The Secret Sister

by Elizabeth Lowell

  When she couldn’t take the silence any more, she said, “Is it a deal?”

  He nodded curtly.

  She let out a long breath. Then she dug around in her jeans pocket until she found the key. She held it up in the bright light coming through the windshield.

  “Do you have any idea what this might open?” she asked.

  He glanced at it, looked at her in disbelief, then back at the road again. “Yeah, I have an idea. Where did you find it?”

  “Jo-Jo’s room.”

  “Anything she had, Hutton knew about.”

  “Not this key. It was taped to the bottom of a drawer in her closet.”

  “How did you know where to look?” Cain asked.

  “I spent my last six years in Wyoming searching Jo-Jo’s room for forbidden fruit of one kind or another.”

  He took a hand off the wheel and reached for the key.

  Christy didn’t let go.

  “If you don’t trust me, you’re better off alone,” he said evenly.

  She opened her fingers, giving him the key.

  Without a word he reached down for the ring of keys that hung from the ignition. Deftly he fished one of the keys out of the cluster on the ring and let it dangle down his palm next to Jo-Jo’s key.

  They looked identical.

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “You’ve been in the city too long.”

  “Fine. I’ve been in the city too long. What does that have to do with these keys?”

  “It means some country folks drive in to get their mail out of little boxes opened by keys just like these.”

  “You mean Xanadu doesn’t get mail delivery?” she asked in disbelief.

  “Sure it does. Makes you wonder what Jo-Jo was expecting in the mail that she wanted to hide from Hutton.”

  Cain flipped the key back to Christy.

  A few minutes later he turned into a tiny, dusty ranch lane. A weather-beaten house was tucked away behind some big elms.

  “Wait here,” he said.

  She watched while he walked to the door, knocked, and was greeted by a woman who was neither young nor old. She had dark brown hair with a dusting of gray and a smile that lit up the old run-down porch. She kissed Cain soundly, hugged him, and led him into the house.

  A few minutes later he emerged with an armful of clothes and a paper bag full of food. He put the food behind the driver’s seat, tossed the clothes into Christy’s lap, and got in.

  “Change into these while we drive,” he said.

  “What about you?”

  “I’ll do my best not to drive into a ditch watching you.”

  She tried not to laugh but couldn’t help it. “I meant what about your clothes?”

  “Out here, a man with dirty pants is no big deal.”

  “Where I came from in Wyoming, the women got just as dirty as the men.”

  “Were they wearing white designer jeans?”

  “Point taken.”

  “Strip. I won’t see anything I haven’t already seen.”

  “In your dreams,” she retorted.

  He laughed and made a point of blocking his view with one hand so he couldn’t see the passenger side.

  Christy peeled off her filthy sweater and blouse and pulled on the soft, faded plaid shirt Cain had gotten for her. She kicked out of shoes and socks, pulled off the ruined white jeans, and put on a pair of Levi’s that were as soft and faded as the shirt. Though loose, the clothes fit well enough. She transferred the contents of her pockets to her new jeans, put on her socks and shoes, and turned to look at Cain.

  “I was wrong about not seeing anything new,” he said blandly.

  “What?”

  “Nice underwear, Red.”

  “Stuff it.”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “You’re more fun to tease than my little sister ever was.”

  Christy ignored him. She pulled her purse out of the console where she’d locked it away before hiking out to the Sisters. The purse was small, smart, and hopelessly Manhattan. She stripped out money, ID, and credit cards, and pushed them into her pockets. Then she sorted through the remaining clothes. A bandanna, a frayed quilted vest, and a faded red T-shirt rounded out the collection.

  “Who should I thank for these?” she asked.

  “Angie.”

  “Friend of yours?”

  “Yes.”

  “She must be, to lend clothes to another—er, friend of yours.”

  Cain gave Christy a sideways look. “Angie is like every other human being. She gets lonely. So she’ll cook dinner while I bore her with my latest Anasazi theories.”

  Christy made a neutral sound.

  “Or I’ll chop some firewood for her,” he said, “and she’ll swap ironing my shirts for some tutoring for her oldest kid. Angie never learned to read books, but she’s a fine judge of people.”

  Christy’s cheeks burned. “I didn’t mean…”

  “Sure you did. So I’m telling you. She’s a friend. They’re a lot harder to find than a piece of ass.”

  It was silent in the truck until Cain entered Remington on one of the dusty country lanes that crisscrossed the valley.He kept off the main street and worked his way through town on the unpaved, unmarked back roads until he stopped in an alley a block and a half off the main square in downtown Remington.

  Through a gap between two sagging old frame business buildings, Christy saw the second story of the Remington County Courthouse, as well as the rear side of the buildings that fronted on the square. In the middle of the block, an American flag snapped lightly in the afternoon breeze.

  “That’s the post office,” he said, pointing to the flag. “All you have to do is figure out which box is Jo-Jo’s.”

  “Wasn’t the number on the—no, of course it wasn’t. I would have seen it. How many boxes are there?”

  “About a hundred.”

  She looked at both sides of the key again, hoping a number would appear.

  It didn’t.

  “A hundred. God.” She shook her head.

  “Start at one hundred and work backward.”

  “Any particular reason?”

  “The boxes with low numbers have been in the same families for the last century.”

  “Oh. Makes sense. Won’t people get suspicious if I spend ten or fifteen minutes trying to open boxes?”

  “They’d get a lot more suspicious if I tried it,” he said. “I’ve had the same box for the last ten years. Most people in town know it. And me.”

  “I imagine most people in town know most everyone else. I’ll stick out like a boil.”

  “Lots of summer folks rent boxes, and lots of summer ranch workers are transient. There’s quite a bit of coming and going during the fall.”

  She looked uncertain.

  He reached for the key.

  “No,” she said, jerking her hand back. “You’d be spotted for sure. Every woman in town looks up when you walk by.”

  He gave her an odd glance.

  “Well, it’s true,” she muttered. “It’s something about the way you carry yourself.” She reached for the door handle. “Damned arrogant western—”

  Her words ended in a startled sound as he casually dragged her back into the seat.

  “You forgot something,” he said.

  “What?”

  His long fingers slid into her hair. “This. Blazing red and damned beautiful.”

  “My hair?”

  “Your hair. Looks like fire, feels like silk, and if you don’t cover it up and get out of this truck I’m going to kiss you until neither one of us can stand up. That would be a really stupid thing to do.”

  “I—I don’t have a hat,” she said.

  Without looking away from her eyes, he pulled the bandanna out of the clothes he had given to her. He folded the cloth diagonally, placed it over her hair, and tied it at the back of her neck. The stroking of his long fingers over her sensitive nape made her shiver.

 
“Better run, honey. Fast.”

  Chapter 35

  For an electric moment Christy wanted to stay. Then she told herself it was the wrong time and the wrong man.

  Well, wrong time for sure.

  She opened the door and bolted out of the truck.

  “I’ll meet you in there when you’re finished.” Cain nodded toward the blank back door of a building. “Don’t take long. I’ve got to ditch the truck real quick.”

  She read the rude sign over the building’s door. “The Dew Drop Inn? I don’t believe it.”

  “Believe it. Head for the booths in back.”

  She waved her understanding and walked quickly down the alley to the street.

  Remington’s sidewalks were busier than they’d been the day before. There was a crowd in the parking lot of the supermarket. The Greyhound bus had just unloaded across the street. A troop of trail bike enthusiasts sprawled in the shade of one of the square’s huge trees.

  The ranchers, townspeople, and tourists didn’t give Christy a second look. Part of it was her clothing; a woman in old jeans, plaid shirt, and bandanna was unremarkable and natural in Remington. The rest of it was a surprise to her.

  She felt natural too.

  The town’s rhythms and social nuances were as familiar to her as the lettering on the stop sign at the corner. She knew how to meet the passing glance of the cowboy and his wife so that they categorized her as a newcomer rather than as an outsider.

  The lobby of the post office building had a musty pipe-tobacco smell. Someone was ignoring the rules and smoking in the sorting area. The customer at the counter was a sharp-faced Native American woman with two long beautiful black braids down her back.

  No one gave Christy a second look. Most didn’t even give her a first.

  She went around the corner to a smaller lobby where the boxes were located. Cain was right. One hundred postal boxes stared at her like the prisms in the eye of a bee. Discarded junk mail littered the floor. No one was in sight.

  Without looking around, she walked straight to Box 100. The key slid easily into the lock but refused to turn. Box 99 was the same. So was Box 98.

  The key grated softly each time she tried a new lock. It sounded like a file on a live microphone to her, but nobody else seemed to notice. Certainly no one came to ask her if she needed help.

  She tried three more boxes before she heard footsteps approach. Shielding the next box with her body so that no one could see the number, she tried it quickly.

  No good.

  Straightening up, she walked past a potbellied store merchant heading for his own box. There was a pay phone at the other end of the lobby. She headed for it, pulling change out of her pocket as she went. Her first call was to the hotel.

  “This is Christa McKenna,” she said. “Any messages?”

  A sharp intake of breath followed by a pause told her that she was glad she hadn’t gone back to the hotel for her own clothes.

  “Er, where are you, Ms. McKenna?”

  “Pocatello,” she said blandly. “Any messages?”

  “Mr. Hutton would most urgently like to see you.”

  “How sweet. Any other messages?”

  “Um…er…”

  She hung up. After a moment’s hesitation, she used her Horizon calling card to pay for a long-distance connection. Someone picked up the phone immediately.

  “Horizon, may I help you?” the voice asked.

  “Hi, Amy,” Christy said. “You’re working late.”

  “So is Myra. Good thing you checked in. She’s climbing the walls. Peter Hutton wants to see you, and he wants it right away.”

  “So I’ve heard. Any other messages?”

  “Ask your boyfriend, Nick.”

  “Nick? Why?”

  “Myra told me to give out his number to callers since you weren’t checking in at the office.”

  Anger flashed through Christy. “I see.”

  “What should I tell Myra?” Amy asked.

  “Go screw a chainsaw.”

  “What?”

  “We must have a bad connection,” Christy said. “I can’t hear a word you’re saying. I’ll call back.”

  She hung up and punched in her calling code plus Nick’s office number. He answered quickly.

  “Hi, Nick. I hear you’ve been nominated as my personal message drop.”

  “Christa! Where are you?”

  “West of Manhattan. Has anyone other than Peter Hutton and Myra been asking for me?”

  “Ted Autry and someone who claimed to be a sheriff or something called too. Got my number from Myra, for chrissake. What’s going on?”

  “Myra’s rabies shot must have failed. Who else is after me?”

  “Me,” Nick said. “Are you thinking about me?”

  Cold washed over her. “What did you say?”

  “Have you been thinking about me, darling? I’ve been thinking about you.”

  “Oh, my God. It was you, not Jo-Jo.”

  “What?” he asked, confused.

  “Did you leave a message for me at the hotel?”

  “Of course I did.”

  Christy clung to the receiver and tried to fight the sick fear washing through her as she remembered Johnny’s words.

  People dying, dead. People gonna die.

  “Are you, Christy?”

  “What?” she whispered.

  “Thinking about me,” Nick said impatiently.

  “Right now I’m thinking about Jo-Jo.”

  “Jo-Jo? Your sister?”

  “Yes. Has she called asking for me?”

  “No. When do I get to meet her?”

  “I’ll be sure to introduce you if the three of us are in a room together.” But Christy didn’t think that would happen. Ever.

  Fear and nausea rolled coldly in her stomach.

  “Dy-na-mite!” Nick said. “Can’t believe I’m going to meet her in the flesh.”

  “Don’t hold your breath. I’m not likely to be in any rooms with you in the future.”

  “Huh?”

  “Nick,” she said wearily, “it’s over. Good-bye, adiós, ciao, babe. I’m gone. You’re free. We’re history.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t make me repeat it.”

  “Does this have something to do with a man called Aaron Cain?” Nick asked abruptly.

  “How did you—” She stopped.

  “It is Cain, isn’t it?”

  “No. It’s just that you and I aren’t—”

  Nick ignored her and kept talking. “Autry warned me about Cain. Says he’s a real hand with the ladies. Especially the New York kind looking for a souvenir of the Wild West.”

  She didn’t say a word.

  “Christa?”

  “Most of the time you’re a nice man,” she said. “Go find a nice woman to love you most of the time.”

  “Christa, I—”

  She hung up before Nick could finish. For a long time she stared at the phone without seeing it.

  Jo-Jo hadn’t left any messages.

  People dying, dead. People gonna die.

  Grimly she straightened her shoulders and went back to the lobby where post office boxes waited in taunting array. No one was getting mail or watching other people get mail.

  She tried a dozen more boxes, working the key as quietly as possible. She didn’t want to make the pipe-smoking, mail-sorting employee on the other side of the boxes curious.

  Two wind-burned women in rough work clothes like Christy’s walked into the lobby chatting with each other. One opened a box while the other gave Christy the kind of casual yet thorough examination only one woman can give another.

  Christy felt a momentary rush of uneasiness. She left the lobby, crossed the street to the hardware store, and pretended to window-shop while watching the door of the post office. A minute later the women came out, climbed into a pickup truck, and drove away. Christy started back across the street. She glanced in the direction of the courthouse in time to see a fami
liar truck pull into the space reserved for the sheriff.

  Danner got out from behind the wheel and headed for his office. A man dressed in a business suit that would have been at home on Wilshire Boulevard or Madison Avenue met him on the sidewalk.

  At first, Christy didn’t recognize Autry. He’d shed his drugstore cowboy costume along with the barbecue sauce. Now he looked like what he really was, a highly paid corporate cop, a private policeman in the hire of a Fortune 500 company.

  She fought a wild, primitive urge to break and run. Danner might not have seen her there on the face of the mesa, but Autry was hunting her for his boss. Watching Autry and Danner together, she didn’t doubt that when it came to violence, the only difference between the two men was that Danner had been elected.

  Turning her face away, she made certain the bandanna hid every lock of her red hair. Then she crossed the street, not as fast as she wanted, not as slowly as she should have. Just as she reached the sidewalk, a police cruiser with a light bar and state police insignia parked beside Danner’s truck.

  She ducked into the lobby and watched while a state highway patrolman climbed out and joined the other two men. Immediately Danner began talking, waving his arms around to dramatize his words. He pointed back to the mesa where the Sisters lay hidden from view. Then he made a falling, twisting, diving gesture with his hand.

  Christy’s hands clenched. Danner was describing the death of Johnny Ten Hats.

  And Cain’s part in that death.

  The uniformed patrolman listened, then reached back into his cruiser and picked up the microphone on his two-way radio.

  Her nails bit into her palms. The word was going out at the speed of light.

  We have to get out of here.

  But first she had to find the lock that fit Jo-Jo’s key.

  The lobby was empty again. Dropping all pretense, she tried box after box, working with grim efficiency. When a young mother pushing a stroller came in to collect her mail, Christy looked up and smiled.

  “Forgot the dang number,” Christy drawled.

  The woman laughed sympathetically. “You can skip seventy-nine. It’s mine.”

  “Thanks.” She went back to shoving the key in slot after narrow slot, not looking up.

  On Post Office Box 73, the key worked.