Change of Fortune

by RaeAnne Thayne

  “Who killed him?” he asked, unable to keep the wariness from his voice but hoping she didn’t notice.

  “I don’t know. Nobody’s telling me anything,” she answered. “All I know is that they’ve got some ‘person of interest’ and they’re ready to let me go. Oh, I can’t wait to be home. Will you come get me?”

  He slid out of the bed, already reaching for his khakis. “Of course. Stay in touch and call me the minute you hear from your attorney. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Don’t wake up Josh, okay? I want to surprise him.”

  Ross frowned. Somebody in the family was definitely in for a surprise. He could only hope it was indeed Josh who was surprised at learning his mother had been released and not him and Frannie when they found Josh already in custody.

  “I’ll see you in a little while,” he said, instead of responding to his sister’s plea about her son.

  He hung up, his mind racing in a hundred different directions as he yanked on his socks and thrust his arms through the sleeves of his shirt.

  “Ross, what’s going on?”

  He looked toward the bed and found Julie watching him with consternation. How could he have forgotten Julie? She looked soft and tousled, her hair messed and her lips swollen from his mouth. He gazed at her, wishing with everything inside him that things could be different, that he could stay with her, right here in this warm, cozy bed.

  But his family needed him. And just like always, he had no choice but to help. Still, the choice had never seemed so damned hard before.

  “I’ve got to hurry back to Red Rock. That was Frannie.”

  Her features tightened with concern. “What is it?”

  “They’re letting her go. They’ve brought someone else in for killing Lloyd Fredericks.”

  * * *

  She stared at Ross, not quite sure she had heard him correctly. “Letting her go? Are you serious?”

  “Completely.” He started buttoning up his cotton shirt and it was only as she watched his grim features that Julie realized why all this seemed so discordant and unreal. He wasn’t reacting like a man who had just learned his sister was about to be freed from jail.

  “Okay, my brain obviously isn’t working correctly yet this morning,” she said. “Tell me again why you’re not throwing the world’s biggest party? Isn’t this what you’ve wanted? What you’ve been working so hard to bring about for the last two weeks? Frannie’s coming home, Ross! Why on earth do you look like you’re heading to a funeral, instead of celebrating?”

  He was silent as he started to slip on his boots, but his features looked even more austere than normal.

  “Ross, tell me. What’s wrong?”

  At last he lifted his gaze to hers and she nearly gasped at the haunted expression in his brown eyes. Her mind sifted through the pieces, Frannie, Lloyd, the Spring Fling and the events of that awful night.

  And Josh.

  Josh was the missing piece, she realized, as everything clicked into place. She thought of his determined efforts to find his nephew the night before, and the odd phone call he had made to the police station, their seemingly casual route back to the Frederickses’ home that had led them right past the station house.

  She gasped and stared at him. “You think it’s Josh they’ve hauled in. You think he killed his father!”

  He didn’t respond for a long moment but his silence was answer enough. “I don’t know what I think,” he finally said. “All I know is that Josh fought bitterly with his father that night and uttered what could be taken as a direct threat. He was seen with the murder weapon, not long before his father’s body was found. He knows something, something he’s not saying. I told you that since the murder, he’s been secretive. He takes these mysterious phone calls and I can tell he’s troubled.”

  “He’s had a rough few weeks, losing his father and his mother at once. You can’t honestly think he had anything to do with killing Lloyd! That he would let his mother go to jail for his own crime!”

  “Where is he then?”

  She had no answer to give him, though she fervently wished she did.

  “I’m sorry about this,” Ross said, “but I’ve got to go back to Red Rock right away. I can drop you off at your house on the way.”

  “Okay. I only need a moment.” She rose and quickly began to dress again, thinking with regret of the brief, stolen time they had shared together. Something told her those moments were as elusive and rare as a wildflower growing on a harsh, unforgiving rock face.

  As she dressed, she listened to his one-sided conversation with the police station. She could have guessed the outcome, even before he hung up the phone in disgust.

  “They’re not saying anything until charges are officially filed, which might or might not happen any moment. I need to haul out of here.”

  “Of course.” She threw on her blouse and sweater, doing her best to block out the dull ache of regret.

  “I need to make some phone calls on the way back to Red Rock to see if I can find out what the hell is going on, just who it is who’s confessed. How do you feel about taking the wheel so I’m not distracted by talking while I drive?”

  “Anything I can do to help. You know I want to do whatever I can.”

  “Thanks.”

  Though gratitude flashed in his gaze, it was quickly gone, replaced by a deep anxiety. She wanted to soothe it but she knew nothing she said would help him right now. But she could do as he asked and take at least one responsibility from his wide shoulders by driving them back to Red Rock.

  He must have spoken with a half-dozen people as she took the shortest route possible away from San Antonio. Listening to him probe each contact for information was fascinating. He seemed to know exactly the right buttons to push with every person he spoke with. He could be brash and abrasive when necessary, but he could also pull out unexpected wiles that completely charmed her—and whoever he was talking to.

  As they neared the Red Rock town limits, she listened to him try to skillfully pry information out of a source in the police department.

  “You’re not holding out on me, are you, Loraine?” he asked after a short conversation where he had exhibited a delicate finesse that surprised her.

  He was quiet for a moment and Julie would have given anything to know what the person on the other end of the line was saying.

  “How sure are you on that?” he asked after a long moment, his features unreadable. “Ninety-nine. That’s good. And the other one percent?”

  Loraine said something that made him laugh. When the worry left his features, even for a moment, he looked younger, lighter. Almost happy.

  She jerked her gaze back to the road, her heart tumbling around in her chest like a bingo ball in the chute.

  She was in love with him.

  The knowledge burrowed into her heart, as clear as the exit sign on the freeway. She wanted to push it away, to deny and disclaim, but she couldn’t. She knew exactly what this dangerous tenderness curling through her meant.

  She was in love with Ross Fortune, a hard and cynical man who seemed the last one on earth she ought to fall for, a man who was an expert at protecting himself from any deeper emotions.

  She loved him. His deep core of decency, the care and concern he doled out to his family, his complete commitment to doing what was right.

  She loved him—and he so desperately needed someone to love him, even if he would never admit it.

  Why did that someone have to be her? she wondered with grim fatalism. She didn’t want to love him. She wanted to go back to the way things had been just a few short weeks ago, before he had barreled into her life.

  He would hurt her.

  The knowledge hovered around her like the wavy mirages on the highway. Pain, harsh and unforgiving and unavoidable, waited for her. He would hurt her and she could do absolutely nothing to hold it back.

  The time for protecting her heart might have been before that fateful night when he had accused poo
r Marcus Gallegos of stealing. She had been heading for this moment, for this inevitable pain, since then.

  She might have been able to reduce its severity if she had walked away after that evening, if she had maintained all her careful defenses. Instead, she had let her life become entwined with his through Josh. Each time she saw Ross, she had allowed him to sneak a little further past her defenses.

  Tears burned behind her eyes, blurring the road in front of her, but she blinked them away. He hadn’t hurt her yet. She refused to waste this particular moment in anticipation of the future pain she knew was on the way.

  He ended the call a moment later and Julie knew she wasn’t mistaken that his mood seemed lighter. His eyes seemed brighter, his expression less anxious.

  “That was a friend of mine who works in central booking at the jail. She said the guy they’re holding is a 40-year-old male.”

  “So not Josh.”

  Her voice sounded like she’d just swallowed a handful of gravel but she hoped he didn’t notice or that he would attribute it to an emotional reaction to the news of his nephew’s apparent reprieve.

  “I won’t be completely convinced of that until I find the little bugger and figure out where he’s been all night. But no, at this point it looks like somebody else in Lloyd’s legion of enemies had it in for him.”

  “How tragic, that so many people in Red Rock could have enough motive to want a man dead.”

  When he said nothing for several moments, she glanced away from the road just long enough to catch the quizzical look he threw at her.

  She flushed, her hands tightening on the steering wheel. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “You didn’t even know Lloyd, did you?”

  She shook her head.

  “You didn’t know the man but as far as I can tell, you’re the only one besides his own mother and his mistress who finds anything to mourn in his death.”

  “I just think it’s terribly sad that someone could take the precious gift of life and all the opportunities given him to make the world a better place and then twist them all so hideously that most of the world is glad he’s gone.”

  He reached across the width of the seat and picked up her hand. Before she quite realized what he intended, he lifted her fingers and pressed his mouth to the back of her hand, in a very un-Ross-like gesture.

  “Do you know what your greatest gift is?” he asked.

  She let out a shaky breath, wondering how on earth she was going to collect the tattered pieces of herself when this was over. “What?”

  “You make everyone around you want to be better. To try harder to see the world through those same bright, optimistic eyes.”

  She loved the feel of his hand holding hers, the safety and warmth of him, even as she wanted to snatch her hand away, to protect herself from any more encroachment on her heart.

  “You didn’t get nearly enough sleep last night if you can wax philosophical this morning.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  Heat scorched through her at his words as she remembered all the ways they had kept each other awake in the night. She was almost positive she was able to keep her fingers from trembling in his.

  “Do you mind if we swing by Frannie’s house before I drop you off? I want to make sure Josh hasn’t checked in. For all we know, he could be asleep in his own bed, not knowing that everything has suddenly changed.”

  “No problem,” she answered, trying not to be too disappointed when he released her hand so she could use both of hers for driving.

  Ross must have been listening to his cop’s intuition again. The very moment she pulled into the Frederickses’ driveway, a battered yellow sports car pulled up beside them and Josh climbed out.

  He looked tired, Julie thought. Tired and worried and somehow older than he had appeared the last time she saw him.

  She wondered how he would react to seeing them together so early at this time of the day but he didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow.

  “Hi,” he said when they joined him outside their respective vehicles. “You two are out and about early this morning.”

  Already the morning was shaping up to be a warm one. But the sun-warmed heat was nothing compared to the anger suddenly radiating from Ross.

  “Well?” he snapped to his nephew. “Let’s hear your explanation? I’ll warn you, it better be good.”

  Josh looked genuinely bewildered and a bit wary. She also thought she saw a little guilt there, as well. “Explanation for what?”

  “For what?” Ross’s voice rose on the last word. “Let’s start with where the hell you’ve been all night. Julie and I drove around Red Rock and San Antonio half the night looking for you!”

  His eyes widened with shock. “Why? I left you a note and then I called and left a message on voice mail. Didn’t you get it?”

  “Sure we got your note,” Ross answered tightly. “Do you think you could try to be a bit less cryptic next time? We didn’t know what was going on. And then when you didn’t answer your blasted phone all night long, what were we supposed to think?”

  “I told you a friend of mine needed help.” Josh suddenly seemed as taut and angry as his uncle and Julie wondered how much of his reaction was due to fatigue.

  “Did it ever once occur to you that saying only ‘a friend needs help’ could mean anything from algebra homework to changing a flat tire to running drugs across the border? You said you were going to help this friend but you didn’t say anything about it taking you the whole damn night.”

  “I didn’t expect to take all night. It was a…routine thing. But there were…complications. But everything’s okay now. She…everything’s okay.”

  An echo of worry flickered in his eyes and Julie reached a hand to rest on his arm. “Are you sure everything’s okay, Josh? You look tired.”

  Josh’s gaze met hers and for an instant that illusion of maturity disappeared and he looked suddenly desperately young. He seemed to want to lean on someone. He opened his mouth and she held her breath, hoping he would choose to confide in her and his uncle, but then he changed his mind and closed it again.

  He straightened his shoulders. “Yeah. It’s been a long night. Sounds like for you guys, too. I’m really sorry you made an unnecessary trip to San Antonio, but you can’t blame me for your own overreaction. I told you not to worry or wait up. And I left you a message, too. I told you not to worry about me.”

  “Easy for you to say!”

  “I’m officially eighteen, Uncle Ross. An adult in the eyes of the law. You don’t have to treat me like a baby and run off and look for me like some kind of bounty hunter.”

  Ross looked angry and uncomfortable at the same time. Julie cut him off before he could voice the angry words forming in his eyes and possibly say something he might come to regret after their respective tempers had cooled.

  “We were worried about you,” she said to Josh. “It seems uncharacteristic for you to just take off like this.”

  He suddenly seemed inordinately fascinated with the bluebells growing in his mother’s flower garden. “It was an emergency. And that’s all I can tell you right now.”

  * * *

  Ross knew his nephew was holding out on him. The boy—no, not a boy anymore—had secrets in his eyes. Ross was an expert at extracting information from unwilling subjects and sifting through lies and subterfuge to the truth but somehow none of his techniques seemed to work on his nephew.

  That was what happened when he let his emotions overrule his good sense. He ought to sit Josh in a room and make the kid tell him what was going on. But Josh was right, he was eighteen and Ross supposed he was entitled to a few secrets.

  He was so relieved that Josh hadn’t been involved with his father’s murder that he supposed he could let the mystery of his whereabouts overnight remain just that for now—a mystery.

  “If your cell phone had been working, I might have been able to call you to tell you the news,” he said.

  �
��What news?” Josh asked, his hand on the open doorframe of Ross’s SUV.

  He paused. “Your mom is being released from jail any minute now. I’m on my way to get her.”

  Josh stared at him as if he had just announced they were flying to Saturn later. “What?” he exclaimed. “Why didn’t you say so?”

  “You just got here. We haven’t exactly had much time to chat.”

  “This is huge! What happened? Did the stupid district attorney finally agree to reduce her bail?”

  “She’s being let out on her own recognizance. According to my sources, they’ve got someone else they like for the murder.”

  He watched his nephew’s reaction carefully and saw a mix of emotions chase across his features, everything from shock to disbelief and finally a deep, pure relief.

  “Who did they bring in?”

  “I’m still trying to get answers to that. Your mom called me a little while ago and said her attorney was working on getting the charges against her dropped but she didn’t know many details. I’ve been able to find out a little but not a name or anything like that. I’m heading down to the police station right now to see what else I can find out.”

  Josh’s hand tightened on the doorframe. “I’m coming with you.”

  His nephew had obviously been up all night, judging by the fatigue lining his eyes and the heavy sag of his shoulders. But he was young enough to survive an all-nighter. Ross had a feeling he wouldn’t be able to keep Josh away.

  “Get in, then. We can drop Julie off at her place on the way.”

  He took over behind the wheel from Julie and she slid into the passenger seat beside him. The three of them were mostly silent on the five-minute drive to her house. Ross found himself grateful for the buffer of Josh’s presence, suddenly aware of the monumental shift in his relationship with Julie after the night they had shared.

  He wasn’t ready for things to change. He enjoyed her friendship too much to ruin things with sex but he was afraid that’s exactly what he had done.

  He didn’t want things to get messy with her but he knew with brutal self-awareness that he sucked at relationships. He was much better at short-term flings, where women had few expectations beyond a few dates and a good time.