“They were best friends. About the time I turned fifteen or sixteen, their relationship… altered, I guess is the way to describe what I observed. When I asked Dad about it, he said relationships are never stagnant. They change. It was as if he treated Ray more like an employee rather than a business partner.”
If the two had a falling out, and Ray was forced to stay on at the Preserve, that could create resentment, and resentment could be reason enough to kill. Depending on how trapped Ray felt, maybe the only perceived escape would be if Tanner’s was no longer run by Bear. Ray, having been such a long-standing feature of the Preserve, had the knowledge of where Bear was going with the hunting party that morning, the terrain of the canyon, and was even a seasoned hunter and therefore knew
