Not that Case was to blame. He’d been a boy then; it was his father who should have known better, should have loved better. Bitter anger rose at the injustice of it all. She wanted to hold the boy Case close to her heart, to make up to him for all he’d had to suffer.
Yet even though he had so little reason to care, he’d come back to take care of the ranch and its inhabitants after his father’s death. The scene of his most painful memories must have been the last place he’d wanted to go, but he’d still returned to do the right thing. One thing she’d discovered about Case was that his sense of honor was his guiding light. When the chips were down, you could count on him.
How much would such a man resent being deceived?
And why did it have to be my uncle who cheated him?
In the night Sammie awoke with a start, confused at the sounds she was hearing.
Until she saw the angry orange glow at her bedroom window. Heard the shouts, the chaos.
Fire!
She leaped out of bed, scrambling for the jeans she’d worn last night. She shoved her feet into her Keds and yanked a t-shirt over her head as she barreled down the stairs.
Outside, voices fought to be heard over the roar of the flames devouring the shed next to the horse barn. Ralph led horses out of the barn, while Wiley’s old brown pickup boiled up a cloud of dust, roaring down the road from his house. At the wellhouse, he began rolling out hose so they could fight the fire before it spread.
Sammie ran for the horse barn to help. Trapped horses screamed with fear. Smoke billowed through the opening next to the shed.
Case’s roan kicked at his stall door, bellowing loudly. Sammie swallowed hard and headed for him, praying that he would understand she meant to help.
The whites of Comanche’s eyes showed, and his nostrils flared. He had never looked more menacing to her, and she quailed at the thought of going closer. Case was the only one who could really control him, but Case wasn’t here. She grabbed a rope hanging nearby, grateful it was already knotted into a loop. She threw it over her shoulder as she climbed the slats on the side of his stall.
Frantically she fought to slip it over Comanche’s head as his hooves flashed, thundering against the walls. Every strike threatened to topple her from her perch. She crooned to him, not sure that he could hear over the crackling flames and terrified whinnying.
Finally she managed, then leaned down and unlatched the stall door. He lunged for the opening and dragged the stiff rope through her palms as she grappled to hold onto it. Refusing to give in, she launched herself onto his back. She grabbed his mane for balance and laid herself flat on his back, clinging for dear life. Comanche stalled, torn between throwing her off or racing out of the barn.
In the moment of his hesitation, Sammie dug her heels into his side. “Go, boy—Comanche, go!”
He charged for open ground. Terrified he would tangle his legs in the whipping halter rope, she used one hand to try to retrieve it.
“Sammie!” she heard Wiley yell and spotted him running faster than an old man should to help her stop Comanche.
It seemed like forever before she felt the horse slow. “Good boy,” she crooned to him. “Good boy. You’re okay. We’re okay.”
At last Comanche stopped, sides heaving, blowing hard, his coat streaked with sweat. The big horse trembled and stamped nervously. Sammie slid to the ground and leaned into him, stroking his neck, trying to impart calm to the terrified animal.
“Damned if I ever thought I’d see such a thing,” Wiley said, grabbing the rope. “Never knew anyone could ride that mean sumbitch horse but Case. Don’t know that even he could have controlled Comanche in these circumstances, and just look at you, Sammie. Are you all right?”
“I’m…I’m okay.” But her voice trembled. “Thank you.”
As her heart finally slowed, her mind reverted to what was uppermost: Case. “Wiley…I don’t know what to do.” She blinked back tears.
“Girly girl, I don’t know what happened with Roland, but I don’t believe you had any part in it. Case won’t either, once he cools off.”
“I really didn’t. I tried to tell Case before he left, but he wouldn’t listen.” She tried for a smile. “But there’s a fire to fight. Don’t you worry about me.”
“It’s about under control now, and thanks to you, the last of the horses are out of harm’s way.” Wiley patted her arm awkwardly. “Case will listen to me—or be sorry he didn’t,” Wiley muttered darkly as he stalked over to put Comanche in a pen well out of danger.
A tired group sat around the table, faces sweaty and soot-stained. It had been a close call. If the barn had burned, if the horses had been trapped… So much could have been lost. Thanks heavens the mother cat had moved her kittens just the day before, tired of all the company.
This was bad, but it could have been much worse.
Sammie and Linnie Mae moved around the kitchen, putting together a snack, pouring glasses of iced tea.
“If you don’t mind, make mine coffee,” Wiley said. “It’s close enough to morning as to make going back to bed hardly worth the effort.” He shrugged. “Don’t sleep that much, anyway.”
Sammie joined him in a cup, certain that she could not possibly rest. Her reaction to the escapade with Comanche was delayed, but now that she had time to think about what she’d done, her insides quivered uncertainly.
“Got to get these children back to bed,” Linnie Mae said. “I’ll be back to fix breakfast.”
“You sleep. I’m not the cook you are, but I could fix it,” Sammie offered. “Please.”
“Hon, you don’t have to do that.”
“I want to. Please let me?”
“Let’s just say that I’ll plan to be here, but if I don’t make back before folks get hungry, I’d be much obliged.” With a fond smile, she left.
Ralph lingered. “I got a notion what happened.”
“You always got a notion, son,” Wiley responded. “Some of ’em goldarn foolish.” He winked at Sammie.
Sammie couldn’t help but smile. Sometimes she thought Wiley and Ralph would be lost without each other to argue with at the drop of a hat.
“You won’t think so when I tell you about the kerosene can I found out back.”
“What?” All mischief left Wiley’s features. “Where out back?”
“Right where the south shed wall once was.”
“You know better than to leave kerosene so close to hay storage.”
“I would never do something so stupid.”
The two men stared at each other. Wiley spoke first. “You sayin’ somebody set that blaze? Who would do that?”
Her breath stalled. Her blood chilled.
“Beats me,” Ralph said. “Case would never have left it. I can’t imagine who would.”
But she could.
They’ve found me.
She had to leave. She jumped up and busied herself wiping down an already-clean counter, fighting the urge to run out the door.
At last only she and Wiley were left. Sammie looked over at him, lost in his thoughts, a frown on his forehead.
How kind he and Linnie Mae had been to her.
She couldn’t leave him puzzling, not when she might have the answer. It was time to share her secrets with someone. Before she left, she wanted Case to know that she was innocent of the crimes he’d charged, even if she couldn’t stay to tell him.
“Wiley…” She cleared her throat. “I wish I’d been honest with Case earlier. I had a good reason for lying to him, but it’s all gone so wrong, I need to explain—” Her voice cracked with misery.
“What is it?”
She twisted the dishcloth in her hands. “I knew Case had some problems he was trying to solve, but I never had any idea until yesterday that Uncle Roland was involved. I still—I just don’t understand how he could have done it. That’s not the Uncle Roland I knew, hurting good people like you. Oh, not that he was ever an angel—I’m not saying that.” She smiled fondly, re
membering. “He’s been the black sheep as long as I can remember. Mother loves him dearly, and he’s very devoted to her, too. They’ve had only each other for many years.”
Wiley patted her back. “Truth to tell, it still doesn’t seem like him to do such a thing, either, honey.”
“I appreciate that.” Sammie looked up at him, grateful for the support. Summoning the courage to continue. “But that’s not why I didn’t speak up sooner. I’m in trouble, big trouble, and they told me they’d hurt my family if I talked to anyone, so—” When he didn’t respond, she continued. “I swear I never meant to harm any of you.”
His level gaze urged her on. She could see no condemnation in it.
“I guess I’d better start at the beginning, only I’m so afraid of what they’ll do if they find out. I couldn’t bear it if any of you—” She chewed at her lip.
“Why don’t you let us worry about that? Seems to me you’ve been carrying around quite a load all by yourself for long enough. There’s not many troubles that can’t be improved by sharing them.”
She wanted so badly to believe him. She didn’t know anymore what to think, what to do next. She’d searched for an answer, but she was no closer than the day she’d left New Orleans, running for her life. These good people had stood by her. They’d been fair and honest when she’d held back too much that was important. If she couldn’t have Case’s forgiveness, at least she could square things with them.
“My parents are prominent in New Orleans society, and my father is—well, let’s just say that he has standards he expects all of us to meet. Don’t get me wrong, I love him very much, and I know he loves me, but I haven’t always been the easiest child for him to raise. My sisters have always done what he wished. They’re both married, one to a doctor and one to a partner in a big law firm. They’re seen at the right functions, belong to the right charities…” She uttered a deep sigh, lost in remembrance.
“I didn’t openly rebel against Papa, but I just couldn’t see myself living that way forever. I had enough of the right parties to last me a lifetime the year I was Queen of Rex.” From the blank look on his face, she could tell that Mardi Gras’ most famous krewe made little impression on Wiley. Women in her circle would kill to be Queen of Rex, but how empty it seemed now.
“Anyway, I wanted to do something different, but I’m not much good at rebellion. The most revolutionary thing I did was to get a finance degree from Yale and go to work in the bank that was Papa’s oldest competitor.” She smiled, remembering how hard she’d had to fight over that.
“You see, Papa’s chairman of the board of Whitney National Bank, one of the two oldest banks in New Orleans. If I’d been a son, it would have been fine for me to get a degree in finance. But it would never have been fine for a child of his, boy or girl, to go to work for Restoration.”
She saw his interest spark, surprised that he would be familiar with a bank which was only slightly active in Texas. She thrust the thought away, continuing with her story.
“I was—I am good at banking and finance. I’ve always been good with numbers, and I did well for myself at the bank. Several weeks ago, I received a strange message from Uncle Roland telling me to look closely at the files on loans generated by Mr. Whitehead, a senior vice-president at Restoration. I wasn’t sure why he would ask that, and I felt very uneasy about doing it. I didn’t follow up until it was brought to my attention a few days later that an account at the bank belonging to Uncle Roland had been completely cleaned out.”
Wiley’s eyebrows winged upward. “He has a habit of doing that.”
She smiled ruefully. “The bookkeeping department was concerned because a draft on that account had bounced and they couldn’t get hold of Uncle Roland. He used to be an officer at Restoration, so they would never think of just notifying him by mail. Uncle Roland was prone to, um, interesting investments, so the bank was used to strange comings and goings in that account—but it had never before been cleaned out. The bookkeeper wanted me to know, in case there was something I could do to avoid embarrassing him at the bank. It was an account on which he’d asked me to be an additional signatory long ago.” She hesitated. “Things started to get…difficult after that.”
Wiley’s eyes narrowed. He placed his hand on top of Sammie’s tightly clasped knuckles.
The quiet support nearly broke her. Sammie cleared her throat, determined to go on. “When I began to look at Mr. Whitehead’s loan files, I noticed several irregularities in them. Documentation was missing, items like appraisals. When I delved deeper, I realized that several of the loans made were clearly much larger than the collateral would warrant.” She saw the puzzlement on his face and explained. “That’s fraud, if it can be proven. Mr. Whitehead could spend years in jail if it came to light.”
Wiley still looked as if he didn’t understand why this was significant to Sammie or Roland. She took a deep breath and went on.
“When I looked closer at Uncle Roland’s account history, I could see a pattern there. When some of the loans were made, there were corresponding deposits made to his account. I think…I wonder if he was blackmailing Mr. Whitehead. They never liked one another, according to a secretary who’s been at the bank forever.” She stopped, too miserable to continue.
“Now, Sammie,” Wiley soothed. “You don’t really know that.”
“No, I don’t know for sure, but as things turned out, I’m fairly certain.”
“What do you mean?”
“I tried to be as discreet as possible in my inquiries, to limit the likelihood of anyone noticing until I could put the pieces together. But I started getting threatening phone calls, telling me that if I didn’t leave Whitehead alone, I’d wind up like my no-good uncle. I was concerned, but when I really got scared was when they—” Her throat closed up.
He waited patiently for her to continue, frowning slightly. She took a deep breath.
“One day, I received a package filled with recent photographs of my mother. There was also a note that said she’d suffer if I didn’t knock it off. I got a call later, threatening the safety of my entire family if I continued.” She looked up anxiously. “I just couldn’t take the chance, you see? They told me if I talked to anyone, they’d make sure that my family would pay. I still didn’t want to believe them.”
“Is that when you left New Orleans?” Wiley questioned.
“No…but things began to happen. My tires were all slashed one day. The phone began to ring in the middle of the night, and my mail appeared to have been opened. But the night I left was when a man—” She couldn’t finish.
“You can stop right there. You don’t have to relive whatever it was.” His jaw hardened, but his gaze remained gentle.
“No, I—I need to tell it all.” She shuddered, then straightened her back. “I came home one night, and the apartment didn’t feel right somehow. I…it was only a feeling that someone was in there, so I didn’t turn on the light, thinking I could get back out and call the police. But he—he pinned me against the wall, and he began to—” She struggled to master her terror as she relived that night.
Wiley shifted. “That’s enough.”
But she had to finish, so he’d see why she’d kept silent. “Thank God my doorbell rang when it did. He had stripped me—his hands in those horrible surgical gloves were all over me. He said the most sickening things, telling me what he was going to do to me before he killed me.” Her arms wrapped tight around her body. She dropped her head and sobbed.
Wiley put his arms around her and rocked her like a child. “Sh-h-h, Sammie…you don’t have to talk about it. You’re safe here now,” he soothed.
She sank against him, then at last drew a ragged breath. “He left through the patio door, but he told me he’d be back. I threw what I could in a suitcase and drove out of New Orleans as fast as I could, heading west. I remembered that the postmark on the letter from Uncle Roland said San Angelo, and I had the idea I might find him there. When Case found me at the truck sto
p, I already knew I’d been followed and the secondhand car I had traded my Porsche for had broken down. I was sitting in this booth, scared to spend any money for food because I didn’t know how long it would have to last, and I had no idea what to do or where to go.
“Case offered to get my car running, but before he could, those men tried to abduct me. He saved me, Wiley, when he didn’t have to. He’s never been anything but good to me. I’d never hurt him—I didn’t know, I swear I didn’t know…” Sammie wept for the harm she’d done. For all she’d lost. All they’d lost.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve tanned Case Marshall’s hide, but by God, he’s got some apologizing to do for not even giving you a chance to explain. When he hears this, he’s going to feel like the lowest scum on the planet.”
That didn’t matter. It would be too late for her.
“Why don’t you go on to bed now? The whole world will look better after some sleep. Case won’t be back until tomorrow sometime. By then, he’ll have calmed down and will be ready to listen,” Wiley soothed. “It will all still be here tomorrow. Get some rest.”
Wearily, Sammie nodded agreement and started toward the door.
Then she stopped as she remembered.
“Wiley, what Ralph said about that can—was he right? Could someone have set that fire? I don’t know how they’d find me here, but maybe they have. I can’t let you all be endangered.”
Wiley glanced away, then looked back at her squarely. “Those are just middle-of-the-night thoughts, Sammie. I’m absent-minded as the dickens—I probably left that can there. You go on to sleep and don’t worry, hear?”
She wished she could. Wished she didn’t know he was saying that for her benefit.
But she knew it was them.
She had to leave.
The Marshalls Boxed Set (Texas Heroes: The Marshalls Books 1-3) Page 62
