Ghost Seer (4 page)

From the quiet conversations around her, she learned there were people researching their family trees, students, a writer or two, and a couple of research assistants of local professors.

She approved, smiling at the lovely environment. Imaginary Enzo had remained in the park.

She set up her tablet computer with Wi-Fi keyboard and accepted from the librarians the basic biographies on men who’d been in Colorado more than 150 years ago.

Instead of just flipping through the works for old photographs—or the drawing she half recalled—she sank into the stories.

And found Jules Beni, the founder of Julesburg, Colorado, who was not her guy.

But his killer was.

The infamous Jack Slade. The Jack Slade whom Mark Twain and Sir Richard Burton had written about. The first bad guy who defined all other American West bad guys. But not one most people knew.

Jack Slade, a man who could be considered a hero, with admirable qualities—setting up a whole division of the Pony Express and Overland Stage on time and on budget, ensuring the safety of the riders and drivers and stage passengers. But, as the vision had told her, he was definitely a bad and mean drunk.

Not the kind of guy she wanted anything to do with. Still, she ordered all the books the library had on him . . . some of which were reference only, not to be removed from the building. While she waited, she did a basic Internet search. There was a lot of information on Jack Slade, some that didn’t sound right, too wild and fantastic—myth and legend.

She scowled. She preferred hard facts.

Most of the data was based on the stories Mark Twain told. Mark Twain, one of the greatest spinners of tall tales of all time.

Sighing, she began to make notes of what might actually be factual.

“I’ll deliver those, Mary, while you help this customer.” A loud voice broke into Clare’s thoughts. She glanced up to see a tall, paunchy man, the research assistant. He appeared to be retired, but still middle-aged. Smiling, he gave her the books. “You know Slade was the mastermind behind the Overland Stage Company robbery at Virginia Dale in 1863. Sixty thousand in gold, never recovered. That would be millions today. Missing treasure, just like the Reynolds gang’s bank robbery and the Lost Dutchman mine.”

Clare frowned at her notes and the Slade timeline she’d found. “Wasn’t he somewhere else in 1863?” And she was pretty sure that if he’d had a lot of money, or access to a lot of money, he wouldn’t have been in financial straits when fired by the Overland Stage for shooting up a saloon.

The man chuckled, shaking his head. “Slade remains a shadowy figure, both larger than life and obscured by the stories and legends surrounding him. Nothing is solid about him, including his whereabouts at a particular time. And, like I said, he
masterminded
.” The guy wiggled his own neatly curved brows. With another smile, he settled back at his own table.

An hour later, stomach rumbling, she put aside the materials she couldn’t take home and picked up the books she’d check out. The library was great, but food sounded good.

As she walked out of the large entrance, she saw the research assistant and the other patrons pounce on her research books. She sniffed. There couldn’t be anything more fruitless than treasure hunting.

 • • • 

“We’re consultants,” Tony Rickman, private investigator, a large man behind the equally large desk, said to Zach. His fingers were interlocked, a uniquely engraved wedding ring on his left hand. “We handle a variety of cases—security advice and audits, bodyguards, missing persons.” A shrug of blocky shoulders. “Most of my operatives carry private investigator licenses. Not necessary in Colorado, but I prefer that.”

Some undertone Zach caught in the man’s voice, an edgy shadow in Tony Rickman’s eyes, kept the
Not interested
lying on Zach’s tongue from escaping his mouth. He shouldn’t be interested in going private, serving for money instead of for the public good, working for an ex-military man. Instead, he questioned, “Most of your operatives?”

“There are . . . miscellaneous cases that don’t need great physical abilities, but investigation, a good pair of eyes, and a sharp brain. You could use your skills. Be an asset.”

Zach grunted. The man
hadn’t
said legs. “No running?” Zach said sardonically.

Cool gray eyes met his. “No desk.”

That was a point.

Rising smoothly with the help of his cane, Zach nodded. His lips didn’t curl as they’d wanted to when he walked in. “I’ll consider the info you gave me.” The consulting fee Zach would earn was nearly obscene. Private paid well if he could swallow being in that area.

“You do that.” Rickman unclasped his hands. “And consider this: Justice and honor matter to this firm and every one of my operatives.”

Zach nodded again and left. A military man usually spouted stuff about justice and honor, in his experience, but the General’s and most of his buddies’ notions of those concepts had rarely lined up with Zach’s.

For his father, justice and honor were for his friends and his class first, then others might be considered.

But . . . Zach had felt comfortable with Rickman, and Zach respected his old boss, the sheriff, and the sheriff’s take on things. Maybe Rickman wasn’t blowing smoke. Zach shrugged, still uncomfortable with the whole notion of going private. He’d figure it out later.

Right now he could use a beer. He smiled. For the first time he was glad to be back in Denver. Plenty of beer choices here: local microbrews, imports.

To his surprise, he liked being in the bustle of the city. A city with people with all different slants on life, much more so than the homogenized Plainsview and Cottonwood County, Montana. Taking the job there had seemed like a good move at the time. Tough luck everything went bad.

As soon as he came to the corner at the Sixteenth Street Mall and a restaurant with an open area, he moved in. For just after one
P.M.
, the tables inside weren’t crowded, though the ones behind the rail on the sidewalk were full.

A single woman just inside the restaurant sitting by the window caught his attention. Her conservative gray suit and the clean head-hugging cut of her thick brown hair with gleaming red strands showed that she considered herself a serious professional.

This impression was contradicted by the fact that she appeared to be talking to herself—or, perhaps, reading aloud from the book open in front of her.

He was a sucker for lovely contradictions.

“Jack Slade!” she announced.

Sounded like “Zach.”

He walked in and gave her a slow smile, moved up to the square two-top. “Yeah? You called?”

T
HE WOMAN LOOKED
up, flushed with embarrassment. “Sorry, I was reading about the, um, historical figure.”

Zach stopped a grunt, held out his hand, and replied, “I got that. I’m Zach.” She was attractive enough, and he was interested enough, to give her the rest. “Jackson Zachary Slade.” He smiled. “No relation to the gunfighter.”

She blinked, lifted her slim, elegantly shaped fingers, and put them in his own. “Clare Cermak.” Then she glanced down at the open book. “Jack Slade wasn’t all bad. He had post-traumatic stress disorder, you know.”

Anger flared inside Zach, fiery and hot, and probably showed in his eyes, because she withdrew her cool hand and leaned back in her chair, away from him.

He said, “I’m tired of hearing about that. Anything bad happens and the perpetrator is excused because he has post-traumatic stress disorder.” And the docs had stuck that label on Zach, too.

Her hazel gaze flicked down to neat handwritten notes, then back up to meet his and remained steady. “I’d say getting ambushed and shot with a six-shooter, then having a shotgun emptied into you, then being taken by wagon over rough trail for a hundred and sixty miles, operated on there, suffering for weeks, and then being sent by train to St. Louis for removal of more bullets, might cause post-traumatic stress syndrome. All this in 1860.”

Zach winced. His one bullet had been bad. He didn’t recall his time in the ambulance but knew the drive was only a few miles to the medical center. His stay in the modern hospital had been hideous. He didn’t know what an old-time hospital might have been like, but it couldn’t have been good. “Maybe you have a point. You sure know your stuff,” Zach said, gestured to the chair opposite her. “May I sit?”

She nodded, her glance sliding to his cane, but she said nothing about that or his awkwardness. Another point in her favor.

She said, “You know about the original Slade?”

He shrugged. “Happens when your name is close to an infamous—or famous—guy. You’ve been studying Jack Slade?” He angled his head toward the book. It looked well worn.

“I’m reading about him. This is from the library; I’ll be obtaining my own copy. The man was a very interesting character.” She set a bookmark into the pages, closed the book, and put it in the outer pocket of a leather computer bag. The middle compartment showed four other books.

She tucked her cell into her bag, pulled out a portfolio and slipped her notes inside, returned it to the tote, and moved her coffee cup from his side of the table and sipped. Her eyes studied him over the rim.

The waitress sauntered up and Zach ordered a Tivoli beer.

Zach’s telephone sounded the sheriff’s classical notes. Had he spoken already with Rickman about Zach? Had Rickman double-checked Zach’s references? The taste in his mouth went sour.

He glanced at Clare, who’d placed her cup in her saucer and watched him with a gaze that he suddenly noticed had shadows. She wasn’t as simple as he’d thought. Again, interesting.

She nodded at his cell. “Go ahead.”

Grimacing, he said, “Former boss.”

She flinched; a smile formed on her pretty lips and vanished. “I have one of those, too.”

The lady presented more puzzles.

Zach picked up his phone and thumbed it on, “Slade.”

Clare’s gaze flicked to her bag with all the books on the other Slade.

“Zach, did you talk with my deputies Lauren Aguirre and Larry Pickman lately?” the sheriff asked.

Warning bells went off in Zach’s head, but he kept his voice easy. “Yeah. Lauren and Larry caught up with me the day before yesterday at the diner.”

The sheriff grunted. “After I spoke with you?”

“That’s right.”

“They were both off duty then and yesterday.” Zach’s former boss cleared his throat. “Exactly when and where did you last see them?”

“On the twenty-third, approximately thirteen hundred hours at the Daisy Diner near the southern border of the county. Lauren wanted to say she was sorry for my trouble. They left first.”

After the damn crows had cawed. Four crows. Death. Dread tightened the back of Zach’s neck. A high-pitched whine came to his ears and he jerked his head to get rid of it.

Sighing heavily, the sheriff let silence hang. Didn’t bother Zach. Finally his ex-boss said, “Looks like they had a single-car accident on the way back to Plainsview City. Ran off the road and down a bank. Rolled the vehicle. We had some nasty weather that afternoon.”

Zach’s gut tightened. “How bad is it?”

“The worst. They’re dead.”

“Christ. You don’t need me to come back?” He shouldn’t have to, but you never knew. So far the sheriff had treated him better than anyone else in the department.

“No. Just wanted to clear the timeline up. You spoke with Tony Rickman?”

“Yeah.”

“So did I. He was impressed.”

Zach snorted.

“Take the job, Zach,” the sheriff said.

“Good-bye.”

“Good-bye, and good luck.”

Zach pushed away his half-empty glass of beer. The light clouds had drifted away and the day had begun to heat up in earnest. A trickle of sweat ran down his spine, sticking one of his good white shirts to his back and making him wish he’d taken off his jacket. He
hated
when he saw the crows. Hated even more when the stupid rhyme seemed to be right.

Otherwise, just emptiness at the thought of those deaths filtered through him. Not even anger, his usual response to senseless loss of life. Should he feel anything for them? The woman who’d made a mistake just as he had, one that screwed up his life? The man who’d liked to make jokes at his expense? He didn’t know.

But they were colleagues, people he’d worked with, and now they were dead. An area of emptiness, of emotions more layered than the single, primal ones he still experienced, grew. He’d think about that later.

No one would expect him to come back for the funerals, and that was damn good. He didn’t want to see anyone from that particular job again. The job he’d thought had been a career.

“Problems?” a soft voice across from him asked.

He blinked Clare Cermak’s pretty face into focus. Not model-perfect, and with a gold-dust tan that seemed to be natural.

Clare’s lips pursed, something he didn’t care to see, and she leaned a bit toward her bag as if she were ready to pick it up and go . . . and Zach realized he didn’t want her to leave. “Yeah, a couple of problems,” he said.

Her brows lowered, then she said, “But not your problems, because you aren’t at that job anymore?”

“You’re right.” He studied her, made a good guess. “You were an accountant.”

Now her brown-red eyebrows lifted. “How did you know?”

He found a smile curving his own lips. She was easy to be around. “Your phone has a tax app and fancy calculator on the home screen.”

“Oh.”

“You’re very neat and tidy,” he said.

Her tongue came out and moistened her lips, and a flicker of lust flared in his groin. Very welcome, since nothing much had stirred down there for a while. He’d been told his wound had been severe enough, and he’d lost enough blood, that it might take him a while before his dick functioned. Now it seemed it was functioning just fine.

The truth was, no woman had attracted him in a while.

He stared at Clare Cermak and her steady hazel eyes, and couldn’t help comparing her to Lauren. Yeah, he’d have bet his Corvette that Clare would always do her job. There’d be no slipups. Another fine trait.

She still frowned at him, vertical lines over her nose, bit her full lower lip. “You’re a police officer?”

His smile faded. “How’d you guess?”

“You said ‘perpetrator.’ And your reaction to the idea of post-traumatic stress syndrome.” Her eyes flickered at his cane, at him. “You seem in good shape.”

He ignored the implied question about how he might have come to be crippled, leaned back, and crossed his good ankle over his knee. “Checking out my build, Clare?”

She laughed and her serious-mode expression faded, making her appear younger and more carefree. Pity she had those shadows in her eyes; she was beautiful when she laughed. Her long lashes swept down and up, flirting with him, and he relaxed even more. Maybe being here in Denver might turn out to be a good move.

“Absolutely I checked you out, Zach.”

“Good to know.” Zach smiled, then continued the conversation. “So you’re an ex-accountant?”

She tilted up her chin. “There’s no such thing as an ex-accountant. I am a CPA.” She paused and the shadows darkened her eyes to brown. She sighed. “I just don’t have a job anymore.”

“Why’d you quit?”

That got her staring back into his eyes instead of looking at the suited men and women passing by.

“You think I quit?”

“Yep.”

“You’re good.”

“I know, and more than just my observational skills.”

Now her gaze was penetrating, intense. He knew that look, too. The lady was deciding whether to trust him. He didn’t bother giving her a sincere smile; he wanted no prompts from him on her decision.

Because it mattered that she’d trust him and he didn’t know why. Maybe just because he really liked the looks of her. He thought he heard a dog yip but didn’t break the gaze.

Clare leaned forward, and his stare did slip a little to her newly revealed cleavage. The collar of her white blouse wasn’t open that far, just enough to see the rise of nice breasts.

“I received an inheritance,” she murmured.

His ear caught doubt in her voice. “Strings attached?”

“You might say that.”

Something—someone—snuffled near them; Zach didn’t turn to see but met her gaze again. “You don’t have to work anymore?”

“No.” Her lips flexed down. “And someone else could use my excellent job.”

He dipped his head. “Good idea.”

“Thank you.” She slid his beer back toward him. “And I don’t think you’re an ex–police officer, either.”

“Deputy sheriff,” he said.

“Law enforcer.” She nodded. “No such thing as an ex-policeman?”

He thought of the drunk ex-cop who’d shot him, now sitting in prison, convicted of assault with a deadly weapon on an officer of the law. “I wouldn’t say that.”

“Hmm,” Clare said, once more considering him. He didn’t mind that. “Maybe there are people . . .” She blinked. “There
are
people who live their job. I think you were—
are
—one of them.”

Drinking to give him time enough to think about her insight, he realized that there were now four ex–law enforcers in his mind—himself, the guy who’d shot him, and Lauren and Larry. All done with such work forever. He clicked the empty glass down on the table, licked the last of the foam from his mouth—and when Clare’s gaze flicked to his lips, his brooding eased.

Until she gestured to his cane. “Despite your circumstances, I think you’ll always be a lawman
here
”—she touched fingertips to her breast over her heart.

A dog barked and Zach scanned the mall for one, didn’t see it.

Clare said, “Not like the gunman Jack Slade, who was
the
law of the West at one time, then devolved into an alcoholic and was fired from his job.”

Zach felt one side of his mouth kick up in a half smile. “He had PTSD.” Could have happened that way.

Nodding soberly, Clare said, “You know, they didn’t get all the lead out of him. That probably bothered him for the remaining four years of his life.”

Zach lifted his hand. “I concede the point already.” He paused. “I don’t want to think or talk about bullet wounds.” And he didn’t know what possessed him to say that, either.

Clare’s eyes rounded, pupils black against the hazel. “Is that how . . . ?”

“Yeah.”

She swallowed, and her mouth must have been dry because she finished her coffee.

When she put her cup down, Zach reached out and grasped her fingers. Her hand remained cool, felt nice in the heating- up afternoon. He smiled at her. “I’ve remembered something else about Jack Slade. He had a vibrant, intelligent, loyal, and sexy wife.”

“Maria Virginia,” Clare said. Her smile turned teasing. “I’m sure that list of qualities isn’t in the order you prefer.”

Zach grinned, realized his face hadn’t moved like that since he’d been shot. “Nope.” Her hand was warming in his and he rubbed the back of it with his thumb, to keep that pretty smile going.

“So what would be the order?” she asked.