Page 55 of River Wild

She wrinkled her nose. “Why would someone leave you a stained towel?”

“You were facing in the right direction. Do you remember seeing anyone near my SUV? They left the door open after they tossed it in.”

“Was that your SUV? Yes, I guess it was. I’d forgotten what color it was. Is it supposed to be a green?”

“Norma, it’s important that I find the person who got into my car.”

“I would think so. A stained towel.” Her nose wrinkled again. “I did see someone. I didn’t know what she was doing. I just assumed she was putting something into her own car.”

“Her?”

“Annette. She seemed to be in a real hurry. Looked right at me after she tossed it in. I thought it was so rude to leave the door open as she hurried away.”

“AnnetteCline? Dickie’s wife?”

“Why would a grown man call himself Dickie?” Norma said, and motioned for Bailey to finish her muffin.

Bailey had no idea. She ate the last of the muffin and washed it down with coffee. “Do you need to talk about our conversation from yesterday?”

Norma blinked. “You said you weren’t interested in my husband. That conversation?”

“Yes. It’s true. I’m with Stuart Layton and have been for some time. I have no interest in your husband, nor does he have any in me.”

The older woman nodded and smiled. “So glad we have that cleared up,” she said, getting to her feet and scooping up Bailey’s plate and empty coffee cup. The muffin had been dry, not that she would have told Norma that to save her life.

Dismissed, Bailey rose. “Thank you for your help and the muffin.”

Norma waved it off. “I’m just glad you stopped by. If you don’t mind seeing yourself out, I have a lot to do today. A woman’s work is never done.”

“So true.” She left and almost made it off the Jones Ranch before her stomach began to roil. She was throwing up beside the road by the time she reached the edge of Powder Crossing and remembered something that had seemed out of place in Norma’s ultra-clean kitchen. A small plastic bottle of eye drops next to the coffeepot. That evil woman, Bailey thought as her stomach cramped again.

DEPUTYDODSONHADcalled to say the crime team had arrived when the dispatcher told Stuart there was an urgent call from a woman, but she wouldn’t give her name.

The moment he answered the phone, Stuart could hear a woman crying hysterically. “Take a breath,” he ordered even as his pulse began to pound. Bailey had said she was going out to see Norma Jones. “Tell me your name and what’s wrong.” He could hear her struggling to gain control of her sobbing. At first he couldn’t understand what she was saying and felt his frustration rising.

Then he heard what she was trying to tell him. “He’s dead,” Annette Cline sobbed. “He’s dead.”

“Annette, tell me what’s happened? Is it Dickie?”

She sucked in a breath on a sob. “It’s...it’s my friend Brock.”

Brock Sherwood, the Wyoming man Stuart had seen driving to her house when Dickie was gone.

“He’sdead.”

“Where are you?” the sheriff asked, and listened as she told him the name of a motel in Miles City. She went on to say that she’d gone to get them something for breakfast before they had to leave, and when she came back...

“I opened the door and...” She began sobbing again. “It’s so awful.”

“You’re sure he’s dead?” She was.

“He’d been worried, thought someone had been following him and was afraid, but I didn’t really think...” She broke up again.

“Don’t touch anything. Just stay there. I’m sending help. Where is Dickie?”

Between sobs, she told him that Dickie had called yesterday to say he was on his way home, but since she hadn’t gone to the house yet, she hadn’t seen him. Dickie’s return explained the motel in Miles City.

Stuart disconnected and called the police in Miles City. He’d just hung up when the dispatcher said Dickie Cline was on the line.

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