Killer View by Ridley Pearson Read Free Book Online Page A

liberal.”
    “What if you just set him on fire?” she asked.
    He barked a laugh and then hid his smile behind his hand. “A reasonable reaction, I think.”
    “Or, better yet, just leave him. Do nothing.”
    “You think like a cop,” he said.
    “He’ll freeze his butt off out here with no one to preach to.”
    “I think I’ll take your advice,” he said, squeezing her arm—a nice, firm arm. He headed for his office.
    Nancy offered him a grim look. “Nothing on Mark,” she said.
    “Cell phone?”
    “Not answering.”
    “Work?”
    “They don’t open until ten. I tried the emergency number, but the woman who answered hadn’t heard from him. She reminded me— unnecessarily—how close he was to Randy. She said he may have just shuttered himself in for the morning.”
    “I doubt that.”
    Despite the mountain of paperwork, Walt had to admit that he loved his office. It gave him an excuse to shut the door and lock the world out. Yet these days, thanks to Gail, he would catch himself behind his desk, staring into space, ten minutes lost to the black hole.
    “What about the Runaway Bride?”
    “Bridesmaid,” Nancy corrected. Her sense of humor stopped when she occupied that chair. “Her name is Kira Tulivich. No, still no word.”
    He’d made up his mind. “I’m going over to Mark’s,” he said.
    “I’ve called,” she reminded. “We could send a cruiser by, if you’d rather.”
    “No, I’m doing it myself.” Before he left, he gave Nancy his wish list: he wanted more on Kira Tulivich, all her friends, boyfriends, and fellow bridesmaids; he wanted to know why the ERC had not yet provided the caller ID for the Search and Rescue call that had sent them up Galena in the first place; and he wanted photos from Fiona of the tire tracks.
    “Got those,” Nancy said. “She just dropped them by.” She handed Walt a manila envelope, and he double-checked the contents.
    “If you get a minute, call the Barkin’ Basement and see if they have a kid’s winter coat, Nikki’s size. Zipper, not snaps.”
    HE DROVE the four miles north to the Starweather subdivision, marveling at the beauty of a fresh snowfall sparkling in the sunlight. A sky of perfect blue. Sugarcoated evergreens bowing to gravity.
    Highway 75 ran north-south, bisecting the twenty-mile-long valley. It was the only road that connected the three main towns: Bellevue, Hailey, and Ketchum/Sun Valley. For most of the drive, the south faces of the mountains were without trees. Covered in a fresh snowfall, they looked like giant marshmallows, forming a V with Sun Valley near the tip that pointed north. Dozens of smaller roads, all hosting million-dollar homes, led east or west off the spine of Highway 75.
    He drove his department-issue Cherokee down a small hill into a forest of aspen trees. Starweather formed a large oval through the woods.
    Aker’s driveway hadn’t been plowed. Snow slipped down into Walt’s boots and melted around his ankles, as he headed from the Cherokee. The multiple tire tracks he followed suggested vehicles coming and going at a very early hour. When Walt had arrived home just after two A.M., the snowfall had still been steady. The tracks he was following had been left somewhere before three A.M., when the storm had stopped completely.
    The driveway curved to reveal a modest one-and-a-half-story log home with a river-rock chimney. About an acre of trees had been cleared around the house, and Walt knew from many summer evenings spent on the back deck that it overlooked a small lawn, leading to the edge of the Big Wood River.
    A magpie floated overhead on fixed wings, landed between Walt and the house, and then took off again. No motion in any of the windows. A pair of spotlights, on the corner of the roof nearest the garage, left on. Another light glowed by the front door. Combined with the lack of any interior lights, Walt didn’t like the look of the place. It was possible, of course, that a grieving Mark Aker had