Sleepily, Molly moved back to the bed and sat down trying to wake up. She kept thinking about hearing Rowdy singing. Not in a dream. Not in her imagination. But why would someone want her to think that she’d heard Rowdy singing? The same way they’d duped the elderly couple who’d been in a room nearby the night her father died?

  “I don’t know anything about Rowdy,” she said seeing that Georgia was waiting for an answer.

  “But if Clay’s father confessed...?”

  “You’ll have to ask the sheriff in the morning,” Molly said and mentally kicked herself even as she asked it, “How was your date?” But she needed to get her wits about her, and she couldn’t with her new friend here.

  Georgia plopped down on the bed beside her, throwing herself back to stare up at the ceiling. “It was amazing just as I’d known it would be.”

  Molly half listened in between falling asleep sitting up. “Sounds perfect.”

  “It was.”

  “Are you still leaving Fortune Creek?” Georgia was quiet for a little too long. Molly lay back and looked over at her. “You aren’t seriously thinking of staying.”

  Her friend wiped away a tear as she shook her head. “Stay somewhere because of a man? Please! I’ve done that before. Good thing I got a job within the same insurance company because the guy dumped me a few months later. Of course I’m leaving. As amazing as the date and Jaden are, I have to go home.” Georgia sat up. “The sheriff really didn’t say anything about Rowdy?”

  “Sorry, I forgot to ask.”

  “Does that mean you don’t want to destroy Rowdy?”

  Molly thought about it for a moment as she too sat up. “I guess not.”

  “I’d ask what changed your mind, but I’m just glad. Sorry about your dad though.”

  She nodded. “Thanks.”

  “Looks like you’ve worked through some of your issues,” Georgia said.

  “I’m still a work in progress. I wanted to tell you. If Rowdy isn’t found, I don’t want the insurance money. If you don’t have to pay out, you should be able to keep your job, right?”

  “Are you serious?” Georgia was staring at her. “You’d turn down a million dollars?”

  Molly nodded. “I can sign something or talk to your boss. Just let me know what you need.”

  “Wow, that is so nice of you. But I can handle it. I’m just surprised.”

  She shrugged. “I have everything I need.”

  Her friend’s eyes widened. “The sheriff?”

  “No.” She looked away. “But it would have been nice.”

  Georgia laughed. “Nice? I hope it would have been a whole lot better than that. Listen, if you ever get to my part of the country, give me a call. We’ll go have a drink together. My treat.”

  Molly leaned over to hug her. “I’ll do that. But only if you will now let me get some sleep.”

  Her friend rose chuckling. “Goodnight. I’ll lock the door behind me. Go to bed. It’s late.”

  Molly climbed back under the covers. Images of the sheriff kept popping up. If it wasn’t so late, she would have called him. He’d believe her about the singing, wouldn’t he?

  She had just nodded off when she heard a sound that made her eyelids fly open. She lay perfectly still for a few moments before she looked toward the door—and the sheet of hotel stationery folded neatly in half illuminated by moonlight shining through the window onto the floor.

  Molly started to reach for her phone but stopped herself. After rising from the bed, she padded across the floor and used her big toe to unfold the note.

  Her heart began to pound wildly as she read: If you ever want to see Rowdy the Rodeo Cowboy again, you will meet me now. I’ll give you twenty minutes. If you don’t show alone, I’ll destroy the dummy. Meet me by the big rock you can see from your hotel window.

  The note was nothing like the other ones and for a moment she didn’t trust that it was real. She definitely knew the large rock. She’d stared out at it enough times.

  But go now? In the middle of the night? Not to meet a killer, she told herself. Cecil had confessed. If she got Rowdy back, then Georgia could definitely keep her job.

  Even as she thought it, Molly knew it was more than that. She wanted to get Rowdy back for her father. She liked the idea of Rowdy the Rodeo Cowboy being in a museum and thought her father would too. It was wrong for whoever had taken him to keep him—let alone destroy him.

  She hurriedly dressed, telling herself she should call the sheriff. But then whoever had Rowdy might destroy him. She pulled her phone from her purse, telling herself that she could call him if she got into trouble. She didn’t have much time, she thought as she headed out the fire escape exit.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Brandt bolted upright in bed. Something was wrong. It took him a moment to remember the thought that had awakened him so abruptly. After swinging his legs over the side of the bed, he rose and quickly pulled on his jeans.

  He realized that he’d fallen asleep for longer than he’d thought. Moonlight shimmered over the tops of the pines as he rushed downstairs to his office muttering to himself, “Where did I put that?” It took a good twenty minutes before he found what he was looking for. He’d made a copy of the note Clay Wheaton had left on his hotel room bureau top.

  The photocopy still showed the ink spots from the leaky pen the ventriloquist had used along with the names and numbers of the two calls he’d wanted made in case of an emergency.

  Dropping into his office chair, he called the second number and listened to the recorded message telling him that the insurance company office was closed. He hadn’t remembered the name of the company, but now that he had it, he called their New York office, which should have just opened since it was two hours earlier there.

  Waiting for the call to be answered, he mentally kicked himself for not doing this sooner. He kept telling himself he was wrong as he listened to it ring. He wanted to be wrong. But something had been bothering him and had finally awoken him with a start as he realized what he might have overlooked.

  “Hello,” a woman said as she answered. She rattled off the name of the insurance company. “How can we help you?”

  He quickly told her who he was and what he needed. “It’s a matter of life and death.” He gave her his identification information and explained what he needed.

  “This is highly unusual. Let me see what I can do. Please hold.”

  The wait seemed interminable before she came back on the line. “I’m sorry, but I had to check your credentials. You’re at the sheriff’s office now? I will call you back.”

  “Please hurry.” Even as he told himself that Molly would be in bed sound asleep at this hour, he couldn’t help the urgency he felt and the worry that he might be too late. He’d thought about calling her, waking her up and then what? Telling her about the crazy theory he had and to keep her door locked and not let anyone in?

  The office phone rang. He quickly answered it. “Sheriff Brandt Parker.”

  “I have that information you called about.” He listened, his heart dropping. From the start of this investigation, it had been about Rowdy. It had always been about Rowdy. He’d been such a fool. He was busy looking for a murderer, thinking the dummy had nothing to do with it.

  He hung up and quickly called Molly as he hurried upstairs to finish dressing. His pulse quickened as the call went straight to voicemail. She must have turned off her phone. Swearing, he headed for the hotel at a dead run.

  * * *

  THE WOODS WERE DARK, shadows lurking under the thick pine branches. Rays from the moon fingered through the boughs and bathed the top of the huge rock in moonlight. Through the branches, Molly kept getting glimpses of the rock, assuring her she was headed in the right direction.

  She gripped her phone in her hand. She knew she shouldn’t be out here alone. But then again, she wasn’t alone. Someone was waiting for her.

  As she walked, she tried to make sense of everything that had happened. Did it surprise her that Cecil had confessed to killing her father? From what she’d seen, she thought the rancher certainly was angry enough to do it.

  In her memory, she called up the image of him standing on his porch, the shotgun in his hand. As she did, she recalled something that made her frown. His hands had shaken. She’d blamed it on his fury at her and the sheriff being on his property.

  His hands had been shaking still when she’d crossed the porch right next to him and gone in the house to talk to Irma. She’d only noticed out of the corner of her eye. The shotgun leaning against the side of the house. Cecil trying to hide the trembling fingers of his hands. Trying to hide his weakness.

  Molly felt a start and almost stumbled into a tree limb. His fingers were clawlike. Arthritis? Would he even have been able to fire the shotgun?

  Her mind leaped to the ransom notes. There was no way he could have written them. Someone had tried hard to make it look as if he had though, or that they had been written by someone trying to conceal their real handwriting, but it hadn’t been Cecil Crandell.

  Molly stopped. The rock was only a few dozen yards ahead. The person waiting would have heard her approach. They would be ready for her.

  But who was waiting for her?

  * * *

  THE SHERIFF GRABBED the spare key for Molly’s room as well as Georgia’s from behind the hotel desk. He would try to rouse Molly by pounding on her door, but if that didn’t work, he was going rogue.

  She must have turned off her phone since it had gone straight to voicemail, he told himself as he charged up the stairs to the fourth floor and down the hall to pound on her door. No answer. His heart was thundering as he inserted the key, knowing he was breaking the law. But if he hadn’t gotten the second key from downstairs, he would have broken down the door, screw the consequences.

  The door swung open. In the shaft of moonlight coming through the window, he saw at once that the bed was empty. He rushed in. “Molly?”

  Within in seconds, he knew with certainty that she wasn’t here. As he started to head for Georgia’s room, he saw the sheet of hotel stationery lying on the table by the door. He swore as he read it, wondering how much of a head start she’d had.

  At the window, he looked out at the huge rock visible beyond the pines. Why would she go alone? Because she was determined to see this through to the end. Because she didn’t trust him? Or because this was something she wanted to do on her own?

  He swore and quickly left the room and went to Georgia’s. He knew before he opened the door that she was gone.

  Out the window, a light flashed on near the large rock. Brandt took off at top speed. He had to get to Molly before it was too late.

  * * *

  ALL MOLLY’S INSTINCTS told her to turn around and run. But if she ever wanted to know the truth... Whoever was waiting for her turned on a flashlight. It went off quickly, but she knew now where the person was—on the dark side of the huge rock.

  She took a step forward then another. The cold air was filled with the scent of pine and the creek nearby. A breeze moaned softly in the tops of the pine boughs as she walked toward the rock on the soft bed of dried needles.

  She hadn’t gone far when the trees opened to a small meadow next to the rock. Standing at the edge of the trees, she saw him waiting for her. She was startled for a moment because of his resemblance to Cecil, and to her own father. He was a large man, like his father and brother.

  “Did you bring the money?” Gage asked.

  She patted her purse. There was a couple hundred dollars inside it. She hoped he wouldn’t demand to see the money first. She’d come here wanting answers. She’d love to save Rowdy for her father, but mostly, she wanted to know who killed him. The theory was that whoever killed the ventriloquist had Rowdy.

  “Where’s Rowdy?”

  Gage Crandell stepped to one side revealing Rowdy’s case resting against the base of the rock.

  “Please open it.”

  Gage scoffed. “You’re not very trusting, you big-city types.” He opened the case and she got a glimpse of Rowdy’s painted face before he snapped it closed again.

  “If your father killed mine, then how is it that you have Rowdy?” she asked staying where she stood, a half dozen yards away.

  “How do you think?”

  “You’re going to let your father take the fall for this?”

  Gage laughed. “Believe me, he’s safer in prison. When my mother finds out that he confessed to killing Seth, her favorite son, he’s a dead man. She already blames him for not telling her that Seth was in the area, let alone for seeing her son without telling her. There is no happy ending here.”

  Molly didn’t know what to say. This man standing before her was her blood. That alone was a chilling thought.

  “You just don’t get it,” Gage said taking a step toward her. “My father and I went to the hotel that night to kill Seth. I’d left a book stuck in the fire escape door so we could get in. He hadn’t wanted me to come with him. I jumped into his truck as he started to leave.”

  “You knew he was going to the hotel to kill your brother?”

  He huffed. “He had his gun with the silencer on it. Yeah, I knew. It had been building up ever since we’d gone to the hotel the first time to see Seth. My old man had killed Seth in his heart, in his mind, in his very soul. I wanted him to do it. That’s why I went along.”

  Molly felt sick to her stomach listening to this.

  “But he couldn’t do it. Even when he had Seth down on his knees waiting for the bullet to enter the back of his head, my father couldn’t do it.” He sounded both disappointed and disgusted. “I watched from down the hall as he dropped the gun and left. Maybe he was hoping Seth would take his own life.”

  She had trouble finding her voice as she realized that she had done what Brandt had feared—she’d met a killer in the woods all alone. “What did you do?” Her voice came out a whisper.

  “I left the book in the door and followed my father down the fire escape. He was driving off, leaving me there as if he’d forgotten me. Nothing unusual about that. I was the forgotten son, the one who’d gotten trapped on the ranch after the only two sons my parents ever cared about were dead and gone.”

  Molly heard the bitterness in his voice. She swallowed knowing in her heart what happened next. “You went back to your brother’s room.”

  Gage nodded, looking as if he was reliving that night. “Seth had made it so easy for my father. He wanted him to kill him, or maybe he was already dead, you know, maybe sending him away like he had, had already killed Seth and that’s why he changed his name, that’s why he had that silly doll that talked for him.”

  “You went back and killed him.”

  He looked at her and blinked. “No. When I reached his room, Seth was already dead. The gun was gone. I just took the pen and some paper.”

  She stared at him. Was he telling the truth? “What about Rowdy?”

  “My father had the case when he left. Not sure what he planned to do with it, not sure he even knew. Destroy it probably. But when he reached the bottom of the fire escape stairs, he just threw the case into the bushes. I retrieved it, hiding it until I went back upstairs to finish what he’d started. Maybe I planned to kill Seth—I don’t know. But I didn’t have to. I took his pickup keys and left. I got my son Cliff to follow me back to Fortune Creek to leave the pickup behind the hotel.”

  “If any of this is true, then who killed your brother?”

  “I don’t know. But I need that five thousand to be able to leave, to buy my freedom. This is my chance to escape the prison my brothers left me in. I was forced to stay here, be the good, loyal, hardworking rancher’s son who couldn’t abandon his parents especially after they’d lost their other sons. Both Ty and Seth are now free. I’m tired of envying them for getting away from this life. I want to be free too.”

  “That works out well then,” said a voice from the trees behind Molly an instant before she heard the gunshot and saw Gage grab his chest and slowly slump to the ground next to Rowdy’s case.

  * * *

  BRANDT’S HEART DROPPED to his boots at the sound of the gunshot. He’d been moving quickly through the pines, the large rock in sight. He’d put it all together—but not fast enough. Maybe not fast enough to save Molly. His chest contracted at the thought, making it hard to breathe.

  The rock was not far now. He could hear voices. But a sound closer made him stumble. Someone was directly behind him.

  The blow seemed to come from out of nowhere. He caught only a flash of movement. He went down hard in the dried pine needles. Then in a blink there was nothing but blackness.

  * * *

  GEORGIA STEPPED FROM the darkness of the trees into the moonlight.

  Molly stared, stunned to see the gun in her hand now pointed at her. “You really did bring a gun.”

  She smiled. “I told you, I never leave home without it.”

  “What’s going on?” She felt confused by this Georgia holding the gun pointed in her direction.

  “You could say that I’m saving you and getting Rowdy back.” She tsked. “I thought you were going to tell me when you heard from the person who had the puppet? I trusted you.”

  Her mind raced, unable to understand what was happening. “You shot Gage.”

  “Yes, well...you forgot to mention that there’d been a ransom demand for Rowdy. If I hadn’t heard about the notes being found under your door, I might have given up and left town without the dummy. But I knew someone had it and if anyone could find it, it would be you or that damned cowboy sheriff. Couldn’t leave without knowing where Rowdy was.”