to her feet, and before she thought it through she’d stepped out of her concealment.
He jerked to a stop, breathing hard, sweat glistening on his face. “Ruby,” he panted. “What are you doing out here at this hour?”
She wished now she’d stayed hidden. “I was, uh, checking on something. Do you always run before sunup?”
He shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep. Insomniac. It’s either run or watch countless hours of NBA basketball reruns.” He paused. “My brother’s home.”
“Oh. I’m glad he made it.” The silence grew awkward between them. She wished he would say goodbye and move on, leave her to her mission. He didn’t, staying there with hands to his narrow waist, regarding her without his usual good-natured smile, which made her wonder.
“I heard from the sheriff that there was no sign of the locket at the Walker’s house.”
“Hmmm. That’s a setback. So what are you checking out then?”
She sighed. No point in holding back. “I just wanted to see if my memory was accurate.” The pine needles under the tree were thick and fragrant as she knelt and sifted her fingers through the detritus.
He took a knee next to her, uncomfortably close, heat emanating from his body. He didn’t say anything, which made her feel a pressing need to fill the silence.
“When I found it, the necklace I mean, some debris from the nest fell down. I didn’t think anything of it at the time. The nest has been vacant for years. As the trees grew up around this one, it obscured the view, you see, and eagles don’t like to have their view obstructed so they found another location. The tree sort of became invisible until the others around it were cleared.”
He let her babble, crouched down, one arm resting on his muscular thigh. When she ran out of breath, he nodded. “So what are we looking for?”
“This,” she said, snatching up the fragment and holding it up to the light.
He squinted. “Looks like part of a fish backbone.”
“It is. Amazing that it’s still intact, but it was tucked between the twigs, which sheltered it from the elements, I think. The rest just sort of disintegrated. There are really only a few vertebrae left.”
“You’re the bird expert and all, I’m just a plant guy, but isn’t it pretty common to find fish remnants in an eagle’s nest? They’re really into seafood, right?”
She smiled. “Sure, but it got me to thinking about how the locket got up into the tree. It couldn’t have been carried by the wind and eagles aren’t like magpies that collect every shiny thing they see, so how did it get in the nest? It’s possible it was tangled in a branch that one of them brought to the nest, I suppose, but I came up with this crazy notion that it got here...”
His eyebrows shot up. “Via the fish.”
“Exactly.” She was pleased that she did not see disbelief in his look. “The eagle carried the fish up here and the necklace was inside the fish’s stomach.”
He laughed. “I believe it. My brother and I once caught a salmon with a watch in its stomach. Fish gobble first and think about it later.”
“Right. When the eagle tore away the flesh, the locket fell out and got caught in the branches.”
“Which means,” he said, standing and offering her a hand, helping her to her feet, “that someone chucked the necklace in the lake to get rid of it, but your eagle friend brought it back here.”
“Ironic, don’t you think?”
“Amazing, is more like it. After twenty years, long after the fish and eagle are gone, Ruby Hudson happens along and finds it. What a break.”
She winced. “I don’t believe in breaks anymore.”
He brushed pine needles off of his knees. “I do.” His smile faltered. “And I wouldn’t say no to one that helped solve Alice’s disappearance.”
“What did Peter have to say about the locket?”
“Not much.” His mouth tightened. “He was exhausted so I didn’t get a chance to tell him about Lester. He’s been working hard.”
Something in his voice was uncertain, wary perhaps?
Cooper straightened. “I’ll go change and fill him in. Then we can head out.”
“Head out?”
“Are you a runner?”
“Not unless something’s on fire.”
He grinned. “Okay. I’ll hold myself back to a brisk walk. Let’s go. I need to get out of these sweaty clothes before we leave.” He charged off.
“Leave for where?” she called, scrambling to catch up with his long-legged strides.
“You’re planning on going to the lake, aren’t you?”
How had he known that was her plan? To go to the lake, by herself.
“There’s no point, really. After twenty years there is nothing left there that will show us what happened to Alice.”
“Well, we just figured out whoever had her locket was probably there twenty years ago, and that’s more than we’ve known until this moment. Gotta go and see if we can figure out anything, right? Reconstruct the scene? Make like detectives?”
“Okay,” she said, weakly, mulling in her mind how her plan had suddenly come to include Cooper. “But it’s really going to be a waste of time. I can go by myself, no need for you to...”
Cooper disappeared around a bend in the path, leaving her talking to herself.
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