As the rideshare stopped in front of the pastry shop, Divine Treats, Grace rated the driver and confirmed payment. “Thanks,” she said, hopping out.
There was no sense in Holden trekking all the way across town to pick her up when she was capable of getting herself there.
Entering the bakery, she was hit full force by the smell of sugary goodness, which sparked her appetite for the first time today. She’d been a bundle of nerves since discovering Rodney in her home. Sleep had been impossible, with her thoughts racing a mile a minute. She could barely rest or eat. The idea of breakfast had made her queasy until right now.
Amy, one of the clerks, waved. “You’re in earlier than usual.”
“Figured I’d get a jump on things.”
“The order for Delgado’s is ready.” Amy hiked her chin toward the six pies boxed and tied up with string. “I included a little something for you, too.”
Every Friday Amy gave her a sweet treat. “Please tell me it’s a chocolate croissant.”
“I saved you the last bear claw.”
Grace salivated. “Even better. You’re an angel.”
“I know.” Amy winked. “Hey, I take classes over at USD,” she said, referring to the Underground Self-Defense school Grace had seen nearby. It was owned by a woman, Charlie Sharp. “There’s a female-only class I wanted to invite you to.”
“Oh, I, um, know how to throw a punch and a kick.”
“Figured it might be a good way for you to meet people. Sometimes the ladies get a drink together afterwards. It’s Thursday evenings.”
“I’m committed to working Thursdays until after the Super Bowl.” So Xavier could watch football.
“There won’t be any more classes until after the New Year. You could always start in February. Think about it.”
“Okay. I will.” Grace grabbed the bundle of pies along with the little brown bag sitting on top. She’d never been good at making friends. Something so simple was always so hard for her. Maybe the class would be a good opportunity. “Have a good one.”
“Merry Christmas.”
“To you, too.” It was hard to believe Christmas was around the corner, only three days away.
Grace pushed back through the doors outside. Her gaze flew to the decorations hanging on storefronts and draped from the lampposts. Since everything had been put up before Thanksgiving, she’d grown numb to it. Perhaps pushed the thought of being alone for the holidays to the back of her mind to ward off the sadness.
She loved the quaint streets and the small-town, homey feel. Even though, technically, it was a city. There were lots of murals on the walls to catch your eye, little pops of fascinating art in places where she would least expect.
Delgado’s was right down the street, which made these regular pickups easy to do on foot. The best part about this morning routine was the walk back to the bar and grill. The Snowy Range Mountains were a breathtaking backdrop that she doubted she’d ever tire of, much less take for granted. It wasn’t the ocean, but the abundance of natural beauty more than made up for it.
Xavier Triggs was standing out in front of the bar and grill, waiting on her. She’d called him this morning, asking him to come in a little early.
He took the pies from her while she fished her keys from her coat pocket. “I still can’t believe what happened to you. I saw the police tape outside the B and B. You could’ve been killed.”
She had been fortunate. Unlike the woman she had tried and failed to help. “Thanks for getting here early.” She unlocked the door, and they went inside. “I have a feeling today is going to be hectic.”
“Speaking of hectic. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I have an item to add to your to-do list.”
“What’s that?”
“When I parked out back, I noticed you had two flat tires.”
“Two?” Grace winced.
She had just put snow tires on her brand-new-to-her used Chevy Blazer. She’d bought it after being left no choice but to trade in her cherry-red Mazda MX-5. For the weather and terrain of Wyoming, the sporty convertible, with its sleek lines, had been impractical.
“Unfortunately. Both tires on the same side. Don’t you live off Old Mill Road?” Xavier asked. “That rural stretch is all dirt and gravel.”
“Yeah.” Out in the boonies, where the road didn’t get plowed regularly. Hence the need for snow tires.
“When the grader evens out the road, the blade can sharpen the edges of the stones. You must’ve had the bad luck to roll over some jagged rocks.”
To her knowledge, the grader hadn’t been through since October. “I wonder how much that’s going to cost me.”
“Three to six hundred depending on what kind of tires you get.”
Ouch. That was an expense she hadn’t budgeted for. Thankfully her online classes for her master’s degree in healthcare administration had been cheaper than she’d expected. “Great.”
“Maybe you can get them patched rather than shelling out for new ones. You should ask.”
“I’ll call a local garage and have them tow it. Do you have any idea which one is closest?”
“General Tire and Automotive.”
She googled them, looked up their number and called, making arrangements. It had been simple and there wouldn’t be a four-hour wait like she would’ve had in Los Angeles. Then again, her tires wouldn’t have gotten punctured on gravel out there, either.
“One of the guys is coming over now to get it.”
“Hey, if you need to run errands, or want to take the day off,” Xavier said, “I can cover down. After I told my wife about what happened to you, she gave me an earful this morning about letting you close so I can watch football.”
He didn’t let her do anything. She was the one doing the letting. “I make the schedule. What happened isn’t your fault.”
“Other than giving your statement at the sheriff’s office, do you think they’ll need you for anything else?”
Good question. “I don’t know.” Grabbing her phone again, she fired off a text to Holden.
At Delgado’s. Saved u a trip. Ready to give my statement. Or help any way I can.
GLANCING AT THE text, Holden, now alone in the car, grumbled to himself. She was so headstrong. He’d never met a woman like Grace. He had nothing against independence or strength. His mother had both. But Grace had a perplexing mix of steel and fragility. He couldn’t wrap his head around it. Or rather her. It was as though she had a wall around herself, closing herself off. He couldn’t pinpoint why.
Whatever the reason, it compelled her to do everything on her own instead of relying on others. Or waiting for help. That was what had made her go outside in a rainstorm with a baseball bat and had nearly gotten her killed.
She was unpredictable and enjoyed challenging him. Which he loved, unexpectedly. There was something about Grace Clark that made him want to know all her secrets.
Then again, the more he knew, the more he was drawn to her, the more easily her charms would weaken his resolve to do the smart thing and not kiss her.
Holden drove past Custom Gears Garage and parked across the street in front of the Burks’ residence, behind a pickup truck. No motorcycles in the driveway, but the garage was closed.
His arrival drew attention. Kyle Burk looked up from a computer in the office that faced the road and stared at him. As soon as Holden strode up the walkway of the house, Kyle was out of his seat and hustling into the garage where they worked on the vehicles.
Standing at the front door, he waited to ring the bell. He only wanted to deliver the bad news once while assessing reactions. Then he would launch into his line of questioning, which he didn’t want interrupted.
“Holden,” Gary called as he crossed the street. Kyle was right behind his father. “What’s going on? Why are you here?”
That was when he rang the bell.
It didn’t surprise him in the least that both Gary and Kyle were rushing over to find out what had brought Holden to their doorstep. Not like it was every day a sheriff’s deputy came knocking.
By the time Lorraine answered the door, her husband and son had entered the front yard.
“Can we all go inside?” Holden asked. “I need to speak with you.”
“Certainly.” Stepping aside, Lorraine glanced at her watch. “I have some time before I need to leave. It’s my turn to help out with lunch prep at Amelia’s preschool.”
Taking off his hat, Holden crossed the threshold. Kyle was the last to file in. When he shut the door, Holden noticed the cast on his right arm. It had a fresh look to it, as though the injury had been recent.
“I think it’s best if we sit down,” Holden said.
Heading toward the living room, Lorraine sighed. “If this is about Todd getting caught doing something illegal with that club of his, we are not bailing him out.”
Once the Burks were all seated in a row on the couch, Holden took a chair opposite them. “Todd hasn’t been arrested. I’m here about Emma.” Swallowing, he paused. “She’s dead.”
The color slowly drained from Lorraine’s face.
Gary shook his head like he was confused. “What?”
“Oh no,” Kyle said in a low voice.
“Dead...” Lorraine pressed a palm to her chest. “That can’t be. We just saw her yesterday. She was fine.”
“This must be a mistake,” Gary said.
Kyle wrapped his good arm around his mother’s shoulders. “Are you sure it’s Emma?”
“I’m very sorry. There is no mistake.” Though Holden wished it were. “A witness saw Emma fighting with someone. A man. He was seen choking her shortly before she died. But we haven’t been able to identify him because his face was covered.”
“Wait a minute.” Gary scooted to the edge of the sofa. “Are you saying that she was murdered?”
Holden nodded. “Yes.”
“She’s really dead?” Lorraine said on a sob, dissolving under the shock of losing her only daughter.
Kyle tightened his embrace on his mother.
“Was it drug-related?” Gary asked. “We always thought she’d get hooked back on heroin or meth.”
“It’s like you said, Mom. Once a junkie, always a junkie.”
Shivering and weeping, Lorraine hung her head and covered her mouth with a hand.
“There’s no evidence that she’d been using. We believe she was clean, but won’t know for certain until we get the results of the toxicology tests,” Holden said, wanting to alleviate their concerns. That didn’t mean this wasn’t drug-related. Or that it wasn’t connected to a custody battle. “I’m sorry for your loss. I know this is difficult, but it’s imperative that we find out all we can as quickly as possible to increase the likelihood of us catching the person who did this. Do you mind answering a few questions?” Each gave their consent with a nod. “You mentioned seeing Emma yesterday.” Holden took out his pad and pen. “What time did she leave here?”
“I don’t know,” Lorraine said, her voice breaking.
Gary lifted a shoulder. “We had dinner together at about five thirty. Emma gave Amelia her bath. Read her a few stories.” Gary paused, like he was thinking about what to say next. “Then she left.” His gaze darted away from him.
Holden didn’t know if that was because he was lying or hiding something. But it was one or the other. “So would you say she left around seven, eight, maybe nine o’clock?”
“Closer to nine,” Gary said with a nod.
“That’s right,” Kyle added, sitting upright like he’d remembered something. “The detective show Mom likes had just started but she was too upset to watch it.”
Holden’s mind snagged on the word upset, but decided he’d circle back around to it. Something about that time frame was off. He didn’t know much about kids, but he suspected there shouldn’t be such a big gap between dinner and when a child went to sleep. “Lorraine, what time does Amelia go to bed?”
“Seven thirty,” she said without hesitation. “We like to keep her on a schedule.”
Holden looked between them. “Then why did Emma stay for an extra hour and a half?”
Kyle lowered his head.
Clearing his throat, Gary climbed to his feet. “I’ll get you some tissues, sweetheart, and a glass of water.” He shuffled out of the room.
“Lying to me is obstruction of justice,” Holden said.
Lorraine cried harder, sobbing uncontrollably. The sounds she made were closer to whimpers than wails. She opened her mouth, then reconsidering, closed it.
“Why was Emma here until nine?” Holden kept his voice calm, low and firm. “Why were you too upset to watch your show?”
Again, Lorraine took her time, swallowing like there was a lump in her throat. “She wanted to talk to us. About getting custody back and taking Amelia.”
Gary returned from the kitchen. His wife accepted the box of tissues but waved off the glass of water.
“Did you fight about it?” Holden asked.
Lorraine nodded. “We had a terrible argument. Said awful things to each other. Oh, God, Gary.” She turned to her husband as if suddenly remembering, and the look she sent his way ripped at Holden’s heart. “The last thing we said to her was—”
“We didn’t mean it,” Gary said, cutting her off. His face seemed to break apart. His eyes glistened as tears slid down his cheeks. “The stuff we said had only been out of anger. Because we were caught up in the heat of the moment. Nothing more. Emma knew we loved her.”
The heat of the moment often sparked a firestorm of trouble. Crimes of passion, especially homicides, were the result of a sudden strong impulse such as rage rather than as a premeditated act.
“Did anyone give her a lift somewhere?” Holden asked.
“No.” Kyle shook his head. “We were just relieved when she left. Mom was worried Dad was going to have a stroke or a heart attack.”
“It’s my understanding that you let her stay here at the house during previous visits.”
“Yes,” Gary said. “I’d pick her up near the compound and bring her to the house because it’s such a long way to walk. That way she could maximize every minute with Amelia.”
It sounded like they supported the visits until this last one. “Did you pick her up a few days ago?”
Gary nodded. “Sure did.”
“What were you driving?”
“My Ford,” Gary said. “The F-150 parked outside.”
“You still ride, don’t you?” Holden asked. “What kind of motorcycle do you have?”
“Couple of Harleys. A Low Rider ST and a Fat Boy 114. They’re both in the garage. Why?”
“What about you, Kyle?”
“I don’t have my own. Sometimes Dad will let me ride one of his.”
“Why didn’t you let Emma stay at the house this time?” Holden asked, his gaze bouncing between the parents.
Lorraine wiped her nose with a tissue and dabbed at her eyes. “She brought up the custody issue last month. We were worried that if she stayed at the house during this visit, we’d only bicker the entire time. That would not have been good for Amelia.”
“I imagine you feel that your granddaughter is better off here than she would have been with Emma.”
“You hold on a minute.” Gary pointed a finger at him. “We’ve raised Amelia since she was a baby because Emma was high all the time. Then she joined that weird cult, where they brainwashed her.”
That was one interpretation. “Got her clean, from what I’ve heard,” Holden said.
“Yeah, they did.” Gary propped a fist on his thigh. “With that Empyrean proselytism. He turned our daughter into some kind of puppet. She wasn’t the same person anymore. Who knows what would happen to an impressionable, innocent child in that compound? Yes, we are what’s best for Amelia. But we never wanted anything to happen to Emma. Never.” The man had a shell-shocked expression that seemed genuine. “She was our daughter. Until you have a kid you can’t understand that kind of unconditional love.”
Holden mulled that over a moment. “Where were the three of you between eleven and midnight last night?”
“Right here,” Gary said, stabbing a finger toward the floor. “In bed. Asleep. Lorraine had a terrible migraine. I set the alarm once Emma left. A habit after she started using.”
“I wasn’t asleep.” Kyle looked at Holden as he rubbed his mother’s back. “I was in bed, watching TV. Bingeing a show.”
Kyle was a grown man living at home with his family. Not that Holden could criticize him for it. He was thirty years old himself and still living on his parents’ ranch. Though it was in an apartment above the garage, where he could come and go with some relative privacy. Not in the basement, like Kyle. But the difference was purely semantics.
“Did Emma say where she was going?” There were several hours unaccounted for between the time she left the Burks’ and when Grace had called about the fight.
“To see her ex, Jared Simpson,” Kyle said. “Amelia’s father.”
“That man is bad news.” Gary swore under his breath. “Jared is the one who got Emma hooked on drugs in the first place. He used her as a drug mule and even had her selling for him. She started seeing him again. Last month. I don’t know what she was thinking.”
“They had an unhealthy and volatile relationship,” Kyle said.
“Volatile in what way?” Holden asked.
“They had physical altercations,” Lorraine said. “There are medical records at the hospital documenting it. She almost lost Amelia while pregnant.”
Holden nodded. He would have Mitch look into it and dig up the records. Becca was already doing him a favor by tracking down the lawyer Nagle, to see what they could glean from him. “I’ll get out of your way. I’m sorry for your loss.” Holden put on his hat. “Kyle, see me to the door.”
Gary held his wife and rocked, taking over comforting her while Kyle walked with him.
At the front door, Holden whispered, “What did your parents say to Emma that was so awful? I need to know.”
Kyle glanced at his grieving parents before stepping outside on the front stoop with him and closed the door. “Emma OD’d a couple of times. The last incident happened right before she joined the Shining Light. Mom called her selfish, ungrateful, brainwashed by McCoy.” Kyle took a deep breath. “Dad was furious. He said that it would have been better if they hadn’t saved her life after she overdosed. The whole thing was pretty intense.”
Holden could only imagine. “Did you back your parents up in the argument? Or take Emma’s side?”
Kyle shook his head. “I stayed out of it. Mostly listened. Tried to keep my dad from getting too upset.”
“That’s understandable,” Holden said. “What happened there?” He gestured to Kyle’s cast.
“Accident in the repair shop. I broke my hand. Really stupid on my part.”
Holden wondered if it had been an accident.
The Burks had a history of violence. At least two of their children did anyway. Todd used to beat up kids in school. These days he was beating up his girlfriend, or as the bikers would call her, his old lady. Each time he did it, Nikki never agreed to file charges against him. Still, the courts had him taking mandatory domestic violence classes.
There was also Emma. Allegedly, she’d gotten into physical fights with Jared on multiple occasions.
Oftentimes children who had survived domestic violence were at risk for future abusive relationships. Perhaps the cycle of violence had started with Gary. Maybe it was still ongoing. This time with Kyle’s hand.
“When did it happen?” Holden asked, staring at the cast.
“Last week.”
With a broken hand, Kyle wasn’t choking anyone or riding a motorcycle. But Gary was about the same build as his son. An inch or two shorter, with a bit of a belly that came with age and a few beers. He also owned two motorcycles and had been angry and wishing his daughter hadn’t survived.
“Since we’re out here,” Holden said, “do you mind opening the garage and showing me the motorcycles?”
“Sure, come on.”
Kyle opened the garage and turned on the overhead light.
The Low Rider was gauntlet gray, with a wide base and saddlebags. Designed for a weekend escape out on the open road. The Fat Boy was sleek. Fast. Perfect for a hot rod rider.
And it was black.
Holden inspected the left side of the bike, where it would’ve been damaged. No spots stuck out as being recently buffed and repainted. Both bikes gleamed like they were well-maintained and not used often.
There were a lot of motorcycles in town. Most of them were black.
But how many had owners who knew Emma well enough to kill her?
Off the top of his head, Holden could think of at least two more.
Jared Simpson and Todd Burk.
“My parents didn’t mean what they said to Emma. They were upset and angry, but they didn’t want her to die. Last night, Mom told her to be careful going to visit Jared. She always worried that if the drugs didn’t kill Emma, then one day Jared would.”
Maybe he had.