Page 5 of Engaging the Deputy (Silver Stars of Montana #3)

Jaden shone his flashlight beam on the body crushed under the old block wall before calling for backup to secure the scene where Rob Perkins had been killed.

He’d seen at once what the rescue crew had.

Deep footprints in the dirt, where it appeared someone had stood—and waited?

—before struggling to push a portion of the wall over his victim—who hadn’t been dead very long.

The deep tracks in the soil were a dead giveaway this hadn’t been an accident.

Perkins lay on his back, his body crushed under the blocks and cement. Only his head and shoulders were free, his arms raised as if he’d been trying to ward off what was coming for him.

At the sound of a bloodcurdling scream from higher up on the hillside, Jaden felt his heart drop. Wasn’t that the area where Emery had told him Olivia had gone with Cody?

He turned to the state law-enforcement officer who’d arrived.

“If you keep everyone away from here until the rest of the state Department of Criminal Investigation arrive, I’ll see to whatever that is,” he said and took off up the hill.

It was hard getting around in the debris.

He’d had to make a wide circle to get to the small crowd on the hillside.

As he drew closer, he saw several people standing over a hole in the ground.

Behind Jaden, the sun was starting to rise over the mountains, turning the sky pink.

One of the two rescue workers was attempting to climb down into the hole with the help of the other.

The woman was standing off to the side. Olivia?

“What’s going on?” the deputy called to them.

“We have an injured man down in an old root cellar,” he called back as Jaden advanced on them.

As the woman turned, Jaden felt a start. Relief made his knees go weak. It was Olivia and she didn’t seem to be injured. She seemed startled to see him.

“I hadn’t heard that you were back in Montana,” he said as he glanced in the hole. He’d gotten only a glimpse of Cody Ryan lying awkwardly in the bottom of what was left of the root cellar. He appeared to be unconscious.

As he felt the ground shift under him, he quickly stepped back. Taking Olivia’s arm, he drew her away from the hole as the search and rescue team did their work.

Living in Fortune Creek to the north, he’d only recently met Cody. He was the high school sweetheart she’d told him about. After what Cody had told him about how she’d broken his heart, he hadn’t expected to hear that they’d been together out here.

“He was fine when I left him,” she kept saying now.

“He wasn’t injured in the storm?” Jaden asked.

“No, he was fine. He couldn’t climb out. I told him I would go get help, but when I came back…” She began to cry. “I don’t understand what could have happened. And…” She motioned to a spot along the wall away from Cody’s body. “We found those bones. Cody said they’re human.”

The deputy shone his light on the bones.

Cody might be right, he thought. They appeared to be human bones.

They’d know more once the coroner had a look at them.

His mind was more on what Olivia was doing out there, of all places, with her old boyfriend.

Not that it was any of his business. Not anymore.

Jaden had agreed with Cody on their chance encounter that Olivia was indeed a heartbreaker.

With a sigh, he pushed that thought away. He already had one suspicious death. Now this. “You climbed out and went for help?” He couldn’t help but wonder why it had taken her so long. “How long ago was that?”

“I don’t know. I got turned around trying to navigate this mess out here.

” She sounded close to tears. The debris had made it difficult to move.

Look how long it had taken him to make it up the hill.

But he couldn’t wrap his mind around what Olivia was doing with Cody out here, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the night.

If Cody had been injured after she’d left him, could it have been the same person who’d pushed a wall over on Rob Perkins?

Where was Olivia when that was happening?

One member of the search and rescue team, a paramedic, confirmed that Cody’s vitals were strong. His only injury appeared to be a blow to the head.

“Deputy,” he called up. “There’s a rock down here with his blood on it. Would you like me to bag it for you?”

“Please,” Jaden said and saw Olivia shoot him a look.

“You think someone did this to him on purpose?” She seemed shocked at even the idea.

“Did you see anyone else around before you left Cody?” he asked, telling himself whatever his problems were with Olivia, she wasn’t a killer.

“No, it was dark, and all I could think about was getting him help out of that hole.”

“But you’re sure he wasn’t injured when you left him?”

“He was fine,” she repeated more adamantly. “He just couldn’t get out. He insisted I go get help.” She started to cry. “If I’d stayed—”

“You might have been injured as well,” he told her. “Do you know anyone who might have wanted to harm him?”

She shook her head. “No. That is, I don’t know. I’ve been gone all these years.”

Exactly, he thought. “How long have you been back?”

“Only a few days.”

Jaden nodded. “You and Cody together again?” He knew she and Cody had been close from the time they were kids. They’d grown up next door to each other and had years of history.

She seemed surprised by the question. “No.”

“But you were out here with him.” He hated that he sounded like a jealous lover. He needed her to tell him why, after being gone for years, she was here with her old boyfriend at what was now a murder scene. A double murder scene, if Cody didn’t make it. And they still had people missing.

“We’re just friends.” She shook her head. “After tonight, maybe not even that anymore.”

He felt his pulse jump at her words. “Did the two of you have an argument?”

She seemed to realize what he was asking. “I didn’t do anything to him,” she snapped indignantly. “I told you he was fine when I left.”

At the sound of more sirens headed their way, Jaden stepped away to make two calls. One to the coroner, the other to the EMTs to tell them that they were needed high on the hillside to help get an unconscious man out of a root cellar.

Disconnecting, he stepped back over to where Olivia was standing, hugging herself. Her face was streaked with dirt and tears. Still, she looked beautiful.

His cell rang. He stepped away to talk to the state crime team.

Photographs of the scene had been taken and they were ready to get the body to the morgue.

A helicopter had been arranged to airlift Cody Ryan to the hospital.

One of their biggest problems was moving through all the wreckage left by the tornado.

Jaden kept looking back at Olivia, standing alone as a team worked to maneuver Cody out of the hole. There was still some speculation about where the helicopter would be able to land. At least the sky was getting lighter, visibility better.

He caught a glimpse of Cody and his head wound as he was brought up.

Clearly, it had bled a lot, as head wounds tended to do.

The rock he’d been hit with was large. Too large for the average person to throw down into a hole onto a man.

But it could have been rolled. Not that Jaden had noticed any rocks like it nearby, none especially in the hole, except for the one that had injured Cody Ryan.

Jaden couldn’t believe he had one suspicious death on his hands and an assault, along with two missing people: Jenny Lee and Dean Marsh.

As Olivia watched an unconscious Cody Ryan being lifted from the hole in the ground, Jaden observed her. He didn’t want to believe she’d had anything to do with what had happened out here tonight. But he couldn’t stop questioning what she’d been doing there with Cody to begin with.

More rescuers arrived to help dig through the debris for bodies as the sun rose behind the mountains, announcing the new day.

The deputy took statements from everyone, let the parents of Tammy and Whitney take their daughters home, and then made calls to both Jenny Lee’s husband and Dean Marsh’s wife.

To his surprise, Jenny was home, her husband said. She’d called him to pick her up. From the emotion he heard in the husband’s voice, he was aware that Jenny had been out in Starling with Dean Marsh.

“Did you happen to see anyone else when you picked up your wife?”

“You mean someone like Dean Marsh?” Tom Lee asked sarcastically. “No. I didn’t see him.”

Jaden asked to speak to Jenny, who sounded contrite. She swore that she and Dean had gotten into an argument and she’d taken off, walking down the road, where she’d called her husband and he’d come to pick her up. They’d just missed being caught in the tornado.

The deputy thanked her and kept the rescue workers searching for Dean Marsh’s body as the new day began.

He called his boss, Sheriff Brandt Parker, to let him know that he had one suspicious death, another man unconscious with a suspicious injury, and a missing man who’d been involved with another man’s wife.

“That’s all?” Brandt said.

“No. The storm uncovered some human remains. Oh, and my former fiancée is here with the unconscious man who is being transported to the hospital.”

His boss swore. “And I thought I had a rough night with all the storm calls. Any suspects?”

“Lots of them, including Elden Rusk’s ghost. I wouldn’t be surprised if they all tell me they saw Rusk in the storm, walking away from Starling, carrying something heavy.”

“The gold,” Brandt joked. “What the devil were they doing out there?”

Good question, he thought. “Some kind of Halloween dare, apparently. Though one of them could have had an ulterior plan to commit murder. The confusion during the tornado gave him or her the perfect opportunity.” He shuddered as the sun rose so he could see the devastation and how little was left of Starling. “It’s a miracle any of them survived.”