Chapter 3
NOELLE
This… This wasn’t what she was used to.
The skulls she looked at were clean.
Processed.
The skull that she was looking at?
It was different from the one in the picture.
Not in itself.
But it was out of the ground.
Still with dirt on it.
Plant matter clinging to it.
It was…
It was asking her…
Begging her to help.
Noelle swallowed and wiped her hands on her jeans, trying to dry them off.
The skull.
This woman.
Needed help.
Needed my help.
“I’m going to try.”
“Miss Garcia?”
Startled, she stepped back and lifted her gaze to meet his.
“Ranger McCrae?”
He smiled. Not a full grin, but just a hint.
“It’s actually Ranger King. But you can just call me McCrae if you want.”
She nodded.
Slowly.
Noelle felt a little awkward. “McCrae. It’s… unusual.”
He shrugged. “You can blame my mother.”
“No need to blame her,” she explained, “it’s just different. I’m sure it made things easier when you were growing up. No one else answered when they called your name in class.”
He looked away and nodded his head. “True. Did that happen to you?”
“Not often, but I’ve seen it with others.”
He nodded.
And then a silence fell between them.
“Do you need some water? A chair?”
She took in another breath and nodded. “I’d like to sit down.”
He looked around and she turned her head.
She was being silly. This wasn’t a place where they’d just have chairs. It was just behind a barn. On someone’s property.
McCrae King’s property.
The man in question put out a hand toward the barn. “There’s a bench inside. Walk with me?”
The way he spoke, the lowered tone of voice, felt strangely personal to her.
The problem was… she liked it.
Noelle felt a little light headed.
When was the last time she’d eaten something?
“Noelle?”
Her heart pounded against her ribs.
“Yeah,” she spoke softly, almost to herself, “I need to sit down.”
“Okay. Come with me.”
For a moment she wasn’t sure that she could walk, but when she felt his hand on her lower back as she moved with him.
The moment they stepped inside the barn she felt some kind of relief.
Maybe it was the shade on her face or the earthy smell of the barn, she felt pleasant.
Air filled her lungs and when he showed her to the bench, she sat down, grateful for the respite.
“You look better.”
She smiled and tipped her head back, lifting her face into the air. “Thanks, I feel better.”
He gestured to the space beside her. “Do you mind if I sit down beside you?”
“No,” she shook her head and heard the creak of wood as he settled beside her. “I’m sorry this happened here.”
He shifted on the bench and she heard the sound of a horse nearby.
“I’m sorry, too.” He sighed. “My mom and dad bought this property when they married and added this part of the property from a neighbor when the family moved on.”
“Hmm…” she took in another breath. “I’m sorry your mother had to see it.”
“To say she was shaken…”
“It’s an understatement. I get it.”
There was a moment when McCrae went completely still beside her.
She didn’t know how she knew… but she knew.
She… felt it.
“You have,” he hesitated to finish his question.
Even though she knew what he meant to ask, she didn’t interject.
She needed time to come up with an answer that wouldn’t end up with her crying.
Again.
“You have experience with things like this?”
“Not me,” she drew in a breath through her nose, “my daughter.”
She smiled at the thought of her daughter. Always so precious to her.
“Ciela saw her father killed in front of her.”
Just saying the words made her catch her breath in her chest.
It had been a few years, but still, just the thought of it felt like a physical blow.
“A stray bullet came through the window of the ice cream shop and…”
She wasn’t sure she could say the rest.
Noelle closed her eyes and blew out a breath.
She had a strange sensation as if she might just fall off of the bench onto the dirt floor and then it stopped.
She felt something warm and heavy on her hand, anchoring her there.
The weight shifted and her brain started working again.
She didn’t have to look down to know what it was.
McCrae had put his hand on hers.
“T-thanks.”
“No need to thank me,” his hand gave hers a gentle squeeze. “I’m… I’m sorry for your loss. For both of you.”
“Thank you.”
She was breathing easier again.
“I wasn’t the one to see it happen, but just the photos from the crime scene were enough to make me lose it. Still, I wasn’t the one beside him when it happened. Ciela’s been through enough to last anyone else a life time.”
* * *
DUVAL
He had a feeling that he knew what she was talking about.
While Noelle had been talking about the situation, his memory had kicked in.
He’d seen photos of her daughter. Everyone in Texas and probably the country had seen the images on newspapers and websites.
The image of a child with her tear-streaked face on the floor beside her father, his shirt stained with blood.
The concept of ‘if it bleeds, it leads,’ had always been something disgusting to him. But the images taken that day by an onlooker had been sold to a number of news organizations.
What made it worse is that the child’s name had been published as well.
Ciela Oliver.
Noelle’s last name was Garcia. Maybe, he wondered, she hadn’t taken the same name as her husband? Or maybe she’d changed it after his death. Either way, he had a feeling she’d done what she could do protect her daughter.
He didn’t want to bring it up.
He didn’t need to know.
He didn’t want to cause her any more pain than what she was already carrying with her.
Duval felt something brush against his hair and he lifted up his free hand.
He came into contact with a whiskered muzzle.
A moment later he felt teeth nip at his palm.
He shook his head and turned his hand so he could give the horse a welcoming rub.
Noelle shifted beside him and her movement pulled her hand away from him.
“Sorry,” he apologized, “Butter doesn’t understand that I’m here on the job.”
“Butter?”
Noelle stood and turned to look behind him.
Or rather, above him.
Duval stood from the bench and tried to ignore the wooden groan it made.
He stared balefully at the horse who’d tried to take a bite of his hair. “Really, Butter?”
The Palomino mare had always been a bit of a troublemaker.
Duval turned to look at Noelle. “Butter is my sister’s horse. And like my sister, Butter had no problem giving me an attitude.”
At the moment, the mare was acting like a properly trained animal.
If it was possible for her to speak, she’d be saying something along the lines of, ‘Who? Me?’
She stood perfectly still with her head over the stall door and tipped her head to get a good look at Noelle.
Noelle gestured at the mare. “Does she… I mean, can I…”
If it was anyone on his team he would have told her to ‘Go ahead,” and step back for them to try.
It wasn’t that Butter was mean or violent in anyway, but she had a personality.
Again, like his sister.
“Come with me.”
He reached out his arm toward her and Noelle stepped up to his side.
Duval could have easily put his hand on her lower back to guide her, but he wasn’t sure if he’d be out of line if he did it.
Noelle approached the stall with him at her side and just a step away, he leveled a look at the horse. “Be nice.”
Butter, if it was possible for a horse to show human emotions, looked affronted.
And then, when Noelle paused her raised hand half-way, Butter stretched out her neck and put her muzzle within an inch of her hand.
“Go ahead,” he murmured softly, “give her a scratch.”
He heard a soft exhale of breath and then her hand lowered to touch the golden and white swath down the horse’s long nose.
Duval thought he heard a soft moan and smiled.
It took him a moment to realize the sound was coming from the horse.
“She likes it.”
Noelle stepped closer and lifted her other hand so she could gently scratch both sides of the horse’s face. “How could anyone be this close to a horse and not touch it?”
Butter looked damn pleased with herself and Noelle looked like she was about to lose herself in the ‘zone,’ as his sister Katie called it.
Duval lifted his hand to touch the horse’s neck, and the palomino mare must have seen him coming, because she side-stepped.
Not enough to pull away from Noelle’s hands, but enough that he couldn’t touch her.
The mare flicked a glance at him and swished her tail.
That whole thing was to put him in his place.
Butter really didn’t like him.
“Sure, you’ll take a bite out of my hair,” he complained to the pretty mare, “but that’s the extent of it, huh?”
Butter blew out a breath that sounded like the horse equivalent of a raspberry.
Noelle laughed softly and leaned in to touch her forehead to the mare’s nose. “You’re so sweet.”
The look that the horse gave him over her head looked like she was mocking him.
He opened his mouth to point out the fault in her assessment, but he never got the chance.
“McCrae King! Come and give your mama a hug, young man!”
* * *
NOELLE
She heard the booming voice that seemed to fill every inch of the barn, but it wasn’t disruptive in any way. It sounded warm.
And welcoming.
But, by the way that McCrae tensed up beside her, she wasn’t sure if he’d taken it that way.
“Ma? Is there a way for you to talk to me that you don’t sound like I’m twelve?”
“Twelve? Well damn it all to hell, I must be losing my touch. I was going for five or six years old.”
Noelle could only stare at the woman who strode through the barn with the backs of her hands on her hips.
She wore white sneakers with pink frilly socks, white capri pants and a pink blouse that was equal parts pretty and blousy at the same time.
Her nearly white hair was arranged in loose waves around her head framing her face which was perfectly made up down to the pretty pink lipstick and immaculate eyeliner.
* * *
DUVAL
“Well, hello there. I’m Finola King.” She reached out and Duval tensed, ready for her next gesture. Just like clockwork, his mother smacked his upper arm with her palm, shaking him a few times “This big galoot is my boy.”
Duval had his lips pressed tightly together to keep from saying anything that his mom might react to. She was already taking him down at the knees. He didn’t need her to have any more ammunition to come at him.
She might be his mother, but there was a reason that he was a damn good officer.
His delightful and gorgeous mother was a pistol.
Noelle lowered one hand and turned to look at him. Butter lifted her head, nudging Noelle’s hand for more attention.
She managed to continue petting the large animal and give him a curious look as well. “I can tell your mom loves you, a lot.”
His mom laughed, her shoulders shaking. “Awwww… She sees right through me, son. How wonderful is that?”
Noelle blushed. “My mother is kind of… the same.” She shrugged. “Different, but…”
“The same.” His mother had obviously taken a liking to Noelle. “Come, sweetie. You must be starving. Come inside and I’ll make you a sandwich and get you something to drink.”
Finola reached out for Noelle’s arm.
Butter leaned her neck over the stall door, teeth bared in what might have been mistaken for a smile.
His mother wagged a finger at the mare. “Don’t you dare bite me, Butterfinger.”
The horse took a step back, her tail swishing and her chin lifting as she nickered.
Finola wrapped an arm around Noelle and started to walk her toward the house.
Realizing that his mother had taken over, Duval fell in behind the two and walked in silence until they got to the entrance.
His mother stopped as soon as they were in the sunlight, her hair taking on a kind of golden halo.
“McCrae?”
He stopped short, and lifted an eyebrow. “Yes, Mama?”
She beamed at him.
For a moment.
“Go do your Ranger thing. I’m going to feed Noelle and then you can have her after.”
His mother nodded with a kind of finality that he was used to.
“Buh-bye now.”
Finola turned back to the house and took Noelle by the hand.
“Come along, dear. Let me feed you and get you out of the sun.”
Noelle managed to look over her shoulder at him before she was swept inside.
Duval shook his head.
Not only had he been dismissed, but his mother had kidnapped their expert with the ease of Girl Scout waggling a box of Thin Mints in his direction.
With a sigh he turned on his heel and walked back to the excavation site.