Page 145 of Seven Deadly Sins

“Footprints leading that way. The same footprints stopped there.” He pointed to a spot a few feet in front of Spooner’s truck.

“The shooter came from the trees, flagged Spooner down, then shot him?”

“That’s what I’m thinking.” He slid down the ditch and headed for the trees.

Torn between staying at the scene and following Liam, she chose to follow Liam. They’d vowed to have each other’s backs. That meant she went where he did.

By the time she reached the bottom of the embankment, her backside was covered in mud. She obviously didn’t have the skill Liam did. He didn’t have more than mud stuck to his polished shoes.

He moved back and forth, then pointed. “More tracks.”

The footprints headed straight for the railroad tracks.

The hair rose on Harper’s arms. The feeling of not wanting to know what they’d find filled her. Her hand shook as she placed it on Liam’s arm. “I’ve got a really bad feeling.”

“You and me both.” He patted her hand, then moved forward.

A shoe lay next to the tracks. A few feet further on, a gun. Most likely the weapon used to kill Spooner. On the other side, Harper spotted an arm parting the weeds. She looked both ways and crossed the tracks.

The man who had refused to speak to her lay dead, his sightless eyes staring upward. Accidental death or suicide?

Liam cursed under his breath, then apologized.

“I’ve never seen you like this.” She didn’t like it, either. She’d thought the always optimistic Liam to be annoying on occasion, but this side of him frightened her. The hope he’d always exuded seemed to slide off him in a thin trickle of despair, and she had no idea how to help him.

“Let’s get back to the highway. We’ve two crime scenes now.” He turned and marched back the way they’d come, stopping at the steep incline to give her a hand up.

“Thank you.” She stepped in front of him and peered up at him. Her gaze swept over his handsome features. She reached up and smoothed his dark, wet hair away from his face.

With a groan, he pulled her to him and claimed her lips in a kiss. Not a soft, exploring one, but a hot kiss that reeked of desperation.

Her first instinct was to pull back, reprimand him, but her body acted on its own. Her arms wrapped around his neck as she returned the kiss with all the emotion she’d kept bottled inside. She could explore what this meant later. Right now, they both needed this. Whatever this was.

When they were both breathless, Liam lifted his head and rested his forehead against hers. “I’m not going to apologize for that.”

“Okay.” Her word slipped out on a whisper. “Are you okay?”

“For the first time, I feel as if we might not win this. So, I kissed you. What if I didn’t and never got the chance?” He stepped back, his gaze piercing hers. “I’ll go back to being professional, but I can’t guarantee that I won’t kiss you again in a moment of desperation.”

She gave a slow nod, not sure whether she should be relieved or hurt that he’d kissed her in order to feel alive in the face of death. The crunch of tires alerted her to the fact they were no longer alone and saved her from having to answer.

~

Liam turned to greet the crime scene techs. “We’ve another body by the tracks. The shooter.”

The tech frowned. “It doesn’t happen often that someone gets hit by a train, but there isn’t a crossing here. I guess he could’ve stepped in front of it.”

“Maybe.” He didn’t think so. There was a small clearing between the trees and the tracks. The man would’ve spotted the train unless he really wasn’t paying attention. He supposed that could happen if you’d just shot someone in cold blood.

“The detective and I are going to look for the shooter’s vehicle. We’ll be back to assist you in any way we can.” He waved for Harper to follow him.

They turned left at the first railroad crossing, then down a dirt road that ran along the opposite side from Spooner’s truck. A maroon sedan sat off to the side of the road. “Let’s get the registration and find out who this guy is.”

The car had been left unlocked. Using a napkin from the car’s console, Liam opened the glove compartment and pulled out the vehicle registration. Mark Beck. He snapped a photo of the registration with his cell phone, then dug through the glove compartment for anything else that might help them. Nothing other than receipts and the car manual.

“Maybe we’ll get something when we put his name and the license plate through our system.” Harper stepped to the back of the car.

Liam straightened and studied the area. Pastureland stretched to the next rise where he could barely make out the top of a roof. He put the address on the vehicle registration into the GPS on his phone.