need the heat to help with the soreness.”
I blinked, then flushed further. “How do you even know that?”
“Loverboy. He read any book he could get his hands on. Technical. Romance. You name it. He was shit with the ladies, but he knew more about your gender than most women knew about themselves.”
“Well, I’m fine.”
“I’m not arguing about this.” And to prove he wasn’t arguing, Logan pulled the lacy bra from my body and picked me up like a sack of potatoes and threw me over his shoulder. Resistance was futile so I didn’t fight him. He deposited me into the filling tub, then grabbed a towel for my head to rest on while I soaked. When I sank into the warm water with a sigh of defeat, I moaned audibly the moment my sore muscles relaxed. Loverboy wasn’t wrong about the bath. The heat helped instantly.
“Twenty minutes,” he ordered, pointing at me. “Then we’ll head out.”
I smirked at his order then saluted him. “Sir, yes, sir.”
His answering grin made me smile. At least his eyes weren’t haunted anymore.
Sixteen
Truce
“HOW LONG DO you think it will take them to process the hair?”
Logan glanced at me as we headed back to Ennis. After searching all morning, the only evidence we’d found was a long, dark brown or black hair caught in the seat belt mechanism of Duke’s truck. Spear and his officers had searched all night for Duke but found no evidence that would point us in the right direction. Divers were being called in so they could search the bottom of the lake, but that could take days. Since there was nothing left for Logan and me to do in Yellowstone, we decided to return to Ennis and wait for news. It was frustrating having no leads other than a single strand of hair. Tom Petty was right. Waiting was the hardest part.
“Weeks. And it won’t tell us much since there’s no hair follicle. We’ll be able to match the hair to a suspect if we have one, but it won’t prove anything conclusive. Duke interacted with everyone, baby. The hair could have been there for months or it could have been left behind a day ago.”
“The length suggests it’s a woman’s hair.”
Logan nodded.
“I can’t see a woman killing Duke, though. He may have been in his fifties, but he was still strong. The only way a woman could have killed Duke is if she snuck up behind him and bashed him in the head. And even then, I don’t know many women strong enough to move a body. Unless they were out on the water together and she shoved him overboard—which makes no sense since he liked to fish alone—then how did she dispose of him?”
“So what does that tell you?”
I sighed and sank farther into my seat. “That the hair probably isn’t related to Duke’s disappearance.”
“We’ll figure this out. Concentrate on the bar, on the carnival, and leave this to me. You’ve got enough on your plate.”
With all that had happened in the past twelve hours, I had forgotten about Chance and the threat to my family. Thank God for Kenzie. She was a lifeline. If I had to worry about Duke and the bar, I would have still been a mess.
Thinking about Kenzie and Duke reminded me of my conversation with Kenzie the day before. I sat upright and turned to Logan. “I forgot Kenzie was waiting to talk to Duke. I guess she’ll have to talk to you now.”
Logan reached over and started rubbing my shoulder, digging his fingers deep into the tissue. The past day must have settled in those muscles because I moaned a little and relaxed back into the seat.
“What did she need to talk to Duke about?”
“Chance scared her.”
His fingers paused their delectable torture for a moment. “Scared her how?”
I glanced at Logan and caught a scowl working across his features. “She said he showed up at her house with war paint smeared across his face.”
His eyes shot to mine in confusion. “Is that supposed to mean something?”
“Like a declaration of war?”
“Yeah.”
“I think so. Justice was half Flathead, but he really didn’t intermingle with his people. I was a little surprised, honestly, since Chance hadn’t grown up in the culture. Flatheads are normally peaceful. They didn’t war against the white man like some tribes did. Their biggest enemy was the Blackfeet and they only fought them for their territory and food. As a whole they are a peaceful nation.”
Logan seemed to ponder that as