Page 63 of Skin Game

“Elton said there were notebooks, the spiral kind.” Althea scowled at Gabe. “She was always writing stuff down, like she was some sort of Harriet the Spy. Where are they?”

Now there was a book Gabriel hadn’t thought about in decades. Heidi had loved it and had bought Gabe a copy that he’d tucked away somewhere after reading once. When he got out of this hellhole, he was going to track down a copy and read it again.

“Where are the damn notebooks?” Althea demanded.

“No idea.” Where they were was where he’d left them, under the passenger seat in the Honda, along with his laptop. Information Gabe did not plan on sharing with Althea or the losers she employed as henchmen.

“Carla and Holly were your sisters, then,” Gabe mused.

“Carla,” Althea said with a dismissive sneer, hatred gleaming in her eyes. “Carla is the one who fucked up the whole gig by telling Holly about it. Then she went and died—drove right off the road. I thought I’d freed myself of Westfort but no, I had to come back and mind her useless grandchildren for their useless father. I only agreed because I figured I could finally find out what happened to those drawings.”

Althea glared at Gabe. “At least Holly had the decency to take care of her own damn messes.”

“Except you still don’t know what she did with the artwork,” Gabriel pointed out with a smirk.

Let’s keep it this way, Chance.

TWENTY-THREE

CASEY – FRIDAY EARLY

Hours passed and there was no sight of or word from Gabriel.

Casey tried to rest, convincing himself that driving around in the pitch dark with rain pissing down only meant emergency services would be pulling him out of a ditch, but staying inside hadn’t stopped his brain from spinning. Elton’s couch was a torture device in disguise, anyway, not meant for sleeping and certainly not for someone Casey’s size.

Instead, he’d spent the last few hours wondering what had happened. Add in the young woman who’d turned up dead and?—

Casey tried not to imagine the very worst but failed miserably.

As Gabe would say, whatthe fuck?

Yesterday evening, as requested by Acting Chief Deputy Eagan, he and Elton had visited the Sheriff’s Office. They’d had nothing to add to the facts that Eagan and her team had already gathered.

“It’s a bit early to report Karne as a missing person. He’s an able-bodied, healthy adult,” Eagan had told them. “But I am concerned. If he doesn’t show up by midmorning, we’ll rethink filing a report.” She’d raised a hand, making a calming gesture. “I know you’re both worried. And it is worrisome, but this isGabriel Karne we’re talking about. We found no blood or signs of a struggle, and we all know Gabriel’s good at taking care of himself.”

They had found his phone though, half hidden underneath the remains of his couch. If Gabe didn’t generally keep it on silent mode, Casey would have been able to find it when he’d called his number.

“How would you be able to tell if there’d been a struggle in that mess?”

That comment had earned Casey a stern look from the acting chief deputy.

“I’ll have my deputies keeping an ear out tonight, and we’ll talk again in the morning,” Eagan had promised. “If either of you think of something or if he calls, feel free to call me. Don’t worry about the time. It’s shit weather out there tonight, so please don’t do anything stupid.”

She’d handed each of them a business card with her cell phone number and desk number.

“My updated number. You call that and you’ll reach me directly.”

Thwarted and hating feeling helpless and freaked out, Casey had loaded Bowie up in the Wagoneer and they’d followed Elton back to his place.

“I was already planning on you two being here. Gabe had found something.”

“He didn’t tell you what it was, did he?”

Elton shook his head. “Just that he was bringing the notebooks and wanted to show us something.”

They’d eaten chicken soup paired with Sailor Boy Pilot crackers and rehashed the facts they had gathered as they understood them. Which was not many and not well. By the end of the meal, they had a list. It started with now dead Mia Witherspoon showing up on Gabe’s doorstep Monday morning and the trip to Westfort that afternoon.

“Maybe somebody from his past saw him in town or someplace else he’s been this week? We need to track it, just in case,” Elton said. “Tuesday you drove to Seattle, which prompted Gabe to do some research at the library and Public Records on Wednesday. Westfort again.”