Shotgun Sheriff

Delores Fossen

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Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

About the Author

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

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Copyright

About the Author

Imagine a family tree that includes Texas cowboys, Choctaw and Cherokee Indians, a Louisiana pirate and a Scottish rebel who battled side by side with William Wallace. With ancestors like that, it’s easy to understand why Texas author and former air force captain DELORES FOSSEN feels as if she was genetically predisposed to writing romances. Along the way to fulfilling her DNA destiny, Delores married an air force top gun who just happens to be of Viking descent. With all those romantic bases covered, she doesn’t have to look too far for inspiration.

Chapter One

Comanche Creek, Texas

Something was wrong.

Sheriff Reed Hardin eased his Smith and Wesson from his leather shoulder holster and stepped out of his mud-scabbed pickup truck. The heels of his rawhide boots sank in the rain-softened dirt. He lifted his head. Listened.

It was what he didn’t hear that bothered him.

Yeah, something was definitely wrong.

There should have been squawks from the blue jays or the cardinals. Maybe even a hawk in search of its breakfast. Instead there was only the unnerving quiet of the Texas Hill Country woods sardined with thick mesquites, hackberries and thorny underbrush that bulged thick and green with spring growth. Whatever had scared off the birds could be lurking in there. Reed was hoping for a coyote or some other four-legged predator because the alternative put a knot in his gut.

After all, just hours earlier a woman had been murdered a few yards from here.

With his gun ready and aimed, Reed made his way up the steep back path toward the cabin. He’d chosen the route so he could look around for any evidence he might have missed when he’d combed the grounds not long after the body had been discovered. He needed to see if anything was out of place, anything that would help him make sense of this murder. So far, nothing.

Except for his certainty that something was wrong.

And he soon spotted proof of it.

There were footprints leading down and then back up the narrow trail. Too many of them. There should have been only his and his deputy’s, Kirby Spears, since Reed had given firm orders that all others use the county road just a stone’s throw from the front of the cabin. He hadn’t wanted this scene contaminated and there were signs posted ordering No Trespassers.

He stooped down and had a better look at the prints. “What the hell?” Reed grumbled.

The prints were small and narrow and with a distinctive narrow cut at the back that had knifed right into the gray-clay-and-limestone dirt mix.

Who the heck would be out here in high heels?

He thought of the dead woman, Marcie James, who’d been found shot to death in the cabin about fourteen hours earlier. Marcie hadn’t been wearing heels. Neither had her alleged killer. And Reed should know because the alleged killer was none other than his own deputy, Shane Tolbert.

Cursing the fact that Shane was now locked up in a jail he used to police with Reed and Kirby, Reed elbowed aside a pungent dew-coated cedar branch and hurried up the hill. It didn’t take him long to see more evidence of his something-was-wrong theory. There were no signs of his deputy or the patrol car.

However, there was a blonde lurking behind a sprawling oak tree.

Correction. An armed blonde. A stranger, at that.

She was tall, at least five-ten, and dressed in a long-sleeved white shirt that she’d tucked into the waist of belted dark jeans. Her hair was gathered into a sleek ponytail, not a strand out of place. And yep, there were feminine heels on her fashionable black boots. But her attire wasn’t what Reed focused on. It was that lethal-looking Sig-Sauer Blackwater pistol gripped in her latex-gloved right hand. She had it aimed at the cabin.

Reed aimed his Smith and Wesson at her.

Maybe she heard him or sensed he was there because her gaze whipped in his direction. She shifted her position a fraction, no doubt preparing to turn her weapon on him, but she stopped when her attention landed on the badge Reed had clipped to his belt. Then, she did something that surprised the heck out of him.

She put her left index finger to her mouth in a shhh gesture.

Reed glanced around, trying to make sense of why she was there and why in Sam Hill she’d just shushed him as if she’d had a right to do it. He didn’t see anyone other than the blonde, but she kept her weapon trained on the cabin.

He walked closer to her, keeping his steps light, just in case there was indeed some threat other than this woman. If so, then someone had breached a crime scene because the cabin was literally roped off with yellow crime-scene tape. And with the town’s gossip mill in full swing, there probably wasn’t anyone within fifty miles of Comanche Creek who hadn’t heard about the latest murder.

Emphasis on the word latest.

Everyone knew to keep away or they’d have to deal with him. He wasn’t a badass—most days, anyway—but people usually did as he said when he spelled things out for them. And he always spelled things out.

“I’m Sheriff Reed Hardin,” he grumbled when he got closer.

“Livvy Hutton.”

Like her face, her name wasn’t familiar to him. Who the devil was she?

She tipped her head towards the cabin. “I think someone’s inside.”

Well, there sure as hell shouldn’t be. “Where’s my deputy?”

“Running an errand for me.”

That didn’t improve Reed’s mood. He was about to question why his deputy would be running an errand for an armed woman in fancy boots, but she shifted her position again. Even though she kept her attention nailed to the cabin, he could now see the front of her white shirt.

The sun’s rays danced off the distinctive star badge pinned to it.

“You’re a Texas Ranger?” he asked.

He hadn’t intended for that to sound like a challenge, but it did. Reed couldn’t help it. He already had one Ranger to deal with, Lieutenant Wyatt Colter, who’d been in Comanche Creek for days, since the start of all this mess that’d turned his town upside-down. Now, he apparently had another one of Texas’s finest. That was two too many for a crime scene he planned to finish processing himself. He had a plan for this investigation, and that plan didn’t include Rangers.

“Yes. Sergeant Olivia Hutton,” she clarified. “CSI for the Ranger task force.”

She spared him a glance from ice-blue eyes. Not a friendly glance either. That brief look conveyed a lot of displeasure.

And skepticism.

Reed had seen that look before. He was a smalltown Texas sheriff, and to some people that automatically made him small-minded, stupid and incapable of handling a capital murder investigation. That attitude was one of the reasons for the so-called task force that included not only Texas Rangers but a forensic anthropologist and apparently this blonde crime-scene analyst.

As he’d done with Lieutenant Colter, the other Ranger, Reed would set a few ground rules with Sergeant Hutton. Later, that was. For now, he needed to figure out if anyone was inside the cabin. That was at the top of his mental list.

Reed didn’t see anyone near either of the two back curtainless windows. Nor had the crime-scene tape been tampered with. It was still in place. Of course, someone could have ducked beneath it and gotten inside—after they’d figured out a way to get past the locked windows and doors. Other than the owner and probably some members of the owner’s family, Reed and his deputy were the only ones with keys.

“Did you actually see anyone in the cabin?” he asked in a whisper.

She turned her head, probably so she could whisper as well, but the move put them even closer. Practically mouth to cheek. Not good. Because with all that closeness, he caught her scent. Her perfume was high-end, but that was definitely chocolate on her breath.

“I heard something,” she explained. “Your deputy and I were taking castings of some footprints we found over there.” She tipped her head to a cluster of trees on the east side of the cabin. “I wanted to get them done right away because it’s supposed to rain again this afternoon.”

Yeah, it was, and if they’d been lucky enough to find footprints after the morning and late-night drizzle, then they wouldn’t be there long.

“After Deputy Spears left to send the castings to your office,” she continued, “I turned to go back inside. That’s when I thought I heard someone moving around in there.”

Reed took in every word of her account. Every word. But he also heard the accent. Definitely not a Texas drawl. He was thinking East Coast and would find out more about that later. For now, he might have an intruder on his hands. An intruder who was possibly inside with a cabin full of potential evidence that could clear Shane’s name. Or maybe it was the cabin’s owner, Jonah Becker, though Reed had warned the rancher to stay far away from the place.

With his gun still aimed, Reed stepped out a few inches from the cover of the tree. “This is Sheriff Hardin,” he called out. “If anyone’s in there, get the hell out here now.”

Beside him, Livvy huffed. “You think that’s wise, to stand out in the open like that?”

He took the time to toss her a scowl. “Maybe it’d be a dumb idea in Boston, but here in Comanche Creek, if there’s an intruder, it’s likely to be someone who knows to do as I say.”

He hoped.

“Not Boston,” she snarled. “New York.”

He gave her a flat look to let her know that didn’t make things better. A Texas Ranger should damn well be born and raised in Texas. And she shouldn’t wear high-heeled boots.

Or perfume that reminded him she was a woman.

Reed knew that was petty, but with four murders on his hands, he wasn’t exactly in a generous mood. He extended that non-generous mood to anyone who might be inside that cabin.

“Get out here!” he shouted. And by God, it better happen now.

Nothing. Well, nothing except Livvy’s spurting breath and angry mumbles.

“Just because the person doesn’t answer you, it doesn’t mean the place is empty,” she pointed out.

Yeah. And that meant he might have a huge problem. He didn’t want the crime scene compromised, and he didn’t want to shoot anyone. Yet.

“How long were Deputy Spears and you out there casting footprints?” he asked.

“A half hour. And before that we were looking around in the woods.”

That explained how her footprints had gotten on the trail. The castings and the woods search also would have given someone plenty of time to get inside. “I’m guessing Deputy Spears unlocked the cabin for you?”

The sergeant shook her head. “It wasn’t necessary. Someone had broken the lock on a side window, apparently crawled in and then opened the front door from the inside.”

Reed cursed. “And you didn’t see that person when you went in?”

Another head shake that sent her ponytail swishing. “The place was empty when I first arrived. I checked every inch,” she added, cutting off his next question: Was she sure about that?

So, he had possibly two intruders. Great. Dealing with intruders wasn’t on his to-do list today.

Now, he cursed himself. He should have camped out here, but he hadn’t exactly had the manpower to do that with just him and two deputies, including the one behind bars. He’d had to process Shane’s arrest and interrogate him. He had been careful. He’d done everything by the book so no one could accuse him of tampering with anything that would ultimately clear Shane’s name. Kirby Spears had guarded the place until around midnight, but then Reed and he had had to respond to an armed robbery at the convenience store near the interstate.

Lately, life in Comanche Creek had been far from peaceful and friendly—even though that was what it said on the welcome sign at the edge of the city limits. Before the spring, it’d been nearly a decade since there’d been a murder. Now, there’d been four.

Four!

And because some of those bodies had been dumped on Native American burial ground, the whole town felt as if it were sitting on a powder keg. With the previous murder investigations and the latest one, Reed was operating on a one-hour nap, too much coffee and a shorter fuse than usual.

He glanced around. “How’d you get up here?” he asked the sergeant. “Because I didn’t see a vehicle.”

“I parked at the bottom of the hill just off the county road. I wanted to get a good look at the exterior of the crime scene before I went inside.” She glanced around as well. “How’d you get up here?” she asked him.

“I parked on the back side of the hill.” And for the same reason. Of course, that didn’t mean they were going to see eye-to-eye on anything else. Reed was betting this would get ugly fast.

“Reed?” someone called out, the sound coming from the cabin.

Reed cursed some more because he recognized that voice. He lowered his gun, huffed and strolled toward the front door. It swung open just as Reed stepped onto the porch, and he came face-to-face with his boss, Mayor Woody Sadler. His friend. His mentor. As close to a father as Reed had ever had since his own dad had died when Reed was seven years old.

But Woody shouldn’t have been within a mile of the place.

Surrogate fatherhood would earn Woody a little more respect than Reed would give others, but even Woody wasn’t going to escape a good chewing-out. And maybe even more.

“What are you doing here?” Livvy demanded, taking the words right out of Reed’s mouth. Unlike Reed, she didn’t lower her gun. She pointed the Blackwater right at Woody.

Woody eased off his white Stetson, and the rattler tail attached to the band gave a familiar hollow jangle. He nodded a friendly greeting.

He didn’t get anything friendly in return.

“This is Woody Sadler. The mayor of Comanche Creek,” Reed said, making introductions. “And this is Sergeant Livvy Hutton. A Texas Ranger from New York.”

Woody’s tired gray eyes widened. Then narrowed, making the corners of his eyes wrinkle even more than they already were. Obviously he wasn’t able to hold back a petty reaction either. “New York?”

“Spare me the jokes. I was born in a small town near Dallas. Raised in upstate New York.” As if she’d declared war on it, Livvy shoved her gun back into her shoulder holster and barreled up the steps. “And regardless of where I’m from, this is my crime scene, and you were trespassing,” she declared to Woody and then fired a glance at Reed to declare it to him as well.

“I didn’t touch anything,” Woody insisted.

Livvy obviously didn’t take his word for it. She bolted past Woody, grabbed her equipment bag from the porch and went inside.

“I swear,” Woody added to Reed. “I didn’t touch a thing.”

Reed studied Woody’s body language. The stiff shoulders. The sweat popping out above his top lip. Both surefire signs that the man was uncomfortable about something. “You’re certain about that?”

“I’m damn certain.” The body language changed. No more nerves, just a defensive stare that made Reed feel like a kid again. Still, that didn’t stop Reed from doing his job.

“Then why didn’t you answer when I called out?” Reed asked. “And why’d you break the lock on the window and go in there?”

“I didn’t hear you calling out, that’s why, and I didn’t break any lock. The door was wide open when I got here about fifteen minutes ago.” There was another shift in body language. Woody shook his head and wearily ran his hand through his thinning salt-and-pepper hair. “I just had to see for myself. I figured there’d be something obvious. Something that’d prove that Shane didn’t do this.”

Reed blew out a long breath. “I know. I want to prove Shane’s innocence, too, but this isn’t the way to go about doing it. If there’s proof and the New York Ranger finds it, she could say you planted it there.”

Woody went still. Then, he cursed. “I wouldn’t do that.”

“I believe you. But Sergeant Olivia Hutton doesn’t know you from Adam.”

Woody’s gaze met his. “She’s gunning for Shane?”

Probably. For Shane and anyone who thought he was innocent. But Reed kept that to himself. “Best to let me handle this,” he insisted. “I’ll talk to you when I’m back in town. Oh, and see about hiring me a temporary deputy or two.”

Woody bobbed his head, slid back on his Stetson and ambled off the porch and down the hill, where he’d likely parked. Reed waited until he was sure the mayor was on his way before he took another deep breath and went inside.

He only made it two steps.

Livvy threw open the door. “Where’s the mayor?” she demanded.

“Gone.” Reed hitched his thumb toward the downside of the hill. “Why?”

Her hands went on her hips, and those ice-blue eyes turned fiery hot. “Because he stole some evidence, that’s why, and I intend to arrest him.”

Chapter Two

Livvy was in full stride across the yard when the sheriff caught up with her, latched on to her arm, whirled her around and brought her to an abrupt halt.

“I’m arresting him,” she repeated and tried to throw off his grip.

She would probably have had better luck wrestling a longhorn to the ground. Despite Sheriff Reed Hardin’s lanky build, the man was strong. And angry. That anger was stamped on his tanned face and in his crisp green eyes.

“I don’t care if Woody Sadler is your friend.” She tried again to get away from the sheriff’s clamped hand. “He can’t waltz in here and steal evidence that might be pertinent to a murder investigation.”

“Just hold on.” He pulled out his cell phone from his well-worn Wranglers, scrolled through some numbers and hit the call button. “Woody,” he said when the mayor apparently answered, “you need to get back up here to the cabin right now. We might have a problem.”

“Might?” Livvy snarled when Sheriff Hardin ended the call. “Oh, we definitely have a problem. Tampering with a crime scene is a third-degree felony.”

The sheriff dismissed that with a headshake. “Woody’s the mayor, along with being a law-abiding citizen. He didn’t tamper with anything. You said yourself that someone had broken the lock, and Woody didn’t do that.”

“Well, he obviously isn’t so law-abiding because he walked past crime-scene tape and entered without permission or reason.”

“He had reason,” Reed mumbled. “He’s worried about Shane. And sometimes worried people do dumb things.” He looked down at the chokehold he had on her arm, mumbled something indistinguishable, and his grip melted away. “What exactly is missing?”

“A cell phone.” Livvy tried to go after the trespassing mayor again, but Reed stepped in front of her. Worse, her forward momentum sent her slamming right against his chest. Specifically, her breasts against his chest. The man was certainly solid. There were lots of corded muscles in his chest and abs.

Both of them cursed this time.

And Livvy shook her head. She shouldn’t be noticing anything that intimate about a man whom she would likely end up at odds with. She shouldn’t be noticing his looks, either. Those eyes. The desperado stubble on his strong square jaw and the tousled coffee-brown hair that made him look as if he’d just crawled out of bed.

Or off a poster for a Texas cowboy-sheriff.

It was crystal-clear that he didn’t want her anywhere near the crime scene or his town. Tough. Livvy had been given a job to do, and she never walked away from the job.

Sherriff Hardin would soon learn that about her.

By God, she hadn’t fought her way into the Ranger organization to be stonewalled by some local yokels who believed one of their own could do no wrong.

“What cell phone?” Reed asked.

Because the adrenaline and anger had caused her breath and mind to race, it took her a moment to answer. First, she glanced at the road and saw the mayor inching his way back up toward them. “One I found in the fireplace when I was going through the front room. You no doubt missed it in the initial search because the ashes were covering it completely. The only reason I found it is because I ran a metal detector over the place to search for any spent shell casings. Then, I photographed it, bagged it and put it on the table. It’s missing.”

His jaw muscles stirred. “It’s Marcie’s phone?”

“I don’t know. I showed it to Deputy Spears, and he said he didn’t think it was Shane’s. That means it could be Marcie’s.”

“Or the killer’s.”

She was certain her jaw muscles stirred, too. “Need I remind you that you found Deputy Shane Tolbert standing over Marcie’s body, and he had a gun in his hand? Marcie was his estranged lover. I hate to state the obvious, but all the initial evidence indicates that Shane is the killer.”

Livvy instantly regretted spouting that verdict. It wasn’t her job to get a conviction or jump to conclusions. She was there to gather evidence and find the truth, and she didn’t want anything, including her anger, to get in the way.

“Shane said he didn’t kill her,” Reed explained. His voice was calm enough, but not his eyes. Everything else about him was unruffled except for those intense green eyes. They were warrior eyes. “He said Marcie called him and asked him to meet her at the cabin. The moment he stepped inside, someone hit him over the head, and he fell on the floor. When he came to, Marcie was dead and someone had put a gun in his hand.”

Yes, she’d already heard the summary of Shane’s statement from Deputy Kirby Spears. Livvy intended to study the interrogation carefully, especially since Reed had been the one to question the suspect.

Talk about a conflict of interest.

Still, in a small town like Comanche Creek, Reed probably hadn’t had an alternative, especially since the on-scene Ranger, Lieutenant Colter, had been called back to the office. If Reed hadn’t questioned Shane, then it would have been left to his junior deputy, Kirby, who was greener than the Hill Country’s spring foliage.

The mayor finally made his way toward them and stopped a few feet away. “What’s wrong?”

“Where’s the cell phone that I’d bagged and tagged?” Livvy asked, not waiting for Reed to respond.

Woody Sadler first looked at Reed. Then, her. “I have no idea. I didn’t take it.”

“Then you won’t mind proving that to me. Show me your pockets.”

Woody hesitated, until Reed gave him a nod. It wasn’t exactly a cooperative nod, either, and the accompanying grumble had a get-this-over-with tone to it.

The mayor pulled out a wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and a handkerchief and keys from the front ones. No cell phone, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t taken it. The man had had at least ten minutes to discard it along the way up or down the hill to his vehicle.

“Taking the cell won’t help your friend’s cause,” she pointed out. “I already phoned in the number, and it’ll be traced.”

Woody lifted his shoulder. “Good. Because maybe what you learn about that phone will get Shane out of jail. He didn’t kill Marcie.”

Reed stared at her. “Can the mayor go now, or do you intend to strip-search him?”

Livvy ignored that swipe and glanced down at Woody’s snakeskin boots. “You wear about a size eleven.” She turned her attention to Reed. “And so do you. That looks to be about the size of the footprints that I took casts of over in the brush.”

“So?” Woody challenged.

“So, the location of those prints means that someone could have waited there for Marcie to arrive. They could be the footprints of the killer. Or the killer’s accomplice if he had one. Sheriff Hardin would have had reason to be out here, but what about you? Before this morning, were you here at the cabin in the past forty-eight hours?”

“No.” The mayor’s answer was quick and confident.

Livvy didn’t intend to take his word for it.

“You can go now,” Reed told the mayor.

Woody slid his hat back on, tossed her a glare and delivered his parting shot from over his shoulder as he walked away. “You might do to remember that Reed is the law in Comanche Creek.”

Livvy could have reminded him that she was there on orders from the governor, but instead she took out her binoculars from her field bag and watched Woody’s exit. If he stopped to pick up a discarded cell phone, she would arrest him on the spot.

“He didn’t take that phone,” Reed insisted.

“Then who did?”

“The real killer. He could have done it while Kirby and you were casting the footprints.”

“The real killer,” she repeated. “And exactly who would that be?”

“Someone that Marcie got involved with in the past two years when she was missing and presumed dead.”

Livvy couldn’t discount that. After all, Marcie had faked her own death so she wouldn’t have to testify against a powerful local rancher who’d been accused of bribing officials in order to purchase land that the Comanche community considered their own. The rancher, Jonah Becker, who also owned this cabin, could have silenced Marcie when she returned from the grave.

Or maybe the killer was someone who’d been furious that Marcie hadn’t gone through with her testimony two years ago. There were several people who could have wanted the woman dead, but Shane was the one who’d been found standing over her body.

“See? He didn’t take the cell phone,” Reed grumbled when the mayor didn’t stop along the path to retrieve anything he might have discarded. The mayor got into a shiny fire-engine-red gas-guzzler of a truck and sped away, the massive tires kicking up a spray of mud and gravel.

“He could be planning to come back for it later,” Livvy commented. But probably not. He would have known that she would search the area.

“Instead of focusing on Woody Sadler,” Reed continued, “how about taking a look at the evidence inside the cabin? Because naming Shane as the primary suspect just doesn’t add up.”

Ah, she’d wondered how long it would take to get to this subject. “How do you figure that?”

“For one thing, I swabbed Shane’s hands, and there was no gunshot residue. Plus, this case might be bigger than just Shane and Marcie. You might not have heard, but a few days ago there were some other bodies that turned up at the Comanche burial grounds.”

“I heard,” she said. “I also heard their eyes were sealed with red paint and ochre clay. In other words, a Native American ritual. There’s nothing Native American or ritualistic about this murder.”

Still, that didn’t mean the deaths weren’t connected. It just meant she didn’t see an immediate link. The only thing that was glaring right now was Deputy Shane Tolbert’s involvement in this and his sheriff’s need to defend him.

Livvy started the walk down the hill to look for that missing phone. Thankfully, it was silver and should stand out among the foliage. And then she remembered the note in her pocket with the cell number on it. She took out her own phone and punched in the numbers to call the cell so it would ring.

She heard nothing.

Just in case it was buried beneath debris or something, she continued down the hill, listening for it.

Reed followed her, of course.

Livvy would have preferred to do this search alone because the sheriff was turning out to be more than a nuisance. He was a distraction. Livvy blamed that on his too-good looks and her stupid fantasies about cowboys. She’d obviously watched too many Westerns growing up, and she reminded herself that in almost all cases the fantasy was much hotter than the reality.

She glanced at Reed again and mentally added maybe not in this case.

In those great-fitting jeans and equally great-fitting blue shirt, he certainly looked as if he could compete with a fantasy or two.

When she felt her cheeks flush, Livvy quickly got her mind on something else—the job. It was obvious that the missing cell wasn’t ringing so she ended the call and put her own cell back in her pocket. Instead of listening for the phone, she’d just have to hope that the mayor had turned it off but still tossed it in a place where she could spot it.

“The mayor’s not guilty,” Reed tried again. “And neither is Shane.”

She made a sound of disagreement. “Maybe there was no GSR on his hands because Shane wore gloves when he shot her,” she pointed out. Though Livvy was certain Reed had already considered that.

“There were no gloves found at the scene.”

She had an answer for that as well. “He could have discarded them and then hit himself over the head to make it look as if he’d been set up.”

“Then he would have had to change his clothes, too, because there was no GSR on his shirt, jeans, belt, watch, badge, holster or boots.”

“You tested all those items for gunshot residue?”

“Yeah, I did,” he snapped. “This might be a small town, Sergeant Hutton, but we’re not idiots. Shane and I have both taken workshops on crime-scene processing, and we keep GSR test kits in the office.”

It sounded as if Sheriff Hardin had been thorough, but she would reserve judgment on whether he’d learned enough in those workshops.

“But Shane was holding the murder weapon, right?” Livvy clarified.

“Appears to have been, but it wasn’t his gun. He says he has no idea who it belongs to. The bullet taken from Marcie’s body is on the way to the lab for comparison, and we’re still searching the databases to try to figure out the owner of the gun.”

Good. She’d call soon and press for those results and the plaster castings of the footprints. Because the sooner she finished this crime scene, the sooner she could get out of here and head back to Austin. She didn’t mind small towns, had even grown up in one, but this small town—and its sheriff—could soon get to her.

Livvy continued to visually comb the right side of the path, and when they got to the bottom, they started back up while she examined the opposite side. There was no sign of a silver phone.

Mercy.

She didn’t want to explain to her boss how she’d let possible crucial evidence disappear from a crime scene that she was working. She had to find that phone or else pray the cell records could be accessed.

“What about the blood spatter in the cabin?” Reed asked, grabbing her attention again.

“I’m not finished processing the scene yet.” In fact, she’d barely started though she had already spent nearly an hour inside. She had hours more, maybe days, of work ahead of her. Those footprint castings had taken priority because they could have been erased with just a light rain. “But in my cursory check, I didn’t see any spatter, only the blood pool on the floor. Since Marcie was shot at point-blank range, that doesn’t surprise me. Why? Did you find blood spatter?”

“No. But if Shane’s account is true about someone clubbing him over the back of the head, then there might be some. He already had a head injury, and it had been aggravated with what looked like a second blow. But the wood’s dark-colored, and I didn’t want to spray the place with Luminol since I read it can sometimes alter small droplets. Judging from the wound on Shane’s head, we’d be looking for a very small amount because the gash was only about an inch across.”

She glanced at him and hoped she didn’t look too surprised. Most non-CSI-trained authorities would have hosed down the place with Luminol, the chemical to detect the presence of biological fluids, and would have indeed compromised the pattern by causing the blood to run. That in turn, could compromise critical evidence.

“What?” he asked.

Livvy walked ahead of him, up the steps and onto the porch and went inside the cabin. “Nothing.”

“Something,” Reed corrected, following her. He shut the door and turned on the overhead lights. “You’d dismissed me as just a small-town sheriff.”

“No.” She shrugged. “Okay, maybe. Sorry.”

“Don’t be. I dismissed you, too.”

Since her back was to him, she smiled. For a moment. “Still do?”

“Not because of your skill. You seem to know what you’re doing. But I’m concerned you won’t do everything possible to clear Shane’s name.”

“And I’m concerned you’ll do anything to clear it.”

He made a sound of agreement that rumbled deep in his throat. “I can live with a stalemate if I know you’ll be objective.”

The man certainly did know how to make her feel guilty. And defensive. “The evidence is objective, and my interpretation of it will be, too. Don’t worry. I’ll check for that blood spatter in just a minute.”

Riled now about the nerve he’d hit, she grabbed a folder from her equipment bag. “First though, I’d like to know if it wasn’t Woody Sadler, then who might have compromised the crime scene and stolen the phone.” She slapped the folder on the dining table and opened it. Inside were short bios of persons of any possible interest in this case.

Reed’s bio was there on top, and Livvy had already studied it.

He was thirty-two, had never been married and had been the sheriff of Comanche Creek for eight years. Before that, he’d been a deputy. His father, also sheriff, had been killed in the line of duty when Reed was seven. Reed’s mother had fallen apart after her husband’s murder and had spent the rest of her short life in and out of mental institutions before committing suicide. And the man who’d raised Reed after that was none other than the mayor, Woody Sadler.

She could be objective about the evidence, but she seriously doubted that Reed could ever be impartial about the man who’d raised him.

Livvy moved Reed’s bio aside. The mayor’s. And Shane’s. “Who would be bold or stupid enough to walk into this cabin and take a phone with me and your deputy only yards away?”

Reed thumbed through the pages, extracted one and handed it to her. “Jonah Becker. He’s the rancher Marcie was supposed to testify against. He probably wouldn’t have done this himself, but he could have hired someone if he thought that phone would link him in any way to Marcie.”

Yes. Jonah Becker was a possibility. Reed added the bio for Jonah’s son. And Jerry Collier, the man who ran the Comanche Creek Land Office. Then Billy Whitley, a city official. The final bio that Reed included was for Shane’s father, Ben Tolbert. He was another strong possibility since he might want to protect his son.

“I’ll question all of them,” Reed promised.

“And I’ll be there when you do,” Livvy added. She heard the irritation in his under-the-breath grumble, but she ignored him, took the handheld UV lamp from her bag and put on a pair of monochromatic glasses.

“Shane said he was here when he was hit.” Reed pointed to the area in front of the fireplace. It was only about three feet from where Marcie’s body had been discovered.

Livvy walked closer, her heels echoing on the hardwood floor. The sound caused Reed to eye her boots, and again she saw some questions about her choice of footwear.

“They’re more comfortable than they look,” she mumbled.

“They’d have to be,” he mumbled back.

Though comfort wasn’t exactly the reason she was wearing them. She’d just returned from a trip to visit her father, and one of her suitcases—the one that contained her favorite work boots—had been lost. There’d been no time to replace them because she had been home less than an hour when she’d gotten the call to get to Comanche Creek ASAP.

“I do own real boots,” Livvy commented and wondered why she felt the need to defend herself.

With Reed’s attention nailed to her, she lifted the lamp and immediately spotted the spatter on the dark wood. Without the light, it wasn’t even detectable. There wasn’t much, less than a dozen tiny drops, but it was consistent with a high-velocity impact.

“Shane’s about my height,” Reed continued. And he stood in the position that would have been the most likely spot to have produced that pattern.

It lined up.

Well, the droplets did anyway. She still had some doubts about Shane’s story.

Livvy took her camera, slipped on a monochromatic lens and photographed the spatter. “Your deputy could have hit himself in the head. Not hard enough for him to lose consciousness. Just enough to give us the castoff pattern we see here. Then, he could have hidden whatever he used to club himself.”

Reed stared at her. “Or he could be telling the truth. If he is, that means we have a killer walking around scot-free.”

Yes, and Livvy wasn’t immune to the impact of that. It scratched away at old wounds, and even though she’d only been a Ranger for eighteen months, that was more than enough time for her to have learned that her baggage and old wounds couldn’t be part of her job. She couldn’t go back twenty years and right an old wrong.

Though she kept trying.

Livvy met Reed’s gaze. It wasn’t hard to do since he was still staring holes in her. “You really believe your deputy is incapable of killing his ex-lover?”

She expected an immediate answer. A damn right or some other manly affirmation. But Reed paused. Or rather he hesitated. His hands went to his hips, and he tipped his eyes to the ceiling.

“What?” Livvy insisted.

Reed shook his head, and for a moment she didn’t think he would answer. “Shane and Marcie had a stormy relationship. I won’t deny that. And since you’ll find this out anyway, I had to suspend him once for excessive force when he was making an arrest during a domestic dispute. Still … I can’t believe he’d commit a premeditated murder and set himself up.”

Yes, that was a big question mark in her mind. If Shane had enough forensic training to set up someone, then why hadn’t he chosen anyone but himself? That meant she was either dealing with an innocent man or someone who was very clever, and therefore very dangerous.

Because she was in such deep thought, Livvy jumped when a sound shot through the room. But it wasn’t a threat. It was Reed’s cell phone.

“Kirby,” he said when he answered it.

That got her attention. Kirby Spears was the young deputy who’d assisted her on the scene and had carried the footprint castings back to the sheriff’s office so a Ranger courier could pick them up and take them to the crime lab in Austin.

While she took a sample of one of the spatter droplets, Livvy listened to the conversation. Or rather that was what she tried to do. Hard to figure out what was going on with Reed’s monosyllablic responses. However, his jaw muscles stirred again, and she thought she detected some frustration in those already intense eyes.

She bagged the blood-spatter sample, labeled it and put it in her equipment bag.

“Anything wrong?” Livvy asked the moment Reed ended the call.

“Maybe. While he was in town and running the investigating, Lieutenant Wyatt Colter made notes about the shoe sizes of the folks who live around here. He left the info at the station.”

That didn’t surprise Livvy. Lieutnenant Colter was a thorough man. “And?”

“Kirby compared the size of the castings, and it looks as if three people could be a match. Of course, the prints could also have also been made by someone Marcie met during her two years on the run. The person might not even be from Comanche Creek.”

Livvy couldn’t help it. She huffed. “Other than you, who are two possible matches?”

“Jerry Collier, the head of the land office. He was also Marcie’s former boss.”

She had his bio, and it was one of the ones that Reed had picked from the file as a person who might be prone to breaking into the cabin. Later, she’d look into his possible motive for stealing a phone. “And the other potential match?”

Reed’s jaw muscles did more than stir. They went iron-hard. “The mayor, Woody Sadler.”

“Of course.”

She groaned because she shouldn’t have allowed Reed to stop her from arresting him. Or at least thoroughly searching him. Mayor Woody Sadler could have hidden that phone somewhere on his body and literally walked away with crucial evidence. Lost evidence that would get her butt in very hot water with her boss.

“I’ll talk to him,” Reed said.

“No. I’ll talk to him.” And this time she didn’t intend to treat him like a mayor but a murder suspect.

In Reed’s eyes, she saw the argument they were about to have. Livvy was ready to launch into the inevitable disagreement when she heard another sound. Not a cell phone this time.

Something crashed hard and loud against the cabin door.

Chapter Three

Reed drew his Smith and Wesson. Beside him, Livvy tossed the UV lamp and her glasses onto the sofa so she could do the same. Reed had already had his fill of unexpected guests today, and this sure as hell better not be somebody else trying to “help” Shane.

“Anyone out there?” Reed called out.

Nothing.

Since it was possible their visitor was Marcie’s killer who’d returned to the scene of the crime, Reed approached the door with caution, and he kept away from the windows so he wouldn’t be ambushed. He tried to put himself between Livvy and the door. It was an automatic response, one he would have done for anyone. However, she apparently didn’t appreciate it because she maneuvered herself to his side again.

Reed reached for the doorknob, but stopped.

“Smoke?” he said under his breath. A moment later, he confirmed that was exactly what it was. If there was a fire out there, he didn’t want to open the door and have the flames burst at them.

There was another crashing sound. This time it came from the rear of the cabin. Livvy turned and aimed her gun in that direction. Reed kept his attention on the front of the place.

Hell.

What was happening? Was someone trying to break in?

Or worse. Was someone trying to kill them?

In case it was the or worse, Reed knew he couldn’t wait any longer. He peered out from the side of the window.

And saw something he didn’t want to see.

“Fire!” he relayed to Livvy.

She raced to the back door of the cabin. “There’s a fire here, too.”

A dozen scenarios went through his mind, none of them good. He grabbed his phone and pressed the emergency number for the fire department.

“See anyone out there?” Reed asked, just as soon as he requested assistance.

“No. Do you?”

“No one,” Reed confirmed. “Just smoke.” And lots of it. In fact, there was already so much black billowy smoke that Reed couldn’t be sure there was indeed a fire to go along with it. Still, he couldn’t risk staying put. “We have to get out of here now.”

Livvy took that as gospel because she hurried to the table, grabbed the files and the other evidence she’d gathered and shoved all of it and her other supplies into her equipment bag. She hoisted the bag over her shoulder, freeing her hand so she could use her gun. Unfortunately, it was necessary because Reed might need her as backup.

“Watch the doors,” he insisted.

Not that anyone was likely to come through them with the smoke and possible fires, but he couldn’t take that chance. They were literally under siege right now and anything was possible. The smoke was already pouring through the windows and doors, and it wouldn’t be long before the cabin was completely engulfed.

The cabin wasn’t big by anyone’s standards. There was a basic living, eating and cooking area in the main room. One bedroom and one tiny bath were on the other side of the cabin. There was no window in the bathroom so he went to the lone one in the bedroom. He looked out, trying to stay out of any potential kill zone for a gunman, and he saw there was no sign of fire here. Thank God. Plus, it was only a few yards from a cluster of trees Livvy and he could use for cover.

“We can get out this way,” Reed shouted. The smoke was thicker now. Too thick. And it cut his breath. It must have done the same for Livvy because he heard her cough.

He unlocked the window, shoved it up and pushed out the screen. The fresh air helped him catch his breath, but he knew the outside of the cabin could be just as dangerous as the inside.

“Anyone out there?” Livvy asked.

“I don’t see anyone, but be ready just in case.”

The person who’d thrown the accelerant or whatever might have used it as a ruse to draw them out. It was entirely possible that someone would try to kill them the moment they climbed out. Still, there was no choice here. Even though he’d already called the fire department, it would take them twenty minutes or more to respond to this remote area.

If they stayed put, Livvy and he could be dead by then.

“I’ll go first,” he instructed. He took her equipment bag and hooked it over his shoulder. That would free her up to run faster. “Cover me while I get to those trees.”

She nodded. Coughed. She was pale, Reed noticed, but she wasn’t panicking. Good. Because they both needed a clear head for this.

Reed didn’t waste any more time. With his gun as aimed and ready as it could be, he hoisted himself over the sill and climbed out. He started running the second his feet touched the ground.

“Now,” he told Livvy. He dropped the equipment bag and took cover behind the trees. Aimed. And tried to spot a potential gunman who might be on the verge of ambushing them.

Livvy snaked her body through the window and raced toward him. Despite the short distance, she was breathing hard by the time she reached him. She turned, putting her back to his. Good move, because this way they could cover most of the potential angles for an attack.

But Reed still didn’t see anyone.

He blamed that on the smoke. It was a thick cloud around the cabin now. There were fires, both on the front porch and the back, and scattered around the fires were chunks of what appeared to be broken glass. The flames weren’t high yet, but it wouldn’t take them long to eat their way through the all-wood structure. And any potential evidence inside would be destroyed right along with it. If this arsonist was out to help Shane, then he was sadly mistaken.

Of course, the other possibility was that the real killer had done this.

It would be the perfect way to erase any traces of himself. Well, almost any traces. There was some potential evidence in Livvy’s equipment bag. Maybe the person responsible wouldn’t try to come after it.

But he rethought that.

A showdown would bring this fire-setting bozo out into the open, and Reed would be able to deal with him.

“Will the fire department make it in time to save the cabin?” Livvy asked between short bursts of air.

“No.” And as proof of that, the flames shots up, engulfing the front door and swooshing their way to the cedar-shake roof. The place would soon be nothing but cinders and ash.

Reed was about to tell her that they’d have to stay put and watch the place burn since there was no outside hose to even attempt to put a dent in the flames. But he felt Livvy tense. It wasn’t hard to feel because her back was right against his.

“What’s wrong?” Reed whispered.

“I think I see someone.”

Reed shifted and followed her gaze. She was looking in the direction of the county road, which was just down the hill from the cabin. Specifically, she was focused on the path that Woody had taken earlier. He didn’t see anyone on the path or road, so he tried to pick through the woods and the underbrush to see what had alerted Livvy.

Still nothing.

“Look by my SUV,” she instructed.

The vehicle was white and barely visible from his angle so Reed repositioned himself and looked down the slope. At first, nothing.

Then, something.

There was a flash of movement at the rear of her vehicle, but with just a glimpse he couldn’t tell if it was animal or human.

“There’s evidence in the SUV,” she said. Her breathing was more level now, but that statement was loaded with fear and tension. “I’d photographed the cabin and exterior with a highly sensitive digital camera. Both it and the photo memory card are inside in a climate controlled case, along with some possible hair and fibers that I gathered from the sofa with a tape swatch.”

Oh, hell. All those items could be critical to this investigation.

“The SUV’s locked,” she added.

For all the good that’d do. After all, the person out there had been gutsy enough to throw Molotov cocktails at the cabin with both Reed and a Texas Ranger inside, and he could have broken the lock on the SUV or bashed in a window.

Livvy grabbed her equipment bag from the ground and repositioned her gun. Reed knew what she had in mind, and he couldn’t stop her from going to her vehicle to check on the evidence. But what he could do was assist.

“Stay close to the treeline,” he instructed.

He stepped to her side so that she would be semi-sheltered from the open path. Another automatic response. But this time, Livvy didn’t object. However, what she did do was move a lot faster than he’d anticipated.

Reed kept up with her while he tried to keep an eye on their surroundings and her SUV. None of the doors or windows appeared to be open, but he wouldn’t be surprised if it’d been burglarized. Obviously, someone didn’t want them to process that evidence.

He saw more movement near the SUV. A shadow, maybe. Or maybe someone lurking just on the other side near the rear bumper. Behind them, the fire continued to crackle and burn, and there was a crash when the roof of the cabin gave way and plummeted to the ground. Sparks and ashes scattered everywhere, some of them making their way to Livvy and him.

Livvy didn’t stop. She didn’t look back. But when Reed saw more movement, he latched on to her arm and pulled her behind an oak. This was definitely a situation where it would do no good to try to sneak up on the perp because the perp obviously was better positioned. Despite the cover of the trees, Livvy and he were in a vulnerable situation.

“This is Sheriff Hardin,” he called out. “Get your hands in the air so I can see them.”

He hadn’t expected the person to blindly obey. And he didn’t. Reed caught a glimpse of someone wearing a dark blue baseball cap.

Reed shifted his gun. Took aim—just as there was a crashing sound, followed by a flash of light. Someone had broken the SUV window and thrown another Molotov cocktail into the vehicle.

“He set the SUV on fire,” Livvy said, bolting out from cover.

Reed pulled her right back. “He might have a gun.” Except there was no might in this. The guy was probably armed and dangerous, and he couldn’t have Livvy running right into an ambush.

“But the evidence …” she protested.

Yeah. That was a huge loss. Like Livvy, his instincts were to race down there and try to save what he could, but to do that might be suicide.

“He could want you dead,” Reed warned.

That stopped Livvy from struggling. “Because of the evidence I gathered from the cabin?”

Reed nodded and waited for the rest of that to sink in. It didn’t take long.

“Shane couldn’t have done this,” she concluded.

“No.” Reed kept watch on the vehicle and the area in case the attacker doubled back toward them or tried to escape.

“But someone who wanted to exonerate him could have,” Livvy added.

Reed nodded again. “That means the fire starter must have thought you saw or found something in the cabin that would be crucial evidence.”

That also meant Livvy was in danger.

Reed cursed. This was turning into a tangled mess, and he already had too much to do without adding protecting Livvy to the list.

In the distance Reed heard the siren from the fire department. Soon, they’d be there. He glanced at the cabin. Then at Livvy’s SUV. There wouldn’t be much to save, but if he could catch the person responsible he might get enough answers to make up for the evidence they’d lost.

More movement. Reed spotted the baseball cap again. The guy was crouched down, and the cap created a shadow that hid his face. He couldn’t even tell if it was a man or a woman. But whoever it was, the person was getting away.

“Stay put,” Reed told Livvy.

Now it was her turn to catch onto his arm. “Remember that part about him having a gun.”

Reed remembered, but he had to try to find out who was behind this.

“Back me up,” he told her. That was to get her to stay put, but the other reason was he didn’t want this cap-wearing guy to sneak up on him. Reed wouldn’t be able to hear footsteps or much else with the roar of the fire and the approaching siren.

Keeping low as well, Reed stepped out from the meager cover of the oak. He kept his gun ready and aimed, and he started to run.

So did the other guy.

Using the smoke as cover, the culprit darted through the woods on the other side of the SUV and raced through the maze of trees. If Reed didn’t catch up with him soon, it’d be too late. He ran down the hill, cursing the uneven clay-mix dirt that was slick in spots. Somehow, he made it to the bottom without falling and breaking his neck.

Reed didn’t waste any time trying to save the SUV. The inside was already engulfed in flames. Instead, he sprinted past it, but Reed only made it a few steps before there was another sound.

Behind him, the SUV exploded.

He dodged the fiery debris falling all around him and sprinted after the person who’d just come close to killing them.

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