Promise from a Cowboy

by C. J. Carmichael

  * * *

  “THIS IS WHAT’S going to happen. We’re going out to Coffee Creek Ranch and you’re going to apologize to B.J. Then we’re going to town and you’re giving Harris another statement. The truth this time.”

  “Are you crazy? We have a plan. You said so yourself. We have to think of the future.”

  “There is no future for any of us if we don’t do the right thing now. Get in my vehicle, Hunter. We’re going now.”

  “No bloody way. What I told you was just between the two of us.”

  “You really expect me to keep everything you said a secret? And let B.J. take the fall?”

  “He’s willing to do it. And you know damn well his family has the money to protect him.”

  Hunter had disappointed her many times over the years. But she’d always hoped that at the core, he was a good, if misguided person. But how could she believe that now, when he was saying these awful things? “Please, Hunter. Don’t make me get my gun and force you to come with me.”

  “You would never do that.”

  “Don’t put me to the test.”

  But then he was running, out the door and into his truck. She had time to get her gun, but just stood on the porch watching as he drove away.

  He was right. She couldn’t shoot at her own brother, not even to aim at one of his truck tires.

  But there was something else she would do. Something she had to do.

  * * *

  IT WAS LATE AFTERNOON when Savannah drove up to Coffee Creek Ranch, having texted the Realtor to reschedule their appointment. She pulled up to the main house, but before she had time to turn off the ignition, Olive Lambert was marching out of the front door and up to her truck. She stopped about a foot from the driver’s-side door.

  Since Olive hadn’t left enough room for Savannah to open the door, she lowered the window.

  “What are you doing here?” Olive wasn’t bothering with the pleasantries today.

  “I need to talk to B.J.”

  “Then you ought to be in town. That’s where that special investigator took him for questioning. Such stuff and nonsense. We both know who the authorities ought to be harassing. And it isn’t my son.”

  Olive’s eyes were brilliantly green and flashing anger.

  This time, Savannah couldn’t blame her.

  “Rex Harris was here?”

  Olive nodded.

  “When?”

  “About an hour ago.”

  “Thanks, Mrs. Lambert.” She raised the window, then waited for Olive to move a safe distance away before she turned her SUV around and headed back to town.

  This was much worse than she’d expected. What was B.J. saying to Harris? And why hadn’t he got word to her that he’d been hauled in for questioning?

  Chapter Sixteen

  Savannah made it as far as the receptionist’s office at the courthouse before being asked to take a seat and wait for Mr. Harris, who was in a meeting.

  “If he’s meeting with Mr. B. J. Lambert, then I need to see both of them.” Savannah didn’t sit, expecting that she would be called into the meeting room right away.

  She was correct. The receptionist returned quickly and ushered her into an interview room, where Harris was sitting with June Savage, an older man in a suit and tie who had to be a lawyer—and B.J.

  B.J.’s broad shoulders, cowboy hat and sun-bronzed skin looked out of place in the office setting. He appeared tired and frustrated, but not cowed, and he nodded slightly to acknowledge her presence.

  He didn’t smile, though. Not even a little. And Savannah’s guilt was overwhelming at the sight of the man who had been her friend—and her lover—enduring an interrogation that he didn’t deserve.

  The four of them were sitting at a table with room for eight, the polished wood surface littered with mugs of coffee, a plate of cookies and lots of loose paper.

  Savannah looked from Harris, to B.J., then back to Harris.

  “My brother just told me what really happened the night of the fire. You need to release B.J., locate Hunter and bring him in to revise his statement. You’ll find that B.J. is exonerated in every way. The party was never his idea. He’d never met Travis McBride before, never stole the watch and certainly didn’t go up in the loft area the night of the fire. My brother’s revised statement will clear him entirely.”

  Everyone around the table looked stunned. Except B.J.

  “Do you know what you’re doing, Savannah?” His voice was laced with caution.

  “You should have told me the truth. From the beginning.”

  He averted his eyes.

  “I know. You were trying to protect me by protecting Hunter.” He was just so noble...that was his biggest strength and also his biggest flaw.

  “Are you saying your brother lied in his previous statement?” Harris spoke slowly, seeking absolute clarity with this.

  “Yes.”

  “How refreshing to get a straight answer for a change.”

  By Harris’s dry tone, Savannah gathered that B.J. had been giving him the runaround.

  Why not tell the truth and protect himself?

  He wasn’t giving Harris a hard time for Hunter’s sake, that was for sure. He’d done it for her. And how had she repaid him? By throwing him to the lions to save her brother.

  “I wish Hunter were here to tell you himself,” she said.

  “Since he isn’t, we have only your word that B.J. had no involvement.”

  “My word and this.” She took out the coin and handed it to Harris.

  She told them the entire story, from the moment her brother had met Travis McBride online and promised to train him to be a cowboy, to the awful ending, where he had stripped the passed-out young man of his wallet, coins and whiskey bottle.

  “It looks like an old British coin,” Harris said. “Where did you find it?”

  “In the dryer today, at the bottom of a load of my brother’s clothes. I have another just like it in the evidence room at my office. B.J. and I found it a few weeks ago in the loft of the old barn.”

  “Looks like something that belongs in a coin collection,” Harris said, passing the coin to the private investigator.

  “Tyler’s father is a numismatist,” June said. “Tyler may have stolen the coins hoping to sell them at some point. His father said he’d done this before.”

  “My brother has carried that coin as some sort of talisman all these years. When he saw that I’d found it, he confessed the whole story to me. I couldn’t convince him to come here and revise his statement. But I’m hoping—”

  There was a tap on the door, and then the receptionist stepped inside. “I’m sorry to interrupt again. But I have a Hunter Moody and his friend Hanna White, who insist they have something urgent to say to Mr. Harris.”

  And then her brother and Hanna were in the room.

  Savannah felt suddenly weak—whether from relief or fear she wasn’t sure. Maybe both. Somehow B.J. had noticed. He pulled out a chair and urged her to sit.

  Meanwhile, everyone else was focused on her brother.

  “Your sister just showed us this,” Harris said, reclaiming the coin from June.

  Hunter’s face grew pale, but he didn’t back down. “Yeah. It’s kind of a long story.”

  “We’ve heard it once,” Harris said, his voice stern. “But we’re more than prepared to sit through it again.”

  * * *

  HUNTER SPOKE, mostly without interruption, for forty minutes. All the while, Hanna sat silently beside him, holding his hand. When Hunter finally reached the end of his sordid tale, for a long while no one said anything. Savannah felt as if she might cry—for her brother, who had made so many terrible choices.

  And for herself—and what she’d done to a
very fine man.

  She’d known B.J. was covering for Hunter. And she’d let him.

  “You’re sure you’ve told us the truth this time,” Rex Harris finally said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m going to need to see you separately for a while.” He glanced at the lawyer. “Maybe you should stay, too. The rest of you leave now. My office will be in touch.”

  * * *

  B.J. FOLLOWED SAVANNAH down the stairs, then out the main doors of the courthouse. The day was on its way to being a real scorcher. First day of July, he remembered. He sure hoped this month would be quieter than the last.

  He had never seen Savannah more miserable than she looked right now. He could tell she was on the verge of tears. She kept her head high, though, and seemed determined to go straight to her vehicle and get away as fast as she could.

  “Look. I’m really sorry, Savannah.”

  That stopped her in her tracks. “You’re sorry? You have been so bloody noble in all of this. You did everything you could to protect him. And you never even told me.”

  He couldn’t. He’d wanted to protect her.

  “No one’s going to blame you for something your brother did.”

  “Why wouldn’t they? I blame myself. He didn’t have a father or mother providing guidance in his life. I should have kept a closer eye on him.”

  But they’d been the same age. And she hadn’t had the influence of caring parents, either.

  Savannah never would cut herself any slack. It wasn’t in her nature. And it was one of the reasons he loved her so damn much.

  “You’ll see,” he told her. “When the next election comes around, the people of this community will show how much they support you.”

  “When the next election comes around, I won’t be here.”

  Her words hit him like a bucket of cold water. “What?”

  “I never had a chance to tell you—Regan’s been accepted to med school in Seattle. I’m selling our land and moving to Washington, as well. Hopefully I’ll get a job in law enforcement and start rebuilding my life.”

  B.J. couldn’t speak at first. Tears were welling in Savannah’s eyes. He couldn’t believe this was really what she wanted. “What if I don’t want you to go?”

  “You’ll be so much better off when I’m gone. My family has given you nothing but grief.”

  “Maybe that’s true of Hunter. But not you.”

  “Don’t you see? If it hadn’t been for me, you would have been free to tell the truth years ago. All this time, you were lying for my sake. How can I forgive myself for causing you all that pain?”

  “I don’t blame you. You shouldn’t, either.”

  “That’s impossible.” She swallowed, then blotted her eyes with the back of her hand. “But there’s something I need to say first. Something you should know.”

  He tried to take her hands, but she wouldn’t let him.

  “I’ve always been in love with you, B.J. But never more than today when I finally understood what you sacrificed for my family....” She swallowed. “For me.”

  The words should have sounded so sweet to him. But how could they, when she was crying and looking about as heartbroken as a woman could be?

  “I’m sure you’ve had enough of the Moodys—that you’ll never want to see a one of us again. But...I had to tell you how I feel about you. Just so you know how it was. And now I should get going. I have an appointment with a Realtor in half an hour.”

  What could he say to stop her?

  She took a step backward.

  “Hang on a minute. Where are you going with this, Savannah? First you tell me you’re leaving town. Then that you love me. It’s crazy. What good is that supposed to do? Do you want me to move to Washington with you? Because I will.”

  “You belong here. And you’ll be better off without me.”

  “You really think that?”

  “The best thing I can do for you is let you go.” She took another step, then turned and ran for her SUV.

  “You’re damn good at it, too,” he shouted after her. But he doubted she heard.

  * * *

  B.J. WAS MAD AS HELL. Mostly at Hunter. Why hadn’t the idiot told him about the kid in the loft? B.J. would have been able to figure out that Travis was passed out, not just unconscious. That death had been totally preventable.

  But he’d kept his mouth shut in that room. It was what his lawyer had advised him to do. And anyway, he had no idea what to say. Hunter was about to face the consequences for what he’d done that night.

  And so was Savannah.

  Did she really love him? Or was it just guilt that had made her say that to him right now? She was taking everything Hunter had done wrong onto her own shoulders.

  How could he stop her from doing that? There had to be some solution. He wasn’t the kind of man to give up when he wanted something—someone—this bad.

  * * *

  THE FOR-SALE SIGN at the front of the lane stood out in bold red, white and blue. Long after the agreement had been signed with the Realtor and the sign had been hammered into place, Savannah stood staring at it.

  Rather than simply accept the offer from Sam O’Neil, she’d decided to list the property for thirty days to see if she might get a higher price.

  It was time for the Moodys to leave Coffee Creek.

  She’d cleared out her bank account today, coming up with the retainer for Hunter’s lawyer. Mr. Lockhart had stopped in at the house when he’d dropped Hunter off after the meeting with Harris.

  He’d said the situation was serious but there were some exonerating circumstances. He was hopeful they could cut a deal and the punishment wouldn’t be too severe.

  Tomorrow evening, at the town-council meeting, Savannah was going to hand in her resignation. After that, she would look into locating a new care home for her mother in Seattle and a nearby apartment for her and Regan.

  She placed a hand on the for-sale sign and gave it a push to make sure it was in nice and solid. Satisfied, she headed for the house to see if she had any frozen entrées for dinner since Regan was working late.

  * * *

  THERE WERE ABOUT a dozen men and women present in the city-commission chambers at city hall the next evening, including the mayor, the city manager and the city attorney.

  Savannah had been expecting this.

  What she hadn’t expected to see was B. J. Lambert, sitting in the area reserved for guests.

  He was tall, handsome and somber. She hadn’t been nervous up to that point, but suddenly her palms were damp and her throat went dry.

  Beside B.J. were some other people she recognized. Mr. Kincaid, whose cattle she’d rescued. Beside him were some kids she’d caught spray-painting the sidewalk by her office a few months ago and had roped into community service to atone for their crimes.

  There were other faces she recognized, too. Faces from a dozen different cases she’d worked on over the three years she’d been acting sheriff in this town.

  When it came to the time in the meeting for new business, Savannah stepped forward. She had her letter of resignation all typed up and ready to be presented to the chair. She’d only read the first few lines, though, when B.J. interrupted her.

  “Before you accept the sheriff’s letter of resignation, would you allow me and a few of the citizens of this county to make a brief presentation?”

  Mayor McCormick, a punctilious man who worked hard to ensure meetings closed on time, was surprisingly open to the idea.

  It turned out B.J. had a video clip as well as several spoken testimonials, all commending her for the great job she was doing as the sheriff. Some of the people he had on tape surprised her. Burt from the post office, Tabitha from the library, Ed from the feed supply shop...and so many more.


  A lot of them were people she could have sworn were talking behind her back the past few weeks.

  But maybe she’d misunderstood.

  Maybe instead of judging her, they’d merely been feeling sorry about her brother.

  That was what this video seemed to be implying.

  At the end of the fifteen-minute presentation, the mayor thanked B.J. and B.J. took his seat.

  “Are you willing to reconsider your resignation?” the mayor asked.

  Tears were coming down her cheeks so fast, all she could do was nod. After this show of faith from her community how could she leave?

  Later, B.J. came to find her. Before she could thank him, he asked if she’d heard from her Realtor.

  She checked her phone, which she’d turned off for the meeting. Three missed calls, all from the same source. “How did you guess?”

  “You’ve got a bidding war going on for your property.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  “Yes, I can. I’m one of the prospective buyers.”

  “Seriously? Are you looking to expand Coffee Creek Ranch? But my land is a fifteen-minute drive from your spread.”

  “I figure fifteen minutes is a pretty good buffer from my mother. Farther would be better. But then, you’ve got that pretty view. And that’s worth something, too, don’t you think?”

  He had her so confused. But she liked the way he was looking at her. She hadn’t seen him this happy or trouble-free in ages.

  “It’s the perfect solution. I buy the land from you—Regan has the money for med school, and we get married.”

  “W-we do?”

  He kissed her. “We do. Then we build the home of our dreams. You continue to work as the sheriff and I run the quarter-horse operation at Coffee Creek. Children are optional, but horses aren’t. I want to have a few of our own. And dogs. At least two.”

  “Oh, B.J.” He was painting a picture of a perfect life. But was it really possible?

  “The people here in Coffee Creek disapprove of what Hunter did. But they love and respect you, Savannah. Not nearly as much as I do, though. Will you stay? And marry me?”

  “But Regan. I promised her I’d move to Washington to be near her.”