Chapter Six
“Animal blood.” Ted King, Mountain Wood’s Chief of Police, leaned an elbow on his desk at the police department and flipped over the lab report page. Stirring first one large teaspoon of sugar followed by another into a paper cup of hot coffee, he met Ben’s gaze.
At sixty-two, King’s argument against post middle-aged spread was a losing one.
His police uniform stretched rebelliously and to the breaking point over his generous belly, the traitorous buttons hanging on by mere threads.
Ben got the idea that if one popped, it might start a chain reaction of small discs flying six feet across the room.
Despite his dough-boy appearance, Chief King had a no-nonsense demeanor that Ben appreciated. With the end of his spoon, King tapped the file. “The sample indicts it is blood, just not human. On that basis I won’t order a confirmatory test.”
“No,” Ben agreed. “If it’s animal, we can’t worry about it.
However, with the news that Ridley Kemper is out of prison, and further, with his whereabouts unknown to his probation officer, we have to be real careful.
That’s the asshole who stalked Sarah five years ago.
She’s safe right now inside Sinclair’s office, but I’ll be dogging her every step. ”
“Understood.” Tom King’s eyes sharpened. “We’ll be on the watch for Kemper.”
Ben offered a hand. “Much appreciated. We can’t jump to any conclusions yet that it’s him. You have my cell number. I know you’ll be on the lookout. Wouldn’t hurt to send a cruiser by the Lang ranch every now and again.”
“When my deputies make their rounds, they can take a pass by,” Chief King said. “We won’t let anything happen to our Sarah. She’s special to us.”
That was the second time Ben had heard one of the townspeople use the term, our Sarah. Around Mountain Wood, his charge was certainly well loved.
At that moment an overweight, middle-aged man, bald except for a ring of brown hair crowning his scalp came through the department doors. Stretching to his tallest, he wouldn’t top five-foot-five. He bellowed a hallo and Chief King introduced him to Ben.
“Paxton, this is our local big wheel, Mayor Beekins.”
“Beekins.” Ben offered his hand. “I was told you own the bakery.”
“I do. Good to meet you, Paxton.” He shook Ben’s outstretched hand with hearty enthusiasm. “Really good to meet you. Come into the bakery and I’ll make sure you get a free bagel. Now, tell me, will you be in town for the festival?”
Ben glanced at the chief. “Festival?”
Chief King said, “It’s our annual Rhubarb Festival celebration. In only ten days, Mountain Wood hosts a fair, and the town relies on the income. We get a lot of out-of-town visitors.”
“Yes, yes,” the mayor said expansively. “All kinds of demonstrations, right here in the town square. Blacksmithing, a chainsaw demonstration, lots of kids showing their sheep and pigs, plenty of crafts and food booths. And the rhubarb! We’ll have pies and such.
You’ll enjoy it, Paxton.” He nodded. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have some business to conduct with the chief. ”
Not about to be dismissed, Ben quickly filled the mayor in on Sarah’s troubles.
“A stalker?” The chubby man paled. “Oh, no! This won’t do. If word gets out, business will be depressed. Why, we could lose our annual influx of visitors and the influx of cash!”
Ben rested a hand on his hip. “Well, word’s about to get out because I’m on my way to all the store owners and managers to tell them. We need everyone on the lookout, not have them unaware of a possible loose cannon in their midst.”
“No!” Beekins nearly squealed.
“Mayor, Paxton’s right,” Chief King said. “We need to inform the populace—-for their safety as well as for Sarah’s.”
“I can’t have you riling people up, frightening them,” Mayor Beekins sputtered. “My town isn’t a big city, in case you haven’t noticed, Paxton. This could cast a shadow over the town’s festival—a pall that will never lift.”
“Sorry,” Ben said, not sorry at all. “Sarah’s life is worth more than your festival.” He left with the mayor still upset and stammering.
Making his way back around the square, Ben re-visited all the stores where he’d already introduced himself and came clean with the owners and managers.
“Sarah Lang has a stalker,” he told them.
“I’m here to see that she remains safe. However, your help is needed and it’s necessary.
It’s up to us to be observant, to notice anybody unfamiliar. ” He gave them his cell number.
All were alarmed and vowed to be on the lookout. At last, he returned to Milly’s and found that Big Jim had gone home to the ranch. Because it was the before-lunch lull, he asked Milly for a word.
She poured him a new cup of coffee and sat with him at a booth.
“Sarah doesn’t know, but people around here have already been protecting her,” she surprised him by saying.
“Lots of times we get fans asking where she lives, or the paparazzi want to find her and snap photos. Since she’s been gone from Los Angeles and New York for all these months, they usually want to do a Where is Super Sarah Lang now? type of story.”
Ben sipped his coffee. “I can imagine. Her face is famous the world over.”
“We know. And when the scum-sucking vermin come around, the shopkeepers give wrong information or tell them she’s moved to Japan.
They say she’s gained a hundred pounds and gone into seclusion.
I told one rude journalist that she’d taken up big game hunting in Africa.
We’ve all done it. Happens a couple of times a month, or more.
She doesn’t need any crap from those people. ”
“Ah.” No wonder she believed that she’d mostly been left alone.
The good people of Mountain Wood had already closed ranks around her.
He was pleased. With dozens of extra eyes on the lookout, it could help make his job easier.
“She told me she’s just Sarah to all of you here.
She says she’s left alone, despite her celebrity, because she grew up here and is one of you. ”
“She is. It’s just that she went off and got herself famous.
That’s real different from the rest of us.
Not too many folk around here with that sort of high profile.
Our faces don’t get plastered on thirty-foot billboards.
” She flung up a hand and knocked a spoon to the floor.
She had to bend out of the booth to retrieve it.
Looking down, he noticed her pink shoes were high-top tennies dusted with equally bright pink glitter.
Ben felt his eyebrows raise. Other than her unusual choice in footwear, Milly appeared to be what she was, a small-town diner owner, often serving her food with a quick tongue.
Fortunately for him, she seemed to know everyone and everything that went on around Mountain Wood.
“Those are some nice shoes there, Milly,” Ben said.
“Like em?” She glanced down. “I don’t care for high heels. They hurt my feet. And I really hate those nurse-style shoes a lot of waitresses wear. Still, I do like colorful tennis shoes.”
A commotion at the door pulled Ben’s attention from Milly.
Sarah burst inside breathless, her hair flying behind her back in a gold banner. Her eyes were wide, her movements jerky. She swung her face wildly around the diner.
As Ben began to rise, she spotted him and rushed over.
“Ben!” she exclaimed, “where have you been?”
On his feet now, he frowned, studying her flushed features. “I told you to text me when you wanted to leave your meeting, remember? I don’t want you walking the streets alone.”
“Oh, yeah.” Clearly frazzled, she glanced around.
Milly got up to fuss over Sarah. “Sit down, honey. I’ll get you your tea.” With a quick rub of Sarah’s shoulder, Milly rushed off.
Ben waited for Sarah to sink into the booth. Making a thorough visual sweep of the restaurant and the street outside, and seeing nothing alarming, he took his seat. He wondered if somehow she’d caught wind about Ridley Kemper’s release. “What’s upset you?”
“Um ... I ... I freaked out.” She hunched her shoulders.
Milly arrived and set a delicately flowered teacup and saucer with a dangling string hanging over the edge. “Here,” she said, edging the cup close to Sarah. “It’s your favorite, Earl Grey. Now, I’ve got to serve, but we’ll talk later, okay?”
Sarah nodded.
“Tell me,” Ben urged Sarah.
“It’s nothing really. I totally overacted. I saw a knife,” she said, “on the office desk just now. “A—a dagger. It made me think that maybe it’s Donovan Sinclair. Maybe he’s the one threatening me.”
“The building owner—the one you’re negotiating with for the lease?”
She sighed. “Yes. Of course it’s not him. I just ... I’m afraid of knifes. I wasn’t like this before. Growing up on a ranch, well, everybody has some sort of knife in his pocket. It’s just lately, I don’t like them.”
From a sheath on his belt, Ben withdrew a fixed blade knife. He held up his Ka-bar. “Like this?” The blade glinted.
Sarah’s eyes widened. She gulped. “Yes. Just like that.”
“What about them bothers you?”
“It’s the nightmares. I dream of sharp objects coming at me, of swords and spears, of daggers and knives. From the dark. I know they’re going to stab me, kill me.”
“Odd,” Ben said. “Why do you fear them so much? Must be a good reason.”
Sarah bowed her head. “The guy that stalked me and went to prison? He used knives on his victims. That day in my apartment hallway, he held one to my neck. Later on, I found out he’d cut his rape victims.” She swallowed hard.
“I see.” He replaced his knife in its sheath. He didn’t like being in this position, but he had to tell her. “Sarah, I just found out that Ridley Kemper is out of prison.”
Her head snapped up. “He’s out? When? When did he get released?”
“A month ago. And he never reported to his probation officer. No one knows where he is.”
“A month ago,” she breathed. She clutched her teacup and it rattled in its saucer. “That’s about the same time I started getting the awful emails.”