Justice at Cardwell Ranch

“Just … what if he didn’t do it? What if they killed him?”

“They? Who?”

“Don’t listen to me. I’ve had a few too many beers tonight. So, are you sure I can’t talk you into coming to the reunion? Even if I told you I have a theory about Tanner’s death.”

“What theory?”

“Come to the reunion. Call me when you get into town and I’ll tell you. Don’t mention this to anyone else. Seriously. I don’t want to end up like poor old Tanner.”

“That could have just been the alcohol talking,” Liza said when he finished.

“That’s what I thought, too, until he wanted to meet at the falls after dark. Something had him running scared.”

“With good reason, apparently. Alex Winslow is a former friend?”

Jordan nodded.

“You weren’t just a little suspicious, meeting in the dark at a waterfall?”

“I thought he was being paranoid, but I played along.”

“You didn’t consider it might be dangerous?”

“No, I thought Alex was overreacting. He was like that. Or at least he had been in high school. I haven’t seen him in twenty years.”

“Why, if he knew something, did he wait all these years?”

Jordan shrugged. “I just know that Tanner wouldn’t have killed himself. He was a smart guy. If anything he was too smart for his own good. I figured if there was even a small chance that Alex knew something …” He glanced over at her. “Apparently, Alex had reason to be paranoid. This proves that there is more to Tanner’s suicide.”

She heard the determination in his voice and groaned inwardly. “This proves nothing except that Alex Winslow is dead.” But Jordan wasn’t listening.

“Also it proves I wasn’t such a fool to believe Alex really did know something about Tanner’s death.”

She studied Jordan for a moment. “Did he say something to you before he was shot?”

His gaze shifted away. “I can’t even be sure I heard him right.”

“What did he say?”

“Shelby.”

“Shelby?”

He nodded. “We went to school with a girl named Shelby Durran. She and Tanner were a couple. At least until Christmas our senior year.”

HUD HAD JUST RETURNED with the kids when he got the call about the shooting.

“Go,” Dana said. “I’ll be fine. Stacy is here. She said she’d have the kids help her make dinner for all of us.”

He mugged a face and lowered his voice. “Your sister cooking? Now that’s frightening.”

“Go,” his wife ordered, giving him a warning look. “We can manage without you for a while.”

“Are you sure?” He took her hand and squeezed it. “You promise to stay right where you are?”

“Promise.”

Still, he hesitated. He’d been shocked to walk into the house and see Dana holding a baby. For a few moments, he’d been confused as to where she’d gotten it.

“Has Stacy said anything about where she’s been?” he asked, glancing toward the kitchen. He could hear the voices of his children and sister-in-law. They all sounded excited about whatever they were making for dinner.

“Southern California. She’s headed for Great Falls. There’s a military base located there so that makes sense since she says the baby’s father is in the military.”

“If Stacy can be believed,” he said quietly.

Dana mugged a face at him. But telling the truth wasn’t one of her sister’s strong suits. It bothered him that Dana was defending her sister. He figured the baby had something to do with it. Dana was a sucker for kids.

“Stacy seems different now,” she said. “I think it’s the baby. It seems to have grounded her some, maybe.”

“Maybe,” he said doubtfully.

“Go on, you have a murder investigation to worry about instead of me.”

“You sound way too happy about that.”

LIZA ALREADY HAD THE CRIME scene cordoned off when Hud arrived. He waved to the deputy on guard at the falls parking lot as he got out of his patrol SUV. The coroner’s van was parked next to the two police vehicles.

“The coroner just went in,” the deputy told him.

He turned on his flashlight and started down the trail. Hud couldn’t help thinking about his wife’s siblings trying to force her to sell the family ranch. They’d been like vultures, none of them having any interest in Cardwell Ranch. All they’d wanted was the money.

Jordan had been the worst because of his New York lifestyle—and his out-of-work model wife. But Stacy and Clay had had their hands out, as well. Hud hated to think what would have happened if Dana hadn’t found the new will her mother had made leaving her the ranch.

He smiled at the memory of where she’d found it. Mary Justice Cardwell had put it in her favorite old recipe book next to “Double Chocolate Brownies.” The brownies had been Hud’s favorite. Dana hadn’t made them in all the time the two of them had been apart. When they’d gotten back together six years ago, Dana had opened the cookbook planning to surprise him with the brownies, only to be surprised herself.

Two of her siblings were back in the canyon? That had him worried even before the call from his deputy marshal that there’d been a murder. And oh, yeah, Liza had told him, Jordan Cardwell was somehow involved.

Now as he hiked into the falls, he tried to keep his temper in check. If Dana’s family thought they were going to come back here and upset her—

Ahead he saw the crowd gathered at the top of the falls. He headed for the coroner.

Coroner Rupert Milligan was hugging seventy, but you’d never know it the way he acted. Six years ago, Hud had thought the man older than God and more powerful in this county. Tall, white-haired, with a head like a buffalo, he had a gruff voice and little patience for stupidity. He’d retired as a country doctor to work as a coroner.

None of that had changed in the past six years. Just as Rupert’s love for murder mysteries and forensics hadn’t.

“So what do we have?” Hud asked over the roar of the falls as he joined him.

Rupert answered without even bothering to look up. “Single gunshot through the heart. Another through the lungs. High-powered rifle.”