Slade pulled out his pack of gum and jammed a piece in his mouth. In the cold air, the powerful peppermint had an extra bite to it, but the gum helped soothe the fire in his chest. The heartburn had been his near constant companion since his wife, Krista, died.
Hearing the crunch of tires on gravel, Slade straightened and tugged the brim of his Stetson down.
A pickup truck pulled to a stop at the gate, headed out from the employees’ wing of the ranch house. When the truck stopped, a man in faded blue jeans and a tan ranch coat emerged and walked toward the gate, casting a glance toward Slade. Behind the steering wheel, Jared Hansen, the young hand Slade had met in the kitchen, gave a small wave.
“Howdy,” the second man said as he opened the gate so that Jared could drive the truck through.
“Morning.” Assuming this must be another one of the hands he’d be working with, Slade stepped forward, his hand out, and introduced himself.
“George Jeffries,” the hand returned. “Jared told me the new foreman had arrived last night.”
As the men shook hands, Slade sized up the ranch hand. He looked fit, capable and had the courtesy to look Slade in the eye.
“Off to Vegas, huh?” Slade asked.
George looked contrite. “Yeah, bad timing. Sorry to be leaving just when you arrive. Cal’s staying, though. He’ll show you the ropes.”
Slade nodded.
George flicked a glance to the truck as Jared drove through the open gate, then back to Slade. “Whatcha doin’ out here, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“Just taking a look around.”
George eyed him. “You heard the story, didn’t you?”
“What story?”
“About some cop getting shot out here some years back. Before my time. I’ve only been here four months, but when other crazy mess started happening this summer—people getting killed and babies kidnapped—folks started talking about the other murder that happened on the ranch.” George pointed to the bullet hole in the fence post. “That hole’s the only evidence left. Crazy, huh?”
Slade wanted to ask the hand what exactly he’d been told about his father’s murder, but Jared whistled from the truck. “C’mon, George! We’re already late!”
George gave a nod as he closed the gate and hurried to the pickup. “Nice meetin’ you.”
Slade returned a wave. “Good luck in the competition.”
He watched the pickup pull away, then turned back to the fence post and grunted. A hole on a wooden post wasn’t going to give him the answers he needed. His time today would be best spent going through the cold case files at the police station. Chief Peters had promised to make all the evidence and crime-scene photos available to him, a courtesy the previous police chief had denied him. Slade now knew that the previous chief in the Dead River Police Department had been covering up a lot of dirty dealings and botched investigations. If Slade’s instincts were right, the identity of his father’s murderer was among the secrets the ousted chief had taken to his grave.
Shoving down a ripple of grief, Slade headed back toward the employee quarters of the ranch house. The sooner he solved his father’s murder, the sooner he could end his charade as the Coltons’ foreman and begin piecing his life together again.
* * *
Jethro was a mere shadow of his former self. That was Amanda’s first impression when she entered the room where her father lay dying. Dying. A spurt of frustration and anger roiled inside her that Jethro’s illness had come to this. But her father had refused treatment when it was discovered his increasing pain, frequent infections and fatigue were because of late-stage leukemia. His diagnosis had sent shock waves through the family, but none as great as when Jethro declared he would not take chemo or other treatment to slow the advance of the illness. Jethro had, for all intents and purposes, given up on life.
For Amanda, his decision had felt like an affront to the family. Jethro had long been accused of selfishness, and to her, his refusal to try treating his cancer smacked of just such self-centeredness. If he loved his family, why wouldn’t he want to fight the disease and give himself the chance to attend Gabby’s wedding, see Cheyenne learn to walk, be there when Catherine’s baby was born, share one last Christmas with the first-born son he’d just found after thirty years? But he wasn’t willing to endure the discomfort of chemo to buy himself more time with his growing family.
Pain needled Amanda as she drew close to his bedside and eyed the machines and oxygen tanks he was hooked to via a web of wires and tubes. Had Jethro ever really loved his daughters at all? She couldn’t imagine giving up on any fight that would give her precious moments with Cheyenne.
“Amanda. Hi.”
She glanced from her pale, sleeping father to Dr. Levi Colton, her illegitimate half-brother, who’d agreed to serve as Jethro’s private physician throughout his illness. The position had given Levi and Jethro an opportunity to find a strained peace with each other. But Levi’s presence on the ranch had also united him with his half-sisters, after years of only barely acknowledging each other’s existence—by Jethro’s design. If losing her father had a silver lining, it was the newly formed bond and promise of closer relationship she now had with her half-brother.
Levi stepped into the bedroom-turned-hospice-ward from the adjoining sitting area and flashed a warm smile at her. “I thought I heard someone come in. How are you?”
Amanda returned a grin to her brother. “Sleep-deprived. And you?”
Levi’s brow wrinkled. “Sleep deprived? Has there been trouble?”
She raked her hair, which she’d left loose after her shower, back from her face with her fingers. “Sick horse. Sick baby. Nothing that isn’t in the mommy-slash-veterinarian job description.”
He lifted his cheek in a sympathetic grin. “Sounds a bit like when I was in med school.” He sobered. “Is Cheyenne getting worse?”
“Not really. Just the stuffy nose. Low-grade fever.” She tipped her head and implored him with a worried expression. “Just the same, could you stop by and check on her? I’d bring her here, but we were warned about Dad’s vulnerability to germs.”
“Of course.” His smile softened, and his eyes warmed. “Anything for my niece.”
Instinctively, Amanda analyzed Levi’s tone and body language, searching for sarcasm or the subtle hostility that he had shown the family when he’d first arrived. Having been lied to last year by Cheyenne’s father, Amanda kept her guard up around men. Her trust was hard-earned lately.
But she found no deception in Levi’s expression or voice. She was relieved and reassured the amicability between them was genuine. In fact, his hazel eyes twinkled with the same joy she’d seen in her sisters’ eyes in recent days—a happiness rooted in finding true love. In Levi’s case, Kate McCord, the ranch’s pastry chef and kitchen assistant, had snagged her brother’s heart.
“So...” She glanced awkwardly toward the bed where Jethro slept. A nasal cannula fed oxygen into his nostrils, an IV dripped painkillers and fluids through a needle into his frail, bruised arm, and a clamp on his finger monitored his blood oxygen level. “How is he?”
Levi sighed and jammed his hands in his pockets. “I won’t lie, Amanda. This pneumonia has set him back a good bit. It’s hard for him to breathe at times, and his strength is failing.” He twisted his mouth in regret. “He doesn’t have long.”
“What if he changed his mind about the bone marrow transplant? We might still find a match.”
Levi shook his head. “He’s beyond that point, Amanda. All we can do now is make him comfortable until...” He left the “until” unsaid but understood.
Her father was dying. Despite knowing the gravity of the situation before she came in, hearing Levi’s grim assessment shot Amanda with an arrowlike pain in her chest. She drew a short, soft gasp and squeezed her eyes shut.
A large hand curled around her bicep, startling her from her moment of grief. “I’m sorry. I know it must be hard to see him like this.”
Levi’s comforting gesture touched her, and she forced a smile. “Yeah. I mean growing up, he always seemed so...indestructible. Larger than life.” She covered Levi’s hand with her own. “I know he’s not perfect, and I know he’s hurt a lot of people, including you and your mom—heck, including me—but...he’s my dad, and I love him. Despite all his flaws.”
Her half-brother nodded. “I understand. You can try talking to him. He might rouse some, but I’ve been upping his painkillers, so he’s been real drowsy the last few days.”
“I knew it,” Jethro mumbled from the bed. “Knew you were...pushing me toward my grave...don’t need your...stupid drugs....”
“My, my,” Amanda said, turning toward her father with the brightest smile she could muster. “So the cranky old coot is awake.”
Her father opened one eye to peer at her sourly. “You’re not...too old...to spank...missy.”
She carefully pressed a kiss to his sunken cheek. “Maybe. But you’d have to catch me first.”
“Where’s...my granddaughter?” Jethro rasped.
Amanda settled on the edge of the bed. “In the nursery. She’s a little sick, and I didn’t want to expose you.”
Jethro grunted weakly. “As if...I could get sicker.”
A soft rap sounded on the bedroom door, and Levi answered the knock.
“I hope I’m not intruding,” a familiar male voice said, drawing Amanda’s attention to Jethro’s visitor. “I just wanted to pay my respects, introduce myself to Mr. Colton.”
“I’m sorry,” Levi said, frowning, “But who are you?”
“Slade?” Amanda moved from the bed toward the door. Levi and Slade both glanced her way. “What are you doing here?”
Nodding a greeting to her, Slade fingered the brim of the Stetson he held. “Meeting the ranch’s owner. As a courtesy.” His gaze darted to Jethro, then back to her. “Unless this is a bad time.”
“Who’s there?” Jethro asked, his eyes fully open now and as shrewd as ever.
“Our new foreman,” Amanda said, waving Slade in.
Levi stepped back to let Slade enter, then disappeared into the sitting room again to allow Amanda and Slade a private audience with Jethro.
“New foreman?” Her father’s gaze slid over Slade, clearly sizing him up. “I didn’t...hire you.”
“No, sir. Dylan Frick did.” Slade stepped forward and extended his hand to Jethro. “Slade Kent, sir.”
Jethro’s eyes widened at the mention of Dylan’s name and, if possible, his face turned a shade paler. Only weeks earlier, Dylan, the son of the nanny who’d raised Amanda and her sisters, had been proven to be her long-lost half-brother, Cole. Clearly Jethro was still adjusting to the knowledge that his son, who’d been kidnapped as a baby, had been living under his roof for most of the thirty years the family had been searching for him. For a moment, he only stared at Slade and the proffered hand, but finally he seemed to gather himself and raised a frail and shaking hand to Slade’s. “All right.” Jethro’s brow dented as he glared at Slade. “You can stay...on a trial basis....”
Slade blinked, but, to his credit, showed no other outward sign that would counter Jethro. “Yes, sir. I appreciate that.”
Amanda bit the inside of her cheek, both covering a grin and fighting back the well of tears in her throat. Her father’s paltry attempt to show he was still in control of the ranch was bittersweet. Jethro Colton had wasted away to skin and bones and barely had a breath left in him, but in his chest beat the heart of the stubborn, despotic, arrogant man who’d turned Dead River Ranch into a multi-million dollar operation.
Jethro’s eyebrows drew closer together as his frown deepened. “Have we met? You look...familiar.”
Amanda jerked her gaze up, startled by Jethro’s question.
Slade, too, seemed shaken by the question. “No, sir. We’ve never met before today.”
But Jethro was rarely wrong about such things. Her father had a mind like a steel trap for anything related to business and people. She leveled a curious gaze on the new foreman. Was Slade not who he claimed?
“What did you say...your name was?” Jethro asked, wheezing.
A muscle in Slade’s jaw twitched, and his fingers tightened around the brim of his hat. Drawing a deep breath, he said, “Slade Kent.”
Jethro’s wheeze caught, and a strangled-sounding cough rattled from his chest. He gasped for air as the coughing fit wracked his weakened body.
“Dad?” Amanda hurried to his side, desperate to do something to help. If Jethro were a sick horse or cow, she’d know what to do, but her father’s frail health left her feeling helpless. “Levi!”
But her half-brother was already at their father’s side, having raced back in to his patient at the first rattling cough. He helped Jethro sit up, giving him firm smacks on the back until Jethro regained his breath. When Levi laid Jethro back on his pillows, a tiny trickle of blood seeped from Jethro’s nose.
Amanda gasped. “He’s bleeding.”
“Nose bleeds are common at this stage of his illness.” Levi dabbed at the blood until Jethro batted his hand away.
“I can...do that.” Jethro held a tissue to his nose, but Amanda noticed the telltale tremor in his arm.
“I should go.” Slade, who had backed away from the bed during the chaos, stood near the door, his hat still crushed in his hand. “I apologize if I’m responsible for—”
“No, no,” Levi cut him off. “Not your fault. It’s the pneumonia.”
Despite Levi’s exculpation, Slade seemed uneasy and eager to leave. “Just the same, I have things to tend to and an appointment to keep.”
Amanda rose quickly. “I’ll walk you out.”
She had questions for the new foreman that wouldn’t wait. Bending, she brushed a quick kiss on her father’s forehead. “Bye, Dad. Don’t give Levi a hard time, eh?”
“Next time,” her father rasped, “bring Cheyenne...or don’t bother coming.”
She scoffed a short laugh. “Love you, too, Dad.” Swallowing hard, she choked back the emotion that clogged her throat and followed Slade into the hall.
Though still rattled by her father’s deteriorating health, she didn’t miss the way Slade’s shoulders visibly relaxed once the door to Jethro’s room closed behind them. Maybe her father’s obvious suffering had put him on edge. Plenty of people were uncomfortable around dying patients. But she couldn’t forget her father’s question or Slade’s startled reaction to it. Have we met?
Amanda’s nape tingled with suspicion. In recent months, she’d had her fill of deceitful men and people’s secret agendas. She caught Slade’s arm as he started down the narrow rear staircase toward the employees’ quarters. “Have you met my father before?”
His blue gaze darkened, and his brow furrowed. “Did you not just hear me answer that question for your father?”
She raised her chin. “I heard you. But I haven’t decided if I believe you.”
He faced her fully and squared his feet. Standing on a lower step as he was, his eyes were nearly level with hers. From this angle, she could see the flecks of sapphire that gave his irises their bright color, and their intensity made her belly quiver. “And what proof are you looking for that I’m telling the truth?”
“I don’t know. But my father is rarely wrong about whom he’s met. He doesn’t forget a face.” Amanda crossed her arms over her chest, trying to quell the jitters Slade’s stare induced.
His gaze dipped briefly to her breasts, plumped by her defiant posture, before returning to her glare. Her pulse tripped, but she held her ground.
“Well, he’s wrong this time. We’ve never met.” He firmed his mouth and
turned to leave.
“I hope you’re right. I don’t take kindly to liars or con artists.”
He sent her a cool look over his shoulder as he descended the stairs. “Then we’re square, Miss Colton. Because neither do I.”
* * *
Later that week, Slade took a break from ranching work to head into town. He’d been swamped with chores that the hands would normally do. Amanda had helped out, mucking stalls and riding the fence with her daughter bundled in a baby carrier on her back. Cal, the only hand who’d stayed home from the rodeo finals, was a hard worker but stayed to himself—which suited Slade just fine. He got enough questions and suspicious looks from Amanda.
He was eager to get down to the brass tacks of his investigation, maybe even be back in his own apartment by Christmas.
A young officer looked up from a computer screen when he walked into the Dead River Police Department headquarters. “Can I help you?”
“I’m here to see Chief Peters.”
“Slade,” the police chief said amiably, strolling in from a back room with a steaming mug before the officer could summon him. “How are things at Dead River Ranch?”
“Quiet for the most part. I thought I’d use this time to dig into those case files on my dad’s murder.”
Chief Peters sipped his coffee and nodded. “Follow me. I’ll set you up in an interrogation room.”
Slade fell in step behind the chief of police, an anxious roll in his gut. After all these years, was he finally going to know who killed his father and why the case was shelved with little investigation? He plucked his peppermint gum out of his pocket and shoved a stick in his mouth.
“You can wait here,” Peters said, opening the door to a Spartan room with a rickety table and metal folding chairs. “I’ll get the file. Would you like some coffee?”
Slade shook his head. “Thanks, but no.”
Colton Christmas Rescue Page 4