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She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, and climbed out of bed. They had both slept naked, and when he wasn’t tossing and turning and checking his phone, he’d savored the soft comfort of her skin against his.
“Is he being charged with Daniel’s murder?”
“I don’t know what the specific charges will be.” He scanned the rest of the texts that Bradley had sent. “Jimmy Marsh said Ruth was seeing Daniel, but she broke with him and he was really upset. She ran into him at the gas station and he asked to meet her on the Ice Falls road when he was done plowing. But he’d been drinking, so she went to Luke, wanting some backup. Luke saw an opportunity to get rid of him. Jimmy Marsh says Luke didn’t think he was a good fit for the Chilkoot family. Apparently he, uh…”
“What?”
“His grandmother was from Jamaica.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Molly walked across the room to her bag. Sam kept his distance, since if he got close to her, he’d want to roll her right back into bed, and they didn’t have time for that.
Or did they? Their part was over, right?
Molly rummaged through her tote bag and pulled out a pair of panties. “I’m sorry, I’m not buying it.”
“Which part? The racist part?”
“The whole thing. We found the note about the Ice Falls. Daniel didn’t send it. Someone else did.”
“We don’t know when that note was from,” he reminded her.
She stepped into her panties, an unreasonably sexy process. “True, but I also don’t believe the bit about Daniel drinking. His AA group didn’t believe it, and they knew him. He never drank hard alcohol, even when he was drinking.”
“They found alcohol in Daniel’s blood.”
“Maybe he was forced to drink it. Were there signs of a struggle in the truck?”
“The truck was never analyzed. It was ruled an accident. Do you think Marsh is lying?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I wish I could interview him. Depositions are my specialty.”
“Yeah, well, they’re not even letting me in, so the chances of that happening are probably zero.”
She pulled on a thermal shirt and a black sweater over that. “You know it’s not winter anymore, right?” he asked, amused.
“It is to me.” Her sassy smile nearly got him going again. Then it disappeared. “So what now? Any peeps from Elias?”
“Hopefully he got a good night’s sleep and he’s ready for breakfast in the big city.”
“Of Blackbear, Alaska, population four thousand and twelve?”
“That’s a lot of strangers.”
Still bantering, they walked to the next room over and tapped on the door. No answer.
“Do you think he’s still sleeping?” Molly whispered.
Sam knocked more loudly. Still no answer. A bad feeling settled in his stomach.
He texted Agent Bradley. I need to break into Elias’ hotel room. Will you back me up?
His phone rang. Bradley. He tugged Molly back into their own hotel room and shut the door, then put him on speaker.
“What’s going on? I’m here with Molly. You’re on speaker.”
“ATF picked Elias up this morning around three. They had to interrogate him about the loud noises he mentioned. Probable cause for the search warrant. He’s under the protection of Children’s Services now.”
Sam felt Molly grip his arm, her fingers digging into his muscles.
