knew that was petty, but with four murders on his hands, he wasn’t exactly in a generous mood. He extended that non-generous mood to anyone who might be inside that cabin.
“Get out here!” he shouted. And by God, it better happen now.
Nothing. Well, nothing except Livvy’s spurting breath and angry mumbles.
“Just because the person doesn’t answer you, it doesn’t mean the place is empty,” she pointed out.
Yeah. And that meant he might have a huge problem. He didn’t want the crime scene compromised, and he didn’t want to shoot anyone. Yet.
“How long were Deputy Spears and you out there casting footprints?” he asked.
“A half hour. And before that we were looking around in the woods.”
That explained how her footprints had gotten on the trail. The castings and the woods search also would have given someone plenty of time to get inside. “I’m guessing Deputy Spears unlocked the cabin for you?”
The sergeant shook her head. “It wasn’t necessary. Someone had broken the lock on a side window, apparently crawled in and then opened the front door from the inside.”
Reed cursed. “And you didn’t see that person when you went in?”
Another head shake that sent her ponytail swishing. “The place was empty when I first arrived. I checked every inch,” she added, cutting off his next question: Was she sure about that?
So, he had possibly two intruders. Great. Dealing with intruders wasn’t on his to-do list today.
Now, he cursed himself. He should have camped out here, but he hadn’t exactly had the manpower to do that with just him and two deputies, including the one behind bars. He’d had to process Shane’s arrest and interrogate him. He had been careful. He’d done everything by the book so no one could accuse him of tampering with anything that would ultimately clear Shane’s name. Kirby Spears had guarded the place until around midnight, but then Reed and he had had to respond to an armed robbery at the convenience store near the interstate.
Lately, life in Comanche Creek had been far from peaceful and friendly—even though that was what it said on the welcome sign at the edge of the city limits. Before the spring, it’d been nearly a decade since there’d been a murder. Now, there’d been four.
Four!
And because some of those bodies had been dumped on Native American burial ground, the whole town felt as if it were sitting on a powder keg. With the previous murder investigations and the latest one, Reed was operating on a one-hour nap, too much coffee and a shorter fuse than usual.
He glanced around. “How’d you get up here?” he asked the sergeant. “Because I didn’t see a vehicle.”
“I parked at the bottom of the hill just off the county road. I wanted to get a good look at the exterior of the crime scene before I went inside.” She glanced around as well. “How’d you get up here?” she asked him.
“I parked on the back side of the hill.” And for the same reason. Of course, that didn’t mean they were going to see eye-to-eye on anything else. Reed was betting this would get ugly fast.
“Reed?” someone called out, the sound coming from the cabin.
Reed cursed some more because he recognized that voice. He lowered his gun, huffed and strolled toward the front door. It swung open just as Reed stepped onto the porch, and he came face-to-face with his boss, Mayor Woody Sadler. His friend. His mentor. As close to a father as Reed had ever had since his own dad had died when Reed was seven years old.
But Woody shouldn’t have been within a mile of the place.
Surrogate fatherhood would earn Woody a little more respect than Reed would give others, but even Woody wasn’t going to escape a good chewing-out. And maybe even more.
“What are you doing here?” Livvy demanded, taking the words right out of Reed’s mouth. Unlike Reed, she didn’t lower her gun. She pointed the Blackwater right at Woody.
Woody eased off his white Stetson, and the rattler tail attached to the band gave a familiar hollow jangle. He nodded a friendly greeting.
He didn’t get anything friendly in return.
“This is Woody Sadler. The mayor of Comanche Creek,” Reed said, making introductions. “And this is Sergeant Livvy Hutton. A Texas Ranger from New York.”
Woody’s tired gray eyes widened. Then narrowed, making the corners of his eyes wrinkle even more than they already were. Obviously he wasn’t able to hold back a petty reaction either. “New York?”
“Spare me the jokes. I was born in a small town near Dallas. Raised in upstate New York.” As if she’d declared war on it, Livvy shoved her gun back into her shoulder holster and barreled up the steps. “And regardless of where I’m from, this is my crime scene, and you were trespassing,” she declared to Woody and then fired a glance at Reed to declare it to him as well.
“I didn’t touch anything,” Woody insisted.
Livvy obviously didn’t take his word for it. She bolted past Woody, grabbed her equipment bag from the porch and went inside.
“I swear,” Woody added to Reed. “I didn’t touch a thing.”
Reed studied Woody’s body language. The stiff shoulders. The sweat popping out above his top lip. Both surefire signs that the man was uncomfortable about something. “You’re certain about that?”
“I’m damn certain.” The body language changed. No more nerves, just a defensive stare that made Reed feel like a kid again. Still, that didn’t stop Reed from doing his job.
“Then why didn’t you answer when I called out?” Reed asked. “And why’d you break the lock on the window and go in there?”
“I didn’t hear you calling out, that’s why, and I didn’t break any lock. The door was wide open when I got here about fifteen minutes ago.” There was another shift in body language. Woody shook his head and wearily ran his hand through his thinning salt-and-pepper hair. “I just had to see for myself. I figured there’d be something obvious. Something that’d prove that Shane didn’t do this.”
Reed blew out a long breath. “I know. I want to prove Shane’s innocence, too, but this isn’t the way to go about doing it. If there’s proof and the New York Ranger finds it, she could say you planted it there.”
Woody went still. Then, he cursed. “I wouldn’t do that.”
“I believe you. But Sergeant Olivia Hutton doesn’t know you from Adam.”
Woody’s gaze met his. “She’s gunning for Shane?”
Probably. For Shane and anyone who thought he was innocent. But Reed kept that to himself. “Best to let me handle this,” he insisted. “I’ll talk to you when I’m back in town. Oh, and see about hiring me a temporary deputy or two.”
Woody bobbed his head, slid back on his Stetson and ambled off the
