“Who’s that?” Jordan pointed to a man walking up the drive from the main road.
Rachel squinted at the familiar figure. “It’s Mr. Crutchfield, the insurance adjustor. Your dad must have called him.”
When Crutchfield spotted her, he hurried toward the house.
“You here about the fire?” she asked as he approached.
The man glanced nervously from side to side. “Miss, um, O’Riley.” He hesitated and nodded toward Jordan. “I must speak with you in private.”
Rachel paused for a moment, gauging the wisdom of being alone with a stranger, but decided she was safe enough with Wade, Leo and so many others only a shout away. “Jordan, go see if Ursula needs some help.”
With a final curious look at the newcomer, Jordan rose from the steps and jogged across the lawn toward the barn.
“What did you want to talk to me about, Mr. Crutchfield?”
“Is there some place private we can go?”
“What’s wrong with here?”
Shifting uneasily from one foot to the other, the man kept glancing toward the barn. “I have information about your past, information Mr. Garrett doesn’t want you to know. He’s ordered me off the ranch before, and if he finds me here, he’ll throw me out again.”
Rachel shook her head. “That’s ridicu…”
She remembered Lefty posted at the gate with a gun for reasons no one seemed inclined to explain to her. Right now, more than anything, she wanted to learn more about her life before the accident. If Crutchfield could help her…
“Come with me. There’s a secluded spot by the river. No one can see us there.”
Her pulse racing with excitement, she hurried down the trail with Crutchfield behind her. When she reached the rustic bench, she turned to him. “What do you know about my past?”
His eyes turned hard and cold. “I know you’re not Rachel O’Riley.”
Her first reaction was disbelief. “How would you know?”
“Because Rachel O’Riley worked for me in Atlanta, and I was going to marry her.”
Sudden dizziness assailed her, and Rachel sank onto the bench. “Does Wade know I’m not Rachel?”
Crutchfield nodded grimly. “He’s known since my first visit. He doesn’t want you to find out.”
A thousand questions plagued her, but one predominated. “If I’m not Rachel O’Riley, who am I?”
Crutchfield sat beside her and leaned closer with a menacing stare. “That is what I’m here to find out.”
Why hadn’t Wade told her? Did he know her real identity? And where was the Rachel O’Riley who had agreed to Wade’s proposal?
Crutchfield grabbed her by the shoulders, and his fingers bit painfully into her skin. “Tell me your real name.”
Fear mixed with her bewilderment. “I can’t. I don’t remember.”
He shook her forcefully. “Think! You have to remember. I need your name.”
She tried to push him away, but the man was too strong. “I don’t know my name.”
“Let her go, Crutchfield.” Wade’s commanding voice echoed along the riverbank.
Crutchfield released her and sprang away from the bench. “You can’t keep her here forever under false pretenses, Garrett. There’re laws—”
“And there’re laws against trespassing, too.” Wade cocked his rifle with an ominous snap that made Crutchfield cringe.
Rachel had never been so glad to see anyone in her life as she was to see Wade. Her fear melted away, but her confusion remained.
Behind Wade stood Lefty, armed with his own rifle, and Leo with a shotgun.
“Leo,” Wade said, “take our visitor up to the house and call Dan Howard. We’ll let the sheriff take care of him.”
Leo and Lefty led Crutchfield away but not before the trespasser shot Rachel a look of pure venom.
“Are you okay?” Wade asked.
Rachel vacillated between wanting to hug Wade for rescuing her, and smacking him for not telling her about herself.
“Is it true?” she demanded.
Wade leaned the rifle against the bench and sat down. “Is what true? Sounded like Crutchfield was shooting off his mouth about a lot of things.”
“Am I Rachel O’Riley?”
“No.” Grime and exhaustion etched his face, making his expression impossible to read, especially since he refused to meet her gaze.
She struggled with a conflux of emotions, anger the foremost. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Dr. Sinclair warned me not to, not until your memories returned.”
She pivoted quickly on her heel and started up the path toward the house.
Wade sprang from the bench and grabbed her wrist. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
He raked the fingers of his other hand through smoke-streaked hair. “Rachel—”
“I’m not Rachel.”
“You can’t go home. You don’t know where it is.”
She wrenched from his grip. “Then it’s about time I found out.”
Without a backward look, she fled toward the ranch. The undergrowth along the path lashed her face, and she welcomed the sting that momentarily distracted her from the pain in her heart, the confusion in her mind.
Who was she?
Her mind remained a blank, registering pain and confusion, but no answers to her question. She slowed when she reached the front of the house and saw the pickup pull away, with Crutchfield sandwiched between Lefty and Leo in the front seat. Thankful no one else was around, she ran up the porch steps and into the house.
Fighting to hold back tears, she sprinted up the stairs to her room. She didn’t have luggage, so she spread her jacket on the bed to use as a makeshift carryall, and began piling her clothes on top of it.
At least her crazy dreams made some sense now. If she wasn’t Rachel, she must be the Jennifer from her dreams. The realization stopped her cold.
She was married.
To a man she no longer loved.
And she’d fallen hopelessly in love with Wade Garrett. With his son. With his home. With everything about him. Only she wasn’t free to love anyone else. And she wasn’t the woman he’d proposed to.
“Rachel, what are you doing?” Jordan stood in the doorway.
“Packing.”
“Why?”
“I’m going away.”
“You’re leaving us?”
The hurt in the boy’s voice wounded her, adding another fissure to her already breaking heart.
“I have to go, Jordan.” She kept her gaze on her packing, but she could hear the tears in his voice.
“It’s my fault, isn’t it? You’re leaving because I’m always in trouble.”
She turned at his anguished cry and rushed to him. Going down on her knees, she pulled him close in a fierce bear hug. “You’re a terrific kid, Jordan, and I love you.”
“Then why do you have to go?” he sobbed into her neck, his tears wetting the collar of her shirt.
“It’s complicated.” She rubbed his back in a soothing gesture. “Your father will tell you.”
“No, he won’t.” Jordan jerked away. “Dad never tells me anything.”
She sat on the floor, leaned against the bed and pulled Jordan beside her, wrapping her arm around him. “I’ll try to explain.”
She recounted what she’d been told of the train wreck and her being identified as Rachel. “The hospital contacted your father because he was expecting Rachel O’Riley for a visit.” She omitted the part about Wade’s marriage proposal. “That’s when he invited me here.”
“Yeah, I know all that.” Jordan’s sobs had ended. “But I still don’t know why you have to go.”
“Remember when Mr. Crutchfield came to talk to me today?”
Jordan nodded.
“He knows Rachel O’Riley, and he says that’s not who I am.”
“Gosh, if you’re not Rachel, who are you?”
She hugged the boy closer. “I don’t know. That’s w
hy I have to leave, to learn who I am.”
Jordan relaxed against her. “I get it. And you’ll come back as soon as you find out?”
A sob caught in her throat, and she swallowed hard to keep from crying. “I may have a family of my own somewhere, waiting for me to come home.”
She glanced up to find Wade standing in the doorway. He had showered and changed clothes, and he looked more handsome than she’d ever seen him.
“Jordan,” he said. “I need to talk to Rachel alone.”
The boy clambered to his feet. “You won’t leave,” he asked, “without saying goodbye?”
She shook her head. “I promise.”
Jordan scurried from the room.
Wade reached down beside the door, lifted a suitcase and placed it on her bed. “You’ll be needing this.”
He was keeping his emotions under tight wraps, and she couldn’t decipher his feelings.
“Sheriff Howard just called,” he said. “He’s discovered your real name.”
She froze where she stood, knowing what was coming.
“You’re Jennifer Reid,” Wade said. “Mrs. Jennifer Reid.”
Chapter Thirteen
Wade watched her face for a reaction, but she looked mostly dazed. He’d been stunned himself when he’d spoken with Dan Howard earlier.
“Someone filed a missing person report on her,” the sheriff had said. “The report contains pictures. Jennifer Reid’s your girl all right.”
Wade had grabbed a pencil and scribbled the address Dan gave him. “Have Lefty and Leo arrived with Crutchfield? We caught him trespassing here earlier.”
“They haven’t come in yet, but you know I can’t charge him for trespassing, not unless I or a deputy caught him in the act. I’ll have to let him go.”
“Will you tell him about Jennifer Reid?”
Dan snorted a laugh. “I figure this is a need-to-know situation. If the real Rachel O’Riley is trying to get away from him, then he doesn’t need to know what name she might be using.”
Returning to his current dilemma, Wade looked at the woman who had sunk onto the edge of the bed at his news. “Should I call you Jennifer?”
She glanced up with a pinched smile. “You’ve always called me Rachel. That’s easier.”
Wade nodded. “Well, I’d better go pack.”
She looked surprised. “Why?”
“I’m taking you home.”
“Home?”
“Memphis, Tennessee. We fly out tonight.”
“I don’t understand.”
At the sight of the adorable wrinkle in her forehead, he felt his heart had been kicked by a wild mustang. “Understand what?”
“Why you’re going with me.”
He wasn’t sure he understood completely himself. “I got you into this. Looks like it’s up to me to get you out.”
RACHEL—she still couldn’t think of herself as Jennifer—unfastened her seat belt and gazed out the window. Below, stretched out like a topographic map, lay the Rocky Mountains of Montana, silhouetted by the setting sun. She experienced a spasm of regret at leaving the Big Sky Country as the plane climbed above the clouds, obscuring the view. She had come to love Montana. It felt like home.
But home was a suburb of Memphis, a place she couldn’t remember, a place she dreaded, from what she’d seen in her dreams.
She glanced at Wade in the seat beside her. “Did Sheriff Howard tell you anything else about me?”
“Only that your attorney will meet us at the airport with the keys to your house.”
“An attorney and not my family? That’s odd.” The news sent a cold chill down her spine. Her husband must not be very anxious to see her. Not that she was looking forward to a reunion with him, if her dreams had been accurate.
“You’re shivering,” Wade said. “Are you cold?”
“Yes,” she lied, ashamed of her fears.
He signaled to the flight attendant, who brought a blanket and pillow. With a tenderness that made her want to weep, he settled the pillow behind her head and tucked the blanket around her.
“Get some sleep,” he said with a huskiness in his voice she’d never heard before. “You’ve had a rough day.”
“I can’t sleep. Too many unanswered questions buzzing in my head.”
“Dr. Sinclair wants you to be rested when you arrive. She’s hoping familiar surroundings will jar your memories loose.”
Obediently, Rachel closed her eyes, but the questions persisted. Where was her husband, and why wasn’t he meeting her, instead of an attorney? Why had she left him? Where had she been headed when the train was wrecked in Montana? What had happened to the rest of her family? Did she have children?
In spite of her uncertainties, she dropped off to sleep, not to awaken until the pilot’s voice on the public address system announced their descent to the Memphis airport.
Leaving the plane, she was grateful for Wade’s rock-steady presence, for her knees threatened to buckle from a bad case of nerves.
“Chin up,” he told her with an encouraging smile. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
But she knew nothing was going to be fine again, not when she wanted more than anything to return to the plane and fly with Wade back to Montana and Jordan. A chilling thought hit her. Wade was being so pleasant and helpful. Was he sorry to see her go or glad to be rid of her?
“Mrs. Reid?” A tall, slim man with white hair, a pencil-thin mustache and a welcoming smile was waiting at airside. “Jennifer?”
She took several seconds to realize he was speaking to her. She still thought of herself as Rachel. Still wished she was Rachel. “Yes?”
His smile dissolved. “You don’t remember me? I’m Harold Lacy, your attorney, and your father’s attorney before you.”
Wade squeezed her arm reassuringly. “She doesn’t remember anyone, Mr. Lacy. I’m Wade Garrett. We spoke on the phone earlier today. Mrs. Reid has been our guest since the accident.”
She glanced behind the older man. “Are any of my family here?”
A dismayed look flashed across his face before he composed his features. “No, um, I’m alone tonight. We’ll talk about the others in the morning.”
She couldn’t help noting the scowl on Wade’s face, a clear indication that he wasn’t happy with her lack of welcome.
“It’s very late,” Lacy said, “and I’m sure you’ll want to go directly home.”
She didn’t know what to say, couldn’t understand the implications of her family’s abandonment, and she ached with exhaustion in spite of her nap on the plane.
Luckily, Wade wasn’t struck mute as she’d been. “If you have the keys and directions to Mrs. Reid’s house—”
“They’re here.” Lacy handed over a packet. “And the keys to your rental car.”
“Mr. Lacy,” Rachel asked, “will there be anyone waiting at home for me?”
He took her hands and gazed at her with sadness and compassion. “No, Jennifer. There’s no one there except Marie, the housekeeper. I had her open the house when I knew you were arriving. I’ll come around first thing tomorrow morning and explain everything. Good night.”
The attorney left, and Wade hurried her forward to pick up their car. After a few instructions from the clerk at the desk, and with the use of Lacy’s map, he drove through the streets of Memphis. When he reached the turnoff Lacy had marked, he whistled in surprise. “This is some fancy neighborhood, Mrs. Reid.”
Rachel flinched at the strange name and gazed out the window. In spite of the darkness, the entrance to the gated community was well lit. When Wade gave her name to the security guard, he waved them through. She watched with detached interest as they drove past grand, expensive houses, set well back from the street, but nothing seemed familiar.
After a couple blocks, Wade turned the car into a drive blocked by an iron gate. He pulled up to a keypad set in a brick column, punched in a code, and the gate swung wide.
He placed his hand over hers. “Recognize
anything?”
She shook her head, unable to speak without her voice quivering with anxiety.
He drove up a curved drive beneath an arch of magnolia trees and stopped beneath a columned portico. The heavy oak door opened wide, and a tiny, middle-aged woman stood on the threshold.
“Welcome home, Mrs. Reid. Hello, Mr. Garrett. I’ll take your bags.”
“Not necessary.” Wade hopped from the car and picked up her single piece of luggage. “Just tell me where to put this.”
“The first room on the right at the top of the stairs,” Marie instructed. “And your room, Mr. Garrett, is three doors farther down on the left.”
Wade shook his head. “I’m going to a motel as soon as I get Mrs. Reid settled.”
“No,” Rachel begged as she climbed out of the car. She knew they’d have to part, but she couldn’t stand having to separate so soon. “Please stay. I’d like to see at least one familiar face in the morning.”
“It’s no trouble,” Marie said. “We were expecting you to stay.”
“We?” Rachel asked in alarm.
“Mr. Lacy and I,” Marie said. “He made all the arrangements.”
They followed the maid into the foyer, a high-ceilinged room with marble floors and a massive chandelier. Rachel found the space cold and forbidding.
Wade started up a curving marble staircase with a banister of carved mahogany. Rachel followed, and their footsteps echoed in the cavernous space of the enormous house.
On the second floor, Wade opened the first door on the right and placed her luggage on the bed. “Get some rest. You’re all worn out. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Rachel nodded. More than anything, she wanted to throw herself in his arms, to feel the warmth and security of his embrace, but she didn’t have the right.
“I’ll be just down the hall if you need me.” He pulled the door closed as he left.
She crumpled into a chair beside a fireplace filled with ferns for the summer, and fought back tears.
Montana Mail-Order Wife Page 16
