Page 50 of Max's Mission

Swallowing hard, she tried again. “It’s—look.”

He frowned down at her for a moment before his gaze swung in the direction of her light.

She knew the moment he saw what she did. His eyes went wide and some of the color leached from his face.

Shining in the light from her phone, the hollowed eyes of a human skull stared back at them.

Max ran a hand down his face. “Fuck.”

Twenty

Headlights cut through the night, adding to the already illuminated scene at the farm. Max glanced toward the road to see a dark sedan come up the driveway. He assumed it was Agent Dye.

Once the shock of finding human remains wore off, he’d called the man, then the local police. The county sheriffs had been here for a couple of hours, roping things off and separating him from Margot so they could ask them questions.

She leaned against a cruiser twenty yards away, huddled into herself.

A wave of emotion washed over him, making his heart ache. He clenched his teeth. All he wanted to do was go to her and hold her.

The sedan rolled to a stop behind the cruiser. A moment later, the engine cut and the driver got out.

Agent Dye paused near the hood of his car, assessing the scene.

Max studied the agent.

He was young. Barely thirty, from the look of him. But intelligent. When they’d dealt with him earlier at the banksand at the jeweler’s, he asked great questions and quickly made connections between bits of information.

Dye’s gaze landed on Max.

The agent’s expression held no anger. Just a curiousness. Max wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing or not. On the one hand, it could be useful. It could make the man tenacious and determined to get justice. But it could put the Brigade’s investigation in jeopardy. Most of what they did was aboveboard, but there was a certain bit of gray area in which they operated. Agent Dye’s tenacity could force them out of things entirely. As much as Max wanted to be part of finding out what happened to Tad, he didn’t want to go to jail for obstruction, nor did he want to put Asher and the others in that position, either.

Dye’s attention shifted to the sergeant approaching. The two men spoke for a moment, then Dye followed him to the area behind the shed.

Max crossed his arms, continuing to study him.

The agent pulled a penlight from his coat and aimed it at the ground. Max watched him crouch, turn to speak to the crime scene technician nearby, then rise and put his light away. When he turned away, he headed toward Max, his strides determined.

Dye reached him, pausing several feet away. His light blue eyes studied Max.

Having perfected the art of nonchalance before this man was out of grade school, Max kept his arms crossed and stared right back.

Finally, Dye spoke. “What made you think it was a good idea to come out here?”

“Did you really expect us not to?”

A corner of the agent’s mouth twitched. “All right. Did you touch anything?”

“No. We walked around the house, then the barn and the shed. I noticed the greener prairie grass, and when we shined a light on it, we saw the skull. I called you, then the local police.”

“Do you know who it is?”

Max arched an eyebrow. “Why would I?”

Dye shrugged one shoulder. “You know a lot of other things about this investigation. Agent Gallagher mentioned he agreed to work with you and your ‘team.’” He made air quotes.

Annoyance tickled Max’s mind. “Perhaps you should drop the ‘I’m the agent’ attitude, then. Margot and I aren’t the bad guys.”

With a quick puff of air through his nostrils, Dye stuffed his hands in his pockets and glanced away briefly. “What has your team learned about the victim?”

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