Ridley Pearson - Killer View

Far in the distance, but presumably still on Peavy’s ranch, rose a charcoal gray plume of smoke. Probably ranch hands burning off slash, thought Walt. Winter snow made for the safest time to set such fires. It looked beautiful in the slanting afternoon light, lifting and coiling into the blue sky.

“Damn!” Brandon said, rolling down his window. “That’s that same funky smell.”

Walt sniffed the air and knew Brandon was right: a sour, bitter stench. Memorable. He turned the wheel. The car skidded on the snow floor. He backed around in a three-point turn and headed for the fire, stopped ten minutes later by an unplowed road. Brandon consulted the topo map: the road they traveled showed on the map as dirt. It went unplowed in winter.

Brandon ’s thick finger traced a second road-also marked as dirt- that accessed that same area from Peavy’s ranch.

The stench was noticeably stronger there, at the end of the road, the connection to the fire inevitable though unconfirmed.

The two men got out of the car and climbed the snowbank. Walt slipped his hands into his pockets to fight the cold. Brandon tried to warm the fingers that protruded from the sling.

A sign on a fence warned PRIVATE PROPERTY, NO HUNTING, NO TRESPASSING.

“The senator couldn’t keep his eyes off you the whole time you were out in his field.”

“What was that about?”

“He kept what he told me very controlled, but I was much more interested in watching him.”

“What’s this about, Sheriff? You think it’s something to do with the water? That makes the most sense, right?”

“Makes the most sense,” Walt agreed.

“You think we’re going to find Aker? Alive, I mean?”

“We sure as hell better.”

“You think he’s over here somewhere?”

“I haven’t the slightest.”

“You think the senator knows?”

“No. For whatever reason, I doubt that. I didn’t get any sense of that.”

“But he’s involved.” It was a statement.

“He basically offered to single-handedly pay for my reelection,” Walt said, taking his hands out and rubbing them together vigorously. “He’s definitely involved.” Walt turned around and looked back over the vast expanse of the valley, stunning in its emptiness. A neighbor might see such a fire, but he’d never smell it, not given the distances between ranches. “There’s something connecting the three ranches. Mark knew what it was and it got him kidnapped. Got his brother killed.” He headed back to the car. “You hungry?”

“I could eat a horse,” Brandon said.

“ARE YOU GOING TO COME INSIDE OR JUST SIT OUT THERE all night?” Walt held the phone pressed to his ear while staring out his front window at Fiona’s Subaru.

During the long silence that followed, Walt could imagine her backing out and driving away, trying to pretend she hadn’t been parked out there for nearly twenty minutes. Nearly two days had passed since the drive to the Pahsimeroi. With Mark Aker still missing, it might as well have been a month for Walt. He battled the fatigue of twenty-one-hour days while trying to maintain a father’s patience for the sake of the girls. He’d put them to bed after twenty minutes of reading, during which he’d fallen asleep, not them. They’d tickled him awake. He told them a bear story and then turned off the light.

He slogged through his daily paperwork and meetings while exhausting every resource in his bid to find Mark Aker alive. Predictably, the Challis-led investigation into Brandon ’s shooting had produced nothing; if Brandon had died up there, with their history, Walt might have been accused of it. Francine Aker had failed to surface. The lab was taking its sweet time, as always.

The car arriving at his house, and just sitting there, had immediately won his attention, the midnight visit to his back porch still kept firmly in mind. But with the Subaru out front identified as Fiona’s, he’d given her a liberal amount of time before calling her.

He heard footsteps approach the front door, and he put away the phone. He greeted her and invited her inside. She stood by the open fire, warming her backside. He studied her body, in silhouette against the fire, his first unhurried appraisal of her. Despite all the time they’d worked together, only now did he really see her narrow hips, athletically lean figure, and the muscular curve of her backside.

“Sorry,” she said.

“For?”

“Sitting out there.”

“No charge for parking.” A pause. He added, “I’m terrible at jokes.”

“The night of the search and rescue-Randy-I was skiing with Roger Hillabrand.”

“I don’t think that’s any of my business.”

“I was flattered. Enchanted, even. No, charmed. I was charmed.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

“He sent a guy of his out to deliver a message. This is after the search and rescue. Late, late, I’m talking about.”

“Fiona-”

“No. You’ve got to listen. You’ve got to help me make sense of this.” She turned away to face the fire. “He invited me to some gala event in San Francisco. He was flying private. I was supposed to drop everything and join him.”

“You and I were at the hospital the next day.”

“Exactly. I turned him down.” She moved to her left, standing in profile now, the reflections of the flames bouncing off her chest and below her chin. Her face flashed orange. “So now he tells me he didn’t go. He canceled the trip because I turned him down. At least, that’s what he told me. This, while he’s inviting me to dinner-”

“I still don’t see-”

“Can you just listen?”

The question hurt. Gail accused him of constantly interrupting.

“Please,” she added. A word Gail had seldom used.

“I’m listening,” he said, wishing she would get back in the Subaru and leave him the hell alone.

“He invited me over for tea this afternoon. Tea, just so he could ask me out for dinner. This guy is a very smooth operator.” She turned again. “But not too smooth. He gets a phone call after I’m there less than five minutes. There’s a phone right there in the living room, but, of course, he takes it somewhere else. Leaves me to watch the light on the phone glow for the duration. After fifteen minutes, I ask to be driven home.”

“Driven?”

“He lives halfway up Baldy. His people drive you up from the bottom of the hill. I’ve got all-wheel drive, but they won’t even let me try it. The gate is locked at the bottom. So I tell his guy Sean-Sean Lunn-it’s either he drives me or I walk. And he drives me. What’s interesting is, Sean doesn’t interrupt the boss and tell him I’m leaving. He just drives me down the mountain.”

“And that’s interesting because…?”

She snarled. “Because Roger was going to rip his head off when Roger found out he let me leave.”

“Let you.”

“You know…”

“Maybe not.”

“Are you listening?”

That was another line borrowed from the Gail playbook. He was beginning to wonder if Gail hadn’t sent her here to torture him.

“My role in this is?” he asked.

“Oh, God. I’m sorry.” Her expression moved through embarrassment to a feverish glance at the door. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to… But… The reason I had to see you… I don’t think he’s as interested in me as he is in you.”

“What?”

“My working for you.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“I wish it were. But I’m not so sure. He and I have so little in common. I admit that. He flirts with me at a wedding I’m shooting. I wanted to think that was for real, but I’m not so sure. He takes me that same night skiing down Baldy- very romantic-but doesn’t make anything like a pass. I have to leave him because you call me up to the search and rescue. He barely objects, and he isn’t surprised when I tell him I work part-time for you. Not surprised at all. And another thing: I got that wedding at the last minute. Who waits to hire a wedding photographer until the day before? Not in this town. Not in any town. Just isn’t done. Sean, his guy, is waiting for me when I get home that night-this is in a snowstorm, don’t forget. Parked outside the fence. Scares the hell out of me, coming up behind on foot. Says he’s there to invite me on the private jet the next morning. Hello? Ever heard of cell phones? You think a guy like Roger Hillabrand can’t get my cell number?”