Page 62 of Capture the Moment

“His hands,” Tim said in a flat voice.

“They weren’t calloused. What ranger doesn’t have calloused hands?”

Tim frowned. “Coop, now you’re worrying me. Is the Emma Dilemma keeping you up at night?”

Kate piped up. “What’s Emma Dilemma?”

The bedroom door opened and Maisie’s head popped out. “Emma is Coop’s old girlfriend.”

“Maisie!” Tim swiveled to bark at her. “Quit eavesdropping and go to bed.”

The door quietly closed.

Tim turned to Kate. “Emma is Coop’s former girlfriend and now his boss. She caused him a great deal of heartache. Still does.”

“Hey!” Coop said, frowning at Tim. “Can we get back to the more serious issue here? I think you need to follow up with Sally. Just to rule her out.”

“There’s nothing to rule out.”

“I hope you’re right. It’s just ... she seems kind of...”

“Kind of what?” Tim said, annoyed.

“Different. More authoritative than I remember from last year. A little dictatorial.”

“She wasn’t the acting chief director last summer. Just a district ranger, like me. There’s a lot on her plate this year.”

“Maybe. But could you at least just find out where Sally was earlier tonight?”

Tim let out a huff. “I don’t need to. I know she couldn’t have been involved in this.”

Coop raised his palms in the air. “How do you know?”

Tim rose to stand tall, hands on his hips. “Because if Sally Janus had fired a shot, she wouldn’t have missed. She’s a sharpshooter. Best I’ve ever seen, bar none.”

After Coop and Zoo Girl left, Tim sat at the kitchen table, troubled. He refused to believe that Sally could be mixed up with anything illegal. No way. Not Sally. He’d never known another ranger who took her job more seriously. She acted like she was guardian of the park.

Coop was right about one thing—Sally was acting strangely lately. And who was this Yellowstone ranger on loan? Tim vaguely recalled that Maisie had said something about a tall ranger. Something about bumping into Sally and a Yellowstone ranger on the bicycle.

But Yellowstone didn’t have surplus rangers to loan out. Even if there was a ranger on loan, Sally would’ve looped him in. Introduced him.

But that picture was hard to ignore. Granted, the two figures were fuzzy and distant, but as soon as Coop spoke Sally’s name, Tim could see the resemblance.

He rubbed his forehead. Probably just a coincidence. He was 100 percent positive that Sally Janus would never be involved in something illegal.

As Tim got ready for bed, he couldn’t shake the feeling that trouble was brewing. There were two incidents now of gunshots in areas that were off-limits to the public. That was an enormous concern.

As he lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, his mind kept wandering back to Sally. To how often she spoke of money worries. Quite a lot. He remembered a time when she had asked him how he had prepared for retirement. “Little by little,” he said.“From my very first paycheck, I’ve set money aside. Time plus money can work wonders.”

A troubled look came over her. “The problem,” she had said, “is when you’ve run out of time.”

Tim heard the hoot of an owl, then another answer back. He rolled over to his side and punched his pillow a couple of times.

He was 99 percent sure Sally would never do something illegal.

Maybe 90 percent sure.

As Kate and Coop drove back to Oxbow Bend, the night air held a chill that seeped through the truck’s windows. Kate, feeling a mix of relief and apprehension after the evening’s events, turned to Coop. “Do most poachers get caught?”

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