Finding Forever (Smoky Mountain Lawmen Book 1) (12 page)

Cassidy
stared at a point beyond Ben’s shoulder, not seeing the present.  “Um.  We were
just riding along the trail laughing and talking then we heard a loud bang. 
Gemma’s horse reared.  She tried to calm him, but he was freaked.  We heard
another bang then her horse bucked hard and she went flying.  She landed
against a fallen tree.”  He looked at Ben and Tristan then.  “I’ve never seen
anything like it and I’ve been on the back of a horse nearly my entire life. 
She was so still we all feared she was hurt very badly or worse.  Is she okay?”
he asked again.

Tristan
nodded.  “A few bumps, but nothing that won’t heal in time.  So you said you
heard two bangs?” he asked, echoing the question foremost in Ben’s head.

Cassidy
nodded. 

“You’re
sure?” Ben asked.

Cassidy
nodded again.  “Definitely.  I don’t think the horse would have tossed her
without the second one.  She almost had him under control when the second one
occurred.”

Ben
frowned and exchanged a glance with Tristan.  He didn’t like where this was
headed.  “Mr. Cassidy, can you describe the bangs?”

Cassidy
frowned.  “Sharp, like the retort of a rifle, but a little more muffled, I
guess.”

Ben
exchanged another look with Tristan, this one more alarmed.  “Where is the rest
of your group, Mr. Cassidy?”

“Back
at the hotel by now, I would imagine.  I followed the ambulance here to wait on
word about Gemma’s condition while the rest of the group took care of the
horses.”

Tristan
wrote down the name of the hotel where the group was staying and their names
and promised that someone would be by tonight to interview them all.

“I
don’t like this,” Ben said to Tristan as they headed down the corridor. 

“Me
neither.  I want to get a look at that horse.  My gut says he got hit with a BB
or pellet gun.  Unless the gun went off right beside the horse, rifle fire
would not startle that horse, and even then he’d only sidestep.”

After
informing hospital security of the situation and the need for an armed guard,
Ben and Tristan headed to their cars, the need for Gemma’s phone gone now that
they had located the group.

“Let’s
head to the hotel and find out what happened to Jasper, then go take a look at
him,” Tristan said.

Ben
nodded in agreement.  “I’ll follow you.”

The
drive was thankfully short.  Ben didn’t want to be alone with his thoughts and
emotions at the moment.  They were a jumble of frustration, rage, and a more
tender emotion he refused to name.  Seeing Gemma so out of it was frightening. 
She was such a strong woman that it was hard to see her vulnerable like that. 

Within
minutes, he was pulling into the hotel parking lot behind Tristan.  He hoped
the riding group could shed some more light on what had happened.  It could all
just be a coincidence.  The horse could have spooked from the noise like Mr.
Cassidy said.  But Ben had a feeling there was more to it than that.  He prayed
he was wrong, but his gut said otherwise.

“Anything?”
Ben asked Tristan as they met up again in the hotel lobby.  They had split the
list of names and had just finished interviewing them all.

Tristan
shook his head.  “All their stories were consistent with Cassidy’s.  Two sharp,
muffled retorts and Gemma landing against the tree.  No one saw or heard
anything out of the ordinary except the noise.”

Ben
clenched his fists in frustration.  “I got the same thing.  I think it’s time
we go look at Jasper.”

Tristan
nodded.  “You drive.  Since he was taken to the Biltmore stables with the other
horses the equestrian center’s truck is still there.  After we look him over we
can take him and the truck back where they belong.”

Tristan
called the stable manager for the Biltmore on their drive over asking the man
to meet them there to let them in.  Ben followed Tristan’s directions and they
were soon pulling onto the massive estate.  A truck with a single occupant met
them at the front gate and led them back to the stables.

Ben
parked next to the pickup and both men climbed out.

“Mr.
Jenkins?” Ben asked.

The
man nodded as he closed his door. 

Ben
held out a hand to the man.  “Special Agent Ben Davidson, FBI.  This is
Detective Tristan Mabley, Gemma Mabley’s brother.”

Mr.
Jenkins shook both their hands in a firm grasp.  “I’m real sorry to hear your
sister got hurt, detective.  How is she?”

“Concussed
and bruised, but otherwise okay,” Tristan replied.

“Good,
good.  So you’re here to get her horse, right?”  Jenkins started walking toward
the stables.  Horses whinnied as he pulled open the heavy barn doors.

“That’s
right.”

“He’s
a fine animal, detective.  It’s obvious he’s been well-trained and well cared
for.  Must have been something that came out of nowhere to have spooked him
like that.”  Jenkins led them down the row of stall about half way before
coming to a halt.  Gemma’s horse, Jasper poked his russet-colored head over the
stable door and nudged Tristan.

“Hey
boy.  You had quite the night, huh?”  Tristan rubbed the horse between his eyes
and patted him on the neck.  “Let’s get you home, alright?”

Jasper
wickered. 

“Did
anyone check him over for injuries when he was brought back?” Ben asked. 
Tristan unlatched the door and stepped inside while Ben spoke to the manager.

Jenkins
scratched his head.  “We didn’t, but I don’t know about the riders in her
group.  They brought all the horses in and removed their tack.  I had a groom
helping to take them to their stalls, but he just put them in and closed the
doors.  No one said anything about any injuries to the horses though.”

Ben
nodded and turned his attention to where Tristan was inspecting the horse.  He
ran his hands slowly over Jasper’s smooth coat from front to back feeling for
abnormalities.  As he rounded Jasper’s rear, he suddenly stopped.

“Hey,
Ben.  Come look at this.”

Ben
stepped inside, and ran a hand along Jasper’s flank, so he wouldn’t startle the
horse when he touched him out of view.

Tristan
pointed to a spot very close to Jasper’s tail.  “If I hadn’t been looking for
it, I don’t think I’d have seen it.”

Ben
peered closer.  To the right of the tail were two small lumps with tufts of
hair missing.  His blood ran cold as the implications sank in.  Their killer
was much more adept at keeping tabs on Gemma than they’d thought and was
well-prepared.  Gemma’s jaunt to Biltmore had been last minute.  Their suspect
must have had the gun already with him.  It also meant he had to be someone who
blended in very well around here and wouldn’t raise suspicion walking around.  Or
very good at hiding so others wouldn’t notice him.

Ben
looked up at Tristan.  “You were right.  He’s been shot.”

While
Tristan drove the truck and horse back to Marshall, Ben headed back over to the
hotel to question the riding group again.  Now that they knew foul play had
been involved it was important to reconstruct the scene.  He was hoping that
their stalker would be arrogant enough to believe that Ben and the rest of the
police would see this as an accident.  It may have made him sloppy.  Ben wanted
to find his sniper’s nest and see if this sick bastard had left any clues
behind. 

Ben
asked the front desk to call the rooms and have everyone to come down to the
lobby.  He got the hotel manager to lend him the use of a conference room where
he redirected everyone.

Once
they had all arrived he closed the door.  “I’m sorry to have to call you all
down here at this hour, but we’ve done some further investigating into Gemma’s
accident and it wasn’t an accident.  Someone deliberately shot Jasper with a
pellet or BB gun.  I need you to help me to reconstruct the scene so we can
find where the shots originated.”

Talking
erupted all around him.  He patted the air.  “One at a time.  Which direction
were y’all headed when the horse first reared and you heard the first shot?”

“East,”
Robert Cassidy answered.

The
room was equipped with a white board.  Ben snatched up a marker and drew a set
of parallel lines horizontally on the board.  He put an X between them to mark
Gemma’s position.  “Alright, who was closest to Gemma?”

A
teenager raised her hand.  “I was.”

“Which
side of her?”

“The
left,” the girl answered.

Ben
frowned at the board as he placed another X to the left of the first one.  “Was
anyone on her right?”  He looked at the people assembled.  They all shook their
heads.

“The
trail was only wide enough for two abreast,” Cassidy stated.

“He
reared and then took off up the trail about twenty yards before she reigned him
in,” one of the other men stated.  “She started to get him calmed down when we
heard the second noise and he reared again and then bucked.  She wasn’t ready
for the buck and she lost her seat and landed against the tree.”

“Which
side of the trail is the tree?”

“The
right,” the man answered.

Ben
put an X off to the side of the trail on the right slightly ahead of the
others.

“And
no one noticed anything off to the right of the trail?”

Again,
they all shook their heads. 

“We
were all so focused on getting to Gemma and catching then calming Jasper that
we didn’t look around much,” the mother of the teenager confessed.

Ben
stared at the white board.  He needed to get out there and study the scene.  He
itched to walk the forest to the right of the trail.  “Was there any delay
between the noise and when Jasper reared?”

His
witnesses all looked at each other frowning and slowly shook their heads.

“No. 
It all seemed to occur at the same time,” Cassidy replied.

That
meant the shooter had been fairly close.  He wouldn’t have to search far from
the scene for clues.

“Did
any of the other horses spook?”

“We
had a couple side step, but none of them reacted like Jasper,” Cassidy replied.

Ben
thanked the group for their help and sent them back to their rooms.  He had a
good idea of how things had played out now. 

Now
he just needed some daylight so he could go hunting.

Gemma
opened her eyes slowly, wincing as pain lanced her skull at the light streaming
through the window.  She struggled through the fog in her brain to make sense
of where she was and why she felt like she was wading through pea soup. 

Yesterday’s
events came flooding back as she took in her surroundings.  She fell off her
horse.  She was in the hospital.

Her
eyes landed on the figure seated next to her bed.  His dark head was bent at an
awkward angle and resting on the arm stretched across the side of her bed,
holding her hand.

Gemma
felt her heart clench.  He was here. 

He
could deny his feelings until he was blue in the face, but right now, right
here, she knew he felt it too.

“Ben.” 
Her voice came out a croak.  She cleared her throat and tried again.  “Ben.”

His
head lifted and he snapped awake.         

She
watched in the span of a second as he took in his surroundings and reality
rushed back to him.  His eyes swung toward her and collided with her gaze. 

He
immediately leaned forward and gently thrust his free hand into the hair at the
side of her head.  “Gemma.  How do you feel, baby?”

Gemma
smiled softly.  “Like I fell off my horse.”

He
smiled back at her.  “You did.  Do you remember what happened?”

She
frowned as she forced her sluggish mind to think about yesterday.  “I remember
hearing a loud noise and Jasper reared up.  And I remember flying through the
air, but nothing after that.”

“According
to the people with you, there were two loud sounds and he reared both times.”

Gemma
frowned.  That didn’t make sense.  Jasper was too steady to startle that much
at a noise. 

Ben
nodded as he read her expression.  “Tristan thought the same thing: Jasper’s
too steadfast.  So, we took a look at him.  He’d been shot twice near his tail
with a BB or pellet rifle.”

“What?!” 
Gemma jerked up in bed and immediately regretted it.  Fire raced across her
chest and her head swam.  Her stomach threatened to revolt.  Ben helped her
ease back to the pillows and stroked her hair until she had the nausea and pain
under control.

“How
far did I fly?  I feel like I fell out of a three-story building.”

“The
others said you only went about fifteen feet, but you landed against a fallen
tree.”  Ben studied her as she tried to get comfortable.  “Please don’t do that
again.  After the car accident and now this—I don’t think Tristan and I can
take much more.”

Gemma
rolled her eyes.  “I’ll try.  Is Jasper okay?”

He
clutched her hand.  “He’s fine and I mean it, Gemma.  I want you to stay put
until this is over.  No more excursions.  To and from work and that’s it.  I
still really want you to take a trip out west to see your parents.”

Gemma
frowned trying to follow the conversation thread with her muddled brain. 
“We’ve had this discussion, Ben.  I’m not hiding.”

“Someone
shot your horse yesterday, Gemma.  You could have been killed in that fall.  There
is a killer after you.”  His voice rose with each point, his features
hardening.

“I
know all that, but it doesn’t change the fact that we’ll never catch the
bastard if I hide.”

“Yes
we will,” he cut in.

Gemma’s
frown deepened.  “This conversation will get us nowhere and I don’t want to
fight, Ben.  I’m not hiding, so either arrest me—which you have no grounds to
do—or drop it.  I won’t take any unnecessary risks, but I’m not going to sit
behind a locked door all the time either.”

Ben
released her hand and abruptly stood.  He paced several feet away before
running his hands through his hair to grip them at the back of his head.  He
spun back to her, but was spared having to reply by Tristan entering the room.

He
stopped just inside the door, taking note of the distance and tension between
Gemma and Ben.  “Um, am I interrupting something?”

“Yes,”
Ben said.

“No,”
Gemma replied at the same time, eager to shut down the conversation.

Ben
frowned, but Gemma just stared at him, willing him to drop it. 

“Later,”
he muttered before turning to Tristan.  “You ready?”

“Yep.”

Gemma
looked between her brother and Ben.  “Ready for what?”

“We’re
going out to the Biltmore trails to see if we can gather any evidence of the
shooter,” Tristan said as Ben grabbed his phone from the nightstand. 

Ben
swept over her, one arm on either side of her torso, face aligned with hers. 
Gemma looked up into his intense gaze, startled. 

“We
will finish this later, Gemma.”  He leaned down and kissed her hard once before
rising and quickly striding out the door. 

Tristan
cocked an eyebrow at her, a smirk crossing his face, before he followed Ben out
the door.

Gemma
let her body sink into the bed worn out from the gamut of emotions that had
flowed through her in the last five minutes.  Ben had the ability to tax her
emotions like no one else.

Her
fingers grazed her lips as fatigue made her eyelids heavy.  The emotions
weren’t all bad.

Ben
threw his car keys onto his borrowed desk at the sheriff’s department in
disgust.  He and the team he had hauled out to the Biltmore estate had come up
with absolutely nothing.  Oh, they had found the shooter’s hide out—as thick as
the underbrush was in that forest it was impossible not to leave some trace
behind—but crumpled foliage and compressed detritus was all they had found.  No
footprints, no fibers.  Nothing.  If it weren’t for what they’d found at the
Lowell crime scene he’d think this guy was a ghost.

“Mail
call, Agent Davidson.”

Ben
took the letter the young deputy handed him.  He frowned down at the plain
envelope.  It had his name and the department address on it, but no return
address.  Ben glanced at the postmark.  It had come through Asheville.  Any
mail he got should be coming from his office in Richmond and he wasn’t expecting
anything. 

Ben
laid the letter on the desk and quickly pulled on some gloves.  He carefully
sliced the top of the envelope with a letter opener and pulled out the single
sheet of paper inside and unfolded it. 

Just
like at the equestrian center, Ben felt rage make his blood boil as he read the
short missive typed on the plain white paper.

           
That
was just a little fun.  When I finally decide to end her it won’t be so quick
as a bullet.

“Mabley!”
Ben bellowed across the bullpen.

Tristan
came running from where he’d been in conversation with the sheriff about their
investigation, the older man following close behind.

“I
got another note,” Ben said, gesturing to the letter laying on his desk. 

Tristan
read it quickly, an oath slipping past his lips as he comprehended the text. 

“I
assume this is referring to Gemma?” the sheriff asked.

Ben
nodded.

“Why
is our killer targeting her?”

Ben
scrubbed a hand over his jaw.  “Somehow, he got the impression that she means
something to me.”

The
sheriff cocked an eyebrow and looked up at Ben.  “And does she?”

Ben
sighed, unable to deny that he felt
something
for the beautiful
therapist.  He looked at Tristan as he spoke, putting into words what he hadn’t
earlier.  “Yeah.”

Tristan’s
jaw tightened, fury igniting in his eyes.  “I still say I ought to kill you
myself.  Save this psycho the trouble and save my sister in the process.”

Ben
eyed Tristan frostily.  While he might agree with the sentiment behind
Tristan’s words—he’d be reacting the same way if it were his sister that was
the target of a madman—it didn’t mean he liked it.  “It’s not like I planned
any of this.  And like I told you before, she was a target before any real
feelings cropped up between us.  He must have seen us together and assumed she
was someone important in my life.  Being your sister and the therapist of our
victim’s son, she hasn’t exactly been removed from this investigation.” 

“Alright,
simmer down, boys,” Sheriff Raymond said, stepping between the two.  “Killing
each other will not keep Gemma safe.  She needs you both.  Focus on the case. 
Mabley, run down the letter.  Send it off for prints and DNA and see if you can
find out where it was mailed.  Agent Davidson, where are we with the list of
rangers?”

Ben
focused on the sheriff.  Raymond was right.  It would do no one any good if he
and Tristan came to blows.  They made a damned good team and they needed to
work together to find this son of a bitch before he made good on his threats
against Gemma.

“I’ve
been over the list twice.  There’s no one with the name Jack.  I talked with
the chief about a few whose names could have Jack as a nickname and he
confirmed that they all went by their given name.  Either the guy is pretending
to be a ranger or he picked the name at random.  I’ve separated out those who
fit the physical description we got from Caleb Lowell and am running more
extensive background checks on them.  So far, nothing’s popped.”  Frustration
clawed through Ben.  He’d never had a case so utterly vexing.  Every time he
thought he had something he rounded the corner to find nothing.

“Keep
at it, something has to give soon.  In the meantime, I’m going to add to the
guard around Gemma.  She now warrants a team.”  Raymond cocked his head, his
gaze swinging between both Ben and Tristan.  “Unless the two of you can get her
to leave town?”

Ben
barked out a laugh.  “That’s like trying to get rid of kudzu.  Unless we kidnap
her and get her away from here before she realizes our plan—or we hog-tie her
and take off anyway—she’s not going anywhere.”

Tristan
nodded in agreement.  “Ben’s right, sheriff.  You’ve met Gemma.  She won’t
run.  Not when she’s convinced she’s the key to bringing this guy down and
definitely not while there’s others who need her.”

Raymond
nodded.  “If this guy gets much bolder, you may just have to go with the
kidnapping plan and sort out the consequences later.”

Ben
was sorely tempted to instigate that plan today.  He was still struggling to
shake off the fear he felt at the idea that Gemma was in danger.  While he
staunchly refused to label what he felt for the woman, losing her would leave a
lasting mark, one he wasn’t sure wouldn’t be fatal to his peace of mind.

“Agent
Davidson?”

Ben
turned to see the same young deputy who had brought him the letter walking up
to him. 
“Sir, there’s a woman on the phone who says she’s the mother of your victim,
Ms. Lowell.  She wants to talk to you.”

A
small flame of hope ignited.  Maybe Mrs. Trent had thought of something or seen
something that could lead them to the killer.  “Transfer her to my phone,” he
told the young man, pointing at the landline phone on his desk.

“Yes
sir.”  The deputy sprinted back to the front desk to transfer the call.  Ben
sat on the edge of his desk waiting for it to ring.

He
didn’t have to wait long.  He picked up the extension as soon as it jingled,
Tristan and the sheriff listening avidly.

“Mrs.
Trent?”

“Hi,
Agent Davidson.  I wanted to let you know that I heard from Diana’s boyfriend,
Andrew.  He saw on the news that she’d been killed and he called to offer his
condolences.  I told him the police wanted to talk to him.  He said he would
stop into the station today, but I wanted to make sure you knew.  He didn’t say
when he would come in, just that he intended to.”

While
it was looking less like it was the boyfriend who killed Diana, his absence
this past week was troubling.  Ben was anxious to talk to Andrew Emerson.  “Do
you have caller ID, Mrs. Trent?”

“Yes. 
You want his phone number?”

Ben
nodded and grabbed a pen.  “I do.”

She
rattled off the digits.  Ben quickly thanked her and hung up.  He turned to
Tristan and Raymond.  “Emerson called Diana’s mother after he heard the news
about Diana’s death.  She said he intends to come in to talk to us and she gave
me his phone number just in case.”

Ben
moved to his chair and pulled up the phone number in the database, hoping it
was attached to an address.  It came back as a cell phone with an Asheville address.

Ben
grinned as he swiped the keys from the desk and stood.  “Feel like going for a
ride, Tris?”

“You
know it.”

“I’ll
take care of the note,” the sheriff called as they raced from the building.

Ben
put his SUV in park and looked out the window at the high-rise, high-end condo
building in downtown Asheville the address had led them to.

“Damn. 
There goes our element of surprise,” Tristan muttered.