Covert Cootchie-Cootchie-Coo

by Ann Voss Peterson

Reed had seen some beautiful spreads in his years growing up in Texas, but none outdid the Wexler Ranch. He’d heard about the place first from his mother. She’d even taken him driving past it every month or so, so he could see what a real ranch looked like, she’d said. In his teenage years, the place had been a legend in his high school, mainly a result of the bragging of Teddy Wexler, Jr. The place had seemed like a kingdom to a kid from the Double Kay. White board fence, a rare luxury around these parts. Ten thousand head of cattle. A house built as a carbon copy of the White House, maybe even more grand. Two outdoor swimming pools for summer and one inside for use during the colder months. Tennis courts and—the most amazing thing of all—a full-sized football field right there in the backyard, so Teddy Jr. could practice his state-champion passing form.

  Reed couldn’t see the football field from the home’s circular drive, but the mansion still looked every bit important enough to house the president himself. And he couldn’t help feeling a little awed at the white board fence, even as an adult.

  He parked the car, and they marched to the front entrance. The doorbell chime was still echoing when the door swung wide. A maid, complete with gray dress and white apron, stood in the opening. Black hair pulled back from her face in a thick braid. “May I help you?”

  Her Mexican accent made Reed think of Esme. “Is Mrs. Wexler home?”

  “Who should I say is calling?”

  “Reed Tanner and J. R. Dionne…from the Double Kay Ranch,” he added.

  “Thank you.” She shut the door, leaving them staring at the leaded glass and white molding.

  “So his house is as pretentious as the man himself. Can I expect his wife to be the same?”

  “Not sure. She wasn’t on the scene yet when Teddy Jr. and I were in high school. She’s the judge’s second wife. And except for the Springton Stallions’ games, my family and the Wexlers didn’t exactly run in the same social circles.”

  “I noticed what I assume was her picture in the judge’s chambers. Miss Texas?”

  He hadn’t remembered that and hadn’t noticed the photo, but it didn’t surprise him. “It seems you have to earn a spot in the judge’s family. No trophies, no inheritance.”

  Josie let out a sigh. “If he is the twins’ father, I can see why Honey wouldn’t want him anywhere near them.”

  Reed set his chin. He still wouldn’t believe the judge had fathered Troy. The man would have to come up with proof.

  The door swung open once more, and the maid beckoned them into the house his mother would have killed to be able to visit. The air-conditioning hit with the chill of an arctic blast. They followed her across the white marble floor of the foyer and into a parlor decorated with a combination of crown moldings and thick rugs that would look at home on Pennsylvania Avenue and paintings of horses and landscapes that were pure-D Texas.

  Portia Wexler sat on a love seat near a blazing fire. She wore a gold dress that showed off her tiny waist and had the fancy look of some sort of designer original. Its skirt flared out over the velvet of the love seat. Between that and the way she tilted her head to the side and twisted her body just so, she looked like a doll on display.

  The maid made introductions and stepped back to the edge of the room.

  Portia offered them a beauty-queen smile. She was a good-looking woman. Sleek blond hair, sparkling blue eyes and high-as-the-sky cheekbones. But there was something brittle about her Reed couldn’t quite put his finger on. She really did look like a doll. Gorgeous, but with the fragility of china. She reminded him of his mother.

  “Nice to meet you, Reed, J.R. It’s always nice to get a visit from a neighbor. Please, sit down.” She gestured to a seating area facing her.

  A neighbor? That was generous. The only thing the Double Kay had in common with the Wexler Ranch was a poling place. Reed lowered himself into one of the most uncomfortable chairs he’d ever sat on. Josie perched beside him on a chair with curlicue legs.

  “Did Louisa offer you sweet tea? Louisa?”

  Reed shook his head. He sure as hell couldn’t accept this woman’s hospitality, not while knowing the bomb they were going to drop on her. “Thank you, but it’s not necessary. We’re not going to be here that long.”

  “Oh, you don’t have to rush off so quickly you can’t have a little refreshment. Poor things.”

  “I would love some sweet tea.”

  Reed turned to Josie.

  She shrugged. “I’ve always wanted to try it.”

  “Marvelous.” Portia Wexler beamed. “Louisa?”

  The maid rushed from the room.

  “Now, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?”

  Reed pressed against the stiff back of his chair. How in the hell did you break the news that her husband thought he’d fathered babies with another woman? His mouth felt dry as sand. Maybe he should have taken her up on that sweet tea. “We just have a few questions to ask, if you don’t mind.”

  “Of course I don’t mind. However I can help…”

  Clearing her throat, Josie leaned forward, hands on knees. “Do you know a woman by the name of Honey Dawson?”

  A shadow seemed to pass across Portia’s brittle features. She blinked, then smiled all the wider. “The name sounds familiar. Sorry, I can’t place it at the moment. Who is she?”

  “She’s a friend of your husband’s.”

  “My husband has a lot of friends. He’s a very influential man.”

  “Honey would be a special friend. Young. Blond. Pregnant.”

  Reed shifted his feet in the thick, cream-colored rug. He wanted to stand, to walk, to get out of this stiff room, this frigid house. He knew Josie was trying to break through Portia’s defenses, shock her into blurting out a truth she’d rather hide, much as he’d attempted to do with the judge. But that didn’t mean he enjoyed witnessing it.

  “Teddy does give money to a charity to help unfortunate girls like that.” Portia gave an innocent smile, as if that must be the answer Josie was looking for, because it was the only one to be had.

  “Did he give her money?”

  “You’ll have to check with the charity. I don’t know anything about Teddy’s donations.”

  “This didn’t come through any charity, Mrs. Wexler.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Let me explain it to you, then.”

  The sound of ice cubes pinging against crystal rang through the room like pealing bells. Louisa scurried across the thick rug with the tray of sweet tea.

  Reed let out a long breath. He wasn’t built for this kind of warfare, at least not between women. Words that cut. Inflections of voice. Subtle shades of a smile. Give him a muddy field and eleven men dying to kill him for their chance at the pigskin in his hands. That he understood.

  As Louisa served Josie her tea, Reed looked for a gentler way to get the answers they needed. “Honey Dawson is missing, and your husband has hired some lawyers to find her.”

  He tried to ignore the pointed look Josie shot his way.

  Portia covered her mouth with manicured fingers. “Missing? The poor girl. There’s no reason to worry, is there?”

  “No. I’m sure she’s fine.” He wasn’t sure of anything after their run-in with the man in San Francisco, least of all that. But there seemed no point in explaining his concerns to Portia.

  “I don’t understand. If you’re wondering what Teddy has found, why don’t you ask him? He won’t be home for hours now, but you can probably find him at the courthouse.”

  Josie set her untasted tea on the tray in front of her. “We’ve already seen your husband. We came to talk to you.”

  “And how can I possibly help you?”

  Reed braced himself.

  Josie lifted her chin. “Honey Dawson gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl. Your husband seems to think he’s the father.” She paused, as if to let the words sink in.

  Portia’s smile never faltered.

  “We’re sorry to have to spring it on you like
this, Mrs. Wexler.” Reed meant it. She hadn’t shown a stitch of emotion, but he knew the lack of outward signs didn’t mean Portia Wexler wasn’t hurting from the news. His mother had been like that. And he had a sense Portia was very much like her in that way, too. Hell, the poor woman was probably in shock.

  Josie stared a hole through the woman, seemingly not sorry at all. “Your husband said he hired people to find Honey and her babies. We need to know why.”

  Portia tilted her head, as if looking at Josie from a different angle would help her understand. “Why? Why what?”

  “Why did he hire them? To find his children? Or to make sure they were never found again?”

  Portia splayed a hand on her chest. For the first time she looked as if she suspected their visit might be more than a friendly social call. “Pardon me? I don’t know what kind of bone you have to pick with my husband, dear, but how can you possibly suggest he would do such a dastardly thing?”

  Reed could answer that one. He could never understand going to the extreme of hurting someone in order to keep a secret, but he could understand the urge that might be behind it. “How about to protect you? Might he want to make the problem go away in order to keep you from finding out? Keep you from getting hurt?”

  Portia reached across the corner of the glass table and patted him on the knee. “That’s sweet. Bless your heart.”

  Even if the judge didn’t care about protecting Portia, Reed was pretty sure he was still interested in protecting himself. “Could that be the case?” He tried to ignore Josie’s glare boring through him.

  “I’m afraid not.”

  Of all the things he’d expected her to say, that wasn’t one. “What? Why not?”

  “I do recall the name Honey Dawson. Yes, I believe I do.” She plucked a glass from the tray and took a long sip of tea.

  “And your husband’s efforts to find her and her babies? Are those details coming back to you, too?”

  Portia smiled at Josie’s sarcastic tone. Apparently the woman was not going to back down or drop her friendly façade, no matter how much Josie pushed. “Why, yes. I believe they are.”

  “Well?”

  She glanced around the room. “This is a big house. An empty house, really. It needs some spark, some life. What better way than to fill these walls with children’s laughter?”

  Josie sputtered. “You’re saying you’d welcome another woman’s children into your home? Children she had by your husband?”

  Portia gave her a benevolent smile. “Who better for children to be with than their daddy? And who better to raise them than me?”

  JOSIE WAS SO ANGRY, she could barely wait until the car doors were closed. “What the hell was that?”

  “What was what?” He had the nerve to look at her with those big hazel eyes, now an innocent shade of green.

  Fake innocence. As fake as Portia’s waxing on about the joys of family the twins would bring to her life. “Why did you make things easy on her?”

  “Easy? Hearing your husband might have fathered twins with another woman? You call that easy?”

  “She wasn’t surprised. Not for a second.”

  “Even so, it couldn’t be fun.”

  “I don’t care if Portia Wexler was having fun or not. I wanted answers. I wanted the truth. I thought you wanted that, too.”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Then why did you try to namby-pamby the guts out of everything I asked her?”

  Reed looked down at the wheel as if he was going to turn the key in the ignition, yet he didn’t move. He shook his head. “I need to get out of Texas.”

  “What? Why?”

  One second passed, then another, stretching like minutes.

  “Does this have something to do with the past?” She was taking a shot in the dark, but she wanted to know. She sensed something in him, something that only grew stronger since they’d come to Dallas. To the ranch. He seemed distressed. In pain. Not the cocky sailor she’d known in San Francisco, but someone very different. Someone he was trying to cover up.

  He started the car. “In the end, we got our answers anyway.”

  So that was that. The moment was gone, and she had less of a clue as to what made him tick than ever.

  She shook her head and settled back into her seat as he piloted the car down the long, white-fenced drive. “Don’t tell me you believe her.”

  “Do I believe she wants to be a mother? That she’s eager to fill her empty house with the children her husband had with other women?” He glanced at her from the corner of his eye and shot her a grin worthy of that sailor. “Not a chance.”

  She folded her arms across her chest. “Well, thank God. Now I don’t have to kick your ass.”

  A chuckle sounded from deep in his chest. “I don’t know, that might be fun.”

  She could feel the heat start to creep up her neck. What was with her? A suggestive comment, and she turned into a blushing little twit. Hoping he didn’t notice, she looked out the window. Something green caught her eye in the rearview mirror. “That truck.”

  Reed looked in the rearview to see what she was referring to and cursed under his breath.

  She wished she had her gun. But without a Texas private-investigator’s license, she couldn’t function here as anything other than a private citizen. A private citizen without a concealed-carry permit.

  Reed slowed the car.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to find out who’s driving that damn truck. And what he wants.”

  “How?”

  He swung the car around a bend in the road obscured by stunted, twisted trees and stopped. Unfastening his safety belt with one hand, he unlatched the trunk and reached for the door handle with the other.

  “You can’t go out there.” Josie grabbed his arm.

  He threw open the door. “Don’t worry.”

  “But he could have a—”

  “Scrunch down in the seat.” He got out, circled to the trunk and opened it. Pulling something free, he strode into the tangle of brush.

  He was crazy. Insane.

  The pop of tires on gravel sounded from behind.

  Blood pulsing in her ears, Josie slid low in her seat and peered out the passenger-side window. In the mirror, she could see a green truck stopped behind their car and the silhouette of a man hulked in the driver’s seat.

  Objects might be closer than they appear.

  She stared at the broad shoulders in the truck. A flash of movement came from the tangle of brush and trees.

  Reed.

  Chapter Eleven

  Reed brought the tire iron down full force on the green truck’s hood. Steel crunched under the blow. The impact shuddered up his arm. He circled the truck’s hood and caught the edge of the driver’s door before the guy could yank it shut. “Why the hell are you following us?”

  He looked at Reed with saucer eyes as pale as his redhead complexion. A gurgling sound came from deep in his throat.

  Reed hadn’t seen Neil Kinney in over a year, but jail hadn’t changed the sniveling little bastard one bit. Even though he had fifty pounds on Reed, he cringed back against the seat, his stare glued to the tire iron Reed had grabbed from the rental’s trunk. He was a spineless and cowardly creep who chose to harass women because he wasn’t strong enough to look a man in the eye.

  Reed lifted his makeshift weapon to an even more threatening angle. “Answer, Kinney.”

  “I…I…I’m looking for her.”

  “Who?”

  “For Honey. For Honey.”

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know. She’s gone. I go to her apartment, and she’s never there. Not anymore.”

  “Why are you following us?”

  Josie stepped up beside Reed.

  Kinney’s gaze flicked to her.

  Reed wanted to tell her to get back in the car. He didn’t want this guy near her. He didn’t know what Kinney knew or didn’t know about Honey’s disappearance, but
the guy gave him the creeps. He didn’t want him even looking in Josie’s direction. “I asked you a question, Kinney. Keep your eyes on me. Why are you following us?”

  “You were gone, now you came back. You went by her place. I thought you might know where she is.”

  “I’m sure your parole officer would be interested to know you’ve been following Honey again. Keeping tabs on whoever stops at her apartment.”

  “Don’t tell. Please. I never talk to her or go inside. I just watch out for her. I take care of her.”

  “Okay, Neil. You want to watch out for Honey?”

  “Yes.” Kinney put his hands on the steering wheel. His fingers trembled.

  “Then tell me who else has been at her apartment. Who have you seen?”

  “Her friend. The one who works in the court.”

  “Jimmy Bartow,” Josie supplied.

  “The judge. He has other people there sometimes. Lawyers.”

  “Who else?”

  “Women.”

  Cheerleaders, perhaps. Even though Honey didn’t have many female friends, he knew she wouldn’t give up on her dreams to be a cheerleader someday. She’d keep what connections she had alive. Learn the new steps. Plot ways she could make it through auditions and training camp next year. “Good-looking women?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Get off it, Kinney. Were they nice looking, like cheerleaders, like Honey?”

  “Yes. But none look as good as Honey.”

  “What color hair did they have?”

  “Brunette, blond. They were yelling.”

  Yelling. Interesting. Tiffany Maylor was a brunette. And Reed could see her getting in a yelling match with Honey. He’d witnessed it before. The woman had about as much subtlety as a brickbat.

  Or a tire iron.

  He lowered the weapon and stepped back from the truck. He would make good on his promise to call Kinney’s parole agent, get the creep off the streets, if he could. In the meantime he had a cheerleader to track down. A cheerleader more than capable of hiring the man they’d met in San Francisco. “Get out of here, Kinney. And if you follow us again, I’ll use this thing on your head.”

  JOSIE WAS STILL A LITTLE out of breath by the time they reached Dallas. Reed’s stunt with the tire iron had both impressed and unnerved her. And she wasn’t sure what to think of how Captain Gorgeous seemed to be morphing into a larger-than-life cowboy type in front of her eyes.