The Rivals by Joan Johnston Read Free Book Online Page B

slowly and surely inserted the two sides of the zipper together and pulled it up to her chin. He tucked the stray hairs behind her ears, then leaned forward and gently brushed her lips with his.
    â€œIt was nice meeting you, Sarah Barndollar.”
    Sarah waited for him to say that he planned to pursue her, that he wasn’t going to let her get away. He didn’t say anything of the sort. He was letting her walk out of his life, exactly the way you’d expect a man to be glad to see the backside of a one-night stand.
    â€œGood-bye,” she said. She barely managed to keep herself from thanking him. For the pleasure. For making her feel beautiful. For making her feel like a desirable woman again.
    Sarah turned on her heel, yanked open the door and let herself out into the cold.
    Â 
    Libby paced the confines of her chinked log cabin wearing cowboy boots that echoed on the hardwood floor. She glanced at her watch, appalled to see it was 9:03, and still no word from Kate. She’d finally called the police around eight-thirty, feeling more and more frantic as she listened to the dispatcher’s calm demeanor as she wrote down answers to a seemingly endless list of questions she asked.
    Libby crossed back and forth past North, who sat on the saddle-brown leather couch, one booted foot crossed over the other, sipping a mug of coffee.
    â€œSit down and take a load off, Libby,” North said.
    Libby scowled at her brother. “If I want to worry, I’ll worry!”
    Libby stopped and listened. The Teton County Sheriff’s Office was dispatching someone to get a picture of Kate to send out over the Internet to nearby law enforcement offices and to ask more questions about her daughter’s disappearance. “Is that someone at the door?” she asked.
    â€œThe dogs would have heard if it was,” North replied.
    Libby realized he was right. Her two sleek redbone coonhounds lay on the braided rug in front of the roaring fire she’d built in the rock fireplace, following her with watchful eyes, their tails thumping each time she passed. Her twelve-year-old bluetick hound stayed on her heels as she paced.
    Libby turned to North and demanded, “Why would she do it? Kate knows better. Leaving school without permission, flying halfway across the country on a whim, not waiting for me to pick her up at the airport. She knows how dangerous it is to hitchhike!”
    The younger of the redbone hounds rose to its feet, stretched, and whined. Libby crossed to the dog, rubbed its smooth red shoulder, ran a hand over floppy ears that fell below the dog’s jaw, and said, “It’s all right, Snoopy. Lie down.”
    The dog hesitated, then settled back on its haunches. But his large brown eyes remained riveted on her.
    Libby’s gaze blurred with tears as she stared at the hound. Snoopy was a silly name for a hunting dog, but Kate had taken one look at the puppy, with its long ears and sorrowful eyes, and despite its all-over red color, said, “He reminds me of Charlie Brown’s Snoopy.” Snoopy he’d become. The last time Libby had gone hunting in the mountains, Snoopy had treed a snarling, full-grown mountain lion.
    Libby dropped onto her knees beside the bluetick hound, whose graying muzzle settled into her lap. She stroked the dog’s coarse, speckled black-and-white coat and said, “We’ll go looking for her, Magnum, I promise you, if she doesn’t show up soon.”
    A moment later, Libby was on her feet pacing again, railing against her absent daughter. “What was she doing in a bar in the first place? She’s not old enough to drink!”
    Libby had gone into town with Kate’s picture, showing it in every bar in Jackson, including the touristladen cowboy bars. She’d been to the Silver Dollar Bar at the historic Wort Hotel, with its two thousand silver dollars laminated into the bar, the Shady Lady at the Snow King Resort, the Million