, I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.”
Adam focused more closely on his brother. “What’s this about? Oh, no. Don’t tell me you got a call from your detective.”
Cody nodded.
“You can’t leave now. Things are heating up—”
“I have to leave now. Tonight.” He started toward the stairs.
“Cody, damn it, man, how can you go at a time like this?”
Cody turned to face Adam. His dark eyes burned. “Maybe if Dad had gone after Mom she’d still be alive. I’m not making the same mistake. This might be the last time I can get close to Cassie and I won’t throw it away.” In a flash, he was halfway up the stairs, passing Echo on her way down, Bonnie scrambling to keep up on the slick wood.
“Did your father remember the name of the supposed cousin?” she asked as she stopped in front of Adam.
Adam looked away from his brother’s retreating figure. He finally managed to form a single word. “No.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Cody is leaving.”
“Now?”
“He’s got a lead on his wife.”
She was silent a moment, then touched his face. He looked down at her. “I guess he feels like he has no choice,” she said.
Her fingers felt like satin against his skin. He wanted to bury all his anxiety in her. He had no idea if that was even a right thing to want. “I guess.”
His father appeared a moment later. “Lonnie still isn’t answering the phone. I’ll try again in a little bit. He and Janine never stay out too late.”
Adam suddenly understood why Echo had stood up in the boat and tried to climb over him to take the oars. The thought of sitting there waiting for the next ax to fall was too much. “Come on, Echo, we’ll go on over to his place and catch him when he comes home.”
ONCE AGAIN THEY DROVE IN silence. Echo wasn’t sure what Adam was thinking. Her mind jumped between two things. One, Pete. Why had he taken the postcard? How deeply was he involved? Was it possible he’d killed Adam’s mother and Edwin Day and then packed up his family and left Wyoming? Would anyone remember if he had traveled to Canada that year? Had he mailed that postcard to cover his own guilt?