He didn’t respond other than to continue those heartbreaking, muffled sobs.
The truck rattled so hard my bones felt like they were shaking loose. These roads weren’t paved or smooth, just worn from the times we drove through the fields. The tracks were spotted with holes and rocks and dips. They weren’t meant for anything more than five miles per hour. I was going twenty.
My stomach twisted with every passing minute. God, don’t let him be hurt. If he’d cut his hand or arm or leg and was bleeding, it would take us time to get to the hospital. Too much time. And I’d sent Conor to one of the farthest ends of the ranch.
Finally, twenty minutes later, I spotted the fencing truck in the distance. The mountains loomed on the horizon.
“I’m here,” I said, then ended the call. My tires skidded to a stop. A cloud of dust billowed from the road as I shot out of the truck and jogged toward Conor.
He was seated against a tire, his knees pulled up and his head hanging between them. One arm hung loose beside him. The other had the phone pressed to his ear.
“Conor.” I put my hand on his shoulder, doing a quick scan. No blood. No apparent broken bones. All ten fingers. Two ears and two booted feet.
He looked up, his phone dropping to the grass. Tear tracks stained his tanned face. “It’s Lily.”
“Lily . . .”
“G-green,” he choked out. “Lily Green.”
Green. One of the nurses at the nursing home where my grandmother had lived before she passed was a Green. “What about Lily Green?”
Another tear dripped down Conor’s face. “Over there.”
“Over . . .” I trailed off and my stomach found a new bottom.
No. Not again.
I swallowed hard and stood, knowing without asking what I was going to find.
On leaden feet, I walked through the tall grass to the corner post and climbed the fence. My boots followed the same roughly trodden path that Conor must have taken.
Above me, the tower of Indigo Ridge rose into the blue sky. Its bold rock face caught the sun. This place was as intimidating as it was beautiful. A solid wall of rock that cut through the fields in such a harsh line that it was like the mountain had been cleaved from top to toe. The rocks at its base were as black and harsh as the cliff’s face.
I climbed toward the rocks I’d avoided for ages. I hadn’t been on this side of the fence in years. Not since I’d found the body.
The last body.
My gaze landed on a streak of blond hair. On a white dress. On mangled limbs. On a river of blood.
On Lily Green.
Chapter Three
Winslow
“I’m going to run home and grab a new shirt,” I told Janice, frowning at the mess I’d made of my white blouse.
My sleeve, stained with black coffee, was as much of a disaster as my desk. Folders, reports and sticky notes cluttered the brown wooden surface. Or was it gray? I hadn’t seen it in two days.
I was officially buried.
When Janice had come in to tell me that it was time for the weekly staff meeting with the administration crew—an unofficial standing meeting that hadn’t been on my calendar—I’d been in such a rush to join them that when I’d gone to grab my coffee mug, a blob had leapt out of the cup and splattered my shirt.
“Will you call me if anything comes up?” I asked.
“Of course.” She smiled and walked for the door, pausing at the threshold. “You’re doing great, Winslow.”
“Am I? Because I feel like I’m drowning.” Something I’d only admit to Janice. She was my one and only ally at the station. Winning people over was going slower than I’d expected. Much slower.
It was my age. No one had outwardly admitted that they thought I was too young—not to my face. But the sideways looks had held unspoken words. Doubts.
I can do this job.
Maybe the others doubted me but I wasn’t about to doubt myself. Much.
“You’re drinking from a fire hose right now, but it will get easier,” Janice promised. “And the folks here will come around. Give it time.”
I sighed. “Thank you.”
She gave me a sure nod, then slipped away for her spotless desk.
Taking my purse from the bottom drawer, I scanned the piles of reports to review and officer résumés to read. Tonight, I’d take another stack home and read over them like I had last night. I was in learning mode, trying to familiarize myself with the staff. I’d also had Janice pull every case file from the past three months so I could glean what type of crimes happened in Quincy.
So far, it had been nothing more than four drunken drivers, a busted high school kegger, one bar fight and a domestic disturbance. Janice had warned me that there was a meth arrest hidden in the mix but I hadn’t reached that file yet.
Overall, the officer files were thin, too thin. The reports were short, too short. And everything was handwritten on paper templates.
Pops hadn’t been kidding when he’d told me that the Quincy Police Department needed a shove into the future. Though shove seemed too gentle a word. What we needed was a bulldozer.
I was that bulldozer.
Walking through the bullpen, I waved at Allen, one of the day-shift officers.
He nodded, his eyes darting to my sleeve. The corner of his mouth turned up.
I shrugged. “Coffee attacked me.”
“That’s why I’m partial to our black shirts and pants. Hides the spills.”
“My uniform order is supposed to get in today. Then I’ll be sticking to black shirts too.” I smiled and headed for the door.
Okay, that was nice. Allen hadn’t avoided eye contact. Progress, right?
I waved at Officer Smith when I passed him for the lobby, hoping for a nod. “I’m going to run home quickly. Would you please call me if anything comes up?”
He ignored me, like he had for the past two days. Even when we’d bumped into each other in the break room yesterday, he’d acted like I hadn’t even been there. The heat from his glare burned down my spine as I walked out the door.
Early retirement. We were definitely going to discuss an early retirement if he didn’t change his attitude.
I plucked my sunglasses from my purse, using them to shield my eyes from the glare and cover up the dark circles under my eyes—sleep hadn’t been easy this week. My Durango was parked beside Allen’s cruiser. The leather seats were warm and the air stuffy. I cracked my window, drawing in the scent of summer sunshine.
Located in the heart of western Montana, Quincy was about an hour from Glacier National Park. The town was situated in a valley surrounded by snowcapped mountains, their slopes covered by a dense evergreen forest. The Clark Fork River cut a path through the trees and provided a natural border on one side for the city limits.
Pops would take us camping along the river when I was a kid. My family would spend a few precious summer weekends at his favorite sites, where we’d fish and hike and roast s’mores.
At every turn, Quincy held a memory.
Visiting Pops had always felt like an adventure. My father had grown up here, and for him, Quincy was home. Mom and Dad would have loved to see me living here. They probably would have followed me from Bozeman.
Though if they hadn’t died, I doubted I would have moved to Quincy.