The Rivals

by Joan Johnston

  Next time?Kate felt her heart leap to her throat, threatening to choke her. Am I next?

  “There isn’t going to be any next time,” the harsh voice said. “We’re done. I’m going to have to come up with another plan to get what I want. This one isn’t going to work anymore.”

  “Just because this girl has a family looking for her—”

  “You fool!” the harsh voice interrupted. “She not only isn’t a runaway, that idiot from Midland picked up King Grayhawk’s granddaughter!”

  “Lester said he was ordered to pick her up.”

  “Not by me! You two don’t know what you’ve done. Every policeman in the country is looking for that girl. Christ! She also happens to be Clay Blackthorne’s daughter.”

  “How the hell was I supposed to know that? Who even knew he had a daughter?”

  Kate felt a chill run down her spine. Only a very few people knew the truth about her father. She could count them on two hands. Whoever was out there, whoever had been killing girls and taking pictures of them with drugged men, was someone who knew her mother or her father well enough to know that she was Clay Blackthorne’s daughter.

  Which made her situation all the more sinister. Whichever acquaintance it was couldn’t take the chance of letting her go. Which meant sooner or later—probably sooner—she was going to be killed and dumped somewhere no one would ever find her.

  Or left here to die of hunger and thirst.

  When Lourdes had been taken last night, no food or water had been left for Kate. Her throat was raw and her tongue thick. What made it worse was knowing there was so much snow right outside the door. If she could reach it, if she could melt it, she could drink, and ease her thirst.

  But it might as well be snow in Timbuktu, as much chance as she had of reaching it. She was going to die with her tongue swollen up and purple in her mouth, her eyes bugged out and her body shrunken like an old prune.

  Kate cursed her vivid imagination. Her mother and father, and her stepgrandmother and grandfathers, were probably searching for her at this very moment. She knew from past experience that whenever someone in her family wanted something done, they made it happen. Neither Blackthornes nor Grayhawks let anything, or anyone, get in their way.

  But what if someone in her extended family really was responsible for this murder and blackmail scheme? That person would be in a position to thwart the attempts to find her. That person could make sure all efforts to locate her failed. That person could make sure she died.

  Kate ran through the short list of people who knew she was Clay Blackthorne’s daughter: her mother, her father, Ren and Blackjack, King, her eldest uncles North and Matt Grayhawk, her father’s wife Giselle—but she was dead—and Giselle’s sister Jocelyn, her father’s personal secretary and his chief of staff, and her father’s cousin and partner at the ranch, Drew DeWitt, whom she thought of as another uncle.

  Her father’s relatives in Texas knew, as well, including her father’s twin brother Owen and Owen’s wife, and her father’s younger sister Summer and her husband Billy. But they all lived in Texas, which made their involvement in a Wyoming blackmail scheme unlikely. But not impossible, she realized.

  She had two more uncles and two more aunts on her mother’s side, and it was possible they knew the truth, but they lived in Texas, and she’d never even heard any of them mention Clay Blackthorne.

  Her father might have told a few people how she was related to him, but it had been made clear to her from the time she was old enough to understand words, that the truth might be devastating to his political career. She doubted he’d shared such potentially destructive information with many—if any—others.

  Which of her relatives was capable of blackmail and murder? Kate’s heart was pounding as she admitted the truth. Any or all of them, under the right circumstances.

  Grandpa King had told her the story of her grandmother, Clay’s mother Eve, who’d planned her own death by suicide and tried to make it look like Clay’s father Blackjack had murdered her. Her uncle Owen was a Texas Ranger and had killed men. Her uncle North had accidentally killed a man—against whom he’d coincidentally held a grudge.

  Her family were no strangers to violence.

  Kate had learned to shoot when she was big enough to carry a rifle. She’d killed a buck once but had never gone hunting again. She hadn’t liked the way she’d felt when she looked into the glazed brown eyes of the dying animal.

  “So how do we get rid of her?” the gruff voice asked.

  Kate was jerked from her musings by the gruff man’s question and listened with bated breath to hear her fate.

  “It’s dangerous to move her right now,” the harsh-voiced man said. “There are too many cops out there looking for her.”

  Silence. More silence. Kate wanted to scream at them to let her go. That she wouldn’t talk. That she didn’t know who they were. At least, she didn’t recognize either of the two voices. Shouldn’t she, if it was someone she knew?

  Of course, the two men could have been hired by one of her relatives. Almost all of them were filthy rich, starting with both her grandfathers, who not only seemed to have all the money they could ever need, but seemed hell-bent on earning even more.

  In the end, Kate couldn’t remain silent. She had to beg for her life.

  “Let me go!” she screamed. “I won’t talk. I don’t even know who you are!”

  “Have you been in there listening all this time?” the harsh voice asked.

  Kate hesitated a beat too long before she replied, “No.”

  She heard the harsh voice swearing, using words so foul she’d never heard them before, though she had no doubt what they meant.

  “You’re a little too smart for your britches, young lady,” the harsh voice said.

  “Please let me go,” Kate begged. “I promise—”

  “Shut up!” the harsh voice said. “I need to think.”

  Kate rose and pressed her ear against the planking that covered the plastic window, her eyes closed, her fingers crossed, praying for a miracle.

  “We don’t have to do anything right now,” she heard the harsh-voiced man say. “Nobody’s going to find this place. It’s too well hidden. Let’s just let things cool down.”

  “When do you want to meet again?” the gruff voice asked.

  “In a couple of days,” the harsh voice replied.

  In a couple of days she would be dead of thirst. “I need water and food!” she cried. “Please. I’m thirsty and hungry.”

  “You want me to do anything about that?” the gruff voice asked.

  “Might as well keep her alive,” the harsh voice replied. “If things go belly-up, we might need her as a bargaining tool.”

  “I didn’t bring anything with me,” the gruff voice said. “I’ll have to go back to town and get something.”

  “Wait till dark to come back here. I don’t want you being seen,” the harsh voice said.

  “I’m thirsty now!” Kate protested.

  A flat hand slapped against the wood on the outside of the window and Kate jumped back.

  “Get the hell away from that window,” the harsh voice said.

  Kate stared at the light filtering through the boarded-up window, her whole body trembling with fear and fatigue. Then she realized she could see the two men standing outside.

  She squinted as a ray of sunlight hit her eyes. At first the two men were merely black outlines. As her eyes adjusted, she began to make out the shapes of their faces. She didn’t recognize the younger of the two and turned her attention to the other man.

  Kate gasped in shock and horror when she realized who it was.

  16

  Sarah was exhausted, both physically and emotionally. It had been the longest day of her life. Or rather, the second longest. The longest had been the day Tom hadn’t come home. At least this day had come to an end. Finally.

  “You sure you’re okay by yourself?” her boss said as he stopped in front of her house in th
e wee hours of the morning.

  “I’m fine, Jim.” Sarah didn’t want to remind him that Drew had taken her kids home, so she wouldn’t be alone. She reached up to shove an errant strand of hair behind her ear and realized her hand was trembling. She quickly pulled it down, but it was too late.

  “Yeah, sure. You’re fine,” her boss muttered as he eyed her shaking hands. “Stay home tomorrow. Get some rest.”

  “I’m fine,” Sarah protested. “Really.”

  “You’re on administrative leave until you talk to a psychologist and he says you’re all right—up here,” Jim said, tapping his temple. “Those are the rules.”

  “Really, I—”

  “Shut up and get out of the car,” he said.

  Sarah knew there was no use arguing. Her sergeant was a stickler for the rules. As she headed for the front door, she realized she might very well need the day off, depending on what shape her kids were in physically and emotionally.

  Sarah had been anxious about what she might find at home. She certainly hadn’t expected all the lights to be off and for everyone, including Drew, who lay prone on the living room couch, to be sound asleep. She closed the front door quietly, relieved that she could put off talking about what had happened. She wasn’t sure she could relive the past night without falling apart.

  She’d killed a man.

  And she’d found Tom. Or rather, her kids had found Tom.

  Sarah tiptoed down the hallway in the dim yellow glow of the night-light and checked in the boys’ room to make sure they were all right.

  She pulled the covers up over Ryan’s shoulder and brushed a damp mop of hair from his brow before pressing her cheek against his forehead to see if he had a fever. He felt warm, but not hot. Then she crossed to Nate’s bed, laid a hand gently against his warm—again, not hot—cheek and slid the covers over the one bare foot that always hung out at the bottom of the bed. Before she’d finished, the foot had found its way back out from under the covers.

  She closed their door quietly and moved farther down the hall to Brooke’s room, where she could see a light on under the door. She knocked softly and whispered, “Brooke?” as she opened the door.

  Brooke was sitting cross-legged at the head of her bed wrapped in a blanket, the volume in her earphones so loud that Sarah could hear the raucous rap music across the room. Tears had dried on her stepdaughter’s cheeks.

  Sarah settled near enough to Brooke to lay a hand on her knee. “Do you want to talk?”

  Brooke shook her head.

  That wasn’t unusual. Brooke never wanted to share her troubles. Sarah was reluctant to leave without offering what comfort she could. She didn’t ask Brooke to remove her earphones, or even to turn down the volume. She simply talked, sharing her feelings about the discovery of Tom’s body.

  “As horrible as it was to find your dad that way, I feel relieved to know what happened to him,” she began. “I never really believed he left us. But his truck was gone, and he’d threatened…” Sarah stopped and swallowed past the painful lump in her throat.

  She looked into Brooke’s dark, wounded eyes and said, “Now we know for sure that he loved us all too much ever to leave us, if he’d had a choice.” She looked down, unable to meet Brooke’s gaze, and continued speaking.

  The thumping, rhythmic cant in the background suddenly stopped.

  Sarah looked up to see more tears sliding down Brooke’s cheeks. She opened her arms and Brooke threw herself against Sarah’s body.

  Sarah held tight as the girl sobbed, “Poor Daddy. Oh, poor, poor Daddy.”

  The mournful cries were muffled against Sarah’s shoulder. She patted Brooke’s back, her own throat aching with unshed tears. She hadn’t cried yet for Tom, afraid to let go for fear that she wouldn’t be able to stop.

  Sarah wasn’t sure how long they remained locked in each other’s arms, but at last she felt the tension ease in Brooke’s body and realized the exhausted girl had fallen asleep.

  She laid Brooke down and covered her with the blanket that had been wrapped around her, kissing her on the cheek before she turned and left the room. She stepped into her own room, then realized she should cover Drew with a blanket. He was liable to get cold before morning. She grabbed a crocheted quilt from the foot of her bed and headed back to the living room.

  To her surprise, Drew was no longer on the couch. She looked around and saw him standing in the doorway to the darkened kitchen.

  “You’re up,” she said.

  “I should go,” he said. “It’s late.”

  She smiled wanly and said, “No, it’s early.”

  “How are you?” he asked.

  She felt her chin quiver and gritted her teeth. She tried smiling again, but it didn’t work. Her lips wobbled, and then crumpled. She wasn’t sure which one of them moved first, but a moment later Drew’s arms were wrapped tightly around her. She felt herself sagging as she gave in to grief. She felt him pick her up in his arms as she pressed her mouth against his chest and wailed out her sorrow.

  “It’s all right,” Drew crooned in her ear, as he settled both of them on the couch with her in his lap. “Cry all you want. I’m here, Sarah. I’ll take care of you.”

  Which made her wail all the harder and press her face even harder against his shoulder to muffle the sound. She didn’t want to wake up the kids, or frighten them with the depth of her despair. She clung to Drew, her arms around his neck, her body as close as she could get it to his. She would have climbed inside him, if she could.

  She was shuddering and shivering and couldn’t seem to stop.

  “Sarah?” Drew said.

  She heard the concern in his voice and leaned back to look up into his face. “Did you see Tom?” she choked out. “Nobody seemed to think anything of digging him up right in front of me. He was…he was…”

  “Oh, baby,” Drew said, tucking her head under his chin and holding her close. “I wondered why you seemed so calm. You didn’t react and I thought…We’re all stupid idiots. Me, most of all. I should have known you’d be torn apart inside. You don’t have to be so strong, Sarah. I’m here.”

  They were powerful, moving words to hear. A man to support her. A man to lean on. A man to trust. Sarah had been self-reliant for so very long. She’d been on her own for over a year, managing fine. But so lonely. And so scared all the time that she would make a wrong choice and the kids would suffer for it.

  Drew was talking again, and she had to concentrate to understand what he was saying. “I suppose you’re a basket case over that guy you shot, too,” he said. “I’m so sorry, Sarah. I wish I’d realized sooner how you felt. I would have sent the kids home with someone else and stayed with you.”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head. “I would have worried about them if they hadn’t been with someone I trust.”

  He slid a finger under her chin and lifted her face so he could look into her eyes. “You trust me, Sarah? With your kids? I’m the last person—”

  “You’re not like that miserable grandmother of yours,” she said softly, but fiercely. “You’re a good man, Drew. I’d trust you with my kids any day of the week.”

  She heard him swallow noisily.

  “Thanks, Sarah.” He cleared his throat and said, “I’d better get out of here so you can get some sleep.”

  “I can sleep in tomorrow. I’m on administrative leave for a couple of days.”

  “Why’s that?” he asked. “They’re not giving you a hassle about shooting that guy, are they? Because if they are, I—”

  “It’s nothing like that. I had to answer a lot of questions, and I had to turn in my Glock as evidence, but they gave me a replacement weapon. I just have to get checked out by a psychologist to make sure I’m okay about the shooting before I can go back to work.”

  His hand cupped her head and stroked her hair as he asked, “How are you feeling about it?”

  “Sick to my stomach,” Sarah admitted. “Sick at heart. I would do it again, if I had to. B
ut I hope I never have to. What I really want is to be a part of the investigation. I want to find out whether the guy I shot is connected to any of the politicians at that party.”

  “Who says you can’t?” Drew asked.

  “I’m on administrative leave,” she reminded him.

  “So what? Haven’t you ever done any investigating when you weren’t on duty?”

  Sarah snickered. “Are you kidding? I’ve worked more hours off the clock over the past year than on, trying to find those missing girls. It’s important to me, but I’m not the only deputy out there following up on leads and looking for Kate. My kids need me here.”

  “I think they’re fine, as far as their dousing in the river goes. I made sure they got hot baths or showers and were dressed warmly for bed.”

  “Thank you,” Sarah said. “They seemed okay when I checked on them.”

  “I suppose only time will tell whether they need some counseling.”

  “It’s available, if it comes to that,” Sarah said.

  “I should leave now,” Drew said. “And let you get some sleep.”

  “Don’t go.”

  Sarah saw the surprise on Drew’s face. She couldn’t quite believe she’d asked him to stay, but she didn’t want to be alone for what remained of the night. She looked into his eyes, to make sure he understood that she wasn’t offering sex, that all she wanted was comfort, a strong shoulder to lean on and a warm body next to hers to fend off the cold creeping through her.

  “I’m here for you, Sarah, as long as you need me,” Drew said.

  Sarah sagged against him, allowing the rigidity of control to seep from her body. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  She was still on his lap, and she laid her head against his shoulder and slid her fingers into the soft hair at his nape. His heart thumped steadily against her ear.

  “Sleep now,” he murmured, his hand threading through her hair to massage her scalp. “I’ve got you. You’re safe with me.”

  They were words she hadn’t realized how much she needed to hear. Forty-eight hours ago she’d never even heard of Drew DeWitt. Now she would have trusted him with her life. She didn’t want to think how she was going to feel when he left.