As if the hair had been torn from her head.

Morgan shuddered. Had Chelsea fought?

“So now we know that Chelsea was here with her car.”

Morgan held up the plastic bag. “And the broken chain and roots on the hairs suggest the necklace was ripped off her neck. Maybe we finally found an indication of a struggle.”

Chapter Seventeen

Lance watched Morgan work the sheriff. She faced Sheriff King over his desk, all big blue eyes and sincerity. She folded her hands in her lap. Her expression was attentive, her posture ladylike, and yet her presence powerful in a way that Lance couldn’t quite quantify.

It was confidence, he decided. Every word she spoke rang with truth but was delivered in a quiet way that had King leaning forward to listen. Yes, she had the big, badass sheriff hanging on her every word.

She was good. Very good.

No doubt when she’d been a prosecutor, she’d commanded the jury’s attention just as naturally.

King leaned back in his chair and rubbed at his cleanly shaven chin. His eyes drifted to Lance, narrowed just a hair, then returned to Morgan.

Yeah. Lance was not one of his favorite people, which was why he sat back and kept his mouth shut. He would have stayed in the car if he didn’t know he needed to sign a statement about the discovery of evidence. Lance wasn’t as skilled at hiding his anger as Morgan. Frankly, his disposition was more like the sheriff’s.

King dangled the Ziploc bag containing the bird pendant over his desk. “So you found this in the weeds where Chelsea’s car was left?”

“Yes. It was buried in the tall grass.” Morgan nodded solemnly.

Which was a nice way of saying his men blew it while simultaneously offering an excuse.

The sheriff grunted. Lance had no doubt he was irritated at his department being shown up, by a woman no less, but Morgan was so polite and professional and pleasant about the fuckup that King couldn’t get mad, at least not at her.

But his eyes telegraphed his mood. His deputies were going to suffer the blowback from Morgan’s discovery.

“We don’t know that it belongs to Chelsea Clark,” the sheriff said. “Her husband wasn’t very specific when he gave us a list of what she’d been wearing when she left the house. He said he only saw her for a couple of minutes, and he was preoccupied with the kids. He couldn’t even tell me what color her boots were.”

Morgan nodded. “Actually, I called Tim and asked him if Chelsea was wearing any jewelry Friday night. He said she has a silver bird pendant that she wore all the time. I messaged him a photo. He positively identified the necklace as belonging to his wife. He says he has snapshots of her wearing it. He’s looking for one now.”

King grunted. “Would have been nice if he’d mentioned it to me.”

“I’m sure he just forgot. That night was very stressful.” Morgan continued. “The hairs have roots attached and would therefore contain DNA. Are you going to have DNA tests run or would you prefer I send the hairs to a private lab?”

Hair shafts were composed of dead cells and did not contain DNA. Only the portion of a hair that was located below the skin was connected to the blood stream.

“I’ll do it.” The sheriff bit each word off like a piece of beef jerky.

“Do you have a sample of Chelsea’s DNA?” Morgan asked.

“Yes.” The sheriff nodded. “Her husband submitted it when he filled out the missing persons report.”

“Is there anything else we can do to help?” she offered.

“No.” The sheriff sighed. “You’ve done more than enough.”

Morgan rose and offered the sheriff her hand over his desk. King shook it gently and thanked her for her help. But all Lance got was a gruff nod that all but said Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.

Lance and Morgan exited the station. The storm had followed them and pounded the parking lot with heavy rain. The Jeep was parked just twenty-five feet away. Yet Lance’s hair and clothes got a fresh soaking as they raced for the vehicle.

Inside the vehicle, Morgan’s teeth chattered. “Where to next?”

He started the engine and then turned the heater on high.

Lance checked the time on the dashboard block. “Dry clothes are next. Then we regroup. Want to make a quick stop at your house?”

“No.” She held her hands out to the heat vents. “I have a change of clothes at the office.”

“We can update Sharp while we’re there. He’s going to want to know about the necklace. We’ve found the first real evidence that Chelsea was forcibly taken.”

“I almost wish we hadn’t.” Morgan’s voice was quiet.

“I know.” Because now they knew that Chelsea was either being held captive or dead.

The rain stopped as Lance drove to the office. He parked at the curb, and sun burst from the sky in biblical fashion. “Sharp’s not here.”

“I’ll grab my bag.” Morgan ran inside and emerged a minute later, garment bag in hand.

Lance had a two-bedroom house in town just six blocks from Sharp Investigations. They went in through the garage, passing piles of hockey equipment.

“How’s your team?” Morgan asked.

Lance had coached a team of at-risk youths when he was a patrol officer with the Scarlet Falls PD. He’d bonded with the teens and stayed on after he’d left the police force. “Their skills are improving, their self-control not so much. They could start winning if I could keep them out of the penalty box.”

They placed their shoes on the heating vent in the laundry room to dry. Hooking the top of her garment bag over the doorknob, Morgan hung her coat on a peg and then stripped off her socks.

Lance stripped off his flannel shirt and tee. He tossed both into the washer.

“Oh.” Morgan was staring at his chest.

“Do you want a hanger for your clothes?”

And would you like me to help you take them off?

She turned to face him.

“You have man candy abs?” She grinned.

Heat rushed to Lance’s face. And elsewhere.

She stepped forward, her gaze roaming over his chest, her eyes hungry. With slow, deliberate motions, she unsnapped her pants and slipped out of them. Her sweater hung past her hips, but he could see the lace edges of her dark-gray panties. She held out her pants by a belt loop. “You offered to hang these up.”

Holy . . .

Lance’s breath caught in his throat. Her legs were slender and long enough to wrap—

You’re getting ahead of yourself. Be cool.

Right. He’d been waiting to put his hands, and other body parts, on her skin for months. There was nothing cool about his desire. He shifted his gaze to her face. There was nothing cool about the playful heat in her eyes either.

He took the pants. Without taking his eyes off hers, he grabbed a hanger from the bar over the washer, draped them over it, and hung them from the bar.

“You should get out of those wet pants.” She moved closer, her hand reaching for the snap of his cargo pants. He flinched at the brush of her fingers against his belly.

“Are you sure?” He grabbed her hand.

Her face turned serious. “Very. We’ve been clearheaded and logical about whatever this is between us for weeks. Where has that gotten us?”

“There’s nothing wrong with waiting for the right moment.”

She smiled. “The right moment is the one that’s happening right now. Life isn’t perfect. If we wait for all our ducks to be lined up, we’ll be waiting for a very long time. My little ducks are tough to herd.”