Beneath A Texas Sky (Harlequin Super Romance)

by Winters, Rebecca

  Jace sucked in his breath. “What about the woman?”

  “Nothing on her yet. The guys are still combing the area for her Toyota. I’ll get back to you the minute I hear anything.”

  “Thanks, Pat.”

  “Sure thing.”

  No sooner had he hung up than the phone rang again. It was Buck, his younger brother. They’d always been close, but since Jace had taken a leave of absence, they’d only touched base once.

  “Buck? How’re you doing?”

  “Everything’s fine at home. What about you?”

  “Not one piece of hard evidence has turned up yet.”

  “That’s tough, Jace. I figured you’d phone if there’d been any good news. I know how much Gibb meant to you.”

  Jace’s jaw hardened. “Only eleven days to find the killers before I have to report back to Austin.”

  “That means you’ll miss the family reunion again this year.”

  “When is it?”

  “Next weekend.”

  “I forgot.”

  “At least this time you have a legitimate excuse to stay away.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “This is Buck, remember? I know how painful it is for you to be at big family gatherings without Cassie. Maybe by this time next year you’ll have met someone.”

  “I already have,” he muttered before he could catch himself.

  The silence on the other end was tangible. Finally, “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  “Don’t get too excited, Buck. This is a woman who might be involved in Gibb’s murder. I’m waiting to hear what the background check turns up on her.”

  “How in the heck could yo—”

  “It wasn’t a conscious act on my part,” Jace broke in. “She just…happened to me.”

  Buck whistled. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing. You honestly think she’s mixed up in the case in some way?”

  “The only thing I know is that I don’t want to believe it.”

  “I won’t say a word to anyone,” his brother assured him.

  “I can always depend on you. Tell the folks I’ll call them soon.”

  “I will. Be careful, Jace.”

  A vision of Dana Turner flashed before his eyes. “You’re probably too late, but it’s the thought that counts. Thanks for phoning, Buck.”

  GLEN MASON DROVE the pickup to the rear of the ranch house and let himself in the back door. He’d almost made it to his bedroom on tiptoe when his grandfather called out.

  “That you, Glen?”

  “Yeah, Grandad. Go back to sleep.”

  “That’s the second time this week you’ve come in at three o’clock in the morning. Aren’t those pretty late hours you’re keeping with Dana Turner?”

  “I told you. She has to work late. We don’t even leave for Alpine until nine. What do you expect?”

  “Don’t talk to me that way, Glen.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Mr. Jorgenson phoned tonight.”

  “Yeah?”

  “According to him, you’ve been coming into work late and taking longer lunch breaks than you should. Now I can see why. If you’re staying up half the night courting, there’s no way you can be at the grocery store by eight in the morning to stock shelves.”

  “I get the work done.”

  “That’s not the point. Since you came to live with me, you’ve lost one job after another. Mr. Jorgenson took you on as a personal favor to me. I promised him you wouldn’t let him down. You know how hard it is to find a job in Cloud Rim. You’re lucky to have this one.”

  “I know.”

  “No you don’t, but that’s your daddy’s fault for abandoning you. Listen, Glen—if you want to go on living with me and have the use of my truck, you’re going to have to do everything you can to show Mr. Jorgenson you’re not a sluggard. In order to make certain you get your sleep, I’m putting you on a midnight curfew.”

  “Midnight—”

  “If I don’t hear any more complaints from Mr. Jorgenson after a month has passed, I’ll change it to one o’clock. Do we have a deal?”

  “I’m almost twenty-four, Grandad.”

  “That may be, but you can’t take care of yourself yet, let alone anyone else. Before I die, I want to see you hold down a steady job and become responsible.”

  Tears stung Glen’s eyes. “You sound like Mom before she took with one of her boyfriends. She said I’d never amount to anything—that I’d end up a drifter just like Dad.”

  “Don’t talk that way, Glen. You had a hard life, but I believe in you even if she didn’t. Otherwise I wouldn’t keep trying to help you. But you’ve got to do your part to be successful.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m going to be successful. A lot sooner than you think,” he muttered under his breath.

  CHAPTER THREE

  UNANSWERED QUESTIONS about Dana Turner kept Jace tossing and turning throughout the night. If he slept, he didn’t know when it happened.

  At six he was up and out of the apartment. After grabbing breakfast at a drive-thru, he arrived at the small IPS branch office to start loading his van before the other staff reported in.

  He didn’t want to see his co-workers or the other driver who covered the town of Alpine. No doubt they’d ask him what he was doing for the weekend and invite him to join them. They were nice guys, but he had other plans no one could know about.

  After making deliveries at several ranches outside Alpine, he drove to the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute and Visitor’s Center. Along with the usual deliveries, he left some of Art’s flyers. From there he stopped at every facility he hadn’t been in before in order to leave IPS company brochures and the flyers.

  Each time he talked to someone, he asked questions about new people in the area, new businesses springing up. To his chagrin, he never got the answer he wanted.

  So far he still hadn’t heard from Pat about the background check on Dana. By the time he’d reached Fort Davis, he was tied up in knots. After he’d finished his business there, he drove by the service station, unable to resist.

  The silver Jetta had made it to the top of the lift. No telling where Tony was while he waited to get out of here.

  Halfway to Cloud Rim, Jace’s cell phone rang. His gaze swerved to the caller ID. When he saw it was Pat, his heart slammed into his ribs as he realized this was the moment of truth.

  Now that it had come, he dreaded hearing the words if they weren’t the right ones. Yesterday Dana Turner had done something to him, something he couldn’t explain. If Pat had bad news, it was going to take a long time before the name Dana no longer meant anything to him.

  He pressed the talk button. “Pat? I assume you’ve got information for me.”

  “Nothing on the Toyota yet, but there’s plenty on the woman. Her legal name is Dana Turner, female Caucasian, twenty-seven, last known residence Fielding Women’s Prison, San Bernadino, California, on a murder conviction.

  “After serving seven months of a thirty-years-to-life sentence, the case was reopened and the judge vacated his verdict. She went free at the end of April of this year. Before her arrest, her last known address was Pasadena, California.”

  At this point Jace had to pull to the side of the road. Listening to Pat was like flying over the ocean in a jetliner that suddenly went into a twenty-thousand-foot crash dive, then by some miracle righted itself enough at the last second to prevent utter annihilation.

  “Jace? Did you get all that?”

  “I did,” he murmured, still trying to assimilate the fact that she’d spent seven months behind bars. The time frame made it impossible for her to have had any contact with the killers during their crime spree.

  What about before and after, Riley?

  Questions bombarded him from all directions like matter being sucked into a black hole.

  Were the killers originally from California? Was one of them in love with Dana? Had she committed other crimes with them? Had they visited
her at the prison and made arrangements for her to come to Cloud Rim when they heard she was free? Had she threatened Tony so he’d stay away?

  Jace’s chest tightened.

  Either Dana was as guilty as sin but had been released on a technicality that came to light only after her incarceration…

  Or, she was a total innocent—one of the unfortunates of this world sent to prison by mistake while the real culprit ran around committing more crimes.

  Until he knew the truth, he wouldn’t breathe freely.

  And if it’s the wrong truth, Riley?

  He refused to think about that just yet.

  “You’re awfully quiet.”

  Jace had been too stunned by the unexpected news to make conversation. “You had to do a lot of digging to come up with that much information.” Pat was thorough and meticulous about police work. It’s what had made him such a great Ranger in his day. “I owe you.”

  “Forget it. We’ll keep looking for that Toyota.”

  “Thanks.”

  At two-thirty Jace drove into Cloud Rim. Dana said she didn’t usually eat lunch at the trailer. He decided he’d buy a hamburger at the local café, then get all his deliveries and pickups done first. Around five, when most people got off work, he’d drive out to see her.

  “Hi, Millie,” he said as he sat down at the counter. The café was named after the middle-aged widow who knew a lot of the people in town. So far she’d been his greatest source of information.

  She smiled before pouring him a cup of coffee. “Hamburgers get boring, Jace. For once, why don’t you live dangerously and order my egg salad sandwich with a bowl of chowder on the side.”

  “Why not. It sounds like a nice change.”

  “Coming right up.”

  There were only a few people at the booths and no one else at the counter. It appeared the lunch crowd had already passed through.

  When an old sixties song played from the jukebox, Jace glanced in its direction. A strange-looking guy with long blond hair was feeding coins into the slot. Wearing well-worn cowboy boots, jeans and a cowhide vest with no shirt, he reminded Jace of someone out of an old western film.

  “Here you go. Hope you like it.”

  Jace smiled. “I wouldn’t come here every day if I didn’t approve of the food and the service.” He bit into his sandwich and proceeded to devour it.

  “Since I run the only café in town, you don’t have much of a choice.”

  “Sure I do,” he said. “I could pack a lunch. But then I start thinking about your caramel pecan pie.”

  “I’ll see if I have one left.”

  “Before you check, do you happen to know that blond guy over by the jukebox? He looks like Jimmy Stowe, one of my younger brother’s friends who used to live in Alpine. But the last time I saw him, he’d joined the army and wore his hair in a buzz.”

  She shook her head. “That’s Glen Mason, Ralph Mason’s grandson.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. He’s been here since Christmas. I understand he’s had a terrible family life. Ralph’s felt so bad about his own son abandoning Glen, he’s been trying hard to play father and straighten him out.”

  Jace stopped chewing.

  Christmas?

  “I’m glad I asked you first, Millie. The resemblance is uncanny.”

  “They say everyone has a look-alike somewhere.”

  “I’ve heard that too. Not to change the subject, but your chowder’s superb.”

  She eyed him shrewdly. “I can take a hint. I’ll go look for that pie.”

  Jace could see the Mason boy through the mirror behind the counter. He had to be in his early twenties. The way he leaned against the jukebox was a study in loneliness. The awful kind that spelled bad parenting, isolation, neglect. The type of abuse that turned fragile children into gang members, drug addicts and worse.

  Millie brought him his dessert, which he finished off in no time. He put three five-dollar bills on the counter.

  “That’s one too many.” She tried to hand it back, but he moved away.

  “This is my favorite stop of the day. Don’t ruin it for me. See you on Monday.”

  He would have liked to leave her a much bigger tip for the unexpected information. Since Jace had been driving this route, Glen Mason was the first male he’d heard of who’d come to this vicinity in roughly the same time period that the killers had disappeared over the mountains.

  The news by itself didn’t necessarily mean anything, but the fact that Dana Turner lived on the Mason property presented some new possibilities Jace needed to check out. No matter how remote, if he could establish a connection between Dana and Glen, he might be on to something.

  As Gibb had once told Jace, “Working a tough case is like trying to get a ring off your finger that’s too tight. You wiggle it this way, you wiggle it that. You apply leverage. When nothing works, you get out the soap. Use different brands. If none of them do the trick, you pour on a little olive oil and nudge away.

  “Once you’ve tried everything and it’s still stuck, you get real inventive and take pills to lose water. As a last effort you fast for twenty-four hours. Never cut it off unless it’s down to the bone and killing the circulation.”

  After six weeks in West Texas without a glimmer of a clue, Jace decided he was at the inventive stage.

  Both Dana and Glen were new to the area. Both had troubled pasts. If there was a link between them…

  Too bad Dana had asked him not to leave any more of her packages at the ranch house. Was that because Glen didn’t want strangers like Jace coming to the house, chatting with his grandfather, who had no idea what was really going on? Maybe Glen had warned her to keep a low profile around Ralph so he wouldn’t be suspicious of their prior association.

  Without a legitimate reason to ring Ralph Mason’s doorbell, Jace would have to drum up a viable excuse to talk to the older man when Glen wasn’t around.

  Jace could drive to the ranch house right now. However, Glen might decide to pull in right behind him in the blue Chevy truck. Jace could see it parked outside the grocery store across the street from the café. When he made a delivery at the bank next door, he’d jot down the license-plate number for future reference.

  After five o’clock today, Jace would be free for the weekend. During his search for the missing plane, he’d keep an eye on Glen’s comings and goings. At the opportune moment, he’d approach the man’s grandfather.

  If Ralph could tell him anything about Glen’s whereabouts before he showed up in Cloud Rim, it would cut down on the time it took to provide him a lead, assuming there was one.

  That was the rub.

  Time was one commodity Jace was running out of fast. For now, he’d ask Pat to run a statewide background check on Glen and see what came up.

  Three hours later, he’d finished his shift with a big delivery for Art Watkins. The druggist handed him a six pack of Coke on his way out. It was his way of saying thanks for distributing the flyers.

  Relieved to be back at work on the case, Jace headed for the Mason property, hoping to catch sight of the Toyota.

  No such luck.

  He made a big turn at the end of the road and passed the ranch house where the blue pickup stood in the driveway. The wrong person was home.

  The IPS van would attract attention if Jace stayed put for very long. He drove back toward town, planning out the rest of the evening in his mind.

  It seemed the only way to get to the highest point in the area was to take the lonely dirt road coming up on his left. He could follow it now and take a good look around, then drive back to Alpine for his own car. When he returned to Cloud Rim to make camp, he’d call on Dana first, if she was at her trailer. So far, the police hadn’t spotted her car yet.

  SINCE HER RELEASE from prison, Dana had embraced her freedom to the exclusion of almost all other considerations. But after her conversation with Heidi last night, she realized that even working in this glorious setting sti
ll couldn’t fill every human need.

  For the first time since she’d come to Cloud Rim, she was aware that it was a Friday night, and she was alone. She could blame her restlessness on the IPS driver. Her reaction to him proved how vulnerable she was to an attractive male.

  Dana had no idea if he was married, separated, divorced or living with someone. It didn’t seem to matter. Too many times today, she’d found herself thinking about him.

  He probably wasn’t as wonderful as her imagination had made him out to be. In the past, Dana had dated her share of mediocre men. No one truly memorable. Of course there’d been a couple of losers sprinkled in. Tony was a case in point.

  Though she didn’t believe he’d show up again, she decided it might be a good idea to take Heidi’s advice and get away for the weekend. She could drive to Fort Davis and stay at the Pride Ranch for the night. That way she’d be certain to avoid Glen as well. The next time he came by, she would warn him off in no uncertain terms.

  According to Millie, the Pride Ranch served a terrific buffet that included prime rib, barbecued ribs and the most mouthwatering strawberry pies you ever tasted. That sounded good to Dana who was tired of her own cooking.

  As for tomorrow, she could swim and go horseback riding. Meet some fun people. She’d heard about the Pride’s summer-camp program for young astronomers. This would be a good chance to check it out.

  Depending on a variety of factors, she might allow small groups to visit the observatory for a look through the telescope. There was no greater thrill for a youngster.

  With her mind made up, she turned off machines and lights, locked up, then walked out to her car. It was only six o’clock. She had time to throw a few things in her overnight bag and reach her destination well before dark.

  She put the car in first gear and let gravity do the rest. Around and down the summit she went, passing the sign that said, “Private property—No trespassing beyond this point.” By fall the area would be fenced and a gate installed like most of the private property in the area, but everything took time.

  Coming around the bend of a curve Dana was surprised and delighted to see an IPS van coming toward her on the narrow road. Her heart did a little dance to think it might be the same driver.