He heard the door open behind him. “Be right there, Mic.”
“Sheriff, your deputy’s taking Mr. Sparks back to his cell for the night.”
Red nodded at Rozwell. “All right then.”
“I’ll need another few minutes with him in the morning, and would like to meet with the prosecutor.”
“I can arrange that. Let’s say nine o’clock.”
“That’s fine. I’ll be here. I wonder if you could recommend a hotel, motel, just a decent place to spend the night. I didn’t have time to make arrangements.”
“Sure can. Come back to my office. I’ll give you a couple close by—if you’re looking for close.”
“Close would be great.”
“You can call from here, make sure they’ve got a room for you.” In his office, he scribbled names on a pad. “The top one? Good beds, good service, and twenty-four-hour room service if you need it. They charge for Wi-Fi though, which burns my ass.”
“Thanks.”
“Go ahead, use the room.”
Red walked out, waited for Michaela, and considered he probably had the energy for that cold beer before bed. And a hot shower. Christ, he wanted the shower more than the beer.
Rozwell walked out.
“All set?”
“Yeah, thanks. I’ll be here at nine. I left my cell phone number on your pad if you need to reach me.” He started for the door, turned, looked Red in the eye. “I have a daughter. She’s only four. I have a little girl of my own.”
And when he walked out, Red knew they’d deal.
Michaela walked back—still spit and polish, he thought. And had to admire it.
“You settle him in?”
“He tried tears on me. Slow, soulful ones. He’s good.”
“We’re better. Rozwell wants to meet with the prosecutor in the morning. I’m going to contact him on my way home. You can take tomorrow off.”
“I’d like to see it through.”
“Be here by nine then. I’ll walk you out.”
“We’ll walk each other out.”
“Works for me.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Dillon liked mucking out the stalls. He loved the romantic smell of horses—even mixed with horse-shit bedding. Every clear memory of his life involved the ranch, and his favorite ones included horses.
His favorite of favorites was the night he, his mom, and Gram watched Diva deliver her first foal. Some of it had been kind of yuck, but mostly just cool. They’d even let him name the foal, a pretty bay with four white socks and a crooked white blaze.
He’d called her Comet, because the blaze looked like a comet trail. Sort of.
And even though he’d only been six, they’d let him groom her and work with her on the lead line when she got old enough. He’d been the first to stretch his body over her back to get her used to weight. The first to ease a saddle on her, the first to ride her.
He’d helped train others since—and thought he was pretty good at it. But Comet was his.
And he’d been by her side when she’d had her first foal the previous spring.
He just liked being a rancher—an agricultural rancher, because they planted and grew and harvested and sold vegetables, had an orchard of fruit trees, even Gram’s vineyard, though she mostly made wine for herself and friends.
He didn’t mind all the chores (in fact, he liked chores a lot better than school). The planting and hoeing, feeding and watering stock, even making hay when the sun beat down, or helping run their stall at the farmer’s market.
He liked living up high on the cliff, seeing the ocean every day, or walking the fields—even better, riding over the fields, into the woods.
Winter Saturdays meant a lot of chores he handled by himself, or with his mom giving him a hand where she could. Inside the house, Gram and his mom would be baking—bread and pies and cakes for the cooperative. From Friday morning into Saturday the house smelled really, really good.
Sometimes Gram made candles, too, from soy and put smelly stuff in them. She was teaching him how, just like they were teaching him how to bake bread and all that.
He’d rather feed the pigs and chickens, watch them scramble around, haul the feed to the troughs for the beef cattle, milk the nanny goats. And muck out stalls.
He’d finished most of the morning routine before eleven—real ranchers, Dillon knew, started early—and hauled the last wheelbarrow from the stalls to the dung pile.
He heard the car coming up the ranch road, looked up at the sky to gauge the time. His good pals Leo and Dave were coming over to hang, but not until the afternoon.
So too early for them.
He rolled the empty wheelbarrow back to the barn, stowed it, and, slapping his work gloves on his pants to clean them, wandered over to see who was coming.
In the way of boys, he recognized the shining silver vehicle as a BMW—a fanCEE SUV. He just didn’t know anybody who drove one.
Seeing as he was the man of the house, he waited—legs spread, thumbs hooked in his front pockets.
And when he saw Hugh Sullivan get out, he walked the rest of the way over to say hello.
“Hi, Mr. Sullivan.”
“Dillon.”
In a way that made Dillon feel very much man of the house, Hugh offered his hand to shake before he just looked around.
“I didn’t really take all this in when we were here. So much worry, and it was dark. You have a very beautiful place.”
“Thanks.”
Hugh gestured at the work gloves now flopping in Dillon’s back pocket. “And I can see you work hard to tend it. I realize you must have a great deal more work to do, but I wonder if I could take a few minutes of your time, speak to you, your mother, your grandmother.”
“Sure. I’m mostly finished with the morning chores. Mom and Gram are inside baking. They bake most of Friday for the co-op, but there’s a special thing tomorrow, so they’re baking more today.”
Maybe he thought it was too bad Cate hadn’t come, but he didn’t say anything.
“Ah, the sheriff came over the other day to tell us they caught the guys who kidnapped Cate. That they were in prison and everything already. I’m glad,” he said as he walked Hugh to the door. “The man who killed my dad’s in prison.”
Hugh pulled up short, looked back down at the boy. “I’m so sorry about your dad, Dillon. I didn’t know.”
“I was really little, so I don’t remember him. But he was a hero.”
After swiping his boots hard on the mat, Dillon opened the door. He remembered his manners. “I can hang up your coat.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
As Dillon took it, Hugh drew in a deep breath. “It smells like heaven should.”
Dillon grinned. “It gets even better in the kitchen. Since you’re here, they’re going to ask if you want some pie or cookies or something. If you don’t say no, I get some, too.”
Charmed, Hugh put a hand on Dillon’s shoulder. “I won’t say no.”
He led him back, through the scents of fresh bread, rising dough, baked fruit, and sugar to where the women, in their big aprons, worked a kind of production line.
Pies, loaves of bread, four unfrosted cakes, cookies spread out on cooling racks on a long counter. He saw a number of white bakery boxes with the Horizon Ranch label hiding their treasures on the dining room table.