But, to the best of her knowledge, Chase wasn’t aware of who she was, or her position as the manager of the gift shop, and she’d never been in a courtroom with him. She had no social media presence, no photograph associated with her published graduate school research. Did he even realize Abby had a sister?
Hearing a pitiful mewl, her gaze returned to the small black cat, who looked poised and ready to run if she got too close…but also eager to see what food offering Jules had for her. She angled her head as she studied the scruffy feline. “I can’t keep feeding you tuna. And you’re not really safe out here, even with that house I made.”
The cat crept a few steps closer. “Meow.”
Joy’s high-pitched mewl melted her heart. “I’ll bring you some real cat food when I come in the morning. For now, I think there’s some Vienna sausage about to expire in the storage room. How does that sound?”
“Merp.”
“Okay. I’ll be right back.” Once she scrounged up an older can of canned sausage from the storage room, she returned to the back door, where the black kitten hovered at the threshold, peeking inside. She dumped the meat on a paper plate, broke it into bites and carried it to the stoop. “Here, you go, Joy. Eat up.”
Although the cat scurried away when Jules approached, stopping long enough to hiss over her shoulder, by the timeJules was in her car and pulling out of the parking lot, Joy was gobbling the sausage.
Her heart twisted. She hated to see the poor, cranky kitten scrabbling for food and vulnerable to predators. Could she catch Joy? Bring her inside? What was she supposed to do with a kitten, especially one that was largely wild and armed with four razor-sharp death mittens? She told herself she was cuckoo to pursue this path, but when she reached her motel room, she would place a call to the local animal rescue group to inquire about borrowing a humane trap.
She wrapped her arms around herself to ward off the chill in the air. Casting her gaze around the dark North Dakota plains, she shivered at the vast emptiness of the surrounding grassland. Only last night, two men had met out here at the isolated sculpture, and one man had ended up dead. A man she’d seen alive, talked to just moments before he was killed.
In the distance, a coyote yipped and whined, and a disturbing thought she’d been trying to hold at bay finally presented itself at the fore of her mind. The man in the red hoodie had clearly been concerned about cameras capturing his likeness. And while he had hidden his face from Jules, what was stopping the killer from coming to permanently silence her?
She shuddered and considered calling Cal—no, don’t allow yourself to be distracted with his casual manner. She chewed her bottom lip and weighed asking the sheriff about her own safety during this investigation. But all she had to do was remember how dismissive every law enforcement officer she’d trusted with Abby’s safety had been to know when it came to her protection, she was on her own.
Chapter 8
Cal whistled to himself as he parked in the driveway of the house he shared with his father, the house where he’d grown up. Sure, he’d have thought by now he’d have his own place, maybe be married with kids. But since his parents’ divorce, he’d taken upon himself the responsibility of keeping an eye on his father. Dr. Jonathon Colton was a brilliant physician, but he could be absentminded. A loner. So focused on his work and patients that he sometimes forgot to eat and neglected sleep.
At times, Cal felt like he was the parent, reminding his dad of appointments and apprising him of family news, doing the grocery shopping, cooking and monitoring Jonathon’s health. The duty had become second nature since his father had been rather absent throughout Callum’s life, and Cal had assumed a number of paternal roles for his siblings. Especially following his parents’ divorce.
After his mother left the marriage and the family home, Jonathon had become all the more work-focused and closed off. As the oldest child, Cal hadn’t hesitated to step in to fill the void.
Pilot trotted out into the grass and sniffed around, and Cal waited for his dog to finish his business before keying open the mudroom door and standing aside as Pilot squeezed inside first. He was about to flip on the kitchen light when he noticed Pilot’s body going still, his ears pricking with alertness to a sound. Pilot gave a low growl that made the hair on Cal’s nape bristle.
Someone was in the house—someone that wasnothis father, since Pilot knew Jonathon and his smell as well as he knew Cal’sscent. And there hadn’t been another car in the driveway, his father’s or anyone else’s.
Cal unsnapped the strap over his service weapon at his hip and edged deeper into the house, wondering why the security alarm on the house hadn’t sounded or sent a notification to his phone.
He heard bumps and rattling sounds coming from upstairs, and he moved quietly through the dark house to the foot of the stairs. Pilot stayed right beside him, his nose sniffing the air, then lowering to follow the scent up the steps, his canine body taut. A light glowed from one of the bedrooms upstairs, though he couldn’t tell which one from this angle.
The thumping of footsteps and distinctive squeak of the upstairs hall floorboards told him the intruder was on the move. He hunched low behind the banister and was about to take the stairs when Pilot’s body language shifted. Eased.
His dog’s ears relaxed, and his tail wagged. He gave a friendlywoofof greeting.
“Well, hi, Pilot. How are you, ol’ boy?” said a voice Cal knew immediately, and he let his tense shoulders sag in relief.
His younger brother Dylan appeared at the top of the stairs and bent to ruffle Pilot’s fur. When Dylan noticed Cal standing on the bottom step, his smile faltered, and he raised both hands. “Whoa! Don’t shoot, Cal. It’s me.”
Cal let a low grumble roll from his throat and took his time putting his service gun away. “I should shoot you on principle. What are you doing lurking in my house without turning on any lights, much less letting me know you were in town? I thought I had a B and E.”
Dylan, his dark, shaggy hair currently accompanied by unkempt facial hair, lowered his hands and flashed an apologetic grin. “Sorry, Callum. You’re right. I shoulda texted or something. I’m just in the habit ofnotletting anyone know where I am, andso…” He buzzed his lips and shrugged instead of finishing his excuse.
“Did you disable my security system?” Cal asked, arching an eyebrow. His brother, a special agent with the FBI, was perfectly capable of such, and it would explain why the house alarm hadn’t alerted him.
“No,” Dylan snorted. “I got the code from Dad when I called to let him know I needed to get a few things from my closet. Dad clearly didn’t share the news I was home.”
Cal snorted. “Come on. You’ve met Jonathon Colton. Do I really have to answer that?”
“Again. Sorry for startling you. Although,” Dylan said, coming down the steps with an easy gait, “if you don’t want intruders, you should consider changing your security code now and then. You’ve had the same one for a few years now, haven’t you?”
“I’ve tried changing it before, and Dad invariably forgets that it is changed and sets it off in the middle of the night. He finally asked me just to leave it alone and keep the old code permanently.”
