Cowboy's Legacy

“Listen, you did right by calling me.” He tried to think of what to do. No way could they send an officer down there. Nor did he think the local law in Sheridan would be much help on this one. And he couldn’t go himself. He had to stay here in case there was a break in Maggie’s disappearance.

“Tell me what hours you work and where you live. I’ll send someone to take your statement.”

“I don’t know, man.”

“I’m not sending a cop. It’s a private investigator I know. I’ll have him contact you. Don’t worry. It’s someone I trust with my life—and yours and Jenna’s.”

Reiner sighed. Flint could tell that he was regretting this call. “Okay.”

Flint jotted down the information. “Give me your phone number. I’ll get right back to you.” He disconnected and called Curry Investigations in Big Timber, Montana. Former Sweet Grass County sheriff Frank Curry answered on the second ring.

CHAPTER FIVE (#u609b1c04-8cd3-507d-a667-9ac14df12f1e)

FLINT CAUGHT FRANK and his business partner–wife, Nettie, just before they were leaving for the day. From his office at the sheriff’s department, he filled them in on the Jenna Holloway case. He’d met them both on a state investigation some years ago when Frank was sheriff. A big man, Frank looked like an old-timey lawman with a gunfighter mustache.

He’d heard that Frank had retired and opened his own investigation business with Nettie. He admired the two of them doing that since they were both in their sixties. Most people their age were headed for their recliners.

“I got a call from a man in Sheridan, Wyoming, who says he’s been living with Jenna Holloway since March—but that now she has disappeared again,” Flint told them. He held the phone tighter. “I’d go check this out myself, but Jenna is not the only one missing. The woman I’ve been seeing, Maggie Thompson, is also missing. My undersheriff is doing everything possible to find out what happened. The DCI has been called in.”

“What can we do to help?” Nettie asked from a phone extension at their office.

“Kurt Reiner believes Jenna was taken by a man in a brown van a couple days ago. A brown van was seen on the same street where Maggie disappeared earlier today.”

“You think the cases might be connected,” Frank said.

“I think it’s a long shot at best. But both women are from here. If this man knows anything about Jenna Holloway and her disappearance...” His voice broke. “I can’t leave here in case—”

“We can go first thing in the morning,” Nettie said. “Just send us the information.”

“I really appreciate this,” Flint said. “Truthfully, I don’t think Maggie was taken by some man in a brown van. I think my ex-wife did something to her and it scares the hell out of me. But my ex is allegedly away at some spa, and this information on Jenna, who disappeared last March, just came in. When the man mentioned a brown van...”

“I understand. We’ll get back to you as soon as we’ve talked to Kurt Reiner,” Frank said.

He swallowed the lump in his throat, unable to voice his gratitude. He trusted this longtime sheriff, having heard nothing but good news about him. Nor was Frank’s wife any slouch when it came to investigating, he’d heard.

“We’ll start with Jenna,” Frank said. “Then we’ll see where you are on Maggie’s disappearance. We understand time is of the essence. If you need anything...” He read off their cell phone numbers.

“Thanks, Frank. I knew I could count on you. I’ve emailed everything I have. As soon as I hear from you verifying that Jenna was the woman living with Kurt Reiner, I’ll go out to the Holloway farm to talk to the husband. Anvil might have heard from her and just not called me. Or he could be involved. At this point, it’s all up in the air.”

“We have the photo of Jenna and the information you just emailed. We’ll be in touch.”

* * *

TEN O’CLOCK THE next morning, Frank sat down across from Kurt Reiner. Reiner was dressed in jeans, sneakers that had seen better days and a ragged T-shirt with a logo of some band Frank had never heard of. Somewhere around forty-five with a neck tattoo of a snake and a variety of other tattoos on his pale skin below the sleeves of the T-shirt, Reiner appeared to be trying to look younger. His eyes were steel blue with thick lashes in a pockmarked face that wasn’t quite handsome.

But there was something about him that Frank thought might appeal to a woman either looking for trouble or running from it. A quiet mousy woman who’d married a farmer ten years her elder might have looked at Reiner and thought he had something she’d missed out on. Especially since she’d apparently been drawn toward the wilder side of life before her disappearance.

The first thing Frank had done when he’d met Reiner at a local café was show him the photo.

“Yep, that’s Jenna,” the man had said. “Except now she’s a blonde.”

“You wouldn’t happen to have a photo of the two of you, would you?”

Reiner nodded. “I figured you’d want proof.” He dug out his cell phone and swiped for a photo. It was a selfie of him and Jenna in a bar. While not great resolution, there was no doubt it was Jenna—even blonde.

What struck Frank was that she looked younger than she did in the photo Flint had gotten from her husband. He took a photo of the pair and texted it to Flint to let him know that they had a positive ID while Nettie made polite conversation to distract Reiner.

“So how did you and Jenna meet?” Frank asked after the three of them were seated at a back table out of the way. Reiner had suggested the place, wanting to meet in public. Frank got the feeling that he was worried a half-dozen cops would be waiting for him.

Now Reiner shifted uncomfortably in his chair and shot a look toward the door. “So you’re a private dick?”

“Nettie and I are licensed private investigators, yes,” Frank said. “No one is going to arrest you.” He’d told him this on the phone but clearly the man had trust issues. He could tell that Reiner wished he’d kept his mouth shut about Jenna.

“You care about her,” Nettie said. “That’s why you’re here. Are you in love with her?”

Reiner blinked, his expression softening as he looked at Nettie. “She was sweet, you know? The kind of woman who takes care of a man.”

Frank wondered how she’d taken care of him, but let his wife take the lead. Nettie had a sense for these things. He’d learned to trust her instincts long ago.

“You must miss her.”

Reiner’s blue eyes filled with tears as he nodded. He swallowed convulsively, his Adam’s apple going up and down for a minute. “That’s why I called. If some...bad dude has her...”

“Then let us help her,” Nettie said. “We’re going to need to know everything she might have told you about the man, but let’s start with how you two met.”

He nodded. “She was writing to my brother, Bobby. He’s in prison in Deer Lodge.”

Flint had said she’d been writing to prisoners at Montana State Prison, but when she’d disappeared none of those men had been released, so they were cleared as suspects.

“He told me about her and that she needed help, so...” Reiner shrugged. “So I wrote her and we met. I had to help her, you know?”

“But when you met her, there was something about her that stole your heart,” Nettie said.

Reiner smiled. It was a good smile. Frank could see how a woman looking for a radical life change could have fallen for this guy. He had a certain charm.

“She told you about her husband?”

“He seemed like an okay dude. I think she felt bad for hurting him, but she had to get out of there since this other dude had started freaking her out.”

“There was someone after her?” Nettie asked.

“He followed her home one day from town, she said. She saw him drive by the farm real slow and then come right back by. She said that if her husband hadn’t come back on his tractor when he did...”

“She saw the man again?” Frank asked.

“He drove by the next day and later that night. Then one morning, he drove his van up in the yard. He must have thought that her husband was gone. But he wasn’t. Anvil, right?” Frank nodded. “He went outside to see what the man wanted and the dude took off.”

“Did she know who he was?” Frank asked.