LITMIR.BIZ

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You think you would if anyone believed for a minute that you had something to do with her disappearance?”

      “Let me call the family.”

      Mathews raised an eyebrow. “Not much family left as I hear it.”

      “Just her stepbrother Bernard. But I’d just like to be the one to tell him,” Cash said.

      Mathews nodded. “Maybe he’ll have some idea how her car ended up down here. But then if he knew his sister was coming down to see you, he would have mentioned it seven years ago, right?”

      They’d been over this ground before. “She didn’t drive down here to see me. She had plans in Bozeman. But if someone wanted me to look guilty, hiding her car in a barn outside my town would certainly do it.”

      Mathews nodded in agreement. “Awful lot of trouble to go to since she was living almost five hours away.”

      “Covering up a murder sometimes requires a lot of trouble, I would imagine,” Cash snapped back.

      Mathews nodded slowly. “You ought to take a few days off. Didn’t I hear that you have a cabin on the other end of the lake?”

      Cash said nothing.

      “Fishing any good?”

      “Smallmouth bass and crappie are biting, a few wall-eye and northern pike,” Cash said, seeing where this was going. “I have some vacation time coming. I think I’ll tie up the loose ends back at the office and do that. You have my cell-phone number if you hear anything.”

      Mathews nodded. “I suppose it is a godsend that her father didn’t live to see this.” Archie had died five years ago of a heart attack. Jasmine’s stepmother Fran was killed just last year in a car accident. “Her stepbrother Bernard is kind of a jackass but I liked the old man and he seemed to like you. He really wanted you to marry his daughter.” The investigator sounded a little surprised by that.

      No more surprised than Cash, but looking back, Cash knew that was probably why he’d been able to keep his job as sheriff when Jasmine disappeared. Archibald “Archie” Wolfe had never once thought that Cash had anything to do with Jasmine’s disappearance.

      Cash had expected the prominent and powerful Georgia furniture magnate to hate him on sight the first time they met—just after Jasmine had disappeared. It had seemed impossible that Archibald Wolfe would have ever wanted his Southern belle socialite daughter to marry a small-town sheriff in Montana. Jasmine had already told Cash that her father never liked any of the men she dated.

      But Archie had surprised him. “You’re the kind of man she needed,” the older man had said. “I know she’s spoiled and would try a saint’s patience, but I think all she needs is the right man to straighten her up.”

      “Mr. Wolfe, I’m afraid you have it all wrong,” Cash had tried to tell him.

      “Archie, dammit. You know I disinherited her recently. I would have burned every cent I had to keep her from marrying the likes of Kerrington Landow. But once Jasmine is found and the two of you are married, I’ll put her back in my will, you don’t need to worry about that.”

      “I don’t want your money, Mr. Wol—Archie, and I don’t need it,” Cash had said. “Let’s just pray Jasmine is found soon.”

      Archie’s eyes had narrowed. He had nodded slowly. “I think you actually mean that. How did my daughter find you?”

      Cash had shaken his head, thinking that’s exactly what Jasmine had done, found him and not the other way around. He’d tried to think of something to say. It hadn’t seemed like the time to tell Archie the truth.

      Archie had died a broken man, the loss of his daughter more than he could stand.

      “Cash? Did you hear what I said?”

      He mentally shook himself. “Sorry, John.”

      Mathews was studying him, frowning. “If there is anything you want to tell me that might come out during this investigation…”

      Cash shook his head. How long did he have before he was relieved of his position and his resources taken away so he wouldn’t be able to work the case in secret? Not long from Mathews’ expression.

      “There’s nothing I haven’t already told you pertaining to the case,” Cash answered truthfully.

      Mathews nodded slowly, clearly not believing that. “Let me know how the fishing is.”

      As Cash drove back into town, he knew he’d have to work fast and do his best not to get caught. It was only a matter of time before Mathews learned the truth—and Cash found himself behind bars.

      North of Las Vegas, Nevada

      THE FEAR DIDN’T REALLY HIT her until Molly lost sight of Vegas in her rearview mirror. She was running for her life and she didn’t know where to go or what to do. She had little money and, unlike Vince and Angel who had criminal resources she didn’t even want to think about, she had no one to turn to.

      She wiped her eyes and straightened, checking the rearview mirror. In this life there isn’t time for sentimentality, her father had told her often enough. That was why you didn’t get close to anyone. If you cared too much, that person could be used against you. Wasn’t that why the Great Maximilian Burke, famous magician and thief, had never let her call him Dad?

      He’d insisted she go by Kilpatrick. He’d told her it was her mother’s maiden name. Since Max and her mother Lorilee hadn’t been married when Molly was born, her name on her birth certificate was Kilpatrick anyway, he’d said.

      Molly had asked him once why he and Lorilee hadn’t married before her mother died.

      “Your mother wouldn’t marry me until I got a real job,” Max had said with a shrug. “And since I never got a real job…”

      Her mother had died when Molly was a baby. She didn’t remember her, didn’t even have a photograph. Max wasn’t the sentimental type. Also, he and Molly were always on the move, so even if there had been photos, they had long been lost.

      All she had of her mother was a teddy bear, long worn, that Max had said her mother had given her. The teddy bear had been her most prized possession, but even it had been lost.

      She wiped at her tears, tears she shed not for herself but for Lanny. She hadn’t let herself think about her father’s best friend. Lanny had always been kind to her and had remained Max’s friend until her father’s death. That was what had gotten Lanny killed, Molly was sure.

      Her stomach growled and she realized she hadn’t eaten. She pulled off the interstate in one of the tiny, dying towns north of St. George, Utah, and parked in the empty lot of the twenty-four-hour Mom’s Home-cooking Café.

      A bell jingled over the door as she stepped inside. It was early, but Molly doubted the place was ever hopping. She slid into a cracked vinyl booth and rested her elbows on the cool, worn Formica tabletop.

      A skinny gray-haired waitress who looked more tired than even Molly felt, slid a menu and a sweating glass of ice water onto the table. She took a pad and a stubby pencil out of her pocket, leaning on one varicose-veined leg as she waited.

      “I’ll take the meatloaf special with iced tea, please,” Molly said, closing the menu and handing it to her, noticing that the waitress took it without looking at her, pocketed the pad and pencil without writing anything down and left without a word.

      Molly watched her go, thinking her own life could be worse. It was a game she and Max used to play.

      “You think your situation is bad, kiddo, look at that guy,” he would say.

      He called her kiddo. She called him Max and had since she was able to talk.

      “Better no one knows we’re related,” he’d always said. “It will be our little secret.” He told everyone that he’d picked her up off the street and kept her with him because she made

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