B.J. Daniels the Cardwell Ranch Collection (45 page)

Hilde couldn’t do that without telling what she’d done to get Dee’s fingerprints and Colt’s involvement. She wasn’t about to drag him into this any more than he already was.

“You shouldn’t have touched anything until I got here,” Hud said behind her. “Hilde—”

She stopped working to look at him. Fueled by anger, she’d accomplished a lot in a short time. “The person broke in through the back. I haven’t touched anything back there.”

He looked toward the back of the shop, where she had a small kitchen she and her staff used as a break and storage room. She’d found a chair moved over against the wall under the open window. There appeared to be marks on the window frame where someone had pried it open.

When she’d stepped outside in the alley, she’d discovered the large trash container pulled over under the window.

Hud went back in the break room, then outside. “Is anything missing?” he asked when he came back in.

“I don’t believe so. I don’t leave money down here. I think it was just a malicious act of vandalism.”

“Looks like it might have been kids, then,” Hud said.

Hilde had stopped to look at him, after restoring almost all of the bolts of fabric to their correct places. She saw him staring at the countertop where the half-dozen new scissors had been stuck in the wood.

“Kids resort to this sort of thing just for something to do, I guess,” he said.

“It wasn’t kids.” She crossed her arms because she was trembling and she didn’t want him to see it. She thought that if she kept calm and didn’t get upset or cry, he might believe her.

“Don’t tell me Dee did this.” He looked as resolute as she felt.

“Okay, I won’t. You don’t want to hear the truth, fine. Kids did it.”

“Hilde,” Hud said in that tone she was getting used to. “Dee went to bed last night before we did. If she had driven into town, I would have known it.”

“Maybe she walked.”

“It’s a couple of miles. She can barely walk around the yard without twisting an ankle. You think she climbed up into that window back there?” He was shaking his head. “I’m sorry this happened. I’ll file a report and you can turn it over to your insurance. I’m glad nothing was destroyed.”

She laughed at that. Dee had destroyed so much—the shop was the least of it.

“Are you going to be okay?”

The concern and kindness she heard in his tone was her undoing. The tears broke loose as if they had been walled up, waiting for the least bit of provocation to burst out.

He patted her shoulder. “Take the rest of the day off. Go home. Get some rest.”

As if rest would make her world right again.

* * *

F
ORTUNATELY
,
THE
REST
of the day was busy at the shop. All the women who’d come in to sign up for quilting classes buoyed Hilde’s spirits.

Dana called midmorning. “Just wanted to say hi.”

Hilde figured she’d heard about the vandalism from Hud. He must not have told her about the allegations against her cousin.

“Fourteen women have signed up for the quilting classes so far,” she told her silent partner in the shop.

“Oh, that’s great. You must be excited to get them started.”

“I am. It’s going to be a good summer.” Hilde said the last like a mantra, praying it was true.

“Dee’s leaving Saturday,” Dana said.

The words should have made her heart soar, but she heard sadness in her friend’s voice. “I’m sorry her visit didn’t go like you had hoped.”

The bell over the door jangled as another customer came in.

Dana must have heard it. “You’re busy. I’ll let you go. I just wanted you to know I was thinking about you.”

“Thank you for calling.” It was the best she could do before Dana hung up.

The rest of the day slipped by. Hilde had moments when she would forget about the break-in. She knew she would have to replace the top of the counter. The scissor holes were a gut-wrenching reminder each time she saw them that it wasn’t over with Dee.

Colt must have called when she was helping a customer by carrying her fabric purchases out to her car. He’d left a message that he hoped he could see her tonight.

She texted back that she was looking forward to it.

And suddenly it was time to close up shop. She gathered her things, trying hard not to look at the top of the counter. Thinking about Dee only made her blood boil.

A gust of wind caught the door as she started to lock up. She hadn’t realized the wind had come up or that a storm was blowing in.

As she turned, she saw that her SUV parked across the street was sitting at a funny angle. Then she noticed the right back tire. Flat.

All she’d been thinking about the past few minutes was going home, taking a nice hot bath and getting ready for when Colt got back from West Yellowstone.

After finding her store vandalized first thing in the morning, she wasn’t going to let a flat tire ruin her mood now, she thought. For a moment, she considered changing the tire herself, but she wasn’t dressed for it, and her house was only a short walk from the shop.

As she started down the street, she saw that the storm was closer than she’d thought. Dark clouds rolled in, dimming the remainder of the day’s light. She’d be lucky to get home before it started to rain, and in April the rain could easily turn to snow.

Hilde laughed, surprised that even the storm didn’t bother her. She was seeing Colt again tonight and she couldn’t wait. The only real dark cloud right now was Dee Anna Justice, and apparently there wasn’t a darned thing she could do about her.

When she looked up and saw Dee coming down the dark street toward her, she feared she’d conjured her. Because of the upcoming storm and the time of the year, the streets were deserted—something she hadn’t noticed until that moment.

Stopping, she considered what to do. Dee had realized that she had her fingerprints and DNA. That was probably why she’d torn up the shop. Did that mean she’d realized whatever she’d been up to was about to come to a screeching halt? Or would the prints only prove that the woman really was Dee Anna Justice, a psychopath who would be able to keep fooling Dana unless Hilde and Colt could prove otherwise?

More to the immediate point, what was she doing here now? Hilde considered whether she should make a run for it. She didn’t have that many options. Calling the marshal’s office for help would be a waste of time.

“You don’t have to look so scared,” Dee called to her. “I came to give you some news that I think will make you happy.”

Hilde let the woman get within a few feet of her. “That’s close enough. What is it?”

“You win.”

“You’re the one who made it into a competition.”

Dee chuckled as she took another step closer. “I’ve known women like you my whole life. Everything comes so easy to you. You’ve never had to fight for anything. You wouldn’t have lasted two seconds in my world.”

“I’m sorry you had a rough life, Dee, if that is really your name. But that doesn’t give you the right to take someone else’s—literally.”

“You’re right,” Dee said, not even bothering to deny anything. “I’m leaving. I just wanted you to know. That, and I’m sorry. I don’t expect you to understand. I don’t even understand why I’m like I am sometimes.” She put her head down, actually sounding as if she meant it.

Hilde wondered what kind of life this woman really
had
lived through. Dee was right that her own had been cushy. As much as she hated it, she felt some sympathy for the woman. “You should try to get some help.”

Dee slowly raised her head. It took Hilde an instant to realize Dee had stepped closer during all this. When she met her gaze, Hilde saw that something had changed in her eyes. It was an instant too long.

Before Hilde could react, Dee grabbed her right hand and raked Hilde’s nails down her own left cheek.

Hilde let out a cry of shock and jerked her hand back.

Dee was smiling as she touched the four angry scratches down her face. Laughing at Hilde’s reaction, she reached down and picked up a chunk of broken sidewalk at the edge of the street.

Hilde took a step back as Dee said, “You think I need help? Maybe I
should
see someone.” She hit herself in the face with the piece of concrete and for a moment, Hilde thought Dee would buckle under the savage blow. But she straightened, dropped the chunk of sidewalk and, in the next instant, began to tear at her clothes.

“What are you doing?”
Hilde cried. “Have you lost your mind?”

“Isn’t this what you wish you were able to do to me?” Dee asked, smiling again. Her left eye was already swelling shut from where she’d hit herself. There was blood at the corner of her mouth and her lip was split and bleeding. The scratches down the left side of her face were bleeding now as well.

“No, I would never—” The rest of Hilde’s words died on her lips as she realized exactly what Dee
was
doing. “No one will believe I did that to you!”

“Won’t they?” Dee asked with a smirk. “Wanna bet?” With that she turned and ran screaming down the street.

Chapter Eleven

Hilde rushed back to Needles and Pins, fumbled the key in the lock and, once inside, relocked the door behind her. She was in shock, never having witnessed anything like that in her life.

Her hands shook as she took out her cell phone. She tried to call Colt but only got his voice mail. She left a message that it was urgent she talk to him. Only after she hung up did she remember he had to go back to West Yellowstone today.

She’d barely hung up when she saw Marshal Hud Savage pull up in his patrol pickup in front of the shop. Past him, across the street, she spotted her SUV with the flat tire. She hadn’t had a flat in years. Why hadn’t she realized it was a trap?

Because that wasn’t how her mind worked. She’d never had to read evil into everything—until Dee arrived in town.

Hilde felt like a fool. She’d played right into the woman’s hands, not once, but time and again. The more she protested, the worse it got. She knew that even if she hadn’t started to walk home, Dee would have found an opportunity to make this happen.

Lightning cut a zigzagged line across the sky behind Hud as he headed for her front door. Thunder followed on its heels. Large drops of rain pelted the sidewalk as she put her cell phone back in her purse and hurried to unlock the shop door. “Hud, I—”

“I need you to come with me down to the station,” he said, his voice hard as the sidewalk Dee had hit herself with.

“I didn’t do any of that to her,” Hilde cried. “Hud, you have to believe me.”

He grabbed her right hand, holding it up. “Hilde, her skin is still under your fingernails.”

“Hud, I know this sounds crazy, but that’s the problem. Dee, or whatever her name is,
is
crazy. She’s insane. She did all of that to herself.”

He shook his head looking as sad as she had ever seen him. “Are you telling me you didn’t attack her previously with a pair of scissors right here in your shop?”

Of course Dee would have told him about that, too. “No. I mean, yes, but—”

He began to read her rights to her. “Let’s go,” he said when he finished.

“You’re really arresting me?” She couldn’t believe any of this was happening. “You know me, Hud—”

“I thought I did. Dee Anna is pressing assault charges against you. Hilde, what is going on with you?”

She swallowed and shook her head. Even if she told him about the scissors incident, it wouldn’t help her. Nor help Colt. She just had to put her faith in Colt to find out the truth about the woman—and soon.

* * *

C
OLT
TRIED
TO
reach Hilde the moment he got her message. Her phone went straight to voice mail. He called the shop, just in case she was working late. She did that a lot, especially since she’d recently taken over the space next to Needles and Pins and expanded the business.

She was buying a line of sewing machines and would be starting quilting lessons, now that she had the room. He loved her work ethic. Loved a lot of things about her, he thought, reminded of last night.

With growing concern when she didn’t answer at the shop, he realized he didn’t know whom else to call. Not that long ago, he could have called Dana. She would have known where Hilde was. Dana and Hilde had been that close.

But not now. Thanks to Dee.

He was holding his phone, trying to decide what to do, when it rang. It was one of the dispatchers, Annie Wagner, a cute twentysomething redhead who was dating a Bozeman police officer he knew.

“I thought you’d want to know,” Annie said in a hushed voice. “Hilde has been arrested.”

“What?”
His mind whirled. Hilde?

“Dee Anna Justice came screaming into the office thirty minutes ago saying Hilde had attacked her.”

Colt groaned. He’d understood Hilde’s thinking with the scissors, but—

“Dee was a mess. She looked like she’d gotten into a cat fight. Black eye, scratched up, bleeding.”

He couldn’t imagine Hilde doing that to anyone even if she was provoked. But if she was defending herself— “Where is Hilde now?”

“Hud has her in his office. I just put through a call from Dee Anna Justice. Do you want me to call you if anything changes?”

“Thanks, Annie. I appreciate it. I’m on my way back from West Yellowstone. I should be there within the hour.”

What had happened? He couldn’t even imagine.

He’d told himself that Hud would see through Dee soon. Or Dee would give up once she realized Hud loved Dana and would never fall for her. He’d told himself that as long as Hilde stayed away from the ranch and Dee, this wouldn’t escalate.

He’d been wrong. He also realized that until that moment, he hadn’t really thought Dee had tried to kill Hilde. The scare at the falls had been just that. The incident under the raft? He thought Dee had probably pulled the same thing. Held Hilde under the raft then tried to save her, only this time Hilde had fought her off.

Now he was angry with himself for not truly believing what Hilde had known in her heart. Dee was capable of horrendous things. Even murder. Maybe she’d drugged Rick. What had she done to get Hilde arrested? Tried to kill her only to have Hilde fight back?

His heart was pounding as he switched on his lights and siren and raced toward Big Sky.

* * *

H
ILDE
KNEW
SHE
was lucky that Hud hadn’t brought her into jail in handcuffs. She figured that might be Dana’s doing. Dana would go to bat for her even if she believed that her once best friend had attacked her cousin.

It still amazed her that anyone would believe Dee. But look at the extremes the woman would go to. She
was
insane. How else could Hilde explain it? Insane and desperate. This was a ploy to keep Hilde from getting her fingerprints run. Which had to mean that Dee really wasn’t Dee Anna Justice—just as the now deceased Rick had insinuated.

But none of that helped Hilde right now, she thought, as she looked across the marshal’s big desk. He was on the phone and had been for several minutes. From his tone of voice, she suspected it had been Dana who’d called, but Hilde now thought that Dana had put Dee on the line.

“I do understand,” Hud was saying. “But I’d prefer that you came down here and we discussed this before you made any—” He listened for a moment, his gaze going to Hilde, before he said, “If you’re sure. I would strongly advise you against this.” More listening, then he said, “Fine,” and hung up.

Hilde hadn’t realized that she’d been holding her breath toward the end of his conversation until she let it out as he hung up.

Hud sat for a moment before he turned to her. “Dee is dropping the charges. I can still hold you, if I want to, and I’m certainly considering it.”

She could tell that Dana had fought for her. Why else would Dee have dropped the charges? She felt tears sting her eyes. She knew better than to argue that she hadn’t done anything to Dee. She’d already tried the truth and that had gotten her arrested, so she waited.

“Dee is filing a temporary restraining order that is good for twenty days. I assume you know what that is,” he said.

A restraining order? It was all she could do not to scream. “It means I can’t go near her.” Which meant she couldn’t go near the ranch or Dana. Her tears now were of frustration. Dee kept maneuvering her into impossible situations where Hilde always came out looking like the villain.

“That’s going to be hard to do in Big Sky. Hilde,” he said with a sigh. “Think about taking a vacation. Go see your mother in Chicago. Or go lay on a beach for a couple of weeks. Get out of here.”

“For twenty days?” Wouldn’t Dee love that. “Or maybe she’ll make it a permanent restraining order, since she doesn’t seem to be leaving, does she?”

“Hilde, I’m trying to help. I’d think you’d want to get out of here for a while.”

“You don’t know how tempting that is, Hud.” She felt as beat-up as Dee was. She’d lost control of her life. She’d certainly lost her friends, her shop had been vandalized and she was losing faith that she would ever be able to fix any of this before things got worse.

“Dana is worried about you,” he said, and she heard some of that old caring in his voice.

“And I’m worried about her. I wish I
could
leave, but I can’t, Hud. I can’t leave Dana knowing what’s living in your house right now. I’m sorry,” she said when she saw his expression harden. “So can I go now?”

He nodded. “Hilde? Stay away from Dee.”

“Believe me, I’m doing my best. For the record, do you want to actually hear the truth?” She didn’t wait for him to answer. “I came out of the shop after locking up to find I had a flat tire. I should have suspected something then, but I’ve never been a suspicious person. I started to walk home, no big deal, that’s when I saw Dee. She called to me, said she had some news. When she got close, she told me she was leaving. She said she was sorry for what she’d done to me.”

Hilde stopped for a moment, smiled and said, “You know I actually believed her. She is that good. And then she grabbed my hand, raked my fingernails down her face. I was so shocked I couldn’t move. I jerked my hand back. That’s when she picked up a chunk of broken sidewalk from the side of the street and hit herself in the face. I know,” she said, seeing his disbelieving expression. “I had the same reaction. Right after that was when she began to rip her clothing. She said no one would believe me. So far, she’s been dead-on, hasn’t she?”

With that she turned and walked out, leaving Hud frowning after her.

* * *

O
NLY
A
FEW
miles out of Big Sky, Colt got the call that Dee was refusing to press charges, deciding to take out a temporary restraining order instead. He swore, anxious to get to Hilde and find out what had happened.

He found her at her house. She hadn’t been home long when she opened the door. He saw that she had a stunned look on her face. Stunned and devastated. It was heartbreaking.

Without a word, he took her in his arms. She was trembling. He took her over to the couch, then went to her liquor cabinet and found some bourbon. He poured her a couple fingers’ worth.

“Drink this,” he said.

“Aren’t you afraid what I might do liquored up?” she asked sarcastically.

“Terrified,” he said and stood over her until she’d downed every drop. “You want to talk about it?” he asked, taking the empty glass from her and joining her on the couch.

She let out a laugh. “
I
hardly believe what happened. Why would I expect anyone else to?”

“I believe you. I believe everything you’ve told me.”

Tears welled in her brown eyes. He drew her to him and kissed her, holding her tightly. “I’m sorry you had to go through this alone.”

She nodded and wiped hastily at the tears as she drew back to look at him. “You’re my only hope right now. We have to find out whatever we can about this woman.” And then she told him everything, from finding the shop vandalized to what led up to her being nearly arrested.

When she finished, he said, “We shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Surprised? I’m still in shock. To do something like that to yourself...”

“You knew Dee was sick.”

Hilde nodded. “What will she do next? That’s what worries me.”

Colt didn’t want to say it, but that worried him, too. “Maybe Hud has the right idea. Isn’t there somewhere—”

“I’m not leaving. Dee told me that I’ve never had to fight for anything. Well, I’m fighting now. I’m bringing her down. One way or another.”

“Hilde—”

“She has to be stopped.”

“I agree. But we have to be careful. She’s dangerous.” He felt his phone vibrate, checked it and saw that his boss had sent him a text. “Hud wants to see me ASAP.” Not good. “I don’t want to leave you here alone.”

“I’ll be fine. Dee won this round. She won’t do anything for a while, and I’m not going to give her another chance to use me like she did today.”

He heard the courage as well as the determination in her voice. Hilde was strong and, no matter what Dee had told her, she
was
a fighter.

“Would you mind if I came by later?”

Her kiss answered that question quite nicely.

* * *

H
UD
WAS
WAITING
when Colt arrived. He motioned him into his office. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he said the moment Colt closed the door and sat down.

“I beg your pardon?” He had a pretty good idea what the problem was, but he wasn’t about to hand him the rope to hang him.

“Tell me about the unauthorized request to run fingerprints you sent to the crime lab,” the marshal said.

That’s what Colt figured. Someone had caught his friend. He hated that he’d gotten the man into trouble. Sticking out his own neck was one thing. Sticking out someone else’s was a whole other story.

“They’re the woman’s now staying at your house, the one you call Dee Anna Justice,” he said.

Hud swore and slammed a hand down on his desk as he sat forward. “What the hell were you thinking sending an unauthorized request to the crime lab?”

“I was trying to protect you and your family.”

“That isn’t going to wash and you know it. Well, let me give you the news. There are no prints on file.” Hud let that sink in. “That’s right. Dee has no record. Satisfied?”

So she’d never been arrested. That didn’t surprise him given what he’d seen of her maneuvers so far.

“This is about Hilde, isn’t it?” Hud demanded. “You did this for her. This is so you can get closer to her.”

Colt got to his feet. “If that’s what you think—”

“You’re suspended.”

This, too, didn’t come as a surprise. He met Hud’s gaze. “If you really think I would use law enforcement resources to try to get a woman in bed, then I think you should fire me.”

“Damn it, Colt, you’re a fine deputy marshal and I don’t want to lose you. Two weeks without pay. Get out of here.”

He left Hud’s office, knowing there was nothing he could say. He’d taken a risk. It had cost him. Worse, it had only made Dee look more innocent.