“You are okay, aren’t you? I got a call from your stepfather, who said you found something at the cultural center and were in some kind of trouble.”
“Lenny?” She dropped the keys again but didn’t bother to pick them up this time.
“I was beginning to think it was all a crock, that he just wanted to gloat over the fact that he knows you’re using the gift.”
“He does?” Dana slumped against the car. “I—I was afraid he might figure it out. Is that all he told you?”
“Is there more?” He grabbed her ice-cold hand and chafed it between his. She didn’t seem as upset by the news as he expected. But if word leaked out that Dana had decided to use her powers to track this killer, Rafe wanted her the hell out of Silverhill.
“There is more, Rafe.” A few strands of hair clung to Dana’s eyelashes, and she brushed her hand across her eyes.
He clenched his gut as if waiting for a fist to make contact. Did she have another vision? Did the Headband Killer already make a move?
She tugged at his hand. “Let’s sit on the porch.”
On legs that felt like stilts, he followed her to Auntie Mary’s porch and dropped down beside her. Hunching his shoulders, he braced his hands on his knees.
Dana took a deep breath and shuddered as she let it out. “I picked up the girl you just met, Kelsey, at the Durango bus station. I think Lenny must’ve followed me and called you to intercept us here.”
Rafe twisted his head around and fell against the wooden railing bordering the porch steps. The girl? He blinked. Was Dana tense over a family issue?
“Did Jennifer’s daughter run away from home or something? What’s that got to do with Lenny?”
Dana pressed her knees against the folded hands between them, her knuckles as white as the painted trim on Auntie Mary’s windows. “Kelsey isn’t my cousin’s daughter. Jennifer’s daughter, Jessica, is sixteen.”
Rafe ran a hand beneath the band of his hat as if to clear the fog clouding his brain. The girl. Not Jennifer’s daughter. Not sixteen. Younger. Ten? Eleven?
He shot to his feet, his hand grasping the post. “How old is Kelsey?”
“Kelsey will be ten in December.”
Bits of conversation, images and photos all clicked into place like pieces of a puzzle. A puzzle of deception.
Rafe stumbled off the step and strode to his squad car. He hurled himself into the car, slammed the door and cranked on the engine.
He had to get away. He had to get away from her. She didn’t call out to him. She didn’t try to stop him. What could she say?
She’d kept his daughter from him for almost ten years.
Chapter Twelve
Dana rested her elbows back on the top step and, through a haze of tears, watched Rafe’s car speed away. From her. From their daughter.
What had she expected?
The screen door creaked open behind her. Her aunt touched the top of her head. “Give him time.”
Dana closed her eyes and leaned her head against Auntie Mary’s legs. “He’ll never forgive me. The betrayal in his eyes shattered my heart.”
“He may not forgive you, but Rafe McClintock’s going to want to know his daughter. And you have to allow that, whether or not he wants anything more to do with you. That’s the price you pay for deception.”
Auntie Mary’s straight talk plunged the knife deeper into Dana’s heart, but she knew her wise aunt spoke the truth. She’d advised Dana at the time to tell Rafe. Why had she allowed Rafe’s spiteful stepmother to influence her decision more than her trusted aunt? She’d convinced herself that she’d lied to protect Rafe, but maybe her own selfishness drove her more than she cared to admit.
“Now get in there and tell your daughter about her father.” Auntie Mary tugged Dana’s hair.
“D-do you think I should do that now?” Dana pushed up from the porch on shaky legs.
Auntie Mary put her arm around Dana’s waist. “You’ve wasted enough time. You don’t want her to stumble across the truth like Rafe did. Tell her now, and then you can introduce them properly.”
“I don’t want her here for long. I told her she could attend the opening of the cultural center and then I’m sending her home. If Steve can spare me, I might even fly up with her. It’s not safe for her while I’m working this case.”
Auntie Mary nodded. “I know. This case isn’t safe for you either. Kelsey told me why she came. She felt danger all around you.”
“She told you that?”
“I feel it, too. And our feelings are more than vague hunches.” Auntie Mary gripped Dana’s wrists, her gnarled fingers biting into her flesh. “We’re Redbird women.”
THREE HOURS LATER, after burying his rage in piles of paperwork, Rafe squatted on the flat rock that hung over the Twirling Ballerinas. The fantastic rock formations resembled six ballerinas on their toes. He chucked a pebble at one of the dancers and cursed.
He had a daughter. Kelsey.
Why’d she do it? Why had Dana kept the truth from him all these years?
He laughed, the bitter sound creating a faint echo in the canyon. Why do you think she kept it from you? Irresponsibility, immaturity and clowning weren’t exactly the perfect qualities for fatherhood.
Through the years he hadn’t proved himself any more capable of caring for a daughter than he would’ve been at eighteen. In L.A. he’d worked hard and partied hard, trying to prove…what? That he could get lots of people to love him even if his own mother didn’t?
He clenched his teeth against that pathetic truth and tossed another rock at a ballerina.
“Is that dancer meant to be me?”
He shifted a quick glance at Dana, clambering up to his perch, and then looked away. His jaw hardened and he tipped his hat over his face, blocking the blazing sunset from his vision.
As Dana gripped the edge to hoist herself onto the flat rock, Rafe curled his fingers into his thighs to prevent himself from helping her.
The toes of her running shoes scrabbled for a foothold, but she slid down a few feet. Rafe blew out a breath, leaned over and grabbed her arms, pulling her onto his lookout.
He dropped her wrists as soon as she stood beside him, and she wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. “Whew. Thanks for the lift. I’d forgotten how tough this final part of the trail could be.”
Dana’s breath came out in short gasps and she’d worked up a sweat, which only intensified the smell of her musky floral perfume. His gaze focused on the bits of rock on her palm, along with a few bloody streaks.
He pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and circled her wrist with his fingers. Silently, he brushed the debris from her palm and blotted her scratches.
“Thanks.” She closed a fist around the handkerchief and dropped her lashes. “I’m sorry, Rafe.”
He bit back his angry retort and returned to his spot on the rock, dangling his legs over the edge. “What’s she like?”
Settling next to him, Dana folded her legs beneath her. “She’s smart, but she doesn’t much like school. She’d rather play soccer. She once answered a story problem about asparagus on a math test by stating that she wouldn’t have any asparagus left because she hated asparagus and would give away her share.”
Rafe snorted. He’d always believed story problems were irrelevant in the grand scheme of life.
Dana’s shoulder pressed against his as she continued. “Her teachers tell me she’s the class clown, and I know she’s popular. Other girls flock to her. She loves pizza and Rocky Road ice cream.”
As the sun dipped behind a ridge of mountains, Dana told him about Kelsey—her likes and dislikes, her personality and her strengths and challenges. His heart filled with pride and emotion choked him, not the anger and betrayal he’d nursed all afternoon but something else…wonder.
“She sounds…”
“Just like you.” Dana smoothed her hand down his back. “God knows she’s nothing like her type A, rigid mother. And right now she’s crazy
impatient to meet her father.”
“She knows?”
Dana folded her hands in her lap. Rafe had been receptive to hearing about his daughter, but he’d reserved the warmth in his voice for Kelsey. The eyes that met hers briefly as they talked flashed a cold light, like hardened steel. He’d remained unresponsive to her light touches.
He’d want to be involved in Kelsey’s life, but he’d never forgive her mother.
“I told her after you left Auntie Mary’s house. Naturally she was upset because I’d led her to believe her dad left us. Now she’s just excited to see you.” Dragging in a ragged breath, Dana staggered to her feet and stretched her arms to the sky.
“So are you interested in meeting your daughter…again?” She held out a hand to Rafe, but he ignored it and jumped to his feet, brushing the dirt from the seat of his jeans.
“Did you think I’d turn away from her? Is that why you didn’t bother to tell me about your pregnancy and then kept quiet for ten years?”
Dana opened her mouth, years of explanations and excuses and insecurities tumbling to her lips, but Rafe held up his hand.
“Save it.”
Dana gulped back a sob, her eyes stinging with tears. She deserved his scorn. She crept to the edge of the lookout in the darkness.
A beam of light danced in front of her and Rafe said, “Hold on. I brought a flashlight.”
He deftly climbed down the rock face, as sure-footed as a mountain lion, and jumped to the trail below. With one hand, he aimed his flashlight at the first foothold and he used the other to grab her calf, guiding her foot to the small crevice.
When she reached the bottom, Rafe placed his hands around her waist and lifted her down. Once he placed her on solid ground, he dropped his hands as if burned.
She had burned him…badly.
He gestured with his flashlight down the path. “I’ll lead. You follow. Just be careful where the path narrows up ahead.”
Dana knew that stretch of the trail, which plunged off into nothingness after a few detours over craggy rocks. When the trail narrowed, she slipped her hand beneath Rafe’s shirt and hooked her fingers in his waistband. The warm skin of his back scorched her hand as she remembered caressing him there.
Had that just been last night? It seemed as long ago as the first time they made love in one of the caves not far from the trail they now traipsed over silently like two strangers.
His back stiffened at her touch but he didn’t shrug her off.
When the trail opened up and leveled off, Dana maintained her hold on Rafe. He knew the way a lot better than she did, and she had no intention of obliging his anger toward her by falling off a cliff. So she continued to stumble along behind him.
Kelsey had been mad when Dana told her the man she met outside was her father. She’d cried and lashed out, and just like with Rafe’s wrath, Dana accepted it all.
Then she’d bounced back and asked a million questions. She claimed she’d sensed something special about Rafe the minute he took her hand. And Dana believed her…because she had, too.
Dana had taken advantage of the situation by trying to convince Kelsey the danger she felt surrounding her mother concerned Rafe. Kelsey acted like she bought it, but she didn’t fool Dana. Her daughter had a lot of practice concealing her true feelings from her mother.
They neared the end of the trail and Dana released her hold on Rafe. He shot ahead of her, already digging his keys from his pocket.
She didn’t want him rushing over to Auntie Mary’s without her. She quickened her steps, slipped and tumbled against a boulder at the side of the trail. She threw out her hands and landed on top of the big rock, scraping her palms and bumping her knee.
“Damn. Would you wait up?”
All at once the darkness of the night grew blacker and engulfed her on all sides. An overpowering fear clutched her heart like a fist and she fell back against the boulder.
She couldn’t breathe. A pair of strong hands had her by the throat. She clawed at the hands encased in latex gloves. Thin latex. Using her long fingernails, she scratched at the gloves, poking and gouging.
She wanted to scratch him. She wanted to hurt him, but her fingernails couldn’t rip through the gloves. His left glove stretched tightly across a ring on his finger. She dragged her nail across the flat part of the ring. A tiny hole opened and she tried to widen it, but she felt light-headed. The pad of her finger skimmed across the ring and she felt the outline of a crown.
Rafe cradled her in his lap, holding her tightly, rocking back and forth.
Dana sputtered and coughed and then buried her head against his shirt. He stroked her hair and murmured in her ear, “I’m sorry I left you behind. I’m here now.”
Dana raised her head and leaned her chin on Rafe’s shoulder, gulping in deep breaths of pine-scented air. “I—I had another vision, Rafe.”
“Shh. I know. I could tell from the posture of your body and the way your eyes rolled back. It was just like the other two times, but scarier. What happened? Why did you go into a trance?”
Shaking her head, Dana bit her lip and clung to Rafe more tightly. “I don’t know why it happened.”
She did know letting down her guard and giving in to her emotions created more susceptibility to the gift. Those scenes with Kelsey and Rafe had shaken her to the core and further hacked away at her peace of mind.
“What were you doing? What were you thinking?” Rafe smoothed the hair back from her brow.
Dana pursed her lips. She’d been thinking she wanted to smack Rafe for rushing ahead of her. Then she tripped. She’d tripped and fallen across the boulder.
A tingle raced up her spine. Her previous visions had all come after coming into contact with the victims, either directly or indirectly.
The last thing she remembered before the vision took control of her mind was her palms smacking against the rock where Rafe now sat with her curled up in his lap. She slid from his thighs, her bottom hitting the hard surface of the boulder. She tracked the grooves and ridges of the rock with her fingertips, which now buzzed at the contact.
Rafe cocked his head, raising one brow. “What is it?”
“I got the vision because I landed on this rock.”
“What?” Rafe jumped from the rock as if it were a hot seat.
Dana splayed her fingers on the boulder and leaned forward. The granite seemed to come alive beneath her touch. Images and thoughts swirled in her head.
The crown. The gold crown belonged on a ring, not in someone’s mouth or on someone’s head.
She dragged her hands away from the rock and clapped them together. “That crown I flashed on last time with Jacey? It’s imprinted on a ring. The killer wears a gold ring engraved with a crown on his left hand.”
Rafe’s jaw dropped before he swept her into a hug. “That’s huge. It’s the best clue we’ve gotten yet for this investigation.”
“There’s something else, Rafe.” She grabbed the flashlight dangling from his hand and swept its beam across the boulder. “Something happened in this spot. That’s why the vision hit me.”
He snapped his fingers. “Lindy Spode. She had some pine needles in her hair that weren’t consistent with the location of her body.”
The victim murdered here hadn’t seen her attacker. His hands came at her from behind while she was sitting on the boulder. Dana skirted the rock and pointed Rafe’s flashlight at the ground behind it.
Rafe crouched beside her and peered at the blanket of pine needles and pebbles in the dirt. He asked her to shine the light on the tree that hung over the beginning of the trail, and then studied the bark and the low-hanging branches.
“It’s hard to see anything in this light. We’ll have to send a forensics team out here to look for evidence.”
“What excuse are we going to give them?”
Rafe dropped to his haunches and stirred the needles with a pen. “I’ll say I got an anonymous tip. That’s not too far from the truth.”
&
nbsp; Drawing in a quick breath, Rafe pinched a white object between his fingers and held it up to the light. “A cigarette butt.”
“Who’d be crazy enough to smoke out here?”
“A nervous killer?” Rafe wrapped the butt in his handkerchief and stuck it in the pocket of his jacket.
“Lenny smokes.”
“Yeah, but does he also have a gold ring with a crown on it?” Rafe gestured her back onto the trail and out to the road where they’d parked their cars.
“He must’ve parked his car right here to load the body in his trunk and take it to that construction site.” He surveyed the gravel road that sat at the head of the Twirling Ballerinas Trail. “You know, this is where Zack Ballard was murdered by that maniac who was after my sister-in-law, Julia. We found his body sprawled across the trail.”
Dana shivered and clutched her upper arms. “This trail is going to get a spooky reputation. There’s something creepy about the legend of the frozen ballerinas anyway.”
“I wonder why he doesn’t just leave the bodies where he murders them. Why risk additional evidence by loading them in his trunk and dumping them in another location?”
“He wants us to discover them.”
“Someone would’ve found Lindy here, and someone sure as hell would’ve seen Jacey’s body in the Shopco parking lot. There’s some significance about the construction sites.”
“Maybe he’s familiar with them.” Dana hesitated before climbing into her rental. “Are you going to follow me to Auntie Mary’s? It’s not too late.”
“She…Kelsey won’t be asleep?”
“It’s only seven-thirty, and even if it were two o’clock in the morning I think she’d be waiting for you.”
“How would I know about her bedtime?” He shrugged, a careless gesture that couldn’t mask the pain in his eyes.
Pain she’d put there.
“I’m sure she’s anxious to tell you about her bedtime and everything else, Rafe. She needs her father.”
He blew out a breath and opened his car door. “Are you okay to drive?”
She assured him she was, and he followed her to Auntie Mary’s house, the glow of his headlights soothing to her frazzled nerves.
The Sheriff of Silverhill Page 14