Mountain Witness

“Around back, on the deck, well away from the grill. It’s hot and ready.”

Max carried the cooler back down the steps. Twenty minutes later, Destiny PD’s entire five-man-and-one-woman SWAT team was on the large back deck, plus Chief William Thornton, his wife, Claire, Ashley, their 911 operator—Nancy—and a handful of other support staff.

Steaks sizzled on the double-decker grill, which was Max’s domain. On one side of him, SWAT officers Colby Vale and Randy Carter chatted about the best places to fish. On Max’s other side a young female police intern helped load foil-wrapped potatoes and corncobs onto another section of the grill.

“Two weeks.” Dillon grabbed a beer from the cooler at Chris’s feet.

Since Dillon was watching Ashley talk to SWAT Officer Donna Waters a few feet away, Chris wasn’t sure what he meant. “Two weeks until what?”

Dillon used his bottle to indicate the pretty young intern who was earning college credits for helping out at the Destiny police department over the summer.

“I give her and Max’s fledgling relationship two more weeks, at the most,” Dillon said. “They have absolutely nothing in common and she’s young enough to be his...niece...or something.”

Chris shrugged and snagged himself a beer from the cooler. The rest of the team laughed and talked in small groups on the massive deck. The chief and his wife were the only ones not smiling. They were too intent on discussing the best placement of the desserts on the table at the far end. Chris grinned, always amused to see the soft side of his crotchety boss whenever his wife of forty-plus years was around. He hoped someday that he’d be lucky enough to be married that long, and be just as happy. But so far he hadn’t met the right woman. Given Destiny’s small size, he just might have to move to another town to expand the dating pool.

The sound of an engine turning over had him stepping closer to the railing. The moving truck headed down the driveway next door, then continued up the road. His new neighbor stood in the grass beside her front porch, watching it go. Unless she was deaf, she had to hear the noise in his backyard. Was she going to ignore all of them?

He waited, watching. As if feeling the force of his gaze upon her, she turned. Their eyes locked and held. Then she whirled around and raced up her porch steps, the screen door slamming as she hurried inside.

“What’s her name?”

Chris didn’t turn at the sound of Dillon’s voice. His friend braced his hands on the railing beside him.

“I have no idea,” Chris answered. “She’s been here two days and she hasn’t even acknowledged that I exist.”

Dillon whistled low. “That’s a first for you. Must be losing your touch.”

He slanted his friend a look. “Yeah, well. At least I’m not puking my guts up every time someone says fried gizzards.”

Dillon’s eyes widened and his face went pale. A second later he clapped his hand over his mouth and ran inside the house.

Judging from the way Ashley was suddenly glaring at Chris, she’d obviously noticed Dillon’s rapid retreat. She put her hands on her hips. “What did you do?”

“I might have mentioned ‘fried gizzards.’”

She threw her hands in the air and shook her head in exasperation. Then she ran inside after her husband.

Chris winced at the accusatory looks some of the others gave him. He shouldn’t have done that. He knew that Dillon’s sympathy morning sickness could be triggered by certain foods, or even the mention of them. But teasing Dillon was just too easy—and way too fun—to resist.

He supposed he’d have to apologize later.

But right now there was something else bothering him, a puzzle he was trying to work through. He turned back toward his mysterious new neighbor’s house, trying to fit the pieces together in his mind. There’d been something about her that was bothering him, the way she’d twisted her hands together as she’d stared down the road, the look in her eyes when she’d met his gaze.

And then it clicked.

He knew exactly what he’d seen.

Fear.

Chapter Three (#udd99f7bb-0952-5332-a390-b9521d9e9567)

Judging by the empty beer bottles and bags of trash sitting on his deck, Chris reckoned the annual summer-opening bash for his SWAT unit had been a success. Everyone had seemed to have a good time, even Dillon, once he’d gotten over being mad. They’d probably still be partying if the mosquitoes and gnats hadn’t invaded after the sun went down.

He probably should have invited everyone to go indoors. But he’d been too preoccupied to even think of that earlier. He’d spent most of the cookout worrying about a woman he’d never met, who’d made it crystal clear that she wanted nothing to do with him.

After another glance at the house next door, he cursed and forced himself to look away. He grabbed two bags of trash in one hand and a bag of recyclables in the other. Then he headed down the deck steps and around the side yard toward the garage. He slowed as he neared the front. Behind the dark blue BMW next door was a silver Ford Taurus that hadn’t been there earlier.

He shook his head. It was none of his business who the woman next door invited over. Judging by the plates on the Taurus, it was from out of town. Maybe some of her friends were helping her unpack and set up the place. Again, none of his concern.

Rounding to the front of his house, he keyed a code into the electronic keypad to open the garage door. After stowing the trash and recyclables in the appropriate bins, he closed the door again and took the front porch steps two at a time. If he hurried, he just might catch the start of a baseball game on TV.

A few minutes later, he was sitting in his favorite recliner with a beer and a bowl of popcorn on the side table. He was looking forward to a relaxing few hours vegging out before going to bed early, even though it was Saturday.

Come dawn, he had a date with a tractor and a Bush Hog and over an acre of brush to clear for Cooper, a neighbor laid up in the hospital. After that, he had his own chores to see to, including repairing some fencing to keep cows from wandering into his yard again from the farm behind his house. Sunday definitely wasn’t going to be a day of rest for him. And he’d still have to catch the Sunday evening service at First Baptist or his mom would hear about it and start praying for his soul.

A piercing shriek sounded from outside, then abruptly cut off. Chris jumped up from his chair, grabbed his pistol from the coffee table. Standing stock-still, he listened for the sound again. Had a screech owl flown over the house? Maybe one of the baseball fans on TV had made the noise. Maybe. But he didn’t think so. The volume on the television hadn’t been turned up very loud. He pressed the mute button on the remote. Still nothing. Everything was silent. So what had he heard?

As if pulled by an unseen force, his gaze went to the window on the east side of the great room. The front of his home was about ten feet closer to the road than his neighbor’s. He had a clear view of her porch, dimly lit by a single yellow bulb now that the sun had gone down. Everything looked as it had earlier when he’d dealt with the trash. Two cars were still parked in her driveway. There was no sign of any people anywhere. But he couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling in his gut and the memory of the fear he’d seen in her eyes.

Cursing himself for a fool, he headed toward the screen door, gun in hand. His neighbor was probably going to think he was an idiot for checking on her. But he had to see for himself that she was okay. He shoved the pistol into his waistband at the small of his back. No sense in scaring her with his gun out. After jogging down the porch steps, he strode across the lawn to her house.

The sound of breaking glass made him pause before he reached the bottom step. An angry male voice sounded from inside. Chris whirled around, changing direction. He went to the side of the porch, where he wouldn’t be visible from the front door, then hauled himself up and over the railing. Crouching down, he edged to the first window, then peeked inside.

The layout of the house was basically a one-story version of his own. He’d been in it dozens of times helping out old man Hutchinson before his family moved him to an assisted-living facility. The front door opened into the great room. The kitchen was to the left, through an archway. Both homes had a hallway that ran across the back, with two bedrooms and a bath. The only true difference was the size and the fact that Chris’s home had a staircase hugging the wall on the right.

Boxes were stacked neatly across the left end of his neighbor’s great room. A couch and two chairs sat in a grouping on the right. Standing in the middle of the room was a tall, lean man, his face a mask of anger as he said something to the woman across from him. Pieces of a broken drinking glass scattered the floor. But what captured Chris’s attention the most was what the man was holding in his right hand—a butcher knife.

Chris ducked down, his hand going to the gun shoved into his waistband. No. He couldn’t bust in there pointing his gun. The other man was too close to the woman and might hurt her. What he needed was a distraction, some way to put more distance between the two.

He also needed backup, in case this all went horribly wrong. He didn’t want the woman left facing the man with the knife all by herself. He had to make sure she’d get the help she needed, no matter what.

After silencing his phone, he typed a quick text to dispatch, letting them know the situation. As expected, the immediate response was to stand down and wait for more units. Yeah, well, more units were a good thirty minutes away, best case. That was part of the price of living in the country. Like it or not, he had to go inside the house. If he waited, his neighbor could get hurt or killed by the time his fellow SWAT team members arrived.

He shoved the phone into his pocket, then hopped over the railing and dropped down to the grass. His hastily concocted plan wasn’t much of a plan. It basically involved making enough noise to alert the two inside that he was there, and then going all hillbilly on them. If they were typical city slickers, as the BMW and out-of-town plates on the Taurus suggested, they might take the bait and think he was a redneck without a clue. If his gamble paid off, he’d manage to insert himself between the two and wrestle the knife away—hopefully without getting himself or anyone else killed.

Yeah, not much of a plan, but, since he couldn’t think of another one, he went with it.

He wiped his palms on his jeans, then loudly clomped his booted foot onto the bottom porch step.

Chapter Four (#udd99f7bb-0952-5332-a390-b9521d9e9567)

A hollow sound echoed outside. Julie jerked around to see the sexy guy from next door stomping up the front porch steps.

“Who is that?” Alan snarled, closing the distance between them.

She swallowed, watching the knife in his hand. “My neighbor. I don’t know his name.”

“Get rid of him.”