There hadn’t been one.
“I don’t understand. Daniel … what is he saying.”
Except she was catching on. Even without looking at whatever the sheriff had put in that folder, she was coming to understand the truth—her heart was just having trouble getting on board with what her brain was evolving to.
“I called,” she said insistently, looking back and forth between him and Eastwind. “I spoke to the apartment building and they told me they loved the work you did—”
“Who exactly did you talk to?” the sheriff asked. “Because I also called the numbers and every one of them gave him a glowing report. But then I checked the websites and the numbers listed were different. And when I sent a friend of mine to some of the addresses? Sure, they were apartment buildings and schools—just with other names. And none of them had ever had a Daniel Joseph working for them.”
Lydia stared down at the folder. And then her eyes returned. “Daniel?”
With a grim stride, he walked forward, and he met her stare the whole time. Because he deserved every bit of the disbelief and dawning anger that was coming over her face.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“So he’s right?” She opened the folder, but didn’t look at the report. “You lied to me?”
Daniel narrowed his eyes at the sheriff. “I was leaving this morning.”
“You’re still here,” the man said. “So you’ll excuse me for not believing—”
“Why.” As Lydia spoke up, she stepped into Daniel’s path, blocking his way out. “Why did you come to the Project in the first place.”
“I never intended to hurt you—”
“Why are you really here? It clearly wasn’t about a job for a drifter.”
“I protected you. Back at that deer stand. With the locator—”
“That is not an answer to my question.” She put up her hand. “Actually, don’t bother. I’m not going to believe anything you say and you are not going to tell me the truth, anyway. Are you.”
“Lydia—”
“Get out of my house.” She moved aside, so that she stood next to the sheriff. “And I will say this in front of law enforcement, I don’t want to ever see you again. If you come anywhere near me, I will protect myself in any way I have to and to hell with the legal consequences.”
“You won’t see me again,” he told her.
“Good.”
Daniel left out of the front door. And after he walked over to his Harley, he off-shoulder’d his saddlebags and made quick work of strapping them on the back of the bike.
This was not how he’d pictured going out.
Then again, he did feel like he’d been shot in the chest—and he’d always seen that kind of injury in his future.
It had just been literally, of course. Not because he was leaving a woman.
LYDIA REMAINED STANDING as long as Daniel was on the property. But the instant his bike disappeared down her driveway, she weaved on her feet.
“Here, you should sit.”
Eastwind took her over to the couch just as her knees went out from under her. With a wave of dizziness making her eyesight fuzzy, the folder fell from her hand, and as the three or four pieces of paper flew across the rug, he chased after them.
“You want some water?” the sheriff asked as he put the sheets back where they’d been and laid the folder aside.
“No.” Actually, she was pretty sure she was going to throw up. “I’m fine.”
As she went to push her hair back—which was still damp from the shower she’d taken with Daniel—her hands shook so badly they were a blur.
But she was not tearing up.
No, she was not doing that.
She would not give him any more weakness. She’d already let him have way too much of that.
“I am a fool,” she mumbled.
“No.” The sheriff sat down next to her. “You are not that.”
Well, there was no reason to debate the point. Besides, she didn’t really care about the why’s of it all—
No, that wasn’t right. There was one “why” she was very interested in, but she wasn’t going to go into it with Eastwind.
“Ah …” She cleared her throat. “Have you found Peter? And please, let’s not have the whole ongoing-investigation thing, okay? I don’t have the energy for that right now.”
Eastwind shook his head, and, thank God, didn’t beat around the bush. “We haven’t found him, no. We’ve reached out to his known relatives. They haven’t heard from him in months. There’s nothing on social media—and his cell phone was in the house. The last time he used it was the night before you called me, when you were stalked to that deer stand. After that … nothing.”
She stared across the room without seeing a damn thing. “I don’t know if the Wolf Study Project is going to survive this.”
“It will. And you’re going to keep working there.”
She looked him square in the eye. “At this point, fifty percent of us are dead.”