“I thought they were going hiking this morning.”
“Yeah, he was out at Bella Vista at the trailhead at six thirty, where they were supposed to meet, but she never showed.”
“Maybe she decided to sleep in. Did you call her?”
“No answer. I left a message.” Shea came and sat down. “Are you working on the notes?”
Dru nodded. “I can’t get the docs to merge. The addresses aren’t showing up on the label template.”
“Let me see,” Shea said, and Dru turned the laptop so it faced her.
She studied the screen, tapping a few keys. “There.” Shea scooted Dru’s laptop over to her.
“How did you do it? I worked for an hour.”
“I’m brilliant.” Shea smiled.
Dru smiled, too. Reaching out, she patted Shea’s arm. They weren’t finished with the hurt feelings or the hard words, but for the moment, they’d declared a truce.
“Maybe I’ll try some toast.” Shea stood up. “Do you want a slice?”
“Are you making it?”
“Yep.” Shea pulled the toaster out of its cabinet cubby and plugged it in. “After I eat, I’m going to get dressed and go out to the ranch.” She got the butter out of the refrigerator.
“I don’t think you should go on your own. It’s not safe.”
Shea started to argue, but when her cell phone chimed, she handed the butter knife to Dru. “Can you finish?”
She was setting their plates on the table when Shea came back, clutching her phone, white-faced.
“What’s the matter?” Dru asked.
As if Shea hadn’t heard, she went to the small television Dru kept in the breakfast nook and flipped it on. Alarm shot up Dru’s spine. “Who called? What’s wrong?” she demanded.
“It was Vanessa.” Shea got the remote, raised the volume. “Someone found a body—”
“Recapping,” the commentator was saying, “the body of a young woman hiker was found by two other hikers early this morning at Cedar Ridge Canyon Park, a half mile from Monarch Lake. Police so far haven’t officially declared the death suspicious, but an officer at the scene, Patrol Sergeant Ken Carter, indicated there would be a thorough investigation. The young woman is described as being in her mid-to late twenties, petite build, with blonde hair. Her identity is being withheld until her family can be notified.”
Shea locked Dru’s gaze. “It couldn’t be—”
“No,” Dru said. “Of course it isn’t Kate. She went hiking at Bella Vista.”
“But Erik said—”
“They missed each other,” Dru said, but the sick feeling in her stomach belied her reassurance.
The cordless phone on the kitchen counter rang, and she and Shea stared at it. Few people called the landline anymore. Telemarketers, people looking for donations. Dru crossed the floor to answer it, blood pounding in her ears. She didn’t recognize the number on the caller ID screen. She answered anyway. “Hello?”
“Dru, it’s Ken Carter with the Wyatt PD.”
“Yes, Ken,” she said, and she stiffened, preparing herself to hear it, the awful confirmation. Shea knew it, too. It was as if the sense of it was borne on the air, absorbed through some horrible process of osmosis. She came to Dru, and she wrapped her arm around Shea’s waist.
Ken went on talking, as Dru had known he would, about the body that was found at Cedar Ridge Canyon Park. He was terribly sorry to inform her and Shea it was Kate Kincaid.
“Are you sure?” Dru asked fruitlessly, as if asking could alter reality.
Ken confirmed that he was.
Shea pulled away, stricken. “It’s Katie?”
Dru said, “Yes,” gently. It struck her that, unlike Joy, Charla didn’t have another child to live for, and the wave of her grief for Charla’s loss cut more deeply, knotting her throat, burning the lids of her eyes. “Does her mother know?” she asked Ken.
“Kate’s fiancé—Erik Ayala?—is on his way there. He asked if he could be the one to tell her parents. It’s a real help to us. We need our officers at the scene.”
“Well, it’s a blessing. Charla, Kate’s mom—she likes him so much.”
“Yes, ma’am. I’ve heard.”
Shea’s hands, tented at her mouth, were outlined in her tears.
“Erik is telling her folks,” Dru said to her.
“Was he with her when she fell?” Shea asked, and Dru relayed the question to Ken.
“He arrived shortly after my partner and I did. Evidently there was some mix-up about where they were meeting, and when she didn’t show at Bella Vista, he went to Cedar Ridge Canyon, figuring she was there. I don’t know much more than that. He’s agreed to come to the police station here in Wyatt and give a more in-depth statement once he’s spoken to Mr. and Mrs. Kincaid. Here’s the thing, though, Dru, why I’m calling.” Ken’s voice sharpened. “We’re investigating this thing; we’ve got eyes on it, you know, because of everything else that’s happened.”
“You think Kate’s death is related to Becca’s murder?” Dru’s voice thinned. She was aware of Shea, backing up, shocked, disbelieving.
“I’m not saying that, not yet. But we did find something, a charm on a silver chain. When we showed it to Erik, he recognized it. He identified the charm as a lotus blossom and said it belonged to AJ, that your daughter gave it to him before they got engaged. Seeing that necklace shook Erik up, I can tell you.”
Dru looked at Shea, and the knowing was cold inside her that if she asked, Shea could produce the exact same charm on the exact same silver chain. Shea had hunted for the charms after learning that the lotus blossom was the symbol of rebirth. It was her and AJ’s shared amulet, their juju, Shea had said when she’d shown the charms to Dru. She could see them in her mind’s eye, two finely made flowers, wrought of silver, no bigger than her thumbnail.
What could it mean if one of the pair of charms had been found at Cedar Ridge Canyon this morning other than that AJ had been there, that he had something—if not everything—to do with Kate’s death?
“I know this is rough,” Ken was saying, “but you add it up—you know, there was the break-in at the xL yesterday and the note that was left on Leigh’s car last night. The two deceased young women were members of the same wedding party. They evidently exchanged texts prior to Becca’s death, a fact Kate wasn’t exactly forthcoming about.”
“I thought that was odd, too,” Dru said.
“We can’t ignore the possibility of a connection among these events, and while we don’t know Isley’s exact whereabouts, finding the necklace makes it pretty obvious he was following Kate, possibly stalking her.”
“Is my daughter in danger?” Dru didn’t wait for Ken’s answer. “You need to find him.” Fury heated her voice. “You people need to have every officer in this state looking—” She broke off, darting a glance at Shea, inwardly wincing on meeting her daughter’s anguished gaze.
“Trust me,” Ken said, “we’re closing in on his location. In fact, his truck was found today, around daybreak. About the same time those hikers found Kate’s body. Close to the same location, too.”
“Where?” Dru asked.