How to Howl at the Moon (5 page)

Lance had a sixth sense about these sorts of things, and he was still feeling itchy about Timothy. Either the guy was trouble or he was
in
trouble. Hell, from what Lance had seen of Timothy Traynor, it could easily be both at the same time.

Mrs. Fitzgibbons’s voice on the other end of the phone line sounded alarmed. “Sheriff? What can I do for you? Is everything all right?”

“Fine, fine. Just a routine call. You’re renting out your Mad Creek cabin at the moment?”

“Well… yes. Yes, I am.”

“I just wanted to make sure you knew someone was staying there.”

“Well, of course I know.”

“Good. Would you mind giving me the name of your tenant?”

Lance waited, tapping the paper on his desk with the tip of his pen.

“I suppose…. You’re sure everything’s all right?”

“It’s fine, Mrs. Fitzgibbons. It’s just when we have a property like this that’s normally empty, we like to make sure we don’t get people taking advantage.”

“I see. Well, it isn’t empty
now
. I suspect it’ll be good for the place. His name’s Tim. Tim Weston. Very nice boy.”

Ah.

“Is he from this area?” Lance asked.

“No, I met him here. I mean, where we currently reside.” Mrs. Fitzgibbons was being coy and was starting to sound suspicious. Once more into the breach.

“I
see. Do you know if he has
plans to do anything with the propert
y
? Repairs? Clearing land?”

There was silence on the other end of the line. “I don’t know. He can do whatever he likes as far as I’m concerned.” There was a false note in her voice.

“Right. Well thank you for your time, Mrs. Fitzgibbons. I appreciate the info.”

Leesa came in with some bills that needed to be signed, and Lance’s deputy, Charlie Smith, came in to shoot the shit. Charlie was descended from bloodhounds. He was a gifted tracker and incredibly tenacious when trouble came down, but he wasn’t the brightest
pup in the lit
t
er
. When Lance was alone again, the itch inside was bigger and more irritating than ever. Timothy had lied about his name. Lance wasn’t exactly surprised. The question was: why? Lance couldn’t let it go. He hesitated, then picked up the phone and called Sam Miller
at
District
Headquarters
in
Fresno. Lance usually tried to keep dealings with Fresno as light as possible, preferring Mad Creek to stay off the radar. But they had resources he didn’t.

“I need a background check on a Tim Weston aka Timothy Traynor recently of Santa
Barbara.” Mrs. Fitzgibbons might have been coy, but her property deed was in the system along with her current address.

“Sure. What are you looking for?” Sam asked.

Lance told Sam about his suspicions, and Sam promised to run the check rig
ht away. Then Sam told him
more horror stories about the gang activity they’d seen in Fresno. It was a gateway to the California mountains and hearing about the increased activity there did nothing to soothe Lance’s nerves.

Even before he’d hu
ng up with Sam, Lance knew
he was prepared to go further to find out what Tim Weston was up to.

Much
further.

*                          *                         *

Tim coaxed Bessy up
the road that led from
downtown Mad Creek
to the cabin. He
’d had to run to Fresno for more supplies, and it had
first
rained
, then snowed,
all the way home
.
The
late season flurries
would no doubt be melted by noon tomorrow, but
it was still
awesome
.
T
he
road was steep
,
though,
and
Tim
knew one of these days
Bessy would peter out halfway up, the little engine that couldn’t.
Luckily she climbed gamely on, despite the white stuff on the road.

He’d bought another two dozen of the cheap
est plastic seed trays they had at the gardening center.
They’d have mold problems over the long-term, but they were good enough for his first season. And he’d hit Costco and loaded up on mac and cheese and canned tuna too. The prices were way better than anything at the small grocery store in Mad Creek.

Mad Creek. The place was starting to feel like home. He liked it. He’d lived in Southern California all his life, never been anywhere else. But despite the fact that most of his cultural references to the woods came from films like
Friday the 13th
and
In the Woods No One Can Hear You Being Disemboweled
he actually found the mountains quite peaceful. He loved the nip to the air that allowed him to wear his old canvas jacket. He liked that the air smelled of green and growing things rather than sun and sand. And he adored the weather. He was so used to 70
and sunny that any sort of weather at all was a rare treat. It had been mostly cloudy and cool since he’d arrived.
And now snow!
Heaven!

He liked everything about Mad Creek, except, maybe, for Sheriff Beaufort. Tim still couldn’t believe he’d stood up to the man the other day. But he’d been pushed far enough. After his dad, and then what’d happened with Marshall, he’d promised himself he wouldn’t be so gullible, wouldn’t be a pushover anymore. It was the only way he could live with himself. The sheriff might be way hot, but he was obviously the kind of dickhead who got off on power trips. He liked to throw his weight around. Well, he had no grounds to be on Linda’s property, and Tim didn’t have to put up with that. He wasn’t doing anything wrong.

Okay, maybe he was doing something a little wrong. Those rose hips had technically been the property of Roots of Life since Tim’s stupid employee contract gave the company full rights to
everything
he did or thought or shat while he’d worked there, even though he’d grafted those hybrids at home. But Marshall had already made enough money off Tim’s creations, and he didn’t even
know
about the rose hips.

Tim hoped.

Besides, he had no choice but to use them. Starting from scratch was one thing, but roses… roses took time and care and love. A lot of love.

It started
snowing harder
, and the window defroster was having a hell of a time keeping up. Like Tim, Bessy had never had to deal with this kind of weather. Maybe the
snow
wasn’t all that wonderful, not when you were outside in the stuff. Fortunately, he was almost home. He could see the light on the cabin porch now. He misjudged the swing into the driveway and the truck hit a massive pot hole and lurched jarringly downward. Tim hit the gas hard hoping to pull the truck out of the hole and, just as he did, he saw a black dog trotting down his driveway—right toward him. The truck lurched forward, Tim screamed, hit the brakes, and—

There was a thump on the front side of the car and then a doggy howl of pain.

Tim threw the truck into park, feeling like he was about to puke. “Oh, God, no. Please, no.”

He jumped out of the driver’s side and tore around the front of the truck. Lying there, in the
muck and snow
, was a black dog. It looked like some kind of large collie mix with long, shaggy black hair so thick the
melting snow
rolled right off it. He—definitely a he—was lying on his
right side in the mud, his mouth open and tongue lolling. He waved a feeble paw in the air.

“Oh, buddy!” Tim got down on his hands and knees, not caring about the
snow
and mud. He started to reach out for the dog and then realized the dog might bite. And who could blame him if he did? If someone hit Tim with a truck, he’d bite them too.

“Um…. You okay? Of course you’re not. Are you in pain? Is it your paw?” Tim’s hand hovered in mid-air, afraid to get closer.

The dog opened his eyes. He had blue eyes—brilliant blue. He gave Tim a pathetic look. He didn’t seem vicious.

Tim was nearly in tears. He tentatively put his hand on the dog’s head and gave him what he hoped with a soothing pet. “I’m so, so sorry! I tried to stop. Oh, you poor thing! I’ll get help, don’t worry.”

The dog started to get up, but Tim pushed him back down with a
splat.
“No! Don’t move. You could make it worse. Just stay there, okay? Please?”

This was horrible. Tim would never willingly hurt an animal, and he’d hit this one
with his truck
. True, he hadn’t been going very fast, but the truck had really bounced out of that hole as he floored it. God knows what kind of damage he’d done to the dog.

He encouraged the dog to stay down as he petted it with one hand while the other fished his cell phone from a pocket.

Oh, shit. He had no idea where to find a vet in the area. He decided to try 911.

“Hey, sorry to bother you, but I was hoping you could help me find a vet?” He sounded barely in control, his voice thick. “I just hit a dog with my car. Mad Creek. Um… I’m not sure. He’s conscious. And he’s looking at me. Well, glaring really.”

The dog was glaring, too. It looked pointedly at the
half-frozen
mud it was lying in and then shot doggy daggers at Tim. “Hang in there, buddy,” Tim cooed. “I’m getting help.”

The 911 operator was a dog lover, and she was all helpful and encouraging. “Don’t move him, sweetie. There is a 24-hour animal emergency line for Mad Creek, and I’ll connect you. Good luck! I hope he’
s
okay.”

The 24-hour animal emergency line for Mad Creek said they had an on-call vet and they
would send him right out. The woman on the phone asked if he wanted her to alert the police too.

Before Tim could answer, the black dog gave off a set of annoyed-sounding barks. He struggled to get up again.

“Shhh, puppy! I don’t know. Do you think I need to? Call the police? I didn’t mean to hit him.” Tim could just picture Sheriff Blowhard staring at him all disgusted because he’d hit a poor, defenseless dog. He’d probably cuff him and strip-search him before calling out the firing squad.

Strip-searched by Sheriff McHotty. Not really the time to be thinking about that.

The woman on the line must have heard the guilt and fear in Tim’s voice, because she tried to reassure him. “Of course you didn’t! Tell you what, let’s wait and see if Dr. McGurver thinks he needs to bother the police. Okay? He should be there soon.”

Tim gushed his thanks and put his phone away. With his hands and attention free, he got down on all fours to be closer to the dog. The dog seemed to relax too, and lay down flat in the mud, panting and lifting that one paw in the air with a whine. The
snow
on the dog’s thick coat
melted and
ran off in streams as Tim petted him gently, trying to see if he could find any blood or obvious injuries. He was a beautiful animal. He had a regal air about him. Tim would feel awful if he’d killed a creature like this. He could feel heat on his face and knew it was tears.

“Please be okay,” Tim whispered to the dog.

Right then it seemed like the only thing that mattered.

*                          *                         *

Lance was beginning to feel really bad about this. The concept had been simple
—pretend to be mildly hurt by Tim’s truck and get inside the house overnight on sympathy. He figured twenty-four hours max on the ‘inside’, and he’d be able to see once and for all what Timothy Traynor aka Tim Weston was really up to.

No, it wasn’t exactly above board. But the guy was hiding something, and Lance figured the higher good was protecting his community. Once he’d gotten the idea, it had been hard to
dislodge it. And anyway, he could always abort if things went wrong. Right? And no one would ever know he’d stooped so low.

But now, seeing the stricken look on the guy’s face, the tears that trembled on his lashes, the way he looked so miserable, sodden and cold in the
snow
, and the way he touched Lance’s pelt so gently, murmur
ing
apologies and promises so… so….

So ridiculously inane.

Damn! Who would have thought the guy would be such a pushover for a strange dog?

Lance struggled to get up again. This time he was determined to show Tim he wasn’t seriously hurt. He couldn’t bear th
e guy’s guilt any longer
. If it meant Lance could forget being taken in for the night, so be it. This was just cruel.

The lights of a car pulled into the driveway. It was Bill McGurver. Damn it.

Bill jumped out of his vehicle and came running. Lance was still in the mud, pinned by the glare of the old truck’s headlights. He raised his paw and gave a weak whine as Bill dropped to his knees.