Watch Me (Last Stand #3)(45)
Author: Brenda Novak

He had her eat in the truck as they drove and didn’t break his silence until they pulled into Whiterock’s small police station. Then he swore under his breath.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

He nodded toward an old brown station wagon. “My stepfather’s here.”

“Why?”

“I can only imagine,” he said, and got out of the truck.

Sheridan followed him inside to find John Wyatt sitting there, looking far more distinguished than Sheridan remembered. Now gray at the temples, he had more lines bracketing his eyes and mouth than before, but he was still handsome in an even-featured, pleasant sort of way. And he had a nice physique for a man in his fifties.

“Cain, thanks for coming in.”

Sheridan didn’t recognize the police officer who greeted them, but she knew from his badge that he was the Ian Peterson who’d called.

“No problem.” Cain’s eyes cut to his stepfather, who stood, but they didn’t embrace or even shake hands. They exchanged a slight nod of acknowledgement and Cain once again focused on Ian.

“What is it you need?”

“I’d like to ask you both a few questions, if you don’t mind.”

“And if we do?” Cain asked.

“We might think there’s a reason.”

“You’ll think I’m involved regardless,” Cain said, but he waved Sheridan ahead of him, and Officer Peterson showed her into Ned’s office, where she took one of the visitor’s chairs. The station wasn’t big enough to have an interrogation room.

After closing the door, Peterson sat down at Ned’s desk. “I understand you used to live here a decade or so ago.”

She put her purse at her feet. “That’s right.”

He had a steno pad waiting, on which he recorded the date and her name. “You and Cain Granger had a sexual relationship at the time, is that also correct?”

Sheridan clasped her hands in her lap and straightened her spine. “Not entirely, no. We had a one-time encounter, an encounter that had nothing to do with anything before or after.”

“And yet his stepbrother was shot within…” he opened a file that was also waiting on the desk, but Sheridan supplied the information before he could dig through its contents.

“Six weeks.”

“And then you and your family relocated?”

“Two months later.”

“Had you been planning to leave town before the shooting?”

“No. When the man who tried to kill me wasn’t apprehended, my parents were concerned for my safety and decided to move.”

“Did you keep in touch with Cain Granger once you left?”

“No.”

“Not at all?”

“Not at all.”

“Can you remember anything about the man with the rifle at Rocky Point?”

“Nothing that I haven’t previously stated. Otherwise, I would’ve called and added it to the record. I want the man who shot me arrested as much as Mr. Wyatt or anyone else does.”

“I’m sure you do.” He put the file aside and focused on his steno pad. “How well did you know Amy Smith?”

“I remember her from high school, but we didn’t hang out together.”

“Had you seen her since your return to town?”

“Yes, twice.”

“Was Cain present at either of those meetings?”

“He was at both.”

“And yet you don’t have a relationship with Cain Granger.”

The hickey beneath her scarf seemed to burn. “He’s been nice enough to take care of me while I recover. That’s it.”

“Out of the goodness of his heart.”

“Basically, yeah,” she said, glaring at him.

“Did you detect any animosity between Cain and his ex-wife in either of those meetings?” he asked, switching tactics.

“Not the kind you’re obviously digging for.”

He raised his hazel eyes from the lined paper in front of him. “Just answer the question, please.”

“Amy was still in love with Cain. That created tension whenever they were together.”

“You know this even though you’ve been gone for twelve years?”

She could sense Peterson’s loyalty to his fallen comrade, and to his chief. “It was very apparent to me.”

“In two short meetings?”

“You could tell in five seconds,” she said with a pointed look.

“Would it be safe to say that Cain disliked his ex-wife?”

“I wouldn’t call it dislike. I think he simply wanted her to forget the past, move on and leave him alone.”

“And she wouldn’t.”

“No.”

“So he killed her?” he asked softly.

Sheridan waited several heartbeats to give emphasis to her response. “No.”

Peterson tilted his head. “How do you know?”

“Because he was with me the night it happened. We were playing poker when he realized the dogs were unusually silent. He went out to check on them, and then I heard the first shot.”

“You don’t remember Amy coming to the door? Or maybe giving Cain a call?”

“No. I heard voices outside, very briefly. But I had no idea it was Amy.”

“Was that before or after the shot?”

“Before.”

“What happened afterward?”

“Nothing for several minutes. Then there was another shot.”

“When did Cain return to the cabin?”

Sheridan tightened her fingers, which were interlaced in her lap. “After the second shot.”

“How long after?”

“Ten, fifteen minutes.”

“What do you think he was doing during that time?”

Sheridan remembered seeing Cain enter the clearing, covered in blood; remembered the terror that’d gripped her until she’d realized he wasn’t hurt. She’d already watched his stepbrother die. She didn’t want to see another death—especially his. “He followed the sound of that shot—and discovered Amy lying in the road.”

“He told you this?”

“I’m guessing.”

“Exactly. You don’t know what happened once he left the house.”

“I know he couldn’t have tranquilized his own dogs. He was inside with me when they fell silent.”

“He could’ve done it earlier. Haven’t you ever taken a sleeping pill? Some sedatives take time to work. Are you telling me he didn’t go outside at all that evening?”