ALSO BY MARGARET MIZUSHIMA:
Stalking Ground
Killing Trail
HUNTING HOUR
A Timber Creek K-9 Mystery
Margaret Mizushima
NEW YORK
This is a work of fiction. All of the names, characters, organizations, places, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real or actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 by Margaret Mizushima.
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Crooked Lane Books, an imprint of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.
Crooked Lane Books and its logo are trademarks of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.
Library of Congress Catalog-in-Publication data available upon request.
ISBN (hardcover): 978-1-68331-277-2
ISBN (ePub): 978-1-68331-278-9
ISBN (ePDF): 978-1-68331-280-2
Cover design by Melanie Sun
www.crookedlanebooks.com
Crooked Lane Books
34 West 27th St., 10th Floor
New York, NY 10001
First edition: August 2017
For my sister and brother-in-law,
Nancy and Greg Coleman,
and their family
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Tuesday, Mid-April
“Whom do you trust, Mattie?”
Mattie drew her knees up, hugging them to her chest. The question her therapist posed made her pause to think. Finally, she answered. “Robo.”
From across the living room, where he was lying on his dog bed, her German shepherd cocked his head, ears pricked.
Although the Skype image on Mattie’s laptop wavered occasionally, it was still clear enough to see the change in her therapist’s expression. The kindness in Dr. Lisa Callahan’s smile radiated warmth that could melt even Mattie’s reserve.
When her brother, Willie, contacted her last fall after years of silence, he’d opened a Pandora’s box of repressed memories centering on her abusive father that had sent her reeling. She’d been unable to process them by herself, so she’d sought counseling with Lisa, a therapist who specialized in trauma and often worked with cops and soldiers.
“Robo has evidently proven himself trustworthy,” Lisa said. “What does it feel like inside your body when you think about trusting Robo?”
Every week for the past two months, they’d talked about feelings, and Mattie knew the drill—eyes closed to search inside before opening them to share what she’d found. “It feels safe. With Robo, I can let down my guard. Relax.”
Mattie sat on her living room floor, her back to the couch, her laptop on the coffee table in front of her. While Lisa waited for her to expand on her response, she squirmed inside, but she couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Lisa let her off the hook. “Safety is a basic human need. I imagine it’s a relief to let down your guard.”
“Yeah.” A spiral notebook that Mattie used for assignments and journaling sat on the table beside her computer, and she flipped open the cover, picked up a pen, and wrote the word “Trust” on a blank page, underlining it twice. “Trust is a hard one for me.”
“It’s hard for a lot of people. Let’s focus on that feeling you get when you’re relaxing with Robo. Reestablish that feeling.”
Exhausted from months of poor sleep, Mattie tried, but a niggling twinge of anxiety had crept in and tightened her chest.
“Think of one of your friends,” Lisa said, “and how you feel about the concept of trust with that person.”
Mattie thought of Cole Walker, the local veterinarian, but her feelings for him were so balled up, she didn’t want to untangle them in front of her therapist. “I don’t have many friends.”
“Colleagues, then. You’ve talked about some of the people at work before.”
Mattie shook her head. The first person that came to mind was Chief Deputy Ken Brody.
“What?” Lisa asked, apparently in response to the expression on Mattie’s face.
“I was thinking about Brody. I would trust him with my life, but I’d never trust him with my feelings.”
“That’s a good observation.”
“There’s no one I’d rather have at my back, but I wouldn’t share anything personal with him.”
“Pay attention to that part for a moment . . . that feeling of guarding yourself. Then tell me about it.”
Mattie needed only a second. She was well aware of this feeling—this wariness of others. It seemed like her approach with the entire world. “There’s a sort of tightness in my muscles through my whole body. Like I’m going to need to protect myself.”
“Fight or flight.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s good work, Mattie. You’re much more aware of your body’s reactions to your feelings than you were before. And I especially like how you can isolate how you feel about your colleague Brody. Let’s move on to another person you work with.”
Instantly, Mattie thought of the departmental dispatcher, with her flowing, hippie-like garments and wide-open approach to life. “Rainbow. I guess I would call her a friend. Yeah, she’s a friend even though we don’t have much in common.”
Lisa nodded. “How about your level of trust with her?”
“She’s easy to be around, but I don’t share my feelings with her. Not anything important anyway.”
Lisa used that look, the expression that meant I’m listening; keep talking.
So Mattie did. “Rainbow is a kind person. She wouldn’t do anything to hurt me on purpose. I don’t think she’d try to hurt anyone. I guess I don’t tell her much because she’s the one who does the talking when we’re together.”
“These are probably all reasons why you would call her a friend. Do you think you could share something about yourself with her?”
Mattie rolled her shoulders. “Right now, I’m having trouble staying relaxed, and my muscles are pretty tight. But I think Rainbow is the type of person I could trust.”
“There are times when the brain tells you that you’re okay even when your body is guarding or holding itself ready to protect you, either emotionally or physically. Pay attention to that. That’s part of emotional self-reliance.”
Mattie picked up her pen and wrote “Emotional self-reliance” in her notebook.
“Let’s do this exercise with one other person . . . the woman who recently moved to Timber Creek, the detective you’ve mentioned whom you seem to like.”
When Mattie closed her eyes, she discovered a feeling of lightness and warmth associated with the brassy detective that surprised her. She grinned. “Stella LoSasso. She’s like a cross between a mother hen and Godzilla.”
Lisa smiled back. “And trust?”
“I guess I would trust her with almost anything. She’d have my back in a shootout,
and she looks out for my best interests. She already knows my deepest secrets, but she doesn’t judge me. Well, I guess I could say she judges me all the time, but not in a bad way. More like she wants what’s best for me. That’s the mother hen part.”
“Sounds like qualities you appreciate.”
Mattie’s phone vibrated against the coffee table. She’d turned off the ringer during her therapy session but left the phone where she could see it. An emergency text told her to call the sheriff’s department.
“I’m getting a call from the station, Lisa. I need to check in.”
Lisa frowned. “All right, but I hate for you to miss your session. You look like you need it. How are you sleeping, Mattie?”
“Not very well.” Flashes of memory had been haunting her for months, and sleepless nights stacked up one after another. Only when total exhaustion took over could she fall asleep.
“It’s time to address this issue,” Lisa said. “Is there a place in your town where you can get some bodywork, like massage or craniosacral therapy?”
Anya Yamamoto at the Valley Vista hot springs did massage, but . . . no way. “I’m not sure.”
“That’s your assignment this week. Take a look at what’s available in the area. The other thing you might consider is breath training and stretching. A yoga class could combine both.”
“I don’t think we have yoga classes in Timber Creek.”
“While you’re looking for a massage therapist, ask around about yoga too. I think the running that you started as a teen has helped you with your emotions all these years. But I think you should add in more stretching, even if you do it on your own.”
Urgency built inside her. She needed to call the department and didn’t have time for this. “I can do that. But, Lisa, I really need to sign off now.”
Lisa gave her a look. “Okay. But think about trust and emotional self-reliance and what they mean to you, and we’ll discuss it at your next session.”
By the time Lisa confirmed their next appointment and signed off, Mattie’s shoulders had tightened into knots. She made eye contact with Robo, and he lifted his head eagerly.
“Come here.” After scrambling up from his cushion, he came to her and sat, and she hugged him close while she dialed into the office.
Sam Corns, the night dispatcher, answered. “Mattie, we need you to go to the junior high. We got a girl missing from there. Brody will meet you out front.”
Her thoughts leapt to Sophie and Angela Walker, Cole’s daughters. She loved those kids as if they were her own, but her feelings for their father had grown complicated. Despite her yearning to be a part of their family, she’d had to take a step back a few months ago.
“Who is the girl?”
“Last name—Banks.”
Her relief turned to guilt. Someone’s daughter was missing. “Tell Brody I’ll be right there.”
She slipped on a khaki coverall with the Timber Creek County Sheriff’s Department emblem on the sleeve and hurried to retrieve her service weapon from the gun safe mounted on the wall inside her bedroom closet. Robo dogged her tracks and then broke out into his happy dance when she went to the door. He loped to their vehicle, full of energy.
It took only a few minutes to get to Timber Creek Junior High. She parked curbside on the street that ran directly in front of the decades-old redbrick building that dominated the campus. A subsidiary mobile building that housed classrooms sat next to it.
The sun had traveled to linger above the western mountains; shadows were long and the springtime air cool. Mattie rolled down her windows.
“You’re going to stay here,” she told Robo, watching his ears fall. “I’ll be right back.”
Giving Robo one last glance, she saw that he’d resigned himself to stay, watching her from the back window, and she walked up the sidewalk toward the school’s entrance. Brody and the school principal, along with a man and a woman she didn’t recognize, stood at the base of the steps that led to an ornate portico that ran along the middle of the building, its white columns freshly painted.
“I think you already know Deputy Cobb, Mrs. Ketler,” Brody said when Mattie joined the group.
“Yes.” The principal offered a handshake.
“And these are Candace’s parents, Burt and Juanita Banks.”
Mattie scanned their faces while they shook hands. Burt’s bloodshot brown eyes dominated his rather square face, and Mattie caught a whiff of alcohol when he said hello. He had a bushy beard and wore his dark hair slicked back from his forehead.
Juanita Banks appeared small as she stood beside her husband. She’d wrapped a saggy black sweater around herself, clutching it in place with crossed arms. Dark circles underlined her rather narrow-set green eyes. Her straggly brunette hair appeared to have escaped the anchor at the nape of her neck hours ago, and her grip felt limp and clammy when she shook hands.
“What’s the concern, Mr. and Mrs. Banks?” Mattie could have asked Brody, but she wanted to hear it directly from the parents. It also gave Brody a chance to hear them state the problem twice, a method commonly used with missing children.
“Candace hasn’t come home, and she was supposed to be there three hours ago.” Despite the smell of alcohol, Burt seemed sober enough when he spoke. “We came to see if she stayed at school.”
“We didn’t have any after-school activities today,” Mrs. Ketler said. “As far as I know, Candace left with the other children at the end of the day.”
“At what time?” Mattie asked.
“Three o’clock.”
“Did you see her leave?”
Mrs. Ketler shook her head. “I didn’t. I’ve contacted one of the teachers that supervised the children’s departure, but she didn’t notice Candace leave specifically. As you can imagine, we have a great deal of foot traffic out front here when the final bell rings.”
Mattie remembered it. She’d gone to this very school herself, and she’d driven past or sat out front in her cruiser at the end of the school day many a time since hiring on with the sheriff. It was a zoo out here that time of day. But she still wasn’t sure why this girl’s failure to return home on time would warrant calling out two off-duty police officers. She looked at Brody.
“Candace has asthma, and Mr. and Mrs. Banks are concerned that she’s gone someplace alone and had an attack,” Brody said.
Now it came clear. Mattie looked at Juanita. “How severe is her condition?”
“Bad.” Juanita started to say more, but her husband interrupted.
“She takes medicine after school but didn’t get home to take it today.”
Mattie looked at Burt. “And you were home then?”
“He wasn’t.” Juanita looked down at the ground and muttered under her breath, “Even though he was supposed to be.”
“The boys were at home,” Burt said. “They said they never saw her.”
“Are you sure she didn’t go home, take her medicine, and go out again?” Mattie asked.
“The boys were watching TV,” Juanita said, giving Burt a sidelong glance. “They would have noticed their sister come in. She wasn’t there to fix them a snack, and that made an impression.”
“Does Candace carry a rescue inhaler or something like that?”
“She does,” Juanita said, “when she remembers it. It’s in her bedroom on her dresser today.”
Brody nodded toward Mattie’s SUV. “I thought we’d try to follow her with Robo.”
Mattie scanned the premises, imagining all those footsteps and different scent trails coming out the large double doors of the school, crossing over the portico in a human herd, passing down the steps and spilling out into the schoolyard. Even as she stood there eyeing the area, several boys that looked to be in their early teens came onto the property and headed toward them, laughing and jostling each other. “Hi, Mrs. Ketler,” one of them called.
“Hi, Jimmy,” she called back. “Excuse me a minute. Those boys share some of Candace’s classes. I’m going to
ask if they’ve seen her.”
As the principal walked away, Mattie could almost see the woman’s scent trail mingling with all the others on the sidewalk. What Brody had in mind would be a Herculean task for Robo.
Mattie turned to the parents. “Do you have an article of Candace’s clothing with you?”
“What do you mean?”
“If I ask my dog to search for her, I’ll need something that Candace wore recently, not something that’s been freshly laundered. A T-shirt or something.”
“There might be a sweat shirt in the back seat of the car,” Juanita said.
“Wait a minute and I’ll go with you. I should be the one to handle it.”
Juanita’s brow furrowed. “Why’s that?”
“It keeps your scent from mingling with Candace’s. Which way is your house?” Mattie thought she’d start Robo working in the direction toward the girl’s home, out about forty or fifty feet to avoid the scent congestion at the front door.
Burt pointed to the west, into the older part of town, and gave her their address, a location a few blocks from her own house.
Mrs. Ketler came back, the teenage boys drifting along in her wake. Mattie noticed an older couple who looked like they might be out for an evening stroll walking past on the sidewalk. Scent trails everywhere.
“The boys haven’t seen Candace, and they don’t recall seeing her leave the school,” the principal said as she rejoined the group.
“I’ll go see if we have a scent article,” Mattie said to Brody before turning to Juanita. “Let’s go to your car.”
Juanita led her to an older sedan with faded blue paint parked near where Robo was waiting. She opened the rear door and exposed the interior. Both the seat and floor were filled with clutter: fast-food bags and wrappers, papers and receipts, jackets and sweat shirts. Juanita pointed to a turquoise hoodie lying on the floor. “That one belongs to Candace.”
“I’ll pick it up after I get a bag from my vehicle to put it in. Do you have a picture of Candace with you?”
Juanita opened the front door on the passenger side and pulled out a handbag. She rifled through its contents and extracted a wallet, which she opened, then searched through the plastic sleeves holding photos. “Here’s one, but it’s old,” she said, handing it to Mattie.
Hunting Hour Page 1