Kyle’s feet itched to head back into the barn to check in with Ophelia and see if she’d discovered anything. Or even if she had any new theories. But instead, armed with as much info as Kyle could be for now, he and Rocky made their way to the ranch’s main building to question the wedding party and potential witnesses. When he arrived, he was greeted by the cops at the door, who quickly briefed him on the investigation so far.
There were fifteen people who’d been there for the rehearsal party, including the bride and groom, four groomsmen, three bridesmaids, the groom’s grandmother, his parents and three of the couple’s friends. Then of course, Ophelia made sixteen, but obviously she wasn’t being questioned. To his surprise, none of the bride’s family was there, but apparently her parents had been flying in from overseas and their flight had been canceled due to a storm. The ranch staff consisted of two servers, a cook, a cleaner, the manager and two security guards.
So that made over twenty potential witnesses—or suspects.
It also turned out almost all of them had somebody else willing to vouch they’d been together when gunshots were fired. Only three people had nobody to back them up—the elderly cleaner, one of the security guards and the groom, Jared Clarke.
Kyle set himself up in a small lounge with low wooden tables and pale blue couches, and questioned each person, one by one in turn. Rocky lay by his feet and watched the proceedings.
Kyle verified where each person had been when the first set of gunshots sounded, and double-checked their answers matched the info the local police had already gathered. Then he showed them the picture of the victim and clocked their expressions. Thankfully, if anyone was nervous about talking to police, Rocky was an excellent icebreaker and the hound was quick to make friends among the people Kyle questioned. But any hope Kyle had of gleaning something new from the witnesses was dashed, again and again, and nobody claimed to recognize John Doe, or had seen him before the shooting, or had any idea what he was doing at the ranch. And although most had heard of the Rocky Mountain Killer from social media or the news, all of them said they’d never been to Elk Valley, Wyoming or knew anyone who was a part of the Young Rancher’s Club. Then one by one, he let them go, making sure he had their contact details on file and reminding them not to discuss the case with anyone and to keep their phones handy.
Everything was uneventful until he got to the groom, Jared. A few inches taller than Ophelia, with the same tanned skin, blond hair and blue eyes, he could be mistaken for her sibling, although he was her second cousin. Jared’s tan suit and haircut were expensive. But they were coupled with the charisma of a damp sponge. He told Kyle he’d been alone at the time of the shooting. But he also claimed he didn’t know or remember anything remotely helpful, and instead just waffled about how much he loved Gabrielle and needed the wedding to be perfect for her.
The whole endeavor was endlessly frustrating. His final interview was with the bride.
Gabrielle Martinez was about five-foot-two, with glossy black hair that both twisted around the crown of her head and fell in waves around her shoulders. Her dark eyes brimmed with worry. She plucked a candy from a bowl on the table and twisted the end of the wrapper back and forth, opening and closing it again.
“Are you sure that everyone is okay and that nobody else was hurt, Officer?” she asked.
“It’s Agent, actually,” he said, “and with the exception of our unknown victim nobody else was hurt.”
She exhaled. “I’m so glad. They kind of ushered us in here and didn’t tell us anything, or even let us talk to each other. Who was shot?”
“We haven’t identified him yet,” Kyle said. He slid his phone, with the picture open, toward her. “Do you recognize this man?”
“No.” She shook her head.
“You sure you haven’t seen him before?” Kyle pressed. “Take a good look.”
Gabrielle stared down at the phone for a long moment. Then she shrugged.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “He might be one of Jared’s colleagues from work. I know he invited a few I haven’t met. But no, I’ve never seen him before in my life.”
“Jared wasn’t able to identify him, either,” Kyle said.
He left his phone on the table and leaned back. How was it possible a man showed up in the barn on the evening of a wedding rehearsal party and nobody knew who he was?
“And where were you when the shots were fired?”
“With Nolan Taft,” Gabrielle said. “He’s one of Jared’s groomsmen. I’d just left Jared’s grandmother in the suite where the bridesmaids would be getting dressed. Her name is Evelyn Clarke. Jared’s cousin, Ophelia, had agreed to step in as a replacement bridesmaid because my friend Chloe Madison had canceled at the last minute and I was making sure Ophelia had everything she needed. When I left them, I went looking for Jared. I thought he might be at the outdoor, cliffside chapel where we’re having our ceremony. I didn’t see him there but I did bump into Nolan on the way back. We were talking about something, the weather I think, and then I heard the gunshots. We rushed toward the main building, and then ran into Jared. Then we heard a bunch of more shots.”
Yeah, all this matched what other people had told him, too.
“Do you have any idea where your fiancé, Jared, was when the first gunshots sounded?”
Her eyes widened.
“No,” she said. “He said he was looking for me. But I can’t imagine Jared hurting anyone. He’s the sweetest man I’ve ever known.”
His grandmother had said the exact same thing. But if it did turn out the groom had something to do with this, he wouldn’t be the first person to fool his loved ones about his true nature. And if Jared really was as bland and irritating as he appeared, that definitely didn’t mean he couldn’t also be a cold-blooded killer.
“How did you meet, Jared?” he asked. “I heard it was at a party.”
“Yes, downtown Albuquerque,” Gabrielle said, “about nine months ago. I was getting a degree in Design from the University of New Mexico, and my roommate Chloe and I went out to a networking party at this big hotel. But it was a really lame party, so we ended up going into the room where Jared’s company was having a big dinner. He invited us to sit with him and we started talking. I guess you could say it was love at first sight.” She glanced wistfully to the couch cushion beside her as if expecting to see him there. Then suddenly she gasped. Her hand rose to her lips. “Oh, please tell me that we can still get married tomorrow and we’re not going to have to cancel the wedding!”
“It’s not my call,” Kyle said. “As for the ceremony itself, it’s up to you and the venue. But even if you can’t hold the wedding here, I’m sure your hotel or somewhere else will be able to accommodate you. And maybe a slight delay means your parents will make it in time. As for the investigation part of it, really, all that the police care about is figuring out who this John Doe is and who killed him.” And despite his mild suspicions about Jared, he definitely didn’t have cause to detain him, or anyone else, right now. “So, if you and your fiancé have nothing to do with that, you’re free to go get married and live your lives.”
He’d hoped his tone was reassuring. But the bride’s frown only deepened.
“We just really had our heart set on getting married here,” she said. “The mountains are really important to both of us and that barn was so perfect and pretty.”
Well, now it’s a murder scene. He imagined the bride would dissolve into a puddle of tears if she saw just how badly her perfect reception venue had been destroyed.
“Considering the look in Jared’s eyes when he told me about you, I’m sure he’d happily marry you in a grocery store parking lot,” Kyle said in a kind tone. “I’m sure your wedding will still be beautiful and this is just a bump in the road on the way to your happily-ever-after.”
Now that came out cornier than he’d hoped. But it seemed to work, because the bride was now smiling again.
“Can I go talk to Jared now?” she asked. “The cops wouldn’t even let any of us sit together.”
No doubt to make sure people weren’t whispering back and forth coordinating their stories.
“Sure,” he said. He stood. So did the bride. “I think we’re done here for now. Just please don’t discuss the case with anyone, including your fiancé.”
Especially considering Jared was one of the few who didn’t have an alibi for when John Doe was shot.
After Gabrielle left, he waited a few moments with Rocky, going over his sparse notes from the investigation so far and praying for wisdom. Then Kyle and his partner stepped out into the warm June night. To his right, he could see a trail of brake lights flickering as party guests and ranch staff made their way down the winding mountain road. There were fewer law enforcement vehicles in the parking lot now and police presence was a lot thinner on the grounds, too. He sent Chase a quick text telling him nothing concrete had been determined for now about the crime but that he looked forward to talking to him tomorrow.
He signaled Rocky to his side and walked back along the path to the barn to find a someone who could give him a ride back into Santa Fe. As they passed the courtyard, Rocky’s ears perked and his tail wagged, alerting Kyle to the fact that he’d found a friend. Then Kyle spotted her. Ophelia was standing by a low stone and clay wall, looking out over the waves of stars spreading up at the dark sky. Her blond hair was tied back in a ponytail and she’d changed from her purple dress into the standard-issue gray tracksuit and flip-flops that law enforcement kept on hand for victims needing a change of clothes.
Somehow she looked even more beautiful than she had before.
As if sensing his gaze, Ophelia turned toward them. A tired but gorgeous smile spread across her face. He felt an unfamiliar grin tug at the corner of his mouth.
He raised a palm up in greeting. “Hey.”
“Hey, yourself.” She started toward them. They stopped a few feet away from each other and stood in the courtyard, in a bright pool of light created by the glow of two different lamplights meeting. The smell of flowers, warm earth and pine filled the air. “Good news is that CSI is done processing the scene. Bad news is there’s so much to go through and analyze it might take a couple of days. Plus, the lab is pretty backed up and understaffed. But I will do my best to expedite it when I’m in the lab tomorrow.”
“Thanks,” he said. “I’m especially curious about the cuff link. It’s hard to imagine a serial killer going out and getting cuff links made with his moniker on them, but with the RMK you never know. A few weeks ago, he managed to get his hands on the MCK9 Task Force’s compassion therapy labradoodle named Cowgirl. A few weeks ago, someone we believe to be the RMK sent our team leader, Chase Rawlston, a picture of Cowgirl from a burner phone, wearing a pink rhinestone dog collar that read Killer.”
Her eyes widened. “Wow.”
“Yeah,” Kyle said. “Our technical analyst, Isla, is trying to track down where the collar was sold. But after pulling a stunt like that I wouldn’t put getting gold cuff links with his moniker on them past the RMK. Did you find anything else interesting?”
“Well, personally, I think it’s interesting we only found one cuff link,” she said. “Considering they come in pairs. Did he leave one behind on purpose or by accident? But if you’re looking for something more concrete, I can tell you the bullets were 9mm, if that means anything to you.”
“Yeah, it really does.” He blew out a hard breath. “Nine mm is the RMK’s weapon of choice and all of the victims were killed with the same gun. I’ll get Isla to coordinate with you tomorrow about seeing if you can confirm a match. The Mountain Country K-9 Task Force will be coordinating with the Santa Fe PD on this case for the time being.”
“Guess that means we’ll be working together,” Ophelia said.
“We work together all the time,” he said. “I just never knew that you were...you know, you. Or seen you outside of your protective gear.”
“Probably for the best, considering the fact that the first time you did you ordered me out of your crime scene.”
Her eyes twinkled. He could tell she was teasing him, but that didn’t stop heat from rising to the back of Kyle’s neck. He ran his hand over it.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “The whole thing was kind of confusing, especially as we’d never really met and I didn’t know why you’d requested me to respond to the scene.”
To his surprise, a bright pink flush now spread across her cheeks.
“Well, dispatch told me that law enforcement was over twenty minutes out,” she said, “and I knew that you were less than a quarter of a mile away.”
That raised more questions than it answered. He waited, letting an uncomfortable pause lie between them as she struggled to find the words to explain.
“My great-aunt Evelyn is worried about me spending all my time with blood and death,” she said, with a little laugh and a shrug, “so she created a profile for me on a dating app for elderly relatives who want to play matchmakers. She was showing it to me earlier and I recognized you from past cases we’d both worked on. It indicated you were really close by.”
“Oh!” Kyle’s heart stuttered a step. Someone had put him on a dating app. It had to be his mother. Yet, he’d have thought that if anyone knew that between his work with the MCK9 and being a dad to Brody he didn’t have time to add a relationship into the mix, it would be her. Did she doubt his ability to be a good dad or think he was lacking in some way? Or was she worried that she wouldn’t be able to be there for him forever? She’d definitely seemed distracted recently and did seem to need to drop by the drug store often these days, but whenever he’d asked her about it, she’d told him she was fine. “Yeah, I was actually at the petting zoo with my mother and son.”
“I didn’t know you had a son.” Ophelia’s eyes widened with what looked like genuine interest. “How old is he?”
“Eighteen months,” Kyle said. He swallowed hard, feeling a familiar lump in his throat at the thought of how Brody had come into his life. No, he wouldn’t burden her with all that. “Anyway, my mom lives with us. We also have a new puppy named Taffy, who’s Rocky’s half sister. It’s a pretty busy house. I should probably say good-night, though. I need to see about finding a way back to town and I’m guessing you’re heading out soon, too.”
“Ophelia!” a man’s voice called from the darkness.
They turned to see Jared running toward them. He looked worried.
“Jared!” Ophelia took a few steps toward him as he rushed toward them. “Is everything okay with Evelyn?”
“Yeah,” he said. “A police officer has taken her and Gabrielle back to the hotel. Oh, and Grandma told me to tell you that she really hopes you decide to take that spare room, because you deserve to sleep in a luxury bed for a night. But there’s something important that Gabrielle didn’t tell you.”
He glanced from Ophelia to Kyle and back, and Kyle had the distinct impression that whatever it was, Gabrielle didn’t want Jared telling them now.
“Hey, you can trust Kyle,” Ophelia said. “I’ve known him for a while and he’s a great guy. One of the best.”
Really? She thought that about him?
“Whatever’s going on,” she added, “you can trust us.”
Jared glanced back over his shoulder. His voice lowered to a whisper.
“Gabrielle has a stalker,” he said. “One who’s been threatening to kill her.”
“Gabrielle has a stalker?” Ophelia repeated.
She glanced at Kyle. His eyebrows rose as he met her gaze with a look that told her that this was the first he was hearing about it, too.
“Yeah,” Jared said miserably. “His name is Bobby and he’s been harassing her for months, ever since he found out we were getting married.”
“And neither of you ever went to the police with this?” Her voice rose. “You could’ve put her and everyone else at this wedding in danger.”
“But we’re thankful you’re telling us now,” Kyle told Jared, almost gently, as if he could read the frustration in her eyes. He gestured to a table with two stools that had been set up in the courtyard for the party that had never been. “Why don’t we sit down and chat about it?”
Jared hesitated, then nodded. The three of them walked over to the table and Kyle pulled up a third stool. Rocky trotted over and sat down on the ground in between Kyle and Ophelia. The hound looked up at them and whimpered softly, as if sensing something was wrong and wondering if there was anything he could do to help. Ophelia leaned down and ran her hand over the back of Rocky’s head as he nuzzled her fingers, comforting her even more than she was him.
Jared rested his elbows on the tiny table and dropped his head in his hands.
“This may not have anything to do with what happened,” Jared said. Her cousin’s gaze was locked on the table. “She told me it wasn’t a big deal and I promised her I wasn’t going to say anything.” He looked so racked with guilt she felt her frustration with Jared begin to soften. “Is there any way we can keep this just between us?”
Not if it was related to a crime, Ophelia thought.
“I can keep this information within the immediate investigative team,” Kyle said, “and only share it on a need-to-know basis. Trust me, people in my line of work get really adept at keeping other people’s secrets. Nobody has to know about this conversation unless it becomes necessary for pressing charges and obtaining a conviction.”
“Can we keep this out of the press?” Jared asked. “Gabrielle is really worried about this getting online or in the media, and I just really want to protect her.”
“Absolutely,” Kyle agreed. “Except in the event that it’s needed as evidence for a trial.”
Kyle was being so much kinder to Jared than she felt capable of being. To her, most things were cut-and-dried. As someone who collected and preserved evidence for a living, she was irked to no end by the fact that her cousin and Gabrielle had withheld potentially significant evidence from police. In her line of work things were binary. Either DNA was a match or it wasn’t. Fingerprints had either been found at a crime scene or they hadn’t been. There was something comforting about the certainty of that. But Kyle’s tone was somehow multiple things at once. Both caring and firm. Not playing a good cop or bad cop, just a compassionate cop who also wouldn’t flinch from seeking justice.
Jared paused for a moment. Then he sighed and crossed both arms on the table.
“Yeah, I guess that’s fair,” he said. “Gabrielle just comes from a very wealthy and very private family who are worried about her reputation. So she has to be really careful about avoiding scandals or anything that will damage their image. They’re really old-fashioned and she’s worried about getting disowned if she’s caught up in some kind of scandal.”
Ophelia wondered if that had anything to do with Great-Aunt Evelyn’s earlier implication that there was some kind of tension with Gabrielle’s parents missing their flight and Jared needing help dealing with some problem related to the venue. Did they think Jared wasn’t good enough for their daughter?
“Yeah, I hear you,” Kyle said, “and I get that.”
“So, you know how I told you that we met at a party in a hotel in Albuquerque last September? Well, Gabrielle and her roommate Chloe had gone to this other party first, with some students from her college, and this guy named Bobby had shown up.”
“Was he also a college student?” Kyle interjected.
“No,” Jared said. “He was some kind of investments guy from Nevada, who made money in online currencies. They’d only gone on a couple of dates and he’d gotten really demanding. Anyway, I was there at a table with a bunch of my colleagues when she came in and asked if she could hide out at my table and sit with me until the guy gave up and stopped looking for her. We got talking, I offered to walk her home, and next thing I knew we’d spent hours just wandering the city getting to know each other.”
Despite the worry that lined his forehead, a smile filled his eyes at the memory.
“Where was Chloe at this time?” Kyle asked. “She’s the bridesmaid that didn’t show up, right?”
“I don’t know.” Jared frowned. “She made herself scarce shortly after Gabrielle and I started talking. I was honestly so caught up in Gabrielle I didn’t notice. I know Gabrielle was devastated when Chloe canceled on her today.” He glanced at Ophelia. “By the way, I haven’t forgotten that I told you I wouldn’t try to rope you in to be a bridesmaid, but it was kind of an emergency.”
Ophelia bit her tongue and stopped herself from pointing out he and Gabrielle had an odd definition of what constituted an “emergency.”
“Was it love at first sight?” Kyle asked.
Jared nodded. “Yeah, absolutely, I’d never met anyone like her.”
“Did you see Bobby that night?” Kyle asked.
“No, I’ve never seen him,” Jared said. “I have noticed a large guy in a hoodie who seemed to be lurking around her apartment or following us sometimes, but I never got a good look at him. And I didn’t even know if it was him. At times I thought maybe I was being paranoid.”
“Did she tell you about Bobby that night you met?” Kyle pressed.
“Absolutely,” Jared said. “She told me right away that someone was hassling her and I didn’t really ask her for the details. I was just happy to help her.”
“But you didn’t realize it was a problem?”
“Not for a couple of weeks,” Jared said. “We’d gone out for dinner and when I dropped her off there was this big bouquet of flowers outside her apartment door. Absolutely huge. She got all flustered and upset and told me that Bobby was fixated on her and had somehow figured out where she lived. He was really relentless, refusing to take no for an answer.”
“And did you suggest she go to the police?” Kyle asked.
“Of course! But she didn’t want to because she has a really big heart and I think she felt sorry for the guy.”
“And because of her wealthy and controlling parents, right?” Kyle suggested.
The fact that Jared had given two different explanations for the why they’d chosen not to go to the police about Gabrielle’s stalker didn’t mean there wasn’t some truth to both of them. But it did make her wonder if Gabrielle and Jared had been lying to themselves about how potentially serious the situation was.
“Yeah,” Jared said. “I feel weird talking to a cop about this, but apparently Bobby was really well connected in law enforcement and he told Gabrielle if she called the police on him they wouldn’t do anything to protect her from him.” He glanced at Ophelia again. “I think it would help a lot if you assured her that you and Kyle are friends, and that you can promise us that Kyle’s got our back and is on our side.”
She felt her lips beginning to part to tell Jared she’d do no such thing, when she saw Kyle subtly wave his hand, a couple of inches above the table, signaling to her to let the comment go.
“Does she know Bobby’s last name? Where he lives and where he works?”
“No, just his first name.”
“Hmm.” Kyle leaned back and crossed his arms. “Not a lot to go on, then. Were the flowers a onetime thing?”
“No, there were phone calls, too, day and night, from different blocked numbers. He also left notes on her door sometimes, which is how I know he said that he’d kill her if she married me, and if he couldn’t have her nobody could.”
“There are notes?” Ophelia asked. “Where are they now? We can do handwriting analysis, track where the paper came from and test them for fingerprints and DNA.”
“Sadly, she burned them all,” Jared said. “She just wanted to erase him from her life. It’s part of why we decided to get married in Santa Fe instead of Albuquerque. She just wanted to put him behind her and move on.”
Only maybe the danger had followed them here.
“And you wanted to be her knight in shining armor and protect her,” Kyle said.
“Yeah.”
Ophelia sat and listened for another fifteen minutes or so as Jared spoke and Kyle asked insightful questions. But it was clear they were just talking around in circles and Jared had told him everything he knew.
Finally, Kyle reached over and placed a comforting hand on Jared’s forearm.
“It’s clear that you love her a lot,” he said. “And you’re really worried for her. You should head back to the hotel and go be with her.” Then Kyle stood as if to signal the conversation was over. So did Jared and Ophelia. “I suggest you tell her that you told us about this Bobby guy and encourage her to talk to us about him. You can both sleep on it, and maybe she’ll be willing to talk to us tomorrow and fill in some of the gaps. Tell her that it could really go a long way in helping with our investigation. But either way, I will do everything in my power to unravel what happened here today and keep you guys safe, okay?”
“Okay,” Jared said. He still seemed a bit shaky, but lighter, too, as if he’d managed to get a weight off his shoulders. He hugged Ophelia and she hugged him back. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to get her to talk to police. But maybe I can get her to talk to you, Ophelia. Because you’re family and she seems to really like you. I’ll just explain that Kyle’s an FBI agent friend of yours and on our side.”
Again, she could see Kyle’s warning gaze on her face telling her to let the comment slide. So she just pressed her lips together and wished Jared a good night. She stood back with Kyle and Rocky, and watched her cousin saunter to the parking lot.
Kyle pulled his phone from his pocket, glanced at the screen and frowned.
“Everything okay?” Ophelia asked.
“Yeah,” Kyle said. “Well, no, actually. I missed Brody’s bedtime. My mom usually does his morning routine and I do nighttime. He’s fussing that he doesn’t want to go to sleep without saying good-night to Rocky and me.” He glanced down at his dog. Rocky thumped his tail on the ground. “I’m sure the one he really wants to see is Rocky. He really loves my partner.”
“Well, Rocky’s a very lovable dog,” she agreed.
The hound woofed as if thanking her for the compliment. She laughed.
“Problem is we all came to the petting zoo together in my vehicle,” he said, “and I had her take it back. I told her I’d get a ride home with one of the cops on the scene, but most of them have left by now. And I don’t know how long it’s going to take to get a taxi up here.”
“I’ll give you a ride,” Ophelia said quickly.
“You sure?”
“Of course, I don’t mind. It’ll give us time to talk.” His gaze was unreadable as she added, “About the case.”
He nodded. She wished she could spend the time learning more about him and the family he seemed devoted to. Despite the work on her PhD she knew she needed to get home to, somehow she wasn’t quite ready for the evening to end. And maybe neither was he. Because another look she couldn’t quite decipher flickered in Kyle’s eyes, one that seemed to draw her closer while also sending a fresh wave of heat rising to her cheeks. She broke his gaze and looked down at Rocky.
“Although obviously the one I really want to talk to is Rocky.”
Kyle snorted a laugh. “Obviously.”
He fired off a couple of quick texts as they walked to the almost empty parking lot.
“Mine’s the little one,” she said.
She pressed a button on her remote and her small car unlocked and flashed its lights in greeting. She opened the back door for Rocky, who leaped inside and positioned himself in the middle, in between her gym bag, a box of spare plastic gloves and some of her research books. Kyle opened the passenger door and slid the seat all the way back, before folding his tall frame inside. She got in the driver’s seat and was instinctively about to apologize for having such a modest car, instead of the fancier ones the other wedding guests had, before realizing that for once she was sitting beside someone who already knew what she did for a living, understood what it entailed and even relied on it.
It was a nice feeling.
She glanced to the rearview mirror and saw Rocky’s cheerful face smiling back at her, as if riding in her small and crowded car was some kind of grand adventure. She smiled and pulled out.
Slowly, they drove back through the wedding arch, out of the ranch and down the steep, narrow and winding mountain road. A drive that had seemed a bit tricky during the evening felt almost treacherous now.
“I didn’t know you had a family,” she admitted. She had happened to notice he didn’t wear a wedding ring. But that kind of routine observation was a hazard of the job.
“When my fraternal twin and his wife died in a helicopter crash in the mountains last year, their six-month-old son, Brody, was orphaned. And I adopted my nephew.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry for your loss.” She clenched the steering wheel to keep from squeezing his hand reassuringly. How awful for him. “I remember hearing about the accident. I didn’t realize that was your family. What was your twin like?”
“Kevin was perfect. At least in my eyes. He was confident and always seemed so certain of both himself and God. He just threw himself into everything without hesitation. I admired him so much. I always wished I was more like him, and then he was gone, and it felt like I’d lost the person who inspired me most.” He ran his hand through his dark hair. “I don’t think I ever admitted that to anyone before.”
She swerved the car around a blind corner. Suddenly a white delivery van loomed ahead, parked at the side of the road. She turned the wheel sharply and barely managed not to clip it. Thank You, God, that I wasn’t driving faster. She guessed somebody had picked an inopportune place to stop and stargaze. The van’s headlights flickered on and then off again. Kyle glanced at it over his shoulder for a long moment, then turned back.
“I need to ask you something about Jared,” Kyle said. “Are you two close?”
“Yes,” she said automatically. “Well, to a point. We grew up together. My grandmother passed away when I was little, and his grandmother, my great-aunt Evelyn, really stepped in to take her place. I spent every holiday with Evelyn and Jared. My parents are both university professors who traveled a lot for work. But honestly, I wouldn’t say Jared and I are close, as people.”
Something about how candid he was about Kevin made her want to be honest, too.
“We’re both only children and I used to assume we were close,” she went. “But our personalities are really different. He’s not the kind of person who stops to question how he comes across to other people.”
“And how does he come across?” Kyle asked.
“I don’t know how to put it,” she said. “Self-centered, maybe? I’d almost say he was spoiled but that sounds too childish. Or privileged, but that word is too easily misinterpreted.”
“What was your first job?” Kyle asked.
She blinked. “How is that relevant?”
“Hey, you focus on gathering evidence and I do the interpreting, remember?”
There was a grin in his voice. Yeah, she remembered telling him that back at the barn.
“I was a waitress all through high school,” she said.
“And Jared’s first job?”
“A friend of his dad’s got him a position at his firm after college.”
Headlights appeared in the rearview mirror. She turned another corner and they vanished again.
“When you and Jared visited Evelyn, was he expected to clear the table and do his own dishes?”
“No,” she said.
“How about picking his clothes up off the floor?”
“No, those were my jobs,” Ophelia said. “Evelyn had pretty strong opinions about gender roles, and whenever I complained she’d say Jared had the responsibility of protecting the family if we ever went to war.”
To her surprise, Kyle chuckled under his breath.
“Sorry, I’m just imagining ten-year-old Ophelia standing over a sink full of dirty dishes wondering when exactly the invading armies were going to arrive.”
She giggled, despite herself. Her great-aunt was certainly grounded in her opinions about women’s roles, but she’d always made Ophelia feel welcome in her home. She knew Evelyn loved her. Ophelia just wished her aunt had understood how some of her comments made her feel.
“That’s not far off,” she said. “And you can’t have missed Jared assuming that because we know each other, you’d be ‘his cop’ and on his side.”
“No, I didn’t,” Kyle said dryly.
“Truth is my parents were really big on personal responsibility,” she said. “Jared had it a lot easier and his side of the family was a lot wealthier than mine. Although Evelyn did say something about a plot of land Gabrielle’s parents are buying for them that made me wonder if there were money problems.”
“What plot of land?” Kyle interjected.
“A gorgeous place near the Pecos Wilderness that they’re going to build a house on,” Ophelia said. “Jared was so ostentatious about it. Said they’d decided to build a house ‘where the mountains meet the sky,’ et cetera. It was so pompous.”
“Not cheap,” Kyle said.
“No,” Ophelia agreed. “Plus, this whole wedding has been expensive and exorbitant. So maybe he’s been overspending. But please, don’t get me wrong, they’re not bad people. And even if I did end up doing a lot more housework than Jared did, I know Evelyn loves me and she would’ve been the first person to tell Jared to go mow the lawn and chop wood, if she hadn’t had a gardener and central heating.”
Kyle chuckled. Then his smile dropped almost immediately, as headlights reappeared on their tail.
“Do me a favor,” he said, “and turn left at this next fork.”
“Will do.” She focused on keeping the pace steady as the turn ahead grew closer. Then at the last possible moment she tapped her brakes just enough to safely pull off the road that would’ve led them back to the highway in a matter of minutes and onto one that would take them on a longer route past hiking trails. The van kept going forward.
Kyle leaned back against the seat.
“Do you think you’re able to be impartial if the evidence points to your cousin?” he asked.
“I don’t think he’s capable of hurting anyone.”
“His fiancée and grandmother agree with you on that,” Kyle said. “But the fact is that Jared had no alibi for when John Doe was killed. Now, our victim was tall and blond like your cousin. It’s possible Bobby was gunning for Jared and shot John Doe by mistake. But I also have to consider that the victim is Bobby, that he came here to stop the wedding and Jared shot him to protect Gabrielle.”
“But then who was the man who shot into the barn?” Ophelia asked. “Because that can’t have been Jared.”
“I don’t know.”
The road seemed to stretch out endlessly in front of them. The lights of Santa Fe grew closer. Eventually ranch houses began to appear, up and down the mountain on either side. She felt like she was standing on the edge of something very tall and he was asking her to be willing to jump.
Lord, help me keep an open mind about this. Don’t let my feelings blind my vision.
“Okay,” she said finally. “I can promise you I’ll do my job, gather the evidence, process it impartially and trust you to draw your own conclusions.”
Which didn’t mean she’d necessarily agree with him. Only that she knew she was probably unconsciously biased toward her cousin and would try to keep an open mind.
After all, Kyle would be the one who’d make the call on whether any charges would be laid. And she wouldn’t get in the way of him doing his job.
“Good.” Kyle let out a long breath. “Because Jared seems willing to tell you things that he won’t tell me.”
Kyle’s gaze darted up to the rearview mirror and her gaze followed. The headlights had returned.
“Also, I may be wrong,” he said. “But I think we’re being followed.”