Southern Sunset: Book One of 44 South Read online

  “Yes.”

  “Can I have a list of all those who are assigned them? And which RED number is theirs?”

  “Certainly,” he clipped. He was mad.

  I didn’t think he was mad at me, per se. Just mad that I’d had to ask.

  “But several of our vehicles are pool cars,” he added. “Any number of people could have access to them.”

  That complicated things.

  “Do they get signed out?”

  “No. We’re a working station. We try to avoid paperwork, if we can.”

  “So, where are they all kept?” I asked.

  “RED 1 through 5 are assigned permanently to the family and Charlie, our head foreman. The rest get swapped around and used when required. Those in the pool can be anywhere at any given time. But most remain at the main shed in section one until someone needs a car.”

  “Where’s section one?”

  “Around the homestead. The heart of Red Tussock.”

  That made sense.

  “Do you have a map of the station, with the sections outlined?”

  “Yes. I can get you one, if you’d like.”

  “Please.”

  “Maggie,” he said carefully. “Where is this going?”

  I assumed he meant the investigation. Which I couldn’t discuss. But when I looked at him, I wasn’t so sure anymore. There was something there. Some sort of hurt or worry. It looked entirely too personal, entirely too related to me.

  “What do you mean?” I hedged.

  He reached up and touched my hair, running a couple of strands through his fingers. Then his hand dropped and he sighed, staring out of the windshield.

  “I enjoyed last night,” he said.

  “So did I.” His smile was fleeting.

  “I intend to have you again,” he stated simply.

  “Perhaps now’s not the right time,” I felt obliged to point out.

  His head whipped around to face me, his eyes blazing with fury.

  “I can accept an investigation on my station,” he declared. “I can even accept someone targeting us for nefarious reasons. But I will not accept you walking away from me.”

  “You may not have a say.”

  He reached over, wrapped a hand around my nape, and pulled me against his chest. I could have fought him. I should have fought him. I went willingly.

  “You’re mine,” he husked, and then he was kissing me.

  I kissed him back, I’m not going to lie. I grasped his shoulders, opened my mouth, and devoured him with equal passion. When his hand slipped under my t-shirt and snaked up to my breast, I finally pulled back.

  It was daylight. Not dark on a deserted stretch of Red Tussock. The sun was shining. People were still cleaning the events centre, and at any moment the vet could arrive.

  I wasn’t so far gone for this man that I couldn’t think clearly. And, clearly, now was not the time.

  “I have to go,” I said. He hadn’t released my neck, and when he leaned forward, eyes closing, and rested his forehead against mine, I felt… torn. Unsure of myself. Wanting to comfort him, reassure him. Desperately reminding myself of what I was. Who he was. How wrong this was right now.

  “Tonight,” he said. I started shaking my head. He pulled back and looked down at me, a hard glint to his dark eyes. “I’ll get the information you requested and we’ll meet to discuss it,” he advised. “Tonight.”

  “We will?”

  “Yes,” he said, unrelenting. “I will see you again, Maggie.” I couldn’t argue with that. I was investigating two crimes now on his land. “All of you,” he added. His thumb started stroking the side of my neck. “Every delicious inch.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. Part of me wanted to adamantly refuse. I was in charge, damn it. Part of me wanted to beg he prove it. Right now.

  “Tonight,” he repeated.

  “Luke,” I said, gearing up to fire an argument back. Any argument would have sufficed, I wasn’t going to be picky. But I needed to remember what was at stake here. Not just a case, but my entire career.

  I didn’t trust an unstable Senior Sergeant Matt Drake not to take this further. Not to take this where he should.

  I was compromised, and I knew it. But when Luke stilled, his pupils dilating and his nostrils flaring, I didn’t make a sound.

  “Say that again,” he ordered.

  “Luke,” I immediately replied. As if his instruction alone was all I needed to comply.

  “Fuck, Maggie,” he rasped. And then he was kissing me. Again.

  Only this time, he hauled me over the centre console and onto his lap, pressing against my lower spine, making me feel his arousal. I stopped thinking. I stopped caring. Only his touch, his lips, his teeth as they scraped over soft flesh. His fingers as they roamed my body, slipping into the track pants, finding their target unerringly, all carried out with such predatory delight.

  I was panting. He was moaning. And, oh, to hear that uncontrolled sound as it left his lips. To feel the way he gripped me, leaving indentations on my thighs. To taste him. Feel wrapped up in him. To smell his skin, his aftershave, him. It drove me wild.

  And when his fingers found me wet and we both groaned out loud, I was sure I never wanted this moment to end.

  “Come for me, baby,” he purred in my ear. “Say my name.”

  I’d like to think I’m a self-reliant, independent woman. But with Luke Drake all around me and his hands on my body as if he owned it. And his rough, lust filled voice sounding out in my ear and the way he was touching me, stroking me, bringing me closer and closer to the edge. I combusted.

  I shouted his name as his fingers delved deep and his thumb rubbed softly against my clit. Shuddering in his arms, I let him bring me back down again afterwards. Realising, belatedly, that I actually had no say in the matter at all; it was an illusion to tell myself I allowed him anything.

  Luke Drake saw what he wanted and simply took it. And right then he wanted to softly bring me back to earth from a sky-rocketing climax, to draw out the moment, and make me imagine the next.

  “Tonight,” he said in my ear, then nibbled on it.

  I nodded my head. What else could I do? I was so far gone for this man, I already craved his touch.

  I was already imagining what he would demand of my body next.

  And I couldn’t wait for tonight to come.

  Chapter 20

  Everyone In Twizel’s Got A History

  Luke

  The phone hadn’t stopped ringing since I’d walked in here. It was ringing again now. I turned back to my desk and glared at it. Wondering which one of my nosy neighbours was on the line now.

  “Drake,” I growled into the mouthpiece.

  Sometimes Red Tussock wasn’t nearly as isolated as I’d have liked.

  “Heard you lost some stock,” Devon McIntyre’s voice sounded out down the line.

  “Wondered when you’d phone me,” I grumbled back.

  “One hundred head,” he whistled, ignoring my jibe. “That’s gotta hurt.”

  “We’ll manage.”

  “You always do, Luke. But I’d hardly be a good neighbour if I didn’t ask.”

  “And what exactly are you asking, Devon?”

  I could practically hear his smile down the line. Devon McIntyre was always smiling about something.

  “Was it 1080?” And there you have it. X marks the spot.

  We were practically slap bang in the middle of no-man’s land. A great, big, black cross over Red Tussock on the map. Beware all ye who enter here.

  I rubbed a hand over my face and sank into my chair.

  “Don’t know,” I said.

  Devon whistled low. “But you suspect.”

  I liked Devon. Really I did. Shearing season, he’d be the first to strip down to his bare chest and grab a ewe and a pair of clippers, then set the pace for every shearer to match. Hard working, hard living, I’d drunk my fair share of whiskies with the man. It didn’t help that I’d gone to sc
hool with him. Spent every spare minute with him over at Lake Ruataniwha chasing the girls in the camp. Every New Years at Tekapo staring up at the stars. Every summer holidays up Mount Cook, hiking.

  I considered him a close friend.

  But Craggy Range Station was almost as big as Red Tussock and bordered our land. If we had an uncontrolled amount of 1080 on our station, he’d cut his losses, burn us and not look back.

  “We’ve got it under control,” I said.

  “I don’t doubt that you have,” he said quickly. “Where was it found?”

  Well away from you, for now.

  “It’s not been confirmed. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

  “Just a friendly neighbourly chat, Luke,” he soothed. “Can’t I show concern for a good friend down on his luck?”

  “Who said anything about being down on his luck?”

  “Well,” he said, “there was that stock agent.”

  I scowled at the phone’s base unit sitting on my desk.

  “Down by the state highway, I heard,” he added.

  “You heard correct.”

  “Complete prick, but that doesn’t mean his death doesn’t affect us all. I was in Smokey’s that night, too, you know.”

  I hadn’t seen him. I’d been too angry with Whiting to take in anyone else inside the crowded bar.

  “Were you?” I said.

  “Saw it all,” he happily pointed out to me. Great. Just fucking great. “He had it coming, you know.”

  “What? Death?”

  “No, that argument. Bloody hell, mate. You really let him have it. I was so damn sure you were going to throw a punch.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Yeah, but he followed you outside. Not long after, in fact. I wouldn’t have been able to resist having a go at him out on the kerb.”

  “I didn’t see him,” I said, stunned to hear that Whiting had left the tavern so soon after me. Maggie had already cleared me with Mum’s and then Dad’s accounts of that night. I didn’t want to think what this new tidbit of information could mean for my alibi.

  “Yeah, he was staggering, so it wouldn’t have taken much for you to seek revenge.”

  “Jesus, McIntyre. What do you take me for? I left and went home.”

  “Is that what you told the cops?”

  “Why the twenty questions, Devon?” I demanded, rapidly rescinding his friendship status.

  “Just asking.”

  “No, you’re prying and you might be a nosy prick at times, but you don't normally pry like this.”

  Silence.

  “Rumours are spreading, Luke,” he said softly after a while. “All over town.”

  “Nothing strange about that. It’s Twizel.”

  A scuffling sound made it down the line, as if Devon was nervous; shifting in his seat, organising paper on his desk, anything to not say what was on his mind.

  “Spit it out,” I growled.

  “Luke,” he said, “don’t shoot the messenger.”

  “I won’t,” I promised, snapping a pencil in half with the force of my grip.

  “The Herald’s in town.”

  “The Timaru Herald,” I said, my lips suddenly numb.

  “Yeah, and if they’re here, then the Mail will be too.” The Oamaru Mail. “And once they get here, you can bet your arse the Otago Times won’t be far behind. This’ll be on national television by mid-week.”

  “Don’t you think you’re over exaggerating?” I felt obliged to say. “If they didn’t turn up for Whiting, why the hell would they be here for dead sheep?”

  “1080 sells papers. 1080 and death sell even more.”

  I huffed out a disgruntled breath.

  “Red Tussock’s on everyone’s lips,” Devon added. “And Matt’s not doing a thing about it.”

  “Jesus. This all happened this morning,” I complained aloud.

  “I saw the reporter for the Herald when I picked up some lunch at Smokey’s. She was interviewing Mad Eye.”

  “Tom won’t tell her anything. He’s not a gossip.”

  “Nah, but who said reporters ever cite their sources. She could make shit up and declare her source anonymous while standing outside the Smoking Salmon, making everyone think Moody tattled.”

  “Everyone outside of Twizel.” Mad Eye was as tight lipped as they came. I often wondered if he’d lost that hand and eye because he’d narked on someone and paid the price. Never to do so again.

  Everyone in Twizel’s got a history.

  “Just thought you should be prepared if you head into town,” Devon was saying. “Oh, and that new cop?”

  “What about her?” I asked, closing my eyes to my fate and resigning myself.

  “She was in Smokey’s too, listening to everything.”

  Fucking great. Maggie getting corrupted by big city know-it-alls.

  Fuck, who was I kidding? She used to be one. I could only hope she’d see through the reporter’s thin veneer to the harpy underneath.

  I wasn’t so certain the stockyards would, though. Red Tussock was heading for bleak times ahead. And to think, lambing was just around the corner.

  Lambing and therefore shearing season. Now, why did I think dirty wool would be on everyone’s lips. Dirty for more than one reason.

  I hung up the call with Devon and dialled Justin. The vineyard was also going to take a hit.

  Chapter 21

  And Art Is To Be Shared

  Maggie

  This was the busiest I’d seen Twizel get since I’d arrived here. I pushed through Smokey’s front door, shutting in the hubbub of late lunch diners, and stared off down the street. Mac and Annmarie were talking to a reporter. The same one I’d seen inside the tavern talking to Hook. The barman had breezed through the interrogation with the dazzling skills of an uninterested rhino. No matter how the pretty little woman from the Timaru Herald had put the questions to him, his answer had always been the same.

  “Nope. Didn’t see nothing.”

  I’d smiled into my orange juice and watched the reporter get more and more frustrated.

  Somehow I’d remained out of her sights, but Mac and Annmarie hadn’t been so lucky. I was tempted to stroll down the path and rescue them. At the very least, eavesdrop from a shop width away. But I couldn’t risk being associated with the public face of the case. Too many people, granted Red Tussock people, saw me leaving Luke’s bed just today.

  I looked across the street and took in the camera lens angles outside the souvenir shop. If the reporter was worth her salt, she’d head there next. I gave Mac and Annmarie one last look and crossed the road, dodging a quad bike, two dusty utes, and a horse sans rider. I shook my head, but didn’t stop to corral the lost beast. Pushing open the door to Alicia Parson’s shop, I was greeted with the unusual sight of a floating fish, as it made its way between the over stuffed displays, its caudal fin gently swaying in the still air.

  “Heads up, Sergeant!” Alicia said from behind the counter. “Almost caught yourself a salmon.”

  The fish ‘swam’ off towards the front window of the shop and just hung there, suspended in mid-air, big bulbous eyes watching the busy-for-Twizel street.

  “Got a new friend?” I asked, walking around the obstacles until I could see her. She had a remote control in her hand and was watching something on its small screen.

  “New surveillance tool,” she said cheerfully. “See here,” she added, pointing to the screen. “It’s got an auto-iris lens, which means I can manoeuvre the camera into and out of shadows without loss of image quality. I can pan and zoom toggling this switch here. And the resolution is magnificent. 4K. You can’t get better than that.”

  “In a salmon,” I pointed out.

  “Well, it was either that or a shark. And we don’t have many sharks in Twizel.” I wanted to point out we didn’t have many flying salmon either. “Well,” she added, “not that kind of shark anyway.” She laughed at her witticism then.

  “I like it,” I said, watching the s
almon float along the front window. “But I do think people would notice it.”

  “Not ideal for clandestine observations,” Alicia agreed.

  “Do you carry out many clandestine observations?” I asked.

  “Tsk tsk, Sergeant. That would be telling.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “You’ve noticed the reporter,” she said mildly. Not much got past this clandestine observer.

  “Hard not to. Has she been in to see you?”

  Alicia smiled. It was entirely too knowing for a souvenir shop owner.

  “I dare say she will be in due course.”

  “And what do you plan to share with her?” I enquired.

  “I serve the public, Sergeant.” Just what I was afraid of.

  “I’d rather you didn’t share the video surveillance of James Whiting.” Sometimes a direct approach is best.

  “Ah,” she said, placing the remote control for the flying salmon down on the counter carefully. “And would that be a personal request or an official one?”

  I blinked. “Official, of course.”

  She pursed her lips tightly together and turned her attention to her stacked CCTV screens. Pressing buttons and spinning a dial, she produced video coverage of the night Whiting had died. I could tell it was the same night, not only from the convenient date stamp in the bottom right corner, but from the ‘Happy Hour’ sign on the front door to Smokey’s.

  “I’ve already seen this,” I said.

  “Not this, you haven’t.”

  Had she held something back? Or had she discovered something after I visited with her yesterday?

  The door to Smokey’s opened on the screen, light spilled out over the footpath. A shadowed figure burst through the opening and came to an abrupt stop just outside the now swinging shut door, then ran a hand through his dishevelled hair in a familiar movement. He was tall, broad shouldered, and wearing jeans with a heavy jacket. Stubble edged his hard jaw.

  Stubble I had become intimately acquainted with.

  “What’s this?” I asked.

  “Just watch,” she said softly.