“I wouldn’t say no to that.” Clintok, the red still staining his cheeks, sat at the long table in the kitchen area. “Would you know if Billy Jean was working last night, and when she’d have left?”
“She was working, and I can’t be sure exactly when she left, but it would’ve been after midnight. We leave closing up to the staff, as long as they’re available until midnight. It could’ve been as late as one. Then there’s closing up. So I can only say she’d have left somewhere between twelve-thirty and one-thirty.”
She set coffee in front of him, sat herself. “I really need to tell my parents about this, Garrett, and some of the staff.”
“In a bit. We got our own men blocking off this area, so you can tell yours to go on once I get your statement here.”
“All right.”
“Now, what were you doing riding with Skinner way over this way? Did he ask you to take the long way?”
“No. I wanted to give my horse a good run. I haven’t had him out for over a week. It’s why I left early this morning, and when I ran into Callen saddling his own horse, we rode together.”
“His idea?”
“God, I don’t know, Garrett.” Weary, half-sick, she shoved at her hair. “It was just the natural thing to do. We’re leaving at the same time, going to the same place.”
“All right, but—”
“Look.” She was done with the weak-kneed ploy. “I know you’ve got a deep dislike for Callen, but that’s beside the damn point here. We left the ranch together, and I decided how we’d get to the resort. I wanted a good ride. I started to head in, but I just wanted a little more, so I took this road to get another gallop in, and I saw Billy Jean’s car. I didn’t think that much of it, except she must’ve had car trouble and called somebody to come get her, but then I saw her purse still in the car, and I got worried. I called her. I took out my phone to call hers, just to check. And…”
Now she had to take a moment. She rose and poured a glass of water. “I heard—we heard—her phone ring. I know her ringtone. And her phone was on the ground, lying in the snow, and then I saw … I looked over where you could see somebody’d been going off the road, walking or running through the snow, and I saw her coat. I saw her. I told you, I just reacted, and I started running, trying to … to get to her, and Callen grabbed me, told me to stop. That I couldn’t help her.”
“Now, how did he know that?”
“Oh God, Garrett, anyone could see!” Anger reared up, through the weary, through the sick. “I just didn’t want to see, to believe, so I tried to get away. I even punched him, but he held on until I calmed down. I don’t know why you’re letting some idiot high school feud make you try to point fingers his way, but I can damn sure tell you, whoever did that to Billy Jean wasn’t Callen Skinner.”
“I got a job to do.” Clintok pushed to his feet. “And unless you can tell me you know just where Callen Skinner was when this happened to Billy Jean, I’ll point where I need to point. You ought to be careful of him. You can go on into work if that’s where you’re going. The sheriff ’ll come around to talk to you himself when he’s done here.”
When he walked out, Bodine snatched the coffee off the table, dumped it down the sink. “Male, dick-measuring, ball-swinging, chest-puffing bullshit.”
She swung around when Callen came in. “And I don’t want to hear any of it out of you.”
“All right.”
“The pair of you want to ram antlers and paw the goddamn ground? There’s a woman dead. A woman I hired. A woman I liked. A woman with family and friends, and…”
“There it is,” Callen soothed when Bodine covered her face, began to shake. He went to her, wrapped arms around her. She didn’t fight him this time, stayed stiff only for a moment. Then leaned in, let go.
“She was a friend of mine. She was a friend.”
“I’m sorry.” He pressed a kiss to her temple, stroked a hand down her back. “I wish there was more to say, but that’s all there is.”
“I need to do something. I’m better if I know what to do.”
“You need to take a minute. That’s doing something, too.”
“Crying’s just annoying. Crying doesn’t do anything.”
“Sure it does. You empty something out so you can fill it with something else.”
“Maybe, but—”
She turned her head just as he turned his. Their lips met.
Bumped, she’d think later. Really just bumped—unplanned, an accident in timing and direction. Maybe they lingered together a few seconds, but it wasn’t remotely an actual kiss.
Still, she jerked back. “That—that’s so disrespectful.”
“It wasn’t meant to be.”
Stuck between frustrated and embarrassed, she waved her hand in the air, swiped at her wet cheeks as she paced away. “Wasn’t you, wasn’t me. Just happened. It’s a horrible morning, horrible, and it just happened. I need to get to Bodine Town. My mother should be in by now. I need to tell her about this. We need to … God, we need to figure out how to tell everyone.”
She pressed her fingers to her eyes. “You need to get to the BAC. We’re shorthanded enough there.”
“Why don’t I call Chase, tell him what happened? Seems like he and your father should come over here. You’re going to want your whole family when you tell everybody.”
On a long expelled breath, she dropped her hands. “You’re right, you’re right, and I should’ve thought of that. We’ll have Mike take us in. Clintok said the police are blocking things off now.”
She closed her eyes a moment, drew her shoulders straight again. “Okay, I know what I have to do. Let’s get going.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
The family gathered at Bodine House, spread out in the pretty living room with its dozens of framed photographs and its simmering fire. After insisting her mother sit, just sit, Maureen passed around the coffee.
If they’d been at the ranch, Bodine thought, a family meeting would take place at the big dining room table. With her mother fussing just as she was now.
Because fussing kept her calm. Bodine could relate, as doing something, most anything, did the same for her.
They’d chosen the meeting site because the family needed to stay close, and Bodine calculated she couldn’t spare more than a half hour away from her office.
She needed to tend to her people, deal with the fallout and grief already reverberating through the resort.
“What can we do for her family?” Miss Fancy sat, back erect, in her favorite chair. “I knew her—a hardworking, fun-loving girl. But, Bodine, you’d have known her best. What can we do for her family?”
“I’m not sure right now, Grammy. Her parents are divorced, have been, I think, a long time. She has a brother in the marines, and I don’t know where he’s stationed. I’ll find out. Her mother’s in Helena, as best I know. I’m just not sure about her father.”
“If her family comes here, we need to put them up somewhere as private as we can, take care of them.”