Shadows by Ilsa J. Bick

after they brought him back, and they were clean.”
    “Snow probably did that,” Nathan said.
    “Maybe. But then there’s the thing about Alex pitching the shotgun. Why would she do that? Does that make sense? She goes to all this trouble to get two guns; she’s got a good rifle and the shotgun, and then she throws one away ?” She saw the sudden narrowing of Yeager’s eyes as he digested this.
    “She panicked,” Nathan offered, but even to Lena it sounded feeble.
    “So you say.” Yeager evidently heard the same thing, because he jerked his head at one of the other guards, who nodded and slid out of the front room, heading for the door. “I presume you won’t mind if we have a look at this shotgun.”
    “No,” Nathan said, but Lena thought there was nothing else he could say.
    “I don’t understand this.” Chris looked dazed. The imprint of his grandfather’s hand was a purple stencil on his cheek. “Why would Nathan . . .”
    “It couldn’t just be Nathan. It had to be both of them, together, Jess and Nathan,” Lena said. “Because that case—the black one that was so important to Alex? It’s in Jess’s room, on the same shelf.” Chris’s mouth unhinged. “Alex left it behind? She’d never do that.” 
    “But it’s there. I can show you.”
    “I think,” Yeager said, “that this is something we’d all like to see.”

17
    The shotgun’s stock told its story well enough. Chris’s eyes panned from the weapon the guard had retrieved from Nathan’s rooms to that black padded case and back again. The Remington’s stock was crusted with dried blood in which hair, gray and black, was easily visible, preserved like insects in amber.
    Unzipping the case, Chris folded back the top, but he already knew from the weight that the two sturdy bags, filled with gray ash, were still there. Alex would never leave them behind . He feathered the air over the case’s contents, unwilling to touch them. These belonged to Alex, and her parents deserved respect. Handling them more than necessary was like walking over their graves.
    “I don’t believe it.” Weller, who’d retrieved the case from Jess’s room, stared down, wide-eyed. “It was them ? Jess and Nathan?”
    “So it appears. Please,” Yeager said to Nathan, “tell us you have an explanation.”
    “ I’ll explain it,” Weller broke in, and rounded on the other guard. “You son of a bitch, you were in on it. Either you hit Chris and Jess both, or she did Chris and then you did her to make your story stick.”
    “But why?” Tori asked. She and Sarah stood with their arms around one another, as if holding each other up.
    “I know why,” Chris said, grimly. “I came back too early. I was supposed to meet up with Peter, but I decided to ride straight through. At the checkpoint, one of the guards mentioned he’d seen Alex on Kincaid’s horse, and so I knew something was wrong, and then . . .” His fists bunched in frustration. “I just don’t remember. I can see Alex on the horse, and then it’s this blank stretch until I woke up here.”
    “You don’t need to remember. I’ll tell you how it went down. You ruined their plans, and then they had to improvise.” Weller threw Nathan a murderous look. “Nice touch, doing Jess. I’ll just bet you guys were sweating bullets, worrying Chris would remember what happened. What I want to know is what else you’ve done. You had to intercept the runner, Lang. He was the only one who knew where we were and what route we were going to take to get back to Rule. You must have had guys waiting and then tipped off those bounty hunters. You son of a—”
    Uncoiling, Weller slammed his fist in a solid uppercut. Nathan’s head snapped back on the stalk of his neck, blood fanned in a fine mist, and then Weller drove the bony ridge of his forehead into Nathan’s face.
    “Weller!” Kincaid shouted. “Weller, stop!”
    No, don’t stop . Chris was gritting his teeth so hard the