Dead Ringer & Classified Christmas

by B. J Daniels

  She groaned, realizing how that was possible. A few years back, she’d driven over to the prison where Amarillo Calhoun had been sentenced. The eldest of the Calhoun children, Amarillo had followed in his parents’ footsteps, his life of crime going from bank robbing to murder.

  She’d seen him sitting in the glassed-in cubicle. Their eyes had met. He must have recognized her because he told the guard he didn’t want to speak with her—backing out on their interview. Her face had been all over the TV news. She’d just broken a big news story. That was right before she’d gotten her newscaster job in Fort Worth.

  So it was possible Lubbock knew who she was and why she would jump at digging into this story.

  If her friend Bradley was right, then Lubbock was after the missing money. Or Starr and the money, if she’d faked her death. Or there was Houston Calhoun, who’d disappeared the same time as Starr.

  Clearly if Lubbock had left her the tape and newspaper clipping, he wasn’t interested in the truth coming out. And he wasn’t the only one, Andi thought. Cade Jackson wouldn’t want a story about his wife being Starr Calhoun, the bank robber, hitting the news, either, she thought, remembering the look on his face when he’d recognized the woman on the Wanted poster. If he’d loved his wife as much as he appeared to, what would the truth do to him?

  She pushed the thought away. She’d never backed down from a story and wasn’t going to now. The best stories rose out of someone’s pain. This was one of those stories.

  A niggling concern wormed its way into her thoughts, though. Whoever was sending her the information was playing her like a marionette until he got what he wanted. Then what?

  Her phone rang, making her jump.

  “Hello?”

  Silence.

  “Hello?” she said again, feeling suddenly spooked. Lubbock?

  Then to her relief, Cade said, “It’s me.” He didn’t sound happy about it, though.

  She waited, suspecting he was sorry he’d called and might even hang up.

  “I need to see you,” he said gruffly.

  “All right. Do you want me to—”

  “I’m right outside.”

  Chapter Four

  CADE WATCHED MIRANDA BLAKE come out of the newspaper office. She had to be freezing. The temperature was still hovering around zero. Another snowstorm was expected before evening. And here she was dressed like she was still in Texas.

  Didn’t she notice that no one dressed up in Montana let alone in Whitehorse? And she had to be kidding in those high-heeled boots that certainly were never intended for walking on ice and snow.

  He reached across to open the passenger-side door, shaking his head. What the hell was he thinking? He should have just told her what he had to say on the phone. At least he’d left the pickup running. He’d make this quick.

  There was a regal air about her that set his teeth on edge as she climbed in and smoothed her suit skirt. She’d brought along an old-fashioned black boom box. What the hell was that about? He turned up the heat, furious with himself for doing this. Why hadn’t he left well enough alone?

  Because he knew M. W. Blake sure as hell wasn’t going to.

  “I just wanted to tell you that you’re wrong,” he said, looking out at the snowy day through the windshield. He’d just have his say, then get on his way. “That woman in the photo isn’t Grace. Admittedly it resembles her. It sure sent me for a loop.” He cleared his throat. “But if you’d known her, you’d know that she wasn’t some bank robber and you would have realized your mistake.”

  She didn’t say anything and he was finally forced to look over at her.

  “It was an honest mistake, I’m sure,” he said. “I just didn’t want you doing a story and having to retract it. Nor am I looking for an apology.”

  She laughed softly. “Well, that’s good because I wasn’t going to give you one. You’re the one who’s mistaken.”

  He jerked off his Stetson and raked a hand through his hair. This woman was impossible. “I’m telling you that photo isn’t of Grace.”

  “No, it’s of Starr Calhoun, the woman you married,” she said in that sweet Southern drawl of hers.

  He slapped his hat back on his head and gave the pickup a little gas as he gripped the wheel to keep from strangling the damned woman. “I don’t know why I bothered to come by and try to talk sense into you, Tex.”

  The inside of the pickup cab was warm and smelled of the soap he’d used that morning in the shower. Andi recognized the pleasant scent. “My name is Miranda and you came by to see me because you recognized her and whether you want to admit it or not, you want to know the truth about the woman you knew as Grace Browning.”

  “Like hell, Tex,” he snapped.

  As intimidating as he was, she turned to face him. “You can’t keep me from doing the story.”

  “Maybe I can’t keep you from making a fool of yourself, but I can sure as hell keep you from involving me in it.” He shifted the pickup into gear and gave her a pointed look. “You and I don’t have any more to say to each other.”

  “You’re wrong about that. You are involved,” she said calmly as he reached across and opened her door. A blast of freezing air rushed in.

  “Maybe, but you’ll have to do your story without my help,” he snapped.

  “Then I guess you’ll have to hear the truth with the rest of the town when it comes out in my article.” She started to get out. “Oh, by the way, you should know I’m not the only one who knows about your wife’s true identity. Someone sent me a newspaper clipping about her death along with a cassette tape of Starr Calhoun and her male accomplice planning the bank robberies. Want to make a bet it’s your wife’s voice on the tape?”

  He swore and looked away for a moment before he said, “When were you going to tell me about the tape?” He sounded scared and she felt again that prickle of guilt that she was about to destroy this man’s life.

  “When I thought you could handle it.”

  He cut his eyes to her, his expression one of anger and fear. He let out a humorless laugh. “And you think I can handle it now?”

  * * *

  CADE TOLD HIMSELF that the tape would prove this woman was wrong and that would be the end of it. Not that he didn’t realize she was banking on the tape proving just the opposite.

  “Fine, let’s hear the tape,” he said, and reached across her to slam her door.

  “I think the sound quality would be better without your pickup truck’s engine running in the background, don’t you? Also the player’s batteries are low. I need to plug it in.”

  He didn’t really want to take her back to his apartment behind the bait shop, but he had little choice. He much preferred doing this on his own turf. And the newspaper office was out. Anyone could come walking in. He sure as hell didn’t want an audience.

  Pulling out, he flipped a U-turn in the middle of the main street and headed back toward the bait shop.

  One of the benefits of living in Whitehorse was the lack of traffic. But today he would have loved a traffic jam. Anything to postpone this.

  It wasn’t that he feared the voice would be Grace’s. All this talk of Grace had brought back the pain. He just wanted to hide as he’d done the last six holidays. He didn’t need to see more photographs of women who reminded him of Grace. Or hear some woman’s voice that might sound even a little like his dead wife’s.

  But clearly Miranda Blake wasn’t going to give him any peace. Not until he proved her wrong. He glanced over at her, worried about her apparent calm. Did she know something he didn’t?

  * * *

  “PREGNANT?” ARLENE EVANS cried as she threw the spatula at her son.

  “Why are you yelling at me? Charlotte’s the one who got knocked up, not me,” he said and picked up the remote to turn up the sou
nd on the TV.

  Arlene grabbed the skillet, tossing the burned pancakes in the trash and turning off the burner before she wiped off her hands and stormed down the hallway.

  She wished she were Catholic because she had the strongest urge to cross herself. First Violet and that disgrace and now Charlotte? She couldn’t bear it.

  Tapping lightly at the bathroom door, she said, “Charlotte, precious, can I come in?”

  “No!” Then more retching and the whoosh of the toilet as it flushed.

  “Open this damned door now or I will break it down,” Arlene yelled.

  The door opened slowly and Charlotte’s bloated face appeared.

  Arlene had seen her daughter getting heavier by the day and had just assumed it was all the sweets the girl put away. Violet had always had a weight problem and Arlene hadn’t known how to deal with it. She’d told herself that Charlotte, who’d always been slim, would outgrow it.

  “What do you want?” Charlotte asked irritably.

  Arlene pushed open the bathroom door and stepped in, closing it behind her. She spoke carefully, determined not to lose her temper. “Aren’t you feeling well?”

  Her daughter gave her a withering look.

  “Your brother seems to think you’re pregnant but how is that possible?”

  Another withering look. Arlene fought the urge to smack the look off her youngest daughter’s face.

  “You’re pregnant?” Her voice broke. One daughter in the nuthouse and one pregnant out of wedlock. She’d never be able to hold her head up in this county again.

  Charlotte didn’t answer, just looked down at her stomach as she smoothed her large sweatshirt over her protruding stomach.

  Arlene was stunned. “Good heavens, how far along are you?”

  Her daughter shrugged. “Four months, I think.”

  Arlene stumbled over to the toilet, dropped the lid and sat. “Four months? Four months and you don’t say a word? What were you thinking?”

  Charlotte was still looking down at her stomach as if admiring it.

  “Who is the father? Tell me who he is and the two of you can run down to Vegas. No one has to know you didn’t get married four months ago.”

  “I’m not getting married.”

  Arlene stared at her daughter. Lately Charlotte had been reminding her more and more of Violet, an unpleasant similarity at best. “Of course you’re getting married.”

  Charlotte raised her gaze. “Not likely since he’s already married,” she said with a chuckle.

  Arlene thought she’d have a stroke and imagined the paramedics hauling her out of the bathroom on a stretcher. As if her life wasn’t already humiliating enough.

  She willed herself not to have a stroke. “Who is he?” She would castrate him. Then kill him.

  Charlotte shook her head. “I’m not telling you. I’m never telling you.” She gave Arlene a challenging look. “And there is nothing you can do to make me tell.”

  * * *

  THE CLOSED SIGN was still in the front window of Jackson Bait Shop and no customers out front waiting, Cade noticed with relief as he pulled around to the back and got out.

  The reporter followed him, bringing along that huge shoulder bag of hers and the boom box. He opened the rear door and stepped aside, clenching his jaw as he let her pass. Now that he was here, he just wanted this over with—and as quickly as possible.

  “I don’t have a lot of time,” he said.

  She smiled at that no doubt noticing that there hadn’t been a crowd of fishermen beating down his door this morning. But she walked right to his kitchen table and set down the boom box.

  He wondered if she had retrieved the can of pepper spray from the snowbank out back or bought more as he watched her plug in the boom box and then produce a tape from her pocket. She dropped the cassette tape into the player and lifted a brow in his direction.

  He sighed and stepped over to the table to pull out a chair. Swinging it around, he straddled it and sat down, resting his arms on the back as he gave her an impatient nod. “Let’s get this over with.”

  She hit Play.

  At first all he heard was static. The sound was like scraping a fingernail down a blackboard and he flinched, his nerves on edge. He tried to find calm, to breathe. This would be over soon. And yet his heart thudded in his chest with an apprehension that scared him as much as the impossible thought he could have been wrong about Grace.

  The static and whir of the tape stopped abruptly with the sound of a female voice.

  His heart stopped as well, as he heard a voice from the grave. He tried to catch his breath, his pulse a bass drum in his ears and his limbs numb with a bone-aching chill that rattled through him.

  The woman across from him hadn’t missed his reaction. Hell, she’d been expecting it. His blood ran colder than the Milk River outside his door and he thought for a moment that he might black out.

  There was no doubt about it. The voice on the tape was Grace’s. Staggered, he hadn’t even heard what she was saying. But slowly, the words began to register.

  And just when he thought it couldn’t get any worse, he heard another voice, this one male, as the two planned what banks they would rob and in what order.

  There was no denying it. The woman he’d married six years ago and lost wasn’t who he thought she was.

  He stood, knocking over the chair as he lunged at the table to shut off the tape player.

  “There’s more that you might want to hear,” the reporter said.

  “Not now.” His voice felt as rough as it sounded. “Please go. I need to be alone.”

  She started to collect the big black tape player.

  “Leave it. I’ll make sure you get it back.”

  Her gaze locked with his. “I made a copy of the tape.”

  “I was sure you had.”

  She seemed to hesitate, but then rose slowly, all the time watching him as if worried he might come unglued on her.

  “I’m fine,” he said a little sharper than he’d meant to.

  She nodded but didn’t look convinced. He figured he probably looked as horrible as he felt.

  “Call me when you’re ready to talk.”

  He walked over to the door, opened it and stood waiting, not looking at her. He was afraid of what he’d do if she didn’t leave soon.

  “Take my truck,” he said, removing the keys from his pocket and holding them out to her.

  “It’s not far, I’ll walk.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  She stepped out and he slammed the door, leaning against it as he fought to breathe. Grace. Her memory blurred in his mind and he knew even if he pretended this had never happened, Grace Browning was lost to him. More lost than she’d been even in death.

  He lurched forward, slamming into the bathroom to be sick.

  * * *

  THERE WAS NOTHING Arlene Evans enjoyed more than a mission. Finding the father of Charlotte’s baby was now at the top of her list.

  “Take a shower, you smell,” she told her daughter as she left the bathroom and walked down the hall.

  The television was so loud it made the old windows in the farmhouse rattle. Arlene walked calmly over to where her son slouched in the chair. She picked up the remote and pressed Off.

  “What the hell?” Bo demanded, sitting up.

  She shoved him back down, snatching the bag of chips off his lap and carefully folding the top down before she put the bag aside. “Who is the father of that baby?”

  “You’re asking me? Why don’t you ask her?”

  Arlene wet her lips. She liked to think of herself as one of those patient mothers.

  “I’m asking you, Bo. Now, please tell me. Who has she been with?” Arlene tried again calmly.

&nb
sp; “Who hasn’t she been with?” he said with a laugh.

  Arlene hadn’t meant to smack him. If she had, she would have cuffed him harder.

  He recoiled, looking hurt and angry, even though she’d barely touched him.

  “She said the man is married.”

  “So?”

  “I would think that would narrow the field some,” Arlene snapped. “Now, think. You’re going to help me with this.”

  Bo groaned and reached for the chips.

  Arlene held them out of his reach. “I’m going to make you some pancakes and when I’m done, I expect some names.”

  * * *

  ANDI WALKED BACK to her office, the frigid winter air like a slap in the face. The snowstorm moved in before she’d traveled a block. She welcomed it. She was still shaken by Cade’s reaction to the voice on the tape—even though she’d known it had to be the woman he’d known as Grace Browning.

  The look on his face, the shocked horror, the devastation. If Andi had wondered how he felt about his wife, she didn’t anymore. His stricken face had been filled with pain and anguish. Sticking a knife in his heart might have been less painful.

  She shivered from the cold, glad she had only a few blocks to go. The fact that she’d been right—Grace Browning had been Starr Calhoun—gave her little satisfaction. She glanced back toward the bait shop, hoping Cade was all right, wishing he wasn’t alone, a little afraid of what he might do.

  Not that she had any choice but to leave. She’d known better than to argue with him. He’d already thrown her out once today.

  Afraid he’s going to off himself before you get the rest of the story?

  She bristled, hating that he’d been hurt. But he’d needed to hear the truth. It wasn’t as if this all wouldn’t come out even if she didn’t do the story.

  Not that this wasn’t going to be an amazing story and it wouldn’t do even more amazing things for her career. She would get national recognition.