Hallowed Ground by Lori G. Armstrong Page A

My abrupt topic switch didn’t erase his grumpy expression.

    “No comment.”

    Touché.

    “I will say, I doubt this was a random shooting.” He paused, watching my face intently to see if I’d crack.

    I blinked, wide-eyed, an unfortunate bystander.

    The sheriff knew me better and called me on it. “You piss off anyone lately?”

    “Gee, there’ve been so many I lost count.”

    He slapped the notebook against his thigh. “Goddamn it, this is serious.”

    I bristled, but cut the smart comments.

    “Do you think the shots could have been meant for you?”

    “No.” I hadn’t even considered that crazy idea.

    “You have any idea why someone would be shooting at him ?”

    “No.”

    Deputy John loped over, garnering the sheriff’s attention. After a brief, intense discussion, the sheriff came back and said, “You’re free to go for now. I’ll be in touch.”

    And he was gone.

    Gathering my stuff without enthusiasm, I trudged to my pickup and climbed inside. The windows stayed rolled up, not due to dust, but because a bone-chilling cold had burrowed deep inside me. An iciness that owed nothing to the air temperature outside the cab.

    I peeled out of the parking lot and gunned it up the steep incline, glaring at the scenery, the creek, the herd of grazing buffalo, all the beautiful, horrible things about this sacred place.

    The sheriff’s last question kept popping up like a wayward bobber: “You have any idea why someone would be shooting at him?”

    I had a really great idea who to ask.

    As the rage simmered inside me, I began to get warm.

CHAPTER 5
    THE SUN HAD SET, SWIRLING ORANGE, PINK, AND PURPLE together in the sky like rainbow sherbet. It wouldn’t last; once the sun dropped behind the jagged hills, daylight disappeared like someone had flipped a switch.

    I turned on my headlights and pulled onto I-90 going east toward Rapid City. My truck protested when I punched the accelerator to seventy. It wasn’t used to highway miles; mostly I used it to creep along Forest Service roads. Or the occasional trip up County Road 7 to the landfill where the speed limit topped out at a whopping thirty-five.

    I should’ve stopped at home, changed cars, changed clothes, but I was so hell-bent on my mission to kick some ass it didn’t occur to me to do so until I’d passed the halfway mark.

    The thirty-minute drive did nothing to calm me. By the time I’d reached my destination, my rage had intensified to the point my eyeballs pulsated. God. It’d be my luck if I had an embolism after surviving an evening of gunfire.

    Would Donovan survive?

    My belly clenched. I had to focus on other things now.

    As I watched the neon motorcycle spinning on top of Fat Bob’s, I struggled with the best way to get into the club without being recognized.

    Yeah, right. Being covered in blood and dirt was a surefire way to remain inconspicuous.

    I rooted around under the seats until I’d unearthed an old sweatshirt. I shook it out hoping spiders or stink-bugs hadn’t invaded and slipped it over my head.

    Eww. The damn thing smelled like motor oil and the mustiness of decaying vegetation.
    Upending my purse on the seat, I found a sample bottle of Poison perfume—a joke gift from Kim—and liberally spritzed myself. Stinky stuff lived up to the name. It almost smelled worse than the “Eau de 1982 Ford.”

    After retrieving the black case from the glove compartment, I shoved it in my left pocket, wallet in the right. At the last minute I remembered my ball cap. I slapped it on and jumped from the truck, the theme song from Alias playing in my head at my brilliant impromptu disguise.

    Fear and anger made an interesting hormonal cocktail in my system.

    Poker face in place, I marched up to the tin-covered entryway like I had every right to be there.

    Six bikers stood in line ahead of me. I peeked around one super skinny chick—undoubtedly intimately acquainted with meth—to see if I knew the bouncers. My