Field of Danger

Daniel started to protest again, but the expression on Ray’s face told him that his widowed boss spoke from personal experience and wouldn’t budge on this point. Finally he nodded and rubbed a hand over a face swollen by grief. “I don’t even know where to start.”

“The calls. Make one to Beck’s Funeral Home. They’ll walk you through it.”

Daniel pushed away from the car and reached for the driver’s door. “But you’ll keep me updated, right?”

“Like we would any family. I promise.”

Daniel got in the car and backed it out of the driveway, aware that Ray kept his eyes on him until the car was out of sight. He knew Ray didn’t quite trust him to just give up and go home to sit with the phone.

Ray knew him well.

A hundred yards from the field path, the corn ran right up to the road, with only a few feet separating the stalks from the pavement. Daniel pulled off into the dirt there, out of sight, and cut the engine of the cruiser. Gripping the wheel with both hands, he squeezed as hard as he could, straining every muscle in his arms and body, desperate to drive the numbness away, to find the anger again.

His father. Levon. Dad. A low growl grew from deep in his gut, expanding into a rage-filled roar that filled the car, which rocked as he shook the wheel furiously. Daniel’s eyes burned and his throat turned raw as the wrath slowly passed, leaving him feeling empty again, as if part of his soul had been ripped away.

Daniel breathed deeply as dozens of images flashed through his mind, in rapid succession. His father on his tractor, in the backyard garden, stretched out in his recliner with the television remote slipping from his hands as he fell asleep. Levon in church, his face beaming whenever Daniel sang a solo from the choir loft.

Levon Rivers, born in North Carolina to a Native American mother and white father, had one of the most expressive faces Daniel had ever seen, and all his emotions shone through. Anguish over his wife’s death, joy over a good baseball game, melancholy over memories, serenity over the comfort he took in his faith. The thought of his father cold, still and silent seemed so wrong.

Levon always spoke his mind. So did Daniel, which had led to legendary fights between father and son. The disappointment over Daniel’s decision to become a cop instead of a farmer had echoed between them, fueling arguments for years. Although Levon had finally grown proud of his son’s work, their relationship had felt the strain. Daniel knew he and his father hadn’t been as close as they could have been—as close as Levon had wanted them to be.

Levon adored his family, took pride in his town, cherished his friends. His annual weekend-long barbecue emphasized all of that. Levon loved having people over, and at the last barbecue, he had seemed intent on introducing April Presley to everyone in Caralinda.

April. She’d been here almost a year, but had kept mostly to herself. They’d talked, usually at Levon’s, but he didn’t really know her. Gage had said she’d witnessed the shooting, then been chased and threatened by the gunman, but he hadn’t said if she was hurt.

And physical injury aside, Daniel knew April had to be traumatized. Levon had been a good friend to her and no one should have to watch a friend die like that. Daniel knew that firsthand. Jeff Gage’s youth could work against an interrogation if April had a traumatic memory block of some kind. He had only been a cop for a few years. Without experience, Gage could push her in the wrong direction, make her so frightened of her memories that she’d blank them out permanently.

“But I could help.” Daniel had been with a number of witnesses to horrible crimes who could barely remember their own names at first. In Iraq. On the streets of Nashville. He should talk to her. Calm her down. Show her how to deal with her fear and pain. Make her feel safe again.

Daniel shook his head. No. Ray would have his hide if he talked to the primary witness.

But April was more than just a witness. And he couldn’t stand the thought of abandoning her when he might be able to help her through her pain.

With that thought, the drive to see April strengthened. Giving in, Daniel reached for the keys. He’d help April deal with what she’d seen. And then, freed from fear, her memory would come back, allowing Daniel to catch his father’s killer. She had to know more then she thought she did.

She had to.

Aunt Suke pushed a bowl full of fresh mint leaves toward April. “Have some. It’ll help.”

April reached for a leaf and twisted it several times, releasing the sweet scent and gentle oil, before dropping it into her iced-tea glass. “How did you know? I mean, what was happening in the field.”

“I heard the shotgun blast when he killed Levon—that was what brought me to the window. And then I saw him chasing you, firing that gun.” She waved her hand idly toward the kitchen’s ceiling. “We have four floors here, counting the cellar. Sixteen-foot ceilings. And the house is on top of a rise in the ground. From the top, I can see all the way to Robertson County. I called 911, and then went to get you.”

She paused, glancing with annoyance at a splintered hole in the floor near the stove. “Can’t believe that wretched buzzard blew a hole in my floor.”

“Just be glad it wasn’t us.” April frowned. “Why did you hide us downstairs?”

Aunt Suke cleared her throat. “He had to have known that I’d called the police, and that his time was running out. Folks in a hurry usually see only the obvious.”

“The stairs.”

“Right. That’s why I sent Polly upstairs to make noise.”

April glanced at the complacent dog lying on the floor beside the table. “Wouldn’t that put her in danger?”

“Trust me. The shooter was in a lot more danger than Polly.”

April shuddered. “He called my name.”

“Hmm.” Aunt Suke watched her a few more moments, then asked softly, “How close were you?”

April shook her head. “Not close. Like I told the officer, I couldn’t see who shot Levon. He had his back to me. But I could see Levon, see the—” Her voice broke. “I can’t.” Her gaze focused on the wooden table that had been polished to a silky finish by years of use.

Aunt Suke sipped her tea. “The sheriff will be back here shortly to take us both to the station for our complete statements. They’ve started clearing the scene. You need to get ready to talk to them. Ray Taylor is a good man, but it’ll be all business.”

April frowned. “You sound like you’ve been through this before.”

Aunt Suke pushed a long strand of white hair behind one ear. She usually let her hair hang freely, and April had often seen her working in the garden, the wind swirling her hair around her head like a cloud. Only on Sundays did she neatly contain it with a thick barrette clasped just below her neckline. “I may not get out much these days, but there still isn’t much I don’t know about how this town runs.”

April smiled, and Aunt Suke joined her, reaching across the table to grasp one of April’s hands. “That’s better. You can’t let this shake you to the core.”

April heard the plaintiveness in her own voice. “I saw a man get killed!”

Aunt Suke tightened her grasp. “I know. It rips you. But you have to hold it together. They have to find out who did this. If you let it shake you, you won’t be able to help them.”

“I’m not sure I can anyway.”

“You may know more than you realize.” Aunt Suke suddenly stood. “You need some snicker doodles.”

“Cookies?” April asked weakly.

Aunt Suke paused and looked at April steadily. “Trust me. It’s going to be the normal, everyday things that get you through this. Cookies. Tea. Friends. Family. What about your sisters?”

“June’s not back from that conference in California yet. I haven’t called her because I know she’d want to come home early, and she doesn’t need to. She flies home next week.” April sighed. “I love my sister, but to be honest, I don’t know if I can handle June right now. She’ll want to take over everything. Tell me what to do and tell Ray how to run the investigation.”

“You don’t think Ray could rein her in?”

April shook her head. “They’re not close enough yet. He’d just irritate her.”

“What about Lindsey?”

April paused, not really wanting to cross into this territory and talk about her other sister. “Lindsey and I aren’t on good terms right now. We talk, but we’re not what you’d call close. Besides, she’s still at a culinary school in D.C.” April shook her head. “No. I don’t have many friends here in Caralinda. And I lost my closest friend today.”

Raising an eyebrow, Aunt Suke reached out to clasp her hand. “Well, you found a new one, as well. Two, if you count Polly.” After one last squeeze to April’s hand, she stood.

As Aunt Suke went to the cookie jar, Polly perked up, and April looked around the industrial-size kitchen. High-ceilinged and filled with dark woods and polished bronze appliances, it was a practical combination of old and new. She sighed. There was such a romantic nature about a house this old and historic. Levon had spent many an hour talking about the Stockards when April first moved to town, especially the house, which was one of the oldest in Caralinda.

Levon had said…

April pushed the thought away and brushed another tear from her eye.

The plate of cinnamon-laced cookies added a pungent aroma to the air, and Aunt Suke tossed one to Polly, who caught it neatly with a powerful snap of her jaws. Aunt Suke sat, waving a hand at April. “Stop thinking about Levon and my house and eat a cookie.”

April sighed. “How did you know?”

Aunt Suke shrugged. “You’re going to have flashing thoughts about Levon for a long time to come. It’s natural. Part of grieving. Part of the questioning. As time goes by, you’ll want to think about anything but what happened in the field. Your mind will wander, especially to those normal things.” She smiled. “As to the house…happens every time someone sees inside for the first time. When this is over, I’ll give you a tour.”

“I’d like that. I love old homes. I was raised in one. But you’re right, the tour should wait until later, when my mind is clear again.” April focused on her tea again. “I can’t believe Levon is dead. He was a good friend. It just doesn’t seem real.”

“Which is why you’re not grieving for him yet. You will. It’ll be real all too soon.”

The doorbell stopped April’s reply, sending a long series of melodic gongs echoing through the house. Polly stood with a soft woof and bounded out of the kitchen. April flinched, almost involuntarily, and the two women looked at each other a moment.

Then Aunt Suke straightened an already stiffened spine. “Probably just the sheriff. That turkey buzzard murderer may be determined, but even he would have better sense than to just ring my doorbell.”

Both stood and April followed Aunt Suke from the kitchen through the connecting rooms, down a hallway to the front of the house and into a long, elegant entrance foyer. Polly waited at the door as Aunt Suke looked through the peephole then unlocked and opened the massive oaken door to her home.

Daniel Rivers stepped inside without invitation, immediately spotting April. At the sight of the devastation on his face, Levon’s death abruptly became real.

She took one step toward Daniel, then burst into tears.

THREE

Anger drained away from Daniel as he closed his arms around April’s shoulders. His shoulders dropped as he held her, whispering into her hair. “I’m sorry. I know you loved him, too.”

April pushed back and looked up at him, a tinge of red returning to her skin, brighter because the rest of her face remained so pale. She nodded and stepped away from him, looking away, her gaze suddenly distant. “Like a father.”

Aunt Suke tugged at his arm, and Daniel looked down at her.

“Does Ray know you’re here? He’ll have your skin on his wall if he doesn’t.”

Daniel heard the truth in her words and looked down at April again, wishing she’d let him hold her, comfort her. Comfort each other. But April would not look at him, even though tears still streaked her face.

He focused on Aunt Suke. Her white hair spread out over her shoulders like a wide fan, and her blue eyes flared with the fire of a mother bear protecting her cub. “You shouldn’t be here, Daniel. You can’t make me believe Ray wants you working on this.”

A spear of annoyance shot through Daniel, but she was right. Daniel had spent more than twenty years trying to figure out how Aunt Suke knew everything about everybody in town. Then, about ten years ago, he’d given up and accepted it as a fact of life in Caralinda.

Ray would have a fit if he knew Daniel had stopped at Aunt Suke’s. Ray’s strict instructions to stay away from the case and the scene had sound reasoning behind them. Not only would Daniel have no objectivity about the murder, but his involvement would be a perfect target for a defense attorney. Ray had told him to go home and start making calls to his family.

Except that he couldn’t. He had to do something, and he knew that he could interrogate April with an experience almost everyone on the force except Ray lacked. Only, he hadn’t exactly gotten off to a professional start. He should be asking questions. Instead, he wanted to hold her close and make the pain go away.

Daniel closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, trying to shove down the grief roiling inside. Letting the breath out slowly, he slid his hat off his head and ran one hand through his black hair.

“Sorry, Aunt Suke.” He looked at the woman standing behind her. “My apologies, April. It’s just that…well, Dad, he…” He stopped, trying to gather thoughts scattered to the winds by grief. “I knew you were here and that you saw…”

As his voice trailed off, Aunt Suke softened and reached for his arm. Polly, sensing the change in mood, relaxed and slowly wagged her tail. “Well, you’re here now. Get out of the door and stop letting all my cold air out. Sit down in the front parlor and get yourself together.” With small, affectionate prods, she ushered them all into the only room in a fifty-mile radius that could legitimately be called a “front parlor” and opened thick damask drapes to let in the bright sun.

Obviously a room for entertaining ladies, the elegant, spotless parlor had tall windows, a tasteful selection of Queen Anne furnishings and a soft, Oriental rug over a polished hardwood floor. The graceful, feminine room made Daniel a little nervous, and he immediately checked his shoes to see if he’d tracked anything in.

Aunt Suke caught the move, smiled and patted his arm. “Don’t worry about it, honey. Today is not a day to worry about a little dirt. Sit.”

He did, on a sofa that looked too fragile to hold his weight. But it felt solid beneath him, and he relaxed a little, watching as April perched uneasily on a small chair on the other side of a low coffee table, her tall, slender frame making the slightest of depressions on the cushion. She was avoiding eye contact. Was she embarrassed at the way she’d cried on his shoulder? He hoped not. He was glad that she’d felt she could turn to him for comfort. The only part that bothered him was how she’d pulled away when the tears finally stopped. He wouldn’t have minded holding her a little longer.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to fall apart like that. I’m sure this must be hard enough for you without me making it worse. I’m just…I’m sorry about your dad.” Her tight voice held a slight tremor. “He was a good man. A good friend. I wish I could help you find the man responsible. But I didn’t really see…just the gun…and then I ran and hid in the corn.”

As April’s words faded, Aunt Suke sat next to Daniel and spoke softly to April. “You’ve been shook to the core, and who can blame you? There’s no call to be apologizing for that.”

Daniel looked down at the rug, sorrow and frustration tearing a hole in his entire being over his own loss, and what all of this was doing to April. He knew this was exactly why Ray had told him to go home; he had to get control of his feelings or he wouldn’t be of any use to anyone.

He looked up again, this time meeting the uncertain look in April’s bright green eyes dead-on. “I can help you with that.”

“What?”

“I can help,” he repeated to April. “I know how rough it is to see someone get shot. I know it disrupts everything you thought right and good. That anyone could turn a gun on another person just doesn’t register with most of us, and that’s the way it should be. And I know you’re terrified.”

“Not exactly.”

He stopped, waiting for her to go on, watching as she took a deep breath and sat a bit straighter in the chair.

“I mean, I was with that man shoving his way through the corn, firing shots in the air, threatening me in the cellar—”

Daniel’s eyes widened. “Did he call you by name or were the threats just wild?”

April looked very small and still in her chair. “He called my name. Said he would kill me.” She swallowed hard. “Kill us. Said the cops couldn’t protect us.”

“He’s wrong.” Daniel leaned forward on his seat. “We can help you. I can help you. I know it’s hard right now, with the shock and horror blurring your memories, but if we work together, I think I can help you identify the killer.”

Silence covered the room a moment, then Aunt Suke spoke softly. “You mean this is someone we all know.”

Slowly Daniel nodded. “This wasn’t a robbery or a carjacking. The killer didn’t take anything but my father’s life. This was someone with a personal grudge, not to mention someone who knew Levon well enough to know where to find him. There’s not a doubt in my mind—the killer’s a local.”

April took a deep, cleansing breath and let it out slowly. “I’ve not been here long enough to make many friends. Aside from my sister, I barely know anyone but Levon, and the people he’d introduced me to.”

All her muscles seemed to tighten. “But Levon didn’t have enemies, did he? He was a great man. Everyone loved him. How could anyone want or have a reason to do this?”

Good question. One Daniel had already been turning over in his mind a hundred times. Levon Rivers was not only a good man, he was a beloved man. Daniel had never heard an ill word against his father the entire time he was growing up, and when he’d thrown a sixtieth birthday barbecue for Levon four years ago, the entirety of Caralinda showed up.

Whoever the shooter was, he’d managed to keep his grudge against Levon well-hidden. Would he be as successful at hiding his guilt now that the crime was done? Daniel was afraid so, which made April’s blocked memories even more important.

He had to try a different tactic.

Daniel put his hat on the sofa beside him and leaned farther forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he focused on her eyes. “I know that you took him lemonade every morning he worked in the fields. He told me. He loved that about you, said it made him feel remembered, especially when he was doing something on his own, no hired folks about.”

Her eyes glistened a bit at this, and she nodded.

“So you were on the way this morning, walking through the field.”

She nodded again. “Through the corn.”

“He planted it pretty dense this year.”

Again, she agreed. “A different hybrid he was trying. Harder walking than last year, but he said it would make the harvest easier, with the way the combines worked. But it allowed a lot of weeds to grow up in some places.” She smiled slightly, as if remembering something. “Levon encouraged me to walk around the fields, to use the field road to make it easier, but it was still quicker to go through. I told him that the harder hiking was good for me, that I needed the exercise. He laughed.”

I’m sure he did, thought Daniel. April stood almost as tall as his own six-foot height, and her lean, muscular frame reminded him of an Olympic athlete. She had been softer, less muscular when she’d arrived in Caralinda a year ago, a beautiful, vibrant woman he’d wanted very much to spend more time with.

He’d even asked her out, but she’d told him that her divorce still stung and she couldn’t manage anything but friendship. He’d understood, sort of. He’d been through breakups, but nothing as serious as a divorce.

April had obviously been healed by Caralinda, however. The days in the sun, walking the fields with his father, and the work in her own garden had slimmed her down even more and made her skin glow. Her emerald-green eyes had always been bright against her reddish-brown hair and the freckles that splattered across her face, but now they gleamed as they met his focused gaze without flinching.

She knows what I’m doing, he realized. Good. He cleared his throat.

“Did you hear anything before you stepped out of the corn?”

April thought for a moment, then shook her head.

“What did you see first?”

She closed those emerald eyes, and her brow furrowed. “His back. The shooter’s. Then your dad.”

“Was he taller than Dad?”

April hesitated a moment, trying to remember. “N-no. I could still see the top of your dad’s head.” She held her hands about two feet apart. “But broader. I think.”

“What was the shooter wearing?”

She hesitated. “Jeans. Dirty. Beat-up jeans. A light shirt. White…or pale blue. Maybe.”

“Anything on his head?”

“A ball cap.”

“What color?”

Another pause, then she shook her head.

“What did you see next?”

The furrows deepened. “I saw…” Her eyes, still shut, clenched tighter. “Levon stepped back so I saw his face, then there was the shot….” She stopped, and tears leaked from the corners of her eyes and slid down her cheeks.

April opened her eyes. “I can’t remember anything after that. I just…ran.”

Daniel pressed down hard on the frustration, the grief that threatened to boil over in him once more, and his already taut muscles clenched harder from the effort. She’d been doing so well, was clearly trying so hard. He’d gotten his hopes up that the memories were returning on their own by sheer force of will. But now she looked crushed all over again, even the little bit that she’d remembered hurting her all over again.

Daniel turned to Aunt Suke. “You called 911. You saw it?”

Aunt Suke shook her head. “I heard the first shot. By the time I got to one of the windows, all I could see was Levon on the ground, and two people tearing through the cornfield. When I realized one of them was April, I knew she’d probably seen what went down. I told the operator, then went after her.”

“Could you see the shooter?”

Aunt Suke wagged a hand toward the cornfield. “Nothing. By the time I got to the window, he was crashing around in the corn. All I could see was the barrel of the shotgun as he used it to push back the stalks.”

“Did either of you see a vehicle on either of the side roads? A car or a—”

The gongs of Aunt Suke’s doorbell, followed by a determined pounding on the door, interrupted him. Polly bolted for the door with a series of sharp barks.

“That’s probably Ray,” Aunt Suke said softly.

Daniel stood, nodding almost to himself. “I’ll get it. Take whatever he has to say.” He hoped Ray would understand why he had to do this.

The pounding sounded again, and Polly’s barks increased in volume. Daniel headed for the door, hat in hand. He herded Polly aside and pulled open the ancient door, faced Ray and waited.

Ray Taylor stared at him, his jaw clamped so tight that the muscles in his cheeks twitched. He stared at Daniel a moment, glanced briefly at Aunt Suke and then looked at April, who had taken up a position just to Daniel’s right. After a moment, Ray let out a long exhale, as much a snarl as a sigh, and looked back to Daniel. “Boy, if you don’t beat all. I will deal with you later.”

Ray’s gaze turned again to April. “Right now, Ms. Presley, you need to come with us.”

Alarm surged through Daniel at the sheriff’s statement. “What’s happened?”