Who did that leave? The game warden—Henry. He’d shown up the day they found Sheila. Tyler assumed it was because he was working in the area. He’d gone to Sheila’s funeral, and that’s when Sue learned he’d dated Sheila.
Then he stopped at the shop and said he was there to order a case of oil, but it had sounded like an excuse, especially when Robert told him he could get the samestuff at the superstore down the road without waiting for it to come in.
But the way he had just happened to arrive at the same time Tyler did, walking into the building with him, and the subtle threat he made when he left...looking back on it, it seemed a little too coincidental.
Tyler sank into the sofa, turning over the situation with Henry in his mind. Maybe it was a coincidence that he had been the one to show up when dispatch called. Just like it was a coincidence that Tyler was there that day.
They weren’t supposed to be hiking that trail. They had planned on another route, one in a different section of the wilderness area, but Robert had said he heard the loop trail was a good one to take.
Tyler leaned forward. “Well, that’s interesting,” he murmured.
The change in plans had come from Robert. Everything was set for the other trail until he and Sue arrived that morning to pick him up. Sue had no idea the plan had shifted and had been looking forward to the original hike, which promised both a challenging climb and a rewarding view at the top. Robert, however, said he wasn’t up for it. His back had been bothering him, and he preferred something easier.
Robert did sometimes complain of a stiff back now and then. But he’d said nothing about it on the hike, and he seemed perfectly fine when they came across Brooke and then Sheila’s remains. In fact, he hadn’t mentioned it since then.
He reached for his phone. His finger hovered over Robert’s name.
What are you doing?he asked himself as he put it back on the table.Gonna call your boss and accuse him ofmurder? Accuse him of changing our hiking plans so we could magically stumble across the body of someone he killed?Brilliant career move.
Besides, it was a stretch. Why would Robert kill Sheila? He could think of one obvious reason, but Robert didn’t seem the type to cheat on Sue. And then Monique? Why kill her? Unless Monique knew Robert was seeing Sheila.
Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe Robert was seeing Monique. Sheila knew about the relationship and...and what?
Sheila was blackmailing Robert. Hmm. Tyler could see that. Sheila told Robert she’d tell Sue about him and Monique, and he killed her. Maybe he killed Monique because she knew Robert killed Sheila. It was still a stretch but could fit.
Robert could’ve left the note on his truck, too, simply by slipping out the door while they were working. What about Brooke? Would Robert have attacked her?
He hated to think it could be Robert, but with him and Henry both as possibilities, at least he had somewhere to start instead of sitting around waiting for another body to turn up.
Because he couldn’t live with himself if that body was Brooke’s.
Chapter 29
Brooke
Brooke stared at her phone for the hundredth time that Sunday afternoon. The text thread with Tyler sat open, their final messages glaring back at her.
She’d made the smart choice. The safe choice. The choice that protected her business and her reputation, and, most importantly, her heart.
So why’d it feel like the worst mistake of her life?
Brooke set the phone down and pulled her knees to her chest. The house was too quiet. Too empty. She’d spent the morning sulking, the afternoon pacing, and now the evening was stretching ahead with nothing to fill it.
If she was smart, she’d go for a run. The doctor had cleared her for easy runs. No speed work yet, just a slow jog to clear her head. But even that felt like too much.
All she really wanted was to wallow in self-pity. No, that wasn’t it. What she wanted was to call Tyler and tell him she’d made a mistake. Better yet, go to his house and beg him to take her back.
But she knew she couldn’t do that. The whole situation gnawed at her. The evidence, the timeline, it all pointed to Tyler, and yet none of it felt right. It was too...perfect.
Brooke grabbed her phone and pulled up Joe’s number before she could talk herself out of it.
He answered on the second ring. “Hey, you okay? I heard about last night.”
She shook her head, brushing past the part about last night. Of course he had heard. Everyone probably had. She was surprised her phone hadn’t been buzzing nonstop. “I need your help.”
“With what?”
“I need to know everything about Tyler. Really know it. Not what Adam says, not what the evidence suggests. The actual truth.”
