A Merciful Fate

SIXTEEN

Sandy tipped her head back and looked up into the pines as the strides of her horse gently rocked her in the saddle.

The sight of the green branches against the blue sky and the small chill of the early-morning air instilled a peace she couldn’t find anywhere else.

There was something about nature and being on horseback. No vehicle noise, no electronics, no entertaining her guests.

Once a week she rode in the early morning with Bree. Not for training, just for pleasure. It was a break Sandy desperately needed to disconnect from her business. Running a bed-and-breakfast was 24-7 work, so she’d trained a reliable neighbor to supervise the buffet after Sandy prepared all the food.

Now she smelled pine, scrub brush, horse, and leather instead of scones. She inhaled deeper, letting the natural scents ease the residual stress that hid in her spine.

A mental health break.

Even the worry from vandalism and thoughts of her ex felt far away. Right now it was just her, Bree, and their horses. No one else existed.

A relaxed smile on her face, she twisted in the saddle to see Bree.

Bree wasn’t experiencing the same level of relaxation. Her forehead was wrinkled in thought, and her jaw was clenched in a way that meant she was thinking hard. Very unlike Bree on their rides. She’d been quiet that morning as they groomed and saddled the horses, but Sandy hadn’t worried about it. Her friend wasn’t a morning person. It always took a couple of cups of coffee from their thermoses before Bree was ready to socialize.

There was something very extravagant about pouring a cup of coffee on horseback as the animals ambled down the trail. It was slightly awkward, but the leather cup holders Sandy had attached to the saddle horns helped.

Sandy pulled gently on her reins until her mare, Abby, stopped and waited for Bree to come up beside her. Abby turned her head to sniff and blow at Bree’s gelding, Cyrus.

“What’s going on?” Sandy asked. “You look like you have a big math test in an hour. Did something else happen at your place?” She gave Bree her sternest look. They’d agreed to share updates on the vandalism at both of their homes.

Bree snorted. “I’m so glad I’ll never have a math test again. It’s one subject I’ll never be able to teach, and I couldn’t even help Lucas when he was in high school. And no, nothing new has cropped up.”

It’d been quiet at Sandy’s since Truman and Samuel had installed cameras. She’d wondered if the vandals had watched the cameras go up or spotted them the next time they came to cause trouble. She didn’t care as long as it’d stopped.

“Then why are you so preoccupied?”

Her friend looked away. “I had an odd encounter yesterday.”

“What kind of encounter?” Abby sidestepped as Sandy’s calves tightened on her sides.

“It was a woman. She was a reporter, and I didn’t think it had anything to do with the damage.”

“Where did you run into a reporter?”

“At the hardware store. She approached me and asked if I was Bree Ingram.”

“You admitted it?” Sandy fought back a shiver as she put herself in Bree’s shoes. She’d had frequent nightmares about being approached and asked if her name was Jada Kerns. Granted, Bree wasn’t living under a new identity, but it still made Sandy nervous.

Bree shrugged. “I didn’t see why not. She was young and appeared friendly.”

Sandy briefly closed her eyes. “And? Who did she work for?”

“That’s the weird part. She worked for a tabloid called the Midnight Voice.”

“She had purple in her hair,” Sandy stated.

Bree turned to her, eyes wide. “You know her?”

“She came to the bed-and-breakfast late last night. She had questions about the spray paint and broken car windows.”

“So she hunted down both of us,” Bree stated. “She asked about my vandalism too. I didn’t tell her about yours,” she added quickly. “Something about her felt off.”

“How did she know to come ask me?” wondered Sandy. “She must have heard from someone else that I’d been targeted.”

“I asked her how she heard about my vandalism. She just smiled and said she’d heard about my troubles around town.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Yes. It gave me the creeps. I know stories travel like the wind through town, but usually outsiders like a reporter don’t hear them.”

“Why would a national tabloid be interested in vandalism?”

Bree was silent for a long moment. “I don’t know. When I asked the same question, she said she was just investigating and asked if I still read the Voice.”

Sandy struggled to find words. “Damn, Bree . . . Still read that paper? Like she knows you? What the hell does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered.

“You must have misheard her. She probably only asked if you read the paper, not still read the paper.”

“When I was a teenager, I read the Voice every week,” Bree admitted. “Cover to cover. I loved the sensational stories. It threw me off that she was from that paper. It was like an echo from my past . . .”

No wonder Bree’s been distracted.

“Why would she ask if I still read it?” Bree mused out loud, her voice shaking. “Is that something they ask everybody? Or was it meant just for me? But how would she know?”

Sandy studied Bree’s face. She looked . . . guilty. What isn’t she telling me?

“We’ve been best friends for years,” Sandy said slowly, not wanting to make her friend clam up. “Does this have anything to do with your suspicions about the vandalism? You mentioned you had a suspicion the other day.”

Bree wiped her eyes. “I still don’t know.” Tears ran down her cheeks, alarming Sandy. She’d never seen her best friend cry.

“You need to talk to the police,” Sandy stated.

“No. It’s stupid . . . Just old fears cropping up. I can’t talk about it.”

“It’s not stupid if it’s making you cry. Jeez, Bree. Why don’t you talk to Truman? You’ll feel better telling someone.” It broke her heart that her friend didn’t trust her enough to share. You never know what’s going on inside another person.

“I can’t. Not yet.”

Anger touched Sandy’s nerves. “This is ridiculous.”

Bree squeezed her calves and moved Cyrus ahead of Sandy. “I’m fine. I don’t want to talk about this right now.”

“I’m fine.” The biggest lie ever uttered by every woman.

Sandy knew. She had used it plenty of times in the past.

“Let’s get moving,” Bree said in a lighter voice. “I want to get to Horse’s Head Rock before it gets warmer. That’s all I need . . . I need to see that vista. It fixes everything. You need to promise to bury me up there. I like knowing that I’ll always have that view.” She glanced back at Sandy. “Promise me.”

Every time we go to the rock she makes that ridiculous request.

Sandy gave a short nod, refusing to be distracted by Bree’s sudden change of topic. She clucked her tongue, urging Abby after Bree and Cyrus.

She needs to tell me what’s going on.

Confusion raced in Sandy’s brain. A tabloid reporter had tracked Bree through town to ask about her vandalism. Why? And why had the reporter asked the same questions of Sandy?

“Bree.” She raised her voice. “I understand you can’t tell me what you’re afraid of, but can you tell me what you fear will happen if you tell?” She moved Abby to walk beside Cyrus.

Bree turned her head, and Sandy saw her deep need to say something, anything. She’d felt it herself when she hid her secret about her ex. Embarrassment and humiliation were why she’d hidden her story. What was Bree’s fear?

“I’m afraid of ruining my life. My life and my son’s.”

Sandy caught her breath. She’s completely serious. “That sounds like a good reason,” she said faintly, processing Bree’s words. Sandy understood. She’d kept her own secrets out of fear for her life. “Two good reasons.”

“It is.” Bree faced forward, her jaw stubbornly tight. “You see my problem now.”

“Can I help?”

Bree was silent for a long moment. “No.”

That morning Truman was face-to-face with the purple-haired reporter again.

But this time blood had mixed with the purple and dried on her face.

“My dear Jesus in heaven,” Ben Cooley muttered beside him. “Who would murder such a young girl?”

Tabitha Huff had been shot in the head. Her Ford rental car had been found on a quiet road with her body in the passenger seat.

“She wasn’t shot in the car,” Ben continued in a respectful tone. “They put her in it after. There’s no spray or spatter. Just some blood smears on her seat and door from loading her in.”

Truman had arrived at the same conclusion. He shone his flashlight on the steering wheel and gearshift lever. No bloody prints. Someone had cleaned up.

I just spoke with her.

His threat to Tabitha echoed in his head. Stay away from my family.

Clearly she’d gotten too close to someone. Someone who hadn’t controlled their temper with Tabitha as well as Truman had.

He allowed the guilt and sorrow to swamp him for a moment. Guilt for getting angry with her and sorrow for the end of her young life. Both logical emotions.

Taking deep breaths, he firmly put away his sentiments to focus on the nuts and bolts of her murder. He’d used Ben’s car to block the road in one direction and asked Royce to block traffic in the other until more help could arrive. Lucas had already requested a crime scene team from Deschutes County and let the FBI know that a reporter digging into the Gamble-Helmet Heist had been murdered.

Is the case hotter than the FBI realizes?

What did she find out?

The FBI wouldn’t be pleased if a tabloid reporter had discovered something the federal agency had missed.

Truman stepped away from the car, the scent of blood and worse still in his nose. The crime scene team arrived in a white van at the same time Mercy pulled up. His heartbeat stuttered happily at the sight of her even though she was responding to a murder. He’d been asleep in her bed when she finally arrived home near midnight after Eddie’s shooting. She’d collapsed in his arms and shed a few tears as he held her and stroked her hair until she fell asleep. This morning she’d barely stirred as he kissed her goodbye three hours ago.

It’s odd seeing her work without Eddie. He silently sent good wishes to the recovering agent.

“Go brief the team from Deschutes County,” he ordered Ben. Even though the car had been found within the Eagle’s Nest city limits, Truman wasn’t going to attempt to process the scene. A murder investigation like this couldn’t afford any errors on his part.

I’ll stick with my simple vandalism cases.

Mercy approached him, concern in her eyes as she looked him up and down. She gave him a brief hug. “You look like crap,” she told Truman.

“Dead twenty-two-year-olds do that to me. Excuse me a minute.” He walked to his vehicle and popped open the back, then dug around until he found wet wipes. He cleaned out his nostrils. The baby-fresh scent wasn’t his favorite, but it beat the odors of death clinging to the inside of his nose.

Mercy moved closer to Tabitha’s car. Her face was grim, and Truman wondered if she was reliving her conversation with the reporter, as he had. At least Mercy hadn’t threatened her . . . he assumed.

Ollie.

Truman wondered what else the teen had discussed with Tabitha. Could it have been related to what got her killed?

Is there danger to Ollie? Or Mercy?

Both were approached by the reporter.

Dread settled in his lungs, and he counted to ten. He watched as Mercy bent over to look through the car window, the bulge of a weapon at her side. Her lips moved as she pointed and spoke with a deputy. She was a good investigator and capable of taking care of herself.

Doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to care.

He joined her at the car. “I poked around a bit for her phone and didn’t find it.”

Mercy grimaced. “Not surprising. We’ll get her cellular records from her provider and see who she talked to recently. I’ve already put a call in to her boss at the Voice. I’d like to hear his version of what she was doing up here.” Her gaze went past Truman. “Uh-oh.”

He turned. Fifty yards away, two local news vans had stopped, blocked by Royce’s patrol unit. The young cop was already approaching the drivers. “Ben!” Truman waved over the older cop. “Go make sure they don’t con their way past Royce.” Ben immediately jogged toward the vans. Royce was the most gullible man Truman had met. He put in a good day’s work and had a huge heart, but an experienced reporter would dip him in batter, deep-fry him, and then eat him for dinner.

Truman had turned away reporters yesterday. Sure enough, they’d been following up on the Voice story. Truman had directed them to the FBI, stating the Eagle’s Nest PD was not involved in the investigation of the remains found on Christian Lake’s property.

Now they were back. Two men shouldered cameras and pointed them in the direction of the car. One of the crime scene techs spotted the cameras and pulled a collapsible screen out of her unit and set it up between the car and cameras. Good.

Ignoring the press, Mercy spoke into her phone, circling the car and studying the inside. She gestured at a tech and pointed into the back seat as she continued her phone call. The tech understood and took several photos. Curiosity got the better of Truman.

“Find anything?” he asked Mercy as she hung up her phone.

“Did you notice the notebook on the floor of the back seat?”

“No.” Truman took a look. The notebook was mostly hidden under the front seat.

She picked up the book with gloved hands and flipped through it. “It’s packed full of scribblings. Looks like notes for her articles.”

“Sounds helpful. Maybe it will show what she’s been up to for the last two days.”

I hope.

“I called in the request for her cell records. We should have them by tonight.”

Truman looked at the little car. “This is a rental, so I bet she used the GPS system to get around. That will give you some of her destinations, and then ask the rental company if the car has a tracking device. Hopefully her phone will turn up. Possibly she uses apps that track where she’s been.”

“Crossing my fingers you’re smarter than whoever dumped her here. I doubt they considered the GPS might tell us where she met him,” said Mercy, handing the notebook to the tech for evidence collection. “You mentioned you talked to her?”

“Caught her watching Kaylie and me yesterday morning . . . Well, I assume that’s what she was doing. She claimed to be getting coffee.”

Mercy wrote something in her notebook. “What time?”

“About ten a.m.”

“Did Kaylie notice?” Her voice hitched on her niece’s name.

“No. She’d already headed back to work when I spotted Tabitha parked on the street.”

“You had words?” She lifted a brow.

“A few.”

Mercy waited, her pencil poised over her notebook.

“I told her I knew what she had written the night before about you. Told her to stay away from my family and the kids. She had some snarky comeback about Ollie being eighteen. Then I might have told her not to mess with Ollie and Kaylie.”

“Did you say it as politely as that?” Mercy asked, a knowing tone in her question.

“No.”

“Are you saying you threatened her, Truman?”

“Hell no. I was . . . firm.”

Mercy nodded.

I didn’t say anything wrong to her.

But seeing the dead young woman made him feel as if he had.