An Impostor in Town (Colorado Series)

by Denise Moncrief

  “What’s wrong?” Shelly asked from behind.

  She jumped. “I’ve got to take care of something. Would you mind getting together another time?” She nudged Shelly toward the living room.

  Shelly lifted the baby carrier and grabbed her diaper bag. “I’ll call you tomorrow.” Her eyes swept Peyton with a million questions dancing in their brown depths.

  She nodded and closed the door behind Shelly. It was an effort to take her next breath. The man intended to harass her. Fear turned to anger. She made up her mind to meet him just as he had demanded, but the meeting may not turn out as he expected. She shoved the gun she bought yesterday into her coat pocket.

  ****

  Peyton had never been to Mesa Verde National Park. If she hadn’t been under such duress, she might have found the ancient housing development interesting. The drive from Durango to the entrance had been quick enough, but the mountainous road winding into the park demanded her concentration.

  Until she had acquired a map from the information center, she hadn’t been aware Mesa Verde was a collection of cliff dwellings dispersed throughout a valley in the heart of the mesa. She had visualized the entirety of Mesa Verde as one large structure. Cliff Palace was one of the larger dwellings. She could see this particular site from a viewing area where she waited for the two o’clock tour to start.

  She peered over the locked gate and down the steep steps. A trail twisted and curved down one side of the valley. She didn’t want to descend into its depths unless she had to. Jeff’s only instruction was to take the two o’clock tour. She walked the small area where the trail started. If he were here, he would have to come to her. She wasn’t going to search for him.

  At two o’clock, the ranger opened the gate and led the tour group down the steep steps. She stood where the guide indicated and waited for the tour to continue, not really listening to the park ranger’s supposedly informative lecture. It wasn’t until he was nearly finished that she saw Jeff at the tail end of the group. Either he couldn’t wrangle his way to get next to her or he was deliberately keeping his distance. Her lower eyelid twitched.

  The tour continued. The guide took his time at several more stops—explaining things in onerous detail and answering even the most inane questions. A frustrated scream stuck in her throat. She wanted out of there.

  It wasn’t until it was her turn to ascend the ten-foot ladder out of the canyon she heard Jeff’s obnoxious voice behind her. “Well, if it isn’t my long lost mother.”

  “I’m not your mother,” she whispered, hoping none of the others in the tour overheard them.

  She climbed halfway up the ladder to a spot that offered a panoramic view of the dwelling. Her heart thumped in her chest. With one shove he could knock her off and call it an accident. Her fear spurred her to climb faster.

  His hand brushed her right ankle. All he would have to do is grab and jerk. Would anybody see him do it? She looked at the top of the ladder, which seemed so far away. Her knees trembled and she feared she might stall out.

  “It’s not so bad being my mother.” His loud mockery sent a spasm of dread up and down her spine.

  She pretended to ignore him and continued her nervous climb out of the canyon. It was only a little farther now. She counted the few remaining rungs. Only three. She could do it.

  She gasped in alarm when his hand tightened around her ankle. He chuckled. He had obviously read her thoughts and was playing with her. With more bravery than she truly felt, she kicked his hand off. The jolt loosened her grip on the top rung. She hung with one hand and one foot, suspended in space for what seemed like forever until a firm hand grabbed her flailing arm and pulled her out of the canyon.

  “You should be more careful, lady.” The man who ascended the ladder before her held her elbow until she steadied, then released her and headed up the sidewalk toward the parking area.

  Jeff’s heat warmed her back. “You know what it’s like to be a mother, don’t you? Or maybe you don’t?” His ugly questions boomed and echoed in her ear. Heads turned.

  The gun in her pocket banged against her thigh. She whirled on him, heedless of who overheard them arguing. “What do you want?”

  “I know where the boy lives.” His eyes glowed with wicked expectation.

  She dared to ask a critical question. Not the most critical, just more critical. “Does Mason know?”

  “Mason?” He studied her a moment—a puzzled frown on his face. “No…he doesn’t know where the boy is…yet.” Delight radiated from him. “You wouldn’t like that, would you, Paula?”

  She stuck her hand in her pocket and wrapped her fingers around the grip of the gun. Its scored surface against her palm comforted her.

  “Your threats mean nothing. Tell him if you want. Tell him to come and find me. I’m ready for him.” Her insides quaked at the idea of meeting Mason again. The possibility was even more terrifying than the near fatal accident she had just avoided with the help of a complete stranger. The solid reassurance of the gun in her hand made her foolish. She reined in her false bravado. What would Brian think if she shot this hyena right here, right now, in cold blood? She loosened her grip on the gun.

  “You have a fine looking boy. He looks like the Powells, doesn’t he? Does he know you’re his mother?”

  Her heat boiled over. “Stay away from Jake.”

  “No need to get ugly, Paula.” He dragged her real name out into two syrupy syllables.

  “Stop calling me Paula.” She glanced around to see if anyone heard him.

  “The thought of being exposed bothers you, doesn’t it?”

  She thought maybe she had steered him away from her real fear. “Go ahead and talk.” As long as he never figured out what really frightened her, he had no real power over her. That’s what she wanted to believe anyway.

  He circled her. “Maybe I will. Maybe I won’t.”

  She shoved him. “What do you want?”

  He rubbed his arm. “A little money would help.”

  She snorted. “That’s what it’s all about for you, isn’t it?”

  “You’re the reason Dad cut me off.” His bitterness landed on her tattered psyche.

  Maybe he was right. Maybe not. “That wasn’t my fault.”

  “Don’t you think your little confessional had something to do with it?” He shoved his face in hers, and then backed off when people stopped and stared. “It was the reason Cory ended up in jail and Carol and I had to leave town.” Something tickled her memory at the mention of Jeff’s wife, Carol. She didn’t have time to analyze the stray thought.

  Her fingers coiled around the weapon once more. She could kill this jerk and never regret it. “What do you want?” she repeated for the third time.

  “Five thousand.”

  She sniffed her disgust. “I don’t have that kind of money.” She wasn’t giving him anything.

  “Sure you do. You’ve been paying off Johanna Caldwell for years. She’s been keeping your secrets for you, hasn’t she?”

  “I can’t get you that much right away. I just spent all my savings on a new vehicle.”

  “Sell it.”

  Was he kidding? She bluffed. “If you want the money…don’t tell Mason where I am or where Jake lives. And don’t send Sheriff Parker any more of those cute little notes.”

  “So…he did tell you about the note. Does the sheriff tell you things? Are you and the sheriff tight?”

  “Leave him out of this.” She suppressed a scream.

  “So that’s what you’re most afraid of, sweet Paula? Exposure to the local sheriff? What kind of relationship do you have with the cop?” His glee was repulsive.

  “I don’t.”

  “I think maybe you do. You get me the money or he gets a full picture of the real Peyton Chandler.”

  She released the breath she held. He hadn’t detected her worst fear. “I’ll get you some money by the end of the month.”

  She slid into her new vehicle. Would she have to sell it t
o pay Jeff? She turned and tossed him one last withering look before she pulled out of the parking lot. He waved with a cheerful grin as if they were two friends saying goodbye.

  ****

  It seemed Peyton was cold all the time. She turned up the heat and plopped on the sofa, wrapping her quilt around her, listlessly turning on the television, refusing to cry. The holidays appeared dreary from her perspective. Her dismal thoughts turned to her Christmas with Brian last year. A melancholy smile crossed her lips. She had no hope of spending the day with anyone this year. The prospect of going to work was actually appealing.

  It was a lean Christmas. Shopping for Jake had been the single pleasure of the season. It was the first time she dared to send him a gift. It probably wasn’t a wise move, but she risked it anyway. How had Johanna explained its unexpected arrival?

  She was deep in the middle of her pity party when she heard a knock on the door. She rolled off the sofa and trudged to the door—the tail of her robe dragging behind her. She couldn’t stop the smile that erupted when she peeked through the curtain. Brian stood on her porch, juggling a casserole and a prettily wrapped package.

  She flung the door open. The casserole nearly slid out of his gloved hands. “Here let me get that.” He grinned as he loosened his tentative grip, relinquished the hot dish, and followed her into the kitchen. She set the pan on the counter and he shoved the gold wrapped box at her.

  “This is for me?” A tiny, girlish squeak embarrassed her.

  “Well, yeah.” He replied as if she’d asked a silly question.

  She opened it with the anticipation of a child. The box contained a beautiful sterling silver cross necklace. She dropped onto the nearest chair and put her hands to her face to cover her tears.

  “Did I do something wrong?” His anxious voice penetrated her fractured heart. She had pushed him away ever since she pounced on him about Chris, but he cared enough to keep pushing back. No matter how hard she tried to avoid him, he was right there in plain sight. His persistence might have made her feel awful because she knew any day he might find out who she really was, but she was tired of hurting, so she yielded to the tiniest inkling of joy, allowing hope to flood her overtaxed psyche.

  She couldn’t avoid him today. He was standing in her kitchen with concern written all over his face. “No. It’s perfect. Thank you so much.” She smiled at him, and then her happy mood turned to dismay. “I didn’t get you anything.”

  “I didn’t expect you to. I wanted to surprise you.”

  He probably thought she was being a silly woman. Isn’t that what all men think when women don’t react as expected? She stomped on her dismal mood. He was here. He wanted to spend Christmas with her.

  He probably had given Chris Smith a gift as well. She wouldn’t ask. The answer would probably hurt. She changed the subject, trying hard to cover her inner turmoil. “Do I smell chicken pot pie?”

  “You sure do.” He appeared pleased she remembered the aroma from the previous year. “It’s our Christmas tradition!”

  “Are we visiting the horses too?” She hoped they would.

  “Sure, if that’s what you’d like. I even brought apples and carrots to feed them…just in case.”

  The day suddenly brightened for Peyton.

  ****

  Brian enjoyed watching Peyton ride the sorrel—a blur of red mane and red hair as she pushed the horse across the pasture at full run and turned him just in time. She charged toward him and pulled in the reins, sliding easily from the saddle as soon as Chief came to a stop. She tied the lead off on a fence post and turned toward him with a glowing face. “That was more fun than I’ve had in a long time!”

  “Glad you enjoyed your ride.” He grinned. He liked her. He liked her a lot.

  Sometimes thoughts of Peyton would pop into his head at the most worrisome moments. Her past was a huge question mark—a blank that demanded to be filled in. For some inexplicable reason, he had a bad habit of becoming involved with women who wouldn’t or couldn’t talk to him about themselves.

  He hadn’t quite worked up enough guts to do a background check on her. He was in law enforcement. He could do that, but wasn’t that a bit skeevy? He shoved the annoying thought aside and led the sorrel to the recently finished shed. He slid the saddle from the horse’s back and hung it on a hook screwed into a roof support beam.

  Peyton sat on a bale of hay and loosened her ponytail. She seemed natural sitting in the light with the sun sparking bits of fire in her red hair. The radiance of pure pleasure glowed from her eyes.

  He stared at her, boldly stating the obvious. “It’s been awhile since we talked.” And it had been. They chatted and produced an exceptional amount of small talk, but she never gave them a chance to really talk. As soon as anything personal came up, she bolted for the nearest door.

  “I know. I’ve been avoiding anything…real.”

  “Really? I hadn’t noticed.” He tried to smile, to soften the sarcasm. “Why?”

  “Embarrassed, I guess.” She turned her head away. “I was a little rough on you about Chris.”

  By now he shouldn’t be surprised by her directness, but still her comments set him back a step. He wasn’t ready to talk about Chris again…not yet. “Don’t think anything about it. I wanted you to tell me the truth plainly. It’s what I came to you for.”

  She tossed the piece of hay she’d been fiddling with to the ground and snorted. “When did I become a relationship guru?”

  “Sometimes we see other people’s mistakes clearer than our own.” Would she catch his thinly veiled hint? Peyton appeared to have a difficult time perceiving the depth of her own depression.

  “Ah, you may have something there.” The melancholy tone crept back into her voice. He hated the despair in it. He loved it when she laughed and smiled.

  “You do pretty good with this one. You’re one of the best friends I have.”

  “Same here.” She seemed astonished she had actually voiced the sentiment. He could tell from her open expression she meant it.

  “Can I help?”

  She blinked in confusion. Then she seemed to understand. “No. There’s nothing you can do. If there was, I still don’t think I’d ask.”

  He knew she was being unusually forthcoming. He didn’t want to spoil the moment. “Why?” His heart raced as he voiced his question anyway. Then it stopped. Then it pounded again. Would she even tell him this much?

  She sighed. “I don’t want to lose your respect.”

  Her answer wasn’t what he expected—not at all. “You couldn’t do that.”

  “Oh, you just don’t know.” Her laugh was mirthlessly tight.

  “There’s nothing you could do or have ever done that would make me think any more or less of you. I think I’ve seen the kind of person you are. Your problem is that you don’t value yourself rightly. You—”

  “My problem?”

  “Hey, you told me what my problem was.” He shook his head at the memory.

  “I guess I can dish it, but I can’t take it, huh?”

  “Yeah. It kind of looks that way.”

  She grinned and glanced down at her hands—a bit sheepish. The banter lightened the mood. “So…are you gonna fix chicken pot pie for me next Christmas?”

  He smiled. “Of course.”

  ****

  Light rain spattered the twisting mountain road to Molas Pass. A bank of ominous gray stretched across the horizon meeting the ranges on both sides of the valley. As Peyton approached the summit, the day’s final streaks of light punctured the approaching darkness, spilling around the edges of clouds and trailing down to earth, making the scene seem surreal and a bit artificial.

  Maybe the observation area was swarming with people on a beautiful cloudless day, but tonight wasn’t beautiful or cloudless. It was lonely. Peyton didn’t like meeting Jeff in the middle of nowhere, preferring crowds of potential witnesses.

  Her watch read half past eight. Jeff was never on time. If it was his
childish way of making her sweat, it was wasted effort. Each time she met him, she came home drenched from perspiration, no matter the temperature. She plopped onto a bench and wrapped her coat around her, cinching the belt tighter. The weight of the gun—her constant companion—pressed against her thigh.

  Headlights pierced the rain-darkened night, but passed on by. A car horn blasted the quiet as someone drove around a tight curve. The irregular beat of her heart competed with the tip-tap of raindrops. She clutched the silver cross Brian gave her for Christmas as if it was some sort of talisman to ward off evil. She had worn it every day since he gave it to her.

  She jumped to her feet when she heard a car pull into the lot below. Curiosity bettered her, and she stepped to the edge of the deck, peering down at him. Jeff emerged from his truck in no hurry. He must have sensed her presence and glanced up.

  “Hello, mother dear.” A vicious light glowed in his eyes, two barely discernable yellow orbs in the dark. He reminded her of a cat playing with his next mouse meal.

  She ignored his attempt to rattle her. It was getting old. Jeff was a man of little imagination. She marched down the walk and handed him the envelope. Without a word, she headed toward her car.

  “Wait a minute.” He rustled the bills. “There’s not enough here.”

  Her anger bolted out of her mouth. “That’s all I have.” She jammed her trembling hands into her coat pockets.

  He laughed—a horrible, perverse, demonic sort of cackling. “Are you kidding me?”

  She continued toward her vehicle. Maybe she shouldn’t turn her back on him, but she didn’t care anymore. Her fingers clutched the grip of the gun in her pocket. Was tonight the night?

  “Maybe I should have a talk with your boyfriend.” That threat was getting tiresome as well. “I mean it, Paula. I’m going straight to the sheriff.”

  She spun on her heel. “Don’t you ever give up? Your threats are useless. I can’t give you what I haven’t got to give.” She punched each word. “You’re not going to the sheriff. Don’t you know he’s looking for you? How hard was it for him to figure out you’re the one who stole his cattle?” Brian hadn’t figured it out. They hadn’t even discussed it. That was on her agenda tomorrow. She had already made up her mind. Brian would know everything in the morning. She was prepared to come clean and leave town.