Page 5

5

“They’re saying she was murdered.” Molly Evans stepped barefoot into the glassed-in deck at Sam’s house. Sam was staying overnight in Blackbear, where he tended to pick up all the hottest news. She’d just gotten off the phone with him, while Ani and Charlie and Lila set out bowls of popcorn and a pitcher of margaritas.

Girls’ night had just taken a very dark turn.

Lila curled her legs under her on the love seat. Normally she loved this deck, especially this time of year, when the cottonwoods lost their leaves and you could see all the way through the bare branches to the mountains.

But murder…somehow the word made the gray sky look even more ominous.

“What else did he say?” Charlie set down a roll of paper towels that would serve as napkins.

“Just that she hasn’t been identified yet. They’re trying to figure out who it is, but she doesn’t seem to be a local.”

“How do they know it was murder?” Ani asked. Ever since she’d divorced John Walsh and gotten together with Gil, she had a look about her that her friends hadn’t seen in many years—relaxed and content. “Couldn’t it just be a drowning?”

“No, because they found a knife wound in her back,” Molly explained. “That’s not what killed her, but it’s probably what sent her into the river. Then she drowned.”

Images flooded through Lila’s mind. A woman stumbling through the woods. A knife hurtling through the air, ripping into her back. Pain, panic…rushing water… white water.

She shuddered and blinked them away. It was just her imagination. This was Firelight Ridge, where her intuitive ability was dampened. She wasn’t picking up actual images of what had happened. It was just her mind filling in the blanks. “So sad,” she murmured. “I’m glad it wasn’t anyone we know. We’ve had enough drama around here.”

Charlie quirked a smile at her as she plopped onto a cushion on the floor, her long blond ponytail swinging behind her. “I love how you talk like an old-timer.”

“I’ve been here longer than anyone in this room,” Lila pointed out, making everyone laugh. But it was true. After she’d come to Firelight Ridge, Molly had come looking for her, and then Charlie and Ani had shown up to help in various moments of crisis. But Lila had been the trailblazer, and she took pride in that.

“No arguing with that.” Molly chuckled as she poured out margaritas from the pitcher. “Okay then, old-timer. You tell us. Is it common around here for murder victims to float down the river?”

“Don’t they usually show up in the spring after being frozen in the snow all winter?” Charlie lowered her voice for more drama. “Sometimes nibbled at by wild animals?”

“How did this conversation get so gruesome?” Looking distressed, but still stunning, Ani accepted a margarita from Molly. Ani and Gil were still deciding if they were going to stay for the winter, and Lila didn’t want to scare her off with gory details.

“Our murder rate is very low here,” she assured her friend. “It’s much more likely that you’d get buried by an avalanche or chased by a bear or…” Realizing that was the wrong tactic, she smoothly shifted gears. “Or have a nice peaceful winter reading by a cozy fire while watching the snow gently fall through the spruce trees.”

The others cracked up.

“You should have told us you got a job with the tourism bureau,” joked Molly. “How are you going to describe The Fang? Upscale dining at one of Firelight Ridge’s most iconic establishments?”

Lila made a face at her. “It is iconic. Besides, you’re going to see for yourself that I’m right.”

Molly and Sam had decided to spend the winter here, even though Sam’s secret surveillance job was technically over. Molly felt she had unfinished business with the Chilkoot children and their legal status, and once she took on a mission, she never abandoned it.

“I’m very much looking forward to that, although I’m also keenly interested in the murder possibilities. How about that murder spree here back in the eighties? I’ve heard it mentioned a few times, but I still don’t know the details.”

That incident had been on Lila’s mind ever since the dream she’d had a couple of weeks ago. “I hate that phrase, murder spree. It makes it sound like Spring Break or something, like a fun thing. A horrible, vengeful man snapped and decided to take his frustrations out on a bunch of his own fellow townspeople. That’s just a terrible situation.”

“So you do know the details.” Charlie licked salt off the rim of her glass, her eyes wide with interest. “I asked April to tell me the story, but she refuses to talk about it. She says it was a black mark on Firelight Ridge and bad for business.”

April owned the most expensive inn in town, Fire Peak Lodge, and she’d recently put Charlie in charge while she dealt with legal issues arising from a crime committed in the late nineteen seventies.

“It’s hard to get the straight story.” Lila eyed the popcorn, but decided to pass for now, especially if she had to talk about that incident. “I’ve heard a few different versions of it at The Fang. At first I heard the shooting happened at the airstrip. People used to gather for the arrival of the plane that carried the mail. There was no post office, so you’d just show up and collect your mail from the bag on the plane.”

“So the gunman was going for maximum density of population?” Molly winced. “Sorry, that sounded very cynical. He wanted to make his mark, is what I meant.”

“Maybe.” Lila shrugged. “But then Pinky Bannister told me that the murders were spread out over a couple of days while they tried to catch the guy. It’s hard to know the truth.”

“There must have been news coverage.” Charlie, always the computer-savvy researcher, reached for her iPad. But Lila shook her head.

“Not really. Back then, so few people lived out here. Less than forty, or so I’ve been told. There wasn’t a newspaper that regularly included news from Firelight Ridge. We’re talking about oral history, really. The first time I heard about the shootings, I went to the general store to get Wi-Fi and check it out. The only mention I found was in a true crime podcast by a guy named Jim Sutcliff.”

“What did he say about it?” Ani’s dark eyes were fixed on her as if Lila was reading her a fascinating bedtime story.

“He called it the Snow River Murders. I know, so over the top. Apparently the killer lived on Snow River and was kind of a hermit. His name was Paul Anthony Bowman. He was bitter because his wife had divorced him, and he’d moved out here for a fresh start. The long winter sent him off the deep end, and he just snapped. At least that’s what the podcast said.”

“You don’t believe that?” Molly’s eyebrows drew together. She was a lawyer and very good at solving puzzles. Lila could tell she didn’t find the alleged motive very persuasive.

“I have no idea. Why wouldn’t I?”

“Didn’t one of the victims live in your house? Maybe you’ve picked up—” Lila cut Charlie off before she could finish the thought.

“No. I haven’t.”

The dream didn’t count. It was just a dream. Not a vision, or a premonition, or anything more than neurons firing while she was asleep.

She realized that her friends were all looking at her with various expressions of surprise. Not because she hadn’t picked up anything, but because she was so vehemently denying having done so. She hadn’t told any of them about her dream.

“Anyway, Allison Casey was a victim, not the murderer. How would she know why she was killed?”

“Allison Casey?” Molly set down her glass. “You know her name?”

“Of course I know her name.” Hadn’t she always known her name? Lila frowned, trying to remember how she’d learned it. “I’m sure someone told me when I first moved in.”

“You never mentioned it before. You told us about her dress, but I’m pretty sure you didn’t say her name.”

Ani put her hand on Molly’s arm, a signal to lay off. Molly had always been Lila’s fiercest protector, even in adulthood, but she could also be quite the interrogator.

“Well, I’m sure someone told me, that’s all. Anyway, I still have that podcast if anyone wants to listen to it. I can’t say if it’s accurate or not. Besides, I’m more interested in the woman they just found. Molly, what else did Sam say about her?”

“Hmm…well, he said that Bear found the body.”

“ What ?”

She’d barely seen Bear over the past few days, but he hadn’t mentioned anything about finding a dead body.

Ani caught her expression. “He didn’t tell you?”

“No. But of course he doesn’t tell me everything. I’m just his employee.” She startled as her friends all burst into laughter. “What?”

“Do you really believe that you’re just Bear’s worker bee?” Charlie scoffed. “When you’re around, that man can’t take his eyes off you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Bear was…well, he was Bear. Ever-strong, ever-silent, ever on-guard, ever ready to come to the aid of anyone. Not just her.

“I thought you were supposed to be intuitive?” Molly teased her. “You really haven’t noticed how he looks at you?”

“Stop it.” Lila felt heat flood her cheeks. “Bear has always been purely professional around me. It’s insulting to say otherwise. He would never do anything inappropriate with someone who works for him.”

“Oh come on, this isn’t some corporation with a human resources handbook.” Charlie rolled her eyes, which Lila considered completely unnecessary to make her point. “Are you saying you wouldn’t want something to happen with Bear? Completely consensual? Like, he comes to you and looks into your eyes and asks if you’d like to come over for a hot tub. I hear he has a Japanese-style soaking tub under a spruce grove.”

Lila opened her mouth, then closed it again without answering. The question was impossible to answer because now all she could think of was what it would be like to see Bear without any clothes on, soaking in a hot tub. He was such a big guy, in her imagination he nearly filled the tub. But he’d make room for her. The steam would rise between them into the trees overhead, and the light from a candle would make his dark eyes gleam.

“Darn you,” she murmured. “He never told me he had a hot tub.”

Everyone laughed again, but there was nothing but affection in their amusement. “Maybe it’s time you got to know Bear a little better,” said Ani with a smile.

“Good idea. I think I will.”

But despite their very obvious wishes for a hookup, Lila knew exactly where she was going to start. With that poor woman in the river.