She withdrew the astrological chart for Margaret. “Look it over, Mrs. Hansen. See if it’s what you want.” Tessa crossed to Colby. He was staring at the storeroom. “Yes, it was once a kitchen. Still is, but I cook upstairs in my apartment.”
He slanted a look at her. “Is supplying an answer before I ask a question supposed to be a demonstration of your mind-reading ability?”
“It’s called observation. I saw you looking back there. Why are you here?”
“Don’t you know why?”
“Yes, I’ve heard.” Tessa had read the newspaper stories about Harriet Martel’s murder. Colby’s aunt had been forty-three, the head librarian and four months pregnant.
As if tempted, he touched the deck of red tarot cards. “My aunt—”
“Was Harriet Martel,” she finished for him. “I’ve heard about her. I’m very sorry.”
He was going to ask her. She knew there was no other reason for him to have stepped into her store. Too practical. This was a logical, realistic man who believed in only what he could see.
“I want to hire you.” Often people, even those who viewed her as a fraud, considered asking for her help when all else failed. “The sheriff’s investigation is at a dead end.” He honestly sounded stymied.
Tessa rushed a refusal before he explained more. “I’m sorry for your loss, but I can’t get involved.”
He drilled a look at her that carried both annoyance and puzzlement. “I understand you know my mother, Louise Holmes.”
She wasn’t a fool. He was leading her in a different direction deliberately. “Yes.” Her guard went up with his shift in conversation. “Louise is a lovely woman.” A friend of Sylvia’s, Louise had come into the store several times during the past two weeks. Tessa had seen a photograph of Harriet and had noted a resemblance between her and Louise Holmes. Louise was softer-looking, and unlike the unsmiling Harriet, Louise possessed one of the most wonderful smiles Tessa had ever seen. A hundred-watt, sunshiny smile that conveyed warmth and genuine friendliness. Tessa had yet to see Colby really smile, couldn’t help wondering if he had the same smile.
She’d met his father, too. Handsome, he was an older, heavier version of Colby. Known as Bud since his days as star quarterback at the local high school, Adam Holmes had been a rancher all his life. He and Louise were well-liked by a lot of people in town.
“It was bad enough when my mother thought Harriet had died by her own hand, when everyone, including Sheriff Reingard, thought she’d committed suicide.”
“They know now it was murder.”
“Right. When my mother learned Harriet had been killed, she was stunned.”
Tessa wanted to turn away, but she heard such affection in his voice when he talked about his mother.
“She won’t rest unless we find out who killed Harriet.”
Nice, Tessa thought. Mr. Macho, Mr. Rugged was nice—sensitive. In seconds, she’d learned he was a good son. He’d unveiled a wealth of family concern. She’d known another man who’d never understood loyalty to family, who could ignore responsibilities without a glance back.
“Look, I wasn’t as close to her as I’d been when younger. She’d been living in Boston for a while, and when she came back to Rumor, I was on the rodeo circuit.”
And he felt guilty for not being around for her.
“I’ve heard she was unhappy, especially during the past few months.”
That Harriet was having an affair had fueled the gossip.
“You’ve probably heard. The sheriff’s investigation is stalled. For a while, everyone was convinced the killer was local. Now we’re not so sure because of Warren Parrish.” Anger teetered just below the surface of his voice. “He claims he’s Harriet’s estranged husband. One day weeks ago he unexpectedly arrived in town.”
In spite of herself, curiosity got the best of her. “Do you think he killed her?”
“I don’t like him. I wouldn’t mind seeing him gone and behind bars. There was a book in Harriet’s house with blood on it. Her own. She used it to print some letters. H and I and an N or M or R. I’ll see if I can get the book for you.”
Tessa shook her head. “I don’t want it, Mr. Holmes.”
“Colby. Call me Colby. Chelsea Kearns, the forensic expert, has come up with a profile of the killer. I’ll get it for you and—”
“You’re not listening. I’m sorry, but I can’t help.”
“A lot of people believe that you can,” he quipped.
She refused to let him bait her. She wanted him to leave—now. He was more than she’d bargained for. And what she was feeling went far beyond his great looks.
With a look, a moment’s insight into his sensitivity, she felt her pulse rate accelerate. No one had unbalanced her so quickly, so easily before. “That’s their problem, not mine,” she said, watching his gaze shift from her eyes to her lips. She couldn’t let herself connect with him. You’ll have to find help elsewhere.” Before he could say more, she stepped away to check a delivery sheet.
When she heard his footsteps, knew he was moving away, she breathed easier. He was asking too much of her. She couldn’t afford to draw attention to her psychic power if she wanted to make a home in Rumor. Too many years of moving around, she assumed, made her want to stay. She wanted to feel as if she belonged somewhere. And she could lose her chance to have that because of him, because of what he wanted from her.
Colby mumbled to himself during the drive home. One look at her eyes had almost made a believer out of him. Gray, disturbing, they seemed to see inside him. Could she read minds? How in the devil had she known he was thinking about the storeroom having once been the kitchen?
He gave his head a mental shake as he passed under the arched Double H at the entrance of the ranch. The mistake was that he’d taken a lengthy view of her in the snug jeans and bright yellow T-shirt. She hadn’t looked like a kook.
He braked near the stable and climbed out of the truck. Standing on the dirt drive, he shaded eyes against a bright sun. Wide-open rangeland blended with distant buttes. He scanned the corral, the bunkhouse and stables. This was a world he understood. This was where he belonged.
He shouldn’t have gone to her store. Blame it on the heat, he mused. It had been so hot lately. He wasn’t thinking any more clearly than anyone else right now.
In the barn, hay crunched beneath the soles of his boots while he moved past horse stalls, then grabbed a pitchfork. Second sight. No one had it. What she really was was a modern-day Gypsy of sorts with her fortune-telling and astrological readings.
When she’d spieled off the mumbo jumbo about karma and psychic readings, he’d thought Chelsea had gotten the wrong impression of her. But he wasn’t a dumb man. It hadn’t taken long to guess she’d been acting the nutcase for his benefit. Later, she’d given herself away. Instead of giving him some cunning nonsense about her power allowing her to know his birth sign, she’d surprised him and offered a logical answer. She’d read a newspaper article about him, she’d said.
He poked the pitchfork hard, harder than necessary, into the bed of hay. He rarely lied to himself and couldn’t now. His foul mood had more to do with what hadn’t happened. For a brief moment, right before he’d left, he’d gotten lost in those eyes and had nearly drawn her close just to see her reaction. It had been a while since he’d been with a woman, he reminded himself. If he’d felt a heat curling in his gut, blame it on that.
Annoyed with what he viewed as stupid daydreaming, he worked longer than he’d intended. By the time he finished the chore, he needed a shower. Simpler surroundings suited him. He was a man who spent most of the daylight hours outside. His ranch required constant attention.
Colby shook his head with annoyance. He had things to do and lately he’d been distracted from the ranch, in town more than at home. He’d chosen to raise quarter horses. One had faithfully helped him earn plenty of money. They were the cream of rodeo horses, perfect as reining and cutting horses. He’d already had a rancher in
Wyoming and a dude ranch owner in Colorado contact him because the horses were great on the trail, and some fellow from England had called him about purchasing a few for hunts.
In passing, he patted the rump of the prize mare he’d purchased less than three months ago. He’d been taken with her. Because she was no cow pony, he spent more than made sense for her, but she was a fair beauty, pale beige with a white mane and tail, had a hint of Thoroughbred. She stood proud. She’d bear champions. But she still wasn’t pregnant.
He lifted off his hat and used the back of his hand to wipe away sweat as he strolled toward the barn door. He stepped outside into the almost stifling heat. Hotter than hell. A setting sun peeked below the gathering pewter-gray clouds and bathed everything in a warm golden glow, made the air sticky with the promise of rain.
With thoughts about a shower, he passed the outdoor ring where one of his ranch hands was reining a horse sharply around a barrel. Hooves spraying a cloud of dirt into the air, the horse circled the first barrel tightly and then hurtled toward a second at the other end of the ring. She’d be ready for sale soon.
He’d barely stepped inside the house and removed his hat when his cell phone rang. He tossed his hat on a table in the front hall and unhooked the phone from his belt. Only a few people had the number. His mother was one of them.
“Colby, we’re still waiting.”
The greeting made him laugh. “Hello, Mom.”
“Did you find our future daughter-in-law today?”
He indulged her. “Should I have?”
“We’d hoped,” she said with a lightness that assured him this was as much a game as a serious discussion.
“Yeah, I know.”
“You say that, but I don’t think you take your father and me seriously.” Her voice carried humor. “You need to get married. We’re waiting for our grandchild.”
Here it comes, Colby mused. Once a week, his mother gave her we-won’t-live-forever lecture.
“We need an heir, Colby.”
It was useless to tell her not to plan a wedding. While she had high hopes, he’d given them up. There was no perfect woman for him. Diana Lynscot had ended his belief in the forever-after daydream, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to bother looking for another woman.
“Colby, are you listening?”
“To every word, Mom.”
Some of the humor left her voice. “What about our other problem? Did you see Tessa today?”
“I talked to her. She’s not interested.”
Disappointment filled her voice. “Oh.”
“Have you ever been in that shop?”
“Of course.”
“It’s unusual,” he said. The store hadn’t been what he’d expected. He’d been envisioning black walls, witches’ spells and vampire lore. Instead he’d seen unicorns and charms for good luck.
“That’s what makes it so interesting,” she said without hesitation. She had such a great capacity for accepting people and anything new.
“She’s unusual,” he said.
“I think she’s lovely. Don’t you?”
A mild description. Tessa Madison was something else. Cool on the surface. Smiling even when provoked. Controlled. He admired that. He’d followed her movement around the store. He liked the way she moved. It was that simple. “Mom, we’ll get answers.”
“I want people to understand what a wonderful person Harriet was. There’s been so much gossip.”
And that hurt her, Colby knew.
“Harriet wasn’t difficult or peevish. She was a strong-minded, independent woman. A woman with many fine qualities. She wasn’t always easy to understand. But she was special and caring around your father and me. You need to let Tessa help,” she said more firmly.
“There are other ways.”
“Colby, don’t be difficult.”
He wasn’t the one being difficult. “I asked her, Mom. She’s really not interested.”
“Sweetheart, please try again. I know she can help. You will, won’t you?”
He thought he’d be wasting time, but offered her another assurance before saying goodbye. When his aunt had died, he’d felt useless. Well, this wasn’t about him. It was about his mother, about her love, her memories of her sister.
He withdrew a business card he’d plucked up at Mystic Treasures and dialed the phone number. “Tessa Madison,” he requested of Marla, Tessa’s employee.
“Tessa isn’t here.”
“This is Colby Holmes.”
An excited edge crept into her voice. “She’s not here. She went to the antiques sale.”
“Thanks.” Colby set down the receiver. He needed to get this problem handled—now. He cursed the situation. The last thing he wanted to do was walk around the town square and look for the Gypsy lady.
Chapter Two
It was so blessed hot even at dusk. Colby scanned the sea of faces as people browsed from table to table, looking at clocks and crystal and antique jewelry. He stopped beside a table displaying Civil War guns. How hard could it be to find someone who looked like her? She was hardly ordinary with all that black hair and that trim little body.
“A good showing, huh, Colby?”
Colby let Tessa’s image drift away and forced himself to face the ex-mayor, a fiftyish, barrel-chested man with a receding hairline and a reputation as a ladies’ man since his divorce five years ago.
“It was a good idea to have this at night instead of the day. Don’t you think?”
Colby knew he was looking for a pat on the back. “I heard you suggested that to Pierce,” he said, referring to the town’s present mayor. “Real smart idea, Henry.”
Henry nodded thanks, then gestured in the direction of the tall, ruddy-faced man whose dark blond hair was threaded with gray. “Stay away from the sheriff,” he said about Dave Reingard. “He’s sure been in a foul mood for days.”
“It’s the heat,” Colby said. “Everyone’s grumpy.” But who could blame Dave? Colby mused. He had a murder to solve and a lot of pressure to do it quickly. Colby noticed that the deputy sheriff, Holt Tanner, stood near Dave. Colby doubted either man had an eye for the old furniture. They’d shown up at the antiques fair because people were tense, needed to see law enforcement was nearby.
“We need to find the killer,” he heard one woman say to her husband.
“We could all be killed in our beds,” an elderly man commented to a friend.
Concern had increased that a killer was lurking. Colby figured nothing would alleviate that worry except the sheriff announcing he’d arrested someone. Warren Parrish ranked at the top of Colby’s suspect list. Visually he followed the middle-aged man’s path as he meandered from one table to the next as if no worries existed in his life. Thin, tall, with gray hair, he puffed on a cigar, and despite the heat wore his trademark light-colored suit.
It took effort not to slug him. Since Parrish had arrived in town and announced that he was Harriet’s estranged husband, he hadn’t shown a second of genuine grief.
“Your mood is dark.”
Colby turned slowly, preparing himself to see Tessa Madison’s gray eyes. How could he have missed her? he thought. She wore a white dress with small pink-and-green flowers. Sleeveless, it brushed her ankles and scooped to a V above the shadow of her breasts, just enough to tempt his imagination. On her feet were white sandals with half a dozen straps. He eyed her pink toenails and the thin ring, a silver band, on one toe. “My mood’s okay.”
“Purple aura,” she teased.
He found himself grinning. “Not green anymore?”
“Oh, no. Definitely purple.”
Staring at her lips, not for the first time, he wondered about her taste. “Not a good sign?”
Slowly her smile spread to her eyes. “Certain auras reflect a person’s mood or future.”
Colby couldn’t stop himself. He released a snort of disbelief.
“You don’t believe that?”
He could do his own kind of taunting. “I bel
ieve in what I can see—” He paused, looked away from the gold triangle dangling from her left earlobe and fingered her necklace and the amulet, a dime-size letter X. “Touch.” Deliberately he let his skin brush hers above the scooped neckline. “Feel.” With satisfaction, he heard her suck in a breath as his knuckle caressed her skin. “What’s this?”
“It’s the runic letter for good luck.” Her gaze remained on him as she stepped back, forcing the chain to slip from his fingers. “Are you here to buy something?”
“Browsing.” Admiration whipped through him. She wouldn’t intimidate easily. “What about you?”
“I bought something.” When she gestured toward a cherrywood rolltop desk, a pleased smile lit her face. “Look. Isn’t this beautiful?” Lovingly she ran a hand over the top of the desk.
“Nice.” He had no real knowledge about what was a genuine antique, but he liked her choice. Not perfect, its top bore a few scratches. It had been more than a fine antique. It had been useful. Sturdy, long-lasting, it was also too heavy for her to move around. Colby viewed the moment as the perfect opportunity. “Do you need help getting it home?”
In a slow, measuring way, she cast a sidelong look at him.
He laughed, guessing her thought. “No strings.”
“I couldn’t ask you….”
“I volunteered.”
“I have a van. I’ll go home and get it.”
“Do you have good muscles, too?” She looked like a good wind would knock her down. He watched her eyes slice to his arms, sinewy after years of pitting his strength against a broncing animal.
“Colby.” Henry’s slap on the shoulder forced him to look away. “I heard news.” Henry spoke low, as if his news was confidential. “Diana’s back.”
Colby hadn’t seen Diana in a year, not since the day she’d placed his engagement ring on the bedside table and announced she wanted something he wouldn’t give her.
“I heard she’s staying in town for a while, might even settle down here again.”
Big Sky Cowboy Page 2
