Page 53 of River Wild

But would it ever truly be over?

She’d promised Stuart she would stay the night, but going to the spare bedroom was harder than it had ever been, knowing that he was only in the next room. She desperately wanted to go to him, to curl against him, to hold on to him as if their lives depended on it.

Instead, she lay down on the spare bed, listening to the night sounds.Hewas out there.He’dleft her a reminder that he wasn’t far away, thathewas watching her and could get to her at any time.

You’re safe here.The thought rang truer than any she’d had.

STUARTEXPECTEDBAILEYto be gone the next morning. He didn’t expect to see her making French toast and bacon for breakfast. He raised an eyebrow. He hadn’t had bread or eggs or bacon in the house.

“I called my brother Brand. He just happened to be on his way into town,” Bailey said. “He was happy to help since apparently he’s been worried about me.”

With good reason, the sheriff thought. “How fortunate for me,” he said, and sat down in the chair she indicated while she poured him a cup of coffee. “He wasn’t curious about you being here, cooking us both breakfast?”

“Apparently he’d already ready heard about your declaration of love,” she joked as she handed him the full cup of coffee and sat down.

“Holden,” he said with a shake of his head as he studied her. She’d been shaken last night, first after finding out that Norma Jones had been following her and then seeing what the man had left for her in her car.

They ate in companionable silence for a few minutes. “I don’t normally eat breakfast,” Bailey said.

“Me either. But waking up to this—” he took her in “—was a special surprise.”

She grinned. “I promised I wouldn’t leave last night. But Stuart, you wanted to resign, and I never asked you why you—”

“I’m not going to stop looking for the man,” he said, and met her gaze. “And neither are you, and I couldn’t stop you even if I tried.”

She held her fork in the air. “I guess that about covers it.”

He nodded, averting his eyes as he cut off a piece of French toast on his plate. “What do you make of the package he left you?”

Clearly, she’d expected him to want to talk about her tell-all book or his mother or why he’d wanted to resign. Those were the last things he wanted to talk about.

He watched her consider him for a moment before she said, “He wanted me to know that he can get to me—and will when he’s ready.”

“You don’t think he’s ready yet.” That surprised him, because he was thinking the same thing. The man had taken a chance leaving the bundle for her right there on the main drag of Powder Crossing. “Did you see anyone around when you went back to your vehicle?”

She shook her head. “Town wasn’t busy at that hour. Even if it had been, I doubt anyone would have noticed.”

“Except for one person—Norma, who’d been facing in the right direction to see it.”

Bailey stared at him. “I’ll drive out to her place and talk to her.”

“Might be better if I questioned her, under the circumstances.”

She shook her head. “I can handle it.” She took a sip of her coffee as his phone rang.

The moment he answered, Deputy Dodson said loudly and excitedly, “I think I found where he did it. Where he assaulted Willow. There are pieces of cut rope, some torn clothing, the remains of a small fire in one corner and what looks like dried blood.”

Stuart stepped into the other room as the deputy gave him directions to an old outbuilding some distance from the house Willow had been renting. “Okay, stay in your vehicle. Don’t go back inside. Stay there until the crime team gets there.” He disconnected and turned to see Bailey standing in the doorway.

“You found where he assaulted her,” she said. “Can you find out if there was a gas can there? He told me he was going to kill me and then burn down the cabin. He’d brought a small can of gasoline. He was going to destroy any evidence and make his escape back into the barbecue crowd as if he’d never been gone. That old cabin would have burned quickly. When my body was found...”

“He would have covered his tracks. But he underestimated you.”

“I got lucky,” she said with a shake of her head. “I know the area you told the crime team to go to. That outbuilding is back off the road, isolated, perfect for what he had in mind. So why did he take Willow to the river? Why move her at all? Why take the chance? If she hadn’t drowned...”

He saw what she was getting at. “He changed his routine.”

“Or something or someone forced him to. If the gas can is there, then he might have been interrupted and, for whatever reason, he was afraid to go back there to clean it up.”

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