Page 68 of Silver Linings

“Thank you,” I said, addressing the unicorn directly. “Tell them….”

The words trailed off. I had so many things I wanted to say, so many ideas that might have been too complicated for him to communicate.

I just had to hope he’d be able to get this one across.

“Tell them that I understand the assignment.”

The GPS signal from Victor Maplehurst’s phone led the authorities to his body the next morning, after his wife had called the police to say he’d had a meeting in Portland but had never come home afterward. After that news swept through the town grapevine, I couldn’t help experiencing a slight pang of guilt. I’d been so busy thinking about him as the chief threat to the well-being of the forest that I hadn’t even thought about the people he left behind.

But although a full autopsy was scheduled, the medical examiner in Eureka seemed to think Victor had died of an aneurysm…and I had a feeling they wouldn’t find anything different after the examination was completed.

As for Maplehurst’s two goons, Curt and Lenny, they hadn’t uttered a peep about what had happened that night. Maybe they didn’t think anyone would believe them, or maybe they were just worried that if they started flapping their jaws, the unicorn would come after them and they’d meet the same fate as their boss.

Either way, it didn’t sound as if Ben and I needed to worry about them revealing any secrets.

Mayor Tillman had wanted to call off the town meeting scheduled for that night, citing respect for the dead, but Eliza Cartwright had steamrollered right over him, saying that just because Northwest Pacific might temporarily be out of the picture, that didn’t mean others might not step up to threaten the forest. So everyone gathered to voice their concerns, and the town councilors promised that the charter would be amended to state that absolutely no logging would be allowed in the forest. This might have put them at odds with the government, since technically, all of it was federal land, but since no private logging had been officially allowed there for decades, no one seemed too concerned about that particular wrinkle.

“But we’ll have to remain watchful,” I told Ben, who’d come over the next night for dinner. I’d kept expecting him to tell me he needed to pack up and return to Southern California, but so far, he hadn’t broached that awkward subject.

And although I hadn’t been lying when I’d admitted I wasn’t the best cook in the world, I was still fairly decent at following directions, which was why we were eating London broil I’d marinated all day according to my grandmother’s recipe — and which Ben had finished on the grill, guaranteeing that the results would be pretty decent.

As was the German potato salad I’d thrown together, again from one of my grandmother’s recipes. It provided a savory, vinegary counterpoint to the red wine marinade, and I thought the combination made a great, if simple meal.

Once again, the day had turned out blue and bright. Although I’d worked at the pet shop today — I thought being closed a second day in a row when there wasn’t any real reason to do so wouldn’t have been very responsible — I’d closed a half hour early so I could come home and finish getting everything ready. And since the sun hadn’t hidden itself behind the clouds, the two of us were eating dinner out on the back porch rather than in the dining room, so we had a clear view of the forest only a few hundred yards away.

“So….” Ben said, then paused. During the meal, we’d talked about the goings-on of the past few days, and how it seemed as if the residents of Silver Hollow had managed an effective end run against the mayor and his ambitions to fill the city’s coffers — and possibly his own — by looking the other way when it came to illegal logging operations in the forest.

“So?” I echoed before I picked up my glass of cabernet and took another swallow. We’d already gone through two-thirds of it, so I had a feeling we were going to finish the whole thing.

He drank some wine as well, gaze speculative as he stared out at the forest. “I have a conference in Fountain Hills next week.”

There it was. I set down my wine glass, doing my best to look unconcerned. “Where’s that?”

“Just outside Scottsdale. There’s an indigenous-owned casino there with a big conference center, and they host a lot of the fringe-y stuff. Things like MUFON.”

I had no idea what MUFON even was, but I tried to nod as if I understood the reference. “It must be pretty hot there this time of year.”

“Oh, it is.” He also put down his glass of wine, and the hazel eyes that mine were deadly serious. “I have a feeling it’s going to make me want to come straight back to Silver Hollow.”

My heart started to beat a little faster, even though I told myself it was silly to let myself get excited by such a statement, not when Ben and I hadn’t exchanged a single word that could be construed as the two of us wanting to pursue a connection beyond the professional…not when we hadn’t done much more than hold each other’s hands for support and comfort.

“You’re going to start researching Bigfoot?” I asked, only half-joking.

Now he smiled. “Probably not. I like the niche I’ve carved out for myself. But I can do a lot online, and if I need to investigate something in person, there’s no reason why it would be any harder to do that from a home base here rather than in Yucaipa.”

I thought that comment might be stretching the truth a little bit, just because everything I’d heard about chupacabras — which admittedly wasn’t much — seemed to indicate they were mostly creatures of the desert Southwest. His current home on the outskirts of San Bernardino County would be much more convenient if he needed to follow up on a sighting in person, or whatever else it was he did.

But if that’s what he needed to think to convince himself to stay, I wasn’t going to argue with him.

It had been a long time since someone had made my heart pound the way it did every time our eyes met.

“Well, you’ll definitely have a lower air conditioning bill here in Silver Hollow,” I joked feebly, and he grinned.

“That’s for sure. Also, Eliza told me that her friend Nancy’s guest house will be available starting on the first, so I’ll have someplace I can land right away.”

The first of June was only a couple of days off. I didn’t know how Ben would manage to move up here and still be in Fountain Hills for his conference, but if he thought he could handle the logistics, then I supposed it was his business.

And I knew the guest house in question, mostly because a friend of mine from high school had rented it for a time. It was an adorable Victorian cottage behind Nancy Petterson’s home, set just far enough back from the main house that it offered some privacy. Also, it had been fixed up within the past five years, so Ben wouldn’t have to worry about balky plumbing or unreliable heating the way he might have if it had remained untouched.

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