their murders.
“I guess I don’t understand how these things work,” Lacy said. “But it doesn’t seem very smart to base a budget on the contributions of one person. What if Henry had suddenly decided to stop sending checks?”
“Henry’s contributions were significant, but they weren’t all our budget,” Brenda said. “When I started here four years ago, we had a comfortable financial cushion that generated enough income for most of our operating expenses, but that’s gone now.” Her stomach hurt just thinking about it.
“Where did it go?” Lacy asked. But the pained expression on Brenda’s face must have told her the truth. “Jan!” She hopped off the desk. “She siphoned off the money to pay the blackmail!” She put her hand over her mouth, as if she wished she could take back the words. “I’m so sorry, Brenda.”
Brenda had learned only recently that before his death, Andy had been blackmailing her former boss, Eagle Mountain mayor Jan Selkirk, over her affair with Henry Hake. “It’s all right,” she said. “I can’t prove that’s what happened, but probably. But if that is what happened, I don’t know where the money went. I mean, yeah, Andy used some of it for the improvements on our house, and to buy some stuff, but not the tens of thousands of dollars we’re talking about.”
“Maybe Jan was giving the money to Henry, and his donations were his guilty conscience forcing him to pay you back,” Lacy said.
“That would fit this whole sick soap opera, wouldn’t it?” Brenda picked up a battered miner’s lantern and pretended to examine it.
Lacy rubbed Brenda’s shoulder. “None of this is your fault,” she said. “And you’re doing an amazing job keeping the museum going. These auction items should pull in a lot of money. Didn’t you tell me that book you found is worth a lot?”
The book. A shudder went through Brenda at the thought of the slim blue volume she had found while going through Andy’s things a few weeks ago. The Secret History of Rayford County, Colorado. What had at first appeared to be a run-of-the-mill self-published local history had turned out to be a rare account of a top-secret government program to produce biological weapons in the remote mountains of Colorado during World War II. Was that what had whoever left the threatening note so upset? Did they object to the government’s dirty secrets being aired—even though the operation had ended seventy years ago?
In any case, Brenda’s online research had revealed an avid group of collectors who were anxious to get their hands on the volume, and willing to pay for the privilege. Thus was born the idea of an auction to fund the museum—and her salary—for the immediate future.
“I still can’t imagine what Andy was doing with a book like that,” she said. “But I guess it’s obvious I didn’t know my husband as well as I thought.”
“Whyever he had it, I’m glad it’s going to help you now,” Lacy said.
The local paper had run an article about the fund-raiser, and listed the book among the many donations received. That must be where the letter writer had found out about it. Was it just some crank out to frighten her? Could she really take seriously a letter written on yellow stationery with cartoon flowers?
But could she really afford not to take it seriously? She needed to let someone else know about the threat—someone with the power to do something about it. “Can you do me a favor and watch the museum for a bit?” Brenda asked.
“Sure.” Lacy looked surprised. “What’s up?”
“I just have an errand I need to run.” She retrieved her purse from beneath the front counter and slung it over her shoulder. “It shouldn’t take more than an hour.” She’d have to ask the sheriff to keep the letter a secret from his fiancée, at least for now. In fact, Brenda didn’t want anyone in town to know about it. She had been the focus of enough gossip since Andy’s murder. But she wasn’t stupid enough to try to deal with this by herself. She figured she could trust the Rayford County Sheriff’s Department to keep her secret and, she hoped, to help her.
* * *
DEPUTY DWIGHT PRENTICE would rather face down an irate motorist or break up a bar fight than deal with the stack of forms and reports in his inbox. But duty—and the occasional nagging from office manager Adelaide Kincaid—forced him to tackle the paperwork. That didn’t stop him from resenting the task that kept him behind his desk when Indian summer offered up one of the last shirtsleeve days of fall, the whole world outside bathed in a soft golden light that made the white LED glare of his office seem like a special kind of torture.
As he put the finishing touches on yet another report, he wished for an urgent call he would have to respond to—or at least some kind of distraction. So when the buzzer sounded that signaled the front door opening, he sat back in his chair and listened.
“I need to speak with Travis.”
The woman’s soft, familiar voice made Dwight slide back his chair, then glance at the window to his left to check that the persistent cowlick in his hair wasn’t standing up in back.
“Sheriff Walker is away at training.” Adelaide spoke in what Dwight thought of as her schoolmarm voice—very precise and a little chiding.
“Could I speak to one of the deputies, then?”
“What is this about?”
“I’d prefer to discuss that with the deputy.”
Dwight rose and hurried to head off Adelaide’s further attempts to determine the woman’s business at the sheriff’s department. The older woman was a first-class administrator, but also known as one of the biggest gossips in town.
“Hello, Brenda.” Dwight stepped into the small reception area and nodded to the pretty blonde in front of Adelaide’s desk. “Can I help you with something?”
“Mrs. Stenson wants to speak to a deputy,” Adelaide said.
“That would be me.” Dwight indicated the hallway he had just moved down. “Why don’t you come into my office?”
As he escorted her down the hall, Dwight checked her out, without being too obvious. Brenda had been a pretty girl when they knew each other in high school, but she had matured into a beautiful woman. She had cut a few inches off her hair recently and styled it in soft layers. The look was more sophisticated and suited her. He had noticed her smiling more lately, too. Maybe she was finally getting past the grief for her murdered husband.
She wasn’t smiling now, however. In his office, she took a seat in the chair Dwight indicated and he shut the door, then slid behind his desk. “You look upset,” he said. “What’s happened?”
In answer, she opened her purse, took out a bright yellow envelope, and slid it across the desk to him.
He looked down at the envelope. BRENDA was written across the front in bold black letters, all caps. “Before I open it, tell me your impression of what’s in it,” he said.
“I don’t know if it’s some kind of sick joke, or what,” she said, staring at the envelope as if it were a coiled snake. “But I think it might be a threat.” She knotted her hands on the edge of the desk. “My fingerprints are probably all over it. I wasn’t thinking...”
“That’s all right.” Dwight opened the top desk drawer and took out a pair of nitrile gloves and put them on. Then he turned the envelope over, lifted the flap and slid out the single sheet of folded paper.
The capital letters of the message on the paper were drawn with the same bold black marker as the writing on the envelope. BURN THAT BOOK OR YOU WILL DIE.
“What book?” he asked.
“I can’t be sure, but I think whoever wrote that note is referring to the rare book that’s part of the auction to raise funds for the museum. It’s an obscure, self-published volume purportedly giving an insider’s experiences with a top-secret project to manufacture biological weapons for use in World