B.J. Daniels the Cardwell Ranch Collection

by B. J Daniels

  As Dana was leaving, she stopped at the nurses’ station to inquire about her father’s visitors.

  “Your brother was here,” the nurse said. “That’s the only visitor he’s had today.”

  “My brother?”

  “The skinny one.”

  Clay. That meant that neither Jordan nor Stacy had been here.

  “But there have been a lot of calls checking on his condition,” the nurse added.

  Dana thanked her and headed back toward the ranch. She wanted to get a change of clothing if she was going to be staying at Hud’s again tonight.

  She knew she was being silly, wanting to slow things down. She loved Hud. He loved her. They’d spent too much time apart as it was. So why was she so afraid?

  Because she didn’t believe they could just pick up where they’d left off. They’d both changed. Didn’t they need to get to know each other again—everything else that was going on aside?

  And yet even as she thought it, she knew that the chemistry they shared was still there as well as the love. She knew what was holding her back. This investigation. Until Ginger Adams’s killer was caught, Dana didn’t feel safe. And she had no idea why.

  As she drove down the road to the ranch house, she saw the tracks in the snow. Hud would have driven in to feed Joe. But there was at least another set of tire tracks. Someone else had been to the house today.

  ZOEY SKINNER was filling salt and pepper shakers during the slow time between lunch and dinner in the large West Yellowstone café.

  Hud couldn’t say he remembered her. But she wasn’t the kind of woman who stood out. Quite the opposite, she tended to blend into her surroundings.

  The café was empty this time of the day, with it being a little too early yet for dinner.

  He took a chair at a table in a far corner and glanced out the window at the walls of snow.

  The town had changed over the years since the advent of snowmobiles. Where once winters were off season and most of the businesses closed and lay dormant under deep snowbanks, now the town literally buzzed with activity.

  A large group of snowmobilers in their one-piece suits, heavy boots and dark-shielded helmets roared past in a cloud of blue smoke and noise.

  “Coffee?”

  He turned to find Zoey Skinner standing over his table, a menu tucked under her arm, a coffeepot in one hand and a cup in the other.

  “Please. Cream and sugar.”

  Zoey was boney-thin, her arms corded from years of waiting tables, her legs webbed with blue veins although she was no more than in her early forties.

  She filled the cup, produced both sugar and cream packages from her apron pocket. “Menu?”

  He shook his head. “Just coffee, thanks. And if you have a moment—” he said, flashing his badge “—I’m Marshal Hudson Savage. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  She stared down at the badge, then slowly lifted her gaze to his. “This is about Ginger, isn’t it?”

  He nodded.

  She dropped into the chair opposite his, her body suddenly limp as a rag doll’s. She put the coffeepot on the table and cradled her head in her hands as she looked at him.

  “I always wondered what happened to her,” she said. “I heard that she’d been found in that well and I couldn’t believe it.”

  “When was the last time you saw her?” he asked, taking out his notebook and pen.

  “The night she left to get married.”

  “She was getting married?”

  “Well, not right away.” Zoey’s face softened. “Ginger was so happy and excited.”

  “Who was she marrying?”

  He saw her face close. “She said it was better I didn’t know. Better that no one knew until they were married.”

  He studied the small, mousy-haired waitress. “Why was it so important to keep it a secret?”

  “Ginger was afraid of jinxing it, you know? She’d been disappointed so many times before.”

  He didn’t believe that for a minute. “Was it possible this man was married?” He saw the answer in Zoey’s face. Bull’s-eye. “So maybe that’s why she didn’t want anyone to know. Maybe he hadn’t told his wife he was leaving her yet.”

  Zoey frowned and chewed at her lower lip. “Ginger just wanted to be loved. That’s all. You know, have someone love her and take care of her.” He got the feeling that Zoey not only knew who the man was but she also knew something else, something she wanted to tell him and for some reason was afraid to.

  He took a shot in the dark. “This man, did he have money? He must have been older. Powerful?” The kind of man a woman like Ginger would have been attracted to.

  Zoey looked away but not before he’d seen the answer in her eyes along with the fear. He felt his heart rate quicken. He was getting close. Was it possible the man was still around?

  “Zoey, someone threw your best friend down a well, but when that didn’t kill her, he shot her and left her there to die.”

  All the color drained from her face.

  “Before she died, she tried to crawl out,” he said.

  A cry escaped Zoey’s lips. She covered her mouth, her eyes wide and filled with tears.

  “Ginger wanted desperately to live. Whoever threw her down that well was trying to get rid of her for good. If this man she was going to marry really loved her, then he would want you to tell me everything you knew.”

  Zoey pulled a napkin from the container on the table and wiped at her eyes. “What about the baby?”

  “Baby?”

  Zoey nodded. “She was pregnant. Just a few weeks along.”

  That explained why there hadn’t been another skeleton in the well.

  Ginger hadn’t been far enough along for there to be any evidence of a baby in a pile of bones at the bottom of a well.

  But Hud realized it did give the father of the baby a motive for murder. “Did Ginger tell the father about the baby?” Zoey looked down. “Let me guess, he didn’t want the baby.”

  “He did,” Zoey protested, head coming up. “Ginger said he promised to take care of her and the baby.”

  “Maybe he did,” Hud said solemnly. “Didn’t you suspect something was wrong when you didn’t hear from her again or she didn’t come back for her things?”

  “She took everything she wanted with her.”

  “Didn’t she have a car?”

  “She sold that.”

  “But didn’t you think it was strange when you didn’t hear from her?” he persisted.

  “I just thought when things didn’t work out that she was embarrassed, you know?”

  He stared at Zoey, all his suspicions confirmed. “What made you think things didn’t work out?”

  She saw her mistake and tried to cover. “I never heard that she got married so…”

  “You know things didn’t work out because you knew who the man was. He’s still in town, isn’t he, Zoey? He never left his wife. He killed your friend and her baby and he got away with it.”

  Her face filled with alarm. “He wouldn’t hurt her. He loved her.” Her expression changed ever so slightly. She’d remembered something, something that made her doubt what she’d just said.

  “They fought?” he guessed. “He ever hit her?” Hud was pretty sure he had, given what he suspected the man had done to Ginger at the end.

  “Once. But that was just because he didn’t want her wearing the engagement ring until…you know…until he was ready for them to announce it,” she said. “Ginger forgot to take it off and was wearing the ring around town.”

  “Engagement ring?”

  She nodded. “They fought about it. He wanted her to give it back so she didn’t forget and wear it in public again. She refused. He hit her and tried to take it back.”

  Hud thought of the crime lab’s report on the broken fingers of Ginger’s left hand.

  “What did this ring look like?” he asked, trying to keep the fear out of his voice.

  “It was shaped like a diamond on
ly it was green,” she said. “He told Ginger it was an emerald, a really expensive one. It looked like it really was. And there were two diamonds, too. So don’t you see? He wouldn’t have given her an expensive ring like that unless he loved her, right?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Dana pulled into the yard in front of the ranch house and parked, relieved to see no other vehicles. She’d worried she would come home to find Jordan searching the house again.

  She wondered what he’d been up to all day since apparently he hadn’t visited their father in the hospital. Why had Jordan lied about when he’d gotten into town if he hadn’t been the one who’d put the doll in the well, who’d left the chocolates, who’d been trying to drive her from the ranch?

  Getting out of the pickup, she walked to the porch. Someone had shoveled the steps. Hud no doubt.

  Joe came around the side of the porch from his doghouse wagging his tail. He was pretty much deaf but he still seemed to know when she came home.

  She rubbed his graying head and climbed the porch, digging for her keys she’d tossed in her purse after forgetting she was locking up the house now.

  But as she shoved open the door and looked inside, she wondered why she’d bothered. Someone had ransacked the place.

  She cursed and looked down at Joe. He seemed as perplexed as she was. Had he even barked at the intruder? She doubted it. She watched him as he followed her into the torn-up living room. He wasn’t even sniffing around or acting as if a stranger had been here.

  Because the person who’d torn up the house wasn’t a stranger, she thought angrily. It was someone in her family, sure as hell. Jordan.

  The house was a mess but nothing looked broken. It appeared he had done a frantic search not taking the time to put anything back where it had been.

  She thought about calling Hud, but if she was right and Jordan had done this, his prints were already all over the house so it would prove nothing to find more of them.

  Cursing under her breath, she took off her coat and went to work, putting the living room back in order. She had to pull out the vacuum since one of the plants had been turned over and there was dirt everywhere.

  She promised she would fix whoever had done this as she turned on the vacuum. Over the roar of the vacuum, she didn’t hear the car drive up, didn’t hear someone come up the steps and tap at the door. Nor did she see her visitor peer inside to see if she was alone.

  HUD DIALED Needles and Pins the minute he left the Lonesome Pine Café and Zoey.

  “Hilde, I need to speak to Dana.”

  “Hud? Is everything all right?”

  “No,” he said. “Tell me she’s still there.”

  He heard Hilde sigh and his heart dropped like a stone.

  “Hud, she left earlier. She ran an errand and then went to visit her dad. But she should be at the ranch by now.”

  Hud groaned. Of course she would want to visit her dad again. He should have put a deputy on her. Right. Wouldn’t Dana have loved having Norm Turner following her around all day? But Hud would have gladly put up with her wrath just to know she was safe right now.

  “Hud, what is it?” Hilde cried. “Do you want me to try to find her?”

  “No, I’m not that far away. I can get there quicker.” He disconnected, his mind racing with everything he’d learned. The highway was slick with ice. He drove as fast as he could, dialing the ranch house as he did.

  The phone rang and rang. Either Dana wasn’t home yet or—The woman didn’t even have an answering machine?

  His radio squawked. He closed the cell phone and grabbed the radio. “Marshal Savage.”

  “It’s Deputy Stone,” Liza said, all business. “Angus Cardwell’s .38. It doesn’t match. Not even close. It wasn’t the murder weapon.” She sounded disappointed since she’d been so sure it was—based on Angus Cardwell’s reaction to her finding the gun in his pickup.

  He took in the information, his heart racing a little faster. He’d been sure it would be the gun. And after what Dana had told him about Angus’s argument and heart attack, Hud had suspected Jordan Cardwell would turn out to be the person who’d used the gun. Could he be wrong about Jordan’s involvement?

  “But we do have a match on the prints found on both the doll and the box of chocolates,” she said. “They were Jordan Cardwell’s.”

  Jordan. He’d suspected Jordan of a lot more. What bothered Hud was the incident with the doll in the well and the box of undoctored chocolates didn’t go together. One was so innocuous. The other was possibly attempted murder on Dana. At the very least, assault on an officer of the law.

  “I’m on my way back from Missoula,” Liza said. “Anything else you want me to do?”

  “No, it’s supposed to be your day off. Drive carefully.” He disconnected and radioed his other deputy.

  “Deputy Turner,” Norm said.

  “Pick up Jordan Cardwell ASAP,” Hud ordered. He heard the deputy’s feet hit the floor.

  “On what charge, sir?”

  “Let’s start with assault on a marshal,” Hud said. Jordan’s mother and Kitty Randolph had been friends. Jordan could have had access to Kitty’s ring. “Just find him and get him locked up. Let me know the minute he’s behind bars.”

  As he disconnected, Hud thought about Kitty Randolph’s emerald ring. He now knew how it had ended up with Ginger Adams in the well. He just hoped to hell he was wrong about who had killed her.

  AS DANA SHUT OFF the vacuum, she sensed someone watching her and turned, startled to see a shadow cross the porch.

  The doorbell rang. She opened the door and blinked in surprise. “Mrs. Randolph?” The bruise on the older woman’s face was darker than it had been earlier in the day. She had what appeared to be that same shoe box under one arm and her hat was askew.

  Kitty Randolph smiled. “Hello, dear. I’m sorry to drop by unannounced like this.” She looked past Dana. “Did I catch you at a bad time? I was hoping to talk to you. Alone, if possible?”

  “Of course, come in.”

  “You’re sure it’s not a bad time?” Kitty asked, her gaze going again past Dana into the house.

  “Not at all. I was just doing some cleaning myself.”

  The older woman turned and stuck out one leg to show off her blue slacks. “That thread you sold me was the perfect color blue, don’t you think?”

  Dana admired the recently hemmed slacks, telling herself this couldn’t possibly be the reason Kitty had driven all the way out here. It was probably the upcoming fund-raiser. Dana groaned at the thought. The fund-raiser was weeks away. Was she going to find Kitty on her doorstep every day until it was over?

  “Can I take your coat?” Dana asked, wondering what was in the worn-looking shoe box. Probably old apron patterns. Or recipes.

  “The judge always liked me in blue,” Kitty said as if she hadn’t heard Dana. “That was until his tastes changed to red.”

  Dana smiled, remembering the red-and-gold master bedroom—and the bright red high-heeled shoe Kitty had tossed back into the closet earlier at her house.

  “Would you like something to drink?” Dana asked. “I could put on some coffee. Or would you prefer tea?” She hoped Hud showed up soon, as he’d promised earlier. He might be the only way she could get rid of the woman.

  “Neither, thank you. I couldn’t help thinking about your visit to my house today,” she said, glancing toward the kitchen again. “Sometimes I am so forgetful. You did say you’re alone, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.” Was it possible Kitty Randolph had forgotten that Stacy had visited her last night? “Did you remember something about Stacy?”

  “Stacy, interesting woman.” Her twinkling blue eyes settled on Dana’s face. “How could two sisters be so different? You’re so much like your mother and your sister is…” She raised a disapproving brow. “She’s an alley cat like your father. But then some women are born to it.”

  Dana frowned and almost found herself defending her sister. Instead she stu
died the older woman, noticing that Kitty seemed…different somehow. Oddly animated. She’d always been a soft-spoken, refined woman who’d obviously come from old wealth. She’d never heard Kitty talk like this.

  “This must all be very upsetting for you,” Dana said. Ginger Adams’s body being found in the well had dredged up the judge’s murder. Of course Kitty would be distraught.

  “Yes, dear, I can’t tell you how upsetting it’s been.” Kitty stepped over to one of the old photographs on the wall and Dana noticed with a start that it was of the old homestead up on the hillside.

  “Did I ever tell you that the judge’s family were well drillers?” Kitty asked.

  “I didn’t know that.”

  Kitty turned and smiled, “The judge’s father drilled most every well around here. Including the one up at your family’s old homestead.”

  THE RADIO SQUAWKED as Hud neared Big Sky—and the Cardwell Ranch.

  “I’ve got Jordan Cardwell here, sir,” Deputy Norm Turner said. “He insists on talking to you for his one phone call.”

  Hud breathed a sigh of relief that Jordan was behind bars. Now at least Dana should be safe. “Put him on.”

  “Is this about the other night, that thing with the doll and the well?” Jordan demanded.

  “You mean, where you tried to kill me?” Hud said.

  “I’m telling you the same thing I told Dana, I had nothing to do with it.”

  “You lied about when you flew in, you lied about your relationship with Ginger Adams, and you expect me to believe you? Save your breath, your fingerprints were found on both the doll—and the box of chocolates.”

  “I did fly in the day before, the instant I heard about the bones in the well, and I knew Ginger,” Jordan said. “I probably touched the stupid doll when I was searching for the will. And I also gave Dana the chocolates. I wanted her to think they were from you. I thought it might make her treat you a little nicer and that it would speed up the investigation so we could get on with selling the ranch.”

  “You are so thoughtful.”

  “Listen to me, I do care about my sister,” Jordan said. “If I didn’t put some stupid doll down in the well to scare Dana, then who did? That person doesn’t seem to be behind bars in your quaint little jail.”