“Yeah, right. You forget one little thing, Gert.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“You get to go home. I happen to live with the man.”
Not for the first time did Becca grieve over the loss of her own space. Just two years before she’d had her little house, her business, a future separate from her father’s. Then, bit by bit, she’d lost it all.
First came the libel suit, stemming from a puff-piece-turned exposé on a prominent Atlanta businessman’s not-so-squeaky-clean business practices. Then, just to come on with a strong offense, Becca had countersued with defamation charges. Later, when she’d won the libel suit and a half-million-dollar judgment from the countersuit, she’d counted on the money to help bail her out of bankruptcy.
Only, it hadn’t come. Neither had any job offers from the multitude of weekly and daily papers and magazines she’d applied to. Even if Becca had prevailed, just the fact that she’d been sued was enough to make an editor or publisher wary.
“Your father loves you.”
“Yeah, but that box isn’t on an employee performance review, and you know it.”
Gert didn’t contradict her, but then that was to be expected. They both knew Becca’s father only too well.
Becca slid from the corner of Gert’s desktop and made a beeline for her computer. The one thing that could make her feel better might await her in her in-box.
There it was: an e-mail from Rooster.
You nail that big presentation?
That was all, just that in the subject line. So like Rooster, straight to the point. She’d met him on an online farming community a few months before, and the two of them had hit it off.
“Uh-huh, I heard that sigh. It’s that online fella again, isn’t it?”
Gert’s all-knowing smirk couldn’t take away from Becca’s pleasure.
“If you must know, yes.”
“Sometimes I wonder. Why don’t you go out with a real flesh-and-blood guy?”
“Like I have time.”
“You would if you didn’t stay on the Internet all the time, wasting your life away mooning over some guy who could be a psychopath, for all you know. He could be right here in Atlanta, right across the street with a telescope, casing the joint.”
“Uh, Gert, I think you need to lay off the crime dramas. To put your overactive imagination at rest, Rooster and I agreed a long time ago not to mess things up by trading any identifying info. No real names, no locations, not even the names of pets. Simpler that way.”
“If you say so. Me? I think you’re just afraid of disappointing some other guy besides your dad.”
Gert’s comment hit close to home. Becca fretted at the pang she felt from it.
A part of Becca had been excited to work for her dad. Finally she’d had the chance to earn his approval and help him out with his investigative firm, to show him she could use her journalist skills on this job.
Today had left her feeling the eternal screwup, still haunted by her past bad decisions.
But before she could say anything, the office door opened, letting in a sweltering wave of Georgia heat—and her father.
Her dad’s face was a perfect mirror of the weather.
He approached her desk and slapped down a file folder.
“Your last chance.”
“What?”
“I’m a fair man. The suits at Ag-Sure have given us one more shot at getting things right, so I’m passing on the favor.”
“They want us to reopen the case?”
“No. That ship has sailed. This is another one. It took me a lot of talking to convince them that we wouldn’t make a hash out of this one, too. It’s here in Georgia, about halfway between Macon and Savannah, so you get down I-75 and nail these guys. Fast.”
Wow, Dad. Most fathers would have just said, “I’m sorry for losing my temper.” In her heart, though, Becca knew how hard this was for her dad, how scary it was for him to let her take on a case that could well determine their future with Ag-Sure.
She met Gert’s gaze across the room and took in the office manager’s almost imperceptible nod. Yep, this was as good an apology as she was going to get.
She flipped open the file, scanned it. “Asian dodder vine? I’ve never heard of it.”
“Never been east of the Mississippi, according to the insurance company. But there’s a group of farmers claiming it’s overtaking their cotton like kudzu.”
“But, Dad, how can you fake kudzu?”
“That’s your job to figure out. Get busy. You’ve got a day to research, and then you’d better be packed and headed south. The insurance company wants to see results… If you don’t get any, they’ll have our heads on a platter.”
* * *
[email protected]: I’m leaving on a business trip that I have to take, don’t know if I’ll have Internet access, so I may go radio silent for a few days.
[email protected]: I thought you just finished up that big project for work? Figured you could take a break.
[email protected]: I did finish it up, but it sort of imploded on me. I screwed up. So this trip is a penance of sorts.
[email protected]: Your job’s not on the line, is it? Because if you’re short on rent money there in the big city, you can always head down here, grab a hoe and remember what it’s like down on the farm.
[email protected]: I miss being on a farm…well, my grandparents’ farm, at least. Sometimes I wish I could go back.
CHAPTER TWO
“WHOA, LADIES! Easy! No call for fighting!”
But Ryan MacIntosh’s exhortation fell on the deaf ears of a pair of six-year-olds bent on destruction. He pulled back just quick enough to escape a female fist flying for the other’s face.
He made a grab for the fist, saw that the nails were done in a metallic purple nail polish with a constellation of stars. He closed his fingers around the wrist and shoved—as gently as he could—the two girls apart.
Stepping between them, his chest heaving, Ryan struggled for some earthly clue as to what to do next. “Enough!”
“But she started it!”
“She did! She was holding!”
Ryan squelched back his own temper, not an easy thing to do with the August sun beating down on his red hair. He set his jaw and gazed at the upturned faces of the two soccer players.
“Both of you. On the bench.”
When they would have argued with him, he shook his head and pointed toward their respective benches. “Go on and you might get a shot at playing again before the game ends.”
As the girls trudged off the field, Ryan could feel parental wrath lasering in his direction. A fight had to break out on the one game that the referee didn’t show up for.
The other coach shrugged his shoulders and called for a time-out. Ryan indicated for his crew to get a drink. He didn’t have to say it twice. They gathered around the Thermos like cows around a salt lick.
Cows would be easier, he thought. A chuckle brought him back from a momentary image of cows in shin guards, kicking a soccer ball up and down the field.
The chuckle came from Jack MacIntosh, his cousin—and the reason Ryan was here rather than on his John Deere, plowing his sadly neglected back forty.
“What?” he asked.
Jack laughed again. He adjusted the casted l
eg he had stretched out on a folding chaise lounge. “You nearly got clocked by a six-year-old. Doesn’t say much for your reaction time.”
“Hey. It was supposed to be you out there, remember? I could have left your sorry—” Ryan did a quick edit, mindful of the small fry around him “—rump in a sling after you broke your leg.”
“Begging your pardon, cuz, but you forget that I broke this leg hooking up your satellite antenna.”
True enough. Despite Ryan’s griping he enjoyed coaching soccer. This was Jack’s cup of tea usually, what with Jack’s daughter, Emily, involved in whatever the rec department offered. But since Jack was laid up with a bum leg, Ryan had discovered just what a great feeling it was to coach the kids.
He caught the glowering looks scorching between the two girls involved in the fight and sighed, amending his last thought. He liked coaching soccer—not preventing hand-to-hand combat.
He’d done enough of that earlier in the day dealing with Murphy.
Crooked jerk. Murphy’s words came back to him.
“Some investigator type’s supposed to be coming down here to sign off on these claims, Ryan. Now, don’t muck it up. Just say what you gotta say, keep your mouth shut and we’ll have a check cut before you know it.”
Right. Slugging Murphy probably hadn’t been the smartest thing to do, but the guy just would not take no for an answer. He wanted Ryan neck-deep in his scam, for insurance purposes if nothing else. It didn’t matter that Ryan was as good as an accessory for knowing about the plan, even if he kept his mouth shut.
If I could only be sure Gramps hadn’t been involved.
The Blue Devils coach hollered, “Hey, MacIntosh! You ready to finish up this game?”
Returning to the present, Ryan swigged down a healthy gulp of the orange atrocity he’d gotten from the Thermos. As he headed back for the game, he saw a woman pushing her way through the gate.
Even if she hadn’t been a knockout, he would have noticed her. It was the way she dressed—a lightweight blazer paired with jeans that clung to well-proportioned legs. Who wore a blazer to a kids soccer game in south Georgia?
As he hollered for Emily to throw the ball in, Ryan stole another glance in the new arrival’s direction. Honey-brown hair that would go golden in the summer sun, a little smile playing on her lips, more than a dab of confidence in her walk. This was a woman who knew what she wanted—and where to find it.
Ronnie Frasier’s girl took off on a long drive the wrong way. Ryan hollered for her to stop, but his soccer player never heard him. Instead, the ball went into their own net with frustrating ease.
He stood, moved his cap from his head and used his forearm to wipe away the perspiration that had beaded there. Honestly, this was harder work than getting the harvest in.
If there is any harvest this year.
Ryan pushed the thought from his mind. He glanced over at Jack, saw his cousin talking to the new arrival.
Saw Jack pointing in his direction.
Ryan’s stomach sank. Had to be that private investigator the insurance company had said they were sending.
Just his luck.
But then, he’d had a crop of bad luck for the past six months. If Ryan had believed in karma, he’d be convinced he’d been a scuzzball of the first order in a previous life.
All he’d wanted to do was save his grandfather’s farm and look after Mee-Maw.
And avoid Murphy.
Somehow Ryan didn’t think his goals would mesh with those of the pretty little thing waiting for him on the sidelines.
Just his luck.
* * *
BECCA SURVEYED the pack of girls running after the soccer ball. Some of them were pretty good for their age. Well, compared to her. But then Becca had entertained herself picking dandelions from a forsaken corner of whatever athletic field she’d graced.
Give her tai chi any day; it was more her style. No scoreboard to let her know how far along the game was. From the looks of the tall redheaded coach—Ryan MacIntosh, she knew from one of the parents—it had lasted too long already.
Still, MacIntosh seemed to remember why they were here. A few minutes after one girl scored on her own net, he stopped to give high fives for effort when his team managed to recover a turnover.
He looked even better in real life than he had in the few photos she’d dug up on the Internet. He didn’t look like the brain trust of a complicated farm scam.
At that thought, her father’s words when she’d said as much came back to her:
“Becca, remember, he’s a crook. A scammer. You’re just buying into the stereotype that crooks look like crooks.”
MacIntosh had that going for him. With his red-blond hair and his muscled legs that showed off a tan darker than usual for guys his coloring, he certainly didn’t fall into the Wanted-poster category. He was good with the kids, patient. She’d seen him break up a fight earlier. He’d handled that well. Odd for a guy who didn’t have kids of his own.
Becca had made it her business to find out all she could about Ryan MacIntosh before she’d arrived. Thirty-two. Never been married. No scrapes with the law. He’d graduated with an associate’s from Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College and a bachelor’s and a master’s from University of Georgia. Then he’d taken a sales position with an agriculture chemical company. Moved to middle Georgia to run his grandfather’s farm after his grandfather’s death the year before.
The farm had been in his family for five generations. On it, Ryan MacIntosh had grown soybeans, corn and cotton. Lately, though, it seemed that MacIntosh’s chief crop was desperation.
Right now, the farm was the smallest in acreage owned by any full-time farmer in the county—and in the past it had been in tax trouble. She’d turned up a few closed-out liens, as well.
Yup. Ryan MacIntosh was a desperate man.
And, according to her dad, probably a crook, even if he did give peewee-soccer players high fives.
The game played on with Ryan’s Bulldogs taking a beating at the hands of the Blue Devils. Had he chosen that team moniker out of loyalty for his alma mater? What did a person do with a degree in agronomy, anyway?
“Hey, shove that Thermos over and have a seat. This thing could take awhile.”
Becca glanced over at the dark-haired guy with the cast. “Really? I figured it was just about over.”
“Nah. We got started late—the referee stood us up. I’m Jack MacIntosh.”
She moved the Thermos and reached over to shake his hand. “Becca Reynolds. Any relation to Ryan?”
“Sure, first cousins, but we’re more like brothers. Ryan hadn’t mentioned meeting any ladies.”
A smile tugged at her lips as she thought how Ryan was not going to like meeting her in the slightest. “We haven’t actually met.”
Jack raised an eyebrow. “Oh. One of those online deals?”
His words made her feel a little guilty as she thought about her own Rooster—whom she owed an e-mail and hadn’t had a chance to pay that debt since she’d been researching MacIntosh and the other players in this scheme.
“No. This is business.” Becca fished out a card and handed it to him.
“Reynolds Agricultural Investigations.” Jack looked up from the card, a chill in his eyes. “You’re what? A hired gun for a crop-insurance firm?”
Becca had seen that chill before. Farmer types didn’t much care for her or her dad.
At least he didn’t make a cutesy remark about me investigating how many peppers Peter Piper picked. “I’m a private investigator. I work as a consultant for the insurance company that covers several of the farmers in this area, yes. I wouldn’t say a hired gun—”
“I know about people like you. I own an insurance agency.”
Her al
arm bells started jangling. “Crop insurance?”
He laughed, a derisive snort. “You kidding? You can’t make any money selling crop insurance in south Georgia. No, strictly homeowners and auto, as well as life and a few health-insurance policies.”
Becca nodded, staying quiet to see what else Ryan MacIntosh’s cousin would volunteer. She didn’t have to wait long.
“So why are you investigating Ryan?”
“Who says I’m investigating your cousin?”
A shadow fell across her, and Becca looked up to see the man in question standing over her.
“Hand me that stack of cups, if you don’t mind.”
Ryan’s voice was clipped. She picked up the requested cups and extended them his way.
He knelt down beside her to get a refill. The hair on his muscled forearms glinted golden in the late-afternoon sun, and his T-shirt clung damply to a well-sculpted set of pecs that indicated he lifted something besides bales of hay.
He downed the sports drink and crumpled the cup in his hand. Rising to his feet on those marvelous legs of his, he stuck out a hand.
“I gather you’re looking for me. I’m Ryan MacIntosh.”
His clear blue gaze unsettled her. She felt heat rising in her face, struggled to remind herself that he was the one who should be on the defensive, not her.
“Becca Reynolds.” She started to reach for another card, but Jack reached up and handed Ryan the one she’d just given to him.
It was telling that Ryan didn’t even look at it. He never took his eyes off hers. Funny. She’d have sworn that a man with his coloring would have had green eyes.
“Richard Murphy told me somebody would be sniffing around. You already inspected his farm?”
“No. I thought I’d start with yours. I called ahead, and a lady gave me directions here, said I’d find you at the rec department.”
“That’d be Mee-Maw.” A small trace of pain flickered over his features. “She’s my grandmother—our grandmother. She’s nearly eighty-five.”
Seeds of Trust Page 2
