“Where did you go when you left?” Cole asked.

  “Straight home.”

  “And you were there the whole time until we came by?”

  Percy nodded. “That’s right.”

  “If you need proof,” Russell put in, reasserting himself, “there’s a camera by the warehouse that houses the park’s vehicles. You’ll see the exact time my client left the park, as well as the time he arrived. As far as what he was doing before he got the texts from his sister, he was out with several friends at a party that lasted until the early hours of the morning. We are more than happy to give you the names of more than a dozen people who saw him there.”

  Russell works quickly, Cole thought. Mr. Bond must have called him the second we left the house.

  “That would be very helpful,” she said, growing thoughtful.

  Russell leaned back and spread his hands. “Well, my client has been cooperative—far more than I advised, in fact.” He shot Percy a chiding look. “So unless you have any further questions…?”

  Cole shook her head. “We won’t keep either of you any longer. Thank you for your time, Percy.” She handed him a business card. “Don’t hesitate to reach out if you think of anything else.”

  Percy nodded, his earlier anger having given way to numbed silence, and allowed Russell to guide him to the door. Cole watched them leave the room.

  “Well,” Callaway said, yawning and stretching, “that went well, all things considered. If he’d listened to Russell, we wouldn’t have got a word out of him.”

  He seemed to notice Cole’s thoughtfulness. He raised an eyebrow.

  “What is it?” he asked. “Something we missed?”

  “Victoria was in danger,” Cole said, frowning, “but she didn’t want anyone to know—not her parents, not the police. Doesn’t that seem odd to you?”

  Callaway frowned, too, crossing his arms, and rubbing his chin. “I suppose it does now that you mention it. Why? What are you thinking?”

  “I can’t help wondering if she was doing something illegal. Maybe that’s why she didn’t want anyone else involved.”

  “But what illegal activity would take her way out into La Majestad? Maybe it’s just me, but Victoria Bond don’t seem like the type to get involved with drugs. She was too scared to climb a wall at the gym, for goodness’ sake.”

  Cole sensed he had a point. It did seem unlikely that Victoria would have willingly involved herself in anything so dangerous.

  Before Cole could speculate further, however, her phone began to ring. It was Newbury.

  “What’s the word?” Newbury asked without preamble.

  “Well,” Cole said with a tired sigh, “apparently the second victim, Victoria Bond, called her brother and told him to come to the Twins. Wouldn’t tell him what it was about, though, and didn’t want anyone else involved.”

  Newbury murmured softly. “Seems a bit unusual. Think the brother had a hand in her death?”

  “It doesn’t seem very likely. He was clearly shaken up, and besides that, there’s no motive. He was cagey, sure, but I think he just didn’t know what else to do.”

  “Well,” Newbury said, “I’d say you made the right choice cutting him loose.”

  “Why’s that?” Cole asked, surprised.

  “Because we’ve got a third body on our hands, and this one’s fresh.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Cole took a deep breath, trying to calm herself as she stared down at the woman lying spread-eagle in the dust, her blonde hair lying against her neck like a serpent. The sun was high overhead, and its light bathed the body, respecting no shadows, no secrets. It seemed far worse than viewing a body at night, somehow, as if the daylight made the death seem…mundane.

  “Broad daylight,” she murmured, glancing at Callaway. “It’s one thing to act under the cover of darkness, but this?”

  “He’s confident,” Callaway agreed, adjusting his Stetson. “Confident and determined.”

  “Knows the park pretty well, too,” Andy Hart added. “Knew where to find a cliff far enough off the beaten path that he wouldn’t be disturbed. Couldn’t exactly go back to the Twins at this point.”

  Cole nodded, thinking both men had made valid points. Her eyes scanned the cliff face, which towered more than fifty feet above her, a sheer wall of sandstone on which no plant grew and no animal moved. The cliff curved off to Cole’s left, then gradually sank as it met a hiking trail. Nobody on that trail would have been able to see what was happening at the cliff, but they might have heard the woman’s screams.

  But if she had screamed, why had nobody come?

  Cole looked at Andy, who was staring down at the body with an expression of physical pain, as if merely being close to the woman caused him to experience some small measure of her suffering.

  “Who found the body?” she asked.

  “Couple of boys on a class trip,” he said. “One of them dared the other to climb a cliff, so they crept off from the rest of the group to try their luck here. They thought she was taking a nap.”

  Cole shook her head, saddened at what the boys had discovered. She just hoped they had been shepherded away before seeing much.

  “Do we have an identity?” Cole asked.

  “Leta Escudero,” Andy said. “The Escuderos are well-known around here—big players in the tech industry. Lots of money.”

  Cole frowned, wondering whether Leta had any climbing experience. “Did you find a wallet, purse, anything like that?”

  Andy shook his head. “No, but I haven’t searched her pockets.”

  Cole did so, enlisting Callaway’s help to shift the body. The woman’s pockets were empty, however.

  Cole sat back, disappointed.

  “You said our killer knows the area well,” Callaway said to the ranger. “Can you think of anyone in particular who might fit the bill? Any regulars?”

  “Besides rangers like me?” Andy asked, giving Callaway a long look. “No, not really. And trust me, I already considered the idea that it could be someone in my department. But my guys have no criminal records, no history of violence. Our vehicles have trackers, and we’re talking every hour. If one of us disappeared or went silent for a few hours, the others would notice.”

  Callaway seemed pacified by this answer, as was Cole. She couldn’t help but appreciate Andy’s foresight.

  Returning her attention to the victim, Cole crouched beside Leta. The first thing she noticed were Leta’s hands, the skin of which was rough and abraded, though not nearly as badly as the skin of the first two victims. The fingernails, painted a vibrant pink, were chipped and cracked, one of them clotted with blood.

  Peering at Leta’s face, Cole noticed a long cut on the woman’s left cheek. There were bits of stone in the wound, though it was clear from where Leta was lying that she had not landed on that part of her face.

  “What are you thinking?” Callaway asked.

  Cole peered up at the cliff face. “I don’t think she got to the top,” she said. “This injury on her face—it looks like she got it from slipping down the cliff. The hands, too, aren’t as badly abraded as I’d expect, given how the other victims’ hands looked. I’m guessing her fingers lost their grip and she fell when she was only part way up.”

  Lifting her gaze, Cole studied the area around the body. There was no arroyo here, no mud to make plain if any vehicle had come to the site, but even the soft, silty earth seemed undisturbed except for a few sets of tracks coming and going from the nearby trail.

  “We should photograph these,” she said to Callaway, gesturing at the prints. “I know they’re faint, but it’s possible the crime lab will come up with something.” Even as she said the words, however, she was not particularly hopeful. The lab might indeed be able to isolate the killer’s prints, assuming he had stood along the bottom of the cliff, but that could take days or weeks, depending on the workload of the technicians, and there was no telling how many more attacks might happen in the meantime.

  She thought back to what Callaway had said about the killer’s confidence and determination. It seemed to her that the only way he was going to slow down his attacks was if he got bored or if they stopped him, and she couldn’t count on the former happening.

  The day was hot and still, the air heavy, and the faint odor of creosote reached Cole’s nostrils, a pungent smell that she would forever associate with summer rains. The thought of summer rains put her in mind of storms that boiled across the plains as she pressed her face close to the window of her childhood home, Kelly tucked beside her, both of them startling with delight at every boom of thunder.

  Where was Kelly now? Alive somewhere, a slave in some place Cole had never heard of? Or had she ended up like the woman beside Cole, and all Cole was doing was chasing a body from which Kelly’s spirit had departed long ago?

  Thinking of her sister in the presence of the dead hit Cole like a gut punch, and she rose, avoiding the concerned gazes of the other two men.

  “Everything alright?” Callaway asked.

  “I just need a moment,” she said, moving away along the cliff face. She was aware that her breathing was coming faster now, and she tried to slow it, not wishing to pass out in the heat. Much as she tried to calm herself, however, she felt out of control, spiraling downward as memories of Kelly raced through her mind.

  As the cliff curved and she was hidden from the view of the two men, she reached out one hand and leaned against the wall, her head lowered. Her shoulders shook with grief rising from a well that seemed to have no bottom. It could not be emptied, no matter how much she drew from it.

  Trapped in these feelings, she was startled by the touch of a hand on her shoulder. But she knew who it was, even without looking. Only one of those two men would have come after her.

  “Just breathe,” Callaway said in a gentle voice. “Just breathe.”

  She did so, closing her eyes and taking several measured, calming breaths.

  “Will it always hurt this much?” she whispered.

  “You’re thinking of your sister, aren’t you?”

  She nodded, not trusting her voice, and Callaway let out a heavy sigh, as if his inability to share the weight of her grief was a burden in itself.

  “Yes, I suppose it will,” he said. “There’s no getting past it, no way to fit it neatly into a box and hide it in the closet. Grief has a mind of its own sometimes, and it ain’t our decision when it shows up.”

  His hand began to knead gently at the base of her neck.

  “Most of my life,” he continued, “I never had much patience for feelings. If I could solve a problem, good, and if I couldn’t, what was the point in feeling bad about it?” He paused thoughtfully. “It took becoming a husband and a father for me to understand you can’t just shove things aside and expect they won’t affect you. And something as powerful as losing your sister…that becomes a part of you.”

  He paused again.

  “I guess what I’m saying is,” he continued, “you ain’t got nothing to be ashamed of or afraid of. You loved your sister, and that’s where the pain springs from—love. So if loving means crying, then go on crying. Go on crying till the crying’s done. I’ll be here.”

  She turned to him, the tears already starting in her eyes. Reaching up, she touched the side of his face. Her fingers quested upward, slipping beneath his Stetson and edging along his forehead, feeling every inch of his face as if to memorize it by touch. Her heart ached with grief no words could express, but she found a balm for that grief in the reflection of his eyes, which regarded her with a tenderness that seemed to cut through every wall she’d put up to protect her insecurities. She was laid bare, defenseless, and even in the brokenness of her loss he saw her for who she was.

  He saw, and he did not look away.

  “Harley,” he said softly, his lips barely moving. They were leaning toward one another, bending like trees to the sunlight, and Cole felt the thrumming of her heartbeat in her head like a locomotive. She wanted to cling to Callaway, to lose herself in whatever passion might arise from the touching of their bodies…

  And suddenly the guilt of what she was about to do hit her, and she pulled away, sniffing hard and turning.

  “Harley,” Callaway said again, sounding plaintive this time. She did not answer. Instead she hurried along the cliff wall, pawing her phone from her pocket and calling Bryce. She needed to be close to him, needed him to be the one to see her in her grief and speak the words she needed to hear.

  The phone continued to ring, but nobody answered. As she listened to Bryce’s voicemail, the tears she had not shed with Callaway spilled from her eyes, and her chest hitched with a sob. She leaned back against the cliff and stared upward.

  Why did it have to be so very difficult? Why was all of life so complicated?

  She had wanted more than anything to wrap her arms around Callaway and let him comfort her, whatever that comfort might look like or whatever it might become, but the thought of her boyfriend had driven that desire away like wind to a morning mist. Being unable to turn to Bryce for comfort, however, made her feel lonelier than ever, and she took several shaky breaths, trying to pull herself together.

  You’ve carried this grief for almost two decades now, she reminded herself. Don’t buckle under the weight now.

  She was still trying to pull herself together when her phone rang, startling her. She answered it without hesitation.

  “Bryce?”

  There was a pause.

  “It’s me, Sis,” her brother, Greg, said. “You and Bryce are still going strong, huh?”

  Cole’s heart sank. She wanted so badly to talk with her boyfriend, but for whatever reason, he seemed unreachable. Clearing her throat, she tried to inject a lightness into her tone, despite the heaviness of the grief she was feeling.

  “Still can’t get rid of him,” she said. “Like a burr on my backside, as Dad likes to say.”

  Greg chuckled. “He’s got a lot of those.”

  “Which? Burrs on his backside, or sayings?”

  “Sayings. I can’t testify to the condition of his backside, fortunately for me.”

  Cole smiled nostalgically, thinking of the easy, companionable relationship she and her brother had enjoyed as kids.

  “Anyway,” Greg said, “I was just calling to ask how things are going with the investigation.”

  “Investigation?” The question surprised Cole. He knew she couldn’t share with him the details of her work.

  “Kelly’s disappearance. I know Dad gave you his notes. And knowing you, I’m pretty sure you haven’t just been twiddling your thumbs.”

  Cole thought of the laptop she had taken from the Cali Clowns, the laptop that had led her to the name of Rufus Kain, who had apparently been one of Kelly’s kidnappers. She wanted to be open and honest and tell him everything, but what might he do with that information? If he learned about Rufus Kain, Greg might try to go after the man on his own and get himself killed. Cole couldn’t allow that.

  “Still there, Sis?” Greg asked.

  “Still here,” Cole said. “Honestly, I haven’t made much progress. Reading Dad’s notes is like trying to decipher an alien language.” It troubled her, how easily the lie came out. If Greg sensed the deception, his voice did not show it.

  He chuckled softly. “Oh, I hear you on that one. You should try reading his grocery lists.”

  They both fell silent. Ordinarily Cole would have made an excuse to leave, but the silence was somehow…companionable. For the first time in a while, she missed her brother.

  “I never thought it would be like this,” she said.

  “Like what?”

  “Us. You and me. We used to be such good friends, and now…”

  Greg grunted. “Now I’m chopped liver, is that it?”

  Cole sighed, unsure how to express what she meant. “I guess I just always imagined we’d be best friends when we grew up. We’d have our own families, and our kids would play together in the pool while we talked about how old we felt. It just seemed so perfect back then, didn’t it? Before Kelly’s disappearance, I mean.”

  Greg hesitated. “In some ways,” he answered cautiously.

  “In some ways? What do you mean?”

  “There was a lot going on that you weren’t aware of. A lot that Dad and I shielded you from, especially about Mom’s failing health. Even before the heart attack, she was in a downward spiral—not eating right, hardly ever getting out of the house. She struggled with depression a lot.”

  “I didn’t realize that,” Cole said softly, surprised by this news. “She always looked so happy to me.”

  “I guess it goes to show that things aren’t always what they seem, huh?”

  At the sound of Greg’s words, Cole froze.

  “Harley?” he said. “Still there?”

  “Still here,” she said in a soft, distant voice. “I just thought of something.”

  “Something about your case?” There was a note of flat resignation in Greg’s voice, as if he had come to accept that at any point, Cole’s mind might abscond back to work, leaving him with the dangling thread of their conversation.

  “Maybe. I hope so. Listen, I really should go.”

  There was a moment’s hesitation before Greg said, “Alright.”

  “You’re not upset?”

  “Don’t worry about it, Sis. Do what you gotta do.”

  She sighed, relieved at her brother’s understanding. “Thanks, Greg.”

  “One more thing. Do me a favor?”

  She waited for him to explain what he meant.

  “You learn anything more about Kelly, you let me know,” he said with a touch of vehemence. Cole didn’t think the emotion was directed at her. Rather, it was directed at the injustice of the grief he had endured for so long.

  It was her turn to hesitate. She didn’t want to lie to him again, so she opted for a truth she could stick with.

  “If I find out what happened to her,” she said, “you’ll be the first to know.”

  “Thanks, Sis. Be careful, okay?”

 

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