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“I...don’t think so.”
“It would give us a chance to talk for an hour or two over something yummy out at Josie’s. I’ll buy.”
“No, I just...can’t.”
“Are you okay? Do you need me to bring you something?”
Worry slid through Sara as she quickly sorted through her suspicions about the various employees at the plant. Maybe Jane had seen things she shouldn’t. Maybe she’d been roped into the situation and was afraid. Either way, she could be in danger.
The other possibility—that Jane was knee-deep in the drug-shipping deal and glad of it—was one Sara didn’t want to consider. “Look, you don’t sound very good. I’m on my way over, okay?”
“No. Don’t do that—I’m fine. I’ve just got a head cold, nothing more. In fact, I’m on my way to bed for a long nap. Maybe we can get together after the holidays, okay?”
“Sure. After the holidays.” But by then I’ll be done here, and I’ll be gone.
* * * *
HE’D STARTED at seven in the morning doing traffic stops on speeders out by the high school. Given the slippery conditions and the tendency of the more inexperienced drivers to try going forty in a twenty-five zone no matter what the roads were like, Nathan had figured this would be the best use of his time.
By the time school started at eight, he’d nabbed four students and the French teacher, and had flashed his lights in warning at a dozen others.
After that, he’d left to follow up on two barking dog complaints, a cabin break-in on Blue Bell Lake, and one domestic call down at the trailer court.
He’d just started to head toward Bill’s for a sandwich and coffee when a quick burst of static broke the relative silence in his squad car.
“Six forty-five, this is six hundred.”
He lifted the mic and pressed the receiver button. “Ten-four.”
“Vehicle reported in a ditch on County 59 near Dry Creek Road. A black sedan. A woman driving by called it in on her cell.”
“Injuries?”
“Negative. She said she was giving the young man a lift into town.”
Not an emergency, then. “Did you run a twenty-eight?”
“Negative. The caller didn’t report the plate number. Her cell phone signal broke up, then we lost her.”
“I’m on my way.”
Executing a three-point turn, Nathan headed south of town. At the end of Dry Creek he took a left on County 63. Hilly, with a number of curves, the gravel road meandered through a few hundred acres of timber. Eventually it veered to the west and wound through thirty miles of lake country before intersecting with a highway leading to Interstate 94.
The only turnoff back here was an abandoned road leading up to a set of locked gates behind the Sanderson plant. Though Nathan had jurisdiction throughout the county, this was technically outside his contracted area. He didn’t come here more than a couple of times a month at most.
Apart from fishermen, hunters, and teenagers looking for a secluded site for a kegger, the road received little traffic.
Even now, drifting snow had nearly filled in the tire tracks carved through the thick blanket of white. So what was anyone doing back here?
Probably a lost tourist, Nathan decided when he found the black sedan at the base of the next hill.
The car had likely been going too fast when it topped the hill, then the driver had hit the brakes and slewed left and right in an attempt to correct the skid. Overcorrecting had sent the sedan nose-down in the ditch.
Turning on the mic at his shoulder, he called dispatch as he got out and approached the car.
“I’m down in a hollow, so my reception won’t be good. I need a twenty-eight on...” He nudged away the snow covering the license plate, then read off the number.
While he waited for the dispatcher to run the number, he checked inside. Empty, except for a pile of fast-food wrappers and cups on the floor and crumpled cigarette packages on the dash.
