From the Shadows (Buckhorn, Montana #2) - B.J. Daniels Page 0,112

“I’ve never been silent in my life.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

CASEY PUT DOWN the top on the convertible and glanced over at Finn. After several weeks in Buckhorn, they were finally leaving. The marshal said he didn’t think they would be called back for Jen’s trial. Emery was dead and Vi had thrown herself on the mercy of the court. It was over.

“I didn’t want to believe any of them were capable of murder,” Casey said as she looked down the main drag and wondered if she would ever see this place again. “But once I realized Emery hadn’t killed Megan...”

“You thought it was Jason,” Finn said, proving once again how well he knew her, as he buckled up his seat belt.

She nodded sheepishly. “Maybe I just wanted it to be him. Now I feel terrible about that. How did Jen get him to hang himself?”

“I heard drug residue was found in one of the two glasses in the room, along with a bottle of booze.”

“So Jen pretended to go to her room, then sneaked in the back door with a bottle and offered him a drink. Still...”

“Jen is a lot stronger than she looks and definitely determined,” Finn said.

“Angry and bitter. I saw that in her, but no more than Patience and the others.”

“Like Jen’s aunt,” he said. Vi had broken down and admitted that she’d helped her brother try to scare everyone away from the hotel. Her brother Emery, when she’d informed him that the hotel was going to be sold, had returned to Buckhorn to try to cover up his crimes. He’d confessed to his sister about the women he’d killed and hidden in the underbelly of the hotel.

Vi did everything she could to protect him, including trying to stop the sale and even making an offer herself. When that failed, she’d pretended to be Megan’s ghost to try to scare away the people who’d moved into the hotel, starting with Finnegan James, while her brother spent his nights digging up the bodies and trying to remove them. Her brother had shown her the secret passages within the hotel so she could move about without being caught. It had been her in the woods Saturday night.

“I always knew Vi was a force of nature,” Casey said. Vi swore that she’d tried to stop Emery. But with time running out, he had taken matters into his own hands. He’d always worked around construction and had some experience with explosives. He decided the only way to end it was to blow the place up, but he couldn’t kill Casey. So he’d gotten her out.

“I would imagine the law will go easy on Vi since she was just trying to protect her brother,” Casey said.

Finn lifted a brow. “Or merely protecting herself and her reputation in town. The months I lived here, I saw that she was like the mayor of Buckhorn, the way she butted into everyone’s business. Imagine if people found out what her brother did. She would have done just about anything so that didn’t happen. And she did. She’d dressed up like Megan and run through the woods and sneaked around the hotel.” Casey laughed, imagining how embarrassing that would have been for the woman.

She smiled at Finn. She often forgot how well he knew the residents of Buckhorn. She’d known Vi almost her whole life and agreed with him. “She must be devastated, since she was the first lady of Buckhorn.”

“Especially after what was found hidden in her room.” Not just the white dress with what had been sprayed on it to look like blood, but also an extra blond wig. Now she was looking at criminal charges, since she’d knowingly helped her brother to try to cover up his crimes. But the marshal said she would probably just get probation.

Her husband, Axel, had filed for divorce and left town. Vi still had the general store, her antiques barn and their house since apparently it had been her family money that had purchased all of it.

“I’m surprised she’s staying here, though,” Casey said as she looked down the main drag of Buckhorn.

“She has a hundred hours of community service to do, and doesn’t her daughter still live here?”

“Tina? Yes. She’s pregnant.” Baby’s father unknown, but she was still living with Lars, and Lars was still having an affair with Shirley at the motel.

The story of the women Emery killed had gone viral. Buckhorn was on the map again, but maybe the ghosts would finally be at peace, as