“Your staff is tugging you?” Walker asked skeptically, but he was wearing his shades again, so she couldn’t read his expression.When she merely waited for agreement, he nodded. “Fine, then, you, Harvey, and Monty head that way. I’ll divide up the rest of us. Keep each other in sight and hearing at all times. It will be dark before long, so if you don’t have a flashlight, make sure you’re partnering with someone whodoes.”
Monty waved his flashlight. Taking a deep breath of resolve, Sam followed her weirdly twitchingstaff and set off in the direction it led, which seemed to be a rutted lane ofsorts.
Harvey was veering off of it, scrambling down ahillside.
“You don’t really believe that stick business, do you?” the mayor asked cynically when they were out of hearing range. “You just wanted to see thefarm.”
“Maybe my subconscious guides it, you think?” Sam asked with interest. “Ideomotion?It’s onetheory.”
“You’ve already researched Lucy weirdness?” he asked insurprise.
“I’m a scientist. I do not accept anything on faith and looked up divining rods. Google doesn’t explain what I feel. You’ll have to take my word that I had no idea where the farm was. It’s not as if there are directional signs, and I’ve only been here a few days. So the jury is still out on what thisstick can do as far as I’m concerned.” She walked along, unconcerned, studying how the fire had skipped patches of scrub and trees, depending on how the wind blew. The firemen had almost had the flames under control by the time it reached this area. The stench of wet ash and smoke wasoverpowering.
“I understand from Kurt that I’m supposed to welcome you to the family,” her half-uncle saidgruffly. “I should have done sosooner.”
“But you had me investigated first,” Sam said in amusement. “I can understand that. I’m still investigating metoo.”
Harvey had disappeared. Walker had said they were supposed to keep each other in view, but he’d also said that Harvey was a vampire who walked these hills at night. She had to assume Harvey knew what he wasdoing.
“Walkersays you’re the real deal, but he’s not telling me everything.” That sounded almost like a mayoralgrumble.
“Walker considers everything is on a need-to-know basis,” Sam acknowledged. “I didn’t know all that about Aaron, either. And he probably knows a lot about you that he’s not telling. Walker is a font of undisclosed information, but I trust him.” And she did, even though her circumstanceswere so weird, she shouldn’t trust anyone. Jade had taught her to be suspicious of other people’s motives, so she wasn’t naïve. There was just something aboutHillvale...
She crouched down to examine a pine seedling that had survived behind a boulder. The mountain would recover in a few seasons. She wasn’t certain about the lodge ortourism.
“Walker is a professional,” Monty admittedgrudgingly. “I don’t want to believe we have a killer in town, but Juan didn’t shoot himself in theback.”
“The police haven’t told you if they found anything?” Sam asked. “I thought for certain all that finger printing wouldhelp.”
Monty shrugged. “They searched the family vault and found a gun, but there are multiple sets of prints on it. They’re still testing ballistics to seeif it’s the gun that shot Juan. The sheriff seems to think Juan was shot in the security office, but the entire staff has access to it. Even Uncle Lance has been in there to get keys to his studio when he lost his. My mother keeps spare sets of keys there. There are fingerprints all over. With no motive, they havenothing.”
“What aboutopportunity?”
Monty shrugged. “Shots were reportedbefore midnight. I won’t go into the condition of the body, but the cops figure the time line is about right, a few hours before or after if there were any unreported shots. A lot of people were still up and around, but who goes back to the security area at thathour?”
“That’s about the time we heard the howling ghost. Surely they can make a list of people up and around then. I saw Harveywalking toward the cemetery right about thattime.”
Monty frowned. “The cemetery is a couple of miles from the lodge. There were a lot of people closer. Walker reported several of the Lucys, including Valdis, out and about within half an hour of the shots-fired report. He said my uncle was in his studio then. That’s close to the security office, but Lance claims to have seen nothing, whichisn’t unusual for him. Alonzo and Bernard were working the night shift and saw my mother’s Escalade go out, although no one saw who was driving. My mother said she was asleep and Francois claimed no knowledge of it. Kurt and I had just had a meeting with Xavier and Gump. And then there’s half the lodge staff and the guests who could have come and gone without anyone really noticing.Everyonehadanopportunity.”
“I hope they don’t suspect poor Xavier now. I’m afraid if he held a gun in his hand, he’d put it to his head. He seems to be an unhappyperson.”
But Xavier had carried a kerosene can. Would the same person who burned the mountain be the one who shot a man in theback?
“I remember Xavier from when my father was alive,” Monty said thoughtfully. “When he firststarted coming here, he didn’t pay Kurt or me any attention. But he seemed to change overnight, into a ghost of a man who jumped if we saidboo. I assumed he fried his brain on drugs, but he manages the rental office fine. He must have been sharp once. I can’t imagine him shooting Juan for anyreason.”
Sam hid her excitement at finding someone actually willing totalkto her. Walker wastoo professional to reveal police findings, and he hadn’t lived here all those years ago. “Do you think Juan’s death is related to the finding of theskeleton?”
“Yeah, I’m afraid it may be,” he said grimly. “Which will tie it to my family now that Walker’s father has been identified. My mother has suffered enough over all these years. I don’t want her put through that kind of grinder. Ihope she stays in Hawaii until this settles. It always relaxes her to getaway.”
“She’s sensitive to the negative energy, I suspect,” Sam said aloud, forgetting she was talking to aNull.
Her half-uncle went silent again.Oops. She cast him a look, but he was simply studying the terrainahead.
“The farmhouse used to be over by that patch of green on the left. Looks like thebluff protected the shrubs. There’s a stone foundation in there. Usually, morning glories cover it, but they won’t be blooming at this hour, if they survived. There aren’t too many hidingplaces.”
“Where would she hide a golf cart?” Sam studied what must have been her grandparents’ home, but in the twilight, it didn’t look any different than the rest of the mountain. She felt a connectionto the land but nothingelse.
“Daisy gets her stones from somewhere. I guess this is as good a place as any. She probably has a favorite spot for that ugly lump of metal. Daisy!” Monty shouted as they headed down the hill into the secludedbasin.
