Lone Rider. B.J. Daniels
shrugged. “But if the FBI doesn’t think she’s a threat...”
“Then I shouldn’t, either.” Frank wished he could quell his concerns as easily. “Did they run an extensive background check on her?”
His undersheriff nodded. “Just like us, they couldn’t find anything. No arrests, not even a speeding ticket. They have no idea where she’s been.”
Frank considered what Dillon had said. He hadn’t been able to find any trace of Sarah in the past twenty-two years. She hadn’t had a job—at least, not one that didn’t pay under the table. Nor had she gotten another driver’s license in another state. And she hadn’t been arrested or had any reason that her fingerprints would have been on file.
Dillon hesitated at the door. “Once he’s president, he’ll have an army of secret service to protect him,” he said as if to reassure them both. “There’s a chance he might not even win. A lot of women out there could decide he drove his wife to suicide. No pun intended. Sarah might even disappear again, this time for good.”
Anything was possible. So why couldn’t Frank let it go? “An innocent woman would have gladly given us her DNA and fingerprints,” he said for the sake of argument. When he’d asked her, she’d declined.
“But we got both from the parachute harness and that coffee cup she had been drinking from,” Dillon pointed out.
Sarah had broken the cup. Frank was positive she’d done it on purpose, realizing that her prints would be on it. She’d been afraid that something would turn up.
“But neither her DNA or her prints came up on any criminal databases,” Dillon said. “Your gut instincts are still telling you something is wrong, though.” The undersheriff seemed to think for a moment. “We could put a missing persons out on her and see if it turns up anything.”
It was a long shot. If she’d been arrested, something would have come up when they’d run her prints and DNA. But cops somewhere across the country could have run across her and might remember that face. “Let me think about it,” Frank said.
For years, the Hamiltons had been the county’s most upstanding family. Sarah’s return had triggered something. Since she’d been back, there’d been blackmail, murder and a suicide in the family. While she couldn’t be blamed for any of that, it still seemed odd to him.
His wife, Lynette, Nettie as everyone called her but him, had put it best. “There is a dark cloud over the Hamilton family.” She’d shuddered when she’d said it. “I hate to think what will happen next.”
“Still no word on Bo Hamilton?” Dillon asked as if thinking the same thing.
“No,” Frank said, “and I’m starting to worry. The Crazies are such a large area to search. I hope it doesn’t come down to that.”
* * *
RAY TURNED IN the saddle to look back at the woman. He was having misgivings about capturing her. His old man was going to kill him. Maybe he should end this now. The one thing he couldn’t do was let her go. His only other option was to kill her and her horse and make sure no one found either body.
Not that it would keep people from searching these mountains for her. Better to shove her and her horse off a cliff.
She sure was pretty, though. Classy, too. He’d never had a woman like that. There was one other option, he told himself. He could keep her.
But fer how long afore she takes an ax handle to yer head and takes off? His father’s mocking voice demanded. Or are ya plannin’ to keep her tied up the whole time like some mutt ya ain’t able to trust?
He scowled and turned back around, knowing his father was right. A woman like her would never want a man like him. She was so small and delicate, so different from him. He was lumbering and awkward.
When he was younger, he was always taller and bigger than the rest of his classmates. He used to hate the way they gave him a wide berth as if afraid of him when he did nothing to scare them. They made him feel even bigger and clumsier.
He hated them for it, because he would have given anything to fit in. Once he realized he could use his intimidating size, he started taking whatever he wanted.
He heard the woman stumble and almost fall again. The rope he had her tied up with grew taut and slowed the horse. Even so, he would drag her if he had to.
As he reined in, he wondered what she saw when she looked at him and scowled at the thought. He told himself he didn’t give a damn, but for the first time he did. It made him furious with himself.
His daddy always said that if you gave a woman any power over you, she’d destroy you. Bo made him feel inferior. Even if he forced himself on her, he knew he wouldn’t feel that he’d had her.
* * *
BO DIDN’T KNOW how long she’d been walking. Her legs and feet ached. Her clothing was torn, her skin scraped and bleeding from the times she’d fallen down and Ray Spencer had dragged her screaming behind her horse until she’d found her feet again.
“Please,” she said now. “Can’t we stop? Just for a few minutes?” He’d given her a drink of water back down the mountain, but her throat was dry again, her mouth dusty, lips cracked. “I need more water.”
“Ya need to keep walkin’. Ya said people’ll be comin’ lookin’ for ya. If ya don’t want ’em dead...”
Was someone looking for her yet? She couldn’t bear to think about spending days up here with this man. Nor could she stand the thought of what would happen once they stopped and made camp.
She’d pleaded with him to let her go. “I won’t tell anyone.”
He’d laughed at that. “That’s what they all say.”
Her blood had curdled at his words. “I have money.”
He’d seemed interested until he’d realized she meant back at her father’s house.
“I’m worth money,” she’d heard herself say. “My father will pay for my return unharmed.” She had known what she was suggesting was more than a little dangerous. But it was the only thing she could think of that might keep this man from killing her. If he knew that she was worth more alive than dead...
“Oh, yeah?” Ray had seemed only mildly interested. “How much do you think you’re worth?”
She had no idea. “A million?”
He’d laughed again, harder this time. “Sure ya are. Anyway, I don’t need no money up here in the mountains. A woman, though, I been hankerin’ for one for weeks. And now I got you.”
Those words had sent a shudder through her, and she’d shut up. There was no negotiating with this man. She had nothing to negotiate with.
Even as the sun set and twilight turned the mountainside to silver gray, Ray kept going, urging her horse on from high in her saddle, jerking at the rope he’d bound her with and half dragging her deeper into the mountains.
She could barely see where to step as daylight vanished and the trail filled with deep shadows. She stumbled and almost fell again.
“Ain’t far now,” Ray said. “Got jest the spot.”
* * *
DARKNESS CAME QUICKLY in the dense pines of the mountains. Once the sun set, a cool breeze had moved through the trees. The shadows grew longer and blacker.
Jace had been following Bo’s trail for hours. The going was slow because he’d often lose it in the thick bed of dried pine needles and have to find it again. He’d seen the remains of other campsites. Telltale blackened rock rings with the remains of a campfire marking the sites. None of those had been used in the past twenty-four hours, though.
Which meant Bo hadn’t wanted just a night of camping. She’d been set on total