JENNA TOOK A deep breath through the tears that threatened to spill down her cheeks. If she let the dam burst the flood would consume her. She had to remember what Caisey’s dad told her so many times. Words she soaked up like they were life. Nic was the one who lost out. He was the one who missed knowing Jake, watching him grow into the mature—most of the time—and smart young man before her.
“I thought it was better to tell my parents first. I don’t know why I was that stupid. After that all exploded and I came here, I called Nic. His voice sounded funny like he was really upset. He said he didn’t want to see me ever again and I hadn’t even told him about the baby—” Her voice broke. “I went over to his house to try and talk to him but his dad totally freaked out. Called me a bunch of horrible names and threatened to set his dogs on me.”
Jake leaned back in his seat. “Jerk.”
“We were kids. I’ve had a lot of years to come to the conclusion that he must have known about you. He was probably just scared. Maybe it is true that we were too young to be serious about each other.”
“Scared is fine. But so scared you wimp out on the people who need you most?” Jake’s lip curled. “I don’t wanna know a man who does that.” He stood and his chair scraped back on the floor. “Don’t call your dad back, okay? Not if it’s going to upset you this much. It’s not worth it.”
Jenna stood too. “If you’re thinking we’ve done okay without them, you aren’t wrong. But you need to be careful. If you hate them because they were too selfish to care about us then that only hurts you, not them. Trust me when I tell you that holding onto bitterness makes you an ugly person. You have to let it go.”
Jake nodded. “I will.”
“I mean it, Jake. You’re entitled to feel what you feel, but when you’re done processing it you need to set it aside and get on with your life.”
Jake came over and hugged her neck the same way Caisey did, but Jenna saw Nic’s shoulders and heard his stride as she listened to him climb the stairs two at a time. It had taken years and Grams’ help. Eventually she’d been able to work more on what the future could be. At least that was better than spending all her time thinking about why the past made the present less than perfect.
Jake deserved to know there were people in the world who should have loved him but chose not to be in his life. At least that’s what Caisey told her. Caisey never spoke of her mom, but she’d left—abandoning Caisey—when Caisey was a toddler. Caisey always said that everyone’s family was messed up and you either let it define you or rose in spite of it.
Thinking about life all those years ago, when she first moved into this house, always put Jenna in a melancholy mood. She’d spent the first weekend here lying on the couch watching movies, using up three rolls of toilet paper crying. Caisey had sat beside her with two black eyes, bruises on her jaw, and one arm tight around her waist every time she moved. When Jenna asked her what happened, she’d told her not to worry about it. Jenna did have a lot to deal with back then, but Caisey could have let her in.
It made her wonder what else her friend was holding back.
**
Caisey grabbed her phone from the cup holder and called Liam. She’d done the three hour drive west out Denver, got off the freeway and went another forty minutes north, all from memory. The sunrise had lit her rearview mirror, the warmth of the day chasing her like she was trying to remain in darkness.
When Liam answered, Christian rock music was blaring from his radio, but he turned it down. “Feel like turning back?”
“No. Where are you? I haven’t seen you in an hour.” Through the whole drive she’d spotted Liam’s SUV maybe once.
“I just passed the town limits.”
“Already?” Caisey was still half an hour out. She’d only been to her dad’s cabin a handful of times, until her vocal stance on killing something related to Bambi was enough for her dad to leave her at home. She glanced again at the rusty Camry two cars behind the old seventies RV that was behind her. “I think I have a tail. I was going to have you check it out.”
“I’ll turn around.”
“No, don’t bother. It’s probably nothing.”
“If it was nothing, then you wouldn’t have mentioned it.”
“I’ll catch up. See you soon.”
“Case—”
She hung up.
When she flew past the sign for Buckshot, Colorado population 3045, she couldn’t help the eye roll. Born and raised a city girl, she’d get bored inside of ten minutes in a town like this.
At the north end of town where this pocket of civilization tapered off she took a left onto a dirt track that snaked up the side of a mountain. No one pulled off after her.
The wheels juddered over crusted dirt and her engine fought its way up the incline, which wasn’t even that steep. Maybe Liam was right about getting a new car. She could pull off a cute little Jeep.
The cabin was nestled in a crowd of tall pines that covered the tile roof with rusty needles. Caisey sat in the car, staring at the wood structure. If she sat there long enough, surely she’d see her dad stride around the side carrying an armful of logs for the stove.
The light in her door window darkened and she looked over…and nearly jumped out of her skin. She grabbed the handle and opened the door.
Liam jumped back. “Careful. You almost hit me in the face.”
“It serves you right for scaring the crap out of me.” She climbed out. “Any news on the team, or the missing girl?”
Liam fell into step beside her. “The town has search teams out looking for her. There’s a lot of ground to cover, but I’m told they’re not going to admit defeat.” He paused a beat. “Simmons is coming up with the team later.”
“Really?”
“Didn’t you used to date him?”
She shrugged and tried the cabin door. “He asked me.”
“And?”
“It was a few years ago. He made it clear he was interested, but…” She shrugged again.
“No spark?”
“No spark.”
He grinned. “Andrea and I got a lotta spark.”
“And we’re done talking about this.”
The door was locked, so she pulled out her dad’s old key. She wiggled it and tried to finesse the lock until Liam pushed her aside and took over. After a minute of jiggling, he sighed. “You got another key? This one isn’t it.”
“That’s the only one I have.”
Caisey’s boots crunched leaves and twigs as she walked around the cabin to the back door. She dumped out a metal bucket full of water for a stool, reached up and gripped the window ledge. There was an almighty crash at the front of the cabin. Caisey’s fingers slipped and she fell backwards, hit the ground and landed on a rock in the center of her back. She sucked in a breath through her nose, groaned it out and blinked up at the sky. “Ouch.”
The back door opened and Liam stuck his head out. “What are you on the ground for?”
Caisey hoisted herself up on her good leg and brushed off the seat of her jeans. “Did you just break the front door down?”
“Let’s not get caught up in the details. You should come look at this.”
Caisey rolled her eyes. Why did Andrea put up with him?
The hall had a bedroom on one side and a bathroom on the other. The bathroom had a toothbrush, a razor, and shaving cream on the counter and soap scum in the sink, and the bedroom a worn rug that hadn’t been there before, under the queen bed. Neither had the curtains, which she pulled back to let in the light. The bed had a denim comforter pushed back, like someone got out of bed and left it like that.
It couldn’t have been her dad; he’d been dead four years. She hadn’t been here since he was killed, couldn’t spare the time to come when he didn’t leave anything between his trips worth retrieving. Only there was a conspicuous lack of four years’ worth of dust.
Someone was living here.
Caisey’s boots clipped the bare wood to the front room. Liam was in the kitchen. She looked over the living room and small breakfast table. The first thing she thought was, books. They were everywhere, on the tables and shelves, stacked in towers by the short bookcase. She picked up the nearest one, The Empire of the Hittites, and tossed it back on the table. There was a computer on the roll top desk in the corner.
“So much for the plan.”
She caught Liam’s wry grin and returned it. “Yeah. Can’t really clear out someone else’s belongings and sell the place from under them. Well, I could, but my dad might have sold the place and not told me. So who’s been living here? Looks settled enough to have been for a while now. Did my dad know about this?”
Liam’s face turned assessing. “One person, most likely a man.”
“History buff, maybe a teacher. The computer will tell us more.” Caisey hit the power button on the tower.
“Is there any way to check if your dad sold the place?”
“His papers were all still in the file. According to what I have it was never sold, so I’m legally the owner. Property taxes and all.”
Liam leaned back against the counter. “So do we just sit and wait until whoever it is comes back?”
Caisey shrugged. “I’d like to meet him. But other than that there’s not much point in me being here. I should let you go help with the search.”
A car pulled up outside. The engine shut off and a door opened, but didn’t close. “This is the Buckshot Sheriff’s Department. Come out with your hands up!”
Caisey looked at Liam, who’d pulled his gun out, too. She went to the door, which had been broken off its hinges and now leaned against the frame so it mostly covered the door. “We’re federal agents and we’re coming out!” She muscled the door aside and shot Liam a look.
“What? The hinges weren’t as good as I thought they’d be. I was only trying to pop the lock.”
“Right.” She stepped out into the sunlight, one palm raised and her gun angled down.
Liam stepped out beside her. His free hand was up, but not as high as hers. The uniformed sheriff straightened from his defensive position behind the car door and eyed them. He was aiming an honest to goodness six-shooter in their direction.
Liam stopped. “You want to lower your gun?”
“Why don’t you show me some ID first.” His eyes were shadowed by a cowboy hat, but there was suspicion in the set of his mouth and his jaw was covered with day-old red stubble.
“Back pocket.”
“Why don’t you pull it out, nice and slow-like?”
Liam held it up. “I’m Special Agent Conners. This is my partner, Special Agent Lyons. And you are?”
Caisey stuck the wallet that held her badge ID in her back pocket.
“Frank Allens.” He holstered his six-shooter, shut the car door and ambled over to them. “Been the sheriff round here gone twenty years now.”
He held out his hand to Liam and then eyed Caisey up and down. His scowl morphed into a look she’d seen on many a good-ol-boy. The members of that particular club didn’t believe a woman could be a decent police officer. She found they’d only grudgingly accepted the reality of females in law enforcement.
“What can I do you for?”
Caisey motioned behind her. “This was my dad’s hunting cabin.”
“That’s right, Samuel Lyons. He was a special F-Bee-Eye agent too, wasn’t he? Killed in the line of duty a few years back, I heard. Shame. That man could skin a buck quicker than anyone.” He shook his head like he was discarding the detritus of happier times and glanced between them. “So you’re here to see Gabe then?”
Caisey turned to Liam. Gabe?
It was Liam who asked the sheriff, “Is that the guy who lives here now?”
“Moved in a bunch of years back and your dad never came after that, figured he sold the place to Gabe though I don’t know why. Weird, the way that man keeps to himself. Runs a bookstore. Barely talks to anyone. Loner, you know? Makes you wonder what they’re up to.”
Caisey kept her mouth shut. Could he really be talking about the same Gabe, her one perfect date who never called? And why did it feel like the sheriff was holding something back?
She knew Gabe’s uncle wouldn’t rest until he found Gabe. Because he told her, right before he nearly broke her jaw. She’d always assumed Gabe disappeared into Witness Protection. Had her dad stashed him in his hunting cabin? Going by the same first name all these years was either the stupidest plan in the world, or so simple it was genius.
Liam did a chin lift. “You got a last name on this guy?”
“Thompson. Gabe Thompson.” The sheriff scratched his chin.
Caisey’s gaze darted to Liam again, who lifted his chin in a motion barely visible. He’d seen it too; the sheriff had scratches on his knuckles. Who had he been fighting with?
“It just so happens I have the guy in for questioning right now.” The brim of the sheriff’s hat lifted, revealing narrow, ink-black eyes. “Interesting coincidence, two FBI agents turning up the day after my niece goes missing. I mean, I appreciate the, all-hands- on-deck attitude but this is local business.”