Friendly Fire by Lorhainne Eckhart Page B

have the man hours to continue unraveling what’s going on with him, but it doesn’t take a detective to figure out that man is hiding something. We’ll deal with him later.”
    Whatever passed between Jordy and Rose, Logan wasn’t privy to it. He knew what an angry woman looked like, though. Especially from his experience with his own mother and, to Logan, Rose was as close to the mothering type as one could get. Jordy just shook his head as if what Logan had said was the stupidest thing in the world.
    “What?” Logan asked.
    “Rose doesn’t get things wrong,” Jordy said, as if Logan should know better.
    Rose was standing straight, her face already taking on the look of a woman ready to scold him. She was holding back, maybe because of who he was. “Sheriff, I told you once already what that boy told me. I sat him down and had a long talk with him, so I’d consider very carefully why Brent doesn’t want us to know where he came from.”
    Logan didn’t know what to think. The different stories that Brent had relayed to Julia and Rose hadn’t been right, according to his file at the school. Logan needed to have his own chat with the man. Brent had always bothered him, and he knew he was still sitting at Julia’s cafe.
    “Okay, Jordy, tell you what: He’s supposed to be at Julia’s cafe, so I’m going over there to have a chat with him. Jordy, check on—”
    “Sheriff!” an older man called, waving from a desk behind Rose. “One of the volunteers found a girl’s sneaker on the Lost River Trail, about a mile from town.”
    Logan glanced to Jordy, who was still wearing the same scowl he always did.
    “There’re almost three hundred miles of trails out there,” the deputy said.
    “What would little Trinity be doing out there?” Rose asked. “That’s not like her at all. She may be mischievous, but that girl would never wander off.”
    “Who’s missing from town? Let’s find out,” Logan ordered, starting toward his office and lifting his jacket from the hook. “Who knows these trails, Jordy?”
    “Me,” Jordy said. “I know them well. There’re all kinds of cabins and hideaways throughout those hills. You could search for a month and not find them all.”
    “Well, we don’t have a month. If we don’t find that girl soon, she’s going to be in real trouble. I don’t plan on telling her mama that her daughter ain’t never coming home,” Logan said. That was exactly what he was afraid of. Trinity could be hidden anywhere, and it might be damn near impossible to find her. If they had her tracks and her lost shoe, though, they had a place to start. “Rose, get Clinton back here,” Logan said as he started for the door.
    “Well, where are you going?” Rose was right behind him.
    “I’m going after her. Jordy, you’re with me. Rose, have Clinton find out who’s missing in town. You get everyone accounted for.” Then he stopped, remembering Brent sitting at Julia’s cafe. He looked around the station, wishing he had more manpower than two deputies. They were stretched thin enough as it was. He gestured to a thin-haired older man who had come out of the back room, lugging a big carafe of coffee. “You,” he said, pointing to the man, who stopped in his tracks, staring at Logan with an expression that was both startled and worried. “Who are you?”
    Rose tapped his arm. “That’s my husband, Fred,” she said. The man nodded.
    “Fred, can you do something for me?” Logan asked.
    “Sure, Sheriff.”
    “I want you to go to Julia’s cafe. There’s a man there by the name of—”
    “Oh, you mean the new math teacher, Brent Maloney?” Fred interrupted.
    Logan glanced down at Rose. She shrugged, and Logan realized that whatever Rose knew, Fred most likely knew it, too. “Yes, Brent Maloney. I want you to go there, tell him I sent you, and stay there with him. You have a cell phone?”
    Fred reached into his jean pocket. “Right here, Sheriff, charged and ready.”
    “Rose,