Shadow Bones (12 page)

“It's not like he's breaking down my door, you know,” Skye pointed out.

“He would if you gave him some encouragement.”

“It's not just his wandering though.” Skye leaned toward Wynne. “He's told me he's a Christian, but he seems to be struggling with God right now. I can't let myself love someone who doesn't share my faith.”

“Ah.” Wynne nodded. “I'd hoped you would lead him in the right direction.”

“I don't think it should work that way. I've seen too many people end up marrying someone whose faith is weak thinking the person will grow stronger eventually. There are always problems with that.”

“Jake is a good man.” Wynne sounded defensive.

“I'm not saying he isn't, but that's not enough.” Skye swallowed. She'd revealed more than she wanted. Not that it would have mattered about the relationship since she wasn't going anywhere and Jake wasn't staying.

“I'm going to start working on him,” Wynne said. “I've just prayed and not said much but that's wrong. I know the problem is our parents' deaths. I thought he'd
come to grips with it on his own, but I have a responsibility to talk to him.”

“He's got a hard head.”

“Don't I know it!” Wynne shook her head. “And if I'm honest, the real reason I've never talked to him about it is he's my big brother. I've always held him in a little bit of awe, and I've been leery of having him upset with me. We're close and I've been hesitant to do anything that might damage that.” She sighed. “It's hard to admit I'm a coward.”

“I think most of us are when it comes to our family.”

Wynne glanced into Skye's face. “It's hard to imagine you being frightened of anything.”

“You should have seen me with the snake today.” Skye could smile about it now but it hadn't been funny then. “Maybe Becca can help you with Jake. You both seem to have settled what happened to your parents in your own minds.”

“We all went to church when we were growing up, but Jake had a friend who made fun of Christians. It affected how he saw things, I think. And when our parents were killed, he blamed God. He said if God would reward faithful servants like our parents that way, then what benefit is it to follow Him.”

Skye winced. “The age-old question—why do bad things happen to good people? Jake said he's beginning to understand. There are no easy answers, though.”

“I know, I struggled with it, too. I finally came to the verse in Job that says ‘where were you when I formed the world?' Sometimes you just have to realize God is
in control and sees things we can't see and acts for purposes we can't know. It's all about trust.”

“And trust is hard for people. Especially take-charge people like Jake,” Skye agreed. “He's got a strong sense of justice.”

She looked away and stared out the window. The darkness outside seemed to crowd in the window, and she wondered if Tallulah was watching her even now.

Jake came to the door. He looked grim. “I've got to go out. I'm going to get back my eggs.”

“I'll go with you.” Skye stood, though she was almost too tired to think.

“No, you stay here. I won't be gone long.”

“I'm coming with you.” She rose and started after him.

J
ake glowered at Skye sitting across from him in the SUV. “I still think this is too dangerous. Why can't you ever listen to reason?”

“Like you do?”

The eyebrow she quirked made her look a bit like Spock, and he stifled a grin. He liked her spirit. In fact, he liked most things about her. Unfortunately.

He dragged his gaze from her knowing grin and concentrated on the road.

“Do you really think you can trust Cameron?”

She echoed his own misgivings. “I don't have much choice if I want to get those eggs back.” He turned down River Road as Cameron had instructed.

“I wish you'd told the sheriff.”

“Cameron was adamant about that. We have to play this his way.” Jake saw Cameron's truck parked at the side of the road ahead. “There he is.”

“There's nothing out here but deserted mine shacks and a large tract of forest.”

“And my eggs,” Jake said grimly. And he would have them back tonight.

He pulled behind Cameron's truck, and they got out. He went to the truck window and peered in. “He's not here.”

He turned and squinted through the darkness. “I don't know where to look. He said he'd meet me here.”

“Call him,” Skye suggested.

Jake felt a reluctance to announce their presence so plainly. The trees crowded close to the road, their branches seeming to reach for him and Skye, a hungry yearning that unnerved him. Rustles and night sounds from the darkness of the deep woods whispered to him. An owl hooted, and Skye jumped. Jake shuffled uneasily.

“Stay here,” he said. “I'll take a look around.”

“I'd rather come with you.” Her voice sounded hushed and strained.

Jake had to wonder if Cameron was doing this to unsettle him. If so, Jake would show him he hadn't succeeded. He walked past the truck and along the dirt road.

He wondered if anyone ever came back here. It had a desolate feel. Cameron had to have chosen this spot on purpose.

The flashlight in his hand pushed back only the edges of the inky darkness. Maybe he should have come out sooner to survey the terrain.

“He doesn't seem to be here. Is there a cabin or house in the woods near here?”

“There's an abandoned miner's shack just off the road here. But no one has lived there in decades.”

“Show me.” He handed her the flashlight.

After a hesitation, she took it. “It won't be easy. The ground is pretty rough. Stay close.”

The last thing he wanted to do was get separated in the darkness. “You can count on it.”

Shining the light on the ground, Skye led him into the deep woods. Pine, oak, birch and maple trees crowded close together so thickly it was hard to push through. Brambles tore at his clothes in the darkness. He wished he'd insisted Cameron meet him in the daylight. This was ridiculous.

Skye stumbled and fell, and the flashlight flew from her hand and landed on the ground. Jake helped her up.

“You okay?”

“I'm fine.” She sounded disgusted.

“I'll get the light.” He grabbed the flashlight and handed it back to her. “Is it far?”

“Should be just down this slope.”

He wanted to hang on to her hand, but he let go and she went ahead of him again.

After struggling through a patch of thorny shrubs that left him with scratches, he saw a patch of moonlight shining on a small structure.

“That it?”

“Yes.”

“Doesn't look like Cameron is here.” His anger toward the other paleontologist for bringing him out on this wild-goose chase was growing.

He took the flashlight from Skye and stepped through the clearing to the building. “Cameron?”

He felt like an idiot calling for the other man in the middle of obvious wilderness. There was no one here.

“I'm scared, Jake,” Skye said in a small voice. “Something doesn't feel right.”

He felt it, too. A prickling along his neck and back. Probably just animals watching them, he told himself.

“Let me check the shack, and we'll get out of here.” It wouldn't be too soon for Jake.

His flashlight swept the old miner's shack and came to rest on something near the door inside.

“What's that?” Skye's voice was hushed.

Jake didn't answer, but he went closer. She stayed right on his heels.

He focused the beam on the object, and his fingers tightened on the flashlight. The yellow glow settled on Cameron's face. From the shape of his head, Jake knew he was dead. Someone had crushed his skull.

Skye uttered a small shriek, and he put his arm around her.

“I'd better call the sheriff.”

A movement caught his attention, and they turned to see Wilson running away from the cabin.

 

The sheriff's department had rigged bright lights around the scene, but the unnatural illumination failed to reassure Skye. She watched Jake talk to the sheriff. He stood with a stillness that added to the seriousness of the situation.

Murder. The thought made her vision glaze over. It seemed so incongruous on her small island. Her throat
constricted. She'd liked the paleontologist, in spite of Jake's animosity.

Jake. Skye's gaze was drawn to him again. Would he be a suspect? He'd made no effort to hide his dislike of Cameron.

She clasped her arms around herself and joined the sheriff and Jake.

“When was the last time you saw the deceased?” Sheriff Mitchell asked.

“This morning,” Jake said, taking Skye's hand.

She curled her fingers around his palm. Maybe she could bring him some comfort. She knew he had nothing to do with this, but she knew how strangers were regarded with suspicion in the small, insular community. The sheriff might not be so quick to discount Jake's involvement.

“You say you were supposed to meet him at the road. What made you look here?”

Skye could hear the suspicion in the sheriff's voice, and her stomach tightened.

“He was nowhere around, so we started looking in the area.”

“And I remembered the shack,” Skye put in.

The sheriff ignored her. “Did you call out?”

“Not until we got to this shack.”

Now that the sheriff had asked, it had been odd that Jake hadn't called out for Cameron at the road. Skye glanced up at him. That would have been the logical thing to do. And she'd even suggested he do it.

“Why did you search here?”

“I told him about this miner's shack,” Skye said again.

The sheriff's glance quelled her, but she stared back at him with a challenge in her eyes.

“Please let Mr. Baxter answer, Skye,” Sheriff Mitchell said.

Skye gave a slight nod, but she narrowed her eyes at him to let him know she wouldn't stand by and watch him railroad Jake.

“So Ms. Blackbird told you about this place, and you decided to come here. Doesn't that seem odd to you when he was supposed to meet you at the road? What if he came back while you were gone? Maybe he'd just stepped into the forest to relieve himself.”

“Maybe so, but I was impatient to find him.”

“Why were you meeting?”

“He was going to help me recover something that had been stolen.”

The sheriff raised his eyebrows. “Stolen goods? Why wasn't I informed?”

“He insisted we not call you in. My first inclination was to notify you.”

Sheriff Mitchell scribbled in his notebook. “I hear you and the deceased didn't get along. Did you kill him, Mr. Baxter?”

“No.”

Jake's quiet denial held the ring of truth, and Skye hoped the sheriff recognized it.

“But it's true you disliked him?”

“That part's true enough,” Jake admitted.

“It sounds to me like you had good cause for wanting him dead. You believed he'd taken something that belonged to you. From what you say, he was basically blackmailing you into letting him take part in your project.”

“It wasn't like that. I could have refused.”

“But you didn't. Maybe you lured him out here and hit him over the head with that shovel. It was an easy way to get rid of him.”

Skye couldn't keep quiet any longer. “Then why bring me out here to find Cameron? Why not let the animals take care of the body? No one would have missed him for a long time.”

The sheriff pursed his lips. “He still didn't have the eggs back, right? Maybe he hoped this man's death would serve as a warning to whoever else is involved.”

Skye was finding it harder and harder to contain her anger. “Sheriff, you need to find the murderer instead of harassing Jake. You're barking up the wrong tree.” She hesitated. She hated to drag Wilson into this, but it had to be done. “We saw Wilson New Moon running away from the cabin, too.”

The sheriff flexed his jaw. “Why didn't you say so before?”

“Wilson wouldn't hurt anyone, but he might have seen something.”

“I'll ask him.” The sheriff put away his notepad. “When the coroner determines time of death, we'll have more to go on. Wilson may shed some light on things. And he's a strange one. He might have done it himself.”
The sheriff tipped his hat and left them to go talk to two of his deputies.

“Let's get out of here.” Jake led her back to the road, and they stumbled up the ditch to the SUV.

Skye felt tainted and dirty from the experience in the woods as she settled into the passenger seat and fastened her seat belt.

“And I still don't have my eggs back.” Jake sounded resigned.

“Is that all you care about? Don't you care that a man is dead?” Skye frowned at his callousness.

He shrugged. “I'm not going to be a hypocrite and pretend to be upset. Cameron was a blight on humanity. It's too bad he's dead, but he tended to run with some unsavory characters. He basically admitted he had an accomplice. This was just a way to get them back to me and ensure he got a piece of the action. We have to figure out who his accomplice was. That's the murderer.”

“I can't imagine who could be involved on our island. No one here would be interested in your eggs.”

“I thought from the start it had to be Cameron. No one else here cared about the eggs. But someone else does. And whoever it was killed Cameron.”

The web around her seemed to be growing more complex. “We're going to have to figure this out. It's obvious the sheriff likes you for the murder. He didn't even seem too interested in talking to Wilson.”

Jake nodded. “Let's go over what we know.” He ticked the details off on his fingers. “You were attacked
at the mine, the eggs were stolen, and someone lobbed rocks at you.”

“Or you could have been the target in that as well.”

He nodded. “Okay, one of us or both of us were attacked with rocks. Someone put a rattler in your truck, Cameron offered to lead me to the thief and he was killed.”

“They don't seem to be related,” Skye said. It seemed hopeless. Maybe there were two separate things going on.

“Everything seems to spiral back to the mine,” Jake said, rubbing his chin. “Tell me a little about its history.”

“Its history?” Skye frowned. “It's been in my family since the eighteen hundreds. The garnets found here have been some of the largest and most beautiful in the country. Its production has slowed in the last two decades though. My father was always convinced there were diamonds in there, too, something that occurs occasionally in a garnet mine.”

“What if there really are diamonds there and someone knows it?”

“You mean they want to prevent me from finding the diamonds?”

“What if they want to close the mine down, discourage you from keeping the mine open? Maybe they're hoping to be able to buy it once it's closed and they can have the diamonds for themselves.”

“But who?”

“Your stepfather or mother?” Jake suggested.

Skye tensed. “Don't be ridiculous! My mother would never do anything to hurt me. Peter is quite happy to let
the garnet mine wander along. Besides, if the diamonds were found, the money would be his and Mother's, not mine. I only want to find them to fulfill my father's dream not for the money.”

Jake let out a huff of exasperation. “Then who? Tallulah wouldn't have the money to buy the mine, and I can't imagine someone like her having that kind of ambition. She seems content to raise her snakes in her little cabin in the woods.”

Skye nodded. “Nothing makes sense.”

“We've got to figure it out, or I may be making a trip to Superior Penitentiary.”

“But how?” The task seemed monumental to Skye. “And how could the dig be involved?”

“If there really are diamonds in the mine, our perpetrator wouldn't want me messing up his extraction once he's in possession of the mine.”

“That's true.”

“How far are you from finding diamonds?”

“We're about to start the extraction process in the Mitchell tube. James plans to start it up tomorrow.”

James
. Could he or her cousin Michael Blackbird want the mine for their own? The idea seemed preposterous to Skye, and she pushed it away.

“So things may be heating up at the mine. We need to watch the comings and goings there closely. Maybe it's a worker, or even someone in town with the money and drive to gain the mine. The new casino will be finished soon. It could even be an organized crime group that's associated with the casino.”

Skye nodded. “There have been a lot of strangers coming and going lately. I'd like to believe it's someone like that rather than someone I know.” She shivered. Could there be such darkness behind the smiling face of one of her friends?

“What about Tallulah?” Skye asked. “How does she fit in?”

“Maybe she doesn't. Maybe she's just someone who hates you.”

Skye sighed. “You mean more than one person wants to hurt me? I've tried to reach out to everyone I know, to be a friend. I can't imagine who else I would have offended.”