Montana Connection

by B. J Daniels

  As he reached the top and burst into the attic, he saw the old automatic phonograph sitting on the floor by the doorway. A single 45 spun on the turntable, the needle scratching across the record, the music coming out the tinny speakers.

  In that instant, the song stopped, the phonograph moaned and groaned, then a soft click and the record began to play again.

  Past the phonograph, he saw Rozalyn by the widow’s walk. Only this time she wasn’t alone.

  “Come on in, Mr. Lancaster,” Emily said. Except she wasn’t Emily, right? She was some woman named Lynette Hargrove. “You’re just in time.”

  “I’ve got some bad news, Lynette,” Ford said as he moved into the room. He saw her react to the name. So the old broad at the hospital with the bright red hair knew what she was talking about. But that meant that Lynette was more dangerous than even he had suspected.

  Lynette stood with a gun to Rozalyn’s head. Next to her, Drew pressed a blood-soaked handkerchief to his nose with one hand and held a gun in the other. The barrel was pointed at the floor and he seemed distracted by his injuries, including a nasty gash on his forehead. Had Rozalyn given that to him? Drew looked as if he’d taken a bad fall. That was his girl, he thought with pride. Off to the right behind the couch, the young blond Suzanne was sprawled in a pool of her own blood, a bullet hole between her eyes, her sightless blue eyes staring up at the attic ceiling.

  Ford hoped to God that Roz hadn’t seen her, hadn’t completely realized yet just what her stepmother was capable of.

  “We already know the news,” Lynette said over the sound of the phonograph playing next to him. “Liam is dead. Such a pity.”

  “Wrong,” Ford was happy to inform her. “Liam is alive and conscious. In fact, he is talking to the sheriff at this very moment.” A slight exaggeration. “And he’s not the only one talking. Your boyfriend, Mark, Dr. Harris? He’s talking as well.”

  Lynette turned the color of her bottle-blond hair. “That’s a lie.” The record stopped. The room was suddenly deathly quiet. Then the song began again.

  “I stopped Dr. Harris from killing him.” Ford’s gaze went to Rozalyn. He nodded and smiled. “Your dad’s fine. Conscious. He’s tough. Like you.” Ford looked into Rozalyn’s eyes and liked what he saw. Anger in her gaze and a steeliness to her backbone that told him she was ready to kick butt if she only got the chance. He hoped to give them both the chance.

  “Right now, Liam is telling the sheriff everything—including about the bones.” Ford knew he really was clutching at straws now. For a moment he thought he might have made a mistake. All Liam had said was something about finding bones. But how did that tie in with this woman and her beyond dysfunctional family?

  * * *

  ROZ HAD NEVER been so happy—or so upset—to see anyone in her life. But having Ford here only made her more determined that they would get out of this alive. Ford had saved Liam. Her father was alive!

  “Lynette killed and buried Dr. Morrow in our garden,” she said, wondering how much Ford actually knew. From the look of gratitude she witnessed in his expression, not much. She filled Ford in about Lynette Hargrove and the stolen drugs. “My father must have found the bones.”

  “What was Dr. Morrow going to do? Have you arrested for stealing drugs?” Ford asked.

  “Dr. Morrow had stopped by to see my mother that day. She and the doctor had become friends. He confided in her that he’d caught Lynette stealing drugs. He was a kind, caring man. He would have hated to have Lynette arrested because she was the single mother of a son. Lynette must have followed him when he left. She might have gotten away with it except my mother saw her from the attic window.”

  Roz saw the shocked look on Ford’s face. “She didn’t commit suicide.” It was little consolation.

  “That must be a relief to you,” Lynette said. “Unfortunately, the two of you are the only people who know the truth. Everyone will think you couldn’t live with your mother’s suicide, Rozalyn, and took your own life. Sadly, your new boyfriend tried to save you. A terrible mistake on his part.”

  “Lynette, the sheriff knows. You can’t get away with this,” Ford said. “Killing more people isn’t going to save you. And Drew, if I were you, I’d be hightailing it out of here. You don’t have to take the rap for your mother anymore.”

  Drew looked up from the blood-soaked handkerchief in his hand for a moment, then touched the wide open gash on his forehead, grimacing, too involved in his own pain now to even seem to realize what was happening.

  Lynette shook her head as if amused by Ford’s tactics. “Drew is my son. He is all I have. He would never leave me. We will disappear again. I am very good at it and I have enough of Liam’s money socked away. I will do just fine until I find another fool to charm into marriage. I really have had the worst luck with husbands dying on me.”

  Another fool? Is that all Liam Sawyer was to her? Roz felt her face flame in anger. Ford must have seen it. He gave her a slight nod, then he stepped to the phonograph and kicked it hard.

  The needle scratched loudly across the record. The plug jerked from the wall. The phonograph skidded loudly across the hardwood floor like a missile aimed right at Lynette.

  It happened in a heartbeat. Lynette jumped back to avoid the phonograph flying toward her ankles. Roz saw her chance. She turned and grabbed the woman’s wrist holding the gun and jerked her toward the open window of the widow’s walk at the same time Roz bent down.

  Drew, seeing what was happening, reached for his mother as Lynette began to fall over Roz toward the narrow widow’s walk—and the four-story drop past the railing.

  But Ford had already launched himself across the room, hitting Drew hard, chest-high. Drew’s weapon clattered to the floor but his momentum drove him into his mother. It was just enough to propel Lynette into the widow’s walk railing with Drew right behind her. Off balance, she hit the railing and would have gone over right then if she hadn’t grabbed her son Drew’s arm.

  Roz got to her feet, turning in time to see both of their faces, Lynette’s caught in a horrible grimace as she fought to save herself—even at the expense of her son. Drew’s expression was one of realization. If his mother didn’t let go, they would both go over the railing. Or with luck, his mother would be able to pull him over past her and save herself.

  In that instant, Drew could either free himself of his mother—or take the brunt of the impact.

  Lynette let go as Drew hit the top of the railing next to her. Roz heard the wood crack. Nothing could save him. He must have known that. His mother had regained her balance against a portion of the unbroken lower widow’s walk railing. Relief washed over her expression and resignation as she watched her son start to go over the railing.

  Roz watched in horror. To the end Drew had protected his mother.

  At the very last minute, Drew grabbed his mother’s sleeve. Roz saw the smile on his face and heard Lynette scream as the two plummeted over the side and dropped out of sight. Then Lynette’s screams stopped with an abrupt silence that shook Roz to her core.

  She turned to bury her face in Ford’s shirt as he pulled her in his arms.

  EPILOGUE

  The days that followed were a blur. Ford had taken Roz straight to the hospital to see her father. Liam’s eyes had widened, tears flooding them at the sight of her.

  He’d drawn her into his arms and, although weak, he’d held her tightly. “I was so afraid they hurt you. Roz, I’m so sorry, so sorry.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she tried to reassure him.

  “I was such a fool, such an old fool.”

  “You did it to get me home,” she said.

  He looked into her eyes. “Your mother would have so wanted us all here. I feel that in my heart. This is where your children should grow up. On this side of the Cascades, in the one place that made us all once happy.”

  Roz had felt Ford behind her. “I’m not sure I can do that, Dad.”

  “I understand,” he said. “I
t was a foolish dream of mine. Forgive me?”

  “There is nothing to forgive,” she assured him.

  It was later that she had learned Sheriff Mitch Tanner had been airlifted to Eugene with two gunshot wounds. Charity had been at his side.

  His brother Jesse had taken over as deputy, showing up at Roz’s house only moments after Drew and his mother had gone over the broken top railing of the widow’s walk to their deaths in the garden below.

  Roz and Ford had given him their statements a few days later. The woman she’d known as Emily Lane was in fact Lynette Hargrove. She had only one child, a son named Robert Hargrove Junior. The elderly Robert Hargrove Senior had died in his sleep with only his nurse Lynette, whom he’d recently married, in attendance. Unfortunately, his estate hadn’t been as large as Lynette had hoped.

  It would take months before all of Lynette’s former husbands could be found because she had used so many different names.

  The blonde Jesse found dead in the attic turned out to be a third-rate actress from Portland named Sunday Brooks. Her last act was as Suzanne Lane, one she no doubt would regret for eternity.

  Roz spent that first night beside her father’s bed along with Florie Jenkins. It wasn’t until daylight that the nurse, Kate Clark, insisted the two go home and get some rest. She promised to watch over him for them.

  Ford walked Roz out and offered to take her to breakfast. She’d declined. Nor had she wanted to go to the house. She’d taken a room at the Ho Hum. Ford had offered to get her things from the house. That was one offer she couldn’t refuse.

  Over the days that followed, she thought a lot about what her father had asked her. Could she ever go back to that house? She felt torn between the years of happiness she’d known there and the horror. And yet the house was her last link to her mother.

  She had come to grips with her mother’s death, now at peace with the knowledge that her mother would never have left them the way she had if she’d had a choice.

  The day before her dad was to be released from the hospital, he’d patted the side of his bed for her to sit. “I need to ask you what you want to do with the house. If you still feel the same way, I’ll sell it and you’ll never have to come back here. I’ll go to Seattle and get a place up there closer to you. Just tell me what you want, sweetheart.”

  “Excuse me,” Ford said from the doorway.

  Roz turned and gave him an impatient look. Now was not the time to interrupt.

  “We need to talk,” Ford said. “Now.” He looked past her to Liam. “You understand?”

  “I don’t understand,” Roz said as Ford walked her out of the hospital.

  “Liam does,” he said and opened his pickup door for her.

  “Where are we going? I thought you just wanted to talk? Why can’t we talk right here?”

  “Get in, Roz.” It was the first time he’d called her that.

  She slid in, her heart hammering so hard she just knew he could hear it. He had been there for her over the days since the attic, but not once had he tried to kiss her, or make love to her, or even say anything about the afternoon they’d spent in a cave in the Cascades.

  “I’m hungry,” he said as he slid behind the wheel.

  She watched in amazement as he drove to Betty’s and got out. She followed him, not knowing what else to do. Was this his idea of talking?

  Only a few locals were in the café. She told herself she wasn’t hungry. Her stomach was in knots. She figured Ford just wanted to tell her he was leaving. Why couldn’t he just do that in the hospital hallway?

  The smell of freshly baked pies drifted through the air. “I’ll take a piece of banana cream,” she told Betty, surprising herself. But she remembered something Charity had told her about banana cream pie.

  Ford lifted a brow, then ordered an omelette. “Banana cream pie for breakfast?” he inquired.

  She nodded. “It works for my friend, Charity.” Hand trembling, she took a bite of the pie Betty slid in front of her and closed her eyes. Nothing. Just darkness behind her eyelids.

  “Rozalyn?”

  She opened her eyes, disappointed.

  “There is something I didn’t tell you.”

  She held her breath.

  “When I was nine, my dad, my biological dad, John Wells, took me back into the Cascades with him on one of his Bigfoot searches. He left me alone while he climbed up to check out a cave. I saw something.” He glanced toward the window. She followed his gaze to the dark green of the forest just across the street and beyond, miles and miles of wilderness. “I saw a huge creature covered with hair. It was watching me from the foliage. I have never been so terrified in my life.”

  He shifted his gaze back to her face. “That is, until I came into that attic and saw that woman holding a gun to your head.”

  She stared at him, not sure which revelation shocked her the most. “So you have known all along that Bigfoot exists?”

  He looked surprised, then laughed. “I’m trying to tell you something here.”

  “You wanted my father’s photographs to prove Bigfoot existed.”

  He blinked. “Yeah, I guess I did and when they didn’t— Listen, I’m having a hard enough time saying this—”

  “You came up here hoping for Bigfoot bones. I know how disappointed you must be,” she said. “But you wouldn’t have sold them to the highest bidder.”

  He stared at her. “How do you know that?”

  She smiled. “I know.”

  He laughed again and ran a hand over his hair to brush it back from his forehead. “I guess I’ll never know but once I met you—”

  “That’s why you never went with your father again, isn’t it?” she said suddenly, excited. “You never told him what you saw! And he never understood why—”

  He pushed off the booth, standing to lean over the table and kiss her.

  She gasped in surprise.

  “That is the only way I’ve found to shut you up,” he said. “I heard what your father said about your mother and the house. I have to know something. Do you think you could live there?”

  She was still stunned by the kiss. “What?”

  “Let me put it this way. If I told you right now that I love you and don’t want to spend a day of my life without you, would you want to stay in Timber Falls?”

  She stared at him. “Are you asking me—” She couldn’t bring herself to finish. She grabbed her fork, took a bite of her pie and closed her eyes tightly. And there he was. Ford Lancaster dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt sitting on the front steps of the Timber Falls house holding…holding a baby!

  “Roz? In my inept way I’m trying to ask you to marry me and tell you that I’d stay here with you, if you’d have me. If it’s what you want.”

  Her eyes flew open. The look on his face made her laugh out loud. He really thought she might turn him down? Were all men fools at heart? “Ford, oh Ford, yes!”

  She slid from the booth to throw herself in his arms.

  “Say the words, Rozalyn.”

  And she said the words she thought she would never hear come out of her mouth. “Ford Lancaster, I love you.”

  * * *

  OF COURSE, her father was ecstatic. Florie had been coming by every day to see how he was doing, as had Charity, who also had good news. Mitch had finally asked her to marry him and he was recovering nicely from his gunshot wounds.

  Jesse had arrested Wade after his wounds had healed enough to leave the hospital. Daisy was filing for divorce. Their daughter Desiree was raising hell at the Duck Inn. Nothing new there, Charity said.

  The evidence Roz and Ford had collected was turned over to Jesse. The DNA on the cigarette butts were compared to Drew’s along with the tread on the boots. Both were a match. Drew had been doing his mother’s dirty work since he was a boy so it came as no surprise he’d started the rock slide to kill Roz. Or that he’d staged the fake suicide at Lost Creek Falls.

  Once Liam was well enough, he told Roz that a neighbor
’s dog had been digging in the garden and turned up the bones. That dog, Liam swore, had saved his life. If he hadn’t found the old bones, he was certain that Emily, as he knew her, would have poisoned him.

  He’d had doubts almost immediately about his hasty marriage. But when he’d found the bones, then later discovered rat poison in a drawer in the kitchen, he’d made that call to Roz. He had planned to get a divorce. But Emily wasn’t going to let him leave. He’d confronted her. Of course, she’d denied everything. He had told her he had contacted his lawyer and that if anything should happen to him, like a poisoning, she would be the first person the police would come looking for. He’d tried to leave, but of course, Drew stopped him.

  As it was, she drugged him, obviously realizing she had to move fast. He pretended to be out, then got to the phone. When he couldn’t reach the sheriff, he’d hit redial since he could barely see. It was John Wells’s number. That’s why he’d sounded like he was drunk.

  Then Drew had hit him with something. It was the last thing he remembered. He wasn’t surprised that Emily had come up with the story about him falling off a cliff. She would have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn’t been for Roz coming to Timber Falls.

  “Thank you,” her dad had said, taking her hand. “I know how hard it was for you to come back here.” He was saddened to hear that his old friend John Wells had died but he had known he was ill. “I’m just glad I got to meet his son,” Liam said to Ford. “I owe you a huge debt for saving my daughter.”

  “It was my honor,” Ford said. “I had a lot of practice. By the way, your truck and camper turned up. Some Bigfoot hunters found it hidden a few miles from here.” He figured Emily had wanted him in the guest house so she and Drew could keep an eye on him. Her mistake.

  The disk Ford had started writing his article on had also turned up in Drew’s things. Drew had made a copy of the article and left it in the guest house that morning for Roz to find. As Roz watched, Ford had destroyed the disk and the article. She would never know what he had planned to do before he came to Timber Falls. All she knew was that she loved him and he loved her, and anyone who knew anything knew that love transformed a person. Charity Jenkins would attest to that. Mitch Tanner, too.