Cardwell Ranch Trespasser - By B. J. Daniels Page 0,61
but right now we have to get the kids.” For all Hilde knew, the woman calling herself Dee had killed Dana’s cousin and taken over her life.
“You can’t really believe she’d hurt my—”
“She wants Hud, Dana. She’s been after your life since the moment she saw Hud. Do you really think she wants the kids as well?”
Dana seemed to come out of the trance Dee’d had her in since arriving in Montana. Surely she’d seen the way Dee fawned over her husband.
“Hud told me she has a crush on him, but... You have to be wrong about her,” Dana cried. But she grabbed the shotgun she kept high on the wall by the back door.
As they ran outside, Hilde prayed the babies were all right. She told herself that if Dee stood any chance of getting away with this, then she couldn’t have hurt them. But the woman had apparently already gotten away with murdering her own parents—and her brother. Possibly Dana’s cousin as well. Who knew what she’d do to get what she wanted.
Dee and the kids were nowhere in sight.
“She must have gone up the road,” Dana said.
“There!” Hilde cried as she spotted the stroller lying on its side in front of the barn. Dana rushed into the barn first, Hilde right behind her. They both stopped, both breathing hard.
“Mary! Hank!” Dana called, her voice breaking. Silence. She called again, her voice more frantic.
A faint cry came from one of the stalls.
Rushing toward it, they found Mary and Hank holding the twins in the back of the stall. Hilde heard the relief rush from Dana as she dropped to the straw.
“What are you two doing?” Hilde asked, fear making her voice tight.
“We’re playing a game,” Hank said.
“Auntie Dee told us to stay here and not make a sound,” Mary said in a conspiratorial whisper.
“But Mary made a sound when she heard you calling for her,” Hank said. “Now Auntie Dee is going to be mad, and when she’s mad she’s kind of scary.”
“Where is Auntie Dee?” Hilde asked.
Hank shook his head and seemed to see the shotgun his mother had rushed in with. “Are you and Auntie Hilde going hunting?”
“We are,” Hilde said. “That’s why we need you and your sister to stay here and keep playing the game for just a little longer. Can you do that?”
Dana shot her friend a look, then picked up the shotgun. “Be very quiet. We’ll be back in just a minute, okay?” Both children nodded and touched fingers to their lips.
Hilde stepped out of the stall and looked down the line of stalls. The light was dim and cool in the huge barn. Dee could be anywhere.
As they moved away from the stall with the children inside, Dana whispered, “Maybe it is just a game.”
Hilde bit back a curse. Dana was determined to see the best in everyone—especially this cousin who’d ingratiated herself into their lives. But Hilde had to admit whatever game Camilla Northland was playing, it didn’t make any sense.
They both jumped when they heard the barn door they’d come through slam shut. An instant later, they heard the board that locked it closed come down with a heart-stopping thud.
“She just locked us in,” Hilde said, her voice breaking.
Dana had already turned and was racing toward the back door of the barn. Hilde knew before she saw Dana reach it that she would find it locked.
Only moments later did she smell the smoke.
Chapter Fifteen
“I’m about ten minutes outside of Big Sky,” Colt said when he’d called Hilde’s phone and gotten voice mail. “I don’t know where you are or why you aren’t picking up.” He didn’t know what else to say so he disconnected and tried to call her at the shop.
His anxiety grew when the recording came on giving the shop’s hours. He glanced at his watch. Hilde was a stickler for punctuality. If she’d gone to the shop, there was no way she would be thirty minutes late for work unless something was wrong.
When his phone rang, he thought it was Hilde. Prayed it was. He didn’t even look to see who was calling and was surprised when he heard Hud’s voice.
“I can’t get into all of it right now,” he told Hud, “but I have proof the woman at the ranch isn’t Dee Anna Justice, and I can’t reach Hilde at the shop or on her cell. I can’t reach the ranch, either.”
“I’m on my way home from West Yellowstone,” Hud said. “I haven’t been able