The Pint-Sized Secret

by Sherryl Woods

  He offered one of those irrepressible grins. “Glad to see me?”

  “Dismayed would be more accurate,” she muttered, despite the contradictory leap of her pulse. “What are you doing here? I don’t suppose this is pure coincidence.”

  “Nope. I followed you.”

  She saw little point in protesting that. It had gotten to be a habit, albeit an extremely annoying one. “Can’t you do your own investigating?”

  “I am.”

  “No, you’re just tagging along on mine.”

  “Somebody’s got to keep an eye on you. Hasn’t it occurred to you that whoever did leak those secrets might not be happy about you poking around trying to find answers?”

  “So, this is all about protecting me?”

  “Of course.”

  “In a pig’s eye. This time a few days ago, you were intent on nailing me yourself.”

  “A momentary blip in judgment, for which I have apologized.”

  “You could crawl over hot coals on your hands and knees and it wouldn’t get you off the hook,” she told him.

  He winced at the image. “I know you’re mad—”

  “Try furious.”

  “Have a glass of wine. It’ll relax you.”

  “That’s a bad habit to get into, though spending too much time around you could drive me to it.”

  “If we were someplace other than the middle of this restaurant, I could make you take that back,” he said.

  “I doubt it.”

  “Don’t dare me, Brianna. You know I’m a man who thrives on challenge. Besides, I discovered very recently that I’m addicted to a certain smart-mouthed geologist, and I’m suffering from withdrawal. I might do just about anything to get another fix, even if I have to steal it.”

  “Suggesting that you’re not above thievery might not be wise under the circumstances,” she pointed out, though she had to work to keep her lips from curving into a smile. He did know how to make a woman feel desire…right before he turned around and stabbed her in the back, unfortunately.

  He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Peace? Let’s talk about your pal Roy. Did he have anything interesting to say?”

  She thought of her promise to the other man. “Not a word. We were just having a bite to eat and a casual conversation about the weather.”

  “Fascinating stuff, weather.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I heard Homer’s name mentioned, along with Gil’s, Karen’s, and a few others.”

  “What were you doing, hiding under the table?”

  He leaned down and peeked pointedly under the edge of the tablecloth. “I’ll admit the view from there might have been intriguing, but alas, no. I was behind the potted palm.”

  Brianna glanced at the offending plant and sighed. “If you were that close, then I’m sure you caught most of the conversation. You don’t need a play-by-play from me. Draw your own conclusions.”

  She stood up and started for the door, deliberately leaving the check on the table for him to pay. He tossed some money down without a whimper of protest, then followed. He caught up with her at the cashier’s booth at the parking lot next door.

  “Where are we going?”

  She frowned at him. “I am going to run some errands. I don’t know about you.”

  “I could tag along. It would save on gas.”

  “You own an oil company. The cost of gas shouldn’t be a consideration.”

  “We all have a responsibility to conserve our natural resources.”

  Brianna rolled her eyes. “No,” she said emphatically. She was going to see Emma, and she did not want him accompanying her.

  “Is going to see your daughter one of those errands?” he inquired, accurately pinpointing the cause of her reluctance with one guess.

  “Okay, yes,” she admitted.

  To her surprise, he merely nodded. “Fine, then. I’ll catch up with you later.”

  “Please don’t.”

  He shook his head. “Darlin’, until this is settled you’re not going to be able to shake me. Just relax and enjoy it.”

  Relax around the man who’d gotten her into this fix in the first place with his absurd suspicions? The man who now claimed to be totally in her corner? Not a chance, Brianna thought. If he was any more on her side, she’d probably end up in jail.

  Jeb had, in fact, heard enough of Brianna’s conversation with Roy to give him new avenues of investigation to explore. He’d still hoped she would trust him enough to share them with him. Discovering that she did not cut straight through him. Of course, there were some who might say—Brianna among them, no doubt—that he deserved to know what it felt like to have someone he loved not trust him worth spit.

  Since he didn’t have access to some of the same computerized financial checks that his brother did, he called Dylan and asked him to check out Gil Frye’s finances. In the meantime, he decided to have a chat with both Homer and Karen to see how deeply their animosity toward Brianna ran. He intended to tell them he was just paying a little morale-boosting visit to the department. They could make of that whatever they liked.

  Homer Collins was the epitome of a dedicated scientist from his flyaway white hair to his rumpled, careless attire. Jeb could recall the first time as a child that he had seen Homer in the lab and wondered if he was experimenting with something as exciting as Frankenstein. Both Homer and his father had chuckled at his vivid imagination.

  He found Homer in the lab again, surrounded by test tubes and piles of computer printouts analyzing the data he’d assembled.

  “Hey, Homer.”

  The older man glanced up, looking a bit dazed behind his thick glasses. “Oh, Jeb, it’s you. Can I help you with something?”

  “I just stopped by to see how things are going with Brianna out of the picture.”

  “A sorry situation,” Homer said, sounding genuinely distraught. “I would never have thought her capable of selling out this company, not after your dad put such faith in her.”

  “Are you so sure she did?”

  Homer seemed startled by the question. “If she didn’t, who would have?”

  “I was hoping you might have some ideas,” Jeb said.

  “Haven’t given it much thought. I’ve been too busy trying to take up the slack since she left.”

  “She’s only been gone a day,” Jeb pointed out mildly.

  “It doesn’t take long for work to pile up, if everyone’s not pulling their weight,” he responded defensively.

  Jeb patted his shoulder. “Yes, I’m sure you’re right. Thanks for pitching in. I just wanted you to know we’re all counting on you to stay on top of things until we can get this worked out and get Brianna back here.”

  Homer regarded him with surprise. “She’ll be back?”

  “If I have my way, she will be.”

  “Yes, I had heard that the two of you…” His voice trailed off and he shrugged. “Well, never mind. You know what’s best, I’m sure.”

  “Any idea where Karen Cole is?” Jeb asked, letting Homer’s unspoken innuendo about Jeb’s personal relationship with Brianna pass.

  “Where she usually is, I imagine, in the field. She left this morning to do a follow-up report on one of the sites Brianna checked out.”

  “Why? Was there some question about the results?”

  “With what’s happened, everyone’s going to be second-guessing every move Brianna made,” Homer said. “We need to be ready for the questions.”

  Jeb supposed he had a point, but it still grated on his nerves to hear someone so eager to accept the fact that Brianna really had been a spy. Of course, he’d been just as bad. Worse, in fact, since he’d known her well enough to know better.

  As he wandered back to his own office, his cell phone rang. He flipped it open. “Yes?”

  “Jeb, it’s Dylan. I got that information on Frye, but I don’t think it’s going to help you.”

  “Oh?”

  “He’s a financial parag
on. The man’s been depositing his checks like clockwork. No extra money going into his accounts. He doesn’t have credit cards. His mortgage payments are modest. His two big splurges were the beach house and boat you already know about. He made the down payments with money he had in savings.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “He looks clean.”

  “Damn. I thought he was going to be our best shot.”

  “Anything’s possible, but from where I sit, he’s not your man. Want me to run checks on the others in the department?”

  “Not yet. I’ll get back to you.”

  “Jeb?”

  “What?”

  “Could this be a game of smoke and mirrors that Dad’s been playing?”

  Shocked by the suggestion, Jeb halted where he was. “Dad? Why the hell would he do something like that?”

  “You’ve got me there, but I don’t like the way this is going. Be careful. You may be stirring up a hornet’s nest over nothing.”

  “Dylan, those sites were stolen out from under Delacourt Oil. That’s not nothing.”

  “You only have Dad’s word for that, right?”

  “Yes,” he said, then corrected himself. “No, not exactly. Michael confirmed it. He was in on the negotiations for one site himself. And Brianna has never denied that we lost sites she’d been checking out.”

  “Think about it, though. Dad hasn’t gone ballistic. Not even once. That is totally out of character.”

  “True,” Jeb agreed.

  “All he’s done is try to warn you away from getting involved, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Ask yourself why,” Dylan suggested.

  “I’ve asked myself that a million times, but I don’t have an answer.”

  “One comes to mind, but it’s so far-fetched even I have a hard time believing it.”

  “Try me.”

  “No,” Dylan said slowly. “I think I’ll let you work it out for yourself.”

  “Dylan,” Jeb protested, but he was wasting his breath. His big brother had just hung up on him, and if he wasn’t very much mistaken, Dylan had been chuckling. Jeb couldn’t see a blasted thing to laugh about.

  Brianna’s visit with Emma wasn’t nearly the distraction she’d hoped for. Once again, her daughter kept watching the door as if she were expecting someone else to drop by. Since there were no other visitors that Brianna knew about, her behavior was strange. Questioning her about it only drew shrugs and denials.

  “I gots to go to therapy, Mama,” Emma said eventually, dismissing her.

  “Okay, baby. I’ll see you tomorrow,” Brianna said even as Emma whooshed past in her wheelchair. Brianna sighed. She ought to be grateful that her daughter was so eager to keep up with her treatment, but she couldn’t help feeling just a little hurt by the abrupt departure.

  “Put the time to good use,” she muttered as she left the building, waving at the daytime nursing supervisor who’d just returned from a week-long vacation. Gretchen wouldn’t be on until evening. Brianna missed chatting with her. Maybe Gretchen would have some insights into Emma’s odd behavior, though the last time they’d talked, she had been as tight-lipped as the child. There were definitely secrets being kept around the rehab center, and Emma was at the center of them. Unfortunately, Brianna had bigger mysteries to unravel.

  Dismissing it as a problem she couldn’t solve, she tried to focus on her so-called investigation. If she knew Jeb, he had headed straight back to Delacourt Oil to question all the people Roy had mentioned at lunch.

  Sitting behind the wheel of her car, she considered her options.

  “Why am I pussyfooting around with this?” she demanded aloud.

  The person who could tell her precisely what had happened with this last deal was Jordan Adams. He’d bought the land. Why not ask him how he’d found out about it? The worst he could do would be to lie or evade her questions. In the best-case scenario, he could put the whole thing to rest with an honest reply.

  Because she dealt with charter companies all the time to book flights to some of the out-of-the-way sites she needed to explore, she called a pilot she knew and made arrangements with him to fly her to Los Piños immediately. Whatever the cost, if she could prove her innocence on this trip, it would be worth the battering to her savings.

  By the time they arrived across the state, Jordan Adams had left his office and headed home. She found him there in the middle of his dinner.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, when he came to the door with a napkin in his hand and a puzzled frown on his face. “I would have called, but I was afraid you wouldn’t see me.”

  “Why on earth wouldn’t I see you?” Jordan said, his manner surprisingly friendly. “Come on in and join us. Dinner’s just getting started. It’s a little crazy because the grandkids are here, but if you don’t mind chaos, there’s plenty of food.”

  The thought of intruding, along with her own dark mood, kept her from accepting. She shook her head. “No, really, I don’t want to interrupt. I’ll just wait out here, if you don’t mind. Join me whenever you’ve finished.”

  Jordan studied her face intently, then nodded. “Give me a minute. I’ll be right back.”

  He returned almost at once, carrying two glasses of lemonade. “It’s a warm night. I thought you might want something to drink,” he said, offering one glass to her.

  “Thank you.”

  He settled into the rocker next to hers, rocked for a moment, giving the evening’s peacefulness a chance to soak in. “Okay, Brianna,” he said eventually. “What can I do for you?”

  “It’s about the deal you made for the Harrison Ranch mineral rights.”

  He nodded slowly. “I thought that might be it. What can I tell you?”

  “Did that deal just fall into your lap?”

  He chuckled. “Is that your polite way of asking if someone leaked the information about Delacourt Oil’s findings to me?”

  “Pretty much,” she said candidly.

  “No, at least not in the sense you mean. I’d really rather not get into this with you, though.”

  “I’m sure I can understand why,” she said bitterly.

  “I doubt that,” he said in a wry tone she couldn’t quite interpret.

  She decided to play on his well-known sense of decency and honor. “Look, my professional reputation is on the line over this. I know that I’m not the one who told you. And I’m not out to have somebody prosecuted. I just want to be able to go to Bryce Delacourt and offer him something to prove that I had nothing to do with leaking inside information. I need to clear my name.”

  Jordan, the epitome of a gentleman, swore. “It’s come to that, has it?”

  Brianna nodded miserably. “I’ve already quit my job. Jeb’s investigating me. I need answers.”

  “I could use a few myself,” he said fervently. “Don’t worry, Brianna. If you need work, you have a job with me. I know your reputation and your credentials. I would have offered when you left Max Coleman, but Bryce beat me to it. So that’s one worry off your shoulders. In the meantime, I’ll give you an affidavit that swears you had nothing to do with the information I was given.”

  She was astounded by the job offer and the offer of an affidavit. “Thank you. A sworn statement ought to help.”

  “It’s yours, but you’re not going to need it,” he assured her. “Not with Bryce.”

  Something in his voice set off alarms. “Because?”

  “I knew I should have stayed the heck out of this,” he murmured to himself, then met her gaze evenly. “Because Bryce gave me that information himself.”

  As his words sank in, Brianna began to shake, the reaction part fury, part relief. “Do you know why he would do that?”

  “Actually, I think I do, but you’ll have to ask him.”

  “Oh, believe me, I intend to.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Brianna couldn’t begin to imagine what would lead Bryce Delacourt to sabotage his own company, but she i
ntended to find out. In fact, she was mad enough at being caught in the middle of some intrigue he’d obviously masterminded that she would have blistered his ears with her opinion if his secretary hadn’t informed her that he’d suddenly been called away on business.

  “When will he be back?” she asked, during the call she made from the plane on her way back from seeing Jordan Adams.

  “I’m not sure,” Mrs. Fletcher said with a touch of apparent indignation at his failure to be more forthcoming. “He shouldn’t be gone more than a day or two. If he checks in, shall I have him call you?”

  “No,” Brianna said. This meeting needed to be face-to-face. She owed him that much in return for all he’d done for her. “But I would appreciate it if you would contact me the minute he returns.”

  “Absolutely. I’ll add your name to the list of people waiting to speak to him.”

  “Put it at the top,” Brianna said insistently. “This is urgent.”

  “Funny,” Mrs. Fletcher said, sounding anything but amused. “Jeb said the same thing. Is there something going on I should know about?”

  Brianna almost smiled at the increased level of exasperation in the woman’s voice. She prided herself on knowing absolutely everything going on at Delacourt Oil. She had been with Bryce since he started the company more than thirty years earlier and she clearly didn’t like being left in the dark.

  “I’m not sure yet,” Brianna told her candidly.

  “Does this have something to do with the reason you just up and quit out of the blue? I can tell you that Mr. Delacourt was furious about that. He told Jeb exactly how he felt. Not that I was eavesdropping,” she said hurriedly. “But when Mr. Delacourt gets angry, you can hear him in the next county.”

  “I’m sure you can,” Brianna said wryly. “And yes, this is related. I’m just not sure how yet.”

  “Well, for whatever it’s worth, I hope you’ll change your mind and come back. Mr. Delacourt has a lot of faith in you. Ever since Trish refused to become involved in the company and went off to marry that rancher, he’s been down in the dumps. I think he actually thought of you as a substitute for his daughter.”

  Funny way to treat a daughter, Brianna thought, but then Mrs. Fletcher didn’t know the whole story about how Bryce had apparently set Brianna up to take the fall for something he’d done.