The Dark Remains - Mark Anthony [70]
Nothing makes much sense these days, she had said to Travis that day in the café. And she had not seen Travis Wilder or Maximilian Bayfield again.
The roaring in her ears phased back into words. Deputy Windom? It was Mitchell’s tinny voice coming through the phone. Deputy Windom, are you still there?
A spasm coursed through Jace. She sat up straight in the chair.
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I’m here, Mitchell.”
Even as she spoke, her mind raced, fitting together the pieces of what Mitchell Burke-Favor had said. Then, like the papers on her desk, everything fell into place. Wherever he had gone, Travis Wilder was back. And she knew where he was.
A pause on the line, and a hiss of static. He was waiting for an answer. She licked her lips.
“I’ll give your report to the sheriff, Mitchell.” Lies were not so difficult if one spoke them with the authority of truth. “Don’t worry. We’ll keep an eye out for these men and make certain they don’t harass anyone else. Of course. And you’re welcome. Tell Davis hello for me.”
Jace hung up the phone. The hand unit seemed made of lead rather than plastic as she settled it back into its cradle. She waited a second or two—for what, she didn’t know; for the last echoes of the roaring to fade from her ears, perhaps—then looked up at the two men who stood in the doorway.
She wasn’t certain exactly when in the course of her conversation she had become aware of them, only that before she hung up she had known. They had a way of impinging on the senses slowly. It was as if they were so used to watching unnoticed from the shadows that it required special effort to make their presence felt.
“I told you they wouldn’t help you,” she said.
One of the men—the dark one with almond eyes—shrugged as he slipped sunglasses into his coat pocket. “Nor did we expect them to, Deputy Windom, for we trust your opinions. We have found your descriptions of the local population most insightful.”
Jace let her gaze slide past them. Somehow it was easier not to watch them when they spoke. “Then why did you go to Davis and Mitchell’s ranch?”
Now the other one laughed: a raw, brash sound. “Sometimes when a man does not wish to help you, he cannot prevent himself from doing so. It is interesting that Mr. Burke-Favor has called you, no? I wonder what the old cowboy had to say.”
Jace did not like the blond one. He was big and broad-shouldered, but somehow pale and sickly despite his size, as if too many years under the Arctic sun had left him forever deformed, like a gangly, wax-white bean plant she had once grown in a dark closet as a school science experiment.
Jace clutched the edge of the desk. These men always talked in innuendo and gray shades of truth. She hated that about them. And now, because of these men, she had taken to uttering lies and performing acts of subterfuge herself.
“I don’t like this,” she said through clenched teeth. “A report made to a law enforcement officer is confidential until it is officially released.”
The dark one approached. With a graceful motion of his hand he took her words and set them aside. “There are greater issues at hand here, Deputy Windom, than bureaucratic regulations. I believed you understood this.”
The pale one started to speak, but the other lifted a hand, silencing him. So Jace’s judgment was correct. Despite the big one’s bluster, it was the small, slender man who was the commander.
The dark one sat on the corner of her desk. The black fabric of his suit made soft, sensual sounds as he moved. He smelled like her gun after she had just polished it.
“Your duty is to protect the public, is it not, Deputy Windom? Now here is a man whom you know to be a danger to