Page 7 of A Touch of Murder (Touched #1)

Barret had planned on spending the morning calling morgues in the surrounding areas and had started doing just that when the call came in that they had a missing person on one of the trails.

Like everyone else working today, he left what he was doing and joined the Search and Rescue team along with the Fish and Game officers to help find him.

Like everyone else who had grown up in the area, he knew most of the trails by heart.

He also knew that a missing person didn't always stick to the trails and could be anywhere.

The fact that this person had probably been on horseback for a while and either lost his horse or fell from it told him they could be looking for someone who wasn't mobile.

"Take the quad runner and head up Sheep Camp Trail." The search commander, Gary Noring, handed Barret the key to the four-wheeler. "Vance, head up Cottonwood Trail and see what you find. You'll have to take a horse. The trail's too narrow for anything else."

The radio crackled and Barret paused, listening to the call.

"Just got confirmation that the horse belongs to Ray Rowin.

Edith said he went riding around six this morning and hasn't come back.

Edith told me he usually went up to Two Drops Falls when he went riding, but that he didn't tell her where he was headed this morning.

I've got two of my guys taking horses up Two Drops, but let's keep searching all areas within riding distance of the Rowins' place," Kyle Landers said over the radio.

"Gary, keep your phone close. I'm about to call you. "

"Might as well wait to see what he says." Vance stood beside Barret.

"Two Drops Trail is on the other side of the Rowins' property from here." Barret pointed down at the map. "If he usually went that way, we're wasting our time here. Where was his horse found?"

"Ernest Collins found it in his yard," Gary told them as his phone rang. He held up a finger and answered the call.

Barret exchanged a look with Vance. The Collins' place was just down the road from the Rowins' property.

The horse could have been returning home on its own.

He'd seen horses do that before. What bothered Barret was the fact that Ray spent his life on horseback.

It wasn't likely he'd let his horse just wander off, and he doubted Ray had been thrown unless something really spooked his horse, which was always possible in this area.

Gary set his phone down on the table and sighed.

"Sounds like we might be looking for a body.

Kyle took the saddle over to Touched to see if Adam Wrecker could figure out who it belonged to.

He sent Kyle to Edith, but said he had one of his visons and he saw what appeared to be a man clutching his chest and falling from the horse.

Said the man was dead, though I'm not sure how Adam would know that. But that's the update."

Barret frowned. "Don't tell me you believe in that hocus pocus shit that Adam Wrecker claims to do." He'd worked as an officer for years in the area, and knew the rumors of what Adam did, but now, in less than twenty-four hours the man was involved in two cases that Barret was working.

"I've never gone to see him, but I'll tell you about half this town would sing his praises. Believe what he does or not, he gives people the answers and results they seek. He saw enough just touching a saddle to send Kyle over to Edith." Gary shrugged.

"Maybe Adam had seen Edith or Ray with the saddle before and was able to lead Kyle there by that.

I'm not believing for a minute he got some kind of vision about who the saddle belonged to.

" Barret rolled his eyes. "Visions and feelings from touching something.

The only time I got those was when I learned not to put my hand on the stovetop when I was three.

" Even as he said the words, he recalled what Adam had seen with the handcuffs. He still couldn't explain it.

"Believe him or not. I don't care. But Edith said the saddle and horse were what Ray was on when he left the ranch this morning.

Time will tell if the rest of his visions come true.

This once, I'm praying that Adam was wrong.

" Gary held out his hand. "No point in going up those trails if Edith puts him on the other side of the highway.

It will take about twenty to thirty minutes for Fish and Game to get up to Two Drop.

If we find nothing there, we'll start searching over here. "

"Please tell me that Kyle didn't go over there and tell Edith her husband is dead." Barret wanted to scream at the insanity.

"Of course not. He just told her that Adam had recognized her in a vision when he touched the saddle and he'd come to see if it was hers.

No one is going to tell her the rest, though if it's true and Ray is dead, I'm sure the story will get out there and everyone will be talking about it.

" Gary turned away as another searcher walked up.

"Wrecker really gets to you, doesn't he?" Vance asked. "What happened last night at the table when he read your handcuffs? And don't tell me it's nothing. You freaked out and were out of his apartment in seconds. Something he said got to you."

Barret shook his head. "I just don't like him scamming people."

"Is he? If that was true, don't you think we'd have people complaining about him?

We'd be called to his store every afternoon when customers get upset.

If he's scamming people, he's the best scammer I've ever met.

He knows things, Barret. He sees things.

I don't know how, but you've heard people around here talk about him.

He gets results that no one else can." Vance sighed.

"You and I have been partners for a long time.

I've seen you react to a lot of things, but I've never seen you react the way you did last night when Adam held your handcuffs and said the things he did. "

"Just let it be." Barret wasn't going to discuss this.

Not here with others around. He didn't want his personal life flaunted in public.

Besides, he wasn't sure what had happened.

Somehow, Adam had known about his grandmother.

He didn't know how, but there was no doubt in Barret's mind that was who Adam was talking about.

"We've got bigger issues. We need to find Trina Wilson.

We should be back at the station working, not here wasting time if they think Ray is up Two Drops Trail. "

"We'll get back there and find her. I'm more worried about finding out what happened to her.

Someone took that girl. She didn't just leave her car with the doors open and all her things inside.

If she took off, she would have had her purse and her phone.

Hell, no teen goes anywhere without their phone nowadays," Vance said.

"We need to sit down and go through all the evidence again.

We had to miss something. I want to talk to her co-workers again, reinterview the parents.

Someone had to have heard or seen something.

She's been missing for nearly two weeks.

That isn't acceptable. We need to find her.

" Barret didn't want to think that Adam Wrecker could be right and that young woman was lying in some refrigerated shelf at one of the county morgues in the area.

He'd investigated murders before, but never had the victim been a teenager. He'd seen his share of bar fights or even domestic violence murders, but there was something about knowing someone hurt a child that just changed everything.

Damn it. Now he was thinking of it as a murder, not a kidnapping. Damn, Adam for putting that in his mind.

He walked back to their car and leaned against the trunk as they waited to hear if they found Roy.

He stared out over the area. They were parked in a large lot that many hikers used.

From the parking lot, you could choose several trails, some easier than others.

Barret had taken them all at some point in his life.

He didn't get out as much now as he had when he'd been younger, and as he looked out over the forest, he decided that needed to change.

He needed to take the time to go for a run or a hike.

He wasn't getting any younger. At thirty-four, he was starting to see and feel the changes in his body.

He watched searchers come and go from the area.

He loved this community. They always came together.

Even after two weeks, there were still search teams randomly going out looking for Trina, even after the official search had been called off.

And if Roy was really dead, the community would come together to help Edith and make sure she was taken care of.

He couldn't live anywhere else. This was home.

His radio came to life, and he listened as the call came in that searchers had found Roy Rowin and the search was being called off.

His condition wasn't announced over the radio just in case his family was listening, but Barret saw the way Gary's shoulders slumped as he talked on the phone, and he knew that Roy was gone.

Somehow, Adam had been right. One of the pillars of the community was gone.

His heart ached for the family. He'd gone to school with several of the Rowins' kids.

They'd all moved away since then, but he still felt the death deeply.

"Damn, I was hoping for a better outcome." Vance walked over and opened the car door.

"So was I." Barret looked over the people lingering around. No one looked happy. "Nothing more we can do here." He got into the car. "Let's go see what we can do about finding Trina Wilson. We can drop by the Rowins' tomorrow and offer our condolences and see if Edith needs anything."