couldn’t help but stare at him. He towered over her, his massive shoulders stretching taut against his Western shirt, his green eyes a surprise with his dark coloring and black hair.
She sized up his other features—a chiseled jaw, a crooked nose that had probably been broken and a cleft in his chin. By themselves his features didn’t stand out, but the combination made him look tough, rugged, a man not to be messed with.
But that silver star of Texas shining on his shirt reminded her that he was here on business.
Amanda never mixed business with pleasure.
She’d worked too hard to overcome the stigma of being a female in a man’s world and couldn’t backtrack by getting involved with a coworker.
No one would respect her then.
“I think we’d better start over,” Sgt. Thorpe said. “You said that another woman has gone missing?”
Amanda nodded. “Kelly Lambert. She didn’t make it home last night and her father and fiancé haven’t heard from her.”
“So it’s been less than twenty-four hours,” Justin said. “Too early to file a report.”
Amanda shrugged. “Actually it has been over twenty-four hours. They haven’t heard from her since early yesterday morning. She’s been planning her wedding, and she never made it to her bridal shower this afternoon. A shower she was supposedly excited about.”
“Maybe she got cold feet and ran off.”
“It’s possible, but I didn’t get the impression that she was that kind of girl from her father and the groom-to-be.” Amanda folded her arms. “Wait a minute. If you didn’t know about Kelly, why are you here?”
The Ranger’s mouth twitched. “Because the body of a young woman was discovered in Camden Creek earlier.”
Amanda’s chest started to ache. “You think it’s Kelly?”
Suddenly a choked sound echoed from behind her, and Amanda spun around to see Mr. Lambert and Kelly’s fiancé standing at the doorway.
“You found her?” Mr. Lambert asked in a broken voice.
Kelly’s fiancé, Raymond Fisher, paled. “Please, God, no...”
Amanda tensed and glanced at Sergeant Thorpe. “Mr. Lambert, Mr. Fisher, this is Sergeant Thorpe with the Texas Rangers. Sergeant Thorpe?”
Justin motioned with his hands as if to calm the panic in the men’s eyes. “We haven’t identified the young woman yet, but it’s not Kelly. The ME thinks this woman has been dead a couple of months.”
Relief mingled with horror on the father’s face. “But you think this woman’s death is related to Kelly’s disappearance?”
The fiancé stumbled forward and sank into a wooden chair near the desk. He leaned his head on his hands, a sob escaping. “You think she’s dead, don’t you?”
Amanda’s mind raced to the missing-persons file on her desk. Carly Edgewater and Tina Grimes were recent names on the list. It could be one of them.
But compassion for the fiancé and Kelly’s father forced her to keep her thoughts to herself. She was a professional. Her job was to find answers.
She also needed to keep these men calm. If Kelly had been abducted, they might know something to help track down the kidnapper.
“It’s too early to tell that,” Amanda said as she patted Fisher’s shoulder. “Right now all we know is that Kelly didn’t show up for her bridal shower and hasn’t contacted you. Maybe Sergeant Thorpe is right and Kelly just needed some time alone. She could have ducked out to think things over before the wedding.”
“No,” Fisher said with a firm shake of his head. “Kelly wouldn’t run out on me. She loved me, and I loved her. She was excited about the wedding.”
“He’s right,” Lambert said. “Kelly wasn’t the kind of girl to run out on anyone. She was dependable, smart, had a good head on her shoulders.” He fumbled with his phone and angled it toward Amanda. “Even if she did want some time, she would have told one of us. I’ve called her at least fifty times in the last few hours, and she hasn’t answered or returned my calls.”
“I’ve called her, too,” Fisher said, pulling out his phone. “I’ve sent dozens of texts, too, but she hasn’t responded. I even drove by her place, but her car wasn’t there and neither was she.”
“What kind of car does she drive?” Amanda asked.
“A red Toyota.”
“Do you know the license plate?”
He jotted it on a sticky note from her desk.
Sergeant Thorpe exhaled. “I understand your concern,” he said in a gruff voice. “Sheriff Blair and I will do everything we can to find your daughter.”
Amanda’s lungs squeezed for air as she stepped aside to call her deputy, Joe Morgan. She quickly explained the situation.
“Drive around and see if you can find Kelly’s car. She drives a red Toyota.” She gave him the license plate and hung up. Maybe if they located Kelly’s car, they’d find a clue as to what had happened to her.
She just hoped they found her alive.
* * *
JUSTIN CONSIDERED THE circumstances and knew he had to remain objective and treat this woman’s disappearance like he would any other case. To assume Kelly had been abducted by the same person who’d killed the woman in the creek—and possibly a half dozen others who still hadn’t been located—was too presumptuous.
Making assumptions was dangerous. It could lead him to miss important details and send him on a wild goose chase.
After all, it was possible that Kelly’s fiancé was lying. He and Kelly could have had a major blow-up and she could have run off. She might need time to compose herself before contacting her father. Or hell, she might be off planning some sort of surprise for her fiancé.
But his gut instincts told him they were dealing with a serial criminal who’d been kidnapping female victims for nearly a decade and would continue until he was stopped.
But he wouldn’t be doing his job if he didn’t explore every option. With the publicity surrounding the ongoing missing-persons case, someone could use the disappearances as a smoke screen to cover up a more personal murder.
Like a fiancé getting rid of his girlfriend if she decided to call off the wedding...
“Sheriff, why don’t you take Mr. Lambert back for coffee while I talk to Mr. Fisher for a few minutes?”
Amanda’s gaze met his, questions looming, but separating victims or suspects was customary, so she nodded.
“Come on, Mr. Lambert. I’ll start the paperwork for the missing-persons report.” She glanced at Justin and Fisher. “Would you guys like coffee?”
Fisher shook his head no. “I don’t think my stomach could handle it right now.”
“Coffee would be good,” Justin said. “Black.”
Her brows rose a second as if to say that she wasn’t his maid, and his mouth quirked. After all, she had offered.
She led Lambert back through the door to the back and returned a moment later with a bottle of water for Fisher and a cup of coffee for him.
“Thanks,” he said with a small smile.
A zing of something like attraction hit him when her hand brushed his as she gave him the mug. Her mouth twisted into a frown as if she’d noticed it, too, and she jerked her hand away and rushed back to talk to Lambert.
Sweat trickled down Fisher’s forehead. Was he simply upset about Kelly’s disappearance