Page 51 of It's a Wonderful Knife

I gave him a grateful smile. “I’m used to having a team. I feel a little out of my element right now.”

“We’ll just do our best. I mean, the storm can’t last forever.” He sounded determined, but anxiety was clear as day in his blue eyes.

“I think we’ll be fine for now. My guess is whoever killed Santiago just wants to get off the property. I don’t think they’re looking to kill again.”

“But, of course, we don’t know why they killed to begin with.”

“Very true.”

Mona approached. “I’ve got everyone in the living room. Jax and the boys too.”

“Great.” I faked bravado. “Let’s get started.”

Once in the living room, I waited until everyone had quieted down. “I appreciate your cooperation, folks.” I cleared my throat. “As you’ve all heard by now, one of the guests, Santiago, has been found murdered.”

Everyone started murmuring again, and I let it go on for a bit; then I held up my hand, and they fell silent.

“Not sure if everyone here knows this, but I’m a sheriff from Rainy Dale, Texas. I’m going to be handling things as best I can, under the circumstances.”

“Did you call the local police?” Gianna called out.

I grimaced. “I tried. We’re having some trouble getting through on the landline.”

To put it mildly.

Gianna’s face fell. “Oh, no.”

“Why don’t we use our cell phones?” River asked.

Gritting my teeth, I said, “That’s going to be a problem.”

“Why?” Lucas wrinkled his brow.

I squared my shoulders and decided dancing around the truth wouldn’t help anything. “Because someone destroyed our cell phones.”

“What?” Penelope squawked. “What do you mean someone destroyed our phones?”

I sighed. “I’m assuming whoever killed Santiago didn’t want us calling the authorities.”

The room rumbled with uneasy conversation.

Leo tugged his phone from his pocket. “I have a cell. We can use mine.”

“I have one too.” Jameson nodded.

Speaking over the buzzing voices, I said, “We have a secondary problem. There’s no cell service in our area at the moment.”

Jameson frowned. “Not even for a 911 call?”

Lucas nodded. “Yeah, even if our network coverage is down, our phones can camp on a roaming network for emergency calls.”

I grimaced. “Apparently more than one tower is down because I tried dialing 911 and it’s not working.”

River turned to Lucas. “That’s not good, right?”

“No,” Lucas muttered. “That’s not good.”

I cleared my throat. “We’ll keep an eye on the signal. When it comes back, we’ll contact the authorities immediately.”