“That’s bullshit, and you know it,” Tate snarled. “I’m not an amateur. If I shoot someone, it damn sure wouldn’t be an accident.”
“Are you saying you deliberately shot her?”
“Don’t be fucking stupid. I didn’t leave the house last night, and I wouldn’t attack a woman and kill her for her car. If I wanted to get out of town, Greer or Dustin would help me. Hell, even Cash would.”
The sheriff ran his hand over his bald head. “I’m going to take you in. Someone is running around town, killing people to make it look like you’re responsible.”
“If you take me in and the shootings stop, it’s going to make me look even guiltier. The shootings will stop, and they’ll get away while I’m locked up. That shit isn’t going to happen.”
“Tate, if you were in jail, that woman may still be alive.” Sutton bit her lip. Was she indirectly responsible for someone’s death because she had given him a place to hide?
“Maybe. Maybe not. We don’t know for sure. The two shootings could be connected, or I could just have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and he didn’t want to take the time to finish me off. Increase your deputies’ shifts and tell everyone in town to be careful,” Tate advised.
Knox nodded. “I think whoever is doing it has their own agenda, too. But if one more person gets hurt, I’m taking your ass in, and when I come to get you, I won’t be knocking on the fucking door.” He pointed a finger at her. “You don’t leave him alone at the house again.”
“I won’t,” she promised.
“I’ll try to find out if Lyle and Helen had anything in common. Hopefully, I can turn up something.”
“Thanks,” Tate said. Sutton could tell it was laced with reluctance.
Knox gave him a sharp nod.
After he left, she brushed past Tate, going to her bedroom.
“What bug crawled up your ass? I’m the one in trouble.” Tate leaned against the bedroom doorway, crossing his arms over his chest.
“If I didn’t give you a place to hide out, that woman may still be alive.”
“I doubt it. Whoever shot her must have known what time she was supposed to come home. They were waiting for her.”
“You think she knew her murderer?”
“Yes.”
Fear that someone was randomly killing the townspeople had Sutton thinking of packing up and returning to California.
“So, you think it was just a coincidence that I was in town when the shooting happened? Or do you think they could have seen me and decided to use the opportunity?”
“They would have to know I’m hiding out here. Do you remember who you saw at King’s? Did anyone leave after you got there?”
Sutton thought back to last night carefully. “No, I really didn’t pay any attention to who was there. Do you want me to call Cheryl and ask her?”
“No, she might get suspicious. Wait until she calls you. She loves to gossip. She’ll think you don’t know and will call. Then you can feel out if she noticed anything strange.”
“Okay.”
“Why do you still wear your wedding band?”
She stared at him stupidly at the sudden change in conversation. “None of your business.”
“Are you still in love with him?”
“God, no.” Sutton shuddered in disgust at the thought.
“Then why wear his ring?”
“To remind me of him.”
“That doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“It doesn’t have to. It does to me, and that’s all that matters.”
“Did you wake up on the bitchy side of the bed?”
“Yes. That happens when the cops wake me up, wanting to know if the fugitive I’m harboring killed someone else.”
“You know I didn’t kill Lyle or Helen Stevens.”
“Then go in and prove it the way any normal person would!” Sutton turned, scattering the neatly folded clothes out of her suitcase, searching for something cool to wear.
“Are you saying I’m not normal?”
“I don’t think ‘normal’ fits any of the Porter brothers,” she snapped.
The suitcase that was lying on two chairs pushed together fell to the floor, but she didn’t try to pick it back up. She grabbed a pair of crop pants and a T-shirt. Choosing her underwear, she then turned and nearly bumped into Tate.
“Why don’t you unpack your clothes?”
“Because I don’t know how long I’m staying. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to take a shower.”
“You wear your wedding ring to remember a bad marriage and don’t unpack even though you’ve been here a couple of weeks, and you think I’m the one who’s not normal?”
Sutton refused to engage in any further conversation with Tate. His sharp tongue always managed a snide comeback, and the more she tried to fight back, the more she unwittingly revealed. If he was determined to have the last word, he could have it.
She closed the bathroom door then took a leisurely shower, letting the water ease the stress of the sheriff’s visit and being closed in with Tate. If she didn’t get rid of him, there was going to be more than one killer loose in town.
Stepping out of the shower, she dried off then wound the towel around her body as she went to the sink to brush her teeth. She was rinsing the toothpaste out of her mouth when she gave a startled scream, seeing a man’s reflection in the mirror. The bathroom door burst open, and Tate came running in, carrying a rifle.
“What?”
Sutton only managed to point to the window where she now recognized Dustin. She spat out the remains of the toothpaste before furiously stomping to the window to raise it for the younger brother to climb in. When he was halfway in, Sutton lost it and began beating him on the back.
“Stop.” Tate put his hand around her waist, moving her away from the window so Dustin could climb in without further attack. “At least give him a chance to defend himself.”
Sutton jerked away from Tate’s touch. “I’m getting sick of being scared to death by someone coming by to see you. The next one who scares me, I’m going to shoot first and ask questions later.” She jerked the gun away from him before he could react then reached for her clothes.
Juggling the items, she stormed from the bathroom, going into her bedroom and slamming the door shut with her foot. Barely dried off, she tugged on the crop pants and top then dragged a brush through her wet hair and put it up in a ponytail. Then she sat down on the side of the bed and stared at the shotgun she had ripped out of Tate’s hands, and her blood ran cold.
It was his rifle, the one he had said the killer had taken from him. The distinctive scratches on the barrel showing how many women he had lain with were visible. The scratches all seemed old. Either Tate had grown out of the arrogant habit, or he hadn’t had sex in a long time. Sutton didn’t have to wonder which it was; Cheryl had confessed they had slept together as recently as a couple of weeks ago. She guessed women he fucked more than once didn’t deserve a new notch.
The sound of the brothers going into the kitchen had her curious enough to open the door and follow after them.
“Jo told Greer she had no idea why he was out in the woods. Since he wrecked his truck, he caught rides with anyone he could when he wanted to go out. She didn’t know who he had caught a ride with the night of his murder. He called her three hours before he was killed to tell her he was headed to Rosie’s.”
The bar was just a mile up the road from her house.
“Maybe no one gave him a ride home, and he started walking to town,” Sutton surmised.
“Jo said she got a call from him an hour before he was killed, but she was towing a truck, so she missed his call.”
“He was walking home, and he came up on the killer, or the killer used the opportunity to kill him,” Sutton thought out loud before moving to stand beside the front door, Tate’s rifle held seemingly casually in her hand. Keeping both brothers in her line of sight, she lifted the butt of the rifle to her shoulder, pointing it at Tate.
“What the fuck!” Dustin took a step forward.
“Dustin, stop.” Tate jerked him to a halt.
“Listen to your brother,” Sutton warned.
“I’m going to take that shotgun away from you and smack that ass.” Tate now took a step forward.
“Try me. You told me the killer took your gun, so how did Dustin have it?” Sutton pumped the handle, the distinctive noise bringing Tate to a sudden stop.
“I have more than one gun. I don’t carry that one anymore,” he explained, his brown eyes snapping in fury.
His answer explained why the notch marks seemed old and faded. She lowered the weapon.
“Do you mark the barrel of that gun when you get laid by a different woman?”
His silence had her wanting to shoot him.
“I should have known.” Her eyes went to Dustin. “Do you have the same disgusting habit?”
Dustin’s silence betrayed his guilt, too.
“Wow. I see you raised your brother to be a jackass, too.”
“It started out as a joke—”
“Keeping track of the women you sleep with isn’t funny; it’s disgusting.”
Sutton shoved the gun at him before she changed her mind and shot him.