Hunted in Conard County Page 16

  “Probably more than a small idea.”

  He watched her shake her head. “War is a whole different thing. A bigger thing. I’m glad I never had to see it.”

  Then she withdrew her hand, as if trying to break the connection she had started to make.

  At that moment, a scrub-clad woman entered the small waiting room. “Deputy Addison? They’re bringing her back from recovery. I doubt she’ll be very awake for a while, though.”

  Kerri rose to her feet. “Did you reach her family?”

  “They called. I guess your office told them? Anyway, they’re on their way from Missoula. It’s a long enough trip as is, but Mr. Broadwyn said they’d run into some heavy snow in the mountains and might not be able to make it.”

  Kerri nodded. “She’ll need someone there when she wakes up. Will I do?”

  The woman smiled. “You can be with her longer than I can.”

  Then she looked at Stu. “Hi, Stu.”

  “Hi, Mary. How’s it going?”

  “Not bad.” She started to turn away. “Oh.” She looked at Kerri. “Are you involved with Sandra Carney’s case, as well?”

  “I am,” Kerri said.

  “There’s some evidence that she might be returning to us, but she’s still a long way from communicating. That creep gave her a really serious concussion.”

  Stu saw Kerri’s hand rise to the side of her head, then drop.

  “Any family on the way?”

  Mary shook her head. “Sandra Carney has been here all her life, but I don’t know what happened to her parents. Even in a small town, people come and go. But I’m sure we’d have heard if they’d died here. That much I can say with certainty.”

  Stu spoke. “I’m sure we’re on it.”

  Mary nodded. “I’m sure you are.”

  She walked out and Kerri turned to Stu. “Doesn’t she have friends who would know?”

  Stu shrugged. “I can sometimes be the last to know.”

  “What were you doing this morning?”

  “Chasing escaped cattle out of a road before someone had a serious accident.”

  He watched her laugh. “What can I say? Law enforcement in a county full of ranches. Cows are easier than sheep, though. Let me know when you’re done for the day. I can once again be the bringer of dinner.”

  “Oh, Stu, you don’t have to.”

  “Unless you just don’t want me around, I want to. Eating alone is seldom a great experience.”

  “I’d like to see you but don’t wait. I don’t know how long I’ll need to be here.”

  “You got it.”

  * * *

  Kerri watched him leave, shrugging into his jacket, and wondered if he’d just said something important. Eating alone was seldom a great experience? Well, that was true enough, but they both must be used to it. It was especially difficult for people who often worked different shifts from their friends.

  So you ate alone. She gave an internal shrug. He’d probably meant nothing at all, but she made a mental note for her next shopping trip. Buy enough to cook for two.

  Then she picked up her jacket and Snowy’s leash and headed for the room where they’d earlier told her would be May Broadwyn’s. She definitely didn’t want the woman to awake alone.

  * * *

  It was around seven that evening when May woke enough to do more than groan. At last she saw Kerri sitting nearby. “Thirsty.”

  “I’ll bet. Let me get a nurse to find out if you should have water or ice chips.”

  Before stepping into the hallway, Kerri pressed the call button into her hand. “If you need anything before I get back, press the button under your thumb.”

  The woman gave the slightest nod.

  A nurse happened to be coming out of the room next door. “May’s thirsty. Water or ice chips?”

  “I’ll get her something. Given she’s on a morphine drip, I need to check her status first.”

  The nurse entered May’s room and Kerri and Snowy waited outside. She didn’t want to intrude unnecessarily on the woman’s privacy, although at the moment May probably didn’t much care.

  When the nurse emerged, Kerri started back inside. “I’ll bring more ice chips,” the nurse said.

  “Thank you.”

  She’d seen male nurses wandering around and was glad they weren’t sending any to May. She might not be ready to deal with men.

  Back inside the room, she settled on the visitor’s chair and watched May suck on some ice.

  “Mmm. Needed that.”

  “I remember feeling the same way after I had surgery.”

  May’s gaze drifted to her. “Who are you? Did I see a dog?”

  “My service dog. Snowy. I’m Kerri Addison, with the sheriff’s office.”

  “Oh, God, it wasn’t a nightmare.”

  Kerri remained silent, watching tears seep from beneath May’s closed eyelids. When the tears kept coming, she grabbed a tissue from the box on the bedside table and dabbed May’s face gently.

  “I was hoping,” May said, her voice still rough from the breathing tube during the operation, “that it was a car accident.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  But May drifted off again, for a brief while escaping her memory.

  * * *

  Around seven, Gage sent another deputy to relieve her, Sarah Ironheart. Sarah was a tall woman with a kindly face and raven black hair streaked with gray.

  “Gage said to tell you to get out of here, eat something and cadge some rest. I’ll do for now.” Sarah glanced at the sleeping woman. “I bet she doesn’t come all the way back until morning.”

  Kerri, stiff from sitting, rose, taking Snowy’s leash and her jacket. “Call me if she wakes up more? I need to grow some rapport here. Oh, and if she asks, her parents hope to be here by tomorrow. Something about a snowstorm in the mountains between here and Missoula.”

  Sarah nodded. “Up there they get snow in the middle of summer sometimes. I’ll call. Give me your number.”

  They exchanged phone numbers. Kerri tugged on her jacket, picked up Snowy’s leash yet again, then paused to look wryly at Sarah. “I’m from a pretty warm climate. This jacket thing is still defeating me.”

  Sarah laughed quietly. “You’d have remembered as soon as you got outside.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Oh, and Stu is waiting for you out front.”

  Kerri paused. “How’d that happen?”

  Sarah grinned. “We thought he’d want to be notified if you were relieved.”

  Oh, man, Kerri thought. This was getting ridiculous. It was true she couldn’t drive. Everyone in the department knew that, thanks to Stu’s car-pool idea, but still. Any one of them could have come to give her a lift home.

  Yet they had called Stu. If the man didn’t get sick of her seizures first, he was going to get sick of feeling like her personal valet.

  The day had already fled, leaving darkness in its wake. The moon was just rising, adding its silvery sheen to the lights in the parking lot. And there was Stu, near the front door, engine idling.

  “They didn’t have to call you,” she said as Snowy leaped in and she followed, closing the car door behind her.

  “You were supposed to call me, anyway. I asked, remember.” The grin he gave her said he was enjoying this.

  “I don’t want to be an item,” she said querulously. It struck her that she hadn’t eaten as Gage had told her to. Hunger was affecting her mood.

  “Too late,” he answered as he put the car in gear and began to drive from the lot.

  “Apparently. Sorry. I forgot to eat lunch.”

  “That’ll put anyone in a sour mood. Don’t worry about it.” At the end of the lot, he turned on the road leading to the downtown. “You’ve got your usual choices. Preference for eating in or out?�
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  “What I’d really like is a huge breakfast.”

  “Well, there’s actually a place you can get one.”

  Which is how she came to be introduced to the truck stop café. Trucks growled in the parking lot, waiting for drivers who were probably going to be on the road all night. Inside was fairly busy, but not so busy they couldn’t choose seating.

  “Counter, booth or table?” Stu asked her.

  It had been a long time since she’d eaten at a counter. It had been common enough to grab a bite at one when she’d been on duty before. Quick, easy and out in a flash if necessary. The badge at her waist made her feel braver, she realized as she considered a stool. Then she looked down at Snowy. Things were not the same.

  “Snowy,” she said. “A booth or a table so he won’t be underfoot. And no danger of tripping anyone.”

  The waitress who came over to take care of them was a student from Kerri’s class. “Karen, how nice to see you.”

  Karen smiled. “Nice to see you, too, Ms. Addison. I wondered if you were ever going to find this place.”

  “I finally did. How’s breakfast tonight?”

  “Hasty—he’s the owner and grill man—he’ll make you one you won’t forget. Try the onion omelet, if you like onions. It’s my favorite.”

  “Then I will.”

  “Hash browns, home fries? Side of ham or bacon?”

  Kerri looked at Stu. “I wasn’t kidding about being famished. Home fries, Karen, please. With a side of ham.”

  “Toast or muffin?”

  “Wow. You’ve got everything.”

  Karen laughed. “We get a lot of big appetites in here. Hasty will take care of you.” She turned to Stu, whose order differed from Kerri’s only in that he wanted biscuits and gravy instead of home fries.

  The breakfast was delicious, everything perfectly cooked. Kerri glanced over at Hasty, working the grill, and wished she’d been able to sit at the counter. A good grill man practically performed a flawless ballet, well worth viewing.

  She and Stu talked casually, both of them avoiding anything heavy. She talked about teaching; he talked about rounding up cattle and sheep.

  Then as they were ready to leave, he said, “Now that I can talk to you, I’ll share our few developments in the case. When we get out of here.”

  She nodded, understanding that this was something that must not be overheard. They drove back toward town until he took the turn to the apartment complex.

  “You don’t mind?” he asked.

  “Why would I?” She was eager to hear every word. “Snowy must be desperate to eat by now.”

  Stu gave a quiet laugh. “Yeah, he didn’t get offered a burger.”

  “Maude’s being really nice about that.”

  “Maude has a very familiar and old clientele. Not one of them would risk shutting her down over giving a service dog a burger on a paper plate. Hasty, on the other hand, is dealing with truckers, some familiar, some not.”

  Made sense to her. “Just so you know, I wasn’t expecting him to.”

  “Didn’t think you were.”

  Once again they wheeled into a parking space. The lot was mostly empty, except for some cars at the other end. And it was not as well lighted as the hospital.

  Snowy knew he was home and was looking forward to his evening check of the grassy area in front of the building. “Got a plastic shopping bag?” she asked Stu. “I need to clean up after Snowy.”

  “I think I do.” He twisted to look into the back seat where Snowy was alert and sitting up, his tail sweeping the seat.

  “Yup,” Stu said, pulling out a shopping bag. “I usually take them to recycle, when I forget my reusable bags.”

  “Good man,” she answered, hiding her eagerness to get inside and get more details about the investigation.

  Once there, Stu started a pot of coffee without asking. Obviously, he felt familiar enough to do that now. She liked it. She was also certain that he had something to do with the badge on her belt even though he wouldn’t say so. She pulled it off reluctantly and placed it on the counter, admiring it. Then she fed Snowy, who ate as if he were ravenous. Which he probably was.

  “You sure do like your coffee,” she remarked.

  “You’re a cop. You should know.”

  “Hah,” she answered, smiling. “A bottle of antacids in every car. But not just for coffee.”

  “Nope. Some parts of this job just kill the stomach.”

  “But not chasing cows?”

  “Don’t make fun of it. Best time I had all day.”

  At last he led the way into the living room. She declined the coffee, acknowledging that Sarah Ironheart had been right to tell her to get some sleep. Tomorrow might turn out to be awfully long and terribly stressful as she wended her way through the fear to gain the trust of May Broadwyn.

  Instead of taking her favorite battered recliner, she sat on the opposite edge of the couch from him.

  “Okay, the only real news I have is that apparently the rapist circled around May through the trees to come at her from the side.”

  “How do you know?”

  “He scuffed the leaves and I found one big, beautiful boot print. We made a cast of it and the state crime lab is in the process of trying to identify the type of boot and which marks might distinguish it from others.”

  She nodded, considering. “So Mr. Webley saw him enter the park through the entrance, but the circling indicates clear intent. Nobody else would have done that.”

  “A kid, maybe, but the impression was too big, and probably too recent.”

  She frowned, her mind already buzzing. “Weren’t the leaves dry? Wouldn’t she have been able to hear him?”

  “They were damp. As good as silent. The park has an automatic sprinkler system.”

  “Ah.”

  “The SAVE kits are out for analysis. We can hope there’s some DNA, but you know how that goes. If he’s a nonsecreter, no DNA. If he isn’t and leaves some behind, it’s no good until we get a match. We can hope he’s in a database somewhere, but I’m not holding my breath.”

  She understood that frustration. DNA, once a questionable bit of proof, had advanced so greatly that now it was highly accurate.

  She spoke. “Isn’t it interesting how they’re solving cases from decades ago because of public DNA testing for people who want to know who their forebears are?”

  “It makes me want to laugh, on one level.” He smiled over his coffee cup. “As long as someone properly preserved the evidence, that is.”

  Another big problem. A lot of evidence disappeared after years. “Do you have a cold case rule here?” she wondered.

  “Oh, yeah. If it isn’t solved, the evidence stays in a warehouse. If someone is in prison, the same until he or she finishes the appeals process. You probably haven’t seen it, but there’s a big public records storage facility south of town.”

  “I haven’t seen it. I guess I haven’t been getting around enough.”

  “It’s not worth going out of your way.” He drained his cup and rose. “Want me to turn off the coffee or leave it on?”

  “Leave it on,” she decided. So much had happened that day that she felt a need to sort through it. And maybe take another look at the badge until she could believe it was real.

  “You stay,” he said when she rose. “I’ll let myself out. Just be sure to lock up.” He shook his head. “I’m not used to saying that around here. You have a good night.”

  Then he was gone and she was alone with Snowy and the otherwise empty apartment. That was okay. She needed to get some sleep if she was going to be any use to May tomorrow.

  Unable to help herself, she went back over to the counter to look again at her new badge. It was real, and she found it almost indescribable to explain how it was affecting her.

 
Secure? She had certainly felt braver walking into that truck stop than she would have before. She’d felt taller, straighter, not as apologetic.

  Ridiculous. Her seizures weren’t a failure. But deep inside she couldn’t help but believe they made her one. Now she had a badge again. A real purpose. Teaching criminal justice had only been second best for her, the only replacement for losing her career. If she could no longer do it, maybe she could teach it. Make better cops.

  At least that was her stated objective, but it hadn’t left her feeling fulfilled. Slinking around, almost. Not wanting to meet people for fear they’d see her seize. Might be a ridiculous attitude, but there it was.

  She’d felt a shift when Gage had deputized her and handed her a badge. But how much of a shift she hadn’t realized until she walked into that truck stop. An empty hole had been filled, but more importantly, some of her confidence had returned.

  She could still do part of the job and she was being given a chance. She couldn’t ask for more than that.

  Chapter 9

  Ivan was getting nervous. The cops hadn’t seemed like much of a threat after his first rape, but now he was hearing things, things like they’d found something.

  No details, just the gossip floating around. He wondered if it was true.

  Nerves wouldn’t leave him alone, so he dragged out an old bicycle to ride past the park. He didn’t want anyone to notice his interest, and he thought the bicycle would be good cover. Anyone who’d noticed him earlier might think they were mistaken. Besides, it was a good way to ride past as if he had no special interest.

  Maybe he should have stayed with coeds. None of them had even considered filing a complaint. Although he had to admit, he hadn’t cut or seriously beaten either of them. He’d maybe gone too far with these two.

  But the power! It wasn’t just a rape. He’d been holding the lives of the last two in his hands. Now that was true power.

  He seldom wondered why he had such a thirst for power over women. He just knew it was a rush greater than any other. His drug, he thought, and laughed inwardly. He was no addict.

  Which completely missed the point that he was.