Chapter Fifteen #2
That righteous bitch wasn’t getting away with what she’d done to him. Not in this lifetime.
****
R yder snapped awake when his phone rang on the bedside table.
He let go of Danae and rolled over to grab it, squinting against the glare of the screen in the darkness of their bedroom.
Holy shit, it was almost ten a.m. And if Noah Buchanan was calling him on a weekend, it definitely wasn’t good news.
“Sheriff,” he answered. Well, outgoing sheriff. Because he was passing the torch and coming to work for them at CPS soon.
“Morning. I’m on scene at a place just south of town. You got time to meet me and talk a minute? It’s potentially related to Cassie Edwards.”
That woke him up completely. “Yeah, send me the address, and I’ll head out in a few minutes.”
Beside him, Danae yawned and stretched her arms over her head. Rain pattered gently on the roof and against their bedroom window. “Time is it?” she murmured.
“After ten.”
“What?” she said in shock.
“Yeah.” They’d been up all night waiting for a call from Finn in Syria to say he was okay. Because there’d been a rocket attack on his base in the middle of their scheduled call, and Danae had understandably been beside herself when the line had suddenly gone dead.
Finn had finally called back at just after four to tell them he was fine.
Ryder was proud of his stepson for becoming a Marine and serving his country, but he had to admit it was a hell of a lot harder being on this end of the line during a combat deployment and even tougher on Danae as Finn’s mama.
“Who was that?” she asked.
“Noah. He didn’t say what happened, but he wants to talk to me about Cassie.” He leaned over, kissed her gently. “I’m gonna head straight into the office after I’m done there.”
“Okay. You working late again tonight?”
“Not sure yet. I’ll call you as soon as I know.
” He would much rather spend a lazy Sunday in bed with his sleepy, sexy wife, but running a big security firm like CPS meant he was almost always on the clock, and this thing with Cassie meant he had to put in more overtime.
She was a solid agent, a great employee, and an even better person.
He would do everything in his power to help get to the bottom of this shit. “Love you.”
“Love you too.” She caught his arm before he could straighten. “Hey. Thanks for being there for me last night. I don’t know what I would have done without you here to talk me off the ledge before he called back.”
He hadn’t done much. Just said what he could to reassure her, explaining base protocol during a rocket attack, and telling her repeatedly that Finn would be okay. “Yeah, of course. You know I’ll always be here for you.” The same way she was always there for him. He was a lucky man, and he knew it.
Twenty minutes later, he turned his SUV off the main highway and took the feeder route up into the hills south of town, his windshield wipers swishing back and forth to clear the steady rain falling from the leaden clouds.
Noah’s sheriff’s vehicle was parked on the street at the base of the driveway. Ryder found him waiting up top at the front steps, rain dripping off the brim of his sheriff’s hat. “Thanks for coming. Forensics are inside now, but I’m not going to be able to get down to the station for a while yet.”
So it was a murder then. “No problem.” He looked at the sagging, dilapidated cottage. “You ID the victim yet?”
“Michael Vanderbilt. From Nevada originally. We’re still trying to notify next of kin. Thing is, we found this inside.” He held out a bag of pale blue pills in a sealed evidence bag.
“They’re exactly the same as the ones planted in Cassie’s car.”
Noah nodded. “There’re more inside. Along with weed and cocaine. We don’t think he’s a dealer. There’s not enough product or cash here. Looks more like this was his personal stash.”
“Does he match the profile of the suspect who planted them in Cassie’s vehicle?”
“Our initial analysis indicates it could be him. We’ll need to verify that, but with our limited resources it’s gonna take a while.”
The look Noah was giving him made it plain enough to Ryder. He wanted CPS to run its own check on Michael Vanderbilt and see what they could find. “Got it.”
“Sir.” A female deputy exited the front door and came down the rotten wooden steps toward them. “We found this in the bedroom closet.” She handed over a cell phone.
Noah took it in his gloved hands and turned it on. “It’s not encrypted, but it’s definitely a burner.” He pulled up the text messages. Stopped and turned the screen to face Ryder.
He found himself looking at a picture of Cassie getting into her car in front of her house. His mouth tightened. Sonofabitch. “I’ll call her myself, have her go into the station.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Ryder got back into his vehicle, shot off a series of texts to Callum, Walker, and their IT department. This ended now. He wanted to know exactly who Michael Vanderbilt was, and rip his life apart so they could find out whoever was behind this bullshit.
Then he called Cassie.