Page 15 of Mystery at Rescue Ridge (Rescue Ridge #5)

O wen had no intention of being caught off guard twice, despite the flood of anger trying to distract him.

He scanned the surroundings as he paced out back.

Controlling his temper hadn’t been an issue since he was young and riddled with hormones.

Ever since his skin had cleared of acne, he’d prided himself on maintaining a steady state.

The turmoil from recent events, along with Evie’s return, left him scratching his head, wondering where the old Owen had gone. The new one’s emotions brimmed at the surface, ready and willing to launch an attack on his peaceful state after exchanging nothing more than a few words.

Damn.

Get it under control, dude.

Out of the corner of his eye, a flurry of movement deep in the woods caught his attention.

Owen’s instincts had him wanting to give chase.

Better judgment told him to alert Evie and tell her to lock the back door.

He fired off a quick text. It took all of five seconds to let her know.

He bolted into the woods the second he heard the snick of the lock, confirming the house was safe.

Running alone might be a risk, but by all accounts, Size Eleven worked on his own. One set of tracks meant someone was likely fixated on Evie. Perhaps someone who’d followed her from Dallas, or—a thought popped—someone who was a little too happy about her return to town.

Someone following and watching didn’t necessarily mean trouble. Except he’d learned a long time ago that Peeping Toms graduated to either burglary or rape. The latter was unthinkable.

Branches slapped his face and torso as he bolted toward the distant sound of twigs snapping. Fear produced adrenaline. Adrenaline gave the kind of boost that made athletes out of normal people for short bursts.

Could Owen catch the bastard once the boost wore off? Because he wasn’t making progress based on the sounds ahead.

He couldn’t get a good look at who, or what, was running. It could be an animal. Perhaps a deer. There were plenty of those in these parts.

No. This was human. A deer would be long gone by now. Owen was fast, but he couldn’t outrun the animal, and he was not losing ground to the runner.

In this direction, the runner would intersect with the farm road leading toward his family’s ranch.

A dirt bike engine stalled Owen out. Based on the sound, there was no way he was going to catch up.

Hating the thought of leaving Evie alone to fend for herself, he circled back.

He checked his phone for service; found no bars.

Dammit. He couldn’t call Travis until he ran back.

The dirt bike driver would be long gone by then.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Getting this close and coming back with nothing ate away at his insides.

It might be time to go over the list of everyone Evie knew on a personal level, going all the way back to high school.

The Hiker might be someone they’d gone to school with or had worked in town while she’d lived here.

Her return had sparked someone’s interest.

At the back door, he gave the secret knock and waited.

Evie opened the door. Eyes wide, she said, “Thank heaven you’re all right.” She wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his chest.

“I’m good,” he managed to say. It occurred to him that she must have been worried sick the second he told her to lock the door and then took off. “I didn’t mean to scare you like that.” He brought her into an embrace. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” The two words she said were the exact opposite of the truth.

She pulled back, sniffed, and wiped her eyes before grabbing his hand. “I already called the sheriff. You need to see something.”

He let go of her hand long enough to lock the door behind him. Losing the connection, even for a few seconds, tightened the stress knot in his chest.

“What did you find?” he asked as she walked him over to the kitchen table where the laptop was open.

“You mentioned playing videos on the TV for the kids to feel like their parents are still here in some small way, so I searched to find a few that I could maybe loop together.” She sat down and pulled a chair next to her.

He took it and studied the screen. “What the…?”

“Exactly,” she said, tapping her palm on the table as she sat back and let him watch the video playing out.

“I always wondered how my sister was making ends meet. She gets some money from the military, but it isn’t much.

And, of course, there are other survivor benefits that she gets to claim, but I couldn’t figure out how she bought a brand-new sport utility vehicle a couple of months ago. Now, I know.”

He studied the website as shock took hold. “The woman’s face is always blurred or just out of the camera range. Are you sure this is your sister?”

“No question.” She zeroed in on a photograph. “See that birthmark there on the top of her foot?”

He strained to make it out. “The strawberry?”

“That’s the one,” she said. “It’s my sister’s birthmark.”

Owen looked away from the screen, unable to spend too much time focused on Simone in suggestive poses, wearing various role-play outfits. The name of her business was Lonely Military Wife.

“Knowing Simone, this is next to impossible to fathom.” He couldn’t imagine a world where wound-tight, perfect daughter Simone would do such a thing.

“Based on the darkness outside the windows, Simone worked this job at night after the kids went to bed. Speaking of which, she shot videos in her own bedroom. Look at the duvet and the headboard.”

He glanced over at the screen but couldn’t keep his gaze there for long. It made him feel like a Peeping Tom.

“She has a lot of followers, too,” Evie continued. “Tens of thousands.”

The investigation finally had a break, except tracking the followers and filtering through them would take time—time they didn’t have if this guy decided to up his obsession. “This guy could have you confused with your sister.”

“Her hair is brown, mine is red.”

“Look at the wigs she wore,” he pointed out. “Plus, you have the same general height and build.”

Evie frowned. “And Simone never revealed her face to her followers.”

He forced his gaze back to the screen. “See all the private chats? She set this up where the commenters couldn’t see each other’s posts.”

“But she could interact with each one,” Evie said. “She literally copied and pasted her responses because the comments are so alike.”

“That definitely made it easier for her.” He still couldn’t picture Simone with a website like this one, but every family had secrets. Hell, every person had secrets. He couldn’t help but wonder about Evie’s. Every time he brought up the past, she was evasive.

As he looked at her reflection on the screen, he wondered about her secrets. Would he ever know?

By the time Travis arrived, the kids had eaten lunch and were down for their nap.

A call to Ms. Bart had delayed her arrival until three p.m., when the kids were likely to wake.

The widow wasn’t happy about the schedule change and made it known.

Asserting authority over the condescending Ms. Bart hadn’t been easy for Evie.

Having Owen in the room had helped. He’d made a fist and pumped it when Evie had stood her ground.

When the call ended, he’d given her a hug and told her that she’d done the right thing.

He’d reminded her that Ms. Bart got paid to help and, therefore, worked for Evie, not the other way around.

When he put it in those terms, taking charge became more comfortable.

As much as she needed all the help she could get with the kids, Evie needed to call the shots.

She had to start sometime and figured this was as good a time as any.

Travis studied the laptop while a deputy roamed the grounds, searching for the dirt bike tracks. The last report had them disappearing onto the farm road a mile and a half from Simone’s house. My house. This whole situation was going to take some getting used to.

“I should probably check Simone’s room to see what else I can find in there,” Evie said. While Travis checked the computer, there wasn’t much else she could do.

“I’ll go with you,” Owen said.

“Take these.” Travis pulled latex gloves from a backpack he’d brought in. “Wear them and holler if you find anything.”

“Got it.” This was a potential crime scene now. She headed to the master bedroom, which was on the first floor. There was a small room turned nursery downstairs in the same hallway. Upstairs, there were two bedrooms and a shared hallway bathroom, complete with a claw-footed tub instead of a shower.

Owen followed, then sat on the edge of the bed while she opened the closet door.

“I found the gun in here.” It just now dawned on her why her sister had kept a gun when she’d been terrified of them. “I wonder if Simone felt threatened by some of the folks in the chats, and that’s the reason she saw a need to protect herself and the babies.”

“Makes sense.” Owen leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “Based on some of the messages I read, she entertained these people’s fantasies.”

“I’m still trying to wrap my mind around goody-two-shoes Simone having an internet business in the adult entertainment industry.” Seriously, Evie never would have believed it in a million years if she hadn’t seen it for herself.

“It speaks to how desperate she was to be home with her kids and provide a living for them.”

“Couldn’t my sister have sold jewelry or candles with snarky labels?”

“This required no start-up costs or ongoing expenses. It was quick and easy. All she needed was a website.”

“I thought the lighting equipment was to take pictures of her samples to sell online.” This whole scenario was going to take some getting used to.

“The last thing Simone would’ve wanted to do would be to tell you what she was really doing. Admitting that would have been the worst, given her squeaky clean past,” he said.

“Do you know how many times my sister told me to get better grades so I wouldn’t rock the boat at home?

” She blinked at him from deep in the closet.

Feeling along the back wall, she searched for some kind of opening or trap door.

The other items in the shoots had to be stored somewhere far out of reach from the littles, not to mention Ms. Bart.

Speaking of Bart, she would have a conniption fit if she knew what her employer had really done for a living.

“I have to admit, I wouldn’t have expected anything like this from her.”

“Travis will probably want to interview Ms. Bart, too,” she said.

How much gossip did she want to get out about her sister?

Grapevines in small towns could damage a family’s reputation.

Evie didn’t care so much about what folks thought of her, but the kids didn’t deserve the unwanted attention news like this would bring.

“Is it wrong that I want to protect Simone?”

“I’d worry about you if you didn’t,” he said.

His comment made a faint smile appear. She knew how close he was to Archer and how much he loved his siblings.

“I still have guilt over leaving Chloe to fend for herself after escaping town. I think we all do. She was the youngest and needed our protection. We were too young to see past our own pain.”

“No one can fault you for getting as far away from Beaumont as quickly as you could, Owen. The man was a monster.”

“I just think it’s ironic that the minute we were old enough to defend ourselves, we took off rather than stayed and stood up for each other.”

“You did in your own way,” she said.

“Chloe has been to hell and back because we abandoned her.”

“It’s not fair to yourself to take on that responsibility.

” She realized she was doing much the same.

She exhaled a slow breath. “It would be one thing if Simone were here to defend herself. I’d still be protective, but she was a grown adult capable of handling the consequences of her own decisions.

The kids, on the other hand, are innocent. They didn’t ask for any of this.”

“Travis will exercise discretion in the investigation. You can count on that. His deputies have proven trustworthy. I’m the only other person who knows what really went on here, and I’m not about to tell a soul.

” He chuckled. It shouldn’t be sexy or stir up those feelings that made her want to kiss him again, but it did.

“Besides, I’m half certain my family doesn’t think I talk much anyway. ”

She shot him a look of disbelief. “You’re a regular chatterbox with me.”

“Funny.”

“You can’t shut up,” she quipped. He wasn’t a chatterbox, of course, but it broke some of the tension to jab at him and have a reason to laugh, even if it rang hollow.

“Have you tried masking tape over my mouth?” His smile faded like the memory of it actually happening to him had caught up with the quip.

“I’m sorry that happened to you, Owen.”

“I appreciate it, Evie.”

“No. Seriously. That must have been awful. You’re big and strong. Being caught unaware can happen to anyone, but it doesn’t usually happen to someone who can fight like you can.”

“There’s a first time for everything.”

“Believe me when I say those words have never been truer.” Her fingers landed on a loose vent. “I think I found something.”

Owen was at her side in seconds. He squeezed in next to her in the small closet. Old houses didn’t have the closet space she’d gotten used to in Dallas.

She tugged on the vent. It came out a little too easily to be an accident. “Who puts a vent in the bottom of a closet?”

“No one,” he confirmed.

“I’m not sticking my hand in there.”

“Scoot over. I’ll do it.” As it was, they sat so close their outer thighs touched. Heat swirled.

Owen repositioned and then reached in. “Found something.”