by B. J Daniels
“It’s beautiful.”
“Like you,” he said and reached over to take her hand.
She closed her eyes and told herself that everything was going to be all right. But deep inside she felt afraid. Wade and his father were up to something. Something she’d apparently overheard. They wouldn’t trust that she might never remember. This wasn’t over. Once she left here...
“Abby?” Ledger looked concerned.
She opened her eyes, realizing she’d been gripping his hand too hard. “I’m scared,” she admitted. “I can’t think about the future until I know what in my past has me so terrified.”
Something moved past Ledger and she looked in that direction to see Vance. He saw her and quickly disappeared from view. The bad feeling washed over her, threatening to take her under.
Ledger followed her gaze. “You still think something is wrong, don’t you?”
She nodded.
“My father said that the visit with our mother didn’t go well. When she got a good look at him, she screamed. They had to sedate her. He’s worried that this might have set her back. He can’t bear that she might revert back into a catatonic state again.”
Abby shivered at the news. “She must have sensed what I do about him.”
* * *
“A BOOK?” WATERS COULDN’T believe what he was hearing as he stared through the scarred Plexiglas at Patricia. “You do realize that Nikki St. James is doing a book on the kidnapping.”
“Nikki St. James wasn’t there that night. I was,” Patricia said into the phone at the jail. She gave him a smug look. “They’re giving me enough money that it will pay for my decent lawyer. That’s right. I’m going to get off, and when I do, they are going to start looking around for the person who really poisoned my husband.”
He knew what she would be selling. The dirt on the McGraw family. The dirt on him, as well. “What is it you want?”
“Now you want to deal?” she asked, sweet enough to give him a toothache.
“Patty.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“You don’t want to hang out all your dirty laundry.”
“Don’t you mean your dirty laundry, Jimmy?”
“Think of Kitten.”
“Oh, now you’re going to show an interest in her?” Patricia snapped angrily.
She’d told him that Kitten was his, but he’d never been sure it was true given the way the woman lied. He had a feeling that she’d also told Blake Ryan, the former ranch manager, that Kitten was his. It would explain why Blake had done her bidding.
He lowered his voice. “You know why we had to keep this a secret.”
“To protect your relationship with Travers. But look how that turned out. Unless you’ve managed to get back into his good graces.” Her eyes lit. “Oh, you have! You...stinker you. You always land on your feet, don’t you?” Her eyes narrowed. “Well, hang on for the ride of your life. I’m about to bring down your world and Travers’s, too.” With that, she slammed down the phone, rose and motioned to the guard that she was ready to go back to her cell.
* * *
VANCE COULDN’T HELP being rattled.
Travers had apologized at length for taking him to see his so-called mother. “I should never have taken you to see her so soon,” he’d said on the ride home. “Marianne is just now recovering after all this time. This is all my fault. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s all right,” he’d said. “Maybe I scared her.” He hadn’t scared her. He’d seen the look in the woman’s eyes. She knew. Somehow she knew he wasn’t her son.
“I think she was expecting to see you as a baby,” Travers had said. “Or maybe it was just too much for her.”
But Vance knew better and he feared Travers McGraw was having his doubts. Just not enough doubts to stop all this craziness.
The press conference was a blur. He’d blinked into the flash of cameras, stepped up to the microphone to say how glad he was to have found his birth family and had then been ushered to the ranch Suburban as reporters shoved microphones at him and yelled questions.
He managed to escape after lunch, telling Travers he wanted to go for a ride and just digest everything that had been happening. He’d used the burner phone to call Huck, who’d been in a great mood.
“Saw you on the news! You looked real smart in those new clothes. Next step, legally becoming Oakley McGraw.”
“We need to meet and talk.”
Huck’s good mood had evaporated in a snap of the fingers.
“Okay,” Huck said when the three of them met, this time out by Nelson Reservoir in a stand of trees. “So Marianne freaked last night when Travers took you to see her. How did McGraw react?”
“He felt bad about taking me there, made excuses for Marianne, but I could tell he was shocked and taken aback. He has to be thinking she saw something he hadn’t.”
Huck waved a hand through the air. “It wasn’t like she cried, ‘This isn’t my son!’ Even if she had, she’s...sick. So forget about it. You’re still good as gold. McGraw wouldn’t have gone through with the press conference if he had any doubts.”
Vance raked a hand through his hair, his Stetson hanging from the fingers of his other hand. It was hot, but a breeze came off the water, and in the shade of the trees it wasn’t too bad. But still he was sweating.
“I saw Abby looking at me again. Now she’s got Ledger looking at me the same way.”
Wade swore and kicked a rock into the water at the mention of Ledger’s name.
“It’s just a matter of time. I see her trying so hard to remember,” Vance said, hating that he was whining. “She remembers just enough that she doesn’t like me, doesn’t trust me, and she’s been bending Ledger’s ear about me. How long before he goes to his father with this?”
“You just borrow trouble, don’t you?” Huck demanded angrily. “She hasn’t remembered. She isn’t going to. What you need to do is dig in. Stop acting like a guest at the ranch. You need to go to work in the barns with your brothers.”
Vance stared at him. How did he know...? “The cook? Louise is spying on me?”
Huck smiled. “I told you. I make friends easily. I know what is going on out there.”
“I think Vance is right.” Wade spoke up. “You know Abby. Once she gets her teeth into something...”
Huck swore.
“What are we going to do?” Wade cried. “Let me go get her. Once we have her back—”
“Don’t be a fool.”
But Vance could see that Huck was more worried than he let on.
“Okay, maybe it’s time to take care of Abby.” Huck turned to Vance. “Make it look like an accident.”
“What?” He’d hoped he’d heard wrong, but one look at the deputy’s face and he knew he hadn’t. He took a step back. “I didn’t sign on for murder.”
Huck quickly closed the distance between them and got right into his face. “You signed on for whatever I tell you or you’ll be meeting with your own accident. Is that understood?”
Vance’s blood ran cold at the look in Huck’s eyes. There was something bitter and heartless in that gaze. The deputy wasn’t joking. Worse, he thought Huck was right about the places where he had “friends.” He wouldn’t look at the cook the same now that he knew Huck had her in his pocket.
“You are Oakley McGraw,” Huck said, looking less dangerous even though Vance knew he wasn’t. “You will have a great life if you don’t weaken now, you understand? Abby can’t remember who you are because that will raise suspicion and involve Wade and me. So take care of it.”
“But that still leaves Marianne,” he said, hoping to find a way out of this.
Huck laid a hand on his shoulder and squeezed just hard enough to make his point. “Marianne is mentally unstable. We ar
en’t worried about her, okay? Don’t make me worry about you. You’re in this up to your neck. Just remember this. You double-cross me and you won’t live long enough to see prison.”
Go to the sheriff. Confess everything. But even as he thought it, he knew Huck was right. The deputy had friends everywhere. Look how he’d managed to get the lab tests to appear that Vance was a McGraw. He must have gotten someone to get him DNA from one of the real sons. Or maybe the lab already had something of the twins from the kidnapping.
It didn’t matter how Huck had pulled this fraud off. He had. And now he’d painted Vance into a corner. When had it gone from simply pretending to be Oakley McGraw to murder, though? Broke and now involved in fraud with a psychopath, he didn’t see any way out of this but one. He had to kill Abby Pierce.
Chapter Fourteen
“YOU THINK HE’LL do it?” Wade asked after Vance had driven away.
“Nope,” his father said. “He has it in him, but he’s too gutless.”
Wade shot his father a look. “But you made it sound as if you believed he would.” He wasn’t about to admit the sense of relief he’d felt. He still loved Abby. He figured he always would.
But that love came with such a sense of guilt over how he’d mistreated her it had turned into something hard as flint. In order to be rid of it, he had to be rid of Abby. Not that he wanted anyone else to have her.
“Son, if there is one thing I’m good at, it’s reading people. Vance...well, he’s damaged, no doubt about it. That’s one reason why I knew he’d jump at the chance to be Oakley McGraw. But he’s weak. I knew he’d never be able to go the distance.”
“What the devil was the whole point of this, then?”
His father smiled. “Because we don’t need it to. I’ve contacted Waters through a friend. He’s taking care of getting us the reward money.”
“But once they find out that Vance isn’t Oakley—”
“That is never going to happen,” Huck said with so much confidence that Wade wondered if the man had a screw loose. “By then anyone who could hurt us will be dead.”
He stared at his father. “How—”
“You don’t worry about that end of it. I have it all figured out. But first, we need to stop out by that rattlesnake nest in the Larb Hills.” Huck grinned. “I brought along a couple of burlap bags. That wife of yours? You’re not going to have to worry about her much longer. Neither is Vance.”
* * *
WATERS COULD SEE his world exploding in front of his eyes. Patricia was the missile coming in hard and fast. He had to do damage control before she hit. But that meant telling Travers the truth. Well, at least enough of the truth to cover his behind. All he had going for him was the fact that Patricia didn’t believe he would tell.
He found Travers in his office. “Do you have a minute?”
The older man looked up and waved him in. “Boone tells me that you’ve had another inquiry that sounds like it might be legitimate.”
Waters had forgotten about the call from the private investigator in Butte. “Yes, there was something about the call. I mentioned it to Boone.”
“Did you get any specifics?”
“Not exactly, but by the questions the PI asked, I think he might have information about Jesse Rose.”
Travers leaned back into his chair and motioned Waters to sit. “This is great news. We should get on this right away. I’ll talk to Boone about following up on it.”
“The PI was called out of town. He said he’d be back in a week or so. I was planning to go myself.”
“I’d rather have Boone go,” Travers said.
Waters figured the lead would take Boone nowhere. But he had to look as if he was trying to help find Jesse Rose. “There was something else.” He stopped. His role in this house was tenuous at best after he’d sided with Patricia. Now he wasn’t sure how his confession would go down. Travers could fire him and that would be that. He hesitated.
“Yes?”
“I need to tell you something. I should have a long time ago, but Patricia begged me not to and I foolishly listened to her.”
“If you’re going to tell me that you’re possibly her daughter’s father, it isn’t necessary. I’ve known all along.”
Waters stared at him. “How—”
“I knew about the two of you before the kidnapping.” Travers’s gaze hardened. “I also knew about the two of you after I married Patty.”
He didn’t know what to say. I’m sorry didn’t quite cut it. “I don’t understand.”
“Oh, I think you do. That old expression, keep your enemies close.”
“You see me as your enemy?” That shocked him. He’d always thought that Travers trusted him, maybe even liked him. “If you knew, why didn’t you say something?”
“I like to see how things play out. I was fine with you and Patty because I saw that she was using you the same way she was me. A leopard really can’t change its spots.”
He wasn’t sure if Travers was referring to Patricia or to him. “She’s doing a tell-all book to help pay for her lawyer’s fees.”
Travers nodded. “I heard.”
“I can try to get an injunction to stop the book from ever being published if you—”
“Not necessary.”
Waters couldn’t help feeling confused. “But the bad press...”
Travers laughed. “Did you really think that would bother me? Jim, I believe you’re the one who doesn’t want to see Patty’s book published. But I figure by then her trial will be over and the truth will have come out.”
“The truth?” he asked.
Travers only smiled and said, “If that’s all, please make sure Boone has all the information about this private investigator in Butte. I want him down there as soon as the man returns.”
* * *
VANCE HAD NO idea how he was going to kill Abby and make it look like an accident. All the way back to the ranch, he cursed his luck. If he hadn’t been in that bar in Billings, if he’d never met Huck Pierce, if he’d never gone along with this crazy idea for money...
Money was the root of all evil. If he had some right now, he’d be gone. He’d just disappear. Maybe go to South America. All he would need was a fake ID, and he’d heard that you could buy those if you knew the right people.
Except he didn’t have money and he didn’t know the right people. But Huck did. All this time, the cook had probably been watching him, reporting to the deputy that Vance was down at the pool or lying around the house.
Who knew how many other spies the man had at the ranch, he thought, reminded of the ranch hands he occasionally saw when he was down at the pool. It wasn’t like Huck to show all of his hand, so Vance figured there were others watching him—not to mention Travers and his sons. He felt like someone was always watching him, looking for a crack in the story he’d built, waiting for him to unravel and admit he wasn’t Oakley McGraw.
The house was unusually quiet when he entered. He looked around. Travers’s office was empty. He thought he heard the clatter of pots and pans in the kitchen, but no voices. Happy not to be forced to make polite conversation with anyone, he took the stairs two at a time, wanting only to get to his room and hide out for a while.
He was almost to the top of the stairs when suddenly Abby appeared. Seeing her when she was so much on his mind, he reared back in surprise. Her eyes widened in alarm as he lost his balance.
Vance groped for the handrail, but it was slick and he wasn’t close enough to get a grip on the highly varnished wood. He teetered and then felt himself start to fall backward. The irony of it didn’t escape him as his arms windmilled wildly to no avail.
* * *
SHOCKED BY WHAT was happening, Abby rushed down a couple of steps to reach for the man. His hand closed on her wrist.
He flailed, still off balance. But he held tight as she tried to keep her balance.
In those frantic moments, she realized he was so much heavier than her that she wasn’t going to be able to keep him from falling. And with his hand clutching her wrist, he was going to take her with him.
She felt her heels lift off the step. Her free hand grabbed the railing, but Vance’s pull was too strong. She felt herself falling toward him.
Abby let out a cry as Vance jerked her arm hard, then let go. She was thrown toward the center of the stairway as his body was pushed toward the railing. Her gaze tumbled down the long stairway to the marble floor below. She waited for her life to pass before her eyes as she felt herself falling through nothing but air.
Below her, the front door opened and Ledger stepped through. Their eyes met, his rounding in horror. He shot forward as if he thought he’d be able to catch her before she hit the bottom and the hard unforgiving marble.
She closed her eyes as a scream escaped her lips. She’d come so close to being with Ledger, but now fate had stepped in to keep them apart forever.
* * *
LEDGER’S CRY OF alarm mixed with Abby’s scream as she began to fall. He rushed toward the stairs, his gaze locked on Abby. He’d only reached the bottom step when Vance’s free arm shot out, the other looped over the handrail in a death grip. He grabbed Abby at the last minute.
For a moment, it looked as if Vance couldn’t hold them both on the stairway. Ledger saw the pain in his face, the exertion as he looped his free arm around her waist and pulled.
He hadn’t known he was holding his breath until he saw Abby find footing on the stairs. Vance let go of the railing and sat down hard on the steps. All the color had drained from his face, and even from where he stood, Ledger could see that the man was sweating profusely.
Abby had sat down, too. She was crying softly and holding her ribs after her close call. If Vance hadn’t grabbed her when he did... But what were the two of them doing on the stairs together?
