only made it two steps.
Livvy threw open the door. “Where’s the mayor?” she demanded.
“Gone.” Reed hitched his thumb toward the downside of the hill. “Why?”
Her hands went on her hips, and those ice-blue eyes turned fiery hot. “Because he stole some evidence, that’s why, and I intend to arrest him.”
Livvy was in full stride across the yard when the sheriff caught up with her, latched on to her arm, whirled her around and brought her to an abrupt halt.
“I’m arresting him,” she repeated and tried to throw off his grip.
She would probably have had better luck wrestling a longhorn to the ground. Despite Sheriff Reed Hardin’s lanky build, the man was strong. And angry. That anger was stamped on his tanned face and in his crisp green eyes.
“I don’t care if Woody Sadler is your friend.” She tried again to get away from the sheriff’s clamped hand. “He can’t waltz in here and steal evidence that might be pertinent to a murder investigation.”
“Just hold on.” He pulled out his cell phone from his well-worn Wranglers, scrolled through some numbers and hit the call button. “Woody,” he said when the mayor apparently answered, “you need to get back up here to the cabin right now. We might have a problem.”
“Might?” Livvy snarled when Sheriff Hardin ended the call. “Oh, we definitely have a problem. Tampering with a crime scene is a third-degree felony.”
The sheriff dismissed that with a headshake. “Woody’s the mayor, along with being a law-abiding citizen. He didn’t tamper with anything. You said yourself that someone had broken the lock, and Woody didn’t do that.”
“Well, he obviously isn’t so law-abiding because he walked past crime-scene tape and entered without permission or reason.”
“He had reason,” Reed mumbled. “He’s worried about Shane. And sometimes worried people do dumb things.” He looked down at the chokehold he had on her arm, mumbled something indistinguishable, and his grip melted away. “What exactly is missing?”
“A cell phone.” Livvy tried to go after the trespassing mayor again, but Reed stepped in front of her. Worse, her forward momentum sent her slamming right against his chest. Specifically, her breasts against his chest. The man was certainly solid. There were lots of corded muscles in his chest and abs.
Both of them cursed this time.
And Livvy shook her head. She shouldn’t be noticing anything that intimate about a man whom she would likely end up at odds with. She shouldn’t be noticing his looks, either. Those eyes. The desperado stubble on his strong square jaw and the tousled coffee-brown hair that made him look as if he’d just crawled out of bed.
Or off a poster for a Texas cowboy-sheriff.
It was crystal-clear that he didn’t want her anywhere near the crime scene or his town. Tough. Livvy had been given a job to do, and she never walked away from the job.
Sherriff Hardin would soon learn that about her.
By God, she hadn’t fought her way into the Ranger organization to be stonewalled by some local yokels who believed one of their own could do no wrong.
“What cell phone?” Reed asked.
Because the adrenaline and anger had caused her breath and mind to race, it took her a moment to answer. First, she glanced at the road and saw the mayor inching his way back up toward them. “One I found in the fireplace when I was going through the front room. You no doubt missed it in the initial search because the ashes were covering it completely. The only reason I found it is because I ran a metal detector over the place to search for any spent shell casings. Then, I photographed it, bagged it and put it on the table. It’s missing.”
His jaw muscles stirred. “It’s Marcie’s phone?”
“I don’t know. I showed it to Deputy Spears, and he said he didn’t think it was Shane’s. That means it could be Marcie’s.”
“Or the killer’s.”
She was certain her jaw muscles stirred, too. “Need I remind you that you found Deputy Shane Tolbert standing over Marcie’s body, and he had a gun in his hand? Marcie was his estranged lover. I hate to state the obvious, but all the initial evidence indicates that Shane is the killer.”
Livvy instantly regretted spouting that verdict. It wasn’t her job to get a conviction or jump to conclusions. She was there to gather evidence and find the truth, and she didn’t want anything, including her anger, to get in the way.
“Shane said he didn’t kill her,” Reed explained. His voice was calm enough, but not his eyes. Everything else about him was unruffled except for those intense green eyes. They were warrior eyes. “He said Marcie called him and asked him to meet her at the cabin. The moment he stepped inside, someone hit him over the head, and he fell on the floor. When he came to, Marcie was dead and someone had put a gun in his hand.”
Yes, she’d already heard the summary of Shane’s statement from Deputy Kirby Spears. Livvy intended to study the interrogation carefully, especially since Reed had been the one to question the suspect.
Talk about a conflict of interest.
Still, in a small town like Comanche Creek, Reed probably hadn’t had an alternative, especially since the on-scene Ranger, Lieutenant Colter, had been called back to the office. If Reed hadn’t questioned Shane, then it would have been left to his junior deputy, Kirby, who was greener than the Hill Country’s spring foliage.
The mayor finally made his way toward them and stopped a few feet away. “What’s wrong?”
“Where’s the cell phone that I’d bagged and tagged?” Livvy asked, not waiting for Reed to respond.
Woody Sadler first looked at Reed. Then, her. “I have no idea. I didn’t take it.”
“Then you won’t mind proving that to me. Show me your pockets.”
Woody hesitated, until Reed gave him a nod. It wasn’t exactly a cooperative nod, either, and the accompanying grumble had a get-this-over-with tone to it.
The mayor pulled out a wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and a handkerchief and keys from the front ones. No cell phone, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t taken it. The man had had at least ten minutes to discard it along the way up or down the hill to his vehicle.
“Taking the cell won’t help your friend’s cause,” she pointed out. “I already phoned in the number, and it’ll be traced.”
Woody lifted his shoulder. “Good. Because maybe what you learn about that phone will get Shane out of jail. He didn’t kill Marcie.”
Reed stared at her. “Can the mayor go now, or do you intend to strip-search him?”
Livvy ignored that swipe and glanced down at Woody’s
