Manhunt (A Rocky Mountain Thriller Book 1)

by Ann Voss Peterson

  He forced his gaze back to the television screen. Maybe he should just keep his damn mouth shut. It was bad enough that he felt this attracted to Shanna. He sure didn’t need to let her know it. Things were complicated enough already. “We need to figure out a game plan.”

  She circled the love seat and perched on the edge next to him. She slipped off the sunglasses. Unfortunately that left him with an unobstructed view of her eyes. “We should go early, before anyone but the security guard is in the building.”

  “We’ll take the dirt bikes at dawn. What do you need to do to get through security?”

  “With Linda’s card and number, I should be able to slip both of us in undetected. The guard will be in the lobby. We’ll go in the side entrance.”

  He could smell the soft scent of the shampoo she’d used. Floral, but with a sexy edge that made him want to breathe deeper. “Do they have cameras in the entrances or outside?”

  “They do in the lobby. Also in the card scanner, but I think I can avoid it.”

  He wished she wouldn’t look at him. “So it’s settled. We’ll go to Talbot early.”

  “Good.” She didn’t move from her perch.

  Despite his better judgment, he allowed himself one more peek. He hadn’t been involved with a woman for a long time. But if he ever were to test those particular waters again, he could see testing them with a woman like Shanna. Tough and smart. A woman who could get bitten by a dog, hike through snowstorms and jump out of moving vehicles without one complaint.

  And then turn around and make sense out of the financial records of a uranium mining company.

  Too bad things weren’t different.

  She held his gaze for an uncomfortably long time. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Em.”

  His gut hitched. He hadn’t been happy with that little surprise. Not that her daughter wasn’t sweet as hell. But in this situation, she presented a problem. One he could easily see destroying all their best-laid plans. “I understand why you didn’t.”

  “You could have fooled me.”

  “What?”

  “You seemed upset about Em earlier, even angry.”

  He didn’t want to talk about this. He wasn’t sure what he felt about Emily and Shanna and this whole mess. He sure as hell didn’t want to try to explain something he didn’t fully understand himself. “Better get some sleep.”

  She nodded, but didn’t move from her chair. “You said Em made things more complicated. How?”

  He let out a sigh. If he made it simple, if he omitted the gray areas, the emotions involved, maybe he could help her see where he was coming from. “If Barstow can get to your daughter, he can get to you.”

  Her eyes flew wide. “You don’t think he’d…” She covered her mouth with her fingers.

  “I think he’d do whatever he needed to.”

  She jumped up from the love seat’s arm as if ready to storm right back to her friend Linda’s condo and lay her life down to protect her daughter.

  He stood and grabbed her arm, right above the wrist. “Sit down.”

  “You just said—”

  “I know what I said.” He almost groaned. He’d known how she would react, so why had he said it? Why hadn’t he just kept his mouth shut? “Let me explain.”

  She didn’t move.

  “Come on.” He guided her to sit beside him.

  She perched on the edge of the cushion and watched him with wary eyes.

  “Barstow doesn’t have to do anything rash.” Of course, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t, but Jace wouldn’t mention that. Shanna already feared the worst. “He’s a wealthy man. If he can buy off the sheriff, he can buy off child services.”

  “You think he’ll try to take Emily away from me?”

  “I’m saying your daughter makes you vulnerable.”

  She shook her head, as if she didn’t want to accept it.

  He moved his hand down her arm and laid it on top of hers. Maybe that’s why he told her. Subconsciously he’d wanted to frighten her so he could provide comfort? Or had he wanted to push her away? Or maybe he just needed to get his worries out in the open…the worry that had hit him over the head when he’d seen her little girl. “It happened to a friend of mine. A lifetime ago.”

  “Mr. Barstow tried to take her child?”

  “Not Barstow. Someone who runs in the same circles as Barstow. Duncan Masters. Big energy, big money.”

  She frowned. “Who was this woman? How do you know she didn’t deserve to have her kid taken away? How do you know what really happened?”

  “She was my partner.”

  “You lived together?”

  He shook his head, though Darla had once been his partner in every way, despite the warnings in department policy. “She was my partner-partner. I was a cop. A detective.”

  “A cop?” Slowly her expression changed from confusion to understanding. “But you said you were in jail.”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “We have time.”

  “Sure, if you’re not interested in sleep.”

  He’d thrown in the comment for levity, but she didn’t smile. “I’ve been straight with you. I’ve told you everything, even the stuff about Kurt. Things I haven’t even told Linda. I think it’s time you’re straight with me.”

  “You’re probably right.” There was no point in hiding any of it anymore. If Shanna wanted to hurt him, she already had plenty of ammunition. And if she was aware of the dangers she faced, maybe she would be more prepared than Darla had been.

  Even though he had no idea how anyone could be prepared for what his partner had faced.

  He braced one elbow on the love seat’s arm. The question was, how in the hell did he start?

  Shanna watched him through narrowed eyes. “That explains a lot, you being a cop. Like how you seem to notice every detail… and the way you grilled me.”

  “Sorry. I needed to know you were telling the truth. All of it.” Too bad he didn’t realize she was still holding back until he saw that chubby-cheeked little face.

  “So this Duncan Masters, he tried to take your partner’s kids away. Why?”

  “We had a strong case against him.”

  “What did he do?”

  “You seem to be pretty good at grilling people, too, when you want to be.”

  She didn’t smile. “Answer the question.”

  “If you believe Masters, he didn’t do a thing. The body in his swimming pool said different.”

  “He killed somebody?”

  He hadn’t talked about Duncan Masters for years. But even so, he could feel the heat rising in his blood. “His mistress. She also happened to work for him. And if you believe the e-mail they exchanged, she was tired of giving him the milk for free. She wanted him to leave his wife.”

  “So that’s why you thought I was having an affair with Barstow.”

  “Love gone bad makes a strong motive.”

  “What does this have to do with your partner’s child?”

  “Children. Two girls and a boy. Before we could get an arrest warrant, she got a visit from child services. They cited evidence of abuse. Got a child psychologist to swear to it.”

  “And you think Duncan Masters had something to do with it?”

  “I don’t think. I know. People like Masters and Barstow, they can buy anything they want. People, justice. Anything.”

  “You sound bitter.”

  “I am bitter.” He’d believed in justice. Not just as a political slogan or a quaint ideal, he’d believed it was real. He’d believed it was blind. He’d believed it was equal.

  He’d been so damn stupid.

  “So what happened? What did your partner do?”

  He paused a long while, deciding what to reveal. “She gave in. Gave him what he wanted. A walk on the murder charge.”

  “How?”

  “By swearing that I falsified evidence to get the search warrant for Masters’s house and the e-mails.”

  �
��But you didn’t….”

  “No. But it didn’t matter. The evidence was thrown out. Masters beat the system. He proved he was above the law.”

  “What happened to you?”

  “I was fired and brought up on charges.”

  “And that’s how you ended up doing time in jail?”

  “That’s when I knew the law was broken. That it only applied to people who didn’t have millions in their bank accounts.”

  Why had he ever thought he could change that?

  He met Shanna’s eyes. Her beautiful green eyes. When he’d heard about Barstow hunting her down, he hadn’t believed he could change things. Not really. But when he’d looked into her eyes, he’d wanted to try.

  “You must hate her for it.”

  “Hate who?”

  “Your partner.”

  “She couldn’t have done anything different. She lived for those kids. If I had kids, I probably would have done the same.”

  “No, you wouldn’t. You’d fight it out.”

  As much as he liked kids, as much as he’d thought he’d wanted them at one time, he didn’t know what it was like to actually be a parent. However, he did remember the desperation in Darla’s and Shanna’s eyes when they believed their children were in danger. He’d seen what that desperation could make a person do. “I don’t know.”

  “You’re worried the same thing is going to happen with me and Em, aren’t you? That if Mr. Barstow takes her away, I’ll do whatever he wants.”

  Jace clenched his jaw. What could he say? It had also occurred to him that they’d need a fall guy. Someone to take the blame for Roger’s and that Davis guy’s deaths. Maybe someone with a ranch nearby, someone with a record and without an alibi. Maybe he was being paranoid, he didn’t know. But he couldn’t seem to shake it. Not totally.

  Jace made a show of looking at his watch, even though his mind didn’t register the time. “We’d better get some sleep. Dawn is going to come awfully fast.”

  Shanna watched him, her eyes focused, sharp as shards of glass. “You don’t just think I’ll cave in. You’re afraid I’ll sell you out.”

  “What do you want me to say?”

  She sat down on the love seat. For a moment her hand hovered near his knee, as if she wanted to touch him, but wasn’t sure that she should. “I have to be honest. If he tries to have my baby taken away, I don’t know what I’ll do. But I won’t sell you out, Jace.”

  “You can’t say that.”

  “Yes. I can.”

  “Shanna, I know you feel grateful to me, even obligated, but that’s not enough.”

  She withdrew her hand, clenching it into a fist in her lap. “You don’t know what I feel. You don’t know me at all. I won’t sell you out.”

  “Shanna, everyone will sell another person out if the stakes are high enough.”

  ______

  Dawn came way too early. As Shanna piloted the dirt bike into Palmer, its little motor buzzing in her ears, she ran over the conversation with Jace the night before. She couldn’t argue that she wouldn’t do anything to protect Em, but he’d been wrong about the rest. She wasn’t like his ex-partner. She wouldn’t sell him out. Not after all he’d done for her. Not after he’d saved her life. Not after…

  She clamped her teeth to keep them from clattering together with the vibration of the bike. After Kurt had left, she swore she wouldn’t get involved with a man again. She certainly wouldn’t trust one. And although she wasn’t willing to trust Jace in that way, she had to admit he made her want to. He made her want to take a chance.

  Buzzing into town, she pushed all those “coulda, woulda, shoulda” thoughts to the back of her mind. She couldn’t afford to think about what would never be. She needed to focus on what was. And right now that meant figuring out why her boss wanted her dead.

  The streets were quiet. Few people were up and around yet, besides truckloads of workers heading for nearby oil fields and mines to start their days. Already the summer’s tourist traffic had cleared out. Except for a small infusion of hunters, only local residents stuck around this time of year. Soon winter would slow Palmer to a crawl. Particularly in the off-season, the local economy ran on big energy. And in Palmer, that primarily meant Talbot Mining.

  She turned the corner off Main Street before they reached the Talbot building and led Jace to the alley behind a video-rental place. After they’d lost the beater truck at Linda’s, she and Jace had planned to park even farther away from their destination this time. That way, if something went wrong, they could still double back and get the motorbikes.

  She turned off the bike’s ignition and climbed off. Up ahead near the Talbot building, a small group of people milled on the sidewalk flanking Main. “That’s strange. I wonder what’s going on.”

  Jace swung a leg off his dirt bike and stashed it behind the building, leaning it against the whitewashed concrete wall. “A tour or something?”

  “Talbot doesn’t give tours of its headquarters. Not that there’s much to see. It’s just an office building.” Shanna hid her bike, as well. She pulled off her gloves and rubbed her hands together, trying to erase the vibration from the bike’s shrill little motor while she combed the faces of the small crowd. She didn’t recognize anyone. Dressed in heavy coats, mittens, hats and scarves, they looked like they planned to spend the day outside.

  Jace jerked his head back. “I know what it is. The mill.”

  “The mill?”

  “The uranium mill in the Red Desert Basin. The one Talbot is trying to reopen. There’s a protest scheduled for this morning. I saw it mentioned on the news back in Copperville.”

  The Red Desert Basin mill had been shut down long before Shanna came to the company, after the scares at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl had made people wary of nuclear power. But in the past few years, world demand for uranium had grown. And once again, Wyoming uranium mines and milling capacity were on the upswing. “I worked on the profit projections for reopening that mill.”

  “Notice anything unusual?”

  “Not unless the promise of significant profits is unusual. Reopening the mill is going to be a boon to Talbot and the whole Red Desert Basin.” She gestured to the small crowd of people. “Don’t tell me. An environmental group?”

  He nodded.

  That made sense. Increased uranium production brought increased waste materials and fears of contamination. Fears that weren’t totally unfounded. Shanna could understand the ambitions and worries of both sides.

  “What if Barstow thinks you know something that would keep the mill from opening?”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, safety concerns? Something you could feed to a group like this?”

  “If that’s what he’s trying to cover up, he should have invited the project manager on his little hunting trip. I deal with numbers. I don’t have any more information about the actual mining or refining operations than your average citizen on the street.”

  Jace started walking toward Main Street and the Talbot building. “Any ideas how we’re going to get past this group without being spotted?”

  “Luck.”

  He gestured to the building with the sweep of an arm. “Lead the way.”

  She tore her gaze from the protestors and started across the street. Housed in a square, three-story stone building, Talbot had always looked to Shanna as if it had emerged straight out of the old west, even though she knew the building had actually been built during the 1980s energy boom. Today her view of the solid and imposing structure was far less romantic.

  “Excuse me, do you work here?”

  She whirled around at the voice.

  A tanned man with high cheekbones and long hair pulled back in a severe ponytail walked toward them.

  One of the protestors? Or someone who recognized her from the pictures on the news? “Who are you?”

  “Boyd Davidson.” He caught up to them, but didn’t offer his hand. “I’m president of Citizens of the Earth.”


  So much for luck.

  “The activist group protesting the mill,” Jace added.

  Davidson gave him a sideways look. “The mill poses a threat to our groundwater. The first year of waste alone will make the area around the mill uninhabitable.”

  Shanna shook her head. She didn’t want to get into a debate with this guy, but his facts were not entirely accurate. “The waste material is a problem only if it’s not disposed of properly. Talbot—”

  “Do you really think a corporation as big as Talbot gives a damn how they dispose of the waste? The only thing that matters to them is money.”

  Shanna held up a hand. She didn’t want to argue with Mr. Davidson. She didn’t want to be noticed at all. And she certainly didn’t want to do anything that would cause people to remember her. “You’re right.”

  Davidson looked at her from under lowered brows. “We need to talk to Anthony Barstow, and we’re not leaving here until we do.”

  “Good luck with that.” Shanna stepped around him and made for the side entrance.

  “Wait,” Davidson boomed. “I want you to tell him that. Tell him I’m waiting out here for him. Tell him he doesn’t have the right to run roughshod over the people and wildlife who live in the Red Desert Basin.”

  “You can tell him when he arrives. He drives a black SUV with a personalized plate. You can’t miss him.”

  “We aren’t leaving until our concerns are heard,” Davidson shouted, more for the benefit of the crowd, who were now looking their way.

  Shanna shielded her face. Noting the warning glance from Jace, she quickened her pace.

  “Well, look who’s here,” Boyd Davidson continued in his loud voice. “Just in time.”

  A murmur rippled through the crowd.

  Barstow? Here? Now? Without looking, Shanna broke in to a run.

  Jace matched her. They reached the door to the side vestibule. She grabbed the handle. Pulling it open, she glanced over her shoulder.

  She expected to see the black SUV, or maybe Barstow himself, standing in the street, raising a deer rifle to his shoulder. Instead a brightly painted van pulled to the curb. A familiar-looking brunette jumped out along with a man Shanna didn’t know. A man balancing a large camera on his shoulder. A news team.