that it would be a secret where he was headed. The Balducci orchard was at the end of Oak Valley Road, a two-lane deal that ran straight to the hills past neighboring vineyards, farms and horse ranches. Some lit windows stared at him in the distance with yellow predator eyes. Mostly, though, he was surrounded by black and gray. Low clouds blocked the stars. A looming oak sped past, made into a monster by his stark headlights and taking him back to the summer visits to his grandparents’ spread, east and inland from the Bay Area. As a child, he’d been afraid of that dark and the countless animals that could be lurking just out of reach of the kitchen window light.
Those creatures didn’t scare him anymore. As a cop in San Francisco, he’d seen the worst of people. He’d seen it tonight and still held a tight fist and clenched jaw.
According to the GPS on his phone, he’d passed the last of the side roads. Ty killed the headlights and brought his car to a crawl. Details in the terrain slowly emerged as his eyes adjusted. The road curved up a small rise ahead. More oaks flanked the asphalt, behind them aging wooden fences. Cresting the rise revealed the first edge of Mariana’s orchards. They spread up another hill and curled around a broad clearing that held her farmhouse and outbuildings.
He rolled the window down, trying to pick up any sounds of trouble over his engine. Approaching the dark house like this, expecting danger, with only the light from nature to find it, brought him closer to his ancestor than he ever imagined. Jack Hawkins had ridden this land in the dead of night and through stark days, a .45 on his hip and justice on his conscience.
The road turned into a single-lane driveway. Easing closer to the house brought the barking of a dog. Ty had read all the police reports, studied internet maps and social media about Mariana and her orchard, but there was nothing about a dog. He pulled off into a wide swath of dirt and turned off the car. The dog kept barking, but didn’t approach farther than twenty yards in front of the main house. Ty got out of the car and immediately regretted it. Summer was on its way out, and the Pacific Ocean a few miles away sent a cool, damp breeze across the hills and directly through his wet jacket.
“Good dog,” he called up to the guard, but the barking didn’t stop. The dog was as black as the shadows, making its size impossible to determine. It could’ve been anything from a mastiff to a Pomeranian. This being the country, and from the depth of the warning bark, Ty figured it to be a reliable threat and wouldn’t risk getting any closer. “At least you’re on the job.” If there was anyone other than Ty skulking around, the dog would’ve gone at them, too.
A hitch in the barking alerted Ty to a change in the action. He could see from his high vantage point that a pickup truck moved along the road toward the orchard. Mariana’s truck. Easy to remember because he’d been slammed into the side of it. Relief washed over him when he saw she wasn’t being followed. Either by the bad guys or the police. There was too much that he and Mariana needed to sort out, one-on-one.
It was clear from her confidence on the curves that she’d driven this road her whole life. In just a few moments, she pulled up beside Ty and his car. Dashboard lights revealed the exhaustion in her face. Her black hair was still back in a ponytail, her clothes unchanged. He wanted to replace the blanket she had around her shoulders with a clean, dry one. Her wary eyes kept him at a distance.
The dog continued to bark, voicing the caution Ty saw in her. She tipped her head toward her guard. “You met Toro.”
Ty nodded. “I like him. He’s looking out for you.” A small smile brightened her face, then disappeared. Ty took a half step toward her truck. “You should get into something warm before that chill gets too deep.”
She stared at him for a second, expression opaque. “Leave your car there. I’ll meet you at the house.” She drove off to the house, Toro bounding to follow. He saw in her headlights that the dog was some kind of shepherd mix, medium sized and athletic.
Ty collected a duffel from the trunk of his car and walked up the forty yards to the farmhouse. By the time he got there, several lights were on inside and the front door was open. Toro paced on the other side of the doorway, head low and eyeing Ty. It was best to pause on the broad porch that stretched the entire front of the house.
Mariana’s voice came from inside. “Toro, let him in.”
The dog edged away, not breaking eye contact. Ty stepped over the threshold and into a comfortable living room with mismatched furniture ranging from dark wood antiques to minimalist new pieces. Mariana stood on the far side of the room, next to an open cedar chest. In her eyes was the same caution Toro had. In her hands was a lever-action rifle.
Ty carefully placed the duffel on the ground and showed her the palms of his hands. The barrel wasn’t pointed at him, but it wouldn’t take much for her to swivel it in line with his chest. “I’m glad you’ve got that,” he said, noticing that it wasn’t cocked. Yet.
Her gaze narrowed on his duffel. “Are you planning on staying?”
“I’d like to change.” He brought his hands down. “The sprinklers hit me when I was running through the fire to pull the valuables from your shop.”
She lowered the barrel of the rifle toward the ground and let out a shaky breath, some of the tension releasing from her shoulders. Toro sat near her. “Sorry.” Her grip on the rifle loosened. “I’m just...”
“I get it. I’ve seen it.” He turned and closed the front door. “And I’ve been there.”
She tipped her head at the door. “The dead bolt.”
He threw it, but wouldn’t feel the house was completely secure until he’d gone room to room. “Did you tell them my name? Anything about me?”
“No name, just a vague description.” She walked to a small desk in one corner of the room with a laptop on it. Toro followed. “I’ve never seen you before today.”
“Good. Thanks.” He slowly pulled his badge wallet from his back pocket and held it open. “I’m a San Francisco City detective, out of my jurisdiction and technically on vacation.”
She stepped forward, still gripping the rifle in one hand, and took the badge and ID from him. “I don’t know how things are done up in the city, but you suck at vacationing.”
“I don’t want a vacation.” His wet jacket tightened around him. “I want to help you.”
“And I still don’t know why.” She put his ID down on the desk and opened the laptop.
“Let me get dry first.” He nudged his duffel with his foot.
She hooked her thumb to a wide hallway leading away from the living room. Half of it was taken up by a stairway to the second floor. “First door is the guest bathroom.”
He picked up his bag and walked deeper into her house. Floorboards creaked under his feet. The scent of a woman’s soap drifted down from the top floor, where he supposed the master bedroom was. At the end of the hall was the kitchen, but he turned to the bathroom before he could investigate it or the photos that lined the wood-paneled walls of the hallway.
Once inside, with the door closed, he paused and listened. A chair shifted in the living room. Light typing. Toro’s tail thumped on a rug on the floor. At least Mariana wasn’t waiting with the Winchester outside the bathroom. He pulled off his jacket, peeled off his shirt and piled the heavy material in the narrow shower that stood in one corner. A quick inspection in the mirror revealed no open wounds from the fight.
A
