The Ridge

now, I could use a drink. Which will it be?”

“You know, I just noticed that I gave you the wrong pages,” the gray-haired reporter said, his face suddenly full of Tom Sawyer innocence. “Silly mistake. I’ll be happy to—”

“Oh, give it a rest,” Kimble said. “We’re going to talk. It can be an official talk pretty easily. I don’t think you want that option.”

Darmus grinned. “Kimble, you look parched. Could I interest you in a beverage?”

Kimble didn’t smile as he said, “Roman’s, twenty minutes.”

Darmus put his vehicle into reverse and began the awkward trick of turning around on the narrow road and Kimble returned his attention to Audrey and Wesley.

“You’re on your own, guys. Make something good happen. If you need help, call for it fast.” He looked at the cats beyond and said, “Good luck.”

Then they left, too, Kimble and Shipley, the latter driving away from the preserve as if he were fleeing, and it was just Audrey and Wesley in the dark.

They stood in silence until the cars were gone, and then Audrey turned to him and spread her hands.

“What is the matter with you? The sheriff already doesn’t like us, and you’re acting as if—”

“Audrey,” he said, “I’m not acting any way. I’m not pretending. You haven’t been out here at night before. Things got a little…”

“A little what?”

“Nothing,” he said, because he realized that if he told her the story, she’d want to be out here herself. She’d want to see it with her own eyes. That didn’t seem like a good idea. If that light—and the feline response to it—was going to continue, then Wes wanted some time to watch it and consider it, alone.

“It’s just a change for them,” Wes said. “They’re stressed. You’ve moved before, Audrey. Didn’t you feel any stress? Well, imagine being picked up and moved, no consultation, no understanding. How would you react?”

“They were fine until that damned cougar—”

“No, they weren’t,” he said.

“What?”

He sighed. “They get agitated at night. Sorry I bothered you by bringing it up in front of the police. But they were pretty wild last night.”

“They seemed fine this morning.”

“I’m sure they’re adjusting,” Wes said. He was thinking about the blue light and looking at Lily. Lily was a gorgeous white tiger. Lily was also blind. She’d been rescued from a traveling animal show where she’d been kept in a tiny cage and fed dog food. Now she was almost four hundred pounds of beauty, but the terrible care of her youth had left her blind. If the blue light came back in the night, Wes wanted to see if Lily reacted to it. If she did… if she did, it would tell him something. Not what he was hoping, but what he feared.

“Can we get Ira back?” Audrey asked.

“Ira’s gone, I’d say. I’ll put a trap out there, but the way he took off didn’t seem to indicate he had plans for a return.”

“I still can’t believe he did that. What scared him so much? He was terrified.”

“Audrey? Go on home. Get some sleep. I’ll make sure the cats are safe.”

“Maybe I should stay here tonight instead of you.”

“Why?”

“Well, we’ve never seen anything like this before!”

“And you’re more qualified to deal with that than I am?”

“I’m not saying that. But it’s my preserve, my responsibility, so…”

“Audrey.” Wes shook his head.

“It’s my responsibility,” she repeated.

“No,” he said mildly. “It is not. When you and David hired me, you made me the preserve manager, and one of the stipulations was that I live on site. I believe it is my responsibility. I take that seriously. Now, it’s been a long day. Hard on everyone. The cats, you, me.”

“I know.”

“So let’s not get to tangling with each other, okay? Let’s not do that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’ll be here tonight, and I’ll make sure everything is fine,” he said. “Like I always have, Audrey. Every night since I’ve worked for you.”

“I know you will, Wes. I’m sorry for being bitchy about what you told the police. I’m just… I guess I’m just scared of what will come next.”

He looked away from her and out at the rows of glittering eyes in the night and said, “That seems to be a consensus.”

16

ROY SAT IN A BACK CORNER BOOTH at Roman’s Tavern and waited for Kimble with a mixture of apprehension and curiosity. The chief deputy’s insistence on talking with him was interesting, because it suggested that more than a lecture was at hand. If anger was driving Kimble, they wouldn’t have recessed to a local pub. There was a reason that this conversation was happening outside the sheriff’s department, and Roy had a feeling that reason was named Jacqueline Mathis.

He’d been waiting for about ten minutes when Kimble stepped inside with a folder in his hands. He paused and scanned the room and then nodded when Roy lifted a finger to catch his attention. Most of the bars in downtown Whitman were avoided like the plague by locals unless it was summer, winter, or spring break. Roman’s, on the other hand, had managed to create a perfect delineation over the years—the kids went upstairs, where the bartenders offered specials on terrible shots and massive speakers loomed in every corner, and anybody over thirty stayed downstairs, tucked into scarred wooden booths or on backless stools at a small, shadowed bar. Now, in the heart of winter break and on a weeknight, the place was nearly empty. Kimble sat down across from Roy, and when the waitress asked what he’d like, he said, “A glass of… um, just a Budweiser. Thanks.”

She left, and Roy said, “So are you going to arrest me?”

“Don’t laugh, old-timer. I could. You were tampering with a crime scene.”

“Technically, I think I was just observing it.”

Kimble said, “You’ve spent some time on those names, haven’t you?”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because if you went through the effort of swiping them from the lighthouse, then you’d check them out. So? What did you find?”

Roy hesitated. The waitress returned with their drinks, and he took a long swallow of his beer and said, “You weren’t down there tonight because of names on a map, Kimble. What’s up?”

“Unrelated matter.”

“Really? Blade Ridge is a hotspot for local law enforcement needs?”

Kimble looked at him with an expression that was torn between resentment and resignation, then tugged his department baseball cap off and ran a hand through his sandy hair. Emotion didn’t often show on Kimble’s face, but tonight the weariness had leaked through.

“One of the cats got out,” he said.

“There’s a tiger loose out there?”

“Cougar,” Kimble said, and sighed. He accepted the beer that was dropped on the table, then lifted the cold glass to his forehead as if it were a scalding summer day and not a December night. “The black one.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“I look like I’m laughing? Frigging thing jumped right over a fourteen-foot fence, with one of my deputies watching.”

“I remember when they caught that cat,” Roy said. “I’d written probably ten stories over the years about black panther sightings around here, and ignored maybe a hundred more tips. Then word got out that they’d caught one, and I didn’t believe it, but I went out to check. Ended up putting the picture of it front page and above the fold.