“Anybody see Vince this morning?”
She wasn’t surprised to hear everyone say no. “Shit,” she murmured under her breath.
Chad leaned against the wall, a fragrant cup of coffee in his hand, and said, “I heard him say something about heading north to follow up on a potential lead. Didn’t quite catch what it was. Typical Vince, sucking down an expensive coffee and talking so fast nobody would be able to understand him.”
Katie blew out her cheeks. Unfortunately she knew exactly what Chad meant. Vince was like a seventeen-year-old with a gun, most of the time. His clearance record was pretty impressive. On the other hand, he could be exceedingly annoying, and if he stopped at her desk to talk with a mouth full of food one more time, she’d scream or shoot him. And God help him if he called her “little woman” again. Still, she would like to talk to him this morning, and his not being here was incredibly inconvenient.
“Damn it,” she muttered.
“Sorry, K. You could try his cell phone.”
“Already did. Went straight to voice mail.”
Chad shrugged and took a swig of his coffee. “He must be in a dead zone. Anything I can do for you?”
Maybe Chad could help, even if he’d initially been less than enthusiastic about this case. She preferred Vince simply because he had more years on the force, giving him a hell of a lot more experience. His attitude about the idea of Alida being abducted sucked, not that it mattered at the moment. If the guy was MIA, it was a good idea to take offered help, wherever it came from. She nodded and pointed to the empty chair. “Here’s what I’ve got so far—”
“Roberts!”
Chad’s head snapped around at the sound of the captain’s voice. “Yeah, Chief, what’s up?”
Don Garfield, six foot six with a full head of silver hair and a personality that could fill any room, nodded toward an open office door. “Need you in here.”
With a roll of his eyes, Chad looked over at her. “Sorry, Carlisle. Apparently there’s another fire with my name on it.”
“Thanks anyway,” she said dryly.
Before he walked off, he tapped his fingers on her desk. “I’ll check back in later and see what I can do to help.”
It was a nice offer, but she just didn’t think it would matter. She had a feeling something was going to break, and soon. Where the hell was Vince? To Chad she said, “Appreciate the offer.”
When he was gone, she tried Vince’s cell once more. Nothing. Dumb ass, she thought as she dropped the phone onto the top of her desk.
“Learn anything interesting last night?”
“Excuse me?” Brandon stood at her desk holding a couple sheets of paper.
He smiled, all cheerful and bright-eyed. “You know, over at the sister’s house last night?”
Unease made her slowly turn in her chair and stare up into his face. “How the hell would you know where I was last night?”
His gaze never wavered. “Ah, you know how it is. I get out and about. I see things.”
So he saw her car at Thea’s. It didn’t mean a thing. Unless he saw them saying, kissing, good-bye. Keeping her voice level, she said, “Brought her up to date.”
He nodded. “Yeah, good plan.”
“What have you got for me?” Time to turn this conversation away from her activities last night.
If Brandon was aware of her blatant ploy to drive the conversation in a different direction, he didn’t let on. “Wish I could tell you I came up with something good. Can’t. Phone was a bust, if you get me. Only calls made were to another burner phone. No way to track who owns it. Or owned it. Probably in some trash can somewhere.”
He was right, of course. The phone was undoubtedly long gone. “Thanks for trying.”
Brandon dropped the papers on her desk and gave her shoulder a light squeeze. “No worries. I’m always here if you need me.”
“Appreciate it.” Sort of. He gave her a high wave as he headed back to his own space. The exchange left her feeling uncomfortable. The fact Brandon knew she was at Thea’s house last night could be nothing more than simple coincidence. Or not. Dad always told her to be leery of so-called coincidences. True episodes were rare. This didn’t feel like the real thing, but why would Brandon be following her?
With her fingertips she massaged her temple. First Vince was nowhere to be found, and now Brandon giving her the heebie-jeebies. Her earlier good vibes were fading fast.
“Let it go,” she whispered to herself. She could deal with Brandon later. Right now her thoughts turned to the call from Lorna. She needed to figure out what to do with Lorna’s info. Deep inside she had a feeling everything she’d discovered so far was all tied together, and this might be too.
Then another thought hit her. A little unconventional, but maybe that’s exactly what this case needed. She picked her phone back up and punched in a number.
“Mom, I need to pick your brain.”
*
Thea wanted to meet Lorna and Renee for breakfast but needed to work. For the first time since Alida disappeared, she couldn’t ignore her job. With Renee, Jeremy, and Merry here, Lorna could still get a great deal done without her. In fact, she might actually do better without her filling the space with her nervous energy.
Still, it was hard not to be there. It took every ounce of effort she could dredge up to keep focused on the tasks needing her attention. Over all she thought she did a pretty decent job of attending to business, but it was the hardest morning she could recall since she started the company. Normally she loved the creative energy overflowing in the office. Today she couldn’t embrace even an ounce of it.
By noon she was just about jumping out of her skin. At least now she felt okay about leaving again. Five hours of solid work had gotten the recent projects back on track, questions answered, and fires put out. By the time she left her people were briefed and fully capable of going forward without her. It was time to find Lorna.
A quick call and they were set to meet at Thea’s house. Lorna seemed very intent on something, which made Thea’s heart race. She just knew Lorna was going to break through the fog hiding her sister’s whereabouts once and for all. Today was the day. She hoped.
Before she got her phone back in her pocket it rang again. “Hello?”
“Thea, this is Katie.”
The warm sound of her voice sent a thrill sliding down her back. What was it about this cop that made her shiver? Whatever it was, it was good, and right now she very much appreciated anything good.
“Do you have news?” A sliver of something like hope flashed through her.
“Not exactly.” The pause said more than the words.
She didn’t want to feel so let down, yet she couldn’t help it. Understanding at an intellectual level was one thing. Feeling it in her heart was something altogether different. “Oh.” The word sounded flat, felt even worse.
Katie rushed on before Thea could say anything else. “Look, I got a call from Lorna this morning. You might have too.”
She was the one who’d called Lorna, not the other way around. And it was this afternoon rather than this morning. “I talked to her, and I’m actually on my way to meet her right now.”
“Okay, well, good, you’ve talked, and that’s what’s important. Here’s the deal from my side of things. My mother happens to be a local historian. Actually, she’s a professor out at Eastern Washington University, and part of her work is documenting the history of the area.”
Maybe she wasn’t paying very close attention because she wasn’t hearing what she wanted to, and none of what Katie was saying made the least bit of sense to her. “What does this have to do with talking to Lorna?”
The tone of Katie’s voice shifted from fast and furious to slow questioning. “Didn’t Lorna tell you about what she saw in her dream or vision or whatever it was?”
She tightened her grip on the phone, afraid she’d throw up. “No, she didn’t mention a vision.”
Katie paused again. “Ah, I’m not sure why sh
e didn’t tell you. Maybe she wanted to fill you in face-to-face.”
Tears started to fill her eyes. “Let’s go with that.” It was better than thinking her friend had shut her out of something important or, worse, something terrible.
“That’s got to be what it was. Anyway, she had a vision, and it centered on one of the old pioneer cemeteries. So, with Mom having unique access to that kind of information, I ran all of it by her. She said it definitely sounds like it could be one of the old cemeteries on the outskirts of the city. According to Mom, a number of them match the description Lorna gave.”
The hurt she’d experienced at realizing she’d been left out of the loop started to fade. If this was true, maybe they were finally getting somewhere. “So we need to check them all.”
“Not all of them. Mom gave me a list of the ones she thought sounded as close as possible to Lorna’s description. I thought we could work our way through them.”
Honestly, the thought made Thea’s heart hurt. She wanted to bring her twin home alive, but her mind told her the likelihood was pretty slim. Going to cemeteries to try to find Alida shattered that desire as if it were made of single-pane glass.
“Thea? You still there?”
She blinked and returned her focus to the conversation. She thought she’d been silent only a moment, but it must have been much longer. “Yes, I’m still here.”
“Can I pick you up? I’d like you to come with me.”
Rubbing a hand over her eyes, she willed herself not to cry. “I’d like that.”
“Thea, we’re going to find her.”
That’s exactly what she was afraid of.
*
Jesus Christ, it had been a long morning. He didn’t think he was ever going to get out of there. And talk about a chicken-shit agenda. Sometimes he wanted to jump up on the table and show them who he really was. To throw off the veneer and be the real man for once. They all underestimated him. Worse, they didn’t really see him at all. It seemed as though no one took him seriously.
Well, one of these days he’d show them all. Oh, indeed he would show them exactly who and what he was. Then he’d see how serious they’d take him. Serious as the back of a shovel. That thought made him smile. He did so love his shovel.
He leaned back in his chair and looked around. Most of the people he worked with were okay in a bland, boring way. He didn’t have anything against them, unless they looked a little too closely at what he was doing. Just like this morning. How the dumb ass ever thought he was invisible was a mystery. He’d picked up on him on the first day, tailing him like he was a newbie. Not even close. His skills were the best because he spent a lot of time honing them. Worked and worked and worked until perfection was within the palm of his hand. He was that good. Perfection wasn’t luck, it was preparation.
Even the best faced off days, when things didn’t quite go to plan. That fairly accurately described his morning. First he took care of his shadow and then endured the impromptu meeting that went on forever. The whole time he was itching to get back out to his truck and deal with his unintended passenger. Not that anyone would know he was in the truck. He’d made one hundred percent certain his secret remained precisely that.
He’d been anxious to get out of the meeting, and not because he feared exposure. It was more a case of hating loose ends. His world was tidy to the obsessive-compulsive degree. No big revelation there. He understood his own nature very well and was fine with it. In fact, the chaos other people lived in amazed him. He didn’t understand how they functioned in such a loose way. To exist in such a manner would make him extremely uncomfortable. Tidiness soothed him, order and routine calmed his psyche, and that meant taking care of the visitor in his truck. Everything in its place was the credo of his life.
Finally he’d managed to extricate himself from the meeting and was back in his truck and back on the road. Calm settled over him as he drove up Division Street, despite the heavy traffic that forced him to stop at light after light. When he hit the intersection of Division and Francis Avenue he made a split-second decision. Instead of heading straight north he took a left and drove west on Francis. Sometimes it was better to shake it up a little rather than contaminate what was already sacred to him.
He followed Francis as it curved around to the north and turned into State Highway 291. The drive took him past Suncrest and beyond Tum Tum to where it shifted from private ownership to tribal land. Out here, he was the only one on the road, and the landscape was hilly and spotted with outcroppings of ancient basalt rock. It wasn’t the lush forested land just a few miles behind him, but it held its own special kind of beauty, with plateaus overlooking Long Lake and vast expanses of unspoiled fields dotted by unique stones carved by glaciers millions of years earlier.
It took him awhile to find a spot he liked. The area he chose was perfect for what he had in mind. He pulled the truck off the road and drove as far as he dared onto the rough land. It wasn’t thick tree cover, though a fair amount of pine trees still provided what he deemed an appropriate visual barrier from the road. What made it workable for the plan he’d formulated on the drive out here was the abundance of small brush and downed branches. Nice and dry, and plenty of scrub.
When he finally managed to get his passenger out of the truck and on the ground, he grabbed his feet and dragged him a good twenty yards farther away from where he parked. This one was a mite heavier than his normal girls. No matter, a job was a job, and he got his passenger where he needed to be. Ten minutes later he stopped and studied his work. A massive pile of branches and dried brush now covered the motionless figure. Nodding, he decided it was just about perfection.
Back at the truck he grabbed the five-gallon can of gas he always kept topped off in the back of his truck. His always-be-prepared motto came in handy in more ways than one. Usually he used the gas to top off the truck tank. Today, he had something different in mind. The smell of the gasoline he poured onto the pile was pungent in the still afternoon air. When the can was empty, he returned it to the truck.
The gasoline fumes filled the air, and before he struck a match and tossed it into the pile he breathed in the scent. It made him smile. Tossing a match, he stepped back and waited only a second before his plan came to life. With a whoosh the flame caught, turning the mound into a raging funeral pyre. He allowed himself a full minute to stand and gaze upon the creative solution to his problem. It was good. It was right. He was happy.
As much as he longed to linger here and watch the fire do its work, it would be a very bad idea. He had to go. Turning his back on the blaze, he returned to his truck, got in, put it in reverse, and backed out onto the road, bumping through ruts as he went. Not wanting to risk the attention of either the Stevens County Sheriff’s Department or the Washington State Patrol, both which patrolled SR291, he kept to the speed limit as he drove back to town.
Chapter Twenty-two
Lorna was worried about Thea, who looked like shit. She was a beautiful woman who made both men and women stop and stare. But today her face was sallow, with dark circles under her eyes. Usually Lorna hated the stupid psychic thing, except at this moment she wished like hell she understood it enough to find Alida. Anything to erase the shadows that darkened Thea’s face.
Before Lorna could walk through the open front door, Renee stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Thea, tight. “We’re here for you.”
If Lorna didn’t already love Renee, that would have cinched it. Her way of knowing what people needed before they even realized it was magical, and she wasn’t even remotely psychic. Renee did that for her every day. She should have known she’d pick up on the same thing for Thea.
Thea hugged Renee back and then stepped out of her embrace to motion them both in. “You don’t know how much that means to me. Come on in. Katie will be here shortly.”
Katie. Not Deputy Carlisle. Katie. This was undoubtedly the worst imaginable time to meet someone, yet Lorna sensed Thea was taken with the attractive office
r. Honestly, who wouldn’t be? She was striking and intelligent, and who could resist a woman with a badge and a gun?
She turned her gaze to Renee, and all thoughts of a hot cop disappeared. Nothing could make her heart soar like Renee did. She wasn’t a tall, toned athlete. She didn’t carry a badge or a gun. She didn’t radiate power with every stride. None of it mattered, for she was pure magic, and Lorna didn’t think she’d tire of her for one single day the rest of her life.
Renee caught her stare and gave her a small smile and a wink, which sent a rush of desire through her. Funny how that had never happened to her before she met this wonderful woman. How much her life had changed since she left for Aunt Bea’s beautiful house on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Like everyone else, a few of Lorna’s friends were the eternally optimistic types who professed that life always worked out the way it was supposed to. When she was going through her ordeal with Anna she could have screamed each time one of them said that to her. She was glad she’d opted not to throw that particular tantrum because she’d be apologizing now. Seemed those sunny-natured friends of hers might be right.
“So Deputy Carlisle is on her way?” Lorna wondered if she could use anything she’d shared from the fob-inspired vision.
Thea nodded. “She has a list of cemeteries for us to check out.”
“About that…” Lorna should have told Thea when she called earlier but just couldn’t bring herself to say the words over the phone.
Thea waved her off. “You did what you thought was right.”
It was typical for Thea to let her off easy even if she was mad. “I still should have told you so you didn’t hear it from someone else.”
“Katie isn’t just someone else, so don’t worry about it.”
If Thea was pissed, she couldn’t tell. She was calm and focused, her words sounding sincere. “What about Grant? Should we call him? He’ll want to help.”
This time Thea shook her head. “He probably would like to, but it’s better we do this without him. Katie hasn’t said as much, but I get the sense she still doesn’t trust him.”
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