Lone Star Lonely

by Maggie Shayne

  “Just like Madden Hawkins, maybe,” Elliot interjected. When both men swung their stunned gazes his way, he went on. “Hell, boys, I don’t know about you, but it sure seems strange to me that old boy got a hankering to hang himself right in the middle of all of this.”

  “But he left a note,” Adam said, recalling Elliot’s earlier reporting of the event. “You said he left a note.” Elliot nodded, looking at Garrett.

  Garrett nodded. “Yeah, there was a note, all right. A very brief note. ‘A gentleman knows not to linger too long at the dance’ was all it said. It was in his handwriting. But sloppy as hell. Like he was good and drunk when he wrote it…or something.”

  “I’d bet on the ‘or something,’” Elliot muttered. “Hawkins didn’t drink.”

  “When will we get some autopsy results to tell us for sure?” Adam asked.

  “Not as soon as we need ‘em. But I might be able to get a blood alcohol on him by now. The pathologist is an old friend. He’s had Hawkins for over an hour now, and I asked him to run a few tests of his own, so we won’t have to wait for the results on the samples sent to the state crime lab. Won’t be admissible in court, but at least we’ll know.” Garrett headed for Jessi’s telephone, then seemed to think better of it and went outside instead. Adam and Elliot followed.

  Sliding into the front seat of his pickup, leaving the door open, Garrett yanked up his mobile phone and tapped in a number. A second later he was speaking. “Sheriff Brand here. Get me Doc Leighy.” There was a pause, then, “John, it’s Garrett. Got anything for me?” He nodded at the phone, waited a moment, then lifted his brows. “Just what is that, John? Sleeping pills?” Pause. “Um-hmm. I see. Okay.” Another pause. “My brother?” And his eyes met Adam’s. “Nope, no sign of him. He takes off like this when he gets upset, sometimes. Tell your friend the ranger I said he’ll turn up soon enough. And that no, I have no reason to suspect he’s anywhere near Kirsten Armstrong. They hate each other’s guts, you know.”

  Garrett replaced the receiver, sent Adam a level, serious look.

  “Thanks,” Adam said.

  “De nada. They didn’t find alcohol in Hawkins’ blood, but they did find large amounts of a tranquilizer commonly used in over-the-counter sleeping pills.”

  Adam blinked. “Sleeping pills? Does that make Hawkins’ death a murder, as well?”

  Garrett shook his head. “Not necessarily. Pretty common for a suicide to take piles of sleeping pills and either vomit them up or decide they aren’t working fast enough and then move on to another method. The rangers are working on that assumption.”

  “You agree with them?”

  “No.”

  “Neither do I,” Elliot said softly. He looked at Garrett. “Did you find Joe Cowan’s will in any of Madden Hawkins’ files?”

  Garrett shook his head. “No. We turned the place upside down, but there was no sign of it.”

  “I didn’t think there would be,” Elliot said. “And isn’t it odd how reluctant Hawkins seemed to be to turn it over? First he tells the rangers he doesn’t remember what was in it, then he says he’ll pull the file and send it over, then he stalls and delays, and finally he kills himself, and the will is still nowhere to be found.”

  “You think the killer took it?” Adam asked.

  “Either that, or Hawkins hid it himself. The question is, why would he do that?”

  Adam racked his brain, but found no answer there. He glanced at Garrett. “What do you think?”

  “Well, I don’t think Hawkins’ death was a suicide, boys. And if that proves to be the case, then it makes sense to assume that anything missing from his home was taken by whoever killed him.”

  Adam nodded toward Jessi’s trashed house. “I noticed you didn’t tell the rangers about the breakin and Kirsten being abducted.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Garrett said. “I suppose there’s a chance they could help us track Kirsten down, but they’d haul her off to jail the second they found her. I’m thinking we can do just as well on our own. Maybe better. As soon as you took off with Kirsten, Adam, I realized that this…this was a family thing.”

  “Family,” Adam repeated, not sure he understood what his brother was getting at.

  “You love her, don’t you?”

  Adam lowered his head quickly, avoiding Garrett’s eyes, but doubting that it did much good.

  “He loves her,” Elliot said.

  “He’d damn well better love her,” Garrett went on. “I’d hate to think he cold-cocked his favorite brother for anything less.”

  Adam sighed, shaking his head. He didn’t know what he felt for Kirsten right now. He just knew he wanted her back, alive, safe…so he could find out.

  “So in my book,” Garrett went on, “that makes her family.” Garrett slapped Adam’s shoulder. “So the family’s involved now.”

  Adam blinked, looking from Elliot to Garrett and back again. The two exchanged knowing looks. “What do you mean, the family’s involved?”

  Garrett shrugged. “You know how it goes with this crew. So damned close knit that when one Brand gets kicked, another one yips. And it’s sheer hell to keep a secret in this family.”

  Elliot nodded. “Jessi and Lash will be arriving any time now. They cut their trip short the second Chelsea called to tell them what was going on. The minute they get here, we’ll have Jessi take a look around. Well, once she gets done screaming about the mess in her house, that is. If there’s a sign which way that son of a bitch took Kirsten and by what means, you know Jessi will spot it.”

  Garrett picked up there. “Wes is already canvassing town, and if anybody knows a thing, you know they’re gonna tell him. Wes scares people. If that isn’t enough to make ‘em talk, then Taylor will charm the information out of them.”

  “Ben and Penny are over at Madden Hawkins’ place,” Elliot said. That earned him a glare from Garrett, but he only shrugged sheepishly. “I know, it’s a crime scene. But we couldn’t wait. Not when Penny and I already came to the conclusion that the lawyer’s death has to be involved in all this somehow. And Cowan’s missing will seemed fishy to her, too, right from the start. So Penny and Ben are searching Hawkins’ house, office and even his car for any files he has on Cowan.”

  “Waste of time,” Garrett said. “I told you, Elliot, the rangers and I went through that place with a fine-tooth comb. For God’s sake, they only cleared out of there within the last half hour.”

  “Yeah, well, Nancy Drew they ain’t,” Elliot drawled.

  “Neither is Penny,” Garrett retorted.

  “Don’t let her hear you say that,” Elliot said, grinning.

  Garrett rolled his eyes. “Great. I wonder who’s gonna be sheriff when I get run out of town on a rail?’’ But then he lifted his head and continued. “Out at the ranch, Chelsea’s got a list of Cowan’s household employees, and she’s tracking them down by phone. Said she couldn’t sit still and do nothing. Sara’s out there helping her. She came up from El Paso as soon as she heard what was going on. Marcus and Casey stayed there. They’re working through that computer network Marcus’s old friend Graham uses. Checking out business contacts of Cowan’s and so on.”

  “Hell. Sounds like we’ve got every Brand in Texas working on this thing,” Adam said slowly. He was touched. Not surprised, but moved beyond words. No wonder he’d been so miserable in New York. He’d been away from this damned bunch of meddling pains in the backside. Too far away. And he’d missed them.

  “You got that right,” Elliot interjected. “And if that isn’t enough, we can always call in the Oklahoma branch of the family. Though I hesitate to get that rowdy bunch involved in anything this volatile.” He sent Adam a wink.

  Adam wished he could feel as upbeat as Elliot sounded. But he didn’t. He was scared, damned scared. “None of that’s gonna do a bit of good if this guy—whoever he is—has already killed her,” he said slowly. He paced away from the pickup, stared off down the road. “I never should have stormed out on her the way I
did. I just…. When she told me what she’d done, I just…”

  Garrett looked at him. “I guess I’m missing something here.”

  Adam and Elliot exchanged glances. Elliot put a hand on Garrett’s arm. “It’s not the time for that now, Garrett. But we do have to talk. All of us, the whole clan. But later. After Kirsten is safe and sound.”

  Garrett eyed him, then Adam.

  “No,” Adam said. “If he’s going to be risking his badge to help her, he has to know about this first. It’s only right, Elliot.”

  “Know about what?” Garrett demanded.

  “Fine,” Elliot said. “But we’re wasting time standing here. Let’s head over to the Cowan mansion and go from there. We’ll tell you on the way, Garrett.”

  “No one is ever going to believe I killed myself,” Kirsten said slowly. She watched Phillip’s eyes. And what she saw there shook her. Madness. Sickness. There was something just not right about those eyes. And she had a feeling that reasoning with the man wasn’t going to work. He was beyond reason. But she had to try. “This isn’t going to work.”

  “Of course they’ll believe it. Now, come on, swallow the tablet like a good girl.” He pressed the barrel of the gun harder against her temple, thumbed the hammer back. The sound of it was like a jolt to her nervous system. God, if his finger slipped, if he even moved wrong….

  “Okay, okay, just move that damned thing away from my head.”

  The barrel stayed put. Thick, salty fingertips pushed a capsule between her lips, and she felt the urge to rinse her mouth out with soap. Then a glass was put in their place, and she sipped the water, but didn’t swallow the pill. She moved it underneath her tongue. It began to dissolve there, its bitter taste coating her mouth, but she managed not to grimace, and she forced herself not to swallow it.

  The glass moved away fast. “Now open up, and let me see.”

  Obediently, Kirsten opened her mouth. He leaned close, looking inside, then thrust his big fingers in, to check under her tongue. She bit him. It was the only thing she could think of to do.

  Phillip leapt backward, yelping in pain. “Damn you!” he cried.

  “Damn you!’” she said. “You’re the one going around killing people, not me.”

  “I’m going to be a millionaire,” he said. “And you’re just going to be a dead woman. Hell, I’d rather be the killer than the victim any day.” He smiled slowly. “And I’d far rather be the millionaire than the lowly driver and devoted sidekick. Wouldn’t you?”

  “Well, you aren’t going to be either one, Phillip. The only thing you’re going to be is a prisoner of the state of Texas.”

  The pill. The pill was gone. Thoroughly dissolved in her mouth now. Gooey slime lingered, coating her tongue and the roof of her mouth. She wanted to spit, but if she did, he would see. She couldn’t even bring a hand to her mouth, because they were tied to the sides of the chair, and her ankles were bound to the legs of it, as they had been since he’d brought her here.

  They were in Phillip’s apartment. The spacious apartment above the large garage at the estate. The detested mansion was right next door. But no one was there. No one would know she was anywhere near this place. No one would have any reason to think she might be, or to look for her here.

  Phillip jammed another pill into her mouth, shoved the water glass to her lips so hard its rim hit her teeth, and tipped it up. She pressed her lips against the water that flowed. Icy cold, it ran down her chin, soaked the front of her blouse, chilled her tension-warmed skin. She shivered in reaction to the cold and the fear.

  Phillip pinched her nose, swearing at her. “Open. Open, dammit!”

  Kirsten twisted, writhed, and her lungs pulled against her sealed airways, starving, screaming, until she had to open her mouth for air. When she did, Phillip poured water into her mouth instead. Water she inhaled and choked and gagged on. Gasping, panting, coughing, she tried to speak, but the words were hoarse and raspy.

  “You nearly drowned me!”

  “I’m going to do worse to you if you don’t cooperate and do what you’re told.” He checked her mouth. The pill was gone. She supposed she must have swallowed it, despite her best efforts not to.

  She leaned back in the chair, head tipped back, eyes focused on the ceiling. “You’re really going to kill me, aren’t you?”

  He glanced at her briefly, and when their eyes locked, she thought she saw something flash in his— some spark of remorse—but it was so brief she couldn’t even be certain it was real.

  “I don’t have any choice,” he said, looking away, sullen, eyes downcast.

  “Will you…will you at least tell me why? I’ve always been kind to you, haven’t I, Phillip? I never did anything to hurt you….”

  “That’s got nothing to do with it.” His back was toward her now. He paced. She was shaking him up, just a bit, with her questions. Good. She would keep going, then. Shake him up as much as she could.

  “I just don’t see why you think killing me will make you a millionaire,” she said.

  “You don’t see anything, do you, Kirsten? You’re blind.”

  She drew a breath, slow, deep. “I…I could, though. If you let me live, I could make you as rich as you want. I don’t want Joseph’s money. I hated the man, you know that. I could give it all to you. All of it. I’d sign it over right now.”

  He stopped pacing and turned to face her, eyes narrow. “And you’d take me to court later, claiming I forced you. No. Joseph cared for me. I was loyal to him. I took care of him. And unlike you, you ungrateful, faithless bitch, I always did what he wanted. And this, Kirsten Cowan, is exactly what he wanted.”

  Fear clutched her heart. The phone started shrilling again, but he ignored it as he’d done every time it had rung before. He reached for another capsule. Distract him, she thought.

  “You killed him. How can you claim to have loved Joseph when you killed him?”

  Phillip went still for a moment. His eyes closed tight. “He was suffering so much. The pain meds…hell, they weren’t strong enough. He didn’t care. He only wanted to live long enough to have an heir, anyway, but you denied him that. Denied a dying man’s last wish! Deceived him!” Phillip shook his head slowly.

  “Then…he knew?”

  “About your secret little stash of birth control pills? Yeah. He knew. That was when he planned all this, Kirsten, right after he found out about those pills. That was the one thing you did that he couldn’t forgive, and he decided then and there to make you pay.”

  Lifting her chin, she faced him. “I knew it,” she whispered. “I knew he was somehow pulling the strings, making all this happen to me.”

  Phillip smiled a sick, twisted smile. “Oh, yeah. He was too smart for you. He’s been playing you like a fiddle, Kirsten, and you’ve been dancing in time. You thought you could beat him. Even the cancer thought it could beat him. But he won in the end. He cheated the cancer. Wouldn’t let it kill him. No, not Joseph. He died on his own terms and arranged things so that you’d pay for your betrayal, as well.”

  “And so you’d be rewarded for your loyalty? Is that how it is?”

  Phillip nodded, leaned closer. “That’s how it is. He arranged it so I would get everything. All I have to do is make sure you’re out of the way first.”

  He gripped her chin in one hand and stuffed another pill into her mouth. This time he crammed his hand so far into her throat that the capsule went partway down dry. Then he clamped her chin hard, to force her mouth to stay closed, and he held her nose. She had to swallow if she wanted to breathe again. Her head began to swim. From lack of oxygen or the sleeping pills. She wasn’t certain which. Maybe both.

  She swallowed the pill to avoid choking or suffocation.

  He let go, and Kirsten sucked in huge gulps of air, letting her head fall back against the wooden chair. The ceiling was spinning now.

  Phillip smiled. “Time to write the suicide note, Kirsten.”

  “I won’t,” she managed to croak.
“You can’t make me do this.”

  He laughed a little. Opened a drawer. Pulled out an odd-looking device and thumbed a button. A crackling sound, a flash and sparks. “Stun gun,” he said. “Believe me, you’ll do what I tell you.”

  She eyed the thing in his hand. And she wished to God Adam had kept his word not to turn his back on her this time. But more than that. She wished she’d told him how much she loved him. And how she had never stopped. Not in all this time. She wished she could see him just once more before her husband’s insane driver took her life. But wishes were pretty much useless to her now.

  The only chance she had left was to stall for time and pray someone would come looking for her. Even the Texas Rangers. Anyone.

  Stalling for time, however, was going to cost her. It was going to cost her dearly.

  Phillip held the stun gun close to her skin and let it crackle and spark. “You ready to write the note, Kirsten?” he asked her, the thing poised and ready.

  She lifted her head, called up her resolve, met his eyes and said firmly, “No.”

  Chapter 13

  Of all of Cowan’s employees, the only one Chelsea Brand had been unable to contact was Phillip Carr, the driver. A driver named Carr. She should have known right away something was wrong with that. The address she had for him was the same as the estate, so he must have an apartment out there.

  “Sara?” she called.

  Her young cousin by marriage popped into the kitchen at once, holding little Bubba’s chubby hand in hers. A schoolteacher, Sara was terrific with kids of any age. “Yeah, Chelsea?”

  “Would you stay with Bubba while I run an errand?”

  Sara nodded, but she looked a little worried. Still, she knew better than to argue. “Sure” was all she said.

  Chelsea nodded, grabbed her keys and headed out. She was going out to that Cowan estate herself, and she wasn’t coming back until she had some answers.

  “Tell me what you know or I’ll damn well beat it out of you!” Wes grabbed the bartender by the lapels and shook him.

  The man shook his head fast. “I thought you’d turned peaceable, Wes! Didn’t I hear you were some kinda medicine man or—”