Brenda Jackson The Westmoreland Series Books 16-20

by Brenda Jackson

  She lifted a brow, confused. “What are you talking about?”

  “This.” He pulled the folded article from an inside pocket of his jacket and handed it to her.

  She unfolded the article that had been neatly clipped from a newspaper, and it took all she had to hold back a gasp from her lips. Before her eyes was the man she had fallen in love with, dressed handsomely in a tux with a very beautiful woman by his side. The two were smiling for the camera. Although there wasn’t an article associated with the photo the caption read, “Is Romance Brewing for These Two?”

  She swallowed and glanced back up at Fletcher who was watching her intently. “You seemed bothered by that photograph, Pamela. Is there a reason why?”

  She lifted her chin and met his gaze. “You’re wrong,” she lied. “I am not bothered by it.” In truth she was. She and Dillon had just spent time together a few nights ago. He had said he had to return to Denver. Now she knew why.

  Fletcher smiled. “Now I think it’s time I put my foot down regarding our wedding plans,” he said, reaching out and catching her by the waist and pulling her closer to him. His move surprised her because he had never been so forward with her before. Being close to him did nothing for her or to her. It didn’t have the same effect on her that Dillon had. Because she loved Dillon, and the thought that she meant nothing to him, that his words had all been lies, was too much.

  “Put your foot down how?” she somehow managed to ask.

  “I’ve been trying to be patient but more than anything I want you as my wife, Pamela. I’m aware you’re not in love with me, but I believe over time that you will come to love me. I offered you marriage to help you out of a bad situation, but evidently you don’t see it as such anymore. And maybe the thought of losing your home and securing your sisters’ futures aren’t the big deal they once were.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Then prove it. I no longer want a wedding date. Now I want an actual wedding. This week. A very private affair. Here on Friday. Make it happen or come Saturday our engagement is off.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Are you forcing me into marriage?”

  His smile widened. “No, sweetheart, it’s your choice. Good night, Pamela.” He then opened the door and left.

  Pam stood in the same spot and stared down at the photograph in her hand. She angled her head to study the picture. Dillon was smiling. The woman was smiling. Had they been merely smiling for the camera or for each other, she wondered.

  And come to think of it, the issue of whether or not there was a special woman in Dillon’s life had never come up. She had never asked and he’d never offered any information. All she knew was that he was divorced, nothing more.

  But he had asked her to trust him while he checked out a few things. Came up with an alternative.

  She closed her eyes for a moment and leaned against the closed door. Had she read more than she should have into that request? Deciding the only person who could answer that question was Dillon himself, she crossed the room to use the phone, but then realized she didn’t have his phone number. He’d never given her his number. Had there been a reason for him not doing so?

  She glanced down at her watch. It wasn’t quite nine o’clock and Roy Davis at the River’s Edge Hotel would probably have information about Dillon on file. She would have to think of a good reason why she would need him to give it to her.

  She released a long sigh when Mr. Davis picked up the phone. “The River’s Edge Hotel.”

  “Mr. Davis, this is Pamela Novak. How are you?”

  “I’m doing fine, Pamela, how about you?”

  “I’m fine, but I was wondering if you could help me.”

  “Sure thing. What do you need?”

  “Dillon Westmoreland’s home number. I know he stayed at the hotel for a few days last week and I need to reach him. He left something here when he visited,” she said.

  “Hold on. Let me check my records.”

  It didn’t take Mr. Davis but a few moments and he was back on the phone reading off a phone number to her.

  “Thanks, Mr. Davis.”

  “You’re welcome, Pamela.”

  As soon as she disconnected the call she quickly dialed Dillon’s number. The phone was picked up on the third ring. “Hello?”

  Pam’s breath caught in her throat and her hands trembled as she hung up the phone. A woman had answered.

  * * *

  “So now, when are you going home?” Dillon asked the woman who was sprawled on the floor in front of his television set watching a movie.

  He had come out of the shower a few moments before to find her there. Ramsey had warned him that he would regret the day he’d given Megan a key to his house. His twenty-six-year-old cousin Megan was an anesthesiologist at one of the local hospitals. She was okay to have around until she got underfoot. Like now.

  “And why aren’t you at your house watching your own television?” He walked through his living room on his way to the kitchen.

  “It’s a scary movie and I don’t like watching these types alone.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Did I hear the phone ring a few moments ago?”

  “Yes, a wrong number I think,” she said, not taking her eyes off the television. “Do you mind if I crash here tonight?”

  “Nope. I’ll probably be gone when you wake up anyway,” he said, opening the refrigerator.

  That got her attention and she turned away from the television and glanced across the breakfast bar at him. “But you just got back.”

  “And I’m gone again. This time to Laramie. I have business to take care of there.”

  Dillon took a drink of orange juice right out the carton while thinking about his business in Laramie. He couldn’t help but think about Pam. He missed her like hell. He had been tempted to call her but because Fletcher was probably back he had decided against it. He didn’t want to make waves just yet. He hoped she trusted him enough so she could tell Mallard that she wasn’t going to marry him at all. Dillon had promised to give her an alternative. An option in which she wouldn’t feel compelled to marry for anything less than love. In a way he wished he’d never left Gamble or, better yet, had asked her to come home with him and be his date at the ball. But he had promised the sheriff that he would escort his sister. He’d felt obligated to keep his promise. He had pretended he had been having a good time, but had been missing Pam the entire time, which hadn’t been fair to Belinda.

  Then he’d really gotten ticked off to find his picture plastered on the front page of this morning’s paper with a caption suggesting there was something between them. The last thing he needed was for Belinda to get any ideas, especially since he was in love with Pam. That’s why he was determined to be able to offer an alternative solution to Mallard’s marriage proposal, so that he could go to work to capture her heart the same way she had captured his.

  * * *

  Pam woke up early the next morning and, before she could talk herself out of doing so, she dialed Dillon’s number again. Just like the night before, a woman answered. This time in a sleepy voice.

  And again Pam quickly hung up the phone.

  She felt a tug at her heart and knew she could not depend on Dillon to come through with an alternative solution any longer. He was back home and back into the arms of a woman who undoubtedly meant something to him. She had to remember that he had not promised her anything. He gave. She took. No regrets. But that still didn’t stop every bone in her body from aching with the strain of heartbreak.

  At least she had gotten a taste of passion that was so rich and delicious, she would savor it in her memories for years to come and they would be there to help her through the years ahead.

  She drew in a deep breath. Her decision was made. She picked up the phone to make another call. This one to Fletcher. His voice, also sleepy, greeted her on the second ring. “Hello.”

  “Fletcher, this is Pamela. I’ll make sure everything’s set for our wedding on Friday evening.�
�

  * * *

  Dillon had caught a plane early Monday morning to Laramie and went straight to Gloversville Bank from the airport. There he met with the bank president.

  “Mr. Westmoreland, I recognized your name immediately,” the man said, smiling from ear to ear. “Are you looking to do business in Gloversville?” he asked, offering Dillon a chair the moment he’d walked into the man’s office.

  Dillon was glad he had recognized Roland Byers as someone he’d once done business with a few years ago when the man had worked at a bank in Denver. “No, but I would like some information on one of your customers.”

  Byers raised a brow as he took the seat behind his desk. “Who?”

  “Sam Novak. He passed last year and I’m helping his daughter close out his affairs. We were wondering why his loan wasn’t paid off when he died. The balance was over a million dollars.”

  Confusion touched the man’s face. “Umm, I don’t see how that’s possible. We require life insurance on all loans for that amount. Hold on a moment while I check. I can’t give you any specifics of the loan due to privacy laws, but I can tell you whether it’s still active.”

  Dillon watched as Byers called his secretary on the intercom and provided her with the information needed to look up the file. In less than five minutes the woman walked into the office carrying a folder, which she handed to Byers.

  It took Byers less than a minute to glance through the papers, look over at Dillon and say, “There must be some mistake because our records are showing the loan is paid in full. That information, along with the appropriate papers, were given to Mr. Novak’s attorney, Lester Gadling, almost a year ago.”

  * * *

  “I can’t believe you’re actually going to go ahead and marry the guy,” Iris said in a disappointed voice. “What about Dillon?”

  Just hearing his name nearly brought tears to Pam’s eyes. “There’s nothing about Dillon. It was a fling, nothing more.”

  “But I thought he said he would—”

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Iris. Now, can you make it here by Friday?”

  “Of course I can make it, although I prefer not to. But if you’re determined to make a huge mistake, the least I can do is to be there and watch you make it.”

  * * *

  The moment Dillon walked out of the bank and was seated in his rental car, his cell phone went off. He answered it immediately. “Hello?”

  “Bane’s in trouble. We need you home.”

  Dillon drew in a deep breath, released it as he shook his head and snapped in his seat belt. “Okay, Ramsey. What has Bane done now?”

  “Eloped.”

  “What the hell!” Dillon nearly exploded. “And please, whatever you do, don’t tell me it’s with Crystal Newsome.”

  “Okay, I won’t. But I will tell you that Carl Newsome is going to make sure he goes to jail this time for sure.”

  * * *

  Nothing like a death threat to get the Westmorelands together under one roof for something other than to eat or to party. Dillon glanced across the room and stared at his baby brother and wondered if Bane would ever outgrow his bad-boy mentality. You couldn’t help but love him even when you wanted to smash his head in for not having a lick of sense.

  Luckily, they had found him before Carl had, although it had taken nearly two full days to do so, and had included traveling to five different states. It had been obvious that he and Crystal hadn’t wanted to be found. It had also been quite obvious they’d been having so much fun that they hadn’t taken the time to swing by Vegas for a quick wedding after all.

  That had made Carl Newsome somewhat happier. He hadn’t needed to put out the expense for a quick divorce. Something had happened years before to make the Newsomes and Westmorelands modern-day Hatfields and McCoys. Something about a dispute over land ownership. As a result, Newsome would never allow his daughter to marry a Westmoreland.

  Now they were all at the police station where Bane had been charged with kidnapping, although Carl knew good and well that Crystal had gone willingly. Crystal had even said as much. She’d even gone so far as to admit to being the one who had planned the entire thing. She thought she was in love with Bane, but at seventeen her parents thought she didn’t know the meaning of love. Bane thought he was in love with Crystal, as well.

  “The judge has made a decision,” Sheriff Harper said as he came back into the conference room and got everyone’s attention. “Carl Newsome is willing to drop the charges as long as Bane agrees never to see Crystal again.”

  Bane, who had been leaning against the wall, straightened and angrily yelled, “I won’t agree to a damn thing!”

  Dillon rolled his eyes, shook his head and asked the sheriff, “And what if he doesn’t agree?”

  “Then I will have to lock him up and, since he violated the last restraining order with the judge wherein he promised not to set foot on Carl’s property, we will transfer him to the farm for a year.”

  Dillon nodded as he looked across the room at his baby brother, held Bane’s gaze a moment and then said to the sheriff, “He will agree.”

  “Dil!”

  “No, Bane, now listen to me,” Dillon said in a firm voice that got everyone’s attention in the room. He had lost time in returning to Gamble and he wasn’t too happy about it, especially now that he knew the attorney for Pam’s father had lied to her.

  “Crystal is young. You are young. Both of you need to grow up. Carl mentioned he plans to send Crystal away to live with an aunt anyway. Use that time to finish college, get a job at Blue Ridge. Then in three to four years she will be old enough and mature enough to make her own decisions. Hopefully, by then the two of you will have college out of the way and can then decide what you want to do.”

  He saw the misery in his brother’s features. “But I love her, Dil.”

  Dillon felt Bane’s pain because he knew, thanks to Pamela Novak, the intensity of love. “I know you do, Bane. We all know you do. Hell, even the sheriff knows, which is why we’ve overlooked a lot of you and Crystal’s shenanigans over the years.”

  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that Crystal and Bane were sexually active. Hell, Dillon didn’t want to recall the number of times he’d come home from work unexpectedly to find the two had cut school, or how he would get a call in the middle of the night from the sheriff after finding Bane and Crystal parked some where when neither Dillon nor Carl had been aware they were out of their houses.

  “But it’s time for you to finally grow up and accept responsibility for your actions. Go to college, make something of yourself and then be ready to reclaim your girl.”

  Bane didn’t say anything for a moment as he switched his gaze from Dillon to stare down at the floor. Everyone in the room was quiet. And then he looked back at the sheriff. “Can I see her first?”

  Sheriff Harper shook his head sadly. “Afraid not. Carl and Crystal and her mother left a short while ago. It’s my understanding they are taking her to the airport to put her on the next plane to an aunt living somewhere in the South.”

  Bane, with shoulders slouched in defeat, didn’t say anything for the longest time and then he turned and walked out of the room.

  * * *

  Ramsey leaned against the door with a cup of hot coffee in his hand and watched Dillon pack. “You’re leaving again?”

  Dillon nodded as he continued to throw items into his suitcase. “Yes, I should have been in Gamble long before now, and I haven’t been able to reach Pamela to explain my delay.”

  That had bothered him. He had tried more than once to phone her but either she was out or was not taking his calls and he couldn’t understand why. He couldn’t wait to meet with her father’s attorney to find out just why he had lied to Pam, making her think that there was still an outstanding loan balance in her name. For some reason Dillon couldn’t dismiss, he had a feeling Mallard was behind Pam’s fictitious financial problems.

  “Well, good luck. I hope you
r flight leaves on time. A snowstorm is headed this way.”

  “I heard,” Dillon said, zipping up his suitcase. “That’s why I’m heading out now. I’m hoping my plane can take off before it hits.”

  Ramsey took a sip of coffee. “I take it you’re serious about Pam Novak.”

  Dillon smiled as he grabbed his coat off the rack. “Yes, and I intend to marry her.”

  * * *

  Dillon did get stuck at the Denver airport due to the snowstorm, and it was noon the next day before he arrived in Gamble. He was upset that he still hadn’t been able to reach Pam. He hadn’t spoken to her since last Friday and here it was Friday again.

  Once he arrived in Gamble he went straight to Lester Gadling’s office, deciding to let the man explain things before going to see Pam to let her know what he’d learned. He got to Gadling’s office only to discover he was out to lunch, so Dillon waited.

  It was close to three o’clock before Gadling returned and, when the secretary told him Dillon had been waiting for him, he looked at him nervously before asking if he had an appointment.

  “No, I don’t, but I need to talk to you about Sam Novak.”

  “What about Sam Novak?”

  Dillon didn’t like the fact the secretary was sitting there all ears. “I prefer talking to you about this privately,” he said.

  Gadling seemed to hesitate for a moment, then he asked, “And what relation are you to the Novak family?”

  “A friend.”

  Moments later Dillon followed Gadling into his office and as soon as the door closed behind them, the lawyer asked nervously, “And what is it you want to know?”

  Dillon didn’t hesitate. “I want to know why you’ve led Pam to believe she owes a balance on her mortgage. I know she doesn’t, so you better have a good answer for me, Mr. Gadling. And I want to know what happened to those payments she’s been making to you every month.”

  “I don’t have to tell you anything,” the man said.

  Dillon gave him the smile that all his family members knew meant business. “No, you don’t have to tell me anything. I can always call the state attorney’s office to let them know about attorney fraud.”