“Shouldn’t he be?”
It took her mother a moment. “Maybe not.”
McCall felt her mother pulling away, hiding again in the past. “Mother—”
Ruby did that little shrug of the shoulders thing she did when she’d been drinking. “He and Trace didn’t get along after that mess with Sandy.”
McCall already suspected that. “I doubt it will matter. Truthfully? It’s a cold case. Twenty-seven years is a long time. I suspect it will be impossible to find the killer.”
Did her mother look relieved?
Ruby’s cell phone rang. “Speaking of the devil.” She snapped open the phone. “Hello?” She listened, biting her lower lip, then said, “Thanks for letting me know, Grant.”
She put the phone back in her purse, unscrewed the cap on the tequila, then as if thinking better of it, screwed it back on and balled her cup up in her fist.
“Don’t lose your job over this,” her mother said after a moment. “Nothing can bring Trace back. It might have been better if he’d just stayed buried. I don’t want you looking for his killer.”
“How can you say that? Aren’t you relieved that he didn’t leave you? Don’t you want the person who took his life brought to justice?” McCall demanded. This was the last thing she’d expected from her mother. “I thought this man was the love of your life?”
“He’s gone, McCall. Hasn’t he messed up our lives enough?”
McCall stared at her mother. She could see that Ruby wished her daughter had never found the hunting license in the mud at the grave site, that Trace Winchester could be buried again and so could whatever had happened on that ridge.
But unfortunately once bodies were dug up, there was no burying them again. Even if McCall wanted to, Pepper Winchester wasn’t going to rest until her favorite son’s murderer was swinging from a noose.
“You know who killed him,” McCall said, knowing she was thinking crazy. But she kept remembering what Patty Mason had said about the mud on her mother’s pickup. Mud like on the ridge where Trace had been buried.
Ruby shook her head and sighed, suddenly looking exhausted. “Of course I don’t know who killed him. But if I had to guess, I’d say it was someone Trace had pushed too far.”
LUKE SANK A nail into the two-by-four and reached for another one. Restless, he’d decided to work on his house until dark. But he’d been having a hell of a time concentrating on the job.
He’d tried Buzz’s cell phone a half-dozen times and left several messages. He couldn’t help worrying since there had been no word.
Mostly, he was mentally kicking himself for coming back here thinking he stood half a chance with McCall. It seemed they were always on opposite sides of the fence. Now this thing with Buzz...
And yet when Luke thought about holding McCall in his arms last night, he remembered those few moments when it had felt so right. His kiss had taken her by surprise, but she’d responded and he’d felt the heat in her, that old spark of desire that had flickered like a campfire between them.
He reminded himself that she’d thought he’d run her off the road. It was like dousing himself in ice water.
Just as McCall believed he’d done something unforgivable ten years ago, and even though he’d sworn he hadn’t... Yeah, trust was a huge issue between them and he doubted there was anything he could do to fix that.
But he couldn’t bear the thought that McCall might be in danger and worried what might be going on. Buzz wasn’t stupid enough to try to run her off the road, was he?
Luke realized he didn’t know anymore. He had so many questions, and his uncle was the only one who could answer them.
Restless, he started to try Buzz’s cell phone again when he heard a vehicle coming up the road. Probably Buzz, he thought with relief.
Luke shaded his eyes as he watched the cloud of dust draw closer. Definitely a pickup, just not Buzz’s new one he drove.
Squinting into the sun, he saw the sheriff’s department logo on the side and couldn’t believe his eyes.
McCall?
He watched her drive into his yard, hoping this was a social visit, knowing it probably wasn’t. Had something happened to Buzz and Eugene and she was here to give him the bad news? No, the sheriff would have called, not sent McCall.
He stood in the shade as she climbed out of her pickup. Her dark hair shone in the fading sunlight. She moved with long-legged grace toward him. And as always, he was hit with such a need for this woman that it almost dropped him to his knees.
Turning back to his work, he drove a nail into another two-by-four, warning himself not to get his hopes up that her being here had anything to do with him. Or that kiss last night.
Chapter Ten
McCall followed the sound of the hammer toward the wooden structure etched against the sunset—and Luke Crawford.
She’d driven her mother back to town in time to get ready for Ruby’s date with Red Harper.
“Are you sure you’re up to going out tonight?” she’d asked her mother, trying to hide her surprise. “I could rent a movie, get us a pizza—”
“No.” Ruby had patted McCall’s arm. “I need to see Red. I want to be the one to tell him.”
McCall still didn’t know how her mother was really taking the news of her husband’s murder. Maybe it hadn’t sunk in yet. Or maybe it had and she’d been serious about McCall dropping her investigation. “Sure. Whatever you want.”
“Your father’s been dead to me for a long time,” Ruby had said. “I guess I just need time, you know?”
McCall had guessed so. Everyone in town would be talking about Trace’s murder. Being the woman left alone and pregnant didn’t garner the same kind of sympathy as being the widow of a man unjustly murdered in his prime.
