As he finished and began loading everything into grocery bags, however, the phone was ringing again. And this time it wouldn’t stop.
“What the hell?” he muttered and finally walked over to answer.
“Hello?”
“Cain?”
It was his stepfather. Cain’s hand tightened on the receiver. After the past few weeks, what could John possibly want with him? “Yes?”
“Where have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you for over an hour.”
“You’re lucky I picked up now. Why are you calling?”
“It’s Karen.”
“I don’t want to talk about her. Whatever she told you is whatever she told you.”
“Listen to me.” The strangled sound of John’s voice made Cain’s heart beat a little faster.
“What is it?”
“She’s gone.”
“Well, she’s not over here,” he said. He was on the verge of hanging up, but John’s sense of panic was genuine enough to make him hesitate.
“I…I’m afraid something might’ve happened to her.”
Cain sank onto the couch. “What makes you say that?”
“She got into the truck with Owen more than an hour ago.”
“So?” Cain could barely hide his irritation. He had Sheridan waiting for him. He wanted to be with her instead of dealing with these same old suspicions.
“I think Owen’s the one who shot Jason.”
Cain sat without moving. Surely he’d heard wrong.
“Are you listening?” John asked.
“I’m listening,” Cain said. “But you must be losing your mind. First it was me, and now it’s Owen? Owen wouldn’t hurt anybody.” Cain had briefly wondered, when he’d first learned how that rifle found its way into his cabin, but he’d never actually believed it.
“I hope you’re right. Oh, God… But I’m at Karen’s and…she’s not here. No one knows where she went. She was last seen getting into Owen’s truck.”
This wasn’t an apology for misjudging him. So what was it, exactly? “Why are you telling me?”
“I saw something on television once. About killers.”
Killers… The word sounded so strange coming out of John’s mouth, especially in relation to Owen. “I’m waiting.”
“They often return to familiar ground.”
“Which means…”
“Owen put that rifle in your old cabin. He took Sheridan to your land.”
“If he has Karen, you think he might be bringing her here?”
“Somewhere close by. It’s possible. I don’t know where else to look. Robert and I have been all over town. Can you check the forest? It—it might be our only chance of saving her life.”
He was serious. As hard as it was to process what he’d just heard, his father’s heartbreak came through clearly, convincing him. What would it be like to wonder if your son was about to kill the woman you loved? “Has anyone seen Owen’s truck?”
“It was spotted leaving my neighborhood. Lyle Porter said he had a woman with him, couldn’t tell if it was Karen. But I know it was. Lyle told me he turned toward the mountains.”
The mountains… “I’ll call you later,” Cain said and hung up. He wanted to help Karen, didn’t want to see anyone else hurt. But if Owen was anywhere near his place, he didn’t want Sheridan sleeping at the old cabin alone.
Sheridan heard the car pull up, was surprised Cain had returned after only thirty minutes. “It feels like you just left,” she murmured. But she was glad to have him back. It was dark now. She didn’t like being here alone after dark. And she was getting hungry.
When he didn’t come in right away, she got up to see if he needed help carrying in their dinner and saw that it wasn’t Cain at all. It was Owen. The cabin light in his truck gave her a glimpse of him just as he was climbing out.
Ducking so he wouldn’t see her naked, she scrambled to dress and smooth down her hair. She thought she’d be lucky to repair her appearance before he knocked at the door. But she didn’t hear from him even after she’d finished.
What was taking so long?
Another peek through the window told her he was getting something from his truck, so she went out to give him a hand. “Hey, stranger, what’re you doing here?”
She expected him to say that Cain had suggested they meet here. Or that he’d been looking for her because Ned had discovered something new about the investigation. She expected anything—except what she saw.
Obviously, she’d caught him unawares. He turned and stared at her, then quickly tried to shove whatever he’d been wrestling with back inside his truck. But he lost his hold, and it fell against him, knocking him back into the door, which opened wider. Then a body tumbled out onto the ground. Although it was unnaturally limp and covered in blood, Sheridan was close enough to recognize it in the pale glow of the same interior light that had let her identify Owen.
“Ms. Stevens,” she breathed in absolute astonishment.
Owen didn’t respond. He stepped over Karen as if she were nothing and reached inside his truck. But Sheridan didn’t wait to see what he was after. He’d killed Karen. He was probably the one who’d nearly killed her.
That thought galvanized her into action, and she took off for the forest. She knew better than to go back into the cabin. He’d only corner her there, and she didn’t have a weapon. Skye’s gun was at her uncle’s place, under the couch cushions. She might’ve regretted leaving it there, but putting it in her purse wouldn’t have helped. Her purse was in the rental car, which Cain had taken.
Unfortunately, she didn’t have any shoes, either. The soles of her feet screamed in pain with every pinecone, sticker and sharp rock she landed on, which hampered her ability to move very fast.
She could hear Owen charging through the trees behind her. He was quicker than she’d expected. And she knew from experience that he was stronger than he looked.
Her lungs pumping like pistons, she ignored the pain in her feet and dodged right, then left, threading her way through the trees toward Cain’s new cabin. He was her only hope. She couldn’t outrun Owen indefinitely, not without protection for her feet. And maybe not even then. She wasn’t back to full strength.
“Stop! Let me explain,” he called after her.
Explain why he had a bloody corpse in his truck? Hell, no! She kept running.