Page 23 of Shadows Reel

Axel Soledad was unmistakable in the image. He was tall and imposing, with a hatchet-like nose and a week’s growth of dark beard on his face. His head was shaved and reflected the ambient light.

“That’s him,” Nate said. “What were they doing?”

“Do you want to see for yourself?”

Nate indicated that he did.

“Back soon,” Jones called out to thebartender.

CHAPTER EIGHT

April Pickett

When she heard tires grind on the gravel outside their home, Marybeth closed the photo album with a thud and lowered the screen on her laptop. A quick glance at the digital clock on the microwave induced immediate panic.

She’d been so engrossed in her research that she’d let herself become completely sidetracked.

Her list of Thanksgiving to-dos had barely been addressed. The horses needed to be fed, the beds in the two guest rooms needed new sheets, the bathrooms needed fresh towels, the turkey needed to be brined, pies had to be baked... on and on. And yet she’d opened the album again when she got home from the store and once again had been swept away. She’d deliberately let herself get behind schedule.

After a trip to the grocery store, where she’d had to navigatethrough dozens of other Thanksgiving shoppers, she’d completely filled the back of the van and headed home.

Her only stop was a quick one to check on Lola Lowry and deliver her bag of books. Lola lived in a double-wide trailer on a small parcel of land en route to their home on the river. Despite her provocative name, which amused Marybeth and Joe to no end, Lola was an eighty-two-year-old widow, who, being the last person alive in her family, had inherited the land and the trailer from her deceased uncle, who had used it as a hunting lodge on his annual trips from Michigan.

Lola was feisty and independent, and except for a cat, she lived alone. She was fond of those romance books and Marybeth used the weekly visits to check on her in general. Lola was still very sharp, although she thought the couple down the road near the river were named “Pridgett.”

When Marybeth arrived, Lola was drinking Dixie cups of peppermint schnapps and watching her soaps on television. Before leaving, Marybeth invited the woman to Thanksgiving dinner with them, and although Lola demurred at first, she agreed to come if no one minded that she left early.

Which meant they had to plan for an additional seat at the table, even though Marybeth doubted that Lola ate much.

But after unpacking the groceries in her kitchen, Marybeth felt the photo album pulling at her. She assured herself that she’d devote only a few minutes to it. That had been three hours before.

Only the arrival of the vehicle outside broke her trance.

—

She pushed the albumand laptop to the side of the dining room table and tossed a spare apron over the top of them so neither could be seen. The subject matter of the materials was too disturbing to be viewed without context. The album exuded a malignant evil. If it was able to penetrate and infect her, no doubt it would have the same effect on others.

Nevertheless, she couldn’t wait to show it to Joe, tell him what she’d learned about the original owner, and what she was starting to discover about how it might have found its way to rural Wyoming. She was obsessed with it.

But when she parted the kitchen curtains she noticed that the headlights in the drive weren’t from Joe’s pickup. They were narrower and the beams were less focused from the headlamps.

Someone was coming, and she didn’t recognize who it was.

—

Although there wasa small wooden sign out on the county road indicating the turnoff through the timber to the Saddlestring District Game Warden Station—which was what their house was officially called, since it was owned by the state agency—it was always interesting and sometimes alarming to see who showed up after dusk.

Since it was in the latter part of the big-game seasons, it could be hunters arriving to turn themselves in for violations or to report others for transgressions. Occasionally, local landownerswho couldn’t contact Joe by either cell phone or via the dispatcher would simply show up to report trespassers or make their case against changing regulations or opener dates.

The Pickett house had always been quasi-public. Only in larger communities like Cheyenne, Casper, Jackson, or Lander were there dedicated office buildings for Game and Fish personnel.

Marybeth was used to handling situations on the fly, and when people showed up, she no longer had the added worry about their daughters in the house. Not that being completely alone was that much better. But there was no doubt having a woman open the door instead of the game warden himself sometimes defused tense situations.

As agreed between them long ago, she snatched her cell phone from the counter and texted Joe.

Someone coming down the road.

Seconds after she sent it, she saw the word balloon go active on her screen as Joe typed out his reply.

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