It’ll be all right, she promised herself, despite her uncertainty.
She drove up to the century-old hacienda looking for signs of life. Unless he’d changed. Sam was an early riser. A glimmer of light shone from the kitchen, and as she cut her engine, she was certain he’d come to the window.
By the time she arrived at the front door, he’d beaten her to it. The antique wooden panel swung wide.
“Marlene.”
“Sam.”
The years fell away as they stood there, staring at each other. For one moment, she was projected back to her youth, when she and Sam had kept company in secret.
His last name being Valdez, he hadn’t been a suitable match according to her autocratic father. Although the Spaniards had settled the territory and had obtained the original land grants, eventually a Hispanic heritage had become something less than respectable to many of the late-coming, power-wielding Anglos. Her father had been one of them.
Besides which, Sam’s father and hers had been sworn enemies—and all over the land that seemed to hold some kind of curse.
But Sam had been the one to help her through the loss of her mother when she’d been barely eighteen. Papa eventually had learned of that youthful relationship and had ended it.
“Come in,” Sam said, stepping back to let her enter. “I was just getting breakfast together.”
“Smells good.”
“When was the last time you ate?”
“Yesterday, I guess.” She wrinkled her forehead, trying to remember. She hadn’t been hungry since Gray disappeared. “I’m sure I ate sometime.”
“Well, I have enough on the stove to share, if you’re in the mind for it.”
She was.
A few minutes later, Marlene was seated in the kitchen, sipping at a mug of coffee, watching Sam tend to his potatoes in one pan, ingredients for an omelet in the other.
Sam Valdez wasn’t as handsome as Jasper. He never had been. But there was a rugged quality about him that appealed to a woman. Lots of women. He’d had enough of them—rumors abounded when people got bored.
But Sam had never remarried after his divorce and Marlene had always wondered why.
As if it were yesterday, she remembered the second time they’d taken up with each other.
Seventeen years ago, Zane Abreu had died, leaving Cash the truth of his parentage in writing, and as a result, her safe world with Jasper had changed forever. His own wife having recently left him, Sam had gotten her through that period of devastation, as well.
“So, what brings you here, Marlene?” Sam asked, as he set two dishes on the plank table.
“gray.”
“Figured as much.” He took a forkful of egg and followed it with a chunk of potato. “You decided to take me up on my offer?”
Her mouth full, Marlene swallowed and nodded.
“What can I do for you?”
“It’s what we can do for each other,” she stated far more calmly than she was feeling. “You get me the money I need to buy my boy’s safety....” If only Jasper hadn’t left this to her. “And I’ll get you the land along the river you’ve always wanted.”
Sam’s fork clattered to his plate. “Jasper agreed to sell?”
“He doesn’t have to. The land’s mine.”
“Not the way he tells it.”
“Jasper is co-owner,” she agreed, “as long as I stay married to him. Papa had his lawyer set it all up like a business arrangement.”
Though she was fuzzy on the details. She’d never paid attention to the actual contract, for she’d never imagined she would have reason to turn her back on her husband. But Papa had assured her that if things didn’t work out between her and Jasper, he wouldn’t be able to walk away with what belonged to her and her children.
Jasper had been desperate enough for the land and all the opportunities that would come with it to agree to anything Papa demanded.
“Are you saying what I think you are?” Sam’s expression was intent. “Are you telling me you’re finally divorcing Jasper Matlock?”
“I’ll do whatever I have to.” If Jasper wouldn’t agree to sell, she would take the decision from him. “I want my son alive and whole.”
“How much do you need and when?” His words were exactly what she’d hoped to hear.
Marlene took a deep breath. “Two million dollars by Monday sunset.”
“Two million!” Sam’s eyes went huge. “I mean, the property’s worth it, but I don’t have that kind of money myself. And mortgages take time even if I could get me one that big. I’ll just have to find another way.”
“Then you’ve agreed to help me?”
“I’ll do my best for you, Marlene, just like I always have. I’ll find a way as long as you don’t look too closely at what I got to do to get what you need.”
Ignoring a warning twinge, she selfishly said, “I want my son safe.”
“Have you spoken to Gray? Made sure for yourself he’s all right?”
Tears sprang to her eyes even though she’d told herself she wouldn’t cry anymore.
“I must have been sleeping when the call came in. By the time I found out, Jasper was too drunk to make much sense.”
“Damn fool!” Sam groused. “And what about that niece of yours?”
“Reine? What about her?”
“Did she carry through with whatever plan was going through her pretty head?”
“I don’t know,” Marlene said, unable to miss his intent expression. “I haven’t spoken to her since early last evening. I assume if she discovered anything of importance, she would have contacted me....”
Sam shrugged. “She probably went home and forgot about it, then.”
“Oh, I doubt it. Reine doesn’t give up so easily. She’ll keep at something until she succeeds. Though this time, I believe she’s in over her head.”
“Maybe you ought to talk some sense into the girl before she gets herself hurt.”
Marlene shuddered at the thought. She couldn’t bear to see something happen to her niece. Reine was almost as dear to her as her own son.
“I should talk to her,” she agreed.
Though Marlene suspected that, despite whatever she said, Reine would continue on her chosen path and just not say anything that would worry her.
Which, perhaps, she already was doing....
REINE DROVE INTO THE truck-stop parking lot looking for Cash’s vehicle of the day. She hadn’t asked him what he’d be driving, but she was certain the Jaguar wouldn’t be de rigueur.
In addition to several eighteen-wheelers, all she spotted were some pickups and a pair of vintage low riders for which Española was famous. These were particularly fancy, one having an Aztec pyramid painted across the trunk, and the other, skeletons playing musical instruments.
There was no sign of Cash.
Deciding she might as well wait inside, she first found the rest room to freshen up. Then, about to enter the restaurant, she spotted Ozzie Skinner at a booth arguing with a fair-haired man whose back was to her.
What was the ranch hand doing here when he should be on the job? Remembering his having complained about his back to Tobiah Hill, she wondered if he hadn’t defied the foreman, after all, and had decided to take whatever time he chose—not that his back seemed to be bothering him at the moment.
Intent on the men in the booth, she didn’t hear the one come up behind her until he said, “There you are. I was wondering where you’d taken yourself.”
She turned to Cash. “And I was wondering where you were, period.”
His eyebrows arched. “You missed me. Good.”
“Don’t flatter yourself.”
Seeming amused, he indicated the restaurant. “Hungry?”
“I had breakfast. I just thought I’d grab a cup of coffee while I was waiting for you,” she said, glancing back at Skinner and his companion.
“Something wrong?”
“I’m just wondering what Ozzie Skinner’s up to.”
/> Cash followed her gaze. “He doesn’t look too happy, does he? Maybe Tobiah fired him.”
“Could be.”
“Still want that coffee?”
“Togo?”
“Fine with me.”
“I’ll take mine with cream.”
Cash stepped up to the counter to place their order while Reine hung back, her attention once more straying toward the booth. Both men had risen and the fair-haired one was already stalking toward the cash register. His handsome face was marred by a small but nasty scar that drew up one side of his mouth in a perpetual snarl. Though he seemed vaguely familiar, she couldn’t place him.
Even as she stared, he flicked his pale gaze over her in disinterest.
Not so Skinner.
The moment the ranch hand spotted her, he started and quickly turned away, stuffing his hat on his bald head and his unlit cigar into his mouth.
Maybe Tobiah hadn’t fired him, after all. Undoubtedly he was afraid she’d tell the foreman she’d seen him here when he should have been working.
As if she didn’t have more important things on her mind.
Both men were gone by the time Cash handed her a paper cup filled with coffee.
He insisted on taking only one vehicle—his, of course—and Reine saw no reason to object. She slid into the leather passenger seat of his pickup and, sipping her coffee, contented herself with giving him directions. They arrived at their destination before she’d even finished her cup.
She gazed around at the Archer property. The few acres were fenced. Two horses grazed in a pasture near a lean-to shelter. The house itself was a modest two-story affair with a territorial-style overhang porch the length of the building.
Cash pulled up the gravel drive and stopped behind a car with a vanity license plate that read NORA 4, saying, “Looks like she’s home.”
“But is she awake?”
“If not, we’ll be an even bigger surprise than we anticipated.”
But to Reine’s relief, Nora Archer was awake and dressed. She also seemed about ready to leave the house, no doubt to take care of those pesky Saturday errands. If only that were all she had to worry about, Reine thought, greeting the tall, too-thin woman who’d worked for her uncle for as long as she could remember. And while Nora politely invited them inside, she couldn’t keep her startled, bespectacled gaze from Cash.
Staring at him, she asked Reine, “Did your uncle tell you to see me about something?”
“No, and I’m afraid Uncle Jasper wouldn’t approve of our being here, either. But this is really important, Nora.”
“Sit, then.”
They followed her into the sparsely furnished living room, with its identical heavy wooden benches made minimally comfortable by the addition of cushions. She and Cash sat opposite her uncle’s assistant, who nearly faded into herself when she crossed her legs and hunched her shoulders forward.
“It’s about Gray,” Reine began.
Nora’s painfully thin features pinched together. “I heard he’d disappeared...so I guess he still hasn’t turned up, right?”
“That’s because he’s been kidnapped,” Cash told her.
Nora’s gray eyes grew large behind her glasses. “Mr. Matlock didn’t say a thing.”
“He was told not to,” Reine explained. “The problem is, the kidnappers want a lot of money, and if Uncle Jasper can’t come up with it... Well, I’m afraid for Gray.”
She wasn’t about to tell the woman he had no intentions of even trying. Surely, panic had been talking. He’d probably already changed his mind.
“So why come to me?”
“For information,” Cash said, “about any particular business rivals who may have seemed threatening toward Matlock over the past few months.”
“You mean other than yourself?” she sniped, sitting tall, her loyalty to her employer evident. “No one else, to my knowledge.”
“Are you certain?” Reine asked. “Think hard, Nora. This could be important. We’re trying to figure out who might be responsible before—”
“It could mean my brother’s life,” Cash said.
Which made Reine gape. Cash calling Gray his “brother” was certainly a first.
Nora seemed even more surprised. “‘Brother’?”
“Jasper Matlock is my biological father.”
The woman blinked several times as if digesting that news, then quickly gathered herself together.
“Mr. Matlock has had lot of disagreements lately. You know, worries over the business and all. I thought maybe he was going to take that offer from Evan Bixler, but—”
“What about Evan Bixler?” Reine interrupted, remembering Cash had mentioned the man as being one of her uncle’s chief competitors. “What sort of offer?”
Nora twitched and hunched inward again, obviously undecided about explaining.
“Please,” Reine said. “I swear to you, this is for Gray, no other reason.”
Slowly, she nodded. “Mr. Bixler wanted to buy into Matlock Construction. He would have provided the necessary capital to get the company back on its feet. Your uncle didn’t want anything to do with him. Said something about shady business practices and how he wouldn’t front for a hoodlum.”
“A ‘hoodlum’?” Cash echoed. “He used that exact word?”
“That he did. He kind of surprised me, but your fa—Uh, Mr. Matlock doesn’t like his decisions questioned, so I just listened while he talked.”
“How long ago did Bixler make the offer?”
“Two, maybe three weeks. I don’t remember the exact day.” Nora looked anxiously from one to the other. “Do you think Mr. Bixler was so angry about being turned down that he might have done it?”
“We don’t know what to think yet,” Reine said. “We’re trying to sort it all out.”
“I wish I could be of more help. I would hate to see anything happen to Grayson.”
“One more thing,” Cash said. “Does the name Selena Cullen mean anything to you?”
“S-Selena Cullen?” Nora stammered and began blinking rapidly again. “You know about her?”
Her heart sinking, Reine met Cash’s gaze. So there was more to the story, after all. But Nora wouldn’t give them details, even upon prompting.
So they thanked her profusely, asked her to keep their visit to herself, and left.
They were on their way back to the truck stop and her car when Reine said, “I wonder what exactly Uncle Jasper meant by Bixler’s being a hoodlum.”
She didn’t even want to think about Selena Cullen, let alone talk about her.
“Or if he even had room to criticize,” Cash said. “He does have a tendency to get fixated on certain ideas that aren’t fact. So that’s the first thing I want to establish.”
“But how do we find out?”
“Let a professional do it.”
“The sheriff?”
She wasn’t entirely opposed to the idea. Maybe it was time to go against her uncle’s wishes on this one.
“I meant private investigator. Don’t worry, I already know of a firm.”
“A good one, I hope.”
“Steven Kessler & Associates in Santa Fe. I only use the best.”
Reine would expect no less of him, and yet...
She asked, “Why did you need to hire a private investigator?”
“You don’t want to know.”
Probably not. Undoubtedly it had to do with some takeover plan or other, maybe even of Matlock Construction. Already worrying about the unknown deadline, however, she was glad Cash already had an in.
“How fast does this company work?”
“We should have a dossier on Evan Bixler by tonight. And while I’m at it, I’ll see what they can find out about Selena Cullen and her whereabouts.”
Thankfully, he didn’t elaborate.
Cash pulled into the truck stop’s parking lot and stopped at her car.
“You know, I really have to check on Aunt Marlene,” Reine said.
&n
bsp; “That’s fine. I need to catch up on some business with Nemesio.”
“Then I guess I’ll see you later. So when do we rendezvous?”
Giving her one of those looks that made her squirm inside, Cash said, “That’s up to you, isn’t it.”
“If you’re not going to be serious—”
“Don’t worry,” he interrupted. “I’ll find you.”
She nodded and left the pickup, a growing sense of unease filling her at the thought of facing Aunt Marlene with unanswered questions about Selena Cullen.
Chapter Eight
Work was already in progress on the new house when Cash arrived at the pueblo. The eight-inch-high concrete-block stem wall—elevated to avert erosion caused by rain—had already been poured the week before. A small but dedicated crew including the owner, his wife and the older of their sons, was hard at work setting the oversize adobe bricks in place and applying mortar with short-handled shovels.
Spotting Nemesio working on the area above what would be one of the doorways, Cash waved a guy off and climbed up his ladder. Cash’s frustration over Gray’s disappearance was enough to make him doubt himself. He needed the physical labor to ground him, to make him stronger.
And he needed to make certain Nemesio Escobar hadn’t been involved.
His uncle was just about to lay the second angle iron above the lintel when Cash got to the top of the ladder and grabbed the other end. They set the bar in together as they’d done so many times in the past.
“Uncle, I need a favor.”
His expression neutral, Nemesio said, “So ask.”
“You might not like it.”
“There’s a lotta things in life I don’t like, but you know I’d do anything for you or Luna.”
They were the only family Nemesio had, and Cash knew he’d lay down his life for them if it came to that. But would his uncle do something illegal? Something that would hurt someone else he cared about?
The uncertainty had bothered him while he’d been trying to fall asleep the night before. First, possibilities involving Selena Cullen had gone around and around in his mind. Then others involving his uncle had surfaced, as well. He couldn’t forget the weird argument between Nemesio and his mother.
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