Until Dark - Mariah Stewart [81]
And yet he had them all stumped, didn’t he? No one had a clue. He guessed that made him one of the best criminal minds in the country.
The thought cheered him, and his chest swelled with pride, that he could best the best.
Even her. Especially her. She had always been too smart for her own good.
But where was she? He frowned again. Were they hiding her? He wanted her here, to watch. Here, where she could watch up close, where she would be able to understand, to appreciate, his cleverness. Sooner or later, she was going to have to admit just how clever he really was.
Tires crunched on the stone drive, and a car door slammed. He turned in time to see the pretty young woman get out of her car and take several bags of groceries from the backseat. With one foot, she closed the door, took several steps, then stopped, warily, looking around as if testing the air. She stood for several long moments in the same spot, her head slightly tilted to one side, as if trying to decipher something that eluded her, then turned her back, and went about her business.
He watched from behind a low stand of mountain laurel, and it suddenly occurred to him that should ever the need arise, there was one sure way of getting Kendra’s attention.
He wondered why he hadn’t thought of it sooner.
Chapter
Seventeen
Adam rested a reassuring hand on Kendra’s shoulder.
“How do you feel, coming back here after all these years?”
“I don’t feel much of anything,” she told him honestly. “I thought maybe I’d have a sense of some emotion, or, oh, something relevant. But I don’t.”
“Are you ready to go down and see if they’ll speak with us?”
“Yes.”
“Come on then.” He gave her shoulder a squeeze. “We’ll have to leave the car here and walk down, since the gate’s locked.”
He ducked under the fence, waited for her, then held his hand out for her. She took it, and hand in hand they walked down the slope that led to the ranch house a quarter of a mile ahead.
“Think we should have called first?”
“I don’t know what I would have said.”
“Well, you better think of something.” Adam gestured in the direction of the house. “Someone just came out onto the porch.”
“Wonder if she’s one of Sierra’s heirs.”
“Guess we’ll soon find out.”
The air was warm for just past nine in the morning, and the sun, still on the rise, cast the shadow of the barn across a clearing that separated the house from several outbuildings. The woman who’d come out of the house sat quietly in a rocking chair, watching their approach. Except for the gentle rocking, there was no other motion that Kendra could see.
Their footsteps making a scuffing sound in the dry gravel, Adam and Kendra walked toward the thin figure hunched in the rocking chair. They were within twenty feet of the porch before she acknowledged their presence.
“Something I can do for you?” she called softly as she stubbed out a cigarette on the wooden floor of the porch. The aroma of marijuana was unmistakable.
“Hello,” Kendra called back. “Are you one of the ladies who owns this ranch?”
“Yes,” she responded somewhat warily.
“I’m Kendra Smith.” She stopped at the bottom step, still holding Adam’s hand. “My aunt, Sierra, owned this ranch at one time.”
“If you’ve come to try to take it away from us, we’ll fight you. We’ll all fight you.” The woman’s eyes narrowed suspiciously and she stood. Her voice began to rise shrilly. “It was all legal. There was a will. Sierra wanted us to have—”
“Whoa, I’m not here to take anything from you. I just came to talk, that’s all.”
“Talk?” Dirty fingers pulled nervously at a long strand of unkempt brown hair.
“Yes. That’s all. I’m just looking for some information.”
“Information about what?”
“Years ago, my brother died out here, along with my cousin, and I was hoping to speak with someone who was living here at the time. Were you living here then, when Sierra’s son and my brother were lost?”
“You’re Ian’s sister?” The woman’s