Lone Rider (20 page)

Frank waved him into the office. Hat in hand, Russell stepped in and closed the door behind him. The sheriff's interest was piqued as Russell nervously took a chair across from his desk and rested a stack of papers on one knee. Sarah Hamilton was still staying with Russell. In fact, Frank was pretty sure Russell had been protecting the woman. Which made him wonder just what the man knew about her that Frank didn't and why exactly Russell was so protective of the senator's wife.

“What's up?” Frank asked.

“We've known each other a long time. Not well, but I know what kind of lawman you are. I trust you.” Even after that buildup, Russell still looked hesitant. “I think there's something you should know about Sarah.”

There was a lot he should know when it came to Sarah. The mystery of Sarah Hamilton was the real reason he told himself he couldn't even consider retirement. Not yet anyway.

“I hope you know me well enough that you trust I'm not some wacko.”

Frank had to smile. Russell Murdock was as far from a wacko as anyone he knew, and he said as much.

The rancher let out a long breath. “Then I hope what I have to tell you won't come as too big a shock.”

Frank doubted anything the man would tell him about Sarah Hamilton would come as a shock.

“I think I know why Sarah can't remember the past twenty-two years, and I also believe I know who is behind it. The esteemed Senator Buckmaster Hamilton.” He held up a hand as if expecting Frank to object. “I've been doing some research.” He spread a stack of papers out on the sheriff's desk. “What do you know about brain wiping?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

B
O
WOKE
IN
Jace's arms to daylight. She opened her eyes but didn't move. His body was warm and solid, and she felt safer than she had in days.

True, it was a false sense of security. Ray and his father were out there, probably looking for them—at least, that's what Jace believed.

She preferred to think that they were smarter than that and had headed back into the mountains to escape being caught. They had to know that someone else would come looking for her and Jace, so why not run?

With that shot they'd heard yesterday, maybe one had killed the other. She suspected Ray was better with a knife than a gun. She doubted even being shot would stop him. But maybe his wound was so bad that his father had put him out of his misery.

Jace stirred and rolled away from her. She instantly felt regret. She turned to see him standing at the edge of the cave opening.

When she saw that he had his rifle in his hands, she sat up in alarm. “What is it?” she whispered.

He motioned for her to stay quiet. Past him, all she could see was white. How much had it snowed? She groaned inwardly at the thought of wading through it to try to get out of the mountains. “Get dressed,” Jace said. “The storm has let up. We need to be moving.”

Bo heard Jace's horse let out a snort. The trees where the gelding had been tied began to shake viciously. Snow cascaded down from the snow-filled branches an instant before she heard the horse snorting.

She was on her feet, but not before Jace jumped off the ledge, fighting the fallen snow as he rushed toward the trees where he'd left the horse. What had the horse heard that had spooked him?

Wrapped in the sleeping bag, she hurried to the edge of the ledge in time to see the horse come thundering out of the trees, its eyes wide with fear. It reared, striking Jace and knocking him into the rocks an instant before the grizzly bear lumbered out of the pines.

Bo screamed. Jace was still lying in the snow from where he'd been hit by the rearing horse. “Jace!” He had dropped the rifle when he'd fallen, but Bo remembered in a rush that she still had the pistol.

She pulled it out of her jacket pocket and pointed it into the air. She knew better than to try to kill the grizzly. A wounded bear was even more dangerous than a hungry one. She pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. Fumbling off the safety, she fired. At the opening of the cave where she stood, the shot sounded like a cannon going off.

The grizzly, which had been headed for Jace, stopped. She fired again and the bear turned and lumbered back into the trees.

Her heart in her throat, she called down to Jace. “Are you all right?”

“My leg.” She could hear the pain in his voice. “I think it's broken.”

* * *

B
UCKMASTER
FOUND
A
NGELINA
glued to the television.

“The search continues for thirty-year-old Bo Hamilton, the daughter of Senator Buckmaster Hamilton, along with local rancher Jace Calder,” the news anchor was saying.

“Hamilton was camping in the Crazy Mountains but failed to return as scheduled on Monday. Calder had gone up to search for her Monday afternoon.”

An aerial shot of the Crazies flashed on the screen, making Buckmaster's stomach turn. So much country. Bo could be anywhere. Was she even still alive? He thought of the cold, the snow and shuddered to think what she might be going through. Not to mention there was a killer up there.

The sheriff had tried to play it down, but that outfitter had been
murdered
and as far as they knew, whoever had killed him was still up there.

The news anchor droned on about the large search and rescue team that had been deployed the day before to find the two missing residents.

“Searchers were forced back due to a snowstorm in the mountains. Jim Martin with the local response efforts warned everyone to stay out of the mountains because of the dangerous conditions. The search is set to continue today, weather permitting.”

As the news anchor went on to other breaking stories, Buckmaster turned off the television.

“At least there had been no mention of missing funds at the Sarah Hamilton Foundation,” his wife said.

Or of the outfitter's murder.

Cussing under his breath, he told himself he couldn't think like that. Bo was alive. She would be found.

Stepping to the rain-streaked window, he looked out at the Crazies. The mountain range was cloaked in clouds. He knew from experience that it was probably still snowing up there at the higher altitude. He hated to think how much snow might fall before this storm moved on.

His poor baby girl. He would have saddled up and taken his men back up the mountain, but he knew there was nothing anyone could do until the storm ended and risking more lives would only make things worse.

He'd looked at his men yesterday when the storm had blown in. Like him, they'd been cold and wet, and the temperature had been dropping fast. Not only that, they were scared after realizing John Cole's killer could still be up there.

“But what about Bo?” he'd asked the sheriff. “She's out in this, maybe hurt, God only knows.”

“If Jace is with her, he'll take care of her,” Frank had said.

“And if that escaped murderer is with her?”

“There is nothing more we can do until the storm breaks,” the sheriff had said. “Go home. I'll keep you posted. As soon as the storm breaks, we'll have choppers in the air, dogs and horse teams on the ground. These people are trained for this. We don't want them to have to look for you and your men as well as your daughter and Jace Calder.”

He'd had no choice. Yesterday when the snow hit before they could get out of the mountains, he hadn't been able to see two feet in front of his horse. He knew it was insane to continue looking, but turning back had been one of the hardest things he'd ever done in his life.

But now the waiting was killing him.

He felt as if he was letting down his daughter. Maybe had let her down even before she went up into the mountains. Since Sarah's return, he'd been questioning everything he'd done in the past.

After he'd lost Sarah, he'd thrown himself into politics. Now he could see that he'd let his family take a backseat to his political career. It broke his heart that his oldest, Ainsley, had recently quit law school. From the time she could talk, she'd wanted to be a lawyer.

Instead, she'd helped him raise her five sisters. Actually, she and a series of nannies had raised the girls while he spent much of his time campaigning for offices that had finally gotten him into the Senate. When she'd grown older, she'd stepped in, taking on most of the responsibility of running the ranch. How had he let that happen?

He felt now as if he'd stolen her childhood as well as too much of her adulthood. When it came to her sisters, he always went to her to find out how they were doing. He still did. Even now, he wanted to call her—as if she could help with what was happening with Bo.

“I don't even know my daughters,” he said, voicing his thoughts aloud.

Angelina mugged a face. “That's ridiculous! They adore you.”

“I bought them whatever they wanted. I gave them the run of the ranch. I raised them like wild horses that were allowed to run free and do as they pleased.”

She shook her head. “Your daughters have all grown into fine young women.”

That surprised him, her saying what he'd hoped was true. Angelina had never been a mother to his six girls. If anything, she'd always seemed to resent the way he'd spoiled them.

“Look at the trouble they've gotten into, not to mention this latest with Bo. Maybe if I'd stayed here on the ranch and not—”

Angelina shot up from her chair. “I don't have to ask why you're dredging up the past.
Sarah.
” She said his first wife's name with all the venom of an angry rattlesnake. It made him cringe inside.

Not that he hadn't felt bitter about Sarah taking the easy way out and leaving him with six daughters to raise. The girls had needed their mother. Maybe they still did.

“Sarah is to blame for all of this,” Angelina said even more sharply.

“I don't blame her.”

“Well, you're the only one,” she said before stomping off.

He let her go. Bo wasn't her daughter, and Angelina had never had any children of her own. She couldn't understand how he felt right now. Only Sarah could.

As he stared at the mountains cloaked in snow clouds, he thought of what Sarah had said about hating those mountains and being terrified of them.

Right now, he felt the same way.

* * *

N
ETTIE
STUDIED
HER
husband as he ate his breakfast without tasting it. “How is it?”

“Delicious,” he said and pushed away his empty plate.

“Liar. I bet you can't even tell me what you just ate.” He'd been like this since he'd come home late last night. She knew he was worried about Bo Hamilton and that fool rancher Jace Calder who'd gone up after her, but she could tell it was more than that.

“What is it, Frank?” she asked as she took his plate. “You barely tasted that roast I made last night, either.”

“There is just a lot going on right now.”

“Pfffft!”

He looked up at her, focusing on her face for the first time since he'd walked in the door last night. She could see him making up his mind about whether or not to tell her. “It's about Sarah Hamilton.”

“What's she done now?” When Frank hesitated, she reminded him that this wasn't one of his cases. According to the FBI, there wasn't even an ongoing investigation.

The sheriff sighed. “Russell Murdock shared a theory he has about her memory loss.”

“
He
thinks she's lying?”

Frank shook his head. “He thinks her brain was wiped clean of the memories from the past twenty-two years. He thinks Buckmaster is behind it.”

Nettie blinked. “That's the craziest—”

“I know. That was my take on it, as well. Apparently, though, scientists have been experimenting with brain wiping for years and are now at a place where they can erase bad memories in rats.” Frank got to his feet. “I've got to go,” he said, looking toward the Crazies still cloaked in clouds. “The storm is supposed to break. Ideally we'll find the two missing persons today. But we're also looking for an escapee who might be up there. We found John Cole's body. He'd been shot.”

“Murdered?”

He nodded.

“You be careful,” she said, stepping to him. He put his arms around her and held her close, then leaned down to give her a quick kiss.

“Thanks for breakfast.”

She smiled at that and was tempted to quiz him on what he'd eaten. Instead, she said, “I've been doing some research on Sarah Hamilton's tattoo. Did you know that pendulums have been associated with the occult?”

* * *

B
O
WORKED
QUICKLY
, following Jace's instructions. She'd managed to splint his leg and help him back up onto the ledge and into the mouth of the cave. Now he lay breathless from the excursion and pain. He'd lain in the snow for too long. She worried he might be hypothermic.

“You surprise me,” he said. She could see that he was in pain but trying hard not to let her know it.

“Hold still,” she ordered as she put first aid cream on his wound where the rock had broken the skin. Was she really worried the wound would get infected? Neither of them would probably live that long.

Forcing that thought away, she asked, “How do I surprise you?”

“You're tougher and more capable than I thought.”

She stopped to study his face for a moment. “I'm sorry. Was that a compliment?”

He managed a grin that turned into a grimace. She'd had a first aid class years ago and remembered little of it. But one look at his leg and she knew they had to get out of here as soon as possible.

As she reached for a bandage, he took her hand. “Thank you. I don't know what I would have done without you.”

She looked into his blue eyes and fought tears. He wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for her. She pulled her hand free and fussed with his bandage, determined not to cry.

“There, you're going to be just fine,” she said as she finished and covered him again with the sleeping bag.

“I'm not going to be able to get out of here under my own steam. I can't walk on this leg.”

She almost laughed. They had two killers after them who would probably catch up to them before his leg even became an issue.

“I know. But
I
can. The clouds are lifting. They're going to be looking for us again.”

“So are Ray and his father.”

She shook her head. “We don't know that. We heard the shot yesterday, but we haven't heard anything since. All I have to do is find a wide-open place and build a fire so the smoke can be seen. In the meantime, you'll be fine here.”

Jace grabbed her arm, forcing her to look at him. “Ray and his father will see the smoke. They probably already heard the shots you fired to scare off the grizzly.”

She hadn't thought of that. “What do you suggest, then?”

“You get back to the trail and keep heading south toward the ranch as fast as you can.”

Bo shook her head. “I'm not leaving you.”

“Listen to me—”

“No, Jace. I'm not going to—” She froze. “Do you hear that?”

They both stilled as they listened.

“It's a helicopter.” She felt hope rise up in her like helium as she rushed to the cave opening. The storm had passed. She could see patches of blue between the clouds. Soon the clouds would burn off and Montana's big sky would be a canopy of vivid blue. If she could just signal the helicopter...