Page 32 of Dark Side of the River

“What are you doing here?” Her voice didn’t sound like her own.

“I wanted to see how she was,” he said without looking at her. “I didn’t think you’d let me see her, so I waited until I saw you leave the room.”

He’d been here in the hospital, watching her? She swallowed and moved to the chair beside Oakley’s bed to collapse into it. He looked at her then. “When was the last time you had something to eat?”

She shook her head. “I’m fine. I don’t need your...” She hadn’t known what she was going to say, words failing her for a moment. For months she hadn’t seen him even in passing, and then he rode up at their spot on the creek, and now this visit? “You should go. There is nothing you can do here.” She could feel his gaze as if it were caressing her face. She couldn’t meet his eyes. Instead, she kept her eyes on Oakley, wishing he would leave, wishing he didn’t make her feel warring emotions that wore her out.

“I’ll go,” he said after a moment. He turned to Oakley again, touched her cheek, murmured something Charlotte couldn’t hear—a prayer?—and then left. She waited until she was sure he was no longer out there watching her before she put her face in her hands. But no tears came, as if she’d cried them all out over the years. As badly as she needed to weep, to scream, to let it all out, there was no comfort for her, no release of her grief, her fear, her aching need to rewrite history so she would no longer hurt so badly.

For a few moments, she felt incapable of moving, she was so exhausted. She sat looking down at Oakley long after Holden had left. Then she straightened, picked up her purse, kissed her daughter’s cheek and headed home. A woman had to know when she was beaten, she’d always said. She was. But good. She needed a bath, clean clothes and a decent night’s sleep.

Tomorrow, she’d face all of this. Tomorrow.

COOPERDROVEINsilence through the darkness between the rocky, pine-covered mountains before the highway dropped down into the Powder River Basin. Tilly seemed lost in her thoughts, her face turned away from him. But he could see her face reflected in the glass. He could see her chewing at her lower lip, and he knew something had happened back at the bar that had upset her. “You don’t have to tell me about Tick.”

“It’s not that,” Tilly said, tugging at the bottom of her jean jacket for a moment as she sat up. “He made my skin crawl. All the time I was sitting there I was thinking that he could be the person who shot Oakley.”

“I’m sorry.”

She shrugged. “It was my idea. I mean, I knew where he was headed the first time we talked to him. I could have shut him down from the get-go. I certainly didn’t have to meet him at the bar.”

He could hear regret and something more. He glanced over at her. “Did he make a pass at you?”

She let out a startled laugh. “If he had, you’d have known about it by the way he hollered in pain. No. He just made me feel...icky. He’s so slimy.” She hugged herself. “Also, I didn’t learn much. I suppose I’m disappointed, feel cheap for even agreeing to have a drink with him. The only thing he said when I mentioned Oakley was that my sister had the prettiest eyes he’d ever seen.”

Cooper caught his breath, his gaze swinging to hers. “When did he see her close enough that he knew the color of her eyes?”

“I started to ask him that, but he said he misspoke, that he’d had too much to drink, that it was my eyes he was talking about. He said he’d never met my sister, but he sure hoped she’d be all right. I didn’t believe him.”

Cooper didn’t know what to say for a moment. “I think I might know how their paths could have crossed. We need to find out if Oakley was involved in a group opposed to the methane drilling.”

“You think that’s how Tick met her?”

“I think it’s a place to start. There’s been rumors floating around about residents getting together and doing something about the drilling. I doubt we were the only ranch that lost one of our biggest producing water wells because of the drilling.”

“The drilling on our ranch really did cause that?” Tilly asked, concerned. “I’m sorry. I tried to talk my mother out of it, especially so close to your place, but CJ convinced her otherwise. But I can’t see Oakley involved in an anti-methane group... I’ll look in her room when I get home. I don’t even know if she keeps a diary or will have some item to give me an idea of what she’s been doing.”

He glanced at her as he drove. “Can you get into her phone? There could be something on her calendar.”

“Stuart still has her phone. I’ll see if he’s gotten into it. Maybe I can talk him into letting me give it a try. I know Oakley’s passwords.”

He nodded, thinking of his one and only password. Ahead, he could see the lights of Powder Crossing, and the river silver in the starlight. “Maybe you should tell Stuart what you found out and let him take it from here. He is the sheriff.”And your boyfriend, but he didn’t say that.

She shook her head. “He’s also understaffed and, if you must know, looking into other leads, he told me. He didn’t say it, but it was clear that he thought I was wrong about the gas company having anything to do with this because of my bias. If you don’t want to help me—”

“That’s not it.” He slowed on the edge of town and caught her eye. “I don’t want to come between you and Stuart.”

“Do you have any idea how arrogant that sounds?”

“You know what I mean. I don’t want him thinking...”

“What?”

He could see the challenge in her eyes. She was already angry with herself and Tick. He knew that Tilly could be reckless enough, but when she was angry... He didn’t want her doing something she would regret—and he might regret even more.

“I’m not bailing on you,” he said quickly. “I just don’t want him thinking there is more going on between us than there is,” he told her, and saw that he’d put his foot in it again even as hard as he’d tried not to.

She sat back in her seat, turning to look out at town as they drove through. “My truck’s right up here,” she said, unnecessarily since he’d picked her up here not that many hours ago.

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