Wild Hearts. Sharon Sala

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      “What took you so long?” Trey asked.

      Earl looked embarrassed. “Gas gauge was sitting on empty. Had to stop and fuel up.”

      Trey nodded, and then pointed to the area in front of the barn. “Look for fresh tire tracks or anything off,” he said.

      Earl’s surprise showed. “I thought this was a suicide?”

      “Until the investigation is over, nothing is certain. And when you hear sirens, run back to the house and stop the crew from the sheriff’s department from driving down here, too. They’ll want to see the crime scene intact.”

      “Yes, sir,” Earl said, and followed Trey down to the barn.

Two

      Trey’s gut knotted as he looked up at Dick Phillips’s body. Because of Dallas, he knew this man almost as well as he knew his own family. As his mother had said earlier, it hurt to see him this way.

      He eyed the rope tied to the ladder leading up to the loft, then studied Dick’s clothing. The back of his shirt was very dirty, as was the back of his jeans, while the front of both was noticeably cleaner. It would take an autopsy to make sense of this.

      The floor of the breezeway was concrete, so there weren’t going to be any footprints. If more than one person had been in here when this happened, it wouldn’t show up that way.

      He walked all the way through the breezeway to the back of the barn and saw no sign of any footprints there, then walked back to the front, looking for signs of fresh tire tracks, but the ground was hard and graveled. Then he went into the egg room off to the right.

      The shelves and tables were all in place; nothing appeared to have been moved. There was no sign of a fight or a disturbance of any kind. The deep sink where Dick cleaned the fresh eggs before sorting was clean, and the new cartons yet to be filled were all in place. There were at least a dozen large empty plastic boxes, about the same size as a child’s toy box, stored beneath the shelves, with a stack of lids to fit leaning up against the wall. There was nothing out of the ordinary but the body hanging from the rafter. Nothing made sense. He walked farther back into the cooler where Dick kept the eggs, and turned on the light.

      There were shelves lined with cartons of eggs, each marked with the date they’d been gathered.

      Earl came walking back from checking the perimeter.

      “Find anything?” Trey asked.

      “Well, if he killed himself, he fed the chickens before he did it. There’s still some fresh scratch out in the coop, and the eggs have been gathered. However, the cows weren’t fed. There’s no fresh hay or ground feed in the troughs.”

      Trey frowned. “That’s weird. If he cared enough to feed the chickens before he took his own life, then he would have fed the cows, too.”

      Earl shrugged. “Unless he counted on them grazing. The grass is a little short, but it’s still good.”

      They began hearing sirens.

      “Sheriff’s on the way,” Earl said, and took off toward the house on the run.

      * * *

      Betsy watched her son walking down to the barn, then mentally rejected the sight of what she’d seen earlier and looked off toward the mountains for solace. She had always felt a measure of peace in being surrounded by the ancient peaks, but today it wasn’t working. Her head was throbbing, her eyes red and swollen from crying, and she felt like she’d been kicked in the gut. She shoved her fingers through her hair, absently rubbing the five-inch scar on the side of her head. Her hair hid its presence, but when she was upset it throbbed with every beat of her heart, and today was no exception. The shock of seeing Dick’s body had created a feeling of déjà vu, which made no sense. She’d never seen a traumatic death before.

      She stood abruptly, unable to sit still any longer, and began to pace the length of the porch and back, anxious for the sheriff to arrive so she could give her statement and move on.

      When her phone began to ring, she glanced at the caller ID and then let it go to voice mail. It was her daughter, Trina, and she would never be able to hide anything from her.

      She heard a phone begin to ring inside the house and felt like crying all over again. Someone wanted to talk to Dick. Would they weep when they found out, or would they feel nothing more than a passing moment of regret for a good man gone, then forget he’d ever existed?

      When she began hearing sirens, she actually breathed a sigh of relief. All she wanted to do was go home and be grateful for what she had.

      The sirens grew louder, and she saw the officer come running toward the house. She glanced down at her blouse, and when she saw how dirty she was, she began brushing at the dust and grass on her clothes, then wondered if her hair was just as bad. After she took it down and shook it out, and then combed it back with her fingers, she once again fastened it at the nape of her neck. She was as ready as she’d ever be.

      * * *

      Sheriff Dewey Osmond arrived on the scene with a knot in his gut. Dick Phillips was a fishing buddy, and he couldn’t believe this had happened. When he saw the police officer waving for him to stop, he braked and rolled down the window.

      “What?” he asked.

      “Chief Jakes figured you would want to park up around the house so as not to mess up any tracks or stuff you might find on-site.”

      Osmond nodded, wheeled up beside the city patrol car and killed the engine. He saw the woman on the porch when he got out.

      “Who’s she?” he asked.

      “Betsy Jakes, Chief’s mother. She came to buy eggs and found the body in the barn.”

      Dewey broke out in a sweat. He was going to have to go down there, and he was dreading it in the worst way. He decided the best way to begin this investigation was to take the witness’s statement.

      Unfortunately, as fate would have it, she had next to nothing to say that was going to help them figure this out. He took down her information and said for her to call him if she remembered anything else.

      “Am I free to go?” Betsy asked.

      “Yes, ma’am, and thank you for your help.”

      Betsy shuddered. “I would give anything to have never seen that,” she said. “Will you tell my son I’m leaving now?”

      “Yes, ma’am,” he said, and headed for the barn as Betsy got in her car and drove back to town for eggs.

      * * *

      Trey watched the sheriff’s team work the crime scene without comment. It wasn’t his case and he didn’t want to step on toes, but he had a personal request, and as soon as the sheriff stepped outside of the barn to take a call, Trey followed him. He approached after the sheriff disconnected.

      “Hey, Dewey, I need a favor,” Trey said.

      Dewey turned СКАЧАТЬ