by B. J Daniels
“Would you mind driving?” Kat asked and handed over the keys to her SUV at the Bozeman airport. She was too upset right now to get behind the wheel, and she felt guilty that she wasn’t more upset over Angelina’s death.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Max asked once they were on their way to the ranch where he’d left his pickup a few days ago.
“I don’t mean to seem uncaring,” she said. “I’m sorry Angelina’s dead. But my stepmother and I were never close.”
“I gathered that, by your reaction,” Max said. “And by the fact that you and your sisters named her the Ice Queen.”
“I’m just afraid of what will happen now. She and my father have been having trouble, ever since my mother came back into the picture. Still, I know he loved Angelina. He has to be taking this hard. And yet, I also know how he feels about our mother.”
“Any idea what Angelina was doing up by Butte? I thought she and your father were campaigning.”
“Apparently she told him she had some personal business to take care of and flew home,” Kat said.
When they reached the ranch, Max stopped at the gate. “It appears everyone has heard,” he said, motioning toward the news vehicles parked near the gate. There were ten times as many as there had been when they’d left.
The guard, recognizing Kat’s vehicle, opened the gate. Max started to get out to let her drive, as several of the reporters moved toward the SUV.
“Keep going,” Kat cried. “I can’t face this alone. You and I are the only ones who know the truth about my mother.”
He glanced over at her. “Kat—”
“Please.”
He quickly shifted into gear and drove through the gate, which closed quickly behind them. “You aren’t going to tell him tonight.”
“No,” she said as the house loomed ahead of them. “But I’m going to need you to back up my story when I do. And I need you right now.”
* * *
MAX SAID NOTHING, but he couldn’t help being touched that she needed him and wanted him to be with her at this moment.
As for him backing her up with her father, Kat wouldn’t want to hear that it was going to take more than his word to get the senator to believe them. He was just thankful he had the photo of the Prophecy. Even with that, he figured Buckmaster Hamilton would be skeptical. Look what it had taken to convince Kat.
As he pulled up in front of the large sprawling ranch house, meeting the family was the last thing Max had expected to do. The journalist in him couldn’t believe his luck. He’d gotten into the inner sanctum when none of the other reporters stood a chance. But the man who’d come to care about Kat knew there was only one way he could do this.
“Everything, once I cross that threshold, is off the record,” he said.
She looked over at him as if she’d forgotten who he was. What he was. “I am making this hard on you, aren’t I?”
He let out a chuckle. “Yeah. But I’m here for you.”
She smiled at him. Her trust meant everything to him. Getting out, they headed toward the front door. Kat took his hand and held it as she opened the door, and they stepped in. He felt her hand clutch his and looked over to see the expression on her face when she saw her father.
All thought of his damned story was forgotten as Kat rushed to her father.
Senator Buckmaster Hamilton looked as if he was still in shock as he took his daughter in his arms. Max stood at the edge of the living room, taking in the other women gathered. He’d seen a few photos of the senator’s daughters that tabloid photographers had taken since the senator had thrown his hat into the presidential ring. The photos hadn’t been good—slightly out of focus, only in-passing shots or ones taken from their yearbooks.
But he could easily recognize most of them. Ainsley was the oldest sister, the blonde beauty with the intelligent blue eyes who also resembled her mother. Bo was also blonde, freckled and more girl next door with emerald-green eyes. The very pregnant one was Olivia, or Livie, as he’d heard Kat refer to her. She was the blue-eyed brunette who’d recently married a horse trainer named Cooper Barnett, who worked for her father.
The only ones he couldn’t tell apart were the twins, Harper and Cassidy. Kat had said they’d been in New York when they’d gotten the call. Another senator had offered them his jet to get them back to the ranch. They were now huddled on the couch, one on each side of Ainsley. They were all talking in low whispers and hadn’t noticed him.
All of them looked shell-shocked.
“I’m sorry,” Kat said as she turned to see Max standing at the edge of the room. She held out her hand. “Dad, this is Max Malone, a friend of mine, but also a reporter.”
All her sisters turned then to look at him. Apparently Kat didn’t bring many friends home, from their surprised expressions. But a reporter?
Max stepped forward to shake the senator’s hand. “I’m sorry to hear about your loss, Senator. I’m not here as a reporter. I’m only here as Kat’s friend. She asked me to bring her.”
“Thank you. So I can assume...”
“Everything is off the record. Also, I’ll be taking my leave, now that she’s home with her family.”
The senator nodded. The door opened, and two cowboys came in. Max was introduced to Livie’s husband, Cooper Barnett, and Bo’s fiancé, Jace Calder.
“Kat, if you’re all right, I should go and leave you with your family,” Max said when she joined him.
She hesitated, but only for a moment. “Take my car.”
He shook his head. “I can walk back to the gate to my pickup. The cold night air will do me good.”
She took both his hands in hers, her gray eyes large and misty. “Can we talk tomorrow?”
“You have my number,” he said, his gaze locking with hers. That spark between them took a hot, fast joyride through his veins before she let go.
Smiling, she said, “I think I do have your number.”
* * *
BUCKMASTER COULDN’T BELIEVE Angelina was dead. Just hours ago, he’d decided to leave her. Awash with guilt now, he looked at his beautiful daughters, the family he’d made with Sarah, and felt as if he’d caused his wife’s death. He’d wanted her gone, and yet, he’d loved her as much as he’d been able.
All these months of putting up with her jealousy, her plotting, her paranoia, he’d still loved Angelina. He’d owed her. She’d gotten him through the past fifteen years without Sarah. And now she was gone, and he felt such a mix of conflicting emotions that the guilt was killing him.
His cell phone vibrated. Since the news had come out about Angelina’s death, he’d been getting calls from campaign staff, contributors, friends and other politicians, even one from the president. He’d taken a few of the calls at first, but had finally let the calls go to voice mail. He was too shaken to even accept condolences right now.
But this time, when he checked his phone, he saw that it was from Sarah. He quickly stepped out of the room to take the call.
“Sarah?”
“I just heard, Buck. I’m so sorry.”
Suddenly he was so choked up he couldn’t speak. He hadn’t shed a tear since getting the news, but now the flood of emotion overwhelmed him. “I was going to leave her, Sarah,” he said through the heart-wrenching sentiment. “Just moments before I got the call, I’d decided to leave her.” He tried to pull himself together. “Did you hear what I said?”
“I don’t know what to say, Buck.”
“Say you won’t marry Russell.”
“Buck.” There was pleading in her voice. “This isn’t the time to make any kind of rash decisions.”
“On either of our parts,” he managed to say. “I can’t let you marry him, Sarah. I want you. It’s always been you.”
“But the election—”
“I don’t give a damn about it. Being president means nothing if you aren’t at my side.”
She sighed. “Buck.”
“Dad?”
He turned to see Harper standing in the doorway. “I’ll be right with you,” he said to her.
“I would imagine the girls are home?”
“Yes. Harper and Cassidy were in New York for a visit when they heard the news. They flew in earlier. I know you want to see them. I’m sorry I’ve kept them from you.”
“They don’t know me. I’ve missed so much of their lives. So much of yours.”
“There is still time, Sarah.”
“You should go.”
“We will talk soon,” he said. “In the meantime—”
“I know.”
He stood for a long moment after the call ended. Outside, the fall leaves on the aspen trees shimmered in the starlight. He told himself that everything was going to get better. But first he had to get through Angelina’s funeral. Then...then, he would deal with the rest of his life.
* * *
“YOU LOOK TIRED,” Nettie said that evening when the sheriff came home. She’d seen the change in him since he’d been trying to track down Dr. Ralph Venable, the man who’d been experimenting with brain wiping at the clinic in White Sulphur Springs.
The last anyone had heard from Dr. Venable, he’d sent a postcard from Santa Cruz do Sul, Brazil, but that had been twenty years ago. Nettie had been placing calls to every hospital and clinic in the area, but with little luck.
As talk of the upcoming election next year increased, she could see Frank worrying more and more.
“Any news on the missing journalist?” she asked, even though she would have heard something if Chuck Barrow had been found.
Her husband shook his head as he hung up his Stetson. His gunfighter mustache tickled as he gave her a kiss. She looked into his blue eyes and wondered how long it would be before he turned in his badge and retired. She knew, though, that he would hate retirement. But she didn’t know how to stop him. He was becoming more and more frustrated with the rules and regulations, the paperwork and how slow everything seemed to move in law enforcement.
Her cell phone rang. She thought about letting the call go to voice mail, but when it rang again, Frank said, “Go ahead. It could be the latest gossip. I can use a good laugh.”
She slapped his arm playfully as she pulled out her phone. The connection wasn’t great.
“Senora Curry?” a woman asked in what sounded to Nettie like a Spanish accent.
She realized it was probably Portuguese. Her heart leaped in her chest. “Yes, yes, this is Nettie Curry.”
“One moment,” the woman said. “The administrator would like to speak with you.”
“Senora Curry?” a man asked, static on the line. “This is Manuel Ramirez at the Santa Maria Clinic.”
“Yes.” She looked up at Frank. He was watching her with interest.
“I was told you were trying to reach Dr. Venable?”
“Yes, does he work at your clinic?”
“I’m sorry, but the doctor has left.”
“But he did work at your clinic?” she asked quickly.
“Yes, he and his assistant worked here for the past twenty years.”
“His assistant?”
“Senora Johnson.”
Sarah Johnson Hamilton? “You don’t happen to have a photo of the two of them, do you, Senor Ramirez?”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
KAT WENT WITH her sisters to the condo complex her father had built for the six of them, but none of them were ready to go to sleep yet. They’d stayed up talking after Livie and Bo had left.
It was nice to have Harper and Cassidy back, although Cassidy said she was leaving right after the funeral.
“She met a man in France. He’s interning in New York,” Harper had explained.
“It isn’t serious,” Cassidy said. “We’re just having fun.”
The twins had been studying abroad, but Kat could tell that they were both restless. “What do you want to do, now that you’ve graduated?” she asked them as they sat around the separate living area.
Both shrugged. “I’m staying here to be with Dad,” Harper said. “I don’t want him to be alone.”
“He’s hardly alone,” Ainsley said. “I’m sure he’ll be going back to DC after the funeral.”
Harper looked surprised. “I thought he’d drop out of the race.”
“I wish he would,” Kat said without thinking.
“Oh, you’ve always been antipolitics,” Cassidy said. “You’re worse than mother.”
“You’ve been in contact with her?” she asked in surprise.
Cassidy shrugged. “We’ve been chatting online, and I’ve talked to her a few times on the phone. I don’t really know her, but I think she’s sweet.”
Sweet. Wasn’t that what Kat used to think? “She told you she hates politics?”
“It’s obvious that she doesn’t have an interest and she hates being in the spotlight. But she’s very supportive of Dad being president. She’s proud of him.”
Kat bit down hard on her tongue for a moment. “It sounds like you’ve communicated with her a lot.”
“She picked us up at the airport,” Harper said. “It wasn’t as weird as I thought it would be. She looks like all of us, more like you, Kat, and definitely you, Ainsley. But I can see each of us in her.”
Kat was surprised to hear that their mother had picked the twins up at the airport and brought them to the ranch. “Did she come in the house?”
All three of her sisters looked over at her.
“It isn’t as if she’s going to come in and steal our silver,” Ainsley said, frowning at her.
“I was just curious,” Kat said in her defense. The thought of her mother being in this house again terrified her.
“We invited her in, but she declined,” Cassidy said. “I felt sorry for her. What would it be like to lose more than twenty years of your life like that and then to come back, and your husband has married someone else and she’s living in your house?”
“Well, he’s not married anymore,” Ainsley said.
“Do you think Dad wants to get back together with Mom?” Harper asked.
“There’s nothing stopping them now,” Cassidy said, sounding more than accepting of the idea.
Kat couldn’t let that happen. “I would hope he doesn’t do anything for a while.”
“The media would annihilate him if he got married again too soon,” Ainsley said. “But I know he still loves Mother. Remember what Livie told us? Dad confessed that Mother is the only woman he’s truly loved. Would it really be so awful?”
Kat got up and excused herself, unable to listen to this kind of talk any longer. She and Max had agreed not to tell her sisters. They would talk to her father first, show him the photo and what evidence they had. He could then break the news to her sisters.
But they had to do it soon, before Sarah found a way to get back into their father’s life.
* * *
WITH A SINKING FEELING, Russell Murdock listened to the news as he drove toward his ranch. The senator’s wife was dead. He slowed his pickup and pulled over beside the road. Angelina was dead?
For a moment, he couldn’t breathe. The pain in his chest wasn’t a heart attack, but he almost wished it was. Buckmaster Hamilton was free. There would be nothing stopping him from getting Sarah back.
“Except for political suicide,” Russell said to the empty truck cab. He tried to tell himself that the senator wouldn’t give up everything he’d worked for—not for a woman. But Sarah wasn’t just any woman. She was the mother of his six daughters. She was quite possibly the love of his life.
“You can’t have he
r,” he said, his voice breaking. “She’s mine.” But even as he said it, he knew that everything had changed. It wouldn’t matter that he’d put a diamond engagement ring on Sarah’s finger. Buckmaster could buy her a ring ten times as big. Buckmaster could give her a larger ranch. Maybe he could even give her the White House.
“But I can give her love,” Russell said and slammed his palm down on the steering wheel. “Love that she can count on.”
He thought again of Sarah, so desperate that she’d tried to kill herself that winter night years ago when she’d driven her SUV into the freezing Yellowstone River. Russell was still convinced that Buckmaster had been the cause.
“So how can she go back to him?” The empty truck cab seemed to echo his words. “Because she loves him.”
Russell let out a bitter laugh. It was that simple. And that complicated. Sarah loved Buck. She would probably always love him. And vice versa.
“You’re going to have to let her go,” he said quietly over the gentle throb of the pickup engine. The thought broke his heart.
But trying to hold on to her would only cause them both more pain.
Shifting into first gear, he pulled back on to the narrow two-lane dirt road. He wanted to turn around, go back to the cabin where Sarah was still staying. She would have heard the news by now. Buck had bought her a car. For all Russell knew, she might have already packed up and left.
He might have driven up to the cabin where she was still staying until the wedding, but the moment he saw her face, he would know, and there would be nothing either of them could say. For now, he could hope he was wrong.
* * *
MAX HAD WALKED down to the gate, gotten in his pickup and driven into town. He’d told himself all he needed was a big beefsteak at the Grand and a good night’s sleep in a soft bed.
But he couldn’t help worrying. Angelina Hamilton’s death was like a rock thrown into a still pond. It would cause a ripple effect, changing everything. Kat was right. They had to tell her father. With the senator’s wife dead and gone, there would be nothing stopping Sarah from working her way back into Buckmaster’s life.
It would be an uphill battle convincing the senator, though. Max had seen firsthand Sarah and her former husband together. Now there was nothing standing in Buckmaster’s way. If he wanted his first wife back—and Max was positive he did—then there was nothing stopping him, especially Sarah’s engagement to Russell Murdock.
