Hidden Agenda

CHAPTER FOUR

JILLIAN TRIED NOT TO LOOK AT Conner. Although the four-wheel drive Jeep Cherokee Sport wasn’t a small car, it felt small when she was sitting in the front seat with Conner, whose sheer physicality dominated any space he occupied.

Instead, she experimented with her camera, consulting the instruction book, fiddling with the settings.

“Is that a new camera?” Conner asked once he’d navigated out of the worst of the Houston traffic. They were headed for the East Texas piney woods, a trip that would take them about three hours. She wondered why they had to stay overnight—it wasn’t that far. But she figured he knew what he was doing.

Celeste had insisted he wanted to get her out of town so he could either murder her or seduce her with no witnesses, but Celeste was prone to drama.

“Yes, I just got it yesterday.”

“I thought you said you knew how to use a digital camera.”

“I do.” The one on her phone, anyway. This one was more complex than she’d thought it would be. She’d snapped a few photos the previous evening just to be sure she had the basics down, but she had much to learn about settings and exposure. “I needed a new camera anyway, and this seemed like a good time to buy one. What will I be taking pictures of?”

“I’m not sure. Apparently the lumbering crew got overzealous and took down some kind of special owl tree.”

“Owl tree?”

“A hollow tree that’s been a barn owl nesting site for the past ten years.”

“Oh, poor owls. So this is a big deal?”

“Since our agreement with the landowner specifically stated that this tree, and the area around it, wouldn’t be disturbed, we could get sued. But even without the legal angle, it’s still a big deal. Hollow trees aren’t that easy to come by. For every cavity, the owls have to compete with other birds, like woodpeckers.”

That explained why the back of the Jeep was filled with birdhouses. Apparently Conner planned to offer some alternative housing for the owls whose home had been destroyed, and some for their competitors, as well.

“Are they endangered owls?”

“They’re rare in this part of Texas. The state forestry people like owls because the little ones eat insect pests that harm trees, and the larger ones, like barn owls, keep rodents in check. They’re an important part of the food chain.”

Jillian didn’t know anything about owls, but apparently Conner did. He’d always been interested in science, she remembered that about him. His father had been some kind of ecoscientist back before “green” was in. Conner had been smart, too—straight A’s. He’d managed to make that look cool.

Even entering the science fair—a notoriously geeky thing to do—had looked good on him.

Jillian stopped, determinedly focusing on the road ahead, the sky, the puffy white clouds. Thinking about that science fair when Conner was sitting inches from her was a dangerous thing to do.

“Your guy didn’t destroy a nest, did he? Like, with babies?” Jillian didn’t have any pets of her own, but that didn’t mean she didn’t like animals. She’d doted on Daniel’s golden retriever.

“Nesting season is over. But the adult owls were still roosting at the nest site, and they were undoubtedly disturbed.”

After a few more minutes Conner turned off the main road, then onto a still smaller road, then finally onto a logging road that was no more than a couple of tire ruts in the red dirt.

Conner was busy driving, skillfully lurching from bump to bump and avoiding the largest of the holes, so Jillian could study him without fear that he would notice. He seemed to change as they left civilization. The deeper they got into the woods, the more relaxed his face became, to the point where he was almost smiling.

She’d seen nothing but anger, impatience and irritation from him at the office; now he seemed to be enjoying himself.

However, his face and body grew tense again as they approached the logging site. This area, scarred by the trucks and saws, wasn’t so pretty, littered with the stumps of pine trees.

“What the hell’s going on here?” he muttered.

“Is something wrong?”

“Something is very wrong.”

Eventually they pulled up behind a huge, flatbed truck half-filled with logs. A U.S. Forest Service truck was parked off to the side. Several men, mostly in work clothes, milled around.

Conner grabbed a folder from the backseat and nearly flew out of the truck.

Ready for anything, Jillian followed, her camera around her neck, a digital recorder in one pocket and a notepad in the other.

One of the workmen, a scruffy-looking redhead with a full beard, was already heading toward Conner, his long stride full of purpose. “Mr. Blake. I didn’t know anything about owls, I swear. I was just taking down the trees that were marked.”

A second man had come forward, a tall, gaunt man in his sixties in overalls, clutching an unlit pipe in one hand. “He’s practically clear-cutting! Our contract states no more than twenty-five percent of the trees were to be cut, and just look at this! It’s a good thing I came to check on the progress.”

“I only cut the marked trees,” Scruffy Redhead said again. “You can check the truck. Every single tree on that truck is marked with blue paint.”

Jillian switched on the recorder, then started scribbling notes as fast as she could. This wasn’t anything like the civilized meetings she used to deal with at Daniel’s estate. It was a good thing she’d developed her own version of shorthand.

“Who did the marking, then?” Pipe Man asked.

“A man named Greg Tynes.” Conner’s jaw tightened and he all but spit on the ground, so obvious was his contempt. “I personally went over the contract with him and instructed how he was to mark. Obviously he didn’t follow directions.”

Jillian’s heart quickened. So the dead man had been violating the terms of the lumber company’s contract with the landowner. Could that be a motive for murder?

“Well, I hope you fired him!” Pipe Man said indignantly. “My forest looks like a wasteland.”

“Rest assured, Greg Tynes no longer works for Mayall Lumber,” Conner said, giving nothing away. “In fact, he’ll never work in the timber business again.”

That was one promise Conner could keep.

The young, female forest ranger, who’d been listening intently, finally spoke up. “There’s more at stake than just the aesthetics of this woods. Mr. Whatley’s land abuts public lands, forming a contiguous forest, the size of which is crucial to—”

“The owls,” Conner said.

“Yes. Barn owl populations have been declining over the years. The nest site in question has been monitored by Cornell University for ten years. A camera has been in place for five.”

“I get a tax deduction for lettin’ ’em do that, you know,” Mr. Whatley put in.

“The owls are crucial to our woodland ecosystem,” the ranger continued. “They eat—”

Conner put his hand up to stop her impassioned speech. “You don’t have to convince me. We’ve done something wrong here. I want to fix it. I want to make things right. Obviously, Mr. Whatley here will have to be compensated for the excess timber taken from his land. As for the owls—will you show me the nest site?”

Conner retrieved a backpack from the Jeep. Then he, the forest ranger and Jillian began hiking.

“How many acres have been screwed up?” he asked the ranger.

“Between seventeen and twenty.” She seemed calmer, now that it appeared Conner wanted to make things right.