by BJ Daniels
“I saw a birth certificate. It had both their names on it, but I suppose it could have been forged,” Dakota said.
Hoyt shook his head. “Laura told me Clay was the father of her child.”
Emma thought her husband couldn’t surprise her further. She’d been wrong. She stared at him as if seeing a stranger. “When—”
“That day on the lake.” He met her gaze. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I couldn’t bear to relive any more of the past than I’ve been forced to. Laura knew how badly I wanted a houseful of children. Her final blow was to tell me she was pregnant with Clay Lansing’s baby.”
“Did he know?” Dakota asked in a small voice.
“No. She told me she wasn’t going to have it. I saw then that she had so little respect for human life and that was really the last straw. I told her I didn’t love her and that I wanted a divorce. She went crazy.”
“That’s when she fell overboard,” Emma said.
He nodded. “I wanted her out of my life but I didn’t want her dead. I tried to save her… .”
The room had fallen silent again.
Emma moved to her husband and wrapped her arms around him. “She’s sick, obsessed and mentally unbalanced.” None of those words came even close to describing Laura’s kind of sickness.
“You realize we have no way of proving any of this,” Zane said. “All we have is Camilla’s word that the birth mother’s name was Lorraine Baxter. Courtney has the birth certificate with both Lorraine’s name and Clay Lansing’s, and if Clay didn’t know about the baby, then it is a forgery.”
“She had the baby and gave it up for adoption?” Emma asked.
Dakota nodded. “We suspect through the Whitehorse Sewing Circle, so there will be no proof to find there.”
“But surely one of the members…” Emma said. She’d heard about the group of women and what they’d done for years. It hadn’t seemed like such a sinister thing to do, providing babies to good loving homes.
Now she feared that they might never know the truth. Unless Laura was found. She almost laughed at the thought. Laura would find them. She was probably close by, enjoying the pain she was causing them all.
“I’m worried about what she did to my sister,” Dakota said.
“If we’re right and Courtney is her daughter, then Laura wouldn’t hurt her,” Emma said with more conviction than she felt. Her words were met with silence.
Hoyt took her hand and squeezed it gently. “If Laura is alive, she’s a murderer.”
“How can you say if?” Emma demanded.
“Because I don’t want to believe it,” Hoyt said.
She softened her expression as she looked at him. Of course he didn’t want to believe it. “Whatever she’s done, it has nothing to do with you.”
His laugh held no humor. “Emma, it has everything to do with me. I’m at fault. She didn’t believe that I loved her enough. She turned to another man. Everything she’s done is because I failed her.”
“The woman is insane,” Zane snapped. “You just happened to be the man she became obsessed with.”
Dakota hadn’t spoken for a while. When she did, everyone turned to look at her because of the anguish they heard in her voice.
“I think Laura might be responsible for my father’s death,” Dakota said. “I was so hurt that Courtney was with him when he died and not me… .” Her gaze came up. Her eyes welled with tears. “If Courtney was with our father when he died, then it was her mother’s doing. I wouldn’t be surprised if Laura was there when he had his heart attack. I can only imagine my father’s reaction to finding out what Laura had done and meeting a daughter he hadn’t known existed.”
Zane put his arm around her as a vehicle pulled up outside.
Emma glanced out the window and felt her stomach roil with dread. “It’s the sheriff.”
* * *
ZANE OPENED THE DOOR at the sheriff’s knock, worried that she was here to take him back to jail.
“Sheriff Crawford,” he said, hoping he was wrong because he couldn’t leave Dakota, wouldn’t leave her without a fight.
“Zane. I need to have a word with your father. Is he—” McCall looked past him.
“Please come in,” Hoyt said. Zane moved aside to let her enter the house.
The sheriff glanced at Dakota, then Emma, and said, “I’m glad you’re all here. I have some news on the DNA test the crime lab ran on Courtney Hughes’s blood sample.”
“Please sit down,” Emma said. “Can I get you—”
“Nothing, thank you.” She sat down and waited for everyone else to sit as well.
“Apparently when your first wife drowned, you gave the crime lab a sample of her DNA?” McCall asked Hoyt.
He nodded. Zane noticed how he stole a glance at Emma. They all seemed to know what was coming.
“The crime lab in Missoula ran Courtney’s DNA. It brought up another close match. Laura Chisholm’s,” the sheriff said. “It appears that Courtney Hughes is Laura Chisholm’s daughter.”
She looked to Hoyt. He said nothing. They’d wanted confirmation. Now they had it.
“You already knew this?” the sheriff asked, looking around the room at them.
“We just learned that Laura Chisholm was Lorraine Baxter before she married my father,” Zane said. “We hadn’t known that she was definitely Courtney’s birth mother.”
“I don’t think I have to tell you what this means,” McCall said. “If Zane is right, then Laura Chisholm is behind her daughter’s disappearance.”
“She orchestrated all of this,” Emma said.
The sheriff shook her head. “The only thing we’re lacking is proof of that.”
“She’s not finished with this family,” Hoyt said, his voice breaking with emotion.
“You have to find her,” Emma said. “If she’s using her own daughter to hurt my family…”
“I’m circulating copies of that age-progression photo Aggie Wells gave you not only locally, but also throughout the state,” McCall said. “I’m doing everything possible to find her and Courtney.” She didn’t need to add, “If she is still alive.” Everyone in the room had to be thinking the same thing.
“I’ll make sure Emma is never alone,” Hoyt said. “I’ll have one of the boys stay with her as well as Mrs. Crowley.”
The sheriff’s cell phone rang. She glanced at it. “I need to take this.” She got to her feet and stepped out of the room.
A few moments later, she came back into the room. Zane saw the expression on her face and felt his heart drop.
“Is it Courtney?” Dakota asked before anyone else could speak.
McCall shook her head. “That was the warden at the prison in California where the two dead men did time. Both are escaped criminals.” She seemed to hesitate. “Three prisoners walked away from a work area last week.”
“Three?” Zane said.
“The warden said they’d all three had a visitor a few weeks before. He described her as a woman in her late fifties to early sixties, blonde, blue-eyed. She was going by the name of Sharon Jones and used a Billings, Montana, address.”
“Sharon Jones? The woman Aggie found and swore was Laura Chisholm,” Emma cried.
“What more proof do you want that this whole thing is some sort of vengeance against our family?” Zane demanded.
“Until she is caught, all of you need to be very careful,” McCall said. “There’s a third man out there, not to mention Laura herself. I think everything going on with Zane is merely a diversion to bring the focus off the real target, Emma.”
The sheriff turned to look at Emma. “If we’re right and Laura is responsible for Hoyt’s other wives’ deaths, then Laura will be coming after you.”
Chapter Eleven
Dakota was still stunned by everything that had happened in the past forty-eight hours.
“I’m not letting you out of my sight until this is over,” Zane said as they left the Chisholm ranch.
She
smiled over at him. His words were music to her ears. He’d saved her at the cemetery, risked his life. She couldn’t help but think about the kiss as they went back to her ranch where she packed up what she would need.
From there, they drove back toward Whitehorse. “We can stay out at the home ranch with my folks, but I need to go by my place first.”
She didn’t say anything as they pulled into the yard of his house. There were no other vehicles around—just like at her house. She reminded herself that Courtney’s car had been found.
But the third escaped prisoner from California was still at large. She wanted to believe that by now he had crossed the border into Canada and was long gone. Believing that Courtney and her mother had also skipped the country was a little harder to swallow.
“Doesn’t look like anyone has been here,” Zane said as he unlocked the door and stepped inside. “If you just give me a minute…”
“Zane.” He stopped and turned to look at her, concern in his expression.
She stepped up to him and pushed a lock of his blond hair back from his handsome face. “Thank you.”
He shook his head. “I got you into this.”
“No, this started long before us. I just want to thank you. You saved my life last night.”
His gaze locked with hers. “Dakota.” The word came out like a prayer. She felt warmth rush through her. “Don’t you know by now how I feel about you? I was half in love with that kid you used to be. Now…” He shook his head as if he couldn’t put what he felt into words.
She leaned toward him and brushed her lips over his.
He drew back. “You sure about this?”
Had she ever been more sure of anything in her life? And yet, she knew that this would change everything between them—and possibly not for the better.
She’d taken chances in her life, plenty of them, but that was on the back of a horse in an arena or with the rough stock business. This was a whole different matter and she knew she was way out of her league.
He brushed her cheek with the rough pads of his fingertips, turning her face up to his so she couldn’t avoid his blue gaze. She saw the cool blue and the heat behind it. With Zane Chisholm it would be all or nothing.
She nodded slowly and his hand slid behind her head, his fingers burying themselves in her long hair. He pulled her toward him until his mouth hovered over hers. Her breasts pressed against his hard chest, and his hold was strong and sure.
Her heart pounded like a war drum as he drew back to meet her gaze again, as if searching for something to stop this before it got out of hand.
She met that steely gaze with one of her own. The one thing she had never lacked was courage. Those long-ago embers now fanned to a flame so hot she felt her blood catch fire.
Funny how nothing had changed and yet everything had. She was no longer that girl. He’d said men were going to want to kiss her. And they had. Just none of them had been Zane Chisholm. Until now.
His mouth dropped to hers in a stunning kiss that left her breathless. “That has been a long time coming,” Zane said, sounding just as breathless.
She realized why he hadn’t kissed her all those years ago. Nothing about Zane Chisholm was safe. She was just smart enough to know it now.
Zane swung her up in his arms, kicked open his bedroom door and carried her inside. As he laid her on the covers, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down, unable to go another moment without kissing him.
When she touched his lower lip with the tip of her tongue, she felt a shudder rock through him. With a curse he let her pull him down to the bed.
For a moment he stared down at her as if seeing her for the woman she’d become instead of that cowgirl she’d been.
Then he dropped his mouth on hers, taking possession of it, stealing her senses and proving that his earlier kiss was only a prelude of what was to come.
He grabbed her Western shirt and pulled the two sides apart with a jerk that made the snaps sing. A moan escaped his lips as he gazed down at her breasts straining against the lace fabric.
He undid the front hook with two fingers and she felt her breasts freed. His gaze took them in, then those blue eyes shifted to her face.
“You are so beautiful,” he said, his voice sounding hoarse. He lowered himself to the bed beside her, his fingers brushing one hard nipple and making her shiver with a desire she knew only he could quench.
His mouth dropped to the other breast and she arched against him, silently pleading with him not to stop.
He trailed kisses, damp and sweet, over her body, making her wriggle in pleasurable agony until at last he shed his jeans and she felt the heat of his body against hers.
He took her in his arms and slowly made love to her with ever-deepening kisses. The release came like a train gathering speed. She clung to him, crying out as she felt wave after wave of ecstasy.
Zane collapsed next to her, his hand spread on her damp stomach. They lay like that, breathing hard, both of them knowing they wouldn’t be going to the Chisholm home ranch tonight.
* * *
EMMA HAD A TERRIBLE TIME getting to sleep. Zane had called to say that he and Dakota were staying at his place. Emma hadn’t argued. She’d smiled as she’d hung up the phone. It was clear Zane was crazy about the girl.
And to think that a year ago, Emma had thought she was going to have to help her stepsons find the perfect women for them. Somehow they’d all done it on their own. She guessed that was the way it was meant to be.
Of course, each of them had fallen in love with a woman in trouble. So typical of Chisholm men, she’d thought as she’d climbed into bed next to Hoyt.
It was a little after two when she woke. She slipped out of bed and went to the window. The pickup Mrs. Crowley used was gone. Earlier, the housekeeper had complained of a headache and gone to her room. Which had relieved both Emma and Hoyt. They didn’t really want her to know what was going on.
But apparently Mrs. Crowley had felt well enough later to go out after Emma and Hoyt had gone to bed.
“What are you doing?” Hoyt asked from the bed, making Emma jump.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said when she found her voice. She didn’t want him to know she was spying on their housekeeper. He’d think she had enough problems without that.
He blinked. “So you are just sitting in the dark?”
“Go back to sleep. I like sitting here. If it bothers you, maybe I’ll go downstairs and read for a while.”
“You sure you’re all right?” he asked, sounding worried.
“I’m fine.” She got up and went to the bed, leaning in to kiss him. “Go to sleep. I’ll be back before you know it.”
He smiled and closed his eyes. “You can read up here—I don’t mind the light.”
“I left my book downstairs.” She waited for him to put up more of an argument but a moment later she heard him snoring softly.
As she crept downstairs, she admitted that spying on her housekeeper helped keep her mind off Laura Chisholm. But she knew that was only partly the truth. Mrs. Crowley was too smug in her secrets. Emma was determined to solve this one.
Moving to the living room window, she didn’t dare turn on a light. Mrs. Crowley might see it. Instead, she sat patiently in the dark, hoping Hoyt didn’t awaken again and come looking for her.
Twenty minutes later, she saw headlights in the distance.
Emma waited another five minutes after Mrs. Crowley had parked the pickup and gone inside her wing before tiptoeing into the kitchen for the flashlight and spare truck key.
She knew she wasn’t being as careful, but she had to put an end to this nightly spying. With the key and flashlight, she padded out of the kitchen, across the living room and out the front door.
It was colder out tonight. The sky was dark and the wind smelled of rain. She hurried along the side of the house in the shadows, feeling the bite of the wind. Rain was imminent.
It would serve her right to get wet, s
he thought as she slipped around the back of the pickup and through the passenger side door. If Hoyt caught her drenched in rain, how was she going to explain that?
This time, she didn’t take the time to wait and see if anyone might have seen her. She turned the key and snapped on the flashlight.
The beam shone on the odometer reading.
Emma blinked and did quick subtraction. Eleven miles? Eleven miles round-trip, she realized. That meant the woman hadn’t even left the ranch.
It was more puzzling than when she hadn’t known how far away the woman went in the middle of the night.
And more troubling somehow.
Rain pinged off the truck roof, making her jump. She hurriedly climbed out, slamming the door harder than she meant to.
Thunder rumbled in the distance. She hoped anyone who might have heard the slammed door would think that was what it had been.
As she started around the truck, a bolt of lightning splintered across the sky, lighting up the yard like daylight.
For a moment, Emma was blinded. She blinked and when her eyes focused again, she found herself face-to-face with Mrs. Crowley.
* * *
DAKOTA WOKE TO THUNDER that was so close it seemed to reverberate inside her chest. In the darkness she shivered and rolled over to face Zane. His features were lit by the light of the storm. He couldn’t have looked more handsome than he did right now, she thought with a growing ache inside her.
Earlier she’d gotten up to get a drink and had pulled on his T-shirt. It smelled of him, filling her senses. As she’d slipped it over her head, her skin had tingled. Now she remembered the way the T-shirt had fit him, accenting the hard muscles, the washboard stomach, the tanned skin. She couldn’t help but remember the way his jeans had hung on his hips, the fine blond line of hair that ran from his chest to disappear at the large rodeo belt buckle.
She had looked away, but not before he’d seen her looking. A fire had burned in those blue eyes, hot as a welder’s torch.
At just the thought of their lovemaking, she felt a fire burning in her. She’d never known this kind of passion, this kind of desire. Zane had been her childhood fantasy, the rodeo cowboy she’d planned to marry.