at least she was still alive. There had been a moment, as he’d approached that crashed cruiser, when he’d been afraid he was about to unbuckle a corpse.
His cell phone rang, loud enough to jangle his nerves. He checked the display. No name or number, just the word unknown across the smartphone’s window.
He answered. “John Blake.”
“You rang?” Alexander Quinn’s voice was low and smooth on the other end of the line.
He had. After calling the Barstow County Sheriff’s Department to ask for backup, he’d put in a call to his boss. Quinn hadn’t answered, so John had left a message for a call back.
“There’s been an incident here,” he said, and briefly outlined the events of the afternoon.
“Any reason to think you were the target instead of the deputy?” Quinn asked.
“I’m not sure,” John admitted. “The deputy doesn’t remember the crash, and I only heard it when it happened. I don’t know how the other vehicle ran her off the road, so I don’t know whether the location of the crash was deliberate or happenstance.”
“The tri-state task force has been rolling up the remainder of the Blue Ridge Infantry over the past few weeks. Lynette Colley’s been talking to the investigators. She’s given them a lot of names and dates they hope to use to bring all the key leaders of the BRI to justice.” Quinn didn’t bother to hide the satisfaction in his voice. Bringing down the Blue Ridge Infantry had been a personal mission for Quinn since he formed The Gates. While the security agency took on plenty of well-paying cases, Quinn always kept some agents working the BRI angle.
John had asked him once why taking down the BRI was so important to him. Quinn’s answer had been simple. “They’re destroying these mountains, one soul at a time.”
“So what you’re saying is, this incident might have nothing at all to do with the bounty the BRI put on my head?”
“It’s not likely that it does.”
“Even with that car idling outside the house?”
“Sounds like the deputy’s the one who has an enemy there in Cold Creek. Any idea why?”
“No,” John admitted, walking across the front room to the side window. He parted the curtains and saw that the snow had settled to a light but steady fall. From here, he could see the wreck of the cruiser and the lanky young deputy standing guard, bundled up against the cold.
Miranda Duncan seemed an unlikely target for murder. Small-town deputy in a place with maybe three hundred residents.
Who would want a woman like that dead?
“Just keep your eyes open,” Quinn said. “We’ve made big progress, but there are still a few members of the BRI and their ragtag crew out there, looking for a win.”
“And getting to me would be a win.”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll keep my eyes open,” John answered, his tone flat.
* * *
“YOU SHOULD BE in bed.” Gil Duncan’s voice rumbled from the doorway behind her, drawing Miranda’s attention from the computer screen.
“I’m fine, Dad. Dr. Bennett said the concussion was mild and probably wouldn’t give me any more trouble.” She met her father’s worried gaze and smiled. “I promise. My head isn’t even hurting anymore.”
Not much, anyway. Just a little ache where the doctor had sewn a couple of stitches to close up the head wound.
“What are you working on?” he asked, nodding toward the computer.
“Just some web surfing. Nothing to worry about.”
“Like I’m not going to worry about my daughter rolling her cruiser in a snowstorm.” Gil Duncan sighed, looking as if he’d aged a decade in the past twenty-four hours.
Miranda rose and crossed to where he stood in the doorway, wrapping her arms around his waist. “I really am okay.”
He gave her a swift, fierce hug, a show of affection that he rarely displayed. “Maybe you should get yourself a different career.”
She pulled back to look at him. “Maybe join you at the hardware store?”
“You worked there for years.”
“Which is why I know it’s not for me.” She smiled to soften her words. “You know I love being a deputy.”
“Rebel,” he muttered, but not without affection.
“Go watch your basketball game. I’ll finish up what I’m doing and I’ll join you for the second half.”
She watched her father walk down the narrow hall before she returned to the laptop on her bed.
She was fairly sure the blue sedan parked outside John Blake’s house had been a Ford Taurus. So she’d just run the description through the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles database.
No response yet from the DMV. They’d be looking at a five-county area around Cold Creek, so it was too early to expect an answer yet.
She slumped back against the bed pillows, her gaze wandering around the bedroom that had been hers growing up. The poster of the country band Lonestar taped to the closet door was dog-eared. Softball and junior-rodeo trophies covered the top of her dresser, along with a few blue ribbons from the county fair.
In this room, she felt sixteen again.
Not a good thing.
Sheriff Randall had retrieved her cell phone from the wrecked cruiser and returned it to her at the clinic. It had survived the crash without damage, which was more than she could say for herself. She pulled her cell phone from her pocket now and called the station. The night sergeant, Jack Logan, was manning the desk. “Things still crazy from the storm?” she asked when he answered.
“Duncan, aren’t you supposed to be in bed recuperating?”
“I’m in bed,” she said. “Just a little bored.”
“Well, everything here’s settled down, so it’s not like you’d be any less bored if you were here,” Logan told her in a tone that reminded her of her father. Jack Logan was a thirty-year veteran, winding down his time on the force on the night shift. “Snow’s stopped and the temps should be above freezing by early morning.”
“How about the pileup—how many casualties?”
“No deaths. Fifteen hospitalized but none of the injuries are life threatening. Looks like we dodged a bullet.”
“Some of us literally,” Miranda murmured.
“Ah, hell, Mandy. I wasn’t even thinking.”
“Has my cruiser been towed to Lubbock for examination?”
“Yeah.
