The Mountain's Shadow

the doorbell rang.

I opened the front door to see a middle-aged man whose tan uniform strained over a belly that had probably been fed at the town diner too often. He stood with feet planted shoulder-width apart and thumbs hooked into his black belt. His sheriff badge said he must hold some respect in the community.

“May I help you?” I asked. I had no reason to be nervous, but there’s something about a cop appearing at your door that prompts a quick examination of conscience. Had I gone too fast through the community? Did I roll through a stop? Was I supposed to have a parking permit?

“Miz Fisher?”

“Yes, and you are?”

“Bud Knowles, sheriff.” He held out his hand, and I took it. His handshake was firm, if a little moist. “I just wanted to make sure you’re rightly welcomed to the community.”

“Thanks. Would you like to come in?”

His face lit with a grin. “I’d love to, ma’am.”

I suspected the true reason for his visit was to check out the place, but I didn’t mind. I had nothing to hide.

“I just made some coffee. Would you like some?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Call me Joanie, please. How do you take it?”

“Black.”

This guy was not going to be easy to talk to. I led him through the sitting room, where Lonna sat at the card table to the right of the fireplace with an open file. As most men do, Bud Knowles took a second look.

“Who is that, Miz Joanie?”

“My friend Lonna. She’s a social worker with the state. Her friend Matt called her up here to help with the missing kid problem.” Gads, I sounded flippant. The truth was this laconic sheriff made me nervous. I felt like the kid whose teacher has suddenly appeared at the door to talk to her parents.

Bud’s only response to my statement was a heavy sigh. I brought him into the kitchen, and after some searching, found a few cobalt blue mugs and poured the coffee—black for him, with cream and sugar for me, and with cream for Lonna. Apparently Galbraith had done a little grocery shopping when he left the note, and there was at least some creamer in the fridge and sugar in a stainless-steel tin on the counter.

“This seems like a nice community. Crystal Pines, I mean.”

The sheriff looked at his coffee so hard I wondered if a bug had landed in it. “It was nice until the kids started disappearing.”

“That must be awfully hard on the people here.”

“Some of them.”

“I’m glad you’re here. I’m sure Lonna will want to talk to you.”

“I’d rather deal with her than the Feds.” He winked.

I took a deep breath and prepared to change the subject, but Lonna walked in.

“Coffee’s ready,” I told her.

“Thanks.” She held out her hand to Knowles, who stood up so quickly he bumped the table, and his coffee sloshed. She ignored it and smiled. “Lonna Marconi, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Bud Knowles, sheriff,” mumbled the red-faced man. I hid a smile as I wiped his coffee with a dish towel and poured him a little more.

“It’s so nice of you to stop by,” Lonna said as she sat and crossed her long, slender legs in full view. “Is this a social visit?”

“More or less. Just wanted Miss Fisher to know she could call on us if she needs anything.”

“How kind of you.” Lonna smiled at me. “Joanie, isn’t that kind?”

“Very.”

“Now, Mr. Knowles, you came at a good time. I was just thinking about how to get in touch with you.”

She was turning on the deep charm now. I hoped she remembered our earlier conversation and would ask the questions I wanted too. I took a deep breath and attempted to calm the resentment building in my chest at her usurping the situation. Not that I had been doing spectacularly, but there were some things I wanted to know.

“Yes, ma’am?” asked the sheriff.

“I’m with DFCS”—as I had, she avoided mentioning she was also a licensed P.I.—“and I was wondering what you could tell me about the children who have vanished.”

Bud had no more information than Matt had given us. When asked about the full-moon connection, he only said, “I don’t believe in that voodoo witch stuff.”

“Now, Mr. Knowles, I have one more question.” She studied her coffee as though attempting to divine an answer to a long-standing riddle, then hit him with the full force of her gaze. “Do you know what happened to Joanie’s grandfather?”

Bud looked over at me, and I tried not to betray how eager I was for the answer. He leaned back and laced his fingers over his ample gut. “Well now, we don’t rightly know.”

“There must have been something,” pressed Lonna. “Fortunes like this aren’t handed over at the mere suspicion of death.”

“All I know is we found his canoe, life jacket and shoes a little ways down the river. The jacket and shoes had been chewed, and there was some blood, but no body.”

My breath left me as though someone had punched me in the stomach. Lonna put a hand on my arm.

“What did the coroner say?”

“Likely the old man’d had a heart attack and drifted down stream ’til he ran aground, and then wild animals got ’im. I’m sorry ma’am,” he said to me. “I thought that city lawyer would’ve told you.”

“He didn’t.” I tried to still the welling tears. I hadn’t been close to my grandfather for years, but I had been fond of the eccentric old man. He had been the one steady source of support in my family after my brother died and my parents divorced. Some days I would take comfort in knowing I had a safe haven if I needed it. Now that security had been shattered.

“If it’s okay with Joanie, I’ll see you out, Sheriff.”

Lonna and the sheriff both got up and walked out of the room. I held tight to the coffee mug, heedless of the heat scalding my palms, so my hands wouldn’t shake. The image of a black wolf flashed into my mind.

Has my grandfather been hunted down too? What have I gotten myself into?

Chapter Three

After the sheriff’s departure, Lonna and I sat in silence and sipped our coffee.

“Somebody wants you to have this place, Joanie.”

I resisted the urge to look over my shoulder. “Either that or somebody doesn’t want someone else to have it.” Like Leonard Bowman. As much as he’d been described as a loafer living off his brother’s generosity, he looked like he worked toward some sinister purpose.

“Regardless, you're the designated heir. I have a mystery to solve, so I need to ponder my strategy,” mused Lonna. Her eyes focused on a spot on the wall, and I knew she was drawing up a list in her mind. It was the same look she’d gotten on numerous previous occasions—some innocent planning, some diabolical plotting.

“You can stay here as long as you like,” I told her again. “Goodness knows I don’t need all this room.”

“And you probably need the company. I don’t know that you’re safe here.”

“Thanks.” But I felt the same way.

“The locals probably wouldn’t be very forthcoming with me,” she continued, “so how about you talk to them? If nothing else, they may remember the ‘old man’s little granddaughter’. You’re sort of a local.”

“If spending six weeks for five summers makes you a local.”

“It’s more credibility than I’ve got.”

“True. Who will you talk to?”

The corners of her lips turned up in a cat’s smile. “I’ll keep in touch with the charming Sheriff Bud Knowles, of