“Okay, good,” Levi said, clapping Cutter on the shoulder. “Now, don’t you feel better telling me the truth?” Cutter looked like he didn’t but nodded.
“Now what?” Cutter asked. “Can I go now?”
“Sorry,” Levi said, tossing the apple to the ground. “Now you get to tell me the whole story all over again. From the beginning.”
Josie heard the click of the car door opening and peeked up from her spot on the floor to see a deputy and her grandfather. “It’s safe to come out now. She’s gone.”
Josie didn’t want to get out of the car. The world outside was too hard, too painful. She turned her head away.
“Come on, now, Shoo,” he said wearily. “You’re too big for me to carry you. Get on up and walk.”
Josie had always thought of her grandfather as old, but at that moment, the man standing before her looked ancient. His skin was pulled tight against his skull and purple veins mapped his forehead. His eyes were red rimmed and the skin beneath deeply creviced.
Josie stepped from the car, looked around for any sign of Becky’s parents. “The sheriff took her away,” Matthew explained.
Josie’s eyes widened. “They took her to jail?” she asked in disbelief.
“No, no,” Matthew said, putting an arm around his granddaughter and leading her past the tent and toward the house. “They took her to a quiet place where they could talk. She’s pretty upset, Shoo. Their little girl is missing. Don’t be too hard on her.”
“But they think Ethan killed Mom and Dad and took Becky,” Josie cried, unable to stave back the tears.
“People don’t think straight when they’re scared,” Matthew explained. Josie leaned into his thin frame as they walked. “And you’re probably going to hear people say a lot of bad things about Ethan. They’re looking for someone to blame and Ethan’s that person right now. But we know better, don’t we? We know Ethan couldn’t hurt anyone, right?”
“Right,” Josie sniffled. But she wasn’t sure if she believed it. She saw the look on Ethan’s face after he fired the gun into the air. She heard the anger in his voice when he was arguing with her father. “They’re going to take Ethan to jail when they find him, aren’t they?”
“We don’t know anything for sure,” Matthew said. “We just have to be patient until all this gets sorted out. And whatever happens, we’ll be okay.”
Josie wanted to believe her grandfather.
Ignoring the spasms of pain in her arm, Josie ran across the yard to the barn, eager to see the goats. Once inside, she looked up at the rustic beams that ran the length of the ceiling like the ribs of a great, benevolent beast and breathed in the scent of the fresh straw her grandfather must have spread out for the goats in the feed bunks, several eight-foot long, three-foot deep trenches that ran down the center of the barn.
Out of the corner of her eye, Josie saw a figure step into the barn. At first, she thought it was her grandfather coming to collect her, but this person was too tall and broad shouldered, too sure-footed to be Matthew Ellis. As he came closer, Josie could see it was Randy Cutter, Brock’s father.
Randy didn’t seem to know that Josie was sitting just a few yards away from him. There was something cold, calculating in the expression on Randy Cutter’s face. Something that made her want to stay hidden, unseen even in her own barn.
Josie eyed the distance from the pen to the barn door. It wasn’t far, but with her injured arm, she wouldn’t be able to run very fast. She had no specific reason to be afraid of Randy, but she knew her parents didn’t like him.
Josie thought of Agent Santos’s question about whether her parents had any conflicts with anyone. Josie’s father wasn’t a great fan of Randy Cutter or his father, a blustering, red-faced man who was slowly gobbling up all the farmland that came for sale. He won’t stop until he gets a thousand acres, William observed.
But Randy Cutter hadn’t been able to get his hands on the farmland that William and Lynne Doyle had their hearts set on though he tried mightily.
The feud, if that was what you could call it, lasted for years and bled into their day-to-day lives. There were fences that William Doyle was sure Randy Cutter had damaged and calls to the sheriff about wayward cattle. And there was Ethan’s friendship with Randy’s son, Brock. That didn’t sit well with either family.
Randy stood in the center of the barn and slowly turned in a circle, his eyes scanning the great expanse. He shouldn’t be here, Josie thought. People didn’t just walk into another person’s barn. Not without permission. He continued his slow spin until he was facing Josie. Their eyes locked for a moment, and then he looked down as if embarrassed for getting caught.