Her lips quirked and while she didn’t say anything, I could almost hear her thoughts. How could I resist a man who speaks French?
It would be pretty damn hard.
“Mistress June is a pro,” Bobby continued.
“Therefore the animal sacrifices were practice and that equals two killers.”
“At least,” Raye agreed.
“I’ll be careful.” I opened the door.
Owen stood on the other side.
* * *
Owen had awoken when what he thought was Becca’s fingernails scratched his chest. He’d reached for her and gotten a fistful of Grenade instead.
He sat up, the kitten tumbled off, Reggie woofed, and the two of them started running around the cabin.
Owen rubbed his eyes. He was used to waking up much earlier, with a lot more noise. Real grenades going off in a completely different way for instance. Yet still he had a headache.
“Becca?”
No answer. A trickle of unease had him inching to the edge of the bed and calling her name again a little louder.
She’d probably had an emergency or an appointment. Except he hadn’t heard her phone, hadn’t heard her leave. Which made the unease deepen for more reasons than one.
A few months out of the field and he slept right through noises and movement? If he’d been in Afghanistan he’d be dead.
Owen put on some pants and stepped onto the porch. Reggie nosed the kitten back inside when she would have followed. Owen shut the door.
“What’s your excuse?” he asked, but the dog trotted into the high grass at the edge of the lake. At this rate, they were both going to have to do some retraining before they returned to work.
Owen’s hand fell to his thigh, rubbed where the stiff morning ache usually lived. It was faint today. Amazingly so.
His gaze zeroed in on Carstairs Avenue. From here he couldn’t tell if Becca was at the clinic or not. She could have walked back since he’d driven—
His eyes narrowed on the empty space where his rental had been. “Huh.”
Reggie smacked his head against the door. Grenade mewed from the other side, and the dog started barking.
“Shh.” Owen opened it, and the two tumbled across the floor like puppies. He hadn’t seen Reggie behave like this … ever. Work was play, hence his reward of the rubber ball whenever he found what he was sent to find. Since they’d been here, Owen had used the ball so little, he wasn’t sure exactly where it was.
As he pulled the spare from his duffel and shoved it in his pocket, he caught sight of a piece of paper where one hadn’t been last night, and crossed the room, read Becca’s note, then glanced at the clock. Eight A.M.
The time meant nothing, as he’d no idea when she’d left. He retrieved his phone, texted her, waited. Waited some more. Gave the animals some water, a little food. Checked his phone, peered out the window. Twitched. Twitched again.
Finally he put on shirt and shoes, grabbed Reggie’s leash, snapped it onto the dog’s collar, and they left. It didn’t take long to find her. Finding things was what both he and Reggie did best.
The pickup sat in front of the coffee shop like a blazing white flag. However, he could see through the windows that she wasn’t inside. Which made Owen all kinds of nervous.
A car backed up next to him, and the uninterested glance he threw at the driver suddenly became very interested when Owen recognized the wolf hunter he’d last seen in the bar.
Owen lifted a hand, shouted, “Hey!” but the guy pulled onto the highway and accelerated. Within seconds, his taillights were specks at the outskirts of town.
Where was Chief Deb when you needed her?
Owen had just pulled out his phone, thinking he would call Becca over and over until she either answered, or he heard her cell ringing and ringing from wherever she lay unconscious, when Reggie tugged on the leash and practically dragged him to one of the motel room doors, where he promptly sat and stared at the doorknob.
As if his stare was magic, the knob turned, the door opened, and there she was—along with a bunch of people Owen had never seen before.
For an instant Owen thought she might slam the door in his face. But Reggie barked and bounded inside. She patted his head, then murmured, “You too.”
“I … uh…” The woman who’d said she was Becca’s sister—maybe Owen did know one person in the room—glanced at Becca helplessly.