“Why was there a team investigating my father’s death?”

So she’d put two and two together already, had she? She obviously hadn’t missed anything, though he wished he could go back in time and replay his first phone call to her. If he’d had it to do over again, he’d have told her from the beginning that there was some possibility her father had been murdered.

Because if anything, it was worse having to tell her now.

“We suspected he may have been murdered.” He watched her carefully as she absorbed the news. No screams, no crying, not even a gasp.

“And the fact that somebody broke into the house?”

“It’s hard to say at this point,” Gideon tempered his response, “but there’s a very good chance the two are related.”

RACHELLE MCCALLA

is a mild-mannered housewife, and the toughest she ever has to get is when she’s trying to keep her four kids quiet in church. Though she often gets in over her head, as her characters do, and has to find a way out, her adventures have more to do with sorting out the carpool and providing food for the potluck. She’s never been arrested, gotten in a fistfight or been shot at. And she’d like to keep it that way! For recipes, fun background notes on the places and characters in this book and more information on forthcoming titles, visit www.rachellemccalla.com.

Danger on Her Doorstep
Rachelle McCalla

Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain.

—Psalm 127:1

To Henry, Eleanor, Genevieve and Knox.

You inspire me every day.

Acknowledgments

A super big thank-you to my amazing editor Emily Rodmell, without whose keen insights and editorial prowess this book wouldn’t be nearly so good, if it even existed at all.

Never-ending thanks to my husband, Ray McCalla, for picking up the kids and folding the laundry and all the other bazillion ways you take up the slack so I can write. I love you.

Tremendous thanks to Deputy Charles McCalla of the Page County Sheriff’s Department, and my father, retired Police Sergeant Brian Richter, for all your keen answers to even my most bizarre questions. You make me look like I know what I’m talking about.

Huge, huge, huge thanks to all the booksellers and newspaper editors and the wonderful staff at KTCH radio who’ve helped to spread the word about my books.

Terrific thanks to my readers. You honor me by choosing to read my stories.

And most of all, eternal thanks to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who paid it all already. You make everything possible.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

LETTER TO READER

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

ONE

Maggie Arnold felt uneasy about being alone in the old house on Shady Oak Lane, and it wasn’t just because her father died here. The rambling old building was full of sheet-draped furniture which hunkered in the shadows.

But it was now or never. She had to push her fears aside and get the project started if she ever wanted to leave this house behind her. She pulled out her phone.

In her haste, Maggie had the call ringing through before she realized she hadn’t asked for the name of the handyman whose number her Realtor had given her.

A deep voice answered her call. “Hello?” He sounded strong. Capable. Could she tell that much from one word?

“I’m calling for the handyman,” Maggie started, embarrassed that she didn’t know his name. “Susan Isakson gave me this number.”

“I’ll be sure to thank her for the referral. What’s the project?” So he was cordial, too.

Maggie’s heart gave a little flip, which she told herself was silly. There was no reason for her to get too excited at the sound of a strong man’s voice. She just hoped this guy would be able to help her with the house she’d inherited when her father had died a little over two weeks ago. Otherwise she didn’t know where else to turn. “Do you know the old Victorian on Shady Oak Lane?”

The man let out an almost silent groan.

Maggie couldn’t stand the idea that she’d lose him so easily. She rushed on. “I know it’s a big project, but I’m willing to do a lot of the work myself. If you’d at least come take a look at it, even if you could just do part of it—”

“I can stop by this afternoon.”

“You can?” Maggie nearly screeched in her relief. None of the other contractors she’d called had even offered to take a look at the house, and she had to have help—soon.

“Say around four o’clock?”

That was in less than a half hour. “That would be perfect.”

“And, let’s see…” the deep voice paused “…you’re Maggie Arnold, right?”

“Right.”

“Okay, see you at four, then.”

“See you then.” Maggie hung up the phone with a breathless goodbye and leaned her elbows back on the staircase where she sat, looking up the wide-open stairwell at the dizzying pattern of exposed stud walls above her, wondering how the handyman knew her name when she didn’t even know his.

Oh, he’d probably heard all about her already. After living in Kansas City since she’d graduated from high school, Maggie wasn’t used to Holyoake, Iowa, anymore, where the scant five thousand townspeople knew everything about everybody and who was up to what. No doubt rumors were already flying about her return to town and what would become of the house on Shady Oak Lane. Most people probably figured she wasn’t up to the task of fixing it up. She figured they were probably right.

And this handyman guy—whatever his name was—from his reaction, she could assume he already knew how much trouble the house would be. It was entirely possible he was only stopping by to be nice, and had no real intention of taking on the project. But she had to have his help. Though she’d meant it when she’d said she could help with the work, she didn’t know much about construction—just enough to know she wasn’t up to tackling the project alone.

And she’d already been turned down by every other contractor in town. Their excuses echoed through her mind. Too busy. No longer in business. Only new construction. No major renovations. And perhaps the most ominous of all: I wouldn’t go near that house for anything.

“Neither would I,” Maggie whispered to herself, “if it were only up to me.” But she didn’t have much choice in the matter. The house needed so much work. She looked around her at the aging plaster and woodwork coated with decades of paint. Her eyes fell on a couple of dead bats in the corner of the foyer. At least, she hoped they were dead.

Closing her eyes to the sight, she pictured instead the faces of children who’d been patients in the pediatric ward at the hospital where she worked in Kansas City. The new children’s wing addition would be such a blessing to so many. Once she got the house fixed up enough to sell, she could make a large donation to the project and have one of the rooms named after her father. She’d already listed the other rental houses she’d inherited, but her dad had gutted most of the second floor of the old Victorian, and the Realtor had assured her the only way she’d get any profit from the house would be if she returned it to habitable condition first.

“Dear Lord,” Maggie prayed, closing her eyes tight against the sight of the overwhelming amount of work that needed to be done, “help me. Please soften this man’s heart so he’ll be willing to take on this project.” She felt a stab of fear as she wondered why this nameless handyman was able to stop by on such short notice. Why wasn’t he busy at four in the afternoon? “And please let him be a good man. I don’t need any more problems.”

Former Sheriff Gideon Bromley slid the phone back into his pocket and made a face, stomping his foot to let out some of the frustration he felt. Why? Why had he just agreed to take a look at Maggie Arnold’s project? He knew better, didn’t he? But the lawman inside him just couldn’t let a case go unsolved—even if he no longer had his badge.

Ever since that morning two weeks before when he’d found Glen Arnold lying facedown on the cellar floor of that old Victorian house, things in his own life had quickly careened out of control. Labor Day weekend had been a busy one. While he’d been busy on the job trying to sort out what had happened at the house on Shady Oak Lane, his own brother had been using him to gain access to information on a meth production investigation that had broken wide-open.

Worst of all, his brother, Bruce, had been the person producing the drugs. While Gideon was distracted investigating Glen Arnold’s death, Bruce had covered his tracks by framing innocent people for his own illegal activities. And when the DEA swept in, Bruce had tried to pass the guilt onto Gideon.

Gideon had stepped down from his job as sheriff pending a full inquiry into his involvement with his brother’s crimes. At this point, he didn’t even know what the status was on Glen Arnold’s murder investigation. If he was smart, he’d stay away from anything having to do with the case or the crime scene, including staying as far as possible from the house on Shady Oak Lane.

But Maggie Arnold sounded desperate, and his heart went out to her. Besides, he didn’t know what else to do with his time while he waited for the verdict to be handed down. He’d come up with the idea of doing handyman work the week before. Even after hanging up posters and running an ad in the local paper, he hadn’t found a single person who wanted the suspended sheriff working on their house.

Though their rejection stung, Gideon understood. They felt betrayed at the thought that the official they’d elected had been running illegal drugs right under their noses. Except that he hadn’t been running drugs. That was just Bruce’s story.

But of course, everyone believed Bruce. Gideon’s much older brother had long been one of the most respected men in town, mostly because he owned a transportation company that was one of the biggest employers in the county. Ironically, it seemed the transportation company had been just one more cog in the wheel in Bruce’s meth production and distribution ring. And much of Bruce’s well-respected wealth had come from drug money. Though Bruce was now behind bars, his influence remained.

Worst of all, Bruce had used his little brother’s position as sheriff as an inside means of gathering information so he could stay one step ahead of any investigation that might have uncovered his illegal activities. While Gideon had been at the house on Shady Oak Lane, Bruce had been at the sheriff’s station, supposedly waiting to see him, but actually monitoring the progress of the drug investigation.

The old Victorian on Shady Oak Lane had been the wrong place for him to be that weekend. Unfortunately, there was no way he could go back in time and do things differently. All he could do was press on.

As he pulled on his work boots and made sure he had whatever tools he might need, Gideon decided it didn’t matter, really, what had happened at that old house, or how his life had been changed by it. Work was work. And he needed something to fill his time before he drove himself crazy with all his regrets.

At the sound of knocking Maggie looked up from the long list she’d been making of things the house needed done. Through the beveled glass door inset she could clearly see a man’s broad-shouldered silhouette. He was early. Was that a good sign?

She didn’t know, but scrambled to open the door for him. Giving the age-warped door a couple of hard tugs, she finally popped it open, and extended her hand toward the figure on the other side.

Long fingers closed around her proffered hand. “Hi. You called for a handyman?”

The strong voice sounded the same as it had over the phone, but Maggie couldn’t see anything of the man’s face against the backdrop of bright sunlight as the autumn afternoon sun blazed low in the sky behind him. She fought the urge to immediately pull back from him. It was a simple handshake. Maggie had shaken hands with hundreds of people since she’d been back, between her father’s funeral and all the meetings dealing with his estate. So why did this handshake feel so different? His touch sent her heartbeat racing.

Telling herself she was just nervous about his assessment of the overwhelming remodeling project, she pulled her hand away and practically leaped back into the foyer to make room for him to step inside. “Thanks for stopping by. Come on in. Have you ever been in this house before?”

“Uh, yes,” the deep voice rumbled. “Yes, actually. Just a couple of weeks ago.”

As she closed the door behind him, Maggie blinked back the glaring red that had imprinted on her retinas. She looked up at the man who seemed to fill the large foyer, wishing her vision would clear so she could see his face. Her heart was still hammering inside her, and the way his wide shoulders loomed over her didn’t help. Though part of his height could be attributed to his thick-heeled work boots, the man was still close to six feet tall—much taller than her squat five foot two. And kind of scary since they were alone on the outskirts of town, in the house where her father had died.

Chastising herself for letting her fear get the better of her, she startled as the face above her came into focus. The square chin had a deep cleft in the middle that was mirrored by the ridge between his arched black brows. He had a fierce, hard face. Dark eyes glinted down at her as Maggie recognized the man. A jolt of panic sped through her.

No! She wished she could push him back out of her house, but the door was already closed behind her. Did he still hate her after all these years? Did he still blame her father for what had happened two decades before?

“Gideon.” The name dropped from her lips in a lifeless whisper. What was he doing here, anyway? “I thought you were the sheriff.” Her eyes narrowed as her fear-frozen brain started working again. But no, she’d heard people talking…

“I was. Two weeks ago when I called you with the news about your father, I was the sheriff. I’ve stepped down pending an investigation into my involvement in a meth production ring that was operating out of Holyoake County.”

That was what she’d heard about him. Everyone had been talking about it at the funeral. “Did you do it?” The question escaped before her stunned consciousness could hold it back.

While she watched, Gideon’s full lips bent upward in an amused expression, chasing the hardness from his face until he smiled right up to his eyes. A chuckle burst from him, surprising her. “You know, I think you’re the first person who’s ever actually asked me that. Everyone else just assumed I’m guilty.”

Maggie tittered nervously along. The man didn’t look quite so intimidating when he smiled, though she could see how he’d make a great lawman. Probably scared the daylights out of the bad guys.

Gideon’s laughter faded quickly, and he explained, “Actually, I didn’t do any of the things they’re accusing me of. I knew there were drugs coming out of this county, but I had no idea my brother was the person behind their production. And to my shame, I was oblivious that he was using me to get the information he needed to make sure his operation went undetected.” The smile disappeared, replaced by a much more frightening jaded expression. “Not that my innocence will make one bit of difference against the evidence he’s stacked up against me.”

“So, you don’t think you’ll get your job back?” Maggie tried to keep the uneasy shiver out of her voice. She almost succeeded.

“Doubt it. I’ll probably go to prison instead.” He stepped back and looked around him, obviously done discussing the subject. “Where do you want to start?”

Maggie followed his lead and looked around, feeling lost in the midst of the multitude of projects the house would need to have finished before it could be sold. New plumbing, new walls, new…everything. She gulped.

Gideon spun back around from his survey of the foyer and faced her. “Unless you don’t want an accused man working on your house. You can tell me to get lost. I’d understand.”

He’d somehow ended up closer to her, and Maggie could see the pain behind his brown-black eyes. Up until she’d recognized him, she’d been praying with all her might the handyman would be willing to work on the house. Now she wasn’t sure what she wanted. “You’re not just offering that because you don’t want the headache of taking on this project, are you?” she asked him directly. “I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want to have anything to do with this place.”

His dark eyes glinted as he looked down at her, obviously trying to size up whether she was being straightforward with him or playing some kind of game. Yup, the bad guys would be shaking in their boots right now.

Maggie didn’t feel too brave, either, but she’d faced a lot of frightening situations in her job as a nurse in the pediatric ward. Gideon Bromley didn’t scare her—too much.

Gideon’s stony face softened slightly. “Do you realize I’m the man who found your father’s body?”

The backward step she took toward the door was completely involuntary. “You did?” Her confidence in his innocence wavered slightly. What if this man really had done all those illegal things people accused him of? But she’d known Gideon Bromley since junior high school.

He’d been intimidating even then.

“Yes. How much have you been told about what happened?”

“I—I—” Maggie faltered, looking around, trying to think. What had Gideon been doing at the house on Shady Oak Lane that Saturday morning? “They haven’t told me anything, really, just that he had a broken neck. I wasn’t looking for details.”

That seemed to censor him. “Sorry to bring it up. I just didn’t want there to be any awkwardness if I’m going to be working here with you.”

Maggie told herself to resume breathing. “It’s okay. Obviously reminders of him are everywhere.” As if to make her point, her eyes traveled toward the back of the house, where the door to the cellar where her father’s body had been found was located just out of sight.

Gideon turned to glance in the direction where she was looking. “Have you been to the basement?”

“Only once.”

“Would you like to start there?”

Maggie felt her heart give a little squeeze. Did she want to revisit the place where her father had died? No. She wanted her father back alive, but that wasn’t an option. She looked up at Gideon and was surprised by the less-than-fierce expression on his face. Was that kindness behind his eyes?

She took a gulp, stepped toward the back of the house and tried to interject a casual tone into her voice. “Sounds like as good a place as any.” Judging by the way the words faded before she finished her sentence, she knew her attempt at nonchalance had failed.

Maggie led Gideon through the cavernous rooms to the narrow back stairwell that descended to the basement. They stepped down into the musty dark. Two sets of stairs led into the subterranean space. The narrow stairs they’d used came down from inside the house near the kitchen. The other set came in from outside the house in the backyard. A sliver of light marked the opening to the wide cellar doors that led outside—the stairs where her father had died.

With a pull on the chain of the lone lightbulb that dangled from the low ceiling, sickly yellow light filled the room. Unable to look at the door or the floor, Maggie turned her attention to Gideon.

He seemed furious. “They didn’t even clean up?”

Maggie glanced down at the broken pieces of porcelain tiles that littered the floor. She understood her father had been carrying a box of tiles when he’d fallen, which had split open and shattered upon impact with the floor. “Who?”

“The investigation team. They should have at least swept up the pieces of tiles once they were done with the site. That’s just common courtesy.”

“What investigation team?”

“From the sheriff’s office.” Gideon bent down and started scooping broken tiles into a pile.

Maggie bent to help him in slow motion, her mind stuck on what he’d said. “Why did they need an investigation team?”

“To determine whether his death was an accident or—” Gideon’s hands swept close to hers, and he looked up at her. His mouth clamped shut.

“Or what?” Maggie looked at him quizzically. She’d never heard that there was ever any question about how her father had died. “Gideon?”

He looked down at the pile of tile pieces between them, the shiny fragments a stark contrast to the dull cement floor. Slowly, he let the last few chips in his hands drop into the pile with tiny clinking sounds. “Was your father’s death ruled accidental?”

“Of course.”

“Then pretend I didn’t say anything.” He rose and dusted his hands off on his dark jeans. “Is there a broom upstairs?”

Maggie didn’t feel at all comfortable about his sudden change of subject, but she went ahead and answered his question. “Not that I know of, but I saw one in the garage earlier.” She stood, dusting her hands off, as well. “Here, you can go out through the cellar door.”

They both moved toward the wooden double doors that closed off the outside cellar stairs from the inside. Maggie froze as she reached for the drop bar that secured the door. “Wait a second.”

The door hung loosely on its hinges. The two-by-four that had been used to bar entry had been pushed in. Bolts protruded between the wooden door frame and the brick-and-mortar foundation, as though the door had been forced open from the outside.

“Was the door like that before?” Gideon asked from behind her.

“No.” Maggie didn’t have to think about her answer. She’d stood in that exact spot the day before and leaned on the drop bar while she wept for her father. Though her eyes had been blurry with tears, she had no doubt the door she’d seen and leaned on then had been securely attached it its frame. Now it was pulled ajar, dangling loosely, as if someone had rammed it open in order to gain entry.

Gideon stepped past her and gave the frame a gentle tug. It gaped inward a good foot or more—plenty wide enough to allow a person to enter through the space. “Let’s get upstairs,” he whispered suddenly.

“Do you think someone broke in?” Maggie asked.

“Looks like it.” Gideon’s hand fell to her arm, encouraging her back toward the narrow staircase that led to the kitchen in the back of the house. “And for all we know, they could still be in here.”

TWO

Gideon didn’t want to frighten Maggie, but he needed first and foremost to ensure her safety. Obviously the basement wasn’t secure, not with the door hanging from its frame. And for that matter, neither was the rest of the house. If someone had broken in, they could be hiding anywhere in the sprawling dwelling. Gideon had his own theories on how Maggie’s father had died. If he was right, there was a killer on the loose.

“Why don’t we head outside?” he asked as they stepped into the sunlit kitchen.

“We can go out the back door and see what the cellar doors look like from out there,” Maggie said with only a faint tremor running through her words.

Gideon’s heart clenched. Poor thing. She was holding together pretty well, considering. “Excellent idea,” he encouraged her as they stepped out onto the aged brick patio and turned toward where the triangular cellar doors let out from the basement. He groaned as they approached.

The hinges had been pulled free of the aging wood. The break-in job probably hadn’t been very difficult—a crowbar would do it. But what disturbed him even more was the fact that whoever had made entry into the house hadn’t even tried to hide what they’d done.

Why weren’t they more careful? Why weren’t they afraid?

“Gideon?” Maggie’s voice came out too highpitched.

He turned his attention back to her and realized the situation was catching up with her. This couldn’t be easy for her to see. “Let’s have a seat a second,” he suggested, taking her by the arm and guiding her toward an old double glider by the garage. The rusty old swing had obviously spent too many winters outside, but it looked sturdy enough to hold them.

Gideon sat down beside her.

“What was it?” she asked, the fear in her blue eyes magnified by the curvature of her thick-rimmed glasses. “Why was there a team investigating my father’s death? Do you think someone may have killed him?”

So she’d put two and two together already, had she? Gideon recalled from their school days that she was pretty bright. She obviously hadn’t missed anything this time, either, though he wished he could go back in time and replay his first phone call to her. If he’d had to do it over again, he’d have told her from the beginning that there was some possibility her father had been murdered.

Because if anything, it was worse having to tell her now.

“We suspected he may have been murdered.” He watched her carefully as she absorbed the news. No screams, no crying, not even a gasp. She just kept staring at the broken cellar door.

After a minute, she took a gulp and asked, “And the fact that somebody broke into the house?”

“It’s hard to say at this point,” Gideon said, tempering his response, “but there’s a very good chance the two are related.”

She nodded slowly. “Why would the murderer re turn?”

“I don’t know.” Gideon didn’t want her getting any more worked up than she already was. Besides, they needed to call the sheriff’s office. If it had been his house, he’d have placed the call already. But then, his house, though only a couple of blocks from this one, was inside the city limits, and the Holyoake cops would have answered the call. The house on Shady Oak Lane was outside of town, and therefore in the sheriff’s territory.

Since he wasn’t supposed to have anything to do with the ongoing sheriff’s investigations, he needed to leave well enough alone. The last thing he wanted to do was make it look as though he was trying to heavy-hand a case. If he ever wanted to be sheriff again, he needed to respect the boundaries that had been erected. Which meant Maggie would need to place the call.

“Do you have your phone on you? Can you call the sheriff’s office to come investigate?”

She looked up at him with wide eyes. Funny, he’d always thought her plain before. Mousy brown hair, dorky glasses, a little on the short side. But close-up, her thick, long eyelashes fluttered against her lightly freckled cheekbones. Maggie Arnold was pretty.

Gideon shook off his thoughts, wondering what had gotten into him. Whoever had broken into the house could be getting away while he sat there thinking about how Maggie Arnold looked. Worse yet, whoever had murdered Glen Arnold could be plotting to kill someone else. “Do you have your phone?” he asked again.

Maggie blushed and pulled a cell phone from her pocket. “Sorry. I’m still trying to sort this out.”

“Leave that to the sheriff’s department,” he advised.

Gideon paced the brick patio while Maggie placed the call. He couldn’t see any footprints, but the weed-filled backyard was an untamed mess. A crowd of people could have gone tromping through without leaving any discernible marks. When Gideon heard Maggie say goodbye, he returned and sat down by her again.

“They’re on their way,” she reported, her expression now more drawn than frightened.

“That’s good.”

“Yes.” She looked away from the cellar door and met his eyes. “So tell me. What makes you think my father was murdered?”

Gideon tried to state the facts as simply as possible. “About twenty minutes before I discovered his body, your father called the sheriff’s office. He asked to speak to me specifically. You know I used to work for him on the weekends and summers back in high school, correct?”

“That’s right.” Maggie nodded. “You helped him fix up his rental houses.”

“He taught me most of what I know about construction,” Gideon confessed. “That’s part of why I chose to become a handyman while I’m suspended from being sheriff. Construction is the only thing I know besides law enforcement.” He shrugged. “Anyway, your father always felt comfortable talking to me and had called about little things before, so I wasn’t even sure this was an official call until we got into the conversation.”

“What did he say?”

Gideon shook his head, trying to recall the older man’s words exactly. “He said he had something I had to see. At that point I thought it was just some new discovery he wanted me to take a look at. You know, he once found a Civil War musket in a box of balusters he bought at an estate auction. I thought it was something like that from the way he was talking. I asked him to tell me more about it. That’s when—” Gideon broke off as a sheriff’s cruiser pulled into the bricked parking space alongside the garage.

“I’ll finish the story later,” he assured her as she rose to her feet. “You don’t mind if I hang back for now, do you? I’m not supposed to get involved with investigations.”

“Do what you have to do,” Maggie said quietly, though Gideon could still hear the fear in her voice.

As promised, Gideon stayed on the swing while Maggie spoke with the officers who’d arrived. He knew Deputy Bernie Gills and had worked with him closely for years. The man had some annoying habits and wasn’t particularly professional or friendly when he didn’t want to be. But he was a competent officer ten years Gideon’s senior, and Gideon had never encountered any major problems with him.

The woman driving the vehicle was someone Gideon had only met twice before—Kim Walker. Kim had grown up in Holyoake but had been a police officer in Des Moines for almost a decade. She had faithfully applied for deputy positions on the Holyoake force whenever any jobs had come open. Though she’d narrowly missed out on those positions, the County Board of Supervisors had chosen her as interim sheriff. The way he understood it, they’d wanted someone new—someone free of any possible ties to the meth production ring that had brought Gideon down. Probably a good idea, as long as she was up to the job of being sheriff.

Gideon sat back and watched while Bernie and Kim split up to check the house.

Maggie returned and sat next to him on the swing. “They’re going to make sure there’s no one still around,” she explained.

“That’s good.” It was what he’d have done. While he didn’t want to judge Kim’s work—she’d been rightfully appointed, after all—he still felt a lot more comfortable knowing she was proceeding according to the book. Step one was always to secure the location.

“Do you think I should ask them about…?” Maggie paused, her blue eyes watching him, full of trust.

“About the ruling on your father’s case?” Gideon supplied.

She nodded and looked relieved. Obviously she felt hesitant to speak the words out loud.

He understood how she felt. For the same reason, he hated admitting the fact that he was no longer sheriff. Somehow, saying it out loud made it more real. “If I were in your shoes, I’d give them the third degree. They have a responsibility to your father and to you, as well as to the safety of everyone in Holyoake County. If your father really was murdered, then there’s a killer out there somewhere.” He stopped when Maggie looked nervously back at the cellar door.

Guilt stabbed him. He hadn’t meant to make her more afraid, but he felt impatient with the sheriff’s office for not thoroughly addressing that aspect of the case two weeks earlier. In his mind, it was unconscionable that Maggie hadn’t been told the bare facts of her father’s case. But then, part of that was his fault. He’d been the one to call her to notify her of her father’s death. Not wanting to reveal over the phone that they suspected Glen Arnold’s death to be a homicide, Gideon had planned to tell Maggie those things in person once she arrived in town and they’d had a chance to investigate further. But his brother’s arrest had spoiled those plans, as well.

Much as he knew he needed to remain completely uninvolved with the homicide case, on a purely personal level, it was far too late. Glen Arnold had been a mentor and friend. And now it appeared as though whoever had killed him had another mission to accomplish, if the splintered cellar door was any indication.

“I don’t want you to worry,” he offered, noticing that she’d clenched her hands into tight little fists.

“Too late,” she said, her faint smile failing to make the statement a lighthearted one.

“Maggie, can you advise us in here?” Kim called from the first-floor doorway.

“Coming.” Maggie hopped up and followed the sheriff into the house.

Gideon leaned backward on the creaky swing and tried not to feel impatient. As he’d reminded himself a thousand times over the past two weeks, there was nothing he could do to help anyone until his case had been decided. If he tried to get involved before then, it would only make things worse. He watched carefully from his vantage point on the swing, but could see little of the inside activity from the backyard.

Letting his eyes wander over the unkempt grounds, Gideon assessed what he could of the setting. The house sat on a large lot just outside of town. There was another older home about half a block away, with a family living there—the Swansons. They were peaceful people, as he recalled. Mr. Swanson was a schoolteacher and his wife stayed home with the kids. If it hadn’t been for some large shade trees and the thick row of lilac bushes between the two properties, Gideon might have hoped the Swansons would have witnessed something, but between the distance and the visual obstructions, that seemed unlikely.

The other side of the street was a field of soybeans, while on the left side of the house the yard tapered off into what was once probably a well-kept garden area, though it hadn’t been that in eighty years or more. An aging shed marked the rear corner of the property. Beyond that, the wooded hillsides of the Loess Hills sprang up where the Nishnabotna River Valley ended. He wasn’t sure who owned the woodland.

As he sat taking in the surroundings, Gideon thought he saw a movement by the distant garden shed. He turned to look just in time to see a light-haired figure disappear behind the shed. The tallish female figure reminded him of Kim. But what would she be doing over there? Had she found a trail to follow after all?

Curiosity overcame his determination to stay uninvolved, and he hopped up, ambling in the direction of the shed. “Kim?” he asked as he neared the spot, not wanting to startle or surprise her, especially if she had her sidearm drawn. “Sheriff Walker?”

He was nearly to the shed when he heard the woman’s voice behind him.

“Are you looking for me?”

Gideon spun around. “Oh. There you are.” She’d obviously come from the direction of the house—not from back around the shed. “You’re wearing tan.”

“Yes. It is the official color of the Holyoake County sheriff uniforms—” Kim eyed him cautiously “—although I believe the tag calls it khaki.”

Hoping he hadn’t offended her, Gideon tried his best to look apologetic. “Sorry. It’s just that I thought I saw a woman—I had assumed it was you—going back around the shed. But she was wearing light blue.”

“City cops wear light blue and black,” Kim noted.

“I don’t think it was a city cop.” Gideon stepped back toward where he’d seen the figure, “I wonder if it was someone related to the break-in.”

By now Bernie and Maggie had come up from the basement and approached them. Bernie had apparently overheard much of their conversation. “A woman?” he asked skeptically. “It would take a pretty big person to push through those cellar doors. My guess is you’re looking at a good-size guy, maybe two guys. That door was solid.” Bernie spoke with an extra-authoritative air, and didn’t bother to wipe the smirk off his face when he was finished.

Gideon realized it gave the deputy no end of satisfaction to correct his former boss. And though there was plenty Gideon could have said, he knew Bernie well enough to know arguing with him would only make the situation worse. No, he was in a powerless position now, and he had to behave accordingly. “All I know,” he said patiently, “is that just a few moments ago I saw a light-haired female figure walk past here and disappear behind the shed.”

“I don’t see anyone. Where is she now?” Bernie asked.

“I don’t know.” Gideon tried to remain patient. He’d worked with Bernie just fine for years—but that had been when the deputy was trying to cooperate. The circumstances were very different now.

But Kim was already looking where he’d indicated. “Give him a break, Bernie. He’s right—someone was here, probably a woman. We’ve got footprints.”

Maggie was relieved when the sheriff and her deputy finally left. Though she was glad they’d investigated the matter thoroughly, she couldn’t get her mind off what Gideon had been in the process of telling her when the officers had arrived. But even as she and Gideon tromped back toward the house, she saw the sheriff’s patrol car return.

Deputy Bernie Gills leaped out before the interim sheriff had brought the vehicle to a complete stop. He ran up to Gideon and confronted him. “All right, where is it?”

Gideon looked confused, and possibly slightly annoyed. “Where’s what?”

“My Taser. I left it in the cruiser and you were the only person out here. Don’t tell me you didn’t take it.”

Maggie took a step back as Gideon turned his fierce glare on the deputy. “Bernie, what would I want with your Taser? I carried my own for years.”

“Yeah, and you obviously didn’t want to give it up when you stepped down, did you?”

To Maggie’s relief, Gideon didn’t let the argument escalate. “I don’t have your Taser, Bernie,” he stated flatly. “I don’t know anything about it.”

The deputy stared down his former boss for several long seconds before he finally said, “I’m watching you, Bromley. Everybody in Holyoake knows you’re dirty. It’s just a matter of time until the DNE proves it.” He headed back to the passenger side of the cruiser and climbed inside, slamming the door as the car drove away.

Maggie watched the marked vehicle as it rumbled away. She glanced back at Gideon in time to see the stern cleft between his brows relax slightly.

“Sorry about that.” He looked around them. “I don’t know what might have happened to his Taser. That car was within my sight almost the entire time it was back here, except for when I went around the other side of the shed.”

“Maybe he just misplaced it,” Maggie offered as she led the former sheriff back toward the house.

“Maybe.” Gideon sounded unconvinced. “Maybe another officer might, but Bernie’s downright particular about things.”

Maggie didn’t like the sound of that. Between people sneaking around, stealing things and trying to break into the house, she didn’t feel very comfortable around the old place. She also felt bothered by Bernie’s comment about Gideon being proved guilty.

They headed back down to the basement and Gideon pounded the door frame back into place using long nails from the pouch of the tool belt he wore around his waist. Maggie waited for his pounding to stop before asking him the question that was on her mind.

“What’s the DNE?”

Gideon gave the door frame a couple of hard tugs and scowled at it. But the extra nails he’d pounded into place seemed to hold it, and he faced her with a sigh. “DNE stands for the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement. They investigate illegal narcotics operations—in my case, they’re trying to sort out the extent of my brother’s meth operation, including trying to determine whether I was involved.”

“How long does that usually take?” Maggie asked. She could tell Gideon wasn’t happy about discussing the topic, but the question had been worrying her. Once his case was resolved, he wouldn’t be available to help her. Whether he ended up going to prison or just back to his job as sheriff, Maggie was concerned about whether he’d have time to work on her house at all.

“Simple cases can be resolved in a matter of weeks, sometimes ten days or less. But in the case of my brother’s operation, catching Bruce and his men was just the tip of the iceberg. The DNE hasn’t told me much, but I know their methods well enough to know that it’s going to take a long time to sort out everything in my brother’s case, maybe even several months.”

Gideon slammed the drop bar into place, then pulled out his hammer and pounded in a few more nails. His loud pounding told Maggie their conversation was over.

Once Gideon seemed satisfied that the cellar door was secure, he followed Maggie as she climbed the interior stairs. The rooms upstairs were dark, and dusty old furniture filled the first floor, their odd-shaped forms looming like monsters, capable of hiding killers in their shadows, compelling her to quicken her steps as she made her way through the rambling old house toward the front door.

Though it was getting dark outside and the front foyer was dim, Maggie wasn’t ready to leave. She had a feeling her questions had already probed deeper than what Gideon had wanted to discuss. But at the same time, she needed to know more about how her father had died. She simply wouldn’t be able to sleep otherwise. There was so much that still hadn’t been explained.

When she’d asked Bernie Gills about the accidental-death ruling, the deputy had shrugged off her concerns.

“He fell down the stairs. I’m sorry to say it, but he was getting older. Probably wasn’t so steady on his feet. And hauling all those tiles, well, a guy has to be careful when he’s working alone,” Gills had said.

Maggie wasn’t sure if she felt hurt because the loss of her father was still so fresh, or if she felt stung because of the deputy’s vague insinuation that her father had been careless enough to fall to his death. She didn’t like to think that her father was a careless, sloppy man, but then, how else could she explain the mysterious illness that had stricken the people living in one of her father’s rentals twenty years before? Everyone had said her father’s negligence was to blame. The shame she felt over it was the primary reason she’d left town immediately after graduation, and the reason she still felt uncomfortable showing her face in Holyoake. Facing Gideon Bromley, whose young niece had nearly died from the incident, was even harder.

But right now, Gideon was the only one who could answer her questions. “Do you agree with Bernie’s conclusion about how my father died?” she asked Gideon as they paused by the front door.

The stern-faced man scowled, making his expression even fiercer. “I don’t like to say negative things about my coworkers, but Bernie had a habit of cutting corners when he could. It doesn’t escape my notice that he wrapped up your father’s case quickly, right before Kim was appointed interim sheriff. He never appreciated having a supervisor question his report.”

“So you think…?” Maggie couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence.

“I think it’s possible Bernie didn’t want to have to look for a murderer, so he ruled your father’s death an accident before he’d fully examined all the possibilities.”

It was as she’d feared. “You never finished telling me why you suspected it wasn’t an accident.”

The formidable man leaned toward her, his dark eyes black in the dying light. Maggie thought about turning a light on, but his shadowed gaze held her eyes, and her fear kept her rooted in place.

“Your father called me,” Gideon began again where he’d left off in his story earlier, “and said he’d found something in the basement that he wanted me to see. I asked him what it was, but he said I wouldn’t believe it until I saw it with my own eyes. I wish I could recall his exact words, but I know he said it was very suspicious, whatever it was. When I got here twenty minutes later, he was dead.”

“So that’s the reason you think he might have been murdered—because he found something suspicious inside the house?”

“Yes. That, and when I found him, his pockets were all turned inside out.”

Maggie took a startled step back, and the old floorboards groaned along with her. “Someone searched his body before you got there?”

“That’s what it looked like to me. I can’t imagine your father running around with his pockets inside out—that just wasn’t like him. I knew him well enough to know that. His wallet was lying beside him on the floor, but from what we could tell, nothing was missing. We took fingerprints. Most of them matched your father’s, but there were a few that still hadn’t found a match when I was last on the case.”

Much as Maggie tried to tell herself it didn’t make any difference, the idea that her father may have been murdered made his death that much more difficult to bear. She bit down on her lower lip to keep it from trembling.

Gideon obviously noticed her distress. “I’m sorry. Maybe I shouldn’t be telling you this.”

“No.” She sniffled and tried to work her face into a smile. “I’m glad you told me. I was thinking about moving into this house since we’re going to be working on it anyway, but I’m not going to do that as long as the cause of my father’s death is unresolved.” She stopped short as the expression on Gideon’s face tightened. “If you want to work on the house, that is. I didn’t mean to assume—”

“It’s fine. I’ll take the job, if you’re offering it. I owe your father, you know.”

Maggie wasn’t sure she understood what he meant. “You mean since he taught you about carpentry?”

“I suppose that.” Gideon’s mouth tightened into a grim line. “And because I failed to catch his killer.”

Not willing to think about that subject any longer, Maggie said, “It’s getting dark, and I really don’t want to stay here any later this evening. Can I meet you tomorrow morning to talk about plans for the house?”

Gideon nodded and reached for the doorknob, easily opening the door that had given Maggie so much trouble earlier. “Sure thing.” They arranged when to meet, and Gideon extended his hand toward her as he thanked her again. “I appreciate having some work to do. This project should give me plenty to get my mind off everything else that’s happened.”

Reluctantly, Maggie shook his hand, once again surprised by the warmth she felt at that simple contact, and by the glittering blackness of his eyes in the dusky room. “I appreciate your willingness to take on the job, in spite of its complexity.” She fumbled over her words as she looked up at him, feeling an odd connection with the man who knew her father so well. With the man who’d found her father’s dead body.

THREE

Gideon arrived at the house on Shady Oak Lane ten minutes early and settled his tool belt around his hips where his gun belt used to sit. The weight of the hammer and measuring tape weren’t equal to that of his gun and billy club, but it nonetheless felt good to wear the tools of a trade again, even if it wasn’t his chosen trade.

He grabbed his clipboard and circled the property, watchful for any signs of disturbance or clues that may have been missed before. It bothered him that Glen Arnold’s murderer was still at large, without even so much as an investigation under way to catch him. If Gideon had anything to say about it, the murderer would be caught. He might not be sheriff any longer, but he’d ensure the future safety of Glen Arnold’s daughter. He owed the man that much.

As he came around to the front side of the house, he saw Maggie drive up in her father’s truck, looking even smaller than usual behind the wheel of the full-size pickup. Poor girl. She looked skittish as she hopped out of the front seat, glancing around nervously as though her father’s murderer might leap out of the bushes at any moment. Even from across the yard, he could see the fear on her face, the same vulnerability that had crossed her expression so many times when they’d spoken the day before.

His jaw tightened along with his resolve. He would keep this woman safe. He’d failed her father. He’d failed all of Holyoake County by missing the clues to his brother’s drug-making activities for so long. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he failed Maggie Arnold, too.

“Good morning,” he called out so she wouldn’t be startled by his approach. “Just thought I’d secure the perimeter before we start.”

Her tense expression relaxed slightly. “I appreciate that. You wouldn’t think less of me if I told you this place gives me the creeps?” She fell into step beside him as they made their way up the overgrown front path to the porch steps.

Gideon held the screen door open for her as she worked her key in the front-door lock. “Don’t ever be ashamed of being afraid. Sometimes fear is what keeps us alive.”

Maggie froze and looked up at him. “My father used to say that.”

“I know. He’s the one who taught it to me.” Gideon reached past Maggie, and since she had the door unlocked but couldn’t seem to get it pushed open, he placed one hand gently over hers on the knob, slammed his other open hand against the wedged wood, and the door fell back with a shudder. “I should do something about that door,” he offered.

But Maggie had stepped inside and was already looking around the great foyer that opened upward to the stud-walled second floor. “I think we’ve got plenty of other projects that are more pressing.”

“Where do you want to start?” Gideon asked.

With a long sigh, Maggie shook her head. She clearly felt overwhelmed by the immensity of the project and all that needed to be done. Not that he could blame her. He’d lain awake the night before, trying to break down the renovation process into manageable steps until he’d lost track of where he’d started. It was such a large house and needed so much work.

“This place will be spectacular once it’s finished,” he said in hopes of encouraging her.

She didn’t look encouraged. Instead, she looked as though the responsibility of transforming the house into something spectacular weighed on her even more heavily than simply making it habitable. Gideon was reminded that he didn’t know exactly what her plans were. She’d told him a few things, and he’d inferred the rest based on what he’d have done if the place were his. Those two were likely very different things.

“What are your plans for the house?”

Maggie took a gulp of air. “I want to be able to sell it. My father bought it as a foreclosure after Lorna Creel fell behind on her mortgage payments. From what I can tell, Dad’s plans were to convert it back into apartments.”

“I didn’t realize this place had ever been apartments.”

“That was before either of us was born,” Maggie explained. “I found some of the history my father had collected about the house, and Susan Isakson, the Realtor who’s representing my dad’s other properties, let me in on what she knew. This house was built in 1912 as a single-family home, but it was converted into apartments during the Depression. Then in the 1950s Len Turner bought it and turned it into a funeral home.”

“That’s how I always remembered it.” Gideon stepped into the front parlor, arguably the nicest room in the house, though the elaborate wallpaper had to have been several decades old and the wood-inlaid parlor set was worn and rickety.

“He spent his whole career here,” Maggie continued. “Somewhere along the line, he hired Lorna Creel as an assistant. She helped with the funerals and took care of the cleaning and upkeep, as well as living upstairs. When Len retired he sold the house to Lorna, who wanted to continue living here.”

“But she fell behind on her mortgage payments.” Gideon patched the story together.

“Yes. The First Bank of Holyoake held the mortgage, and from what I understand they didn’t want to foreclose on her. They gave her plenty of chances, but she refused to talk with them or refinance, so ultimately, they did what they had to do.”

“And they sold the house to your father?”

“Yes. He gutted the second floor. I found several of his drawings showing how he intended to convert the house back into apartments.”

Gideon recalled from his years working with Glen Arnold when he was younger that the man had a knack for buying up older, unwanted properties and updating them, eventually renovating them into more practical living spaces. Gideon had long been impressed with the man’s ingenuity. “And you’re planning to move forward with your father’s plans?”

Maggie looked stricken. “No.” She shook her head firmly. “It always bothered me the way he took lovely older homes and carved them up into cramped apartments. I thought we could just put it back the way it was—a gracious, single-family home.”

Gideon nodded and suppressed his smile. Something had lit up behind Maggie’s eyes as she stated her plans. Perhaps she wasn’t as afraid of the old house as he’d thought.

“And then you’re planning to sell it?”

“Yes.” Her eyes bent up at the corners. “I’m selling all my father’s properties. The hospital where I work in Kansas City is building a new addition, including an expanded pediatric unit. If I can get fair market value out of what my father left me, I can have one of the rooms of the unit named in his honor. It’s been the one thing that’s kept me going since his death.”

Gideon turned and looked at the room behind him so Maggie wouldn’t see his smile. The shy girl he’d gone to school with had grown up into a private woman, but whether she realized it or not, she’d given him a glimpse of what made her tick. Much as he appreciated Glen Arnold’s skill in converting old houses into apartments, his daughter’s approach more closely paralleled his own preferences. He’d love to see the old house as it was meant to be again.

Maggie’s voice echoed behind him. “I know it’s going to take a lot of work to bring this place up to code, but as Susan explained it, that’s the only way we’re going to see any profit.”

“She’s right,” Gideon agreed. “There are probably a dozen older homes in Holyoake that have been sitting on the market for years now, mostly because no one wants to put the money and effort into restoring them. But none of those houses has the potential of this place. It could be…” he let his eyes rove over the walls and tried to envision what it would look like with woodwork gleaming instead of caked with coats of paint “…beautiful,” he concluded, spinning around to face Maggie.

Maggie turned her face away before Gideon could see her blush. He’s not talking about you, silly. She knew he was referring to the house, but there had been a moment as he’d spoken when his eyes had landed on hers with a softness that made her heart catch. Like Gideon Bromley would ever call you beautiful.

Gideon had been far more popular than she’d been in high school. He’d graduated one year ahead of her, and while he’d been in the homecoming court and on the student council, she’d always done her best to stay invisible. After all, she knew how the Bromley family and the rest of Holyoake felt about the safety hazards her father had rented out. The people in her father’s largest rental house had often complained about strange odors that made them feel light-headed, but her father had never been able to find the source of the poisonous gases. Then, during Maggie’s freshman year of high school, several people had fallen ill from the fumes and ended up in the hospital, including Gideon’s niece, Kayla, his brother Bruce’s daughter, who had nearly died as an innocent toddler.

Pinching back the memory, Maggie turned to face Gideon with a decidedly neutral expression. “I want the house to be safe. Everything needs to be brought up to code. I won’t cut corners just to save money. This has to be a house where a person could feel comfortable turning their children loose to play without fearing something might happen to them. But at the same time—” she took in the faded elaborate furnishings, which had once been the top of the line “—I don’t want to spend any more money than I have to.”

Gideon nodded. “The profit goes to the hospital, correct?”

“That’s right.” She felt glad he’d followed what she’d said so far.

“Safety first,” Gideon echoed. “I’d like to reinforce that cellar door.”

Relief filled Maggie at his suggestion. After she’d gone back to the spare apartment where she’d been staying in town, she’d lain awake worrying that the intruder might return. “I think it needs to be barricaded,” she agreed. “Obviously the board across the door didn’t stop anyone the last time.”

“Let’s see if we can find something to park in front of it,” Gideon said as they headed to the back of the house and the interior stairway that led to the basement. “As I recall there was quite a lot of furniture in the basement.”

Maggie let Gideon take the lead on the way downstairs. Though he’d tightened the door back into place the day before, and he’d apparently already checked it from the outside that morning, she still didn’t feel certain the house was secure against intruders. But if someone was crazy enough to be lying in wait for them just around the corner in the basement, she was confident they’d get a lot more than they’d bargained for in Gideon Bromley. He didn’t appear to be armed, but between the size of his biceps and the hammer he carried, he’d still make a formidable opponent.

To her relief, they made it to the large back storage room without encountering any surprises. Gideon gave a low whistle. “I can’t believe all the junk that’s crammed back here. I wish I’d had a chance to do more than peek in this room before.”

“So you haven’t searched through this stuff?”

“No. I’d planned to. Your father said he found something suspicious in this old house, and I got the impression from what he said that it was down here in the basement somewhere. If his death was related to what he found, it might be the only clue we have to go on to lead us to his killer.”

Maggie stepped slowly around in a full circle, taking in the piles of boxes heaped upon old furniture that filled the room. “I think I’ll need to move this junk out eventually, anyway. To my understanding all of it came with the house. Lorna acquired it when she bought the place from Len Turner, and who knows where Len got it all? It may have been junk that renters left behind when they moved away over the years before Len even bought it. Some of this stuff certainly looks old enough.”

While they’d been speaking, Gideon had poked around the room and now stopped in front of a large armoire piled high with ancient catalogs and other random objects. “This wardrobe looks solid. If we could park it in front of the door it would keep out just about anyone.”

The idea sounded good to Maggie. “It looks like it will fit through the doorway. Let’s get it cleared off.” She plucked up an old paperboard globe that teetered atop a stack of books on the armoire and set it out of the way.

Gideon followed suit, hefting the entire stack of books in one armload. “Do you think you can help me carry it?” he asked from behind the dusty stack of hardcovers. “It looks heavy.”

Feeling only slightly injured by his words, Maggie defended herself. “I may be short, but I’m strong. I’m used to lifting children in the pediatric unit all the time.” Feeling the need to prove herself, she shouldered a large box, which looked only slightly heavy until she felt its full weight. About that same time she realized she wasn’t sure where to put it down.

“Got a spot for this?” she asked, her embarrassment increasing when she realized the strain carried clearly through her voice.

“Here you go.” Gideon quickly moved aside some bottles from a dresser top, revealing just enough space for the box.

Maggie staggered in that direction and felt the aging cardboard giving way.

Before she could warn him, she tipped in Gideon’s direction and felt his strong arms brush hers as he lifted the crumbling box from her shoulders, depositing it on the dresser before the cardboard gave out completely.

“Okay, so maybe not that strong,” she admitted, em barrassed.

“Actually, I’m impressed you were able to carry that thing at all. It must weigh a hundred pounds.” He peeled back a loose cardboard flap. “This is full of old window weights.”

“Not worth keeping, in my opinion,” Maggie determined, brushing the dust from her hands onto her jeans.

“Yeah, I wonder if any of this stuff has value. Some of the old furniture pieces might be antiques, but a lot of it just looks like junk.”

Maggie scrunched her nose at him. “I suppose I should sort through it as I go. Anything that appears valuable I can take to an antiques dealer, but the rest I’ll just toss. And if I find anything that looks suspicious…” Her throat tightened as she spoke the word her father had used to describe whatever he’d found in the basement—the thing that may have gotten him killed.

“I’ll help,” Gideon offered.

Though she appreciated his offer, Maggie shook her head. “I don’t want to waste your time with sorting through things. There are plenty of projects upstairs that could use your skills—” She stopped midsentence as Gideon’s hand touched her arm. In the dank chill of the basement, the brush of his fingers felt warm against her skin. She looked up to see his obsidian eyes glittering down at her.

“If it’s all right with you, I’d just like to help. Pro bono. I know Bernie closed this case, but in my mind, there’s something down here. I want to try to find it. For your dad.” Gideon’s voice grew a little deeper, a little huskier, and Maggie wondered if maybe his flint-hard exterior guarded a soft heart. “This project is for the children’s hospital, right? I can’t take money from sick kids.”

Her mouth fell open slightly, and she was distinctly aware of his hand on her arm. Still. Wishing her thoughts would catch up with his words, Maggie struggled to clarify. “You’re not going to charge me for the time we spend sorting through the stuff in this basement?”

“No.” His tone told her she’d gotten it wrong.

Had she misunderstood?

Gideon continued. “I’m not going to charge you for my time, period. Let me work on your house for free. I’m still drawing pay as sheriff. I can’t in good conscience allow you—”

“I can’t in good conscience allow you to volunteer your time and expertise,” Maggie cut him off and stepped away. She pulled her arm away from his touch, which, slight and simple as it might have been, somehow felt too intimate coming from the handsome lawman, especially when he was making such a generous offer.

But even as she stepped away from him, Gideon followed her, his broad shoulders cutting into her personal space. She wanted to take another step back, but she was hemmed in by piles of junk on three sides. Gideon looked down at her, his expression far too compassionate.

“Maggie, please. I can’t sleep at night. I messed up a lot of things. I missed the clues that should have told me my brother was running drugs. If I’d have gotten here sooner, maybe your dad wouldn’t have died. I have enough regrets in my life. Can you just let me do something that will bring me some peace?”

His powerful shoulders loomed at eye level, but what drew her gaze were his eyes that glittered with unshed tears. Maggie got the distinct sense the hardened sheriff didn’t let many people see this raw, vulnerable side of him. Something tugged at the depths of her heart.

The Bromley family had never been churchgoing folks that she’d ever known of. Was it possible that Gideon was facing all these trials without a faith in God to fall back on? She couldn’t imagine going through what he was in the midst of, let alone enduring it without God.

His voice rumbled close to her, his tone almost pleading. “If your father was murdered, then his killer is still out there. I need to catch him.”

At that reminder, Maggie glanced to the shallow window that looked out on the underside of some bushes outside. Was the killer still out there?

Gideon continued with steady words. “I don’t want to frighten you, but, Maggie, your father placed that phone call from his cell phone as he was working in the backyard of this house. In order for his killer to have overheard that conversation, he would have had to have been watching and listening very closely.”

Fear trembled through her, and Gideon’s steadying hands grasped her shoulders. This time, instead of pushing him away, she reached for him, and let her small hands settle over his shirtsleeves. Gideon Bromley had always frightened her. But her father’s killer frightened her even more.

“Do you think he’s still out there, watching and listening?” Her question came out as a hollow squeak.

As she watched, the muscles in Gideon’s stony jaw tightened and flexed. His determined eyes looked hard. “If he is, I intend to catch him before he can hurt anyone else. Will you let me help you?”

What could she say? She suspected Gideon needed her help almost as much as she needed his, if the hardened man was ever going to be at peace. So really, the decision was a simple one. “I’d be grateful if you did.”

Gideon set to work right away, methodically going through every last trinket and scrap of paper. Much of it didn’t appear to have ever been touched—which made it less likely to have been the suspicious object Glen had called him to report. To his relief, Maggie appeared to be just as organized as he was about her approach to the search.

“Do you think this has any value?” she asked, holding up a dusty green bottle.

“I doubt it.” Gideon shrugged. “Maybe if you knew what it was called.”

“Probably not worth the time it takes to sort it out.” She slid it into one of the contractor-strength trash bags they’d found upstairs. “This bag is about full. What do you think I should do with it?”

Looking around at the mountain of things they’d be throwing away, Gideon decided. “I’ll hire a roll-away Dumpster. We’ll probably generate a lot of debris through the construction process, so we might as well have one on-site.”

Once the Dumpster arrived, Gideon was surprised with how quickly they began to fill it. Though he felt encouraged by the progress they were making clearing out the basement, with every bag of trash they hefted outside, he was left with fewer possible clues. Nothing he saw seemed suspicious. He began to wonder if the killer might have had time to remove whatever it was before Gideon had arrived and discovered Glen Arnold’s body.

As Maggie toted another bag outside, Gideon’s eyes roved over the room. Nothing looked suspicious to him. Doubts taunted him. Was he pursuing an empty lead? No. Between Glen’s final words and the certainty in his gut, he knew there had to be something in that basement. And his instincts had always served him well as sheriff.

“Gideon?” The breathless way Maggie spoke his name from the doorway sent a shot of fear through him. When he wheeled around, the stark-white frightened expression on her face sent his adrenaline racing into overdrive.

“What is it?”

“I think the killer may have returned.”

FOUR

Maggie tried to remain calm as she led Gideon back outside to show him what she’d found. If whoever had killed her father really was watching them, she didn’t want to give them the satisfaction of seeing how much their actions had disturbed her.

“What is it?” Gideon asked again as they stepped outside.

“I’ve been tossing the trash into this end of the Dumpster,” Maggie explained in the calmest voice she could muster. “I’m too short to see inside it from the ground, but I was thinking after all the bags we’ve thrown in there, surely they ought to reach the top by now.”

She didn’t have to say any more. Gideon leaped up the metal-bar ladder that was welded to the side of the roll-away. His groan told her he’d seen the same thing she had.

He looked down at his hands and groaned again. “I suppose I just wiped out any fingerprints they might have left.”

“I’m sure they were all gone after I touched it.” She tried not to think about what she’d seen inside the Dumpster—the bags carefully untied, the contents sorted out, as though someone had been going through everything they’d thrown out. They may have even been inside the roll-away as she’d thrown in more bags, but she hadn’t seen them because of the high metal sides.

But what made her want to scream in fear were the words scrawled along the back inside wall of the Dumpster.

GIVE IT BACK

The jagged block letters made Maggie feel threatened.

“What do they want?” she asked.

“Something from the basement?” Gideon suggested. “It looks like they were searching through the things we threw out.”

“But don’t you think—” Maggie tried to suppress a shudder, but failed “—don’t you think it looks like some things are missing?”

To her relief, Gideon took her question seriously and looked back into the roll-away. “You’re right. That bag was full of all those broken vacuum attachments and that old wrapping paper that was falling apart, but I don’t see half the vacuum attachments anymore. And I think some bottles are missing from that bag over there.”

Maggie could picture the bag he was talking about. It had been dragged to the far end of the Dumpster and all its contents had been emptied out. She knew some of it was either missing or hidden among the other bags. Her gut instinct told her it had been taken. But why?

With a wordless prayer, she looked up to the clear-blue Iowa sky as though God might send her answers straight out of heaven. Instead she saw a broken gutter hanging down from the eaves, and felt that much more disheartened by the project she’d undertaken—which she’d never asked for in the first place. Pushing away her discouragement, she asked Gideon the question that was foremost in her mind.

“Do you think we missed it—the suspicious thing my dad told you about? Do you think his murderer took it with them?” Her voice dropped off as she returned her gaze to the roll-away Dumpster and then back to Gideon.

For a moment she thought the suspended lawman was about to agree with her. But then his features hardened and he shook his head.

“No. It has to still be inside. This only makes me all the more certain.”

“Why?”

“Because if your father’s killer had what they were looking for, they wouldn’t be asking for it back, would they?”

It took three days to empty out the room in the basement. Most of what they hauled out went straight into the roll-away Dumpster, and remained undisturbed after their discovery. Checking inside the Dumpster with every load had guaranteed that, though Gideon had hoped whoever had scrawled the message would come back so they could catch him. Not that there was much chance of that.

They both agreed that, given Bernie’s accusations about his missing Taser, they wouldn’t bother the sheriff’s office about the message, but instead took pictures as evidence.

A few things they found fell into the category of curiosities, and those Maggie took to the local antiques shop for appraisal. But nothing they found fit into the suspicious, you’re-not-going-to-believe-this-until-you-see-it category. Certainly none of it seemed like anything worth killing someone for.

After checking the Dumpster one last time and finding it clear of invaders, Gideon tossed the last contractor-strength garbage bag into the container with a mighty shove, then turned to face Maggie. “Basement—check,” he announced, feeling satisfied that they’d cleared out the debris. Only a few large furniture pieces remained, and those they’d agreed to keep with the possibility of using them to partially furnish the house.

When he met Maggie’s eyes, Gideon felt his feeling of satisfaction take a hit. That worried look was back, and she’d crossed her arms over her chest as she looked around the overgrown backyard.

He hurried to her side. “I’m sorry we didn’t find what we were looking for.”

Though Gideon knew she was disappointed, Maggie put on a brave face. “It’s okay. We tried. We still have the rest of the house to go through.”

“True.” Gideon wished he could make his voice sound optimistic. The gutted second floor was wide-open space, with only Glen Arnold’s tools and stacks of wood lying around. The attic was a smallish space, and didn’t have room for much under its shallow rafters. The first floor was a little more promising, as Glen had hardly disturbed it yet. But Gideon seemed to recall Glen had made his suspicious discovery in the basement. And their pokey perpetrator’s search through the Dumpster appeared to reinforce that theory.

Maggie tossed her dark hair from her eyes just in time for the wind to blow it stubbornly back across her face. She let out an impatient huff and tugged loose the fluffy elastic that held a haphazard ponytail at the back of her head. She then finger-combed her hair back and stuffed it into a fresh ponytail. “This pony holder is about shot,” she explained, looking apologetic.

Gideon watched with interest. The woman had gone through the same ritual a dozen times or more each day that he’d been working with her. When she’d secured her hair to her satisfaction, she leaned a little closer to him.

“I just keep wondering,” she started slowly, her eyes scanning the yard. “Do you think he’s still watching us?”

Though he felt a tiny prickle of fear at her reminder that her father’s killer was still at large, Gideon wasn’t about to let Maggie see him looking scared. It would only frighten her more. Still, he had wondered from time to time if someone was still watching them, especially when he considered the likelihood that their perp had been in the Dumpster even as they’d tossed bags inside it. “Let him watch,” he announced, putting on a brave face. “Now that we’re done with the basement, we’re going to move on to the rest of the house. So, let’s get to it.”

They’d discussed the next steps of the renovation process while they’d been working together cleaning out the basement. Gideon had noticed that most of the first-floor storm windows had been installed on the outside of the house, though there were still a dozen more new units stacked against a wall in the kitchen that needed to be installed on the remaining windows. Maggie had agreed with his plan to pick up where her father had left off installing the storm windows. Gideon hoped to get the extra-insulating layer added while the weather was still mild, since the forecast called for blustery fall weather to hit the area soon.

“You’re ready to install the storm windows?” Maggie asked, tromping back into the house toward where the units were stacked.

“I brought all the tools we’ll need,” Gideon assured her. “The wind won’t whistle through the windows so much once we get these installed. It should help with the heating bills considerably, too.”

“And it will make the house more secure,” Maggie agreed softly.

Gideon watched the quiet woman as she reached the spot where the storm windows leaned against the kitchen wall. They’d spoken little during the three days they’d spent methodically searching through the junk in the back room of the basement. Never having been a big fan of small talk, he appreciated being allowed to keep his thoughts to himself. Other than a few remarks about the objects they’d found or a couple of conversations about Maggie’s evolving plans for the house, they’d worked in silence. Gideon realized he still knew very little about the woman beside him.

Now she touched the aluminum-framed windows almost reverently. Her fingers paused where the tip of a piece of paper stuck up from between two windows. Maggie pulled it out and looked at it.

“What did you find?” Gideon asked.

“It’s the invoice for the windows,” Maggie noted, her eyes scanning the page. “Wow. My father spent a lot of money to buy all these windows.” Her eyebrows shot up above the upper rim of her dark-framed glasses. “He bought them the same week he died.” Emotion showed on her face as she pinched her eyes shut.

Gideon hated for Maggie to be reminded of her loss once again. A thought occurred to him. He wasn’t sure if she’d appreciate the sentiment; normally he would have just kept his mouth shut. But Maggie’s obvious grief moved him to speak. “It’s almost as though he provided what you needed for the house, even though he’s no longer with us.”

Maggie’s eyes remained pinched shut behind her glasses, and she dipped her head. When she finally raised her head again, she opened tear-free eyes. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

Unsure whether she was speaking to him or simply thanking her father, Gideon stood beside her silently for a few moments before clearing his throat and reaching past her for the first of the storm windows. “Ready to get started?”

“Let’s do it,” she said agreeably.

Gideon carried the first storm window outside. Most of the windows on the old house were the same dimensions except for the large front picture windows. That made installing the storm windows even simpler since he wouldn’t have to sort out sizes. He paused in the backyard and looked up at the house. “I’m going to need to fetch my ladder from my truck. Do you think you can hold this?”

“Got it.” Maggie took the window, which, in spite of its size, was fairly light. Still, the breeze that had whipped her hair around earlier was still blowing, and tugged at the widespread panes.

“I’ll be right back,” Gideon promised, and trotted off to where he’d left his ladder strapped to the rack on his truck.

Maggie watched Gideon disappear around the corner of the house. The former sheriff was a mystery to her, made that much more mysterious by his dark looks and quiet ways. His statement about her father providing the windows for them had seemed to come out of nowhere, its sensitivity so much the opposite of what she’d have expected a tough guy like him to say. The man surprised her, and she found herself wondering what other secrets were hidden underneath his granite exterior.

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