Читать книгу Avalanche Of Trouble онлайн | страница 18

“Any enemies, threats, anything like that?” Travis asked.

“She says no, and she thinks she would know. Sounds like she and the sister were close.”

“All right. Maybe we’ll turn up something when we have a chance to go over the evidence from the scene. And I’m going to talk to Ed Roberts.”

Gage thought of the old man who was as close as Eagle Mountain came to a hermit. He lived in an apartment above the hardware store, but spent most of his time working an old gold mining claim in the area. “Is his claim around here?” he asked.

“Behind this property.” Travis gestured toward the north.

“You think he might have seen or heard something?”

Travis’s expression grew more grim. “And he’s a registered sex offender.”

Gage stared. He knew the department received regular updates from the sex offender registry, but he didn’t remember Roberts’s name being on there. Maybe it dated from before his time with the department. Now he felt a little sick to his stomach. “Did he molest some kid or something?”

“He was convicted of exposing himself to women—flashing them. It happened years ago, in another state, but still...”

“Yeah,” Gage said. “Still worth questioning him.”

“In the meantime,” Travis said, “we’ll have someone up here overnight and we’ll start the search again at first light.”

“That little kid must be scared to death, out there in the dark by herself,” Gage said.

“At least if she’s scared, it means she’s still alive,” Travis said. He clapped his brother on the shoulder. “Go home. Try to get some rest. Pray that in the morning we get lucky.”

“I’m going to find a place for Maya to stay. I’ll probably pick her up in the morning and bring her up here with me. She’s the person the kid is most liable to run to on sight.”

“Good idea.”

Maya sat hunched in the front seat, hugging herself. “I should have started the engine so you could get warm,” he said, turning the key in the ignition. “Even in summer, it can get chilly up here at night.”

“I keep thinking about Casey, cold and alone out there in the dark,” she said.