Cold River - Carla Neggers [72]
He continued down the narrow road. It curved close to the river along an old stone wall. Would he have survived here two hundred years ago, with such harsh conditions?
Yes.
He was a survivor.
He pictured Hannah’s soft mouth, her pale eyes and the gentlest spray of freckles on her cheeks. He’d been fascinated with her ever since he’d first walked into Three Sisters Café shortly after it had opened, when its future was still uncertain. He and Vivian had come to Black Falls shortly after the bar fight at O’Rourke’s. He’d heard different accounts about Hannah’s role. He’d run into Drew Cameron not long after he and Chief Harper had gone to the river hollow to find Bowie.
“Bowie screwed up,” Drew had said. “No question. But I have a feeling he’s not telling all he knows about why he did what he did.”
“Do you think he was protecting someone?”
The older man had shrugged without comment.
Lowell had persisted. “Was he protecting Hannah?”
Again Drew hadn’t answered.
Lowell stared out at the ice formations on a bend in the river. What had Hannah seen yesterday at the crypt? What did she suspect?
What did she know?
She wasn’t as meek as Lowell had thought. He’d expected her to run after she’d heard her name eerily whispered in the isolated cemetery. Instead she’d grabbed a shovel and kept coming, determined to find Bowie. She was strong—in her own way as tough as any Cameron or Harper, if softer, more vulnerable.
Lowell reminded himself that he’d succeeded. Bowie’s arrival at the cemetery had caught him by surprise, but he’d managed to hide in time, then thought quickly, acted decisively, and knocked the rocks and debris on him and dealt with Hannah. He’d escaped down the wooded hillside without her or Bowie or Sean Cameron spotting him.
He hadn’t intended to take such an enormous risk. It’d just worked out that way. He’d seized the first clear—or what he’d thought was clear—opportunity to retrieve the copper wire he’d stored in the crypt. Now it was safely tucked in his woodshed.
By itself, the wire wasn’t incriminating. With black powder, gunpowder, a pile of cell phones—then it would be a problem.
He’d never meant to be an operator, but he’d done what he’d had to do. He’d proved to himself a thousand times in the past year that he could step up to the plate and get the job done himself when necessary.
He was strong, too. Yes, he was a survivor.
Eighteen
Sean came to a crooked stop at a meter down from Three Sisters Café and didn’t bother to straighten out the truck. He didn’t feed the meter, either. He was too impatient, and he had no intention of staying in the spot for long. He’d pay the damn parking ticket if he got one.
He launched himself up the sidewalk. The café lunch crowd had geared up, people ordering sandwiches on twelve-grain bread, wraps, quiches, the homemade soup of the day and servings of shepherd’s pie, chili and chicken pot pie.
He didn’t care. He went in through the main door and headed down the center hall, under the sweeping stairs to the kitchen.
Dominique Belair came at him, her fists clenched, her brown eyes wide with emotion. “I can’t believe you let her go out there alone.”
“I didn’t let her go alone.”
“She went to see Bowie O’Rourke, didn’t she?”
Reluctant to give an answer, Sean saw that Dominique didn’t need one.
“She did,” Dominique said with a sigh of resignation. “She sees a childhood friend where the rest of us see a man with a temper he can’t always control.”
“Where is Hannah now?”
Her friend clamped her mouth shut without responding. Dominique was the most private of the three “sisters” and, not being a Black Falls native, was an outsider to the good and the bad that came with growing up in a tight-knit small town.
Finally she pointed to the kitchen door that led to the mudroom. “Back there.”
Sean left her alone in the kitchen and headed back out into the hall. He saw Hannah’s jacket hung neatly on a peg in the mudroom and heard the scraping of a chair or stool across the floor in the adjoining pantry. He had