Out for Justice

by Susan Kearney

  “What else?” Her curiosity burned. What woman could resist hearing what a guy thought of her—especially a man who’d known her for years? A guy that was sending he-was-interested-but-wasn’t-going-to-do-anything-about-it signals. A guy who had a reputation of playing fast and loose with other women, but who backpedaled away from her. They’d never been close, but she’d always been underfoot, and while she wasn’t stunned by his perception, she was surprised that he’d turned the conversation so personal.

  “You have determination and courage but wrap it all up in such a tidy, feminine package, you don’t intimidate men who should feel threatened.”

  “Men like you?” she asked, recalling once again how he’d refused to join her in the hot tub. That he could refuse her at all rankled. And not because she couldn’t take rejection, but because she couldn’t ignore his blatant interest followed by resistance to her. Couldn’t ignore his cool gray eyes meeting hers so frequently. Couldn’t ignore the pleasure his hands had given her neck during his too-short massage. His interest was obvious, jolting and oh, so delicious—and yet she wanted to smack him upside the head for refusing to acknowledge where they were headed.

  She felt as though she was three steps ahead of him. And not only had he no intention of keeping up, but he kept lagging further and further behind.

  “Women like you scare the hell out of me,” he admitted with a bold grin that said just the opposite. “Now I suggest you stop fishing for compliments and get ready. Are we taking the Caddy or your Jag?”

  She dug into her purse and pulled out her keys. “I think I’d like to be in the driver’s seat today.”

  WADE SUSPECTED Kelly was irritated with him. However, he didn’t expect her to turn up the music, then ignore him for the entire half-hour drive to the Wests’ ranch. If she’d been a man, she would have been brooding. He preferred to think of her giving him the silent treatment as pouting. Pouting because she hadn’t gotten her way.

  Tough.

  Kelly might be smart and courageous but she was also one very spoiled piece of work. He’d always thought she was a happily-ever-after kind of woman who wouldn’t indulge in a fling. He’d been wrong, since her current behavior had proved otherwise. However, he didn’t feel like letting her use him to scratch an itch with the town’s bad boy during her summer break before she returned to law school and forgot all about him. Nope. Wade knew better than to knuckle under and give her what she so obviously wanted.

  Not that he wouldn’t enjoy making love to her. He would have enjoyed it immensely. Just the thought of him being the one to draw soft moans of pleasure from her throat, of skimming his hands over her silky, pliant flesh, of finally tasting those sultry lips could heat him hotter than sizzling oil in a hot skillet.

  But the thought of her exploiting him held him back. She only had one use for a man like him, and if he gave her what she wanted, he wouldn’t just be going back on an implied promise to Andrew, he would be selling himself short. Just because she might require comforting to help her get past the loss of her brother, didn’t mean that Wade would let her trample his own esteem in the process. His blood might not come from the illustrious Shotgun Sally of McGovern fame, but he had his standards—ones that most definitely didn’t include Ms. Kelly McGovern.

  So he let her drive and sulk. Let her stay miffed with his refusal to play the dating game.

  He tipped his hat over his closed eyes and pretended to sleep, but surreptitiously he kept checking the side-view mirror. No menacing tow trucks appeared on the highway. This road was as clear as the morning air without a cloud in sight.

  Wade had never been to the Wests’ homestead before. But the overgrazed forty acres didn’t appear much different from the other mom-and-pop ranches that were all slowly going out of business throughout the West. The little guys couldn’t compete with the large corporations that used all the newest technology, who herded cattle by helicopter and bought in volume and were managed by a team of agricultural experts.

  Kelly slowed down considerably before turning onto the dirt drive, which nevertheless shot up choking dust. She shut off the engine, but neither made a move to exit until the dust settled. Outside, the bright sun glared and he kept his sunglasses on. Kelly did the same. He saw her taking in the yard overgrown with weeds, the peeling paint on the sagging front porch, the curling and worn shingles on a lumpy roof.

  The air smelled of sweat, dirt and manure from the cows behind the barbwire fence. Two rusty bikes, both with flat tires, and an old wheelbarrow rotted next to a barn that had been old twenty years ago. He didn’t blame the Wests for selling their ranch. Surely they could do better elsewhere than this overbaked piece of dirt.

  Kelly stood still for a moment, taking in the poor land, ignoring the buzzing flies. Looking as out of place as a fairy princess in a sweatshop, she nevertheless squared her shoulders and headed up the front porch steps. Clearly, she didn’t want to be here, but true to form, she would press on until she had the answers she sought.

  He admired grit in a woman, but wished she’d confided in him. He had no idea if the Wests would welcome them or not. The few times he’d met Debbie, she’d been with Andrew, who tended to overshadow her. And the only time he’d seen Debbie and Kelly together had been at Andrew’s funeral where they’d kept their distance from each another.

  A barking dog announced their presence, but Kelly rapped smartly on the front door, anyway. Still giving him the silent treatment, she didn’t even glance his way.

  With one hand wrapped in the pit bull’s collar, Debbie opened the door. She wore a tank top, cutoff jeans and her hair tied back in a bandanna. No shoes. Her chestnut hair was streaked with dust, cobwebs and grime. But her eyes, dark with sorrow and puffy from too many tears, told of her misery and revealed her surprise to see them.

  “Hey, come in.” She shoved a rag into her pocket and tugged the barking dog back inside. “I was just cleaning the windows.”

  The inside of the ranch house had cheap tile floors that were immaculate. A threadbare carpet lay in front of a worn sofa. However, the coffee table gleamed with a silver tea set and white doilies. And not by one twitch of her lips or change of expression in her blue eyes did Kelly reveal that she was unaccustomed to these kinds of surroundings. In fact, if he hadn’t known her better, he would have sworn that she was as comfortable here as she had been at his place.

  He wondered why he found her adaptability so surprising when Andrew had exhibited the same trait. Wade supposed he made those assumptions about Kelly because of her clothes that always had a style that set her apart, that said, “I’m special.” And he’d been fooled by her airs and her outfits like just about everyone else in town, except Cara. He should have realized the brash and smart reporter had befriended Kelly for her inner qualities—qualities he couldn’t help admiring as much as he did the more visible ones.

  “Would you like some sweet tea?” Debbie asked, offering Southern hospitality that would have been rude to refuse. “I just made some this morning.”

  “Thanks.” Kelly fearlessly held out her hand to let the pit bull have a sniff, then slowly patted the dog on the head. “What’s his name?”

  “Brutus.” Debbie stepped into the kitchen, placed a pitcher of tea on a tray next to mismatched glasses with ice, then carried everything to the living room. “If you know anyone who might want him, we need to give him away before we move. He’s a great watchdog and he’s never bitten anyone. I can’t keep him with me at the new apartment.”

  “So you’re definitely selling?” Kelly asked, her tone casual, but Wade sensed she would soon come to the real reason for their visit.

  “I have a job in town.” Debbie settled in a chair next to her dog. “With the mayor. I’m working for city hall. He wants me to liaise with the ranchers and farming community.”

  “That’s great.” Kelly crossed her legs and folded her feet under the sofa, seeming genuinely happy for Debbie. “And your father?”

  “The mayor’s
offered to find him a job, too—if he can stay sober.” Debbie poured the iced tea. “Andrew set up the sale of this ranch as well as the new jobs for us before he died.”

  “That’s why we came,” Kelly spoke gently. “Are you up to talking about Andrew?”

  Debbie’s eyes narrowed on Kelly. “I suppose.”

  “Did Andrew have any enemies that you know about?” Wade asked. Although he knew Kelly was perfectly capable of asking the right questions, there was a tension between the two women, almost as if Andrew were still alive and they were fighting over him.

  Debbie’s sharp gaze sliced to Wade, then back to Kelly. She set down her tea and folded her arms over her chest. “What’s this all about?”

  “Yesterday Kelly and I were asking a lot of questions around town about Andrew,” Wade explained. “On our way here, a stolen truck ran us off the road. My truck was totaled. We think someone tried to kill us.”

  Debbie’s eyebrows arched. “Because you were asking questions about Andrew?”

  “Yes.” Kelly also set down her practically untouched tea. “If there’s anything you can tell us, I’d be grateful.”

  By unspoken agreement, neither Kelly nor Wade wanted to tell Debbie that Andrew had been murdered. She or her ex-husband could be connected to the killing and if so, Wade didn’t want her leaving town—not before they figured out what was going on. Since she had no motive, Wade didn’t believe Debbie had anything to do with Andrew’s murder, but she could have accidentally given information to someone else who did.

  “Well, Niles, my ex-husband has hated Andrew since Andrew and I got together. Andrew’s handling of our divorce didn’t help.”

  “Exactly how angry was Niles?” Kelly asked, and by her tone Wade could tell she hated prying.

  Debbie sighed. “Niles has a temper, but he’s not usually violent—if that’s what you’re asking—and I’ve never known him to get his hands dirty.”

  She left the statement hanging. Kelly and Wade knew that Niles had the funds to hire people to do his dirty work.

  “Anyone else?” Wade asked. “What about your father? Did he and Andrew get along?”

  “At first Daddy wasn’t too keen about Andrew, but after he did such a good job negotiating the sale of our land to those big lawyers, Daddy changed his thinking. Andrew got us a better price and a faster closing date.”

  “Did my brother ever mention any clients who were angry with him?” Kelly asked.

  “Not really.” Debbie frowned and then pressed her lips firmly together as if remembering something she didn’t want to reveal.

  “What is it?” Wade asked.

  “Probably nothing.”

  “Can you please tell us anyway?” Kelly prodded.

  “Andrew asked me never to repeat it…but… Promise me that you won’t tell anyone else?”

  Wade nodded. “I promise—unless it turns out that this person is trying to kill us—then our deal is off.”

  “Fair enough.” Debbie picked up her tea, drained half the glass in two gulps, then twisted the tumbler in her hands. “During Andrew’s last year in law school, he was involved in an unpleasant incident.”

  Wade glanced at Kelly, who shook her head, indicating she knew nothing about what Debbie was about to reveal. Neither did Wade.

  Debbie sighed again. “Andrew saw another student cheating on a final exam. Now, the code of honor at law school made him duty bound to report the cheater, but Andrew didn’t want to. He knew that his coming forward would cause the other student to be expelled, and likely the cheater would never attain his law degree.”

  “Andrew must have been torn up over that decision,” Kelly muttered.

  Her brother, always the rooter for the underdog, would hate to end another person’s career before it had begun. And yet Andrew’s personal code of honor wouldn’t allow for cheaters, either.

  “What did Andrew do?” Wade asked, his gut already churning because he knew his friend well enough to know the decision must have given him many sleepless nights.

  “He turned Jonathan Dixon in. Sure enough, the school expelled the man two weeks before graduation. And it’s a good thing Andrew turned him in, because the professor had also seen the man cheating and suspected Andrew also knew. If Andrew had kept quiet, he too could have been expelled for failing to report the incident.”

  “Jonathan blamed Andrew?” Kelly guessed.

  “What do you think?” Debbie downed the rest of her tea. “It got ugly. Jonathan issued threats, and the campus police had to physically remove him from the classroom. But you know Andrew. Instead of being angry for being put in that awkward position, he wanted to help the guy. So he told Jonathan that if he ever needed a job, to come to Mustang Valley and look him up.”

  Kelly groaned, clearly annoyed that her brother had tried to befriend someone who might be dangerous—which was probably why Andrew hadn’t mentioned the incident to either Wade or Kelly. Both of them would certainly have advised him to just forget the unpleasant episode and move on. Some people couldn’t be helped, but Andrew had never seemed to understand that. Odd how he and Kelly thought alike on the matter.

  Kelly kept her tone neutral. “And this Jonathan, did he come to Mustang Valley?”

  Debbie nodded. “Andrew got him a job working for the mayor, too.”

  “When?” Wade asked.

  “The week before Andrew died.”

  A week? Now that was a huge coincidence that needed looking into.

  “Seems like the mayor is in a hiring mood,” Wade commented, his thoughts churning. Mustang Valley had been growing large enough that he didn’t necessarily recognize every stranger in the Hit ’Em Again Saloon. And city hall was growing by leaps and bounds. Between Daniels’s reelection campaign and the growth of Mustang Valley, Wade supposed the city employed quite a few people, who all technically worked for the mayor. But Wade still knew most people in town, and, as far as he knew, Jonathan had yet to frequent his establishment.

  “Jonathan’s job is only temporary. Just until the election. Andrew was trying to line up something else for him for afterward.” Debbie sighed. “I have to tell you that Jonathan seems like a really nice man. I can’t imagine him stealing a tow truck and trying to run you down.”

  Kelly frowned. “Wade told you that the tow truck ran us off the road, not tried to run us down.”

  Debbie shrugged. “Same difference.”

  But was her wording an assumption? Or did she know more than she was telling? And what about her Jonathan story? Was that to throw them off track? It seemed suspicious that someone who had a motive for revenge had shown up in town a week before Andrew’s death.

  “Oh, I almost forgot. Jonathan is going by the name of Johnny. He claims he wants to make a new start.”

  “Johnny?” Facts clicked in Wade’s mind. “Is Johnny about five-six with black hair and a mustache?”

  Debbie’s eyes widened. “You know him?”

  “Yeah. He’s been in for a few drinks.” Wade rubbed his knuckles in recollection of the last time Johnny had a few too many. When Johnny turned surly and obnoxious, Wade had cut the man off and Johnny had staggered from the bar, furious. He’d slammed into another customer and a brawl had broken out. Six broken chairs and one cracked mirror later, Wade had thrown out the drunk and restored order.

  Johnny hadn’t returned again.

  Wade didn’t find it odd that Andrew hadn’t introduced him. But he did find Kelly’s accusing eyes on him uncomfortable. He hadn’t said a word, but she seemed to know he was holding back. Yet she clearly understood that he didn’t want to say more in front of Debbie and gave him a slow nod and a we’ll-talk-later look.

  Who would have thought the bartender and the debutante could work so well together? Almost like a team.

  Chapter Six

  “Mom. Daddy?” Kelly walked through the front door of her home with Wade beside her. The stubborn man had insisted on sticking to her like mascara. Unlike her makeup, she couldn’t just wash
him away. So she was forced to make explanations to her parents, which she never found easy, with Wade right there to hear every word. Why did men and parents have to be so difficult? “I’m home.”

  “Don’t shout, dear. We’re in the breakfast room.”

  Kelly checked her makeup in the foyer mirror, smoothed lip gloss that didn’t need smoothing with her pinky and enjoyed the fact that Wade stood there trying to look patient and unable to look away. Just for spite, she fluffed her hair, knowing it would both annoy and fascinate him, then swallowed down a grin. Seemed she did that a lot around Wade.

  Annoyed that he’d refused to stay in her car while she picked up a few changes of clothes and some necessities, she entered the breakfast room with trepidation. Her mother had recently painted the walls a rich burgundy, and contrasted the woodwork trim with a creamy white that supposedly encouraged dining enjoyment by setting the right tone. The octagonal airy space with windows overlooking the garden was usually one of Kelly’s favorite rooms. In fact, her folks often ate informal dinners there as they were doing right now, but today she dreaded going inside.

  After Andrew’s death, she didn’t want to cause her parents any more pain by having them worry over their remaining offspring. And knowing Mustang Valley’s gossip network as well as she did, by now half the town had either spied her driving with Wade or had actually seen them together and reported it to friends, co-workers and family.

  However, she’d loved her brother way too much not to seek justice. She wanted to put behind bars the person who’d murdered him. She wanted his killer to pay for his crime, and if that made her as bloodthirsty as Shotgun Sally, then so be it.

  Her parents had to know she’d been keeping company with Wade, and they wouldn’t be pleased—less pleased if they knew what kind of trouble she’d stirred up. Trying to make the best of an awkward situation, she pasted a cheery grin on her face, looped her arm through Wade’s and escorted him to meet her parents.