Burned by Her Devotion (Rogue Vows Book 2)

by Melinda Leigh

  Bruce crossed the grass to the card table where Sheila had spread out her maps.

  Kenny hurried over to Carly. “An attendant at the truck stop gas station just sold three gallons of gas to a kid on an ATV.”

  “A girl?” Carly asked.

  “He didn’t know. The kid was wearing a helmet,” Kenny said. “There are so many ATVs around here, it might not be her. It would be pretty brazen to drive up to the pump on a stolen quad.”

  “I’m going to check it out.” Carly moved toward her car. Alex didn’t know the area. Carly let Sheila know where she was going, then headed for her Jeep.

  Kenny fell into step next to her. “You can ride with me. Better to be safe than sorry.” He redirected her toward his patrol car. “We still have a killer on the loose.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Seth sped down the rural highway. He saw the tractor trailer on the side of the road and pulled over behind it. Slipping his gun from its holster, he got out of the vehicle. The semi was still and quiet in the shade of some overhanging branches.

  Phil parked and got out of his car, gun in hand. “Is this the truck?”

  Seth eyed the massive grille. A large dent marred the front fender. “That’s it.” He’d never forget the sight of that front end headed straight for him. They flanked the truck.

  “Police!” Seth shouted. “Let me see your hands.”

  Silence filled the air.

  Phil moved around the front of the vehicle. Seth sidled along the trailer to the cab.

  “Cover me,” Seth mouthed to the deputy.

  Phil nodded and aimed his weapon at the cab.

  Seth’s pulse echoed in his ears as he reached for the door handle. Sweat broke out on his back and ran down his spine. He pulled the lever and jerked the driver’s door open. Pointing his gun inside the cab, he swept the interior, then climbed up onto the running board to check behind the seat. “Empty.”

  “Let’s check the trailer.” Phil moved toward the rear of the vehicle.

  But Seth’s gaze lingered on the thick, dark streaks on the passenger seat. Blood.

  He jumped down from the cab and followed Phil. With Seth covering him, Phil rolled up the overhead door. Boxes of paper filled the trailer.

  Phil climbed up and moved cartons. “There’s no one in here.”

  “We need forensics.” Seth wiped the side of his face on his shoulder. He went to the front of the vehicle and put his hand on the hood. The metal was cool under his palm.

  “I’ll have it towed to the impound lot,” Phil said.

  Seth called the sheriff. “The truck is empty, and it’s been here a while.”

  “We’re shifting the search nearer to County Line Road,” the sheriff said. “Do you have any suspects yet?”

  “Not really.” Seth scanned the shoulder of the road in both directions but saw no footprints. “I would guess they changed vehicles here.”

  “They could be driving anything.” The sheriff swore softly. “I’ll be there in ten, and I’ll continue to coordinate the ground search. You keep looking for whoever broke him out.”

  “Yes, sir. Trying to find Chase’s agent now.”

  Seth left Phil to babysit the semi while he continued to the truck stop. Pulling into the service road, Seth passed a row of fuel pumps and slowed the car. A diner, Fletcher’s Bar, and the Wayward Motel were clustered together. Behind the buildings, rigs lined up on the expanse of asphalt.

  Seth parked in front of a one-story, run-down structure. The Wayward Motel epitomized rent-by-the-hour sleaze. Seth had arrested enough prostitutes and drug dealers here over the years to know the establishment was as nasty as it appeared. But with all the B&Bs full, no doubt Tierney hadn’t been able to find anywhere else to stay.

  He went inside the office.

  The manager gave him a tired sigh. “What now?”

  Charlie and Seth were acquainted. Over the years Charlie had learned that the easiest way to get rid of Seth was to cooperate.

  “I’m looking for Aiden Tierney. I hear he has a room here.”

  “The rich douche bag from LA?”

  “He’s from LA,” Seth said. “I can’t attest to his personality.”

  “I can. Total. Douche.” Charlie shook his head. “You just missed him. He checked out about twenty minutes ago. But he was headed to Fletcher’s. You might catch him there.”

  Seth drove across the lot and parked in front of the bar. To his surprise Kenny pulled up in the SPD cruiser. Carly was in the passenger seat.

  They all got out of their vehicles and gathered on the sandy pavement.

  “What are you doing here?” Seth asked.

  She updated him on her search for Alex. “A kid on an ATV bought gas here a little while ago.”

  Before Seth could ask any more questions, the front door of the bar burst open and a man came flying out, landing on his back on the blacktop. He scrambled to his feet and stumbled back inside.

  “That was Josh Black. Damn it!” Seth reached for the radio and requested backup, then got out of the car and hurried inside. Carly and Kenny followed him.

  Fletcher’s was surprisingly full for late afternoon. The dive bar had been spruced up after a recent change of ownership, but the new owner was having trouble attracting better patrons. Usually the daytime crowd was limited to truckers, full-time drunks, and people who wandered in by accident. Decent folks who wanted a meal ate at the diner.

  Josh Black and Spider Ryan stood with a well-dressed man of about forty. They faced a row of men Seth thought were tabloid photographers.

  “Police!” Seth shouted, raising his badge.

  A few heads turned, but not Josh’s. He was totally focused on a large man with a mustache in front of him.

  “You fucker!” He shoved the mustached man, both hands striking his thick chest, Josh’s obvious intoxication making the movement sloppy. At this rate he was going to need a new liver before he was forty. The mustached man was larger and slightly more sober. When he shoved back, Josh went flying.

  Stepping forward, Spider threw a punch at Mr. Mustache, and the fight immediately escalated into a free-for-all.

  Seth showed his badge and yelled “Police” again, but no one seemed to notice. He waded in, grabbed Josh off the floor by the back of his shirt, and heaved him to his feet.

  “That’s enough!” Seth shouted into the din, with no response. He pulled Josh over to the bar and spun him around. Josh’s back hit the edge of the bar. Seth flashed his badge again. But Josh was beyond reason and threw a haymaker.

  Seth blocked the blow, twisted Josh’s arm behind his back, and spun him into an arm bar. Before Josh could blink, he was facedown on the floor.

  Seth reached for the handcuffs on the back of his belt. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Spider and Mr. Mustache trading blows a few feet away. Kenny tried to grab Mr. Mustache, but the huge man threw his arm back, intending to punch Spider but accidentally hitting Kenny in the jaw. Kenny’s knees folded like a lawn chair and he dropped onto his ass.

  Mr. Mustache hauled Spider over the edge of the bar and punched him in the face. Blood streamed from Spider’s nose. He kicked at Mr. Mustache’s shins and wound his arms in wild arcs. They were roughly the same height, but Mr. Mustache had thirty pounds of bulk on Spider. He leaned into Spider’s chest, pinning the thinner man. Mr. Mustache cocked his arm and closed his fist, preparing to punch Spider again.

  Carly was working her way around the perimeter of the room.

  No!

  Who knew when backup would arrive? Local law enforcement resources were already stretched thin with the searches for Alex and Toby.

  Seth snapped handcuffs onto Josh’s wrists and shouted, “I’m going to arrest everyone in this room in one minute.”

  The bartender was behind the bar, holding a phone to his ear. Pointing at it, he mouthed, “Police” to Seth.

  Jake Powers wasn’t dumb enough to jump into the middle of a brawl, and neither was Carly. Skirting the group, she h
opped on top of the bar, swung her legs over, and slid behind the safety of the barrier. She grabbed the seltzer spray nozzle. Aiming it at Mr. Mustache, she caught him full in the face. He sputtered and shook his head in shock, then released his grip to mop his face with a hand.

  Carly was one smart woman.

  Spider took the opportunity to grab for the larger man’s shirt. Carly gave Spider a spray in the face. He closed his eyes and raised a hand in front of his face to block the stream of liquid.

  Carly lifted her thumb from the lever.

  The cold spray seemed to have deflated both men’s rage, and they slunk apart, both wearing shameful expressions.

  Kenny was climbing to his feet, rubbing his face.

  “You all right, Kenny?” Seth called out.

  “Just humiliated, Seth,” the young officer answered.

  “Understandable.” Seth hauled a handcuffed Josh off the floor.

  “Seth!” Carly’s shout spun Seth around. A man lunged toward him, a bottle raised in his hand.

  Carly grabbed a wooden napkin holder sitting on the bar. She threw it at the man’s back. The napkin holder wasn’t heavy enough to do any damage, but when it hit the man between the shoulder blades, he stumbled, giving Seth an extra second to react.

  He dropped Josh and stepped sideways. The bottle sliced through the air inches from his head. Seth grabbed the man’s hand and twisted it into a wristlock. His attacker fell to his knees, his arm bent at an unnatural angle, his eyes opened wide in pain. Seth forced him down until he was lying facedown on the dirty floor. He didn’t break the man’s wrist, but he wasn’t gentle either.

  The door opened, admitting a shaft of light and two county deputies. Seth gestured. “Need some cuffs here.”

  The deputies rushed forward and took charge of the man.

  With the main combatants subdued and two uniformed cops in the room, the fight ebbed as quickly as it had begun. Carly came out from behind the bar.

  “Does someone want to tell me what happened?” Seth asked.

  “They started it!” Josh yelled.

  Seth silenced him with raised hand. Anger balled up cold and hard in his chest. He had no time to waste on barroom brawls and overinflated egos. “Someone else?”

  Spider used his sleeve to dry his face. He jerked a thumb at the group of paparazzi. “One of them posted a picture of Jenny and Brandon online. It’s gone viral. The kid’s picture is all over social media. Do you know what this will do to his life?”

  “We already told you, it wasn’t any of us.” Mr. Mustache mopped his wet shirt with a paper napkin. “If we’d have gotten the picture we wanted, there’s no way any of us would still be hanging around this craptastic little town.”

  The ragtag group around him nodded and murmured their agreement.

  “Some of us are sleeping in our fucking cars. I haven’t had a shower in two days,” Mr. Mustache continued. “What kind of town has one bar and one motel?”

  “The kind that didn’t ask for any of you to come here,” Seth said. He turned to the deputies. “Round them up and take them in. Jake has a few broken chairs and glasses. They either split the damages or we charge them all.”

  “I know you did it.” Josh lunged toward Mr. Mustache.

  Seth hauled him back. “Cool it.”

  Mr. Mustache pointed at Josh. “We think you did it. We wish we had a photo of Chase’s ex and the kid, but we haven’t been able to get near her. She’s been hiding in that B and B all day. I think that you were trying to find a way to make some quick cash now that your gravy train is dead.”

  Josh rushed forward like an angry dog on a chain. “You fucking—”

  “Stop.” Seth dragged Josh back again and stepped in front of him. He scanned the room. “Where’s the third man who was with you?”

  Spider did a quick survey of the crowd. “That was Aiden Tierney, Chase’s agent. He probably snuck out the back. That’d be typical. Always around when trouble starts, never there to clean up the mess.”

  Seth pointed at Spider. “You. Outside.” Seth made eye contact with each one of the remaining four men. “Everybody else line up against that wall with your hands on your heads. Do not leave.”

  He folded Josh’s arm into a chicken wing and marched him out the door. Carly followed them back into the daylight. Out of patience, Seth stuffed Josh into the back of one the deputies’ cars and closed the door. Josh sulked against the back of the seat, shooting angry glares at the closed door of the bar.

  “I’m going to talk to the gas station attendants.” Carly brushed at a wet spot on her shirt. Probably seltzer.

  “Hold on one sec.” Seth stepped closer to his wife. “You were really smart in there. Thanks for the help. I needed it.”

  “That means more to me than you know.” She smiled up at him, her eyes beaming. As always, his heart thumped when she looked at him that way.

  He told her he loved her often. But that was easy. A simple “I love you” didn’t require thought or effort. Expressing the respect, gratitude, and admiration he felt for her was harder. He wasn’t good at verbalizing how he felt. Action suited him much more. But she deserved the words, even if he stumbled over them.

  He cleared his throat of the emotion clogging it. “I’ll see you later. I love you.”

  “You too.” She walked toward the fuel pumps.

  “Be careful,” Seth called. Then he turned to Kenny, who was going to have a black-and-blue jaw by morning. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “My pride took the brunt of the blow.” Kenny nodded in Carly’s direction. “I’ll stick with her.”

  “I’d appreciate that,” Seth said.

  But is Kenny watching out for Carly, or is it the other way around?

  Seth slid behind the wheel of his car and drove around the bar in case Tierney was still around. But he didn’t see the agent anywhere. How long had he been gone? Fifteen minutes?

  Damn.

  Seth’s phone beeped. The sheriff. He answered, “Harding.”

  “Just got a call that a man named Aiden Tierney is trying to hire a Cessna at the Flying W,” Sheriff Walker said.

  “On my way.” Seth flipped on his light and hauled ass. The airfield was only a few miles from the truck stop. Tierney must have driven there from Fletcher’s.

  What do you do when every cop in the state is watching the major roads?

  You fly over them.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The sun beat down on Carly’s head as she interviewed the gas station attendant. “So you can’t describe the child?”

  He shook his head. “I already told the police. I can’t identify the kid, not with the helmet and pads. Couldn’t even say for sure if it was a girl or boy.”

  “She filled the tank?”

  “And an extra container.”

  “Which direction did she go?”

  The attendant pointed to the woods behind the diner. “That way.”

  Carly and Kenny spent the next hour interviewing diner employees and patrons to see if anyone had seen a girl on an ATV. No one had. Alex had disappeared.

  “I don’t know, Kenny.” Carly got back into the police car. “It’s dinnertime. Where is she going?”

  Kenny’s gaze swept the windshield. “Could be anywhere. That ATV probably goes sixty miles an hour.”

  “It’s going to be dark in a few hours. I don’t want to think of her wandering in the woods in the dark. She could run into a bear, a cougar, coyotes . . .”

  “Possible, but very unlikely,” Kenny said. “She’ll be all right, Carly. This kid has been on her own a lot. I’m sure she knows how to look out for herself.”

  Sadly, this was true.

  Kenny’s radio crackled and the dispatcher yelled over the speaker. “Kenny, you there?”

  Solitude had one police chief, three officers, an admin, and a couple of dispatchers. Operations tended to be less than formal.

  He picked up the mic. “Still at the truck stop.”

&n
bsp; “Eric Hearne just called in a shoplifter at the hardware store. Said she drove off on an ATV.”

  “I’ll head there now,” Kenny said, replacing the mic in its dashboard holder.

  “It had to be Alex,” Carly said.

  Kenny sped into town, and then parked in front of the store. A bell jingled as they opened the glass door and went inside. Like most Solitude businesses, the hardware store was small, carrying most of the essentials and few frills.

  Eric came out from behind the counter. He’d dated Stevie once upon a time. “No point in taking a statement now. She’s long gone.”

  Kenny drew out his notebook.

  “I never even saw her come in. The bell didn’t ring or anything.” Shaking his head, Eric stroked his chin.

  “Can you give me a list of the items she stole?” Kenny asked.

  “Follow me.” Eric led them back to a closet-size office. A computer monitor sat on a scarred desktop. He clicked a few tabs and a security camera feed popped up on the screen.

  “You have a surveillance camera?” Kenny’s voice rose in surprise. Most local businesses weren’t as modern. Eric must have updated the store since taking it over from his father.

  “Sadly, we’ve had an increase in shoplifting in the past few years.” Eric rewound the digital recording and Carly watched Alex slip into the store, closing the door ever so gently to keep the bell silent. The camera didn’t cover every aisle, but the girl headed right to the camping supply section. Glancing over her shoulder, she grabbed a backpack, shoved items into it, then grabbed an ultralight sleeping bag.

  “Is that a backpack stove?” Kenny asked.

  “Yes. And a few canisters of fuel, the smallest ones.” Eric formed a small ball the size of his fist with both hands. “She also took water purification tablets, a folding multitool, a box of matches, and some MREs.” He handed Kenny a list.

  Kenny took notes. “Sounds like she’s preparing to camp for a while.”

  “At least it’s summer,” Carly said. “She won’t freeze.”

  Eric rolled his eyes. “She stole more than three hundred dollars in merchandise. That’s a big amount for me to lose. I’m not saying I want anything bad to happen to the kid, but I wouldn’t mind if she was a little uncomfortable. Of course, with all the stuff she stole, she might be downright cozy.”