by Karen Hughes
“I’ve got the faxed reports from my experts.”
Jackson crammed his hands into the pocket of his slacks. “I take it from the look on your face the news isn’t good.”
“The results pretty much match the evidence the police say they have.” Rand shuffled through papers. “The document examiner states that the signature on the insurance policy is close enough to your own that he can’t say it isn’t yours. All he can say is the comparison is inconclusive.”
“Hell,” Jackson muttered. “What about ballistics?”
“Tests confirm the Luger the police recovered from the Dumpster is the gun used in both attempts on Dad’s life. There’s no record the Luger has ever been registered to anyone.”
“And the fingerprints on the Luger?” Jackson asked evenly.
Rand paused. “They’re yours.”
“Dammit, they can’t be!”
“They are.”
“There’s no way in hell I’ve ever touched that Luger.”
“There is some way, and we need to figure it out.” Rand’s dark brows slid together. “Here’s where things get interesting. My expert used Super-Glue to fume the Luger.”
“Fume?” Cheyenne asked.
Rand nodded. “Fumes from Super Glue react to components in human perspiration. Your skin leaves traces of your perspiration behind on anything you touch. Labs have glass tanks in which they place items needed to be analyzed for fingerprints. The tanks are filled with fumes from Super Glue. Those fumes, which adhere to ridge detail, appear after a few minutes as a white latent fingerprint.”
Rand looked back at Jackson. “Except for your exact prints, the gun is absolutely clean. Like somebody wiped it before you picked it up—”
“I didn’t pick it up—”
“Or printed your fingerprints onto the Luger when you were unaware. There are no smears or partials or smudges on the gun’s background surface like there should be when someone handles something. There’s just one set of very clear prints. Too clear, too careful. They have to be deliberate.”
Cheyenne stepped to the desk. “Are you saying someone pressed Jackson’s hand around the gun?”
“That’s the logical assumption.”
Jackson settled his palms against the top of the desk and leaned in. “You want to tell me how come I don’t know about that?”
“I’m working on it,” Rand stated. “What about a medical condition? Have you ever blacked out? Woken up and not known how you wound up there?”
“No.”
“Ever seen a doctor for any symptoms even remotely resembling those?”
“No.”
“All right.” Brow furrowed, Rand stared down at the papers spread across the desk. “We’re missing something. We’ve overlooked the piece that will put this puzzle together so it makes sense.”
Jackson shoved a hand through his dark hair. “It looks like I’ll have plenty of time to work on that when I’m locked in a cell.”
“Cousin, I’ve got a hell of a lot more plays to make before that happens. I don’t care how well this was planned, there’s no way the person who pulled off this setup could think of everything. No matter how well he or she covered themselves, there’s some way they’re not covered. The devil is in the details. Mistakes, accidents or random chance can ruin even the best-planned crime. Trust me, there are too many details on this setup for the person to have anticipated them all. We’ll find what we need. Eventually.”
Cheyenne slid a look at Jackson. She saw the tension in the way he held his shoulders, the strain about his eyes.
Rand glanced at his watch, then rose. “Time for me to hole up in my bedroom and call Lucy before it gets too late. Let’s meet back here first thing in the morning. We’ll put our heads together on this and come up with something.”
Cheyenne waited until Rand closed the door behind him, then placed her hand on Jackson’s arm. She could feel the frustration, the sense of helplessness shimmering inside him. “Rand’s right, Jackson. You can’t give up hope.”
“Too late, babe.” Shaking off her touch, he turned and paced to the far end of the study, where he stood before a bookcase with several shelves crowded with framed photographs. “I’m already there. Somebody decided I should take the fall for two attempted murders. That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
The certainty in his voice had her heart thudding in her throat. “No, you’re not. Not if I can help it.” She wrapped her arms around her waist. “You must have faith. The answer will come, you have to believe.”
He stared at the photographs for a long, silent moment, then turned to face her. His gray eyes were dark, unreadable. “What I have to do is start thinking about spending the rest of my life in prison.” He angled his head. “And while we’re on the subject, it’s time you accept how bad things are. I know you believe you’ll see the answer I need, but I’m not counting on that. Neither should you. There’s too much evidence against me. I don’t have an alibi for the time of either shooting. My fingerprints are on the Luger. No vision is going to change those facts. Period.”
She felt the blood drain from her face. “You don’t believe in my visions?”
“Hell, yes, I believe in them. I just don’t happen to have much faith in this particular one you say you’re having.”
“I say I’m having?”
“That came out wrong.” Swiping a hand across his face, he walked to her. “I know you want to help get me out of this jam. You have no idea what that means to me. But I can’t stand watching you tear yourself apart because you feel some obligation to help me.” He reached out, settled a hand on her forearm. “Just because you believe something will happen doesn’t mean it will. All you’re doing is wearing yourself out. Losing weight. Sitting in here in the dark, crying. All on my account.” As he spoke, his fingers tightened on her arm and he gave her a small shake. “Dammit, you need to think about yourself. You need to back off. Accept the inevitable before you make yourself sick.”
“You don’t believe.” A razor sharp blade of hurt pierced her heart. She took a step back, then another, forcing him to drop his hand. “You don’t believe the answer you need will come to me. You don’t believe in my gift.”
“Dammit, quit twisting my words around.” He moved forward; impatience flicked in his eyes when she retreated backward two more steps. He raised a hand, took a deep breath. “All I’m saying is that you need to think about yourself. From where I’m standing, there’s no way out of this for me. I could wind up in prison for years. For the rest of my life, maybe. We’ll both be better off if we accept that. Deal with it. Then figure out where to go from there.”
“Do you think I’m playing parlor games here?” Her chin lifted while anger boiled through her like water in a pot. “That maybe for my next trick I’ll pull a rabbit out of a hat?”
His brows drew together. “What?”
She fisted her hands, her muscles taut enough to snap. “Do you think my gift works according to some schedule? Demand an answer, then immediately get one?”
Wariness slid into his eyes. “I guess I don’t understand exactly how it works.”
“I guess you don’t.” It hurt to think about everything she felt for him. Everything she had begun to wish for. “And there’s something else you obviously don’t understand, Jackson. From day one, I believed in you. In your innocence. Do you know why? Because a vision sent me to you. I trusted it. Believed in it. Just like I believed in you. Totally.” She set her jaw. The sense of betrayal was huge, overwhelming. “All I ever asked of you was equal belief in me.”
“I do believe—”
“Not enough,” she said in a voice that had gone very cool. Very calm. “Not fully. And that’s what matters.”
“Cheyenne, please.”
She turned, walked to the door, then paused and gave him a searing look across her shoulder. She had given him her heart, and now it was bleeding. She could feel it.
“I can’t—won’t—be with a man wh
o doesn’t accept me for what I am.”
Twelve
Jackson discovered that a man could lose his mind in the space of a single night.
After Cheyenne had walked out on him in the study, he spent hours prowling the dark house and grounds, searching for her. Her white Mustang had remained parked in its usual spot near the five-car garage. When questioned, none of the security team on patrol had caught a glimpse of her. He couldn’t even spot her with the help of his uncle’s state-of-the-art video system that surveilled all of Hacienda de Alegria, including the stables, barns and other buildings. Having run out of places to look, he had gone to their room, where he’d tossed restlessly in bed until dawn. Waiting for her.
Even now, as he sat brooding in his uncle’s study, he told himself what had happened between them was best. If he was going to prison, this was as good a time as any for Cheyenne to pull away. To avoid him. To not even step one foot into their bedroom the whole damn night.
A vicious case of frustration had him surging to his feet, roaming the length of the paneled room. He was going out of his mind with worry. And fear. He closed his eyes on the image of her walking away from their marriage, from him, but that didn’t stop white-hot panic from burning through his belly.
It didn’t seem to matter that he had resolved to walk away from her if he wound up in prison. In his mind, the situation was different. Totally. It was a way—the only way—for him to protect the woman he loved so that she didn’t waste her life waiting for a man who could never give her anything but heartbreak.
He had not considered that he would die on the inside if she were the one who turned her back.
He paced to the study’s far wall then back again, scrubbing his hands over his whisker-stubbled face while guilt and misery rolled through him. His mind was so fatigued that he wasn’t sure he was even thinking logically. How the hell could he think when in all his life he had never been so afraid? That fear had nothing to do with the prospect of going to prison and everything to do with the fact he might never again step into Cheyenne’s arms and feel her complete, unconditional acceptance.
Which was all that she had ever asked of him.
He cursed himself for the idiotic way he’d handled things. More precisely, fumbled them. She had trusted him with all that she was. Opened herself to him. All he’d done was show doubt, try to convince her the gift that was her legacy, a part of her soul, couldn’t be counted on.
Dammit, he did believe in her. In her visions. All he had to do was make her understand that. He was an attorney, adept at delicate negotiations. The minute he saw her he would force—no, request—that she sit with him, then he would calmly ask if a man who was about to have a mountain of irrefutable evidence avalanche on him shouldn’t be allowed to voice a momentary lack of faith. Surely he could compel her to view the situation reasonably, and admit it was human nature for him to have doubts, even if she had never once doubted him.
“Lame, Colton,” he muttered as he paced the length of the room. “Totally lame.”
Okay, he would forgo the attempt at logic, and beg. Promise to do whatever it took to make things right again. Swear he would never again doubt her and all she was.
The sound of the study door opening had him jerking around in midstride. Hope that Cheyenne would walk through the door died like a flamed-out match when Rand stepped into view, a mug of steaming coffee in one hand. Jackson filled the air with a stream of graphic oaths.
Rand raised a brow. “I sense I’m not who you wanted to see.”
“Nailed that one, counselor.”
Rand moved to the front of the desk, leaned against it and sipped his coffee. His speculative gaze met Jackson’s over the mug’s rim. “You look like hell.”
“Since I’m headed there, I’ll fit right in.”
“I told you, we’ve got a lot of hands to play before you need to worry about going to prison.”
“To hell with prison.” Striding to the desk, Jackson took the mug from Rand’s hand and swallowed a gulp. The coffee scalded his tongue. “Dammit, I’m talking about Cheyenne.”
“Ah.” Rand glanced around the room. “Where is your lovely bride?”
“You tell me.”
“You lost her?”
“She lost herself.”
“I’m not lost.”
The sound of Cheyenne’s voice jerked Jackson’s head around. His heart shot into his throat when he saw her face, pale as ice, her bloodless lips. Her hair rained messily down her shoulders; her black blouse and slacks made her look desperately thin, as fragile as glass.
He shoved the mug at Rand, who staggered sideways to avoid the coffee that sloshed over the rim and onto the wood floor.
“Where have you been?” Jackson reached her in two strides, grabbing her forearms as if to confirm she was really there. His stomach knotted when he felt her tremble against his touch. “Are you all right? We need to talk.”
“Not now.”
“Cheyenne—”
“I see the gun.” She stared up into his face, her eyes dark and hard. Lines of exhaustion etched the corners of her mouth. “In my vision. The dark shape—it’s a gun. He wears dark clothing, like a hunter’s. The gun is against his waist, slipped beneath a brown leather belt.”
“Come sit down.” Wrapping an arm around her shoulders, Jackson drew her across the study to the leather couch. She was shaking so badly he was afraid her legs would give out.
“This is the man who tried to kill Uncle Joe?” he asked after he’d nudged her back onto the cushions. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Rand had moved to the bar and was adding a shot of whiskey to the coffee.
“Yes. He hates your uncle. Viciously. The hate has festered for years.”
Crouching beside the couch, Rand slid the mug into her hands. “Drink this,” he said quietly. “It should make you feel steadier.”
“Thank you.” Cheyenne took a sip. Then another. “Rand, he hasn’t given up trying to kill your father. He still wants to. There’s security here now. The patrols. That’s why he hasn’t tried again. He’s just waiting.”
Rand angled his chin. “Do you know who the man is?”
“No.” She closed her eyes, opened them. “I can’t see his face. I tried. All night, I tried….” Her voice hitched. “It’s not Jackson. Even though I can’t see the man’s face, I know it isn’t Jackson.”
“Cheyenne…” Jackson’s heart turned over at the thought of how carelessly he’d handled her faith in him. He cupped his palm against her cheek. “I’m sorry.”
She shifted away. He wouldn’t exactly describe it as a cringe, but it was close enough to lock his jaw.
“In my vision, I see the gun clearly,” she said after a moment. “The metal is dark, its barrel long and thin. It’s older, carries marks of use. It has a notch—one notch—in the top of its grip.”
Jackson felt his throat close. He pictured Thad Law, holding the plastic bag that shrouded the Luger. Even through the plastic, he had noticed the distinctive notch in the Luger’s grip.
“A notch.” Rand’s voice remained even although his eyes had widened. Jackson knew his cousin had read the description of the Luger in both the police report and the information Rand had received from his ballistics expert. He would have read about the notch in the Luger’s grip.
He and Rand exchanged a silent look. Jackson shook his head to indicate he hadn’t described the gun to Cheyenne.
Her brow furrowed as she stared down into the coffee’s golden depths. “I have seen the man before, standing with his hand fisted at his waist, sunlight reflecting off the gun’s metal. I’ve seen him in this setting.” She lifted a hand, rubbed at her temple as if to massage an ache. “I just don’t have a sense of being there. Of being near him.”
Jackson wanted to reach for her hand, but he was afraid she would pull away again. “You’ve seen this?” he asked. “Not just pictured it in your mind?”
Her gaze slowly rose to meet his. “Yes.”
“I don’t know.” Cheyenne raised a hand, let it drop to her thigh. “I just don’t know.”
Jackson’s spine straightened on a thought. “You’ve seen him, but don’t have a sense of being near him. Cheyenne, the other night at the inn, you mentioned how, on the weekends you came to visit River, Uncle Joe would let you sit in here and look through the family photo albums. Maybe this man is in one of the pictures. You would have seen him with the gun even though you weren’t there when the picture was taken.”
Her lips parted. “Yes, that would explain it.” She set the mug aside. “I could have seen him in a picture.”
“Let’s get at it.” Rand turned, had the bottom door on one of the bookshelves open before Jackson and Cheyenne made it across the study. “We’ll each take a couple,” Rand said, jerking albums off the shelves and handing them to Jackson.
Twenty minutes later, Rand was muttering about the number of photographs his parents had taken over the years. “If I’d known they’d kept all these ridiculous pictures of me with various teeth missing, and opening every Christmas present they’ve ever given me, I’d have gotten rid of them long ago.”
“Same here,” Jackson said from the place he’d taken on the couch. At the other end, Cheyenne sat in silence, leafing through the pages of an album. Although the color had returned to her face, he saw no warmth in her eyes when she looked at him—which was as seldom as possible. His fingers tightened on the pages of album he was flipping through. He would rectify that, he promised himself. The minute he got her alone.
“My God,” she whispered, then looked up from the album in her lap. “It’s him! It’s the pose I see in my vision. It’s him!”
“Who?” Jackson and Rand asked the question in unison as they both moved to stand behind her.
“He’s dressed in dark hunting clothes and holding a rifle,” she said, almost to herself. “I didn’t see the rifle in my vision.”
