Redemption (11 page)

Something like that,
Kate thought now, as she eased through the hole she’d cut in the fence and headed for a spot she’d been wanting to check out. She knew it was like finding a needle in a haystack, but she wasn’t giving up. What she was looking for was here—she could feel it.

Overhead, a hawk soared on a thermal. Nearby a squirrel chattered at her from a pine bough. Her boots crunched on the dirt as she walked along the edge of the crumbling rock foundation of what had once been an outbuilding of some sort.

Ahead she saw the house, barn and more outbuildings. They’d all weathered to a dull gray over the past thirty years. And while all were still standing, the years hadn’t been kind to them. The hollow was reclaiming the land. Weeds grew high up all sides of the buildings. Water leaked in the roofs, rotting the wood beneath. Critters had moved into each dwelling, making nests, chewing their way through the walls.

There was a desolation about the place she suspected had always been here, though. She avoided the buildings, keeping to the trees and a faint animal trail she’d found that headed higher up into the hollow.

The lower part of the land lay in foothills but quickly rose in a deep, fairly wide canyon with rock cliffs, towering pines and a meandering creek that any other time of the year ran slow and clear. Now the creek raged as snow still melted slowly in the shade along the north side of the cliffs.

She hadn’t gone far when she found the spot she was looking for. She turned on the metal detector, anxious to get to work. It wasn’t long until she realized the problem she was going to have using the metal detector. She was looking for a metal box and the area was littered with parts of old cars, food tins, nails and other junk.

Still her heart raced each time the device went off—like right now. She was getting a good, strong indication of something belowground. Turning off the metal detector, she grabbed her small digging tool and began to upend the earth around the spot.

Almost ready to go back to the pickup for the shovel, her tool struck something that sounded solid. She dug faster, realizing she was losing her light with the waning daylight. She unearthed enough of the object to see that it was an old vehicle bumper.

With growing disappointment along with aching muscles, she’d started to fill in the hole when she felt the skin prickle on the back of her neck. She spun around, half expecting to find someone standing behind her.

A breeze teased at the loose hair around her face. She brushed it back, staring downhill toward the road she’d come in on. No sign of anyone, but there were too many trees and buildings between her and the road where someone could hide.

A meadowlark sang from the spring grass nearby. The breeze sighed in the tall pines. Her heart began to settle down again, but one hand still gripped the gun in her jacket pocket.

Someone was out there, watching her. It
wasn’t
her imagination.

* * *

S
HERIFF
F
RANK
C
URRY
was waiting for the new owner of the Branding Iron Café when she returned. He was surprised to see that her jeans and Western shirt were dirty, as if she’d been digging in a garden. But Kate didn’t have a garden.

“Sheriff,” she said when she saw him. “I didn’t expect to see you twice in one day.” She opened the back door of the café and he followed her inside. “Coffee?”

He shook his head and took the booth they’d shared earlier that morning. It had been a long day and Kate LaFond looked as tired as he felt.

“You get into the hog wrestling at the fair?” he asked, indicating her dirty attire.

“Just went for a hike,” she said. “Took a little spill.”

He didn’t believe her, but he also didn’t call her on it. “So you like running the café here in Beartooth?”

She smiled. “I doubt you were waiting for me in the heat of the day to ask me that.”

He returned her smile. “I understand Claude Durham left you the café. I’m surprised. I didn’t think you knew him.”

“I’m surprised that you would be interested in my relationship with Claude.”

“What kind of relationship was that?”

“Friends.”

“So you’d been to Beartooth before Claude died.”

“Sheriff, what is this about?”

“Your name isn’t Kate LaFond.”

“No, not legally, but I’m sure you know that. After Claude died and left me the café, I wanted a fresh start in Beartooth, so I chose a new name to go with it.”

“How do I know you’re this Melissa Logan, the woman Claude left the Branding Iron to in his will?”

She got up. He heard her go upstairs and listened to her footfalls moving through the apartment. A few minutes later, she returned and dropped on the table in front of him a Nevada driver’s license in the name Melissa Logan. The photograph wasn’t a great one, but there was no doubt the woman in it was the one now sitting in the booth across from him.

“You changed your hair color, too,” he said. The woman in the photo was blonde, clearly not her natural color. “Most people don’t change their appearance and name unless they have something to hide.”

Kate laughed. “I’m not most women and neither is the woman who put you up to this. I notice Nettie has a new hairstyle and color herself. What do you think
she’s
trying to hide?”

He smiled, her point well taken. “Under Montana law, you need to get a new driver’s license,” he said, handing back her old one. “You might want to see about changing your name legally. That is, if you think you’re going to be Kate LaFond for a while.”

“Sheriff, haven’t you ever wanted to simply be someone else for a while?”

“Can’t say I have.” He got to his feet. The one thing he’d learned being a lawman was that changing a name didn’t change a person—or their past. He had a body down at the morgue without a name. But even nameless the man’s past was branded on him like one of his jailhouse tattoos.

Kate had a past, a murky one. It hadn’t escaped his mind that the murdered man in the morgue hadn’t just been looking for Kate. He’d found her—and now he was dead.

* * *

N
ETTIE FOUND THE
apartment over the general store neat as a pin. She wasn’t all that surprised. Tiffany hadn’t brought enough personal items to make much of a mess. Nor did the girl seem like the disorganized, cluttered teenage type.

But as she glanced around, Nettie thought there was something almost
too
neat about the apartment. There was nothing personal in sight. No photographs. No books. No trinkets of any kind.

Tiffany seemed the kind of kid who would have brought with her a favorite stuffed animal. A collage of photos of her best friends. Or, being an artist, a favorite artwork.

The room looked exactly as it had the day Nettie had rented it to her—as if the girl wasn’t planning to stay long.

Then why pay six months’ rent?

Nettie shook her head at how human nature often astounded her, as she went into the bathroom and opened her toolbox. After she fixed the leaky faucet, she had a thought.

She walked back into the living room. Nothing about it looked lived-in. She noticed that the bedroom door was cracked partially open and realized she hadn’t looked in there.

As the landlord she had the right to take a look, right? She stepped forward and slowly pushed on the door, not sure what she was afraid of finding.

The room looked much like the rest of the apartment—the same as the day it had been rented. The bed was made, the pillows lined up as neatly as if the bed hadn’t been slept in.

Nettie moved to the closet. A jacket and a couple of shirts hung on hangers, but otherwise the closet was empty.

She checked the chest of drawers. A bare minimum of underwear, all very reserved for a girl of Tiffany’s age, Nettie thought. No thongs, no lace, nothing sexy at all. It was as if this girl had been raised by monks.

Nettie had suspected Tiffany’s coming to Beartooth had something to do with a boy. Now she wondered if the girl had ever even had a boyfriend.

As she closed the drawer, she looked around the bedroom. Nothing personal in here, either. It seemed strange. But then, there was something strange about this girl. Nettie remembered the bulging shoulder bag. Did the girl take everything of a personal nature with her each time she left?

As she started past the double bed, she noticed that the comforter was a little crooked. She started to straighten it when her fingers brushed against something.

Bending down, she saw the corner of a sheet of paper, thick like a page from a sketchbook, sticking out from between the mattress and box springs.

Carefully she lifted the mattress. A half dozen sketches lay on top of the box springs. Nettie reached for them, surprised that they weren’t half bad. Also surprised that her renter might actually have been telling the truth about being an artist.

Told you so,
Bob said in her head.
Just goes to show you that you should have more trust in people.

Nettie wasn’t listening. Her hands were shaking as she looked from one sketch to the next.

They were all of the same person, she realized, heart pounding. Each captured an age-weathered face. But each stroke of the pencil seemed to add not only years, but something more sinister. The harsh lines made the face seem...menacing to the point of evil.

Every sketch was of Sheriff Frank Curry.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I
T WAS LATE BY THE TIME
, Jack reached Beartooth. He’d ridden a few carnival rides, feeling like a kid again, then had a couple of beers with Carson, though Carson had soda. As much fun as he’d had, seeing Chantell had left him angry and frustrated. He knew damned well her father had wanted to get him out of her life. But how far would the man have gone?

Jack feared he knew. The timing of the rustling and the two-year prison sentence was too convenient. Judge Hyett had always come off as a man who felt he was above the law.

But how could Jack ever prove that the judge had anything to do with framing him? Hyett had power in this county because he was hard on criminals. The only way Jack had a chance in hell of connecting him to this was to find out who had done the old man’s dirty work. Judge Hyett was too smart to take a chance on any of this coming back on him. But who could the judge trust enough to frame Jack and never talk?

The thought hit Jack like a brick.
Someone coming up for a sentence from his bench.

That was it. And if that person ever did tell the truth, Hyett could simply deny it. It would be his word against a known criminal.

Jack pulled into the spot in front of the cabin and cut his lights. Darkness closed in around him. Not even starlight bled down through the thick pines. He sat for a moment, thinking about what he’d just figured out. It felt right.

But if nobody would believe the truth, then what was the point of his sticking his neck out in an attempt to find it? Once he started digging around in the past, the judge could get word of it. He already suspected how far the judge would go just to get rid of him for a couple of years. Imagine what he’d do to protect himself. Jack knew he could easily end up back in prison—or worse.

He rubbed his forehead under the brim of his Stetson as he looked out at the darkness. Through the pines he could make out a light in the distance. The Branding Iron Café.

The thought of Kate LaFond did nothing to improve his mood. All day, he’d been mentally kicking himself for taking the note. He had let himself get involved when it was the last thing he needed. She’d made it perfectly clear she didn’t want or need his help. Whoever she was and whatever she was hiding, it wasn’t his problem.

But he would love a cup of coffee and piece of peach pie—and while he was at it, he’d return her note. He could just hear what his friend Carson would have to say about this.

He climbed out of his truck, thinking that he and Kate were a lot alike. Tonight they had to be the two loneliest people in Beartooth. Everyone else was still in Big Timber either at the dance at the fair or one of the bars, partying. Beartooth tonight really was a ghost town.

Jack slammed his pickup door, glanced toward his empty cabin, then the café sign shining through the darkness. He recalled Kate’s expression when she’d come out of the fortune-teller’s booth. She hadn’t looked just angry, she’d been scared. What the hell had that old woman inside the tent told her, anyway?

With a curse, he knew he wasn’t going to get a lick of sleep for hours. The thought of peach pie drove him down the trail through the pines toward the café.

He was almost to the highway, still in the pines, when he heard a vehicle coming. He stopped in the blackness of the trees as a large, dark pickup rumbled past. It looked familiar, but he couldn’t place it. There were dozens of trucks like it in rural Montana.

Trotting across the street in its wake, he was already talking himself out of knocking on Kate’s door. But his boots seemed to have a mind of their own. The spring night air was brisk, the sky overhead a canopy of black velvet studded with rhinestones. A breeze stirred the nearby pines, emitting a comforting sigh. There was nothing like spring in Montana—unless it was summer, he thought with a smile.

The paved road through town was empty. Other than the truck he’d seen, there didn’t seem to be a soul left. It gave him an eerie feeling, as if there’d been a disaster he’d only narrowly missed and now he was entirely alone on the planet.

He glanced toward the apartment window over the café. A light was on. His stomach rumbled at the thought of pie, but he willed his boots to keep walking. At the alley, he glanced down it, recalling his first night home, the first time he’d laid eyes on Kate LaFond.

The sound of the earlier truck’s engine broke the night’s heavy silence. He saw the driver flip a U-turn down at the end of the road and start back in his direction. Instinctively, he stepped into the shadowed darkness at the mouth of the alley. The pickup rolled slowly up the street, the engine throbbing.

As the driver passed the café, he looked in the direction of the apartment upstairs.