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Someone who lives nearby.
Someone who gets his rocks off by taunting the police. Though the contents of the notes the police had received hadn’t been made public, the fact that they existed was well known.
How did it make any sense?
Santana tossed another chunk of oak on the fire, then adjusted the logs with his poker. As he stared at the flames he thought of Regan. Was she alive? Injured? Or . . . was it already too late? His fingers clenched over the smooth metal of the poker and his shoulder muscles bunched.
Inside, he felt a vast hole. An emptiness borne of the unknown, and his own deepening fears. Never had he felt so useless, so impotent.
“God damn it,” he gritted through clenched teeth. He refused to let this beat him down. He would find her. One way or another.
Slamming away from the desk, he grabbed his jacket and gloves and headed outside into a clear night, the stars glimmering, tiny pinpoints against the velvety black sky. The first truly clear night in how long? He couldn’t remember.
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Brady Long’s death was tied in with Star-Crossed somehow. If he knew why, he’d be a lot closer to learning who Star-Crossed was. A lot closer to finding Regan. So why Brady? He’d worked for the man for quite a while; had known him for years. Brady was a privileged, selfish pain in the ass who used people to his own advantage. Clementine was a case in point, though she never disparaged her boss.
Brady had enemies in abundance: two ex-wives, jilted girlfriends, and a slew of business partners he’d screwed over. Any one of them could have wanted him dead. Were probably happy, if the news of his death had reached their ears. But would one of them actually carry out their wish? Pull the trigger and shoot the man in his shriveled heart?
A lot of hate for that.
Nate walked into the barn and turned on the light. The horses snorted and shifted in their stalls. He looked in on Lucifer, whose eyes showed the whites, and he soothed the horse with a soft chant of nonsensical words that calmed the beast enough to have him shuffle close to Nate and even head butt his proffered hand. Nate scratched the colt’s head. Animal whisperer? Maybe. But right now all he felt like was a scared, insignificant, and ineffectual human being.
“Brady has two ex-wives,” he said aloud. Lucifer blew through his nose in disdain.
“One was his college sweetheart. A decent woman. He probably made a mistake letting her go, but then maybe she left him. The second one was a gold digger but she made no bones about it. She liked Brady a little, his money a lot. He left her well off when they split and everybody was supposedly happy.”
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Lucifer moved his lips as if he wanted to speak. Nate felt gripped by emotions and swallowed hard, tamping them down into the pit of his soul. If he wanted to help Regan, he needed a cool head.
“He’s got a bunch of jilted girlfriends. And a fiancée, I think, who couldn’t quite close the deal in time. Brady’s dead. She woulda wanted him alive until after that ceremony.
“And his business partners . . .” Nate drew a breath. That was a list he didn’t possess. “Somebody wanted him dead for some reason, and they wanted him to suffer. If it’s Star-Crossed, what’s with the women? Leaving them to freeze to death? What’s the connection between them and Brady?”
His words echoed softly through the stables. Lucifer snorted and moved away from him, as if he were embarrassed by the last question. Nate reluctantly snapped off the light and walked back into the clear, frigid night.
And it didn’t really matter about Brady’s ex-wives and girlfriends anyway. A man had killed these women. The way they’d been left to die, freeze, brought back to health to be tortured anew—that wasn’t the work of a woman.
Whoever had Regan was male. He could feel it. And that bastard was one helluva marksman, which should have decisively narrowed the field, but in these parts of Montana, marksmen were thick on the ground.
Back inside the cabin, he felt time slipping away, time that could cost Regan her life. Shedding his jacket and gloves, he walked toward the fire. Nakita’s eyes opened expectantly.
“William Aldridge,” Nate said to the dog, continuing his dialogue, hoping something would shake 290
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loose, tumble from his own lips, provide a clue.
“Sandi’s ex. He killed most of the animals on display at Wild Will’s with his own rifle. Kept the taxidermist fat and happy.”
But Aldridge as Star-Crossed?
Nakita’s chin rested on his paws, his eyes watching Nate steadily. Santana stopped talking and let his thoughts take over. Bob Simms lived near the canyon, where they found one of the womens’ vehicles. The Asian victim. Wendy something-or-other. And Simms was as crazy as they came. A lunatic whose views on government and laws—there shouldn’t be any—kinda said it all. He killed and trapped animals for their pelts and hides and meat—permits be damned. He’d run up ag
