“It’s okay.” Hannah kept her face neutral as Cooper cleared his throat to redirect the conversation.
“That’s why we need you,” he explained. “There was no bullet found on the ground and yet there was blood. There was no wound on the deceased’s body. The coroner found he died of a heart attack. We want to know how that’s possible.”
“It sounds like a mystery,” Jacob noted. “A very odd mystery ... in a very odd place.” He slowly turned as he surveyed the downtown street. “How many people were present at the time of the altercation? I mean ... were there more people on the street? More than what you indicated, I mean.”
Hannah thought of the dancing man and shook her head. “It was the end of the day. We were just about to do our usual search for stragglers.”
“Basically, the individual at the bottom of the mountain keeps track of how many people come up, and how many come back down,” Cooper explained. “He had just transferred up the information that five people were still on the mountain and we were twenty minutes from closing.”
“Where were the other individuals?” Jacob queried.
“There were two women in the dry goods store and one man in the post office buying commemorative stamps.”
“And then the other two were the men who got into the altercation on the street.”
“Correct.”
It was only then that Hannah understood something important. She’d seen the dancing man with her own eyes. She had no doubt that he was there ... and yet if everybody else was accounted for, that meant he’d somehow appeared on the mountain without anyone seeing him. He couldn’t have ridden up or down the chairlift and the vehicles in the lot were counted, too. You needed a parking permit to even pull into the lot. So how had the strange man made his way to the top of the mountain? It was simply another mystery to be unraveled.
“Well, I don’t know what to make of any of this,” Jacob said, clearly missing the inner turmoil Hannah was mired in. “I guess, to start, it would be best to talk to the re-enactor who had his gun stolen.”
“Justin,” Boone volunteered. “He has an apartment about twenty minutes from here.”
“Well, then let’s head over there. I’m as eager to figure out what’s going on here as you are.”
EVEN THOUGH COOPER WANTED TO stay with Hannah, he thought it best he go with Boone and Jacob. Justin was an employee of Casper Creek, and he wanted to make sure that the man wasn’t inadvertently railroaded. Cooper had no doubt that Justin was innocent and had nothing to do with what had happened. Jacob, however, seemed easily confused. He was hard to pin down.
“I don’t understand why there’s an apartment complex out in the middle of nowhere,” Jacob noted as he glanced around at the nondescript three-story building as the trio moved from the parking lot to the building thirty minutes later. “I mean ... there’s nothing out here.”
“There’s not,” Boone agreed. “It’s an ideal location between towns, though. Casper Creek is twenty minutes that way. Smiths Grove is twenty minutes that way. Cave City is twenty minutes that way.” He pointed accordingly. “It’s an ideal location when you have people working in different towns.”
“Oh.” Jacob nodded in understanding. “The towns are so small that husbands and wives — or girlfriends and boyfriends for that matter — can’t always find places to work in the same town. This place allows them to live together but work in different places.”
“Exactly.” Boone nodded. “My understanding is that Justin was single, though.”
“He was,” Cooper confirmed. “The only reason I know is because he was telling a story a few days ago about going to one of those singles mixers at the line-dancing bar over in Cave City. I thought it sounded like a terrible time but he was raving about it. He says women love a man who can dance, and apparently he’s good at it.”
“I bet you’re glad you got Hannah without having to dance,” Boone teased.
“I’m glad I got Hannah period.”
“She’s very pretty,” Jacob agreed, trailing behind Boone as the sheriff double-checked the apartment number on his phone before knocking on the door at the end of the hallway. “She almost looks ... exotic.”
Cooper wasn’t sure he liked Jacob commenting on Hannah’s looks, but since the man hadn’t said anything untoward, he simply nodded. “She’s beautiful.”
“And Cooper thanks his lucky stars she agreed to date him every night before he goes to bed,” Boone cooed on a smile.
Cooper wasn’t embarrassed in the least to admit his friend was right. “I do.” He frowned when Boone knocked again. “I wonder where he’s at. I can’t imagine he felt like going out last night.”
“I don’t know.” Boone glanced down the hallway. “Do me a favor and get whoever is behind the front desk and have them bring up a master key.”
“You want to enter without a warrant?” Jacob asked, surprise etched across his face. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“The residents here sign an agreement that says that management can let police into their units without a warrant. They’re aware when they move in that it’s a possibility. We don’t need a warrant.”
“Oh, well, then let’s do it.” Jacob beamed. “I didn’t realize that was a thing, but it sounds like a great idea.”
It took the daytime manager five minutes to arrive with a key. He didn’t look happy, but he understood what was expected of him. Once the door was open, Boone was the first through it, and the scene he found waiting for him in the living room was enough to turn his stomach.
“What is it?” Cooper asked, instantly on alert. He could read the sheriff better than most and knew when something terrible had happened.
“He’s dead,” Boone replied grimly, moving outside to get some air so he didn’t have to remain trapped in the tight atmosphere. “I think he ate his own gun, but we’ll need confirmation from
