“Okay, so who else have you told this story to?” he asked.
She took a deep breath. “No one.”
He rolled his eyes again. “No one?”
“Not a soul.”
The look was back in his eyes. As if he was worried she’d honestly lost her mind. “That doesn’t make sense. If no one knows what you’re doing here, how and why would they warn you to leave?”
“I don’t know. I guess it could have been a wrong number.”
“So this person only called once?”
Okay, now he really didn’t believe her. “I got one hang-up and then that call.”
“From the same number?”
“Don’t know. My phone listed both as an unknown caller.”
He raked a hand through his hair, and a couple more pieces of scrambled eggs rained down.
“You’re not going to help me, are you?” she asked.
He closed his eyes for a second. “Do you have your birth certificate?”
“Yes. I was going to go to the library later and…” She saw from his expression he really didn’t care what she’d been going to do. She pulled her birth certificate from her purse and handed it to him.
He studied it. “I’ll check and see if this is the real thing. But that’s all. I’m not going to Mr. Bradford. I can’t.”
He started out, but she blurted out, “How much?”
Looking back, he asked, “How much what?”
“How much is this going to cost me?”
He hesitated, and when his gaze met hers, she saw that flash of something in his eyes, something she hadn’t seen for a long time. Old-fashioned male interest.
“Nothing,” he said. “It’ll only take a phone call.”
“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”
He tapped the birth certificate against his jean-covered thigh. “I think the idea of you being Caroline Bradford is crazy. I haven’t made my mind up about you.” He looked at his watch. “I need to be somewhere.” He pulled out his smartphone. “Give me your cell number. I’ll call when and if I find something. Probably tomorrow or Tuesday.”
She called out her number. He typed it into his phone.
“Stay away from the Bradfords’ place. They could have you arrested next time.”
She nodded. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet.”
Zoe watched him leave, and even though she knew he wasn’t promising anything, she felt more hopeful than she ever had.
Rick Clark arrived at the Bradford security gate five minutes late for his ten o’clock shift. He wouldn’t have been late if Western Union had lived up to the tagline: “Send money in minutes.” It had taken almost an hour to get the money wired to New Orleans. He could have hopped on a plane and given it to her in person almost as fast. Not that he was eager to see Candy.
Seeing Ricky was another matter.
Rick’s gut knotted. He wasn’t going for father of the year; truth was, he didn’t know how to be a father, considering his own had died before he started school, but it had been three months since he’d seen the boy, and two before that. Not that he hadn’t tried to see Ricky. He had. Would his own son even remember him at this point?
And if he did remember him, would he even want to see Rick again? He’d tried everything—gifts, candy. How, Rick wondered, did a father convince a kid to love him when the kid’s mom seemed determined to keep them apart?
Was Ricky reading yet? Probably not. He’d probably never seen his mom pick up a book the way that Ellen Wise did. Maybe for his son’s next birthday he’d send a few books. Would Candy read them to him? The answer rolling around his head made the anger swelling in his chest grow a little bigger.
But damn, he was a cop and he was tired of playing by the rules. Rules Candy didn’t follow and then manipulated for her own good. No, not even for her good. He didn’t have proof, but everything in his gut said Candy had fallen off the wagon again. If the court didn’t see his side this time, he’d start playing by his own damn rules. Somehow he’d get Ricky away from her. No friggin’ wonder fathers were kidnapping their own kids—the messed-up justice system automatically sided with mothers. As if having breasts made them better parents.
Parking his car, he sat there white-knuckling the steering wheel and trying to talk his blood pressure down. A knock hit the window, and he almost reached for his gun. When he saw it was Windsor, the head honcho of the guard, he frowned and got out.
“You’re late,” Windsor snapped.
“Seven minutes.” Rick bit back his attitude. In spite of what he’d told Tyler, he needed this gig. Between paying child support, the lawyer, and the emergency money Candy constantly needed, he could barely get by. “Sorry.”
Windsor nodded and started back to the office, obviously to clock out. Bradford, the owner of the estate, was older than dirt and still used the old punch card method of keeping track of employees’ hours. Remembering Tyler’s request to get the scoop on the mysterious redhead, Rick caught up with Windsor.
“Boring day?” Rick asked.
“No more than usual.” Windsor rubbed a hand over his old-man belly. He wasn’t much younger than the boss and bragged he’d been with Bradford from the very beginning. If anyone knew something about the redhead, this was the man.
“So that redhead gave up trying to seduce the old man?”
“What redhead?” Windsor kept walking.
“One of the guards mentioned a redhead.”
“Yeah. I’m sure she’s off chasing some other rich ol’ man by now.”
“Did you guys get a license plate and check her out?”
“Didn’t see much need in it.”
“Well, if she shows up again, get me a license number and I’ll run it.”
“I have a feeling she’s moved on,” Windsor said.
Rick’s phone rang, and he pulled it out and eyed the number. “I’ll be right up.”
He hung back. “Hey, Jeff.” Rick’s gut tightened, knowing his friend and lawyer working the custody case was going to fly off the handle with the news.
“Tell me this call is about inviting me out for a beer and not the case.”
Rick frowned. “I just wired Candy another two hundred.”
“I told you to stop that shit. You pay child support; you’re not her money bag.”
“She said they were out of groceries.”
“And you believed her.”
Rick gritted his teeth. “I don’t know, but I’m not gonna let my boy go hungry.”
“Jesus, Rick. You told me yourself you thought she’s drinking or using again. You’re supporting her habit.”
“Then get my son away from her, Jeff. Do it, or I’ll do it myself.”
“Sorry, I’m late,” Tyler said thirty minutes later when Dallas opened his father’s door.
“No problem. I appreciate you helping.” Tyler walked into the house that was filled with wall-to-wall boxes and people.
“Hi, Tyler.” Nikki ran up to him and gave him a hug.
“Hey, gorgeous.”
“Watch it,” Dallas said.
“You just better be glad she chose you to puke on,” Tyler said. The first time Dallas and Nikki met had been at a murder scene, and she’d gotten sick all over him. It was a little something Tyler and Austin didn’t let Dallas forget.
“Is that egg in your hair?” Nikki asked.
Tyler ran another hand through his hair. “I thought I got it all out.”
“You got egged?” She grinned.
“Sort of.” He nodded when Ellen Wise, Nikki’s friend and their new receptionist, walked into the room.
“Hi, Tyler,” she said.
“I hope you don’t work too hard today, because I’ve got tons of filing for you to do tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry. I’m ready to get that office whipped into shape.” She smiled, and Tyler realized again how pretty she was—not that she compared to Zoe. But he’d bet she wasn’t crazy, either.
“You got more e
gg on your collar.” Nikki brushed it off.
“Yeah, I had an accident at the diner.”
“Nikki?” LeAnn, Dallas’s sister-in-law, popped into the room. “Did you want those lamps in the extra bedroom?” The women took off to deal with lamp business.
Tyler looked at Dallas. “I remembered where I knew the redhead from.”
Dallas’s eyes rounded. “Where?”
“Cookie’s Café. She’s a waitress.”
“Did you go over there yet?” Dallas asked.
“That’s why I’m late.”
“And she egged you?” Dallas half-grinned.
“Not on purpose,” he said.
“Did you find out why she was snooping around our office?”
“Yeah.” He sighed. “It’s crazy.”
“Let me guess. She was looking for Austin?”
“No. I was right. She was looking through the Bradford files.”
“Why?”
“She thinks she’s the Bradford child who was kidnapped.”
Footsteps sounded behind Dallas, and Tyler looked up. Mr. O’Connor walked into the room. “Did you say Bradford kid? You know, I went to school with that girl’s mama. She was a pretty thing.”
Tyler nodded at Dallas’s dad. “Hello, old man.”
“Who you calling old?” Mr. O’Connor said. “I’ll bet you fight like a girl.”
Tyler grinned.
“Wait,” Dallas said. “The kid who was kidnapped… They found her body.”
“I know,” Tyler said. “I tried explaining it to her.”
“So she’s a whacko, huh?”
“No. Maybe.” He stopped himself from defending her. “She believes they identified the body wrong.”
“They said the mom was whacko for a while,” Mr. O’Connor said. “She was actually a suspect, too. I didn’t believe it. Nancy Bright was a nonconformist in high school, but she wasn’t the type who’d hurt a fly. Smart, sweet, and built in all the right places.” He held his hands out from his chest.
“She died, right?” Tyler asked. “Both her and her husband, right?” He’d been trying to remember everything he knew about the Bradfords on the drive here.
“Yeah. They were killed in that plane crash only weeks after the kid was kidnapped. I asked her to the Junior Prom. That’s before I started dating Dallas’s mom. But Nancy had already been asked by a football player. Not that I wasn’t a catch.” He chuckled. “As a matter of fact… Where did I put that box?”
He walked across the room and flipped open a box and pulled a book. “Here.” He turned a few pages. “Tell me I wasn’t every woman’s dream.” He handed the book to Dallas.
Dallas laughed. “Damn, Dad, you looked like Tony.”
“He couldn’t have been that good looking.” Tony, Dallas’s brother, walked in from the bedroom with a box in his hands and continued toward the front door. “Are we going to load furniture and boxes today, or are we gonna stand around and shoot the shit? You see that’s the difference between PIs and cops. We actually do the work.”
“Kiss my ass.” Dallas laughed and passed the book to Tyler.
Tyler looked at the picture. “Actually, I think you look like Dallas, too.”
Mr. O’Connor reached in and flipped a couple of pages, and put his finger on a face. “There’s Nancy Bright. Soon to be Nancy Bradford. Pretty thing.”
When Mr. O’Connor’s finger shifted away, Tyler’s breath caught. Holy hell, but it was as if he was looking at Zoe Adams.
“Damn,” he muttered.
“What?” Mr. O’Connor asked.
“That’s… her. I mean, that looks like the waitress.”
Dallas walked over and glanced at the picture. “Maybe it’s because they’re both redheads.”
“No. The eyes, the mouth, everything.” The breasts.
“Don’t tell me you’re actually thinking she might be this Bradford kid,” Dallas said. “That’s crazy.”
“And absurd.” Tyler remembered Zoe saying, Admit it. There is a possibility that I’m right. “The absurd is the essential concept and the first truth. Albert Camus.” Tyler looked back at the picture. “The resemblance is uncanny.”
Tyler looked back at Mr. O’Connor. “Can I borrow this?”
“Sure.” The old man pointed a finger at him. “I know where you work if you don’t return it.”
Tyler remembered something else Zoe had said. And now someone is telling me to leave.
It hadn’t made a bit of sense, especially when she admitted she hadn’t told anyone why she was here in Texas. But… if anyone knew her mother, and took one look at Zoe, they wouldn’t have to be told.
Did that mean someone really had been threatening Zoe Adams?
He set the book down on the bar. “Let me help you guys load a few things, and then I’d better head out.”
“We’re going to end up taking her case, aren’t we?” Dallas asked.
“Maybe,” Tyler said. The look Zoe had sent him when she told him thank you flashed in his head. “Show me some furniture that needs carrying out. You aren’t going to have me long.”
Zoe sat at her kitchen table with her lunch—a bag of carrots and a bowl of ranch dressing—and her computer in front of her. She leaned her elbow on the table, and it wobbled. Looking under the table, she toe-kicked the piece of folded newspaper back under the table’s right leg.
Not that she expected much from the prefurnished one-bedroom rental. She’d been fortunate to find one at all. Still the bland, run-down place and furniture did make her long for her own apartment. Her place in Alabama wasn’t anything grand, but it was cozy, colorful, and filled with things that belonged to her. She’d never thought of herself as materialistic, but she missed her things. Stupid things, like the bright red throw pillows her mother had made her, her favorite frying pan, and her microwave that had the perfect popcorn setting on it.
Glancing over at the stain-spotted sofa, she frowned. She never sat on the piece of furniture because it looked… filthy, and for some reason every time she looked at it, she imagined some hairy, heavyset couch potato stretched out with half his dinner spilled on the sofa. Hence the stains.
Refocusing on the computer, she finished reading another article on Tyler Lopez and frowned. “How could they do that to him?” Zoe muttered, feeling angry at a system that could have convicted someone for something they didn’t do. He’d been a cop, and it sounded like the whole police force had turned their backs on him and his two partners.
As soon as Tyler had left, Zoe got on Dixie’s computer and downloaded all the files she could find about Tyler Lopez and his case. Hey, he’d Googled her, so it was only fair. Only difference was, she wasn’t laughing at what she read. Just the opposite—her heart hurt for the man.
She reached for a carrot and dipped it in dressing. “Seriously. I hope he sued the state.” Her cat meowed at her feet as if certain Zoe had been talking to him. And hey, it was probably better than the idea of her rambling on to herself.
The feline leaped up onto the table, something that he seldom did. “Can you believe that even after all that, he’s still a nice guy?” She munched on the carrot and watched Lucky poke his face into the dressing.
He yanked his orange face back, squinted his one eye, and stuck his tongue half out, making a comment about what he thought of her menu.
She grinned and gave him a scratch behind his bobbed ear. “I told you it wasn’t ice cream.” Lucky moved in, sniffed her half-eaten carrot, and then rubbed his face against her cheek. “I’ll share if you really want it.” She sighed and leaned into his soft affection. Considering he was all she had, she treated him more like a family member than a pet. Perhaps it wasn’t completely emotionally healthy, but she suspected she wasn’t the only person in the world whose pets were their best friends. Besides, how could she not love such a brave little fighter?
When she’d seen the news about the kitten that had been trapped in a burning building, and was severely burned but ref
used to die, she’d been one of about ten cat lovers who’d showed up at the vet offering to help pay his vet bills.
Within a year, Zoe had lost her mother, her boyfriend, and her twenty-one-year-old cat Henry, and had discovered her birth certificate, causing her to question everything she knew about herself and her parents. The kitten’s spirit had been just what Zoe needed to focus on. And after visiting the cat almost three times a week for two months, Dr. Shoemaker had asked her if she wanted to take Lucky, a name given to the kitten by local press, home. Zoe had jumped at the offer. She’d been lucky to get Lucky.
“I have one more article to look at and I’ll get your paté,” she told the feline as she dipped her carrot into the dressing again.
The last article had a picture of Tyler. His warm brown eyes stared from the computer screen, and Zoe remembered how her heart had taken flight when she’d shaken his hand. The crazy thing was that she actually thought she’d seen some of the same feeling in his expression. Not that anything could ever come of it.
She had a microwave waiting for her in Alabama.
Her heart did a small lurch when her cell phone rang. She couldn’t help but think that it might be Tyler. Then again, he’d said it would be Monday or Tuesday. Still she didn’t waste any time answering the call.
“Hello?” Something akin to giddiness sounded in her voice.
Silence reigned for a moment, and then…
“Let me spell it out for you,” a gravelly voice said. “Leave town now or die, bitch!”
CHAPTER SEVEN
TYLER HELPED CART OUT the larger pieces of furniture to the moving van. While everyone joked and laughed, his mind stayed on Zoe Adams. And not just on how sexy she looked, or how he’d been so damn eager to make her smile. He started listing questions in his head about her possible case. Was someone really threatening her to force her to leave town? Why? Was it someone in the Bradford family who didn’t want to share the old man’s inheritance? Or did the threat stem from someone who was involved with the kidnapping?
Then came the big question. If the girl they found dead all those years ago wasn’t Caroline Bradford, who was she? Had the same person who kidnapped Caroline killed the other kid? Supposing of course that Zoe was Caroline Bradford, instead of an eerie lookalike.
Blame It on Texas Page 6