B.J. Daniels - Crime Scene at Cardwell Ranch

As he looked out across the ranch, memories of the two of them seemed to blow through on the breeze. He could see them galloping on horseback across that far field of wild grasses, her long, dark hair blowing back, face lit by sunlight, eyes bright, grinning at him as they raced back to the barn.

They’d been so young, so in love. He felt that old ache, desire now coupled with heartbreak and regret.

Behind him, he heard first one pickup door open, then the other. The first one closed with a click, the second slammed hard. He didn’t have to guess whose door that had been.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Warren hang back, waiting by the side of his pickup, out of the way—and out of earshot as well as the line of fire. Warren was no fool.

“Are we goin’ to stand here all day admiring the scenery or are we goin’ to take a look in the damned well?” Dana asked as she joined Hud.

He let out a bark of nervous laughter and looked over at her, surprised how little she’d changed and glad of it. She was small, five-four compared to his six-six. She couldn’t weigh a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet, but what there was of her was a combination of soft curves and hard-edged stubborn determination. To say he’d never known anyone like her was putting it mildly.

He wanted to tell her why he’d come back, but the glint in her eye warned him she was no more ready to hear it than she’d been when he’d left.

“Best take a look in that well then,” he said.

“Good idea.” She stood back as he trailed Warren’s tracks to the hole in the ground.

A half-dozen boards had once covered the well. Now only a couple remained on the single row of rocks rimming the edge. The other boards appeared to have been knocked off by the wind or fallen into the well.

He flipped on the flashlight and shone the beam down into the hole. The well wasn’t deep, about fifteen feet, like looking off the roof of a two-story house. Had it been deeper, Warren would never have seen what lay in the bottom.

Hud leaned over the opening, the wind whistling in his ears, the flashlight beam a pale gold as it skimmed the dirt bottom—and the bones.

Hunting with his father as a boy, Hud had seen his share of remains over the years. The sun-bleached skeletons of deer, elk, moose, cattle and coyotes were strewn all over rural Montana.

But just as Warren had feared, the bones lying at the bottom of the Cardwell Ranch dry well weren’t from any wild animal.

DANA STOOD BACK, her hands in the pockets of her coat, as she stared at Hud’s broad back.

She wished she didn’t know him so well. The moment he’d turned on the flashlight and looked down, she’d read the answer in his shoulders. Her already upset stomach did a slow roll and she thought for a moment she might be sick.

Dear God, what was in the well? Who was in the well?

Hud glanced back at her, his blue eyes drilling her to the spot where she stood, all the past burning there like a hot blue flame.

But instead of heat, she shivered as if a cold wind blew up from the bottom of the well. A cold that could chill in ways they hadn’t yet imagined as Hud straightened and walked back to her.

“Looks like remains of something, all right,” Hud said, giving her that same noncommittal look he had when he’d driven up.

The wind whipped her long dark hair around her face. She took a painful breath and let it go, fighting the wind, fighting a weakness in herself that made her angry and scared. “They’re human bones, aren’t they?”

Hud dragged his hat off and raked a hand through his hair, making her fingers tingle remembering the feel of that thick sun-streaked mop of his. “Won’t be certain until we get the bones to the lab.”

She looked away, angry at him on so many levels that it made it hard to be civil. “I know there are human remains down there. Warren said he saw a human skull. So stop lying to me.”

Hud’s eyes locked with hers and she saw anger spark in all that blue. He didn’t like being called a liar. But then, she could call him much worse if she got started.

“From what I can see, the skull appears to be human. Satisfied?” he said.

She turned away from the only man who had ever satisfied her. She tried not to panic. If having Hud back—let alone the interim marshal—wasn’t bad enough, there was a body in the well on her family ranch. She tried to assure herself that the bones could have been in the well for years. The well had been dug more than a hundred years ago. Who knew how long the bones had been there?

But the big question, the same one she knew Hud had to be asking, was why the bones were there.

“I’m going to need to cordon this area off,” he said. “I would imagine with it being calving season, you have some cattle moving through here?”

“No cattle in here to worry about,” Warren said.

Hud frowned and glanced out across the ranch. “I didn’t notice any cattle on the way in, either.”

Dana felt his gaze shift to her. She pulled a hand from her pocket to brush a strand of her hair from her face before looking at him. The words stuck in her throat and she was grateful to Warren when he said, “The cattle were all auctioned this fall to get the ranch ready to sell.”

Hud looked stunned, his gaze never leaving hers. “You wouldn’t sell the ranch.”

She turned her face away from him. He was the one person who knew just what this ranch meant to her and yet she didn’t want him to see that selling it was breaking her heart just as he had. She could feel his gaze on her as if waiting for her to explain.

When she didn’t, he said, “I have to warn you, Dana, this investigation might hold up a sale.”

She hadn’t thought of that. She hadn’t thought of anything but the bones—and her added bad luck in finding out that Hud was acting marshal.

“Word is going to get out, if it hasn’t already,” he continued. “Once we get the bones up, we’ll know more, but this investigation could take some time.”

“You do whatever you have to do, Hud.” She hadn’t said his name out loud in years. It sounded odd and felt even stranger on her tongue. Amazing that such a small word could hurt so much.

She turned and walked back to Warren’s pickup, surprised her legs held her up. Her mind was reeling. There was a body in a well on her ranch? And Hud Savage was back after all this time of believing him long gone? She wasn’t sure which shocked or terrified her more.

She didn’t hear him behind her until he spoke.

“I was sorry to hear about your mother,” he said so close she felt his warm breath on her neck and caught a whiff of his aftershave. The same kind he’d used when he was hers.

Without turning, she gave a nod of her head, the wind burning her eyes, and jerked open the pickup door, sending a glance to Warren across the hood that she was more than ready to leave.

As she climbed into the truck and started to pull the door shut behind her, Hud dropped one large palm over the top of the door to keep it from closing. “Dana…”

She shot him a look she thought he might still remember, the same one a rattler gives right before it strikes.

“I just wanted to say…happy birthday.”

She tried not to show her surprise—or her pleasure—that he’d remembered. That he had, though, made it all the worse. She swallowed and looked up at him, knifed with that old familiar pain, the kind that just never went away no matter how hard you fought it.

“Dana, listen—”

“I’m engaged.” The lie was out before she could call it back.

Hud’s eyebrows up. “To anyone I know?”

She took guilty pleasure from the pain she heard in his voice, saw in his face. “Lanny Rankin.”

“Lanny? The lawyer?” Hud didn’t sound surprised, just contemptuous. He must have heard that she’d been dating Lanny. “He still saving up for the ring?”