“Anyone out there yet?” I asked.
“Deputy in Rangely is on his way now. See if he spots the vehicle, a black Ford 350. I’m going to try to get a helicopter out there this afternoon.”
Colm ran his fingers through his straight black hair flecked with gray. He paused just a second over the nape of his neck. “She probably huddled up somewhere for the night. Once it starts getting light she’ll find her way back.”
“Did she have any food or water with her?”
“Her friends thought so, but they weren’t sure.”
Colm was now looking at me dead on. I knew he was concerned. He wouldn’t have shown up at my house at five in the morning if he hadn’t been. He was following protocol. Wait till first light. Sheriffs mounted anywhere from fifty-five to a hundred full-fledged searches in Colorado each year, and most of them were successful and short-lived. Only a handful of times would the search turn into the kind of harrowing saga every sheriff feared. Yet with each missing person, the potential presented itself.
“We’re going to have to get a ground team on location,” Colm said. “If Dean finds the vehicle and no hunter, be a good idea for you and Kona to team up with him before the place starts getting mixed up with too much scent.”
“What’s her name?” I asked.
“Amy Raye Latour. Thirty-two. Husband and two kids back home.”
It had been cold during the night. So cold that I’d gotten up a little after two to add more logs to the stove. “East Douglas is a big area. May take Dean hours before he finds the vehicle.”
“Where you planning to be today?”
“Piceance Creek. Wanted to check out a few camps that are clearing out.”
Colm’s head lulled into an easy nod. His eyes stared off through the porch screen. He had a big heart. He would worry about this woman until he found her, and yet it wasn’t just the weight of the missing hunter that was pulling him down. Colm’s divorce had been final for six months. I knew he still didn’t sleep much. I could hear it in that deep throaty voice of his, see it in the folds over his eyes and the way his broad shoulders hung forward.
“You holding up okay?” I asked.
He shot me a quick glance. “Yeah.” Then his gaze roamed off again. “I know I look like shit, but it’s actually better having her gone. I just have to get used to it all.”
I waited for him to say something else. When he didn’t, I reached for his mug. “Want a warm-up?”
“No, I should get going.”
I started to stand. Colm was still sitting in the chair.
“She never loved me. It’s hard to admit, but it’s true. Figure that. Fourteen years and she never loved me.”
Though we’d talked about some of the details of his divorce, his emotions weren’t something we’d touched upon. Still, his vulnerability didn’t surprise me. It’s one of those things a woman picks up on. “Colm, you don’t really believe that.”
“Sure.”
“Why’d she marry you, then?”
“She liked my dog.” Colm laughed and shook his head. “Goddamn woman marries me for my dog.”
Colm wasn’t trying to be funny. He’d had a Labrador named Ruger, black and overweight with a sloppy mouth.
“That’s not why she married you,” I said. “People change.”
“Maybe.” Colm was now leaning forward with his arms on his knees. His jacket, a dark brown leather, was stretched snug across his shoulders.
Colm had lost his dog a year back to cancer, and now he’d lost his wife. He didn’t have any kids. Maggie had never wanted any. Perhaps she knew all along she would leave, even if she’d waited fourteen years to do it.
I dug my toes deeper beneath Kona’s fur. “Ever thought about getting another dog?” I said.
“Thought about it.”
“Maybe that wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
Colm reached over and gave Kona a pat. “You’re a good boy. You keep Pru company, you hear?” Then Colm stood to take his mug to the kitchen.
“Leave it.” I climbed out of the lounge.
It was somewhere in the twenties, and with the windchill factor, more like the teens, especially in the mountains.
“It’s cold out there,” I said.
Colm knew what I was saying. “I’ll call you.”
He lifted the screen door about a half inch off the planked flooring, pulled it toward him, stepped down, and shut the door behind him.
I carried the two empty coffee cups into the kitchen and set them in the sink. I would take a shower, eat a quick breakfast, get Joseph up for school. Colm might be calling soon. If Amy Raye Latour was still missing, I’d want to start searching while the hunter’s tracks were fresh.
I walked down the short hallway to the bathroom, turned on the water, and held my fingers underneath the tap while I waited for the water to become warm. Kona lay on the floor beside the tub. Together we had established a routine that I’d come to depend on. I knew Colm would have to do the same, create new patterns of behavior to close the god-awful spaces of loneliness from losing someone he’d loved.
AMY RAYE