David hurried to slide his key into the lock and opened the big door with a bang. He didn’t wait for Whitney.
Whitney ordered Hunter inside, giving the dog a hand signal to search. Drawing her weapon, she hurried through the open stained-glass door. Hunter ran ahead, doing his job like a pro.
Soon angry barks carried throughout the house, coming from the back.
“David?” she called as she cleared the formal sitting room and the elaborate dining room on each side of the long hallway. “David, answer me!”
“Back here.”
He sounded winded. Hunter’s barks grew more frenzied.
She made it to the big kitchen and then hurried out onto the long sunporch that stretched across the back of the house where she found David with Miss Rosa. Then another gunshot rang out.
Whitney ducked down and called out, “David, help Miss Rosa.”
David knelt beside a Victorian sofa, where Miss Rosa lay with a hand to her head. The petite woman’s wiry gray hair stood out like a feather duster against the embroidered pillow behind her. Hunter snarled near the screen door centered on the porch.
Then they heard a car peeling away down the street.
“Is she shot?” Whitney asked, her breath coming fast.
“I’m fine,” Miss Rosa said. “I’m short, so he missed. Is someone trying to kill all of us?”
“She saw the shadow again,” David explained from behind Whitney, his fingers on Miss Rosa’s wrist. “It wasn’t the topiary tree, Whitney. She saw a face beyond the sunporch. He came back, but he ran when she screamed.”
“A big man,” Miss Rosa said through a moan, her dark brown eyes wide open. “I went out to water my rosebushes earlier. I water them every night. You know, they’re very hard to grow in this climate, but I make it work. That’s when I saw him, right there by the door.” She sat up. “I screamed and doused him with the water hose and then I came inside and called 911.”
“I’ll take Hunter out for a search, but they probably got away when we heard the car leaving,” Whitney said. “Do we need to call an ambulance?”
David shook his head. “She’s fine. Just scared.” He started talking in soothing tones in answer to the innkeeper’s many comments and questions. “Yes, I know I’m your only boarder right now. No, I’m not checking out. Yes, I’ll watch out for things around here. Let me go get you some water.”
“I’m so glad we have a law officer here,” Miss Rosa said on a weak note. “I don’t abide Peeping Toms or being shot at. Why did he shoot at us?”
“Just rest,” David replied. He darted a concerned glance at Whitney before he headed inside to get Miss Rosa’s water.
Whitney grabbed her flashlight off her equipment belt and held it over her weapon. Then she opened the screen door. “Go out,” she told Hunter. The dog immediately took off toward the back of the long, narrow yard.
Whitney followed and held the flashlight up to the tall white fence, where the fragrant yellow puffballs of an acacia tree hovered like cotton. Nothing there but a tree that covered the fence corner. On the other side, near a rock garden, a blue palm fanned out, rustling in the wind.
Hunter alerted near the gate.
Whitney shined the scant light down to the rocky dirt and saw a red baseball cap by the fence.
Her heart pumped against her rib cage as realization swept through her. Miss Rosa was seeing things all right.
She’d seen a person. And that red baseball cap indicated that the person who’d been near the sunporch door was probably one of the drug smugglers who’d been on the train earlier this week. She’d surprised him, so he’d retaliated by shooting at her.
They were trying to make good on their threats.
The drug runners were hunting down both Whitney and David.
And it would be only a matter of time before they made it all the way inside one of the houses. Whitney shuddered to think what would happen then.
Shelby.
Whitney called Hunter away and whirled to run back to the inn. She had to warn the Carters.
“All is well here, honey,” Marilyn said. “We’re inside and eating dinner. Jack is here. I’ll have him set the alarm.”
“Thank you, Marilyn. The cruiser the chief put on our street should be just outside, too.”
Gathering her thoughts, Whitney retrieved her evidence kit from the car so she could bag the red cap. And then she took a quick breath and said a prayer for all of them.
Dear Lord, protect my baby and my friends.
God, please protect all of us.
* * *
“Are you sure you don’t need to go to the ER?”
“Yes.” Miss Rosa got up from her chair on the sunporch. “I’m fine. All I did was scream and fall onto a love seat. Now I have to go and check on dinner.” She turned at the door to the dining room and slanted her head in a dainty way. “I have a permit, you know. And from now on I can assure you I’ll be packing heat.”
David watched her head to the kitchen, wishing he hadn’t brought this danger into the quaint old inn. “I should go and help her.” Then he shook his head. “And I pray she won’t make good on that threat. Miss Rosa with a pistol—that’s scary.”
“We do have drug people out to get us,” Whitney said. “She has every right to protect herself.”
“So do we,” David replied.
The whole place had been checked over for prints and any evidence of a prowler, and the team had combed the woods and yards nearby, looking for bullet fragments and anything else they could find.
Yet they had nothing except the description of the blue car that both David and Miss Rosa had seen, a vintage Camaro that had been overhauled to get away quickly. That and the red cap, which could offer up some DNA, at least.
Now there was an alert out on that vehicle, too.
“I know, but we can’t go into hiding,” Whitney said. “I have my work, and you volunteer at the clinic. Do you want to hang out at the police station all day?”
“No.” Although that would relieve some of his anxieties regarding her.
He glanced out into the dusk to hide his concern. But he needed answers to the whole picture since he was knee-deep in this danger. “I know you can’t tell me everything, but what’s the deal with the missing puppy? And a woman named Marian?”
Her face twisted in surprise. “How do you know about that?”
“The café,” he said. “Everyone is talking about the drug couriers and the missing puppy. And Marian being in a coma.”
“I can tell you what the public knows. Veronica Earnshaw was our master dog trainer. She loved animals and was very good with them. But she didn’t have the best people skills. Shane Weston, one of the rookies, found her dead inside the open gate to the training yard. Gina Perry, another trainer who worked with Veronica, was there with her. At first, people suspected Gina since she and Veronica didn’t get along, but she’s been cleared. And Shane, too, for that matter.”
David held up his hand. “Wait. One of your own was a suspect?”
She nodded. “Briefly. The bullets used to kill Veronica matched those of an antique gun that belonged to Shane’s grandfather—a .45 caliber. But thankfully, Shane was cleared since he had a solid alibi.”
She stopped and took a breath. “Marian Foxcroft, Ellen’s mother, is the woman who funded the department so we could all stay here. She was found unconscious in her home not long after Veronica’s death. She’s in a coma at the medical center. This case has all of us on edge.”
Toying with a rough spot on the arm of the old rocker, she said, “We have briefings almost daily, and we all try to think outside the box.”
“No wonder you didn’t trust me when you first met me,” David said. “You’ve been dealing with a lot of stuff here and then I pop up, a stranger in town. The Old West is alive and well.”
She took a breath and stared out at the growing night. “It gets worse. Marian donated a litter of puppies to the training center. Veronica had been working with them. The night of the murder, she was at the training center, tagging them with microchips. When they found Veronica, they realized one of the puppies was missing. Little Marco. Witnesses spotted someone on a bike picking up the puppy, but it was dark and the person on the bicycle wore a hoodie, so the witnesses couldn’t tell if it was a man or woman. We’ve speculated during our meetings whether Veronica let the puppy go on purpose. The evidence from the crime scene points to that, at least. So we put out flyers all over town, hoping someone would step up and tell us more or maybe bring Marco back.”
“And you have to follow every lead, just in case.”
She ran a hand over her always neat ponytail. “We’re all assigned to the case, so I’ve been making return calls to eliminate some of the crazy tips that we’ve received. We need to find that puppy.”
David followed the maze. “The puppy might help solve the crime?”
“The puppy could be with Veronica’s killer,” Whitney said. “So we have to talk to anyone who might have seen that puppy. Marco had been socialized—trained to be around people—from a very young age. He’d naturally run toward someone, so it’s anybody’s guess who took him. But yes, the killer might have Marco. Especially if Veronica was letting him go as a message or to give us a clue.”
David studied the windows behind them. The inn shimmered with welcoming light. Miss Rosa had turned on all the lamps. “So...did you warn Miss Rosa about all of this?”
Whitney lifted her chin. “Yes, I’ve talked to her about the missing puppy. She said she saw Marco one night, out in her yard. I checked it out, but I think it was probably the neighbor’s calico cat. Kind of the same markings as our missing puppy—fawn colored with a black circle on its head.”
David wondered who’d taken the puppy. “This is serious. Me being here put her in danger, too. We’ve got someone covering up a murder and drug traffickers shooting at us. Any more on those two from the train?”
“No, nothing, but I’m pretty sure one of them was here tonight. I turned the gun over to the property room after we disarmed it. It’s been dusted for prints, but it takes a while to hear back from the crime lab in Flagstaff. They’ll check it and that scrap of fabric from the pants leg for trace evidence.”
“Trace evidence?” David was fascinated, but mostly, he wanted to keep her here a while longer. He enjoyed talking to her about her work and asking her questions. Her answers gave him hints of her personality. He’d learned to listen to wounded soldiers who needed to talk, so he used that technique on the woman he wanted to get to know better. “You’ll have to explain.”
“Blood, DNA, hair or fabric fibers.”
“And I thought my job was hard.”
“We all have hard jobs,” she said, getting up. She tilted her head. “Miss Rosa raves to everyone about what a nice young man you are. How you have manners and offer to help her out a lot. She told me you’re overhauling her old Chevy pickup.”
“I don’t know if that jalopy can be overhauled. But she’s a sweetheart. She leaves fresh-baked cookies out on the refreshment bar and folds my laundry straight from the dryer.” He stared into the house, making sure Miss Rosa was okay. “I’d hate for something to happen to her.”
“She’s a character,” Whitney said. “She has regular boarders passing through, and they don’t want to leave. And I’m pretty sure she’d like to keep you as one of them, so stay diligent. This isn’t over.”
David stood, too, his eyes meeting hers. Funny how he’d just noticed her heart-shaped face. Here in the growing dusk, she looked young and fresh faced, beautiful.
Whitney Godwin was a beautiful woman.
Whoa. In the middle of all of this, he’d still managed to notice? He needed to rein in that notion. Yes, he’d carried her picture near his heart. But he’d done that to honor her brother. Hadn’t he? Lucas hadn’t sent him here to make the moves on his sister. David would have to tamp down any attraction he might be feeling. They both needed to be aware of their surroundings, not each other.
He leaned down. “You don’t need to worry about me.”
Whitney tossed her ponytail and stared out across the salmon-colored roses blooming along the porch railing. “I can’t seem to stop worrying about you.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“I don’t doubt that but...this situation is growing more and more dangerous.” Then she turned stoic again. “Now we need to search for a blue car.”
“It took off in a hurry. Must have dropped off the shooter and doubled back.”
He didn’t want her to leave, but he figured Shelby was waiting. She’d be anxious to get home to her little girl. The image of Whitney holding that cute little baby invaded his efforts to ignore his growing attraction to her.
And before he could stop them, the words were out of his mouth. “Hey, maybe we could get together later in the week,” he called as she headed down the steps. “Dinner or something. Low-key, and we’ll be careful.”
Whitney stopped by her car, surprise chasing confusion in her expression. “Maybe, yeah, sure. Maybe this weekend. If the chief doesn’t put me in protective custody.”
“If he does, I’m going in there with you,” David blurted. “You can’t leave me out here alone. We’re a team now, right?”
“I’d never leave you alone,” she replied.
Then they stopped talking and stared at each other. “We can make jokes but...this is no laughing matter,” she said. “I wasn’t too scared before, but now...I’m terrified. For Shelby, for Miss Rosa and for you, David.”
David wanted to hold her and assure her that he’d take care of this, but...he had no idea how to do that.
* * *
Another long day.
Glad to be home, Whitney checked on Shelby for the fourth time. Her baby was sleeping, the little lamb night-light showing her cherubic face in muted white and yellow. After the scare at the inn last night, she’d explained to Marilyn and Jack that they needed to be cautious, too.
“I don’t think they’ll try anything with you but...I just want you to be aware. Keep Shelby in for a while.”
“I will,” Marilyn had said. “We won’t go for our afternoon strolls until you think it’s safe.”
Marilyn and Jack knew the danger involved in Whitney’s work, but they seemed to take it in stride. Jack’s garage was only five minutes away, so he’d reassured her he could be home very quickly if need be. Marilyn had taken self-defense classes years ago when Jack worked at night, and they had a good alarm system. She didn’t seem afraid, but she wasn’t someone who’d be careless or take too many risks, either.
Now Whitney went back over her week. She’d tracked down false leads and filed numerous reports. But she kept returning to the conversations she’d had with two possible witnesses early this morning before she’d gone to work.
“I saw that puppy,” the woman had told her through a screen door, her hair still in sponge curlers. “He was running down Desert Valley Road all by his lonesome. Cute little thing, too. I almost stopped and picked him up, but when I looked back, I didn’t see him.”
“Describe him,” Whitney said.
“Tan colored with a black blob on his little face. As if he fell into some chocolate.”
Marco.
One other witness, a scrawny skateboarder, had told her he’d also seen Marco. “But somebody on a bike picked him up, so I thought he belonged to the rider.”
The kid had verified what they already knew.
“I saw someone with the puppy,” the kid had said, his foot flipping his worn skateboard up and into his hands. “I mean, it was kinda dark and whoever it was had on a hoodie that covered their head and face. But I do know they took that puppy and rode away on that bike.”
Both the kid and the older woman who’d talked to her had told Whitney they had hoped someone would take the puppy to a shelter or maybe turn it in to the police.
But that hadn’t happened. And nothing else was standing out. No word from the lab in Flagstaff on the drug couriers and nothing substantial regarding Veronica’s murder. Whitney kept wondering if the two were random incidents or if they might possibly be connected.
At their briefing this morning, Whitney gave the report on the two witnesses who’d seen someone take Marco, and then she reported her findings after talking to Dr. Pennington. She mentioned Lloyd Harglow.
“Dr. Pennington says Lloyd and Veronica fought a lot. She confided in him, apparently. He implicated Harglow as a possible suspect.”
James Harrison, one of the rookie K9 officers, looked over at her, his blue eyes full of skepticism. “I interviewed Lloyd Harglow on Monday after the murder. He was at a meeting with city officials on the night Veronica died. After the meeting, three of them went out for a late dinner in Canyon County City. I have several witnesses who corroborated his story.” James pushed at his spiked blond hair. “He did admit that their fling went sour after a few months, but he insists he’d never hurt Veronica. He’s trying to patch things up with his wife, who has an alibi, too, by the way.”
The chief moved on to Whitney and David’s run-in with the couriers. “What do you have on the drug runners, Godwin?”
Whitney went back over the occurrences at her house and at the inn. “The drug couriers are trying to scare us. Mr. Gallagher is safe since he doesn’t live here but...I did see their faces, and so did the one other eyewitness. The shooter fired two shots and then left,” she said, almost thinking out loud.
“But?” Chief Jones pinned her with his stark gaze. “You look as if you have something else on your mind.”
Whitney cleared her throat. “Drug runners usually follow through pretty quickly. They wouldn’t waste time walking around just to scare someone. Frankly, I’m surprised they didn’t get into a shootout with me.” Then she glanced at her friends. “I have a baby to consider, sir.”
“And I don’t have the manpower to guard everyone,” the chief replied. “You do what you need to keep little Shelby safe.”
“Yes, sir.”
“They’ll keep comin’,” Officer Ryder Hayes said. Like James, he had the blond hair and blue eyes that seemed to make some women swoon. Good-looking but guarded, Ryder was still mourning the unsolved death of his wife five years ago. Melanie had been robbed and murdered the night of the police dance. She’d never made it to the party.
Mike Riverton had died from a fall on the stairs of his home on the night of the dance two years ago.
Brian had died in a house fire on that same night last year.
A clear pattern, but one they couldn’t figure out. The night of the annual police dance was significant, but how? And why?
“Whitney?”
She looked up to see Ryder and the others waiting for her to respond. “Yes. Drug runners are usually brutal and swift. So far, we’ve managed to scare them away, and based on the cap we found at the inn, we can assume that was the drug runners.” Then she added, “But I wonder if the prowler in my yard could be related to Veronica’s murder and not the drug runners. What if someone thinks I know something or have something they want?”
“We’ve had a lot of reports about people doing that recently,” Ellen Foxcroft said. “Snooping, but they don’t take anything. Maybe these intruders are just random. Kids out for fun.”
“Or the drug runners could be casing places, hoping to find any opportunity,” James pointed out. “You got to them and scared them off before they could get to you.”
“That could be it.” They could easily have killed Hunter and her and possibly David, too. Something didn’t make sense, but she had too much on her mind to piece it together. “In any case, I’ll be vigilant, and I’ve warned David Evans to do the same.”
“Do you trust him?” Ryder asked. “I mean, he’s new in town, and he happened to be on the same train as those alleged couriers.”
She answered without even thinking about it. “I do trust David. He’s not involved with the drug couriers. He put his life on the line to help Mr. Gallagher.”
Since she’d already reported on his background check coming back clean, she didn’t offer any further explanations. But she hadn’t told anyone why David was here. She didn’t want anyone to think his presence was impacting her work.
Even if it was beginning to do just that.
She’d have to be careful about her feelings toward David. She’d already had one impulsive love affair, and she was pretty sure everyone around here had figured that out. She couldn’t afford to mess up her personal life again, so she’d have to keep her comments on a professional level. And her feelings, too.
Just before she left for the day, the department secretary, Carrie, came by her desk. “Hey, the chief needs you in his office, Whitney. He doesn’t look happy,” she added nervously.
“Okay.” Whitney followed Carrie down the hallway.
“Hope you’re not in trouble,” Carrie said, her brown eyes sympathetic.
Whitney stood near the open door, hoping the same thing. “Sir, you wanted to see me?”
“Shut the door, Godwin.”
Whitney braced herself and took a calming breath.
“Have a seat.”
“Sir, what is it?”
“You remember coming to me about the rookie deaths and suggesting how they didn’t seem so random to you? You were concerned because of the way they each died, especially Brian Miller.”
She nodded, but before she could respond, he kept on talking. “And since Marian Foxcroft made her demands and then threw in her generous offer, I’ve had all of you going back over files and trying to pinpoint something to connect all of this.”
“Yes, sir,” she said. “But it’s only been a few weeks. We’ve all been taking turns with the case files. I know Mrs. Foxcroft wanted these cases declared accidents, but...”
“But some of you seem to think differently. Especially you.”
“How could I not?” she asked. “The two rookies’ backgrounds don’t match up with the way they both died. Mike was an expert mountain climber, and yet he died from a fall down the stairs. And Brian’s whole family died from a horrible house fire. He would never light a candle in his home, let alone leave it unattended. But that’s what the fire marshal thinks happened.”
“Yeah, well, the police dance is coming up again,” Chief Jones said. “I’m not saying I agree or disagree with your theory, but yes, there does seem to be a certain pattern, especially with Melanie Hayes’s murder and the rookies’ deaths all happening on the night of prior dances. And even though Marian wanted the rookies’ deaths ruled as accidents, she’s not the chief of police. I am, and I don’t want another murder on my hands. If she ever wakes up, I’ll convince her of that. I want you to investigate that angle. Talk to anyone who knew them.” He leaned his head down then cast his gaze back up to her. “Can you handle that? And don’t leave out Melanie Hayes.”
“Melanie? So you agree the same person might have killed Melanie?”
“What did I just say, Godwin?”
“Yes, sir. Go over her case, too.” Whitney would handle it. She’d been trying to get to the bottom of this for a long time, but she’d tried to be careful since she wasn’t sure who to trust. She’d talked about Brian’s death with Gina Perry a couple of weeks ago. No one here knew for sure that Brian was Shelby’s father, but she was fairly certain Gina had guessed. Now, at least, she had the chief on her side, even if he didn’t know the whole story regarding Brian and her. “I’ll get right on it.”
When she left the chief’s office, Carrie gave her the thumbs-up sign. Had she heard the chief’s loud voice? It didn’t matter. Everyone who worked at the station wanted those deaths solved.
* * *
Now, home at last and clean from her shower, she’d just settled down in her pj’s to catch up on the evening news when her cell buzzed. The caller ID showed the name David Evans.
She almost didn’t answer. David was too tempting, and she had to stay centered and focused right now. She’d also need to tell him the truth about Brian.
“Hi,” she said. Muting the television, she curled her legs up onto the couch. Hunter was in the hallway by Shelby’s room. On guard for the night.
“Hi. I got Miss Rosa settled down last night. And I made sure the security lights are all working. This old inn could use a security system, but she says she doesn’t have the money for that. Or a good hot water heater, either, apparently.”
“No hot water? How’s that working for you?”
“Let’s just say I come clean pretty quickly these days.”
She grinned at that. “Should I send a patrol around, just in case?”
“To fix the water heater or to watch the inn?”
She enjoyed his sense of humor. “They could probably do both. Small towns tend to have multitaskers by necessity.”
“Miss Rosa would probably feel better with a patrol car in the area,” he said. “But I’ll be okay. You have enough to deal with right now.”
“I’m trained to take care of such things.”
“I know. Talk about threatening my manhood.”
“So you don’t like it when a woman comes to your rescue?”
“Oh, I don’t mind at all, but...I’ve never had the tables turned on me. Takes getting used to, I reckon.”
“Maybe Lucas sent you here for that very reason.”
“He was tricky, your big brother. He loved to play practical jokes on the whole platoon.”
“That sounds like Lucas. Always joking around.” She stopped smiling and bit back tears. “I miss him every day.”
“I know. He was the best of the best.”
“I’m so glad that you’re here, David. And that you knew Lucas.”
“So you wouldn’t mind if your big brother had an ulterior motive?”
She couldn’t lie about that. Lucas might have handpicked David for her, but she couldn’t go beyond friendship with him right now.
“I didn’t like you being here at first, but...it’s almost as if he sent me one last gift.”
“That’s a nice way to look at it.”
“It’s good to talk about him with someone who was with him on a daily basis. No one here knew him, so they all draw a blank when I mention him.”
“They don’t know what to say. Death is a tough topic.”
“Yes. Yes, it is.” She wanted to tell him about Brian, but not tonight. She planned to pull all the files on Brian’s death, along with those of Mike Riverton and Melanie Hayes, first thing tomorrow. But for now, she could use a little distraction.
So they talked about random things well into the night, laughing and discussing everything from movies to ice cream to the Arizona weather.
And when her head finally hit the pillow, she thought of what it would be like to have a man like David in her life for longer than a few weeks.