Black Hills, Page 41

  can’t?”

  “I don’t know, honestly, if I did that deliberately or if it’s because he’s the only one who can.” Lil rubbed her own arms as if to warm them. “Either way, it’s another scary choice. And a lot to think about. I need to get back. I didn’t mean to be gone this long.”

  “Important business.” Jenna rose, laid her hands on Lil’s shoulders. “You’ll find your way, Lil. I know that absolutely. I need you to tell me if you’re sure you don’t need us to be there tonight.”

  “The system was nearly done when I left. If they ran into any glitches, I’ll call. I promise. I may be confused about myself, about Coop, but I’m clear on the refuge. No chances taken.”

  “Good enough. Most people think he’s gone. That he wouldn’t stay in this area with the manhunt.”

  “I hope most people are right.” She laid her cheek on Jenna’s. “And I know we’re not going to relax, not all the way, until he’s caught. Don’t you take chances either.”

  She stepped out on the porch, saw Farley and her father circling one of the outbuildings with the dogs pacing around them. “Tell Farley I’m pulling for him.” She started for her truck, turned, walking backward as she studied how pretty her mother looked standing there on the porch of the old farmhouse. “He gave me yellow tulips.”

  And prettier yet, Lil thought, when she smiled.

  “Did they work?”

  “Better than I let him know. Talk about your typical reaction.”

  SHE GOT BACK before closing and found the new gate open. Still she glanced at the security camera, at the key swipe and code pad. They would, she thought, stop anyone from entering, in a vehicle, after closing. But you couldn’t secure the hills.

  She drove the road slowly, scanning the land, the trees.

  She could find a way in, she mused. She knew every inch of the section, and could find a way to elude the security if she wanted to take the time and trouble.

  But knowing that only made her more aware.

  She let her gaze skim up as she drove. More cameras, positioned to pan the compound, the road. It would be hard to elude all of them. And the new lights would wash everything. No hiding in the dark, not once you were inside.

  She pulled up in front of the cabin, pleased to see there were three separate groups making the tour of the habitats. She spotted Brad at the far western corner, talking to one of his installers. But her attention moved toward the newest member of the Chance family.

  Everything in her lifted. Delilah lay against the fencing with Boris stretched on the other side. She made that her first stop.

  The female didn’t lift her head when Lil stepped up. She was crouched down, but her eyes opened. Still wary, Lil noted. She may very well always be wary of the human. But still, she’d found comfort in her own kind.

  “I guess we’ll be taking that barrier out sooner rather than later.” She kept her voice easy, her movements slow. “Nice job, Boris. She needs a friend, so I’m counting on you to show her the ropes.”

  “Excuse me, miss?”

  She glanced around to the group of four who stood behind the safety rail. “Yes?”

  “You’re really not supposed to be on that side.”

  She straightened, walked over to speak to the man who’d addressed her. “I’m Lil Chance.” She offered a hand. “This is my place.”

  “Oh, sorry.”

  “No need. I was just checking on our newest addition. We don’t have her plaque up yet. This is Delilah, and it’s her first full day here. She’s a Bengal,” she began, and indulged in one of her rare guided tours.

  By the time she’d finished and passed the new group on to a pair of interns, Brad was ready for her.

  “You’re online, Lil. Fully operational. I want to go over the whole system with you and your senior staff.”

  “I’ve let them know they may need to stay late tonight. I’d rather wait until closing, if that’s okay with you.”

  “Not a problem, especially since Lucius said I could help with tonight’s feeding—if you cleared it.”

  “It’s a lot of work.”

  “I’d like to go back to New York and say I’ve fed a lion. I can dine out on that for a long time.”

  “Then you’re on. I’ll walk you through that, then you can walk us through the system.” She turned back toward the habitat. “Even though I saw the design, I was afraid it was going to look intrusive, high-techy, and well, institutional. It doesn’t. Everything’s nicely camouflaged. It doesn’t intrude.”

  “Aesthetics count, but so does efficiency. I think you’re going to find we delivered both.”

  “I already do. Let me take you to the commissary.”

  AFTER FEEDING, AFTER closing, Lil worked through the controls of the security system, under Brad’s tutelage. For the late staff meeting, she’d broken out the beer, provided a bucket of chicken and some sides. It might’ve been serious business, but there was no reason her people shouldn’t enjoy it.

  There’d been enough stress.

  She went through sectors, then elements, switching on lights, alarms, locks, cutting them again, varying the camera view on the monitor.

  “Aced it,” Brad told her. “Not as fast as Lucius. He still holds the record.”

  “Geek,” Tansy accused.

  “And proud of it. Split screen, Lil, four views.” Lucius bit into a drumstick, pushed his glasses back up his nose. “Let’s see what you’re made of.”

  “You think I can’t do it?”

  “I’ve got a buck says you can’t first time out.”

  “I’ve got two she can,” Tansy countered.

  Lil rubbed her hands together, and quickly ran over the codes and sequence in her head. When four images appeared on-screen, she took a bow.

  “Luck. I’ll put five down Mary can’t run the sequence.”

  Mary only sighed at Lucius. “I’d bet against me. Key cards, security codes. Next thing it’ll be retinal scans.” But she stepped up gamely. Inside thirty seconds, she had the alarms shrilling. “Damn it!”

  “Thank God.” Matt swiped a hand over his forehead. “That takes the pressure off me.”

  As Brad walked a frustrated Mary back through the drill, Lil eased over to Tansy. “You’ve got it. You can cut out any time.”

  “I want to run through it one more time. Besides”—she held up her paper plate—“potato salad. I’m not in a rush. What?” she said when Lil frowned at her.

  “Nothing. Sorry. I was thinking of something else.” Which would be the ring burning a hole in Farley’s pocket. “You know, it’s going to be quiet around here tonight. No guard duty.”

  “Well.” Tansy wiggled her eyebrows when Coop came in. “In a manner of speaking. Maybe you should break out the sexy lingerie and give it one more wear.”

  Lil gave her an elbow bump. “Quiet.”

  She muffled a laugh as Mary managed to shut down the monitor. “It’s going to be a while.”

  “If he could put the security on a spreadsheet, she’d kick ass.”

  “Meanwhile . . .” Lil eased a hip onto Lucius’s desk, and nursed her beer.

  It was full dark, with the three-quarter moon on the rise, when she saw off the last of her staff. She hoped they all managed the key card on the gate in the morning, but for now, she wanted a quick pass at some of the work she’d had to neglect during the day.

  “I’ll be by tomorrow,” Brad told her. He lingered on the porch while Coop sat on the rail. “Work with Mary a little more, and make sure we don’t have any glitches.”

  “I appreciate all you’ve done.” She looked out toward the habitats, the streams of lights, the red blink of motion detectors. “It’s a relief to know the animals are secure.”

  “You’ve got the local number if you have any problems. And you’ve got mine.”

  “I hope you’ll come back, even if there aren’t any problems.”

  “You can count on it.”

  “I’ll see you tomorrow.”


  She went to her own cabin. Considering the time, she opted to make a pot of tea to get her through the hour or so of work she hoped to put in.

  In the kitchen, on her rugged table, stood a vase of painted daisies. Pretty as a rainbow.

  “Damn it.”

  Was she weak, was she simple, for going a little gooey inside? But really, was there any more direct hit than flowers on a woman’s table put there by a man?

  Just enjoy them, she ordered herself, as she put the kettle on. Just accept them for what they are. A nice gesture.

  She made the tea, got a couple of cookies from her stash, then sat at the table with her laptop and the flowers.

  She brought up her refuge e-mail first, as always amused by the letters from children, and pleased by the ones from potential donors asking for more details about certain programs.

  She answered each in turn, and with equal attention.

  She opened the next, caught her breath. Then slowly read it through a second time.

  hello lil. long time no see at least for you. you’ve sure been doing a lot around the place, it gives me a good laugh to watch. i figure we’ll get reacwainted. i figured on it being a surprize but seems like the locals figured out i was around. i’m haveing fun watching them chase there fat asses in the hills and will be leving a present for them soon. i have to say im sorry about the cougar but you never should of caged in that way so it’s your fault it’s dead. you think about that animels are free spirits and our ancesters knew it and respected them. you vialated the sacred trust i thougt about killing you for that back aways but i got sweet on carolyn. she was fine and she gave me a good game and died well. diing well is what counts. i think you will. when we are finished i will free all the animels you have put in prison. if you give me good game i will do it in your honer. stay well and strong so when we meet we will meet as equels. good old jim was good practise but you will be the mane event. i hope this gets to you ok i am not good with computers and have only borrowd this to send you this messag. yours truely ethan swift cat

  Carefully she saved the post, copied it. She took a moment to make sure she had her breath, and her calm, before she walked out to get Coop.

  She saw the taillights of Brad’s rental car as Coop strolled toward the cabin porch. “Brad wanted to get back to the farm in time to sweet-talk my grandmother out of a piece of pie. He’ll—” He broke off as she stepped into the light. “What happened?”

  “He sent me an e-mail. You need to see it.”

  He moved fast, shifting her aside to go through the door and straight back to the kitchen, where he angled the laptop around to stand and read the message.

  “Did you copy it?”

  “Yes. It’s saved to the hard drive and the thumb drive.”

  “We’ll need hard copies, too. Do you recognize the e-mail address?”

  “No.”

  “Should be easy to trace.” He crossed over, picked up the phone. Within a moment, she heard him giving Willy the details in a flat, expressionless voice that went with his face. “I’m going to forward it to you. Give me your e-mail.” He scrawled it on the pad by the phone. “Got it.”

  He passed the phone to Lil on his way to the computer.

  “Willy? Yes, I’m all right. Would you arrange for a drive-by? My parents.” She glanced over at Coop as he tapped keys. “Coop’s grandparents. I’d feel better if . . . Thanks. Yes, we will. Okay.”

  She hung up, barely stopped herself from twisting her hands together. “He said he’ll trace the e-mail and check it out right away. He’s going to call or come by as soon as he knows something.”

  “He knows he made a mistake with Tyler.” Coop muttered it as if speaking to himself. “He knows we’ve identified him. How does he know? He’s got a way to get information. A radio maybe. Or he risks coming into town to hear the local gossip.”

  Eyes narrowed, Coop reread the message. “Several places in town you can buy comp time, but . . . That’s a stupid risk. We’d find the source, then find someone who’d seen him, talked to him. That gives us too much more. So a break-in’s more likely. He sent it at nineteen thirty-eight. Waited for dark. Scoped out a house. Maybe one with a kid or a teenager. They tend to leave their computers on.”

  “He may have killed someone else. He may have murdered someone, more than one, just to send me that. Oh, God, Coop.”

  “We don’t go there until we have to. Put it outside,” he ordered, and coldly. “Focus on what we know, and what we know is he made another mistake. He came out of the shadows because he was compelled to connect with you. He learned we know who he is, so he felt free to make that connection, to communicate with you.”

  “But it’s not me. It’s his warped idea of me. He’s talking to himself.”

  “That’s exactly right. Keep going.”

  “He, ah . . .” She pressed a hand to her forehead, shoved it back through her hair. “He’s uneducated, and unfamiliar with computers. It had to take him some time to write that much. He wanted me—his version of me—to know he’s watching. He wanted to brag a little. He said he laughed at what we’ve done here. The new security. At the manhunt. He’s confident neither will stop him from the goal. The game. He said Carolyn gave him a good game.”

  “And Tyler was practice. Everything points to his driving Tyler off the trail, way off, pushing him toward the river. Tyler was a healthy man, in good shape. And bigger, heftier than Howe. The conclusion would be Howe had a weapon. A knife doesn’t work, not if Tyler managed to get any distance away. What’s the game if you force-march some guy miles?”

  She could see it now, the steps and the layers. And seeing it helped her stay calm. “We know he has a gun, and he knows the hills. He can track. He . . . he hunts.”

  “Yeah, you’d’ve held your own on the job. That’s the game—the hunt. Pick the prey, stalk the prey, make the kill.”

  “And he’s picked me because he believes I’ve violated sacred ground, sacred trust by building the refuge here. Because we share, in his head, the cougar as spirit guide. It’s crazy.”

  “He also picked you because you know the land. You can track and hunt and elude. So you’re a major prize.”

  “He might have come here before, for me, but Carolyn distracted him. She was young and pretty and attracted to him. She listened to his theories, certainly slept with him. And when she saw through enough to be afraid, or concerned, to break things off, he went after her instead. She became his prey.”

  Shaken, she lowered to the bench.

  “It’s not you, Lil. Not your fault.”

  “I know that, but she’s still dead. Almost certainly dead. And there may be someone else dead tonight just so he could get his hands on a computer to send that to me. If he goes after anyone else, any of my people, I don’t know what I’ll do. I don’t know.”

  “I’m less worried about that than I was.

  “He’s put you on notice,” Coop said when she looked up at him. “He doesn’t have to show you any more. Doesn’t have to bait you or taunt you.”

  She took a breath. “Tell me. Is Brad staying at your grandparents’ just because he likes Lucy’s cooking, or did you ask him to so he could keep an eye on things there?”

  “The cooking’s a bonus.” He got out a bottle of water, twisted the top off, and handed it to her.

  She drank. “He’s a good friend.”

  “Yeah, he is.”

  “I think . . .” She steadied herself with another long breath. “I think you can get an idea about someone by their friends.”

  “You need an idea when it comes to me, Lil?”

  “I need an idea when it comes to ten years of you.” She glanced toward the phone, wishing she could make it ring, make Willy call and tell her no one was hurt. No more death. “How do you stand waiting like this?”

  “Because it’s what comes next. This place is locked down. If he tries to come here, he’ll trip an alarm. You’re safe. You’re with me. So I can wait.”

  Trying
to keep her calm, she reached out, smoothed a finger over the petals of a daisy. “You brought me more flowers. What’s