Page 29 of River Wild

Stuart looked up at her. He had to follow his gut and hers. The man was coming for her again, and they had to find him before that happened. “I want to know everything about these four ranchers left on your list. With luck, he’s one of the four. I’m assuming you’ve seen each of these men.”

She nodded. “Any one of them could be him.”

“I’ll check them out,” Stuart said. “If he’s one of them, then he wasn’t home the night of the murder. Also, we have a boot print that was left at the scene. The print was fresh, but not enough to prove that he’s our man. It could have been left by someone else who stopped by the river in the past few days.” He frowned as he had a thought. “You don’t happen to remember the type of boot your attacker wore, do you?”

“Black, crocodile, pointed toe.”

“How about the heel?” he asked.

She frowned thoughtfully and shook her head no.

“A buckaroo-style boot by any chance, tapered at the heel?” Stuart asked. “Taller top with an extra layer of leather to protect the cowboy’s legs from the thick brush and tapered heel in the back?”

“Sorry. All I can tell you was that they looked expensive.”

Stuart nodded, though “expensive” could cover a lot of dress cowboy boots on ranchers in the area.

Bailey, he noticed, looked for the first time as if she believed the man could be found and stopped before he came for her. She reached into her bag and pulled out her computer. “I can send you everything I know about the four ranchers and their families. Everything but their boot size and style.”

“Good, I’ll see what I can find out.” He glanced at the time. “I need to get to my office.” The registration letter was still in his desk drawer. He didn’t want anyone finding it before he could destroy it. Bailey was busy on her computer. He heard his phone announce that four emails had been delivered. “Bailey?”

She looked up as she finished and closed her computer.

“I was thinking it might be a good idea if you lie low in the meantime,” he said. “I’d recommend that you go out to the ranch... Maybe tell your father what’s going on.” She shook her head. “It’s going to come out.”

“I wasn’t safe at the ranch when I was seventeen,” she said. “What makes you think I would be now?”

She had a point. “Anyway, I have to go to Billings. If you need to get in touch with me, I’ll be at the Northern for the night.”

He couldn’t hide his relief that she would be away from here. Not that the rancher couldn’t follow her to the hotel. But he felt she should be safe in Billings since as far as they knew, the rancher wouldn’t be as familiar with the city as he was with the Powder River Basin.

However, he had to wonder why she was going to Billings. She could be meeting a man at the hotel. She could be doing just about anything. If she wanted him to know, she would have told him, so he let it go. “Stay in touch.”

She nodded, and they stood awkwardly for a few moments.

“I’m glad you told me.” He said nothing as she turned and picked up her things. “You know I’ll do whatever it takes to find him and bring him to justice.”

Her smile told him how things would go. “You won’t be doing this alone. You need me. Don’t make me sorry I told you.” With that, she swept past him.

He walked to the porch to watch her leave, even more worried about her than he had been. Whatever she was doing in Billings, it had to do with her assault, with the man who was coming for her. He just couldn’t imagine how.

As she started to drive away, their gazes locked for a few seconds before she disappeared out of sight.

In those few seconds, he saw relief. She wasn’t alone in this anymore. The weight of it settled heavy on his shoulders, bringing with it all his doubts and his fears. He couldn’t fail her.

CHAPTER TEN

STUARTREADTHROUGHthe information that Bailey had texted him on each of the four ranchers before he checked in with the state crime team and the coroner. Ronald had little more to tell him after completing his autopsy and turning in the report. Willow had been sexually assaulted, choked repeatedly and finally branded before being dumped in the river, where she had drowned.

So where had the killer attacked and kept the victim? It couldn’t have been too far from where he’d dumped her in the river, right? He sent two deputies to search the area near the drop site for any nearby abandoned buildings where the assault could have taken place.

In the meantime, he planned to talk to each rancher left on Bailey’s list—beginning with the one closest to the drop site, Earl Hall. The sheriff felt a little more confident this morning as he picked up his Stetson and, settling it on his head, headed down the Powder River toward the Wyoming border.

All four of the men on Bailey’s list were born and raised in the area, attended country schools and inherited ranches from their families. The Hall Ranch, like many of those in the Powder River Basin, had been land claimed under the Homestead Act in 1905.

Stuart didn’t call ahead. He took his chances that he’d find Earl Hall at home. Twelve years ago, Earl would have been thirty-six. He and his father, EW, had been invited to Holden McKenna’s barbecue that day. If father and son had ridden to the barbecue together, Earl couldn’t be Bailey’s attacker. She had injured him badly enough that he would have had to leave at once.

But it was possible EW hadn’t gone. Or that he’d taken his own pickup. Or that he’d helped his son. Now suffering from dementia, Earl’s father lived in a rest home in Miles City. Bailey had crossed Earl’s father off the list, the sheriff noted, because of a ranch injury to the man’s right leg that had left it half the diameter of the other. But he could have been a co-conspirator, as horrible as that sounded.

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