The Deputy's Lost and Found Read Online Free PDF Page A

someone to do everything they could to help you.”
    Bridget rubbed his forearm with understanding. “I always thought you were too soft-hearted for this job,” she said gently.
    A dry smile curved his lips as he opened his eyes and looked down at her. “Hell, other than Grandma, you’re probably the only one in the family who thinks I have a heart.”
    Her soft laugh was full of affection. “That’s because they don’t know you like we do.”
    Were his sister and grandmother the only ones who realized he was more than a lawman, covering his heart with a bullet proof vest? How did Lass see him?
    Forget that last question, Brady. How Gray Eyes sees you is irrelevant. She’s just a part of your job. Nothing more. Nothing less.
     
    The next morning, Brady and Hank and two other deputies returned to the mountain road near Picacho to search the area for clues. Thankfully, the day was bright and no rain had fallen during the night to wash away evidence. But unfortunately, they found nothing, excepta crumpled betting ticket from Ruidoso Downs Racetrack. The twenty-dollar bet, found lying against a clump of sage, about a hundred yards down the road from Lass, had been for a trifecta on the fifth race of yesterday’s card. After a quick call to the track, Brady had learned that the ticket was worthless, so there was no other record of it.
    But the money, or lack of it, was inconsequential at the moment, Brady figured. The main question was why the ticket was here on this back road where there was nothing but wilderness? Had a group of party-goers from the track driven out here just to find an isolated place to whoop it up? Teenagers might do something that foolish. But teenagers couldn’t wager. And Lass wasn’t a teen.
    None of it made sense to Brady or his partner as they exchanged speculations.
    “Maybe Lass was at the track yesterday and the ticket fell out of her pocket when she whammed her head,” Hank said as the two men stood in the middle of the quiet dirt road.
    “Or when someone whammed it for her,” Brady said grimly. “We’ll post a few pictures of her at the track. We might get lucky and one of the clerks working the betting cages will recognize her.”
    Last night, after Brady and Hank had left the hospital, they’d driven the thirty-mile trip to their headquarters in Carrizozo to finish the remainder of their shift. Before he’d gone home, Brady had looked through as many missing cases that could possibly be tied to the area and he’d come up with nothing that matched Lass’s description. No calls had come in to the sheriff’s office reporting anyone missing. Nor had there been any calls for domestic disputes, robberies or assaults. Other than the incident with Lass, the only thing that had gone on was a few public intoxication and DUI arrests. Like Hank had said, last night had been as quiet as a sleeping cat.
    This morning, after a lengthy meeting, Sheriff Hamilton had turned the entire case over to Brady and now as he scanned the rough terrain beyond the smoky lens of his sunglasses, he was feeling a heavy weight on his shoulders. For years now, Ethan Hamilton had been his mentor, even his hero. He never wanted to let the man down. Yet incredibly, it was Lass and her pleading face that was weighing on him the most.
    Hank’s voice suddenly interrupted Brady’s deep thoughts. “It’s too bad we couldn’t have found her in the daylight. We might have been able to pick up on more footprints. Looks like most of them were blown away with last night’s wind.”
    “No one ever said our job was supposed to be easy,” Brady replied as he continued to study the area around them.
    The trees and vegetation weren’t exactly thick, but there was enough juniper and pine for a person to hide or get lost in. Not that either scenario applied to Lass, he thought. But his gut feeling kept telling him that she’d come out of the mountains and then ended up at the road’s edge, rather than the other way