The Novels of Nora Roberts, Volume 4

by Nora Roberts

  As they walked, Brody kept his eyes on the ground, or studied the brush. He wanted, more than he’d realized, to find something to prove Rick wrong.

  Which meant, he realized, he was trying harder to prove some woman was dead instead of another woman was mistaken.

  But he remembered how she’d looked, how she’d struggled to keep herself from dissolving on the long hike back. And how alone she’d looked standing in her nearly empty apartment.

  “I did some checking up on her.” When Brody stopped, narrowed his eyes, Rick shook his head. “I consider that part of my job. Somebody new comes around, settles in, I want to know they’re clean. Did the same with you.”

  “And did I pass the audition?”

  “You and I haven’t had any words otherwise, have we?” He paused, lifted his chin to the left. “That’s the back of one of Joanie’s cabins. That one’s the closest, and it took us about ten minutes to walk it. Setting a good pace, and not carrying dead weight. Couldn’t’ve gotten any sort of vehicle closer than this. Either way, there’d be tire tracks.”

  “Did you go inside? The cabin?”

  “Having a badge doesn’t mean I can go inside somebody’s property. But I looked around, looked in the windows. Doors are locked. Went to the two others that are closest, which includes my own. And there I did go in. Nothing there.”

  Still they continued on, reaching the cabin, circling it.

  “Reece is clean, if you’re interested,” Rick continued when Brody peered through the cabin windows. “But she was involved with something a few years ago.”

  Brody stepped back, spoke carefully. “Involved with what?”

  “Spree killing at the restaurant where she worked in Boston. She was the only survivor. She was shot twice.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “Yeah. Left for dead in some kind of closet, storage closet. I got details from a Boston cop who worked the case. She was in the kitchen, everyone else was in the dining room—after hours. She heard screams, gunshots, remembers, or thinks she remembers, grabbing for her cell phone. One of the men came in, shot her. She doesn’t remember much more—or didn’t. Didn’t get a good look at him. Got knocked back in the closet and left there until the cops found her a couple hours later. Cop I talked to said she damn near didn’t make it. Coma after surgery for best part of a week, and her memory was patchy after. And her mental state wasn’t much better than her physical.”

  Nothing, nothing he’d imagined came close. “How could it have been?”

  “What I’m saying is she had a breakdown. Did some months in a psychiatric hospital. She was never able to give the cops enough details or description. They never caught who killed all those people, then she dropped off the map. The lead investigator got in touch with her off and on during that first year or so. Last time he tried, she’d moved, left no forwarding. She got family—a grandmother—but all she could tell him was Reece was gone, and wasn’t planning to come back.”

  Rick stopped, gave a long, slow scan, then changed directions and backtracked. A warbler began to call out in its quick, high-pitched song. “I recollect bits of it myself. The killing made the national news. I thought, as I remember, thank God we live out here, not in the city.”

  “Yeah, no guns out here.”

  Rick’s jaw firmed. “People around here value their constitutional right to bear arms. And they respect it. City slicker.”

  “You forgot the pinko liberal part.”

  “I was being polite.”

  “Sure you were,” Brody said mildly. “You right-wing lunatic.”

  Rick let out a rumble of laughter. “Don’t know how I got to be friends with some urban elitist.” He angled his head. “I’m surprised you didn’t hear about this business, Brody. Being a big-city reporter.”

  Brody calculated the timing. If it happened right after he quit the paper, he would have been baking out his bitterness in the sun and surf of Aruba. He hadn’t read a paper for nearly eight weeks, and had boycotted CNN. Just on principle.

  “I took what we’ll call a moratorium from the news for a couple of months after I left theTrib .”

  “Well, I guess the media business of it would have petered out in that length of time. Always something else to bombard the public with.”

  “Constitutionally, the First Amendment comes before the Second.”

  “And it’s a damn shame about that. But to get back to it, I gotta say, what happened to Reece? That’s a goddamn hell of a thing for anyone to come back from, and it could be she’s not all the way back.”

  “So she, what, hallucinated a murder? Screw that, Rick.”

  “Might’ve fallen asleep, just nodded off for a few minutes and had a bad dream. Cop who worked the case told me she was prone to them. It’s a long way up that trail for a novice, and she’d have been tired by the time she got all the way up to where she stopped. Could’ve been light-headed on top of it. Joanie says the girl hardly eats unless she shoves a plate at her. Got some nerves, too. Dragged the dresser in front of the door of the adjoining room in her hotel, kept it like that the whole time she was there. Never unpacked.”

  “Overly cautious isn’t crazy.”

  “Now, Brody, I never saidcrazy. But I think it’s likely she’s still emotionally disturbed.” He shot up both hands immediately. “Let me take backdisturbed and sayfragile. That’s how I’m seeing it because, when it comes down to it, that’s all I have to see. Not that I’m not going to keep looking into this, but I’m not calling in State at this point. Nothing for them to do here. I’ll make inquiries into missing persons, see if I find anyone matches what description she could give me of the woman she saw. Can’t do more than that.”

  “Is that what you’re going to tell her? You can’t do any more?”

  Rick took off his hat, raked fingers through his hair. “You seeing what I’m seeing here? Which is nothing? If you’ve got the time I’d like you to go with me while I check out the other cabins in the vicinity.”

  “I’ve got the time. But why me instead of one of the deputies?”

  “You were with her.” Face set, Rick settled his hat back on his head. “We’ll call you a secondary witness.”

  “Covering your ass, Rick?”

  “You want to call it that,” Rick said without rancor. “Look here, I believe she thinks she saw something. But there’s no evidence to support it. What I think is she fell asleep, had a bad dream, and you’ve got to at least entertain the possibility that’s just what happened. I don’t want to add to her troubles, whatever they may be, and I’ve got to work with facts. The fact is, there’s no sign of foul play here. No sign anyone’s been here at all, come to that, certainly not in the last twenty-four hours. We’ll do another sweep on the way back and check out the cabins in this section. We find anything—hell, we come across a ball of fucking lint—I’ll call up State and pursue this. Otherwise all I can do is check with Missing Persons off and on.”

  “You just don’t believe her.”

  “At this point, Brody?” Rick looked across the river, up to the rocks. “No, I surely don’t.”

  WHEN THE BREAKFAST rush was over, Reece dove straight into the prep for the soup of the day. She simmered beans, cubed leftover ham, diced onions. Joanie’s didn’t run to fresh herbs, so she made do with dried.

  Better with fresh basil and rosemary. And coarsely ground black pepper would be an improvement over the damn gray powder in a can on the shelf. And for Christ’s sake, how was she supposed to cook with garlic powder? She wished she had some sea salt. And wasn’t there anywhere around here that had tomatoes this time of year with sometaste ?

  “Sure are full of complaints.” Joanie walked over to the pot, sniffed. “Looks good enough to me.”

  Talking to myself again, Reece realized. “Sorry. It’s fine; it’ll be fine. I’m just in a mood.”

  “I could see that for myself all morning. Hearing it now, too. This ain’t no cordon bleu establishment. You want fancy, you should�
�ve aimed your car toward Jackson Hole.”

  “It’s fine. I’m sorry.”

  “Didn’t ask for the first apology, and the second’s just annoying. Haven’t you got any backbone in there?”

  “I used to. It’s still in the shop for repair.”

  Whatever had caused the mood, the look in Reece’s eye and the jerky way she’d been moving, was worrying. “Told you to make up what you liked for today’s soup, didn’t I?” Joanie kept her voice brisk. “You want something we don’t have in here, you make a list. I’ll think about ordering it. Maybe. If you don’t have enough gumption to ask, don’t stand around muttering and bitching about it later.”

  “Okay.”

  “Sea salt.” With a derisive snort, Joanie strode over to pour herself a cup of coffee. From that angle, she could give Reece a good study without being obvious about it. The girl was on the pale side, she noted, with shadows under her eyes. “Doesn’t look to me as if a day off did you much good.”

  “No, it didn’t.”

  “Mac said you hiked up Little Angel Trail.”

  “Yes.”

  “Saw you come back with Brody.”

  “We…we ran into each other on the trail.”

  Joanie took a slow sip of coffee. “The way your hands are shaking you’re going to end up slicing your hand instead of those carrots.”

  Reece set the knife down, turned. “Joanie, I saw—” She broke off when Brody came into the diner. “Can I take my break?”

  Something’s up, Joanie thought, as she watched the way Brody paused and waited. Something’s off. “Go ahead.”

  Reece didn’t run around the counter but she moved fast, and she kept her eyes locked on Brody’s face. Her heart slammed against her ribs. And her hand reached out for his while she was still two paces away.

  “Did you find—”

  “Let’s go outside.”

  She only nodded, which was just as well since he was already pulling her to the door. “Did you find her?” Reece repeated. “Tell me. Do we know who she is?”

  He kept walking, his hand firm on her arm, until they were around the side of the building at the base of the steps to Reece’s apartment.

  “We didn’t find anything.”

  “But…He must have thrown her into the river.” She’d visualized that countless times through the night. “Oh God, he threw her body in the river.”

  “I didn’t say anyone, Reece. I said anything.”

  “He must have…” She caught herself, sucked in a hard breath. Then she spoke very carefully. “I don’t understand.”

  “We went to the place where you said you’d seen them. We covered the ground from there to the road and back from different directions. We went to the five cabins closest to the area. They’re empty, and there’s no sign they’ve been otherwise.”

  The sick dread started in the center of her belly. “They didn’t have to be staying in a cabin.”

  “No. But they had to get where you saw them from somewhere. There weren’t any tracks, there weren’t any signs.”

  “You went to the wrong place.”

  “No. We didn’t.”

  She hugged her arms now, but it wasn’t the sharp spring breeze that chilled her. “That’s just not possible. They were there. They argued, they fought, he killed her. Isaw it.”

  “Didn’t say otherwise. I’m telling you there’s nothing out there to support that.”

  “He’ll get away with it. He’ll just walk away and live his life.” Reece sat down heavily on the steps. “Because I’m the only one who saw, and I didn’t see enough, couldn’t do anything.”

  “Does the world always revolve around you?”

  She looked up then, torn between shock and misery. “And how the hell would you feel? I guess you’d just shrug it off. Gee, I did what I could, better go have a beer and stretch out in the hammock.”

  “Little early yet for a beer. Sheriff’s going to check on missing persons. He’s going out to the guest ranch, the B and B’s, hitting some of the outlying places and campgrounds. Have you got a better way to handle it?”

  “It’s not myjob to handle it.”

  “Mine either.”

  She shoved to her feet. “Why didn’t he come back to talk to me? Because he doesn’t think I saw anything,” she said before he could answer. “He thinks I made it up.”

  “If you want to know what he thinks, ask him. I’m telling you what I know.”

  “I want to go out there, see for myself.”

  “Up to you.”

  “I don’t know how to get there. And maybe you’re the last person I want to ask for a goddamn favor, but you know what? You’re also the only person I’m absolutely sure didn’t kill that woman. Unless, among your other talents, you can sprout wings and fly. I’m off at three. You can pick me up here.”

  “Can I?”

  “Yeah, you can. And you will. Because you wonder about this just as much as I do.” She dug into her pocket, pulled out a faded and wrinkled ten-dollar bill. Slapped it into his hand. “There. That should cover the gas.”

  She strode off, leaving him staring at the ten with a mixture of amusement and annoyance.

  8

  REECE TURNED THE soup to simmer, and since her blood was up, started a list of what she considered essential items for any kitchen.

  Five-star restaurant, small-town diner, personal kitchen. What the hell did it matter? Food was food, and why the hell shouldn’t it be perfectly prepared?

  She handled a few orders for people who, for reasons that escaped her, wanted a buffalo burger before noon. Between orders, she set to work scrubbing down the kitchen, from the inside of the cabinets out.

  She was on her knees washing out the area under the sink when Linda-gail crouched beside her. “Are you trying to make the rest of us look bad?”

  “No. I’m keeping busy.”

  “When you’re done keeping busy here, you can go over to my house and keep busy there. Are you mad at Joanie?”

  “No. I’m mad at the world. The whole stinking, fucked-up world.”

  Linda-gail glanced over her shoulder, lowered her voice. “Got your period?”

  “No.”

  “It’s just that one or two days a month, I usually get mad at the whole stinking, fucked-up world. Anything I can do?”

  “Can you wipe out the last twenty-four hours with the power of your mind?”

  “Probably not.” She laid a hand on the small of Reece’s back, gave it a rub. “But I’ve got chocolate in my purse.”

  Reece let out a sigh, dropped her rag back in the bucket of soapy water. “What kind of chocolate?”

  “The little pads in the gold foil the hotel puts on pillows at night. Maria in housekeeping’s my pusher.”

  The smile felt so foreign on Reece’s face it almost hurt. “They’re not bad. Thanks, maybe—”

  “Reece.” Joanie’s voice, clipped and cool, brought Reece’s head out from under the sink. “My office a minute.”

  Reece and Linda-gail exchanged a look—and Linda-gail’s was ripe with pity—before Reece got up and followed Joanie into the little office.

  “Close that door. I just got a call from my boy. Seems the sheriff’s been out to the ranch asking questions. Appears he’s looking for some people, most especially a woman who might’ve gone missing. Lo didn’t get much out of him, but I didn’t raise any fools, so he got enough.”

  Turning to her tiny office window, she shoved it open before yanking her cigarettes out of her pocket. “Rick says maybe somebody saw something happen to this woman, maybe that person was up on Little Angel and thought something happened across the river. Not being a fool, either, I figure somebody who maybe saw something would be you.”

  “The sheriff asked me not to say anything until he’d investigated, but since he’s not finding anything…I saw a man kill a woman. I saw him strangle her, and I was too far away to help. I was too far away to do anything. And now they can’t find anything. It’s lik
e it never happened.”

  Joanie blew out a quick stream of smoke. “What woman?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t recognize her; I didn’t see her that well. Her face. Or his. But I saw…I saw…”

  “Don’t you go hysterical on me.” Joanie kept her voice cool and firm. “You sit down if you need to, but you don’t get hysterical.”

  “Okay. All right.” Reece didn’t sit, but rubbed away the tears with the heels of her hands. “I saw them. I saw what he did to her. I was the only one who saw anything.”

  Her boots drumming into the ground.

  High-topped black Nikes with silver swatches outside the storeroom door.

  His black jacket and orange hunter’s cap.

  Dark gray hoodie, big, black gun.

  “I was the only one who saw anything,” she repeated. “And I didn’t see enough.”

  “You said you and Brody were on the trail.”

  “He was farther down. He didn’t see. He went back up with me, but there was nothing to see.” Because she couldn’t get enough air in the room, the tiny box of a room, Reece moved to the window. “I didn’t imagine it.”

  “Why would I think you had? If you were upset about this, you could’ve had today off.”

  “I had yesterday off, and look what happened. Did Lo say…was there a woman staying at the ranch?”

  “Everyone booked there, working there, is accounted for.”

  “Of course.” Unsure if she should be relieved or terrified, Reece closed her eyes. “Of course they are.”

  After a brief knock, Linda-gail stuck her head in. “Sorry. But we’re starting to back up out here.”

  “Tell them to hold their water,” Joanie ordered, then waited for the door to close again. “You okay to finish out your shift?”

  “Yes. I’d rather have something to do.”

  “Then go cook. Meanwhile, if you’ve got something eating at your belly, screw what Rick Mardson tells you. You can come to me.”

  “Thanks. My insides feel like they’ve been wrung out like a dishrag.”

  “I’m not surprised. It should feel better, spitting it out.”