This Good Man. Janice Johnson Kay
this weather?”
“You’ve got some empty cabins.”
“Let me know so I don’t shoot you if our paths cross.”
“Good enough. Hell.” Reid rubbed the back of his neck and discovered his hand felt like a block of ice. “I don’t like this,” he said unnecessarily.
“You and me both.”
“I wish you were inside the city limits.”
“What would you do, send patrols by?”
Of course he couldn’t do that. “All right,” he said. “Let me know if anything develops.”
“Glad you’re here,” Roger said unexpectedly and then was gone.
The foot traffic had thinned somewhat while Reid had stood out in the cold talking. Snow crunched underfoot until he was back on the sidewalk, where the smooth sole of his dress shoes skidded. To hell with this, he thought. Nobody would notice or care if he wore dark boots with a decent tread. And...this was March. With April to follow. How many more times was it likely to snow before the seasons turned?
He wasn’t looking forward to his day. The morning plan was for him to interview a couple of applicants for the personal-assistant position. He’d been just as glad his temp apparently hadn’t wanted the job; she didn’t seem to be all that well-informed and he had the impression he’d scared her. He was hoping to hire internally; he felt so damn ignorant, it would be good to have a PA who knew the ropes. About once an hour, he cursed Colin McAllister for having taken his PA with him when he changed jobs.
This afternoon, he intended to take a tour of every department in the building, starting with Records in the basement. He was beginning to realize that he’d misinterpreted his “territory” when he arrived in Angel Butte. He’d felt satisfied after driving damn near every road inside the city limits, memorizing the way house numbers ran, which neighborhoods looked run-down, where the bars and taverns were, the location of parking lots that would be dark enough at night to put women walking alone to their cars in peril.
Truth was, he should have been mapping this building and the maintenance garage, where most of his responsibilities lay, so he had the slightest idea how to respond the next time someone came to him with a request.
Once the first applicant showed up, Reid blocked everything else from his mind, including both his afternoon agenda and the threat to Caleb and the shelter. His skill at compartmentalizing was useful.
This applicant currently worked in Technical Services and might be a whiz at computers and social media, but the way her eyes shied from his and her cheeks stayed rosy the whole time they talked, he could tell she was intimidated by him, too.
Irritated after he saw her out, Reid wondered—not for the first time—why he had that effect on so many people, not only women. He was a big man, sure, but lean, not mountainous. He didn’t have an alarmingly ugly face. He rarely raised his voice. So what the hell was the problem? Why couldn’t he find someone like—
There she was, in his head again. Anna Grant, of course. She hadn’t been afraid of him.
So, okay, he needed a woman like her, someone brisk, businesslike, organized and determined. And, please God, someone who knew the police department from the lowliest of supply closets to the most obscure of requisition forms.
Applicant number two turned out to be a maybe. This one was a man who at least didn’t jump every time Reid shifted in his chair. He was internal only in the sense he was already a city employee, however; his current position was second assistant in the mayor’s office.
Maybe, Reid thought, hiding his grin, that was why the guy wasn’t scared. After all, he’d presumably gotten used to Mayor Noah Chandler, who was an ugly bastard and, rumor had it, tended to be brutally direct.
Reid thanked the man for coming, said he’d let him know and glanced at the clock. He was embarrassed at how much he looked forward to lunch.
Last week, Lieutenant Renner had told him the best place to eat lunch in Angel Butte was the Kingfisher Café, only a couple of blocks from the police station. Reid had given it a try on Friday, walking down there late enough to miss the lunch rush. The door had opened before he reached for the handle, and he’d found himself face-to-face with Anna. She had appeared as startled as he’d felt. After their dinner at the A&W, he sure as hell hadn’t intended to seek her out again.
But courtesy demanded they exchange a few polite words, during which he’d asked whether she was a regular at the café.
“I come at least two or three days a week,” she had admitted, then wrinkled her nose. “I know I shouldn’t eat out so often, but I’m not a morning person. Half the time, I forget to pack a lunch.”
“Ah. Well, maybe I’ll see you here another day,” he’d remarked and was unable to interpret a look that might have been wary, shy or hopeful.
Damn it, after that accidental meeting, she’d been in his head all weekend, with the result that here he was Monday morning, panting to sit down to lunch with her. Stupid thing to do or not, he wanted to talk to her.
Since finding his brother and moving to Angel Butte, Reid had never felt lonelier. He didn’t understand it and sure as hell didn’t like it. No matter who he was with, he felt an uncrossable distance.
The one exception was Anna. He refused to analyze why. Did it matter? She was someone he could talk out some of his confusion with, that was all.
He was going to be very disappointed if this happened to be one of the days she’d remembered to pack herself a lunch. It wasn’t quite time to leave yet, though, which gave him a few minutes to brood.
He envied Mayor Chandler his view of Angel Butte, the volcanic cinder cone that rose right in the middle of town and was topped with the huge marble angel that gave the town its name. His office looked out on the brick wall of the jail. Not bothering to swivel his chair to look out the window, instead, he frowned, unseeing, at the closed door while he let his thoughts rebound to the shelter and the fact that a second fire had been set only a week after the first.
He briefly pondered the timing. The first fire had been set on Saturday night, the second on Sunday night. Chance? Or was there a reason their arsonist had chosen weekends?
This fire wasn’t an escalation. That was a positive. The lodge or one of the occupied cabins, now, that would have been scary. This fire, too, could have been set for entertainment value. It could have been a warning...although of what, Reid couldn’t figure. What worried him most was the possibility it was part of a campaign of terror. Everyone at the resort must be edgy now. No one would be sleeping well. The boys would all be watching each other. The fight Caleb had been in wouldn’t be the last.
Nobody out there would feel safe.
This was where, reluctantly, he had to ask himself whether it was a coincidence that Caleb had been the most recent arrival.
What if Caleb was angry enough to light the world on fire? Or what if this was a campaign not to terrorize, but to make Reid believe he should take his brother home to live with him?
To keep him safe.
Or—and this was the most unwelcome speculation of all—was there any possibility that their father had found his runaway youngest son? Had Reid screwed up big-time by moving to Angel Butte? Could he absolutely swear that when driving out to the old resort a couple times a week, he hadn’t been followed?
“Damn,” he murmured.
He hadn’t let Caleb know how much that phone call from their father had shaken him. In the nearly twenty years since he had seen Dean Sawyer, Reid had tried to think about him as little as possible. He didn’t like knowing how much he resembled his father physically. Sometimes he’d stare at himself in a mirror with an incredulity he had to shake off. But he couldn’t have so much as described his father’s voice.
But the minute he heard it on the