The Colton Marine

by Lisa Childs

  And who the hell had done it? Because once River found out, he would take the person apart. Remembering how he’d found Edith, lying unconscious on the concrete, blood pooling beneath her head...

  He shuddered with dread over what could have happened to her. But she was strong—so strong—that it would take more than a few racks and crates to take her out.

  But why would anyone try?

  “The crowbar certainly suggests it,” Knox remarked. “Why else would it be here?”

  Heat crawled up River’s neck into his face. “Uh, I had the crowbar down here.”

  “Why?” Knox asked, glancing around the cellar before returning his attention to River. He studied him through narrowed eyes. “What were you doing with it?”

  Trying to find the lever to open a door to a secret room. But he wasn’t about to admit that to his big brother. Knox was so honorable that he would never approve of River’s unauthorized searches of La Bonne Vie. But then, Knox had always known who he was.

  And what he was. A lawman.

  He was so good that River suddenly felt like a suspect. “Edith thought she saw something that first night she came to the house. And every once in a while...”

  “What?” Knox asked.

  “We hear stuff...” He gestured toward the crowbar. “That’s why I had that—to check it out.”

  “Did you find anything?” Knox asked.

  River shook his head. Not yet. Not what he was looking for. “The only intruders I’ve found are four-legged.”

  “And us,” Knox said. “We don’t have permission to actually be here, do we?”

  “Hey, Ranger Colton, I’m not trespassing,” River replied with a chuckle. “I work here, remember?”

  “Why?” Knox asked.

  He shrugged. “What else do I have to do?” He touched the patch. “Can’t be a Marine anymore.” At least he wouldn’t be able to carry out the missions he once had. He probably would have been able to become an instructor or something. But he’d known it was time to come back to Shadow Creek and his family.

  “There are a lot of other jobs out there that you could do,” Knox said. “Allison would love to have you working for her.”

  He wanted to say that construction wasn’t his calling. But that would raise even more questions about why he was working as a handyman.

  A vibrating noise saved him from having to make any remark. He stepped closer to the overturned racks and spied the cell phone lying on the concrete. Leaning over, he picked it up. The contact on the screen just said Boss. He was tempted to tap the accept button and talk to the man, but before he could, the call disconnected.

  That wasn’t the only call Edith had missed from her boss. Several more came up on the screen.

  “Can you find out who a number belongs to?” he asked Knox.

  His brother shook his head. “Not anymore. I’m not a lawman.”

  “You should be,” River said.

  A slight smile curved Knox’s mouth, and his blue eyes were even brighter than usual. “I’ve been thinking about it. But if I was again, I would have to have a reason to run that number. What would my reason be?”

  “You don’t want to know who bought La Bonne Vie?” River asked.

  Knox shook his head. “I couldn’t care less.”

  “Really?”

  “Do you?” Knox asked. “Is that why you’re working here? To find out who bought it and what they want to do with it?”

  He didn’t give a damn who the new owner was or what the hell he wanted to do with La Bonne Vie—as long as River found what he was looking for first. He glanced at the stone wall behind Knox.

  He was sure there was a secret room behind that wall. He’d been so close...

  That room was also close to where those racks had fallen over Edith. What if someone was inside?

  A strange feeling rushed over River, raising the short hairs on the nape of his neck. He felt like someone else was there—listening to them.

  “That’s not why I’m working here,” River insisted. “Like you, I couldn’t care less what happens to this place.”

  “Then why are you working on it?” Knox asked the question but another, softer voice, echoed it.

  “Why?” Edith asked.

  River turned to where she stood under the arched doorway into the wine cellar. She must have been whom he’d sensed listening. He rushed over to her and put his hand on her shoulder to support her.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he said. “You should still be in the hospital.”

  She had a small bandage over the wound on her forehead. But her eyes looked clear and bright with curiosity and something else. Hurt?

  Was she in physical or emotional pain?

  He squeezed her shoulder, but she pulled back as if not wanting him to touch her. “What’s wrong?” he asked with concern. “Are you all right?”

  * * *

  According to the ER doctor, Edith was fine. She’d suffered a slight concussion from whatever had hit her head, though. Fortunately, the painkillers had lessened the throbbing. It didn’t pound as hard as her pulse, which had sped up in anticipation of River answering his brother’s question. And now, with him touching her, it raced even more.

  She took another step back from him until his hand fell completely away from her shoulder. “I’m fine,” she said.

  “How did you get back here?” he asked.

  “Uncle Mac.”

  “I told him that I’d come back to get you—”

  “And face the reporters?” There had been an army of them waiting outside the emergency room doors when Mac had pulled up to them. They’d gotten more photos of her, sitting in the mandatory wheelchair.

  He sighed. “Guess I should have told you I was coming back. You thought I just dumped you there...”

  She shrugged off his concerns, even while it had been what she’d thought. And it had hurt her—more than it should have.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “That wasn’t my intention at all. I knew the tests would take some time, and I wanted to bring Knox to take a look around here.”

  Knox stepped forward and held out his hand. “Edith, nice to see you again,” he said.

  She forced a smile for the former Ranger as she shook his hand. “So what do you think happened?”

  “You tell me,” he said. “You’re the only one who was here.”

  She remembered that shadow and flinched. “I’m not so sure about that...”

  “What do you remember?” Knox asked.

  “I heard a clanging noise. It sounded like it was coming from here...” She glanced down at the crowbar lying on the concrete. But before she could bring up the day she’d found River down here with that, the pipes began to rattle overhead, shaking against the floor joists as water rushed through them.

  Both men looked up.

  “Could it have been that?” Knox asked.

  “Maybe,” she murmured. But the water was running now because Mac had to be in either the kitchen or the powder room. Nobody else had been in the house last night with her—at least, not that she’d seen. “I don’t know...”

  And she didn’t know what to believe.

  “What do you think?” River asked his brother. “Do you think we should call the sheriff?”

  “No,” Edith said. The photo of her in the ER would already bring unwanted attention to La Bonne Vie. A police report would make it so much worse. Declan would be furious. “That’s not necessary.”

  “It is if someone’s trying to hurt you,” River said.

  “I agree,” Mac said as he joined them. “We should call the sheriff.”

  “And tell him what?” Edith asked. “That I overreacted to the sound of the plumbing system and knocked racks over on myself?”
>
  “You knocked them over?” River asked, skepticism apparent in his deep voice.

  She shrugged. “I was checking out the bottles on them. I could have...” She’d prefer to think it was an accident over someone actually trying to hurt her.

  River ran a slightly shaking hand over his short dark hair. “I knew it—I knew I should have come back here once Thorne told me he saw you checking out of the B and B in town.”

  “That’s why you were pacing past the window in your apartment when I came home last night,” Mac remarked. “I wondered why you were up.” And it was clear that he’d been worried, probably thinking River had been having more bad dreams.

  So if Mac had seen him at his ranch, the shadow Edith had glimpsed last night hadn’t been River’s. Hell, she wasn’t even certain it had been a shadow. It could have been a lightbulb burning out that had plunged that area by the stone wall into darkness.

  Edith raised her hands to quell both men’s guilt. “I’m sure it was nothing,” she said. “Either I bumped into one of the racks and made it unsteady or an animal tipped it over. It was just an accident. No reason for the sheriff or concern.”

  But she wondered, even as she said it, if she was speaking the truth or being incredibly naive. “And now that I have a clean bill of health, I need to get back to work.”

  “It’s too soon,” Uncle Mac protested. “You need to get some rest.”

  She smiled at her overprotective relative. “I was out all night, so I don’t need to sleep any more.”

  “You have a concussion—”

  “A slight one,” she reminded him. “And I have little pain pills to pop if it bothers me at all.”

  “But you need to watch out for other symptoms. Nausea, dizziness—”

  “And I have none of those,” she assured Mac. “The only thing I am stressed over is the hours of work I have missed on this place. I have a job to do, and I need to get back to it.”

  River held out her phone toward her. “Yeah, your boss keeps calling.”

  Her pulse quickened. Had River answered the phone? Declan wouldn’t be happy to have a Colton working for him. Back in foster care, she’d resented them because they’d had her uncle and she hadn’t. But she’d gotten over it with time. For some reason Declan still seemed to resent them. So why had she hired River?

  And why did he want to work for her? She wished he would have answered his brother. But Knox must have gotten an answer of some sort because she heard him murmur to River, “I understand...”

  “What?” River echoed the question she hadn’t dared ask.

  “I know why you’re working here,” he said with a grin, and he turned toward Edith—as if she was somehow the answer. Did he think River was interested in her?

  Her pulse quickened even more, and she was glad the monitors weren’t on her anymore. If they’d seen her heart rate now, she probably would have been admitted instead of released.

  “Nice seeing you again, Edith,” Knox said and touched the brim of his hat as he walked past her. He stopped by Mac, though, and asked, “Buy you lunch?”

  Mac looked at her, his eyes still so dark and serious with concern and guilt.

  “I’m fine,” she assured him.

  But he turned to River as if looking for confirmation.

  “I’ll be here,” River said, as if he never intended to be anywhere else.

  But that wasn’t possible.

  He couldn’t stay with her 24/7 or she would lose her mind or, worse yet, her heart.

  * * *

  Once it fell silent on the other side of the stone wall, the person listening to those conversations threw something at it. But the pillow made no noise, like clanging the crowbar against the rack had the night before.

  How had the woman survived the accident? Those racks had looked heavy—had felt heavy—and then tumbling the crates on top of them...

  But apparently Edith Beaulieu was tougher than she looked. Too bad she wasn’t smart enough to quit. No job was worth her life. She would learn that soon enough, but it would be too late.

  She would not escape the next accident as easily as she had this one.

  The real question was what to do about River. He hadn’t told his brother or the woman his true intention for working in the house. He’d never had any interest in La Bonne Vie, or even in his family, for that matter. He was back only because he had no place else to go.

  So what was he looking for...?

  And did he have any idea that the search would probably get him killed?

  Chapter 10

  River had kept the light off tonight so Mac wouldn’t catch him pacing in front of the window. He knew he wasn’t going to sleep—not with Edith alone at La Bonne Vie. So he hadn’t even undressed. His boots clomped as they hit the stairs as he hurried down them to the stable. He saddled up Shadow quickly.

  For once he could identify with the horse’s agitation. He felt that way himself—restless, on edge...

  And it wasn’t because he didn’t know who or what he was. He didn’t give a damn about himself at the moment. He just wanted to make sure Edith was okay.

  He knew she hadn’t accidentally bumped into one of those racks. For the past week, he’d watched how she worked, how she moved, with the grace of a ballerina. There was no way she’d been clumsy enough to bump into anything—let alone something as large as those wine racks. As if her slight weight knocking into them could have tumbled the heavy racks over...

  And the plumbing...

  It wouldn’t have been making any noise unless she’d been using it. Maybe she’d been running a bath or something before she’d gone downstairs. He hadn’t looked into the master bathroom. There could have been a cooled tub of water in there.

  But Edith was kind of like the stallion beneath him—full of nervous energy. He couldn’t imagine her being able to sit in a bathtub while there was still so much work to do in the house. No. He didn’t have to know her well to know that about her.

  But he felt like he was beginning to know her well—well enough to know she had her suspicions about what had happened. Had she suspected him? She’d caught him with that crowbar in the wine cellar. Had she thought he was down there again when she’d heard the noise?

  He cursed himself now. His damn search for answers had put her in danger. While he wanted to know the truth, he didn’t want to risk her safety or anyone else’s to find it.

  Now he would not be able to rest until he knew she was safe. So he spurred the horse faster across Mac’s fields to the fence separating the properties. Shadow cleared it easily, and instead of rattling him, the jump seemed to settle down the horse some—as if he had needed to expend some energy.

  Did Edith?

  Did she work so hard because she had no personal life? Or was there something more than business between her and her boss? She’d had so many missed calls from him. And that whole confidentiality agreement between them...

  River realized he’d lied earlier that day. He did care who’d bought the house—but only because he cared about Edith. He wanted to know who she was working for and what the man really meant to her.

  But first he wanted to make sure she was safe.

  Shadow moved quickly and surefootedly across the overgrown acres of La Bonne Vie. It was as if the horse remembered the way—even in the dark.

  Jade was right. The stallion was worth saving. When River had first awakened after the explosion, he’d wondered if he was worth saving. And when he’d found out he didn’t even know who his father was...

  He’d lost all his bearings for a while. But like Shadow, he had begun to find his way in the dark. He was healing on the outside and the inside. Helping Edith out at La Bonne Vie had proved to him that he wasn’t worthless. Since he could fix that house, he could fix anything—even hi
mself.

  But it wasn’t just working on the house that was healing him. It was Edith—with how she looked at him, like he was still a man. Would she look at him that way if her boss was more than just an employer to her?

  Suddenly the horse reared up, pawing at the ground with his front legs. River grabbed for the pommel and gripped the horse with his legs so that he didn’t fall off. Then he soothed one hand over his mane and murmured, “Easy, Shadow. It’s okay.”

  But it wasn’t. Something had definitely spooked the stallion. River peered down at the ground and also tilted his head to listen. Had the horse run across a snake? The brush was overgrown, making it hard for River—especially with only one eye—to see anything.

  But Shadow wasn’t looking down. He reared back and tossed his head to the left. Then River saw it, too, the shadow crouched low, moving through the brush.

  Was it a coyote? A wolf? He’d heard sightings of them in the area. And the presence of a predator would certainly spook the horse.

  But the predator wasn’t moving toward them. It was moving toward La Bonne Vie, toward the house on the hill. River studied the shadow more closely and realized that it wasn’t moving on four legs but two.

  This predator was human. And it wasn’t a threat to Shadow or to him but to the woman who was staying alone at La Bonne Vie.

  He urged the horse forward, forcing it into a run. Maybe it was just a reporter who’d found a way around the gate. But that wasn’t what River’s gut was telling him. He needed to get closer, needed to stop the person before he reached the house. But suddenly the shadow vanished.

  River slowed the horse down as he carefully searched the brush. The person had to be hiding. He couldn’t have just disappeared.

  But River could find no trace of him. Like the horse, he was spooked.

  * * *

  Heat climbed into Edith’s face, and it wasn’t because it had suddenly gotten warm in the house. In fact, it was an unseasonably cool evening in Shadow Creek. She’d shut off the air-conditioning and opened the windows. The night breeze fluttered the old, threadbare curtains in the master suite. She would need to replace those, too, like she had the mattress and the linens, before Declan came to visit.