by Paula Graves
I’m in Freedom. Call me. We need to talk. No number written down on the page, so he guessed she still had her old cell phone number.
He crumpled the paper and tossed it in the garbage can in the kitchen, grabbing his jacket. He was halfway to his truck when his curiosity overcame his stubborn pride.
What on God’s green earth would Alexis be doing in Texas? He’d known her since they were both twelve years old, and he’d never heard her mention any family here. Certainly not in a tiny dot on the map like Freedom.
Had something happened to someone in her family? Did she need his help with something?
Growling a profanity, he climbed into the truck cab and pulled out his cell phone. She was still on his speed dial, he noticed with a grimace. He punched the code.
She answered on the first ring. “Hey, stranger.”
He laid his head back against the headrest. She might be a liar and a cheat, but that sweet magnolia accent still sounded pretty damned good. “What’s wrong, Alexis?”
There was a brief pause on the other end of the line. “Nothing’s wrong. I just need to talk to you about something.”
“Call my lawyer.”
“It’s not a lawyer kind of topic,” she said, impatience adding a hint of spice to that honeyed drawl. “Just come meet me at the Bella Rosa. I’ll buy you a cup of coffee.”
“Despite your best efforts, I can still buy my own cup of coffee,” he replied. “Are you there now?”
“Yes. You’ll come?”
“Yes,” he said after a long pause. “But this better be important.”
“It is,” she assured him.
He hung up without responding, muttering a low curse as he realized his nightmare of a marriage had found a way to live on, even after the divorce papers had been signed.
Bella Rosa was a small bistro on the eastern edge of Freedom’s town square. It was a few blocks down from Talk of the Town, the friendly little café owned by Matt Soarez’s pretty fiancée, Faith. Harlan was glad Alexis had expensive tastes-if he’d met his ex-wife at Talk of the Town, news of the meeting would be all over town by sunset.
Meeting her at Bella Rosa meant the news would take a few more days to circulate, giving him time to come up with a story that didn’t make him look like a grade-A sap.
She was sitting at a table near the back, her honey-blond hair twisted into a neat, attractive coil at the base of her neck. She arched one perfect eyebrow at his casual attire-he’d seen no reason to change out of his jeans and golf shirt just to have lunch with his ex-wife-but waved him over.
“What’s up?” he asked without preamble, sitting across from her and waving off the waiter who’d practically trailed him to the table.
“You don’t want anything to eat?”
“I’m not hungry.” Not the exact truth, but he wasn’t hungry enough to eat with her. “Just get to the point.”
She took a deep breath and folded her neatly manicured hands over each other. “I’m getting remarried.”
Harlan wasn’t sure what he’d expected her to say, but telling him she was getting married again wasn’t it.
“No response?” she asked with a nervous chuckle.
“What’s there to say? Congratulations, I guess? Best wishes? I never remember which you say to the bride and which to the groom.”
“Thank you.” She smiled at him.
“So I guess this takes me off the hook for any more alimony.”
“I never wanted you to have to pay alimony. I don’t need your money.”
“I don’t think you ever needed anything from me,” he murmured. “Speaking of the groom, I have to admit I’m surprised. I always figured Ted the Contractor as more a fling kind of relationship than anything long-term, but if he makes you happy-”
“I’m not marrying Ted,” she said. “I’m marrying Alden.”
He stared at her. “Alden? Your fifty-year-old shark of a divorce lawyer Alden?”
“Forty-six,” she corrected. “And he’s only a shark in the courtroom. He’s really very sweet. And attentive.”
And I wasn’t attentive, Harlan thought. Of course, I was a little busy at the time, dodging bullets and bombs while fighting for my country, but hey. That’s not your problem, is it, sweetheart?
“How’s your hand?” she asked a moment later. He wasn’t sure if she asked the question just to break the uncomfortable silence or if she really cared.
He flexed his right hand, where the scar tissue from the shrapnel wounds was still pale and tight, limiting his mobility. “About the same. I think therapy’s gotten me about as far as it can. I just have to adjust to the limitations now.”
“I’m sorry you were hurt, but I’m glad it got you out of the Marines,” Alexis said, her chin held high as if bracing herself for his anger.
“Too bad you didn’t wait a few months longer before you slept with the contractor. I’d have had plenty of time to be attentive,” he responded.
She looked hurt by his words. He almost felt guilty, until he remembered the humiliation of walking into his bedroom and finding Alexis naked and wrapped around the muscular contractor Harlan had hired to build their dream home.
“I’ve told you I was sorry you found us that way.”
“But not about having sex with the guy behind my back?”
“You know as well as I do our marriage was doomed. We’re too different. We want different things out of life.”
That much was true. He definitely didn’t want to marry a ruthless divorce lawyer. Matter of fact, he didn’t want to marry anyone at all. Ever again.
Once was enough.
“You flew all the way to Texas to tell me you were getting married?” he asked. “You could have just called.”
“Alden’s attending a conference in Lubbock. I thought it would be better to tell you the news face-to-face.”
He just looked at her, taking in her prom-queen beauty, which hadn’t yet faded with age, and her hopeful expression. She wanted closure. Maybe even absolution.
Would it hurt so much to give it to her?
He forced a smile. “I really do hope you and Alden are happy. And that he stays just as attentive fifty years from now as he is today.”
Her smile in return made her look sixteen years old again, bright and beautiful and everything he’d thought he wanted in life. He’d loved her like crazy once.
But not anymore, he realized with a little shiver of relief. He might still resent her infidelity and her lies, but he didn’t really care who she slept with anymore.
I guess that’s progress, he thought.
“I hope you find someone, too,” she added.
He felt his rising mood deflate again. “I’m not really in the market.”
“Just because our marriage didn’t work out-”
He stood, looking down at her one last time. “Have a good life, Alexis.”
“You, too,” she said.
But he was already headed out the door, stepping into the warm midday breeze blowing in over the western plains.
He looked around him, taking in the friendly facades of the shops and businesses that formed the town square. Old cottonwoods and sprawling oaks lined the streets, giving the place the look of an idyllic oasis in the middle of the arid Texas Panhandle.
He’d taken the job Bart Bellows offered because it was a chance to start over, to see what life would be like outside the Marine Corps and his shattered marriage. Freedom seemed like a great place to make a new life-just as in most small towns, it was hard to stay a stranger for long in Freedom.
But Harlan had never felt more alone.
He checked his watch. A little after two. Half of the day spread out ahead of him, barren and daunting.
With a sigh, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed the direct line Lila Lockhart had given him before he left her ranch the night she gave him his new assignment.
He was surprised she answered on the first ring. “Hello, Mr. McClain.” Her drawl was warm and amuse
d. “You haven’t reconsidered, have you?”
“No, Governor, I haven’t. In fact, I’d like to get started today. How quickly can you gather up the staff?”
Chapter Five
Stacy sneaked a glance at her watch. Nearly four. Zachary was probably through with his ride by now.
When was Harlan McClain going to adjourn this meeting?
“Need to be somewhere?” Greg Merritt murmured.
“Nervous habit.”
Harlan McClain’s eyes narrowed, but he kept speaking. “We’re setting up guards at all entry roads. Until the fence is constructed, we’ve set up checkpoints around the property-on the approach to the guesthouse, the path to the pasture, the main road and the road to the stables. We need to keep track of where everyone is and where you’re going.”
Great, Stacy thought. Just great. She had to go through a checkpoint to pick up her son from his ride?
“I need full cooperation to make this work. One of the best ways we can detect and identify threats to the governor is for the rest of us to stick to the protocols so that the aberrations stand out. Everybody understand?”
There were nods and murmurs of assent. Stacy released a soft sigh of frustration.
“I know these new protocols sound overly restrictive, but they’re necessary for the governor’s protection. Yours, too. People were killed in Austin. We can’t let that happen here. Not on our watch.”
Stacy felt guilty for feeling frustrated, but the facts didn’t change her dilemma. She needed to get her son from the stables without going through the security checkpoint Harlan McClain had set up. She didn’t want the governor to know she’d taken time out of work to give in to one of her son’s whims. Lila already worried that the job was too much for Stacy.
She couldn’t afford to give the governor evidence to support that concern.
“Starting tomorrow, everyone gets ID badges. You need to wear these at all times when on the grounds.”
Soft grumbles filled the room.
“It was my idea.” Lila spoke up for the first time since Harlan convened the meeting. The grumbles subsided.
“There’s a checkpoint outside this office now. As each of you leave, you’ll sign out. This will be required at each checkpoint-sign in and sign out.”
And the situation just kept getting worse, Stacy thought. Maybe she could talk a checkpoint guard into keeping her trip to the stable and back to himself, but she couldn’t ask him to let her go through without signing in or out.
Which left her with only one choice.
She’d have to bypass security and sneak her way to the stable to pick up her son.
“I THINK THEY TOOK IT WELL, considering,” Lila commented to Harlan after the employees filed out of her office.
“I suppose I should have softened the blow a little more,” he admitted. “But we really should have put these protocols into place the day you returned from Austin.”
The governor leaned back in her chair, crossing one leg over the other. She looked tired and tense, though she’d hidden her distress quite well while the rest of her staff had been in the room with her. “Austin police haven’t found any leads. They’re studying the surveillance systems at the capitol, but they haven’t found anything yet.”
“Have you ever considered that it might have been an inside job?” Harlan asked.
Lila met his gaze. “I’ve considered it. I don’t want to.”
“From what I understand, your decision to make the announcement of your candidacy was pretty last-minute.”
“Yes. I’ve been considering a run for a while, but the decision to hold the press conference was spur of the moment. The only person I told more than two days beforehand was Stacy.”
Harlan felt a funny dipping sensation in his gut. “An outside agitator wouldn’t have had much of a chance to figure out a way inside your defenses in such a short amount of time.”
“You’re not suggesting Stacy-”
“I’m not suggesting anything,” he said quickly. “I’m just asking questions, trying to get a clearer picture of the flow of information around here.”
“We’ve always run things here at the ranch differently than we do when we’re at the capitol,” Lila admitted. “This is my home. The people who work here are like family to me. We treat each other that way.”
“That’s a nice way to do business if you can,” Harlan conceded. “But you’re going to have to start doing things differently, especially now that you’re seeking higher office.”
Lila sighed, closing her eyes. “I know.”
“It’ll only get worse if you’re successful in your bid.”
Her lips curved. “I know that, too. I’ve always considered it a fair trade.” She opened her eyes again, pinning him with her strong blue-eyed gaze. “I’d just hoped to put off that moment for a little longer.”
“I’ll try to make it as comfortable for you and your staff as I can. Within limits.”
Lila cocked her head. “Bart told me you were the perfect person to head my security team for this fundraiser. He said you’re completely unsentimental and unafraid to be brutally honest. I need you to be that for me.”
“I’ll try to always be straight with you.”
“I know. I just hope you won’t forget what I said about my staff being like family.”
“I won’t, ma’am. I promise.”
“Go see how your protocols are working.” Lila smiled at him. “I can see you’re curious.”
He was, a little. He suspected it would take a little while for people to get used to such strict control of their movements after being given the run of the place for so long.
He hated having to do it to them; as much as he’d thrived under the discipline of the Marine Corps, he had fond memories of his youth in the North Georgia mountains, where the hot summer days had seemed the purest form of freedom-hours of tramping through the woods and playing with friends without school bells or homework to interrupt the fun. His parents had both worked, leaving him in the half-interested care of his teenage sister, whose only rules were to stay out of the hospital and stay out of jail. Somehow, he’d managed to keep those rules, though sometimes by the finest of hairs.
He checked with the guard outside the governor’s office. All fifteen staffers had signed the sheet. His gaze slid down to the clean, bold signature of Stacy Giordano.
She’d seemed restless during the meeting. And when he’d laid out the details of the security protocols, she’d looked frustrated and unhappy.
The only person I told more than two days beforehand was Stacy. The governor’s words rang in his head.
The idea that she could have anything to do with the threat against the governor seemed ludicrous on its face. She’d been the one who found the bomb. She’d dashed right into the debris, stayed there even after she found the bomb and any reasonable person would have completely understood if she’d decided to clear out and let the bomb squad figure a way in to the bomb.
Of course, if she’d been the bomber, or knew the bomber, she’d feel pretty confident the explosive device wasn’t going to blow. Not while she was in the line of fire, anyway.
Pulling his phone from his pocket, he jotted a note to do a background check on the governor’s office staff. He should have started this yesterday, when he found out he was going to be in charge of security for the upcoming fundraiser. He’d already begun to suspect the bombing could have been an inside job.
Do you really think it’s Stacy Giordano?
He had learned to trust his instincts, and something about Stacy’s demeanor during the meeting had set off his radar, big-time. She didn’t like the security protocols one bit, and he wanted to know why.
He jotted another note on his phone.
Check Stacy Giordano first.
T OMORROW, STACY PROMISED herself, I’ll stick to the security protocols like glue. Just not today, when her five-year-old was probably counting the minutes she was late and working himself up into a
fine lather.
The security checkpoint was stationed about seventy yards up the dirt road that led to the stable, but she decided she could stay out of sight for most of the trip to the horse barn by circling around and approaching from the rear, through a rough bit of scrubby pasture fenced off to keep the horses away from the treacherous minefield of gopher holes. Reclaiming the fallow land was on the ranch agenda for next spring, but for now, it gave Stacy a more stealthy approach to the stable.
From inside the horse barn, she heard the familiar sounds of a working stable-the soft nickers of horses and the murmur of conversations between the grooms working inside. Over the other sounds, she heard the high-pitched sound of her son’s voice responding to something a groom had said. She smiled at the sweet, familiar sound.
“Forget something?”
The gravelly drawl, close to her ear, nearly made her jump out of her skin. Whirling, she found herself face-to-face with Harlan McClain, who stood only inches away, his brown eyes hard with suspicion.
“You scared the life out of me.” She pressed her hand to her chest, her cheeks hot with guilt.
His only response was a slow, thorough appraisal of her, head to foot and back again, as if he were trying to see right through to her bones.
“Do you need something from me?” she asked when the continuing silence grew excruciating.
“The truth would be a good start.”
“The truth?” she echoed, not yet ready to incriminate herself, just in case he didn’t realize she’d sneaked her way here instead of following the protocols he’d set up.
“The road from the governor’s house to here is straight and remarkably level for a dirt road. Very easy walking.”
She didn’t reply, although she knew where he was headed.
“So I have to wonder why you chose to walk a quarter mile farther than necessary through a scrubby field to get here when you had such a nice easy path.”
His caustic tone made her bristle, driving away her lingering sense of chagrin. “Are you accusing me of something, Mr. McClain?”
