might never find him.”
“Looks like he didn’t get out,” Travis said. “Which could be a much bigger problem.”
“I hear you,” Ryder said. As long as the road stayed blocked, the killer couldn’t leave—but none of his potential victims could get very far away, either.
* * *
DARCY CONSIDERED CLOSING the clinic the next day, out of respect for Kelly. But what would she do, then, other than sit around and be sad? Work would at least provide a distraction. And the clinic had been her and Kelly’s shared passion. Keeping it open seemed a better way to honor her than closing the doors.
The morning proved busy. Most of the people who had come in had heard about Kelly and were eager to share their memories of her. Darcy passed out tissues and shed a few tears of her own, but the release of admitting her grief felt good. Knowing she wasn’t alone in her pain made it a tiny bit more bearable.
The office manager, Stacy, left for lunch, but Darcy stayed behind, claiming she had too much work to do. If she was being honest with herself, however, she could admit she didn’t want to go out in public to face all the questions and speculation surrounding Kelly’s murder, especially since one of her last patients of the day had told her the newest edition of the Eagle Mountain Examiner had just hit the stands, with a story about the two murders filling the front page. The editor must have stayed up late to get the breaking news in before the paper went to the printer.
Murder. The word sent a shiver through her. It still seemed so unreal. Who would want to harm Kelly? Or Christy? Darcy hardly knew the other woman, but she had seemed nice enough. Not that nice people didn’t get killed, but not in places like Eagle Mountain. Maybe she was wrong to think that, but she couldn’t shake her belief that this small, beautiful town was somehow immune to that kind of violence.
She was forcing herself to eat a cup of yogurt from the office refrigerator when the phone rang. She should have let it go straight to the answering service, but what if it was Ryder, with news about Kelly? Or Kelly’s parents, wanting to talk?
She picked up the receiver. “Hello?”
A thin, quavering voice came over the line. “Is this the vet?” The woman—Darcy thought it was a woman—asked.
“Yes. This is Dr. Marsh. Who is this?”
“Oh, my name is Marge. Marge Latham. You don’t know me. I’m in town visiting my cousin and I got trapped here by the weather. Me and my dog, Rufus. Rufus is why I’m calling.”
“What’s the problem with Rufus?” Darcy called up the scheduling program on the office computer as she spoke.
“He’s hurt his leg,” the woman said. “I don’t know what’s wrong with it, but he can’t put any weight on it and he’s in a lot of pain. It’s so upsetting.” Her voice broke. “He’s all I have, you see, and if something happens to him, I don’t know what I’d do.”
“If you can bring Rufus in at three today I can see him,” Darcy said. The patient before that was routine vaccinations, so that shouldn’t take too long. The patient after might have to wait a little, but most people understood about emergencies.
“I was hoping you could come here,” Marge said. “He’s such a big dog—he weighs over a hundred pounds. I can’t possibly lift him to get him into the car.”
“What kind of dog is Rufus?” Darcy asked.
“He’s a mastiff. Such a sweet boy, but moving him is a problem for me. I was told you do house calls.”
“Only for large animals,” Darcy said. “Horses and cows.” And llamas and goats and one time, a pig. But they had to draw the line somewhere. Most dogs were used to riding in the car and would climb in willingly—even mastiffs.
“Well, Rufus is as big as a small horse,” Marge said.
“Is there anyone who can help you get him to the office?” Darcy asked. “Maybe your sister or a nephew—”
“No, dear, that isn’t possible. Won’t you please come? The other vet already said no and I don’t know what I’ll do. He’s all I have.” She choked back a sob and Darcy’s stomach clenched. She couldn’t let an animal suffer—or risk this old woman hurting herself trying to handle the dog by herself.
“I could stop by after work tonight,” she said. “But we don’t close until six today, so it would be after that.”
“That would be wonderful. Thank you so much.”
The address the woman rattled off didn’t sound familiar to Darcy, but that wasn’t unusual. Four months was hardly enough time to learn the maze of gravel roads and private streets that crisscrossed the county. “Let me have your number, in case I’m running late,” Darcy said.
“Oh, that would be my sister’s number. Let me see. What is that?” The sounds of shuffling, then Marge slowly read off a ten-digit number. “Thank you again, dear. And Rufus thanks you, too.”
Darcy hung up the phone and wrote the woman’s information at the bottom of the schedule, and stuffed the notes she had taken into her purse.
Five and a half hours later, Darcy drove slowly down Silverthorne Road, leaning forward and straining her eyes in the fading light, searching for the address Marge had given her. But the numbers weren’t adding up. She spotted 2212 and 2264 and 2263, but no 2237. Had Marge gotten it wrong?
Darcy slowed at each driveway to peer up the dark path, but usually she couldn’t even make out a house, as the drive invariably turned into a thick tunnel of trees. Growing exasperated, she pulled to the side of the road and took out her phone and punched in the number Marge had given her. A harsh tone made her pull the phone from her ear, and a mechanical voice informed her that the number she had dialed was no longer in service or had been changed.
Darcy double-checked the number, but she had it right. And she was sure she hadn’t written it down wrong. So was Marge completely confused, or was something else going on? “I should have asked her sister’s name,” Darcy muttered. “Then maybe I could have looked up her address.”
Or maybe there wasn’t a sister. A cold that had nothing to do with the winter weather began to creep over her. No. She pushed the thought away. There was no reason to turn this into something sinister. It was simply a matter of a confused old woman, a stranger in town, getting mixed up about the address. Darcy would go into town and stop by the sheriff’s department. The officers there knew the county front to back. They might have an idea where to find a visitor with an injured mastiff and her sister.
With shaking hands, Darcy put the car in gear and eased on to the road once more, tires crunching on the packed snow, even as more of the white stuff sifted down. As soon as she found a place to turn around, she would. But houses were far apart out here, and the narrow driveways difficult to see in the darkness. She missed the first drive, but was able to pull into the next, and carefully backed out again and prepared to return to town.
She had just shifted the Subaru into Drive when lights blinded her. A car or truck, its headlights on bright, was speeding toward her. She put up one hand to shield her eyes, and used the other hand to flash her high beams. Whoever was in that vehicle was driving much too fast, and didn’t he realize he was blinding her?
She
