“Still sure?” he asked, always a man of few words.
Melissa nodded. “Should start about dark. We only have a couple of hours to find her, Joe.”
“Then let’s move.”
She swung herself into the saddle, reflecting with pleasure that Joe never disbelieved her. And he never made her feel like a freak. His grandmother had had the Sight, and Joe considered himself fortunate to have married a woman who also had it.
They split up not far from the house, with Joe heading off to the east and Melissa going west. With bad weather coming, they couldn’t spare any of the hands to help in the search; the men were already working hard to get the other stock into safer areas. Unfortunately, the particular cow that was about to calve had a habit of hiding herself away for the duration, and she was both very valuable and a favorite of Melissa’s.
It took Melissa half an hour to work her way out to the place where the cow had hidden last time. It was a lowlying area, thick with brush, and the worst kind of place for a cow and calf to be during a snowstorm. It was also an extremely difficult area for a horse to pick its way through.
At first, that was why Melissa thought her horse was edgy. Because this was a bad place to be stuck with a storm coming, and animals often seemed to know when trouble loomed in their simple lives. So when her gelding shied nervously when the increasing wind rustled bushes nearby, she didn’t worry too much about it. Especially since she heard a cow bleat mournfully at about the same moment.
It took her ten more minutes to home in on the cow, and when she reached her she was relieved that no calf was present yet. She reached for her rope and dismounted, and in a soothing voice said, “You idiot cow, what’s the matter with you? You should be close to the house, not way out here with a calf and snow coming—”
Belatedly, she realized two things. That the gelding was backing away nervously, trailing the reins that should have made him stand still as per his rigid and reliable training, and that the cow was tied.
“What the hell?” Melissa took a hesitant step toward the cow, staring at the thick rope that bound her to a tree. She very obviously was not about to calve, and the scuffed ground all around her testified to her restless attempts to move away from the tree.
Bait. Bait for you.
She didn’t know where that inner voice came from, but Melissa instantly dropped her rope and turned back toward her horse, one hand reaching for her rifle and the other for the walkie-talkie hanging from the saddle horn.
She never touched either one.
Her horse came back to his stable just minutes before the storm hit, wild-eyed and lathered. The missing cow also returned.
But Melissa Scanlan didn’t.
When Tucker woke abruptly, his internal clock told him it was still well before dawn, probably three or fourA.M. He had been asleep since just after midnight and had no idea what had awakened him. He listened intently for several minutes, one hand under his pillow grasping the .45 just in case, but heard nothing to alarm him.
He finally relaxed a bit—though not completely. He had the idea he’d never be able to relax completely again. What he had discovered so far about the seeming conspiracy to kill and kidnap psychics had shaken him far more than he had allowed Sarah to see. At least, he hoped she hadn’t seen. Or sensed. She needed him to be sure of himself, he thought. Her belief in fate was so strong that he had to be equally strong in insisting they could avert the future she had seen for herself.
Even if he wasn’t sure.
How in hell were they supposed to fight an enemy that was organized on a national scale? An enemy with resources they couldn’t begin to match, with more manpower and undoubtedly some kind of uber-efficient communications network. An enemy ruthless enough to murder a cop—and smart enough to get away with it. How could that enemy be fought? How?
The fire he’d built the night before was no more than glowing embers in the rock fireplace, and he lay there on the couch watching them dim and brighten. Once awake, his mind refused to shut itself off again.
He wondered whether Sarah was sleeping. After seeing all those news clippings, she hadn’t had much to say. And she had kept a careful distance between them. Physically, emotionally, and mentally.