jurors’ minds that my father’s killer is still out there.”
Oh, that didn’t sit well with any of them.
Not that she had expected it would.
Cooper and Colt certainly wouldn’t have done something like this. Or at least she hadn’t thought they would since they were essentially estranged from Jewell, but Jewell had kids who loved her. Her twin daughters, Rosalie and Rayanne.
And her stepson, Seth, of course.
Seth looked her straight in the eyes. “Your father’s killer is still out there.”
Shelby didn’t dodge that stare. “Then, we’ll have to agree to disagree about that.”
They could add it to the other mountain of things they disagreed about. Except Shelby immediately rethought that. The only thing they actually disagreed about was Jewell. Obviously, though, that was enough of a six-hundred-pound gorilla.
Cooper volleyed glances between Seth and her and finally gave a low groan. “You’re both free to go, but don’t leave town. I might have other questions for you.”
That order didn’t sit well with Seth. It got his jaw tight again. Of course, anything Cooper could have said might have caused that reaction.
“I’ll be at my house,” Shelby mumbled. “Seth will probably be at the McKinnon ranch, where you and your brothers can personally keep an eye on him.”
Literally.
Since Seth had been living in the guesthouse for months, waiting on his mother’s trial, and the guesthouse was a stone’s throw from both Colt’s and Cooper’s houses.
Shelby started toward the door, but when Seth didn’t budge, she stopped and looked back at him. “Still planning to give me a ride to my house?”
Seth exchanged a few glances with the McKinnons and then added some profanity. “I’ll wait at her place with her,” he growled to Cooper. “Just find these kidnappers fast. And I’ll need a gun and a phone until the FBI can bring me replacements.”
Maybe it was her frazzled nerves, but it took Shelby a few seconds for that to sink in. It didn’t sink in well.
“You think you’re staying with me?” she asked. “Because we both know that’s not a good idea.”
Seth gave her a flat look and took the gun and cell phone that Colt handed him. “Those two men might come after you again. You really want to be alone when that happens, huh?”
She opened her mouth to say yes, that she wanted to be alone so she could get her head on straight, but the yes lodged in her throat. Shelby didn’t want to have to fend off those men again. She probably couldn’t win.
But then, it might be just as dangerous to be under the same roof with Seth.
Seth put the gun in his shoulder holster, slipped the phone into his pocket. “If the sheriff hasn’t found those men by morning,” he added, “I’ll get you a safe house.”
Shelby didn’t want that, either. Didn’t want to be tucked away so that she couldn’t get to the bottom of what was happening. She had to come up with an alternative plan, one that didn’t involve Seth or the McKinnons.
But what?
She didn’t even get a chance to give that some thought because Cooper’s phone rang, and he stepped away to take the call. Maybe, just maybe, this was news that the kidnappers had been caught. While she was hoping, maybe the person who’d killed Boutwell had been caught, as well. If so, then she could go home and not have to be afraid of her own shadow.
However, one glance at Cooper’s face and Shelby knew she hadn’t gotten that lucky.
“Send me the picture,” Cooper said to whoever was on the other end of the line. Several moments later his phone made a dinging sound.
“What’s wrong?” she asked the moment Cooper finished the call. His attention stayed on the phone screen for what seemed an eternity.
The sheriff didn’t jump to answer. Nor did he aim another hard look at her. This time when Cooper looked at her, she saw something else in his eyes. Concern maybe?
No.
It was sympathy.
Oh, no. This was going to be bad.
“The CSIs out at the warehouse found another body,” Cooper finally said.
Yes, bad, all right.
Mercy. Her knees nearly buckled again, and Shelby slapped her hand on the wall to stop herself from falling. The shock of hearing there was another body was enough to send her stomach into a tailspin, but Cooper had no doubt encountered other dead bodies.
Ones that hadn’t put that look of sympathy on his face.
“Oh, God,” Shelby managed to say. “Is it someone I know?”
“Maybe.” Cooper held up the phone so she could see the image on the screen. Seth came closer so he could have a look.
At first Shelby couldn’t figure out what she was seeing exactly.
“The dead woman was wearing a picture mask,” Cooper explained. “Like the one on the man in the warehouse.”
Shelby swallowed hard. Except the man had a mask of her father. This time, it was Shelby’s face on the screen. A photo that was often printed along with her articles.
Beneath the mask the woman had a piece of white paper clutched in her lifeless hands. And Shelby had no trouble seeing what was typed there.
“You’re a traitor, Shelby Braddock. And soon you’ll be a dead one.”
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