He cupped her ass and applied a lingering kiss to her bare shoulder. His warm lips sent a ripple of pleasure through her followed by something more—something that made her chest feel tight. She turned and planted her palms on his chest, pushing him toward the door. “I—I need to get dressed now.”
* * *
Iris handed Nikki an express package from the Georgia Department of Driver’s Services the moment she entered Wade’s office. She received it with mixed feelings. Now that she had her license she could finally attend to the matter that brought her to Montana to begin with. With Wade’s help she should be able to get everything taken care of and be on a plane by the weekend. As much as it hurt to think about leaving, the sooner she returned to Atlanta, the better. Every hour spent with Wade only made leaving him harder. Shaking off these thoughts, she tore the envelope open and scowled at the horrible mug shot.
“You see. It’s me, Nicole Marie Powell.” She waved her license under Wade’s nose. “Am I now authenticated to your satisfaction? Can I finally take care of what brought me here?”
“It’ll do.” He gave her a grim nod. Nikki noted the shift in demeanor that occurred the moment they’d walked into his office. He continued with no sign of the teasing glint she’d become so accustomed to. “The first order of business is obtaining a death certificate so you can properly dispose of your father’s remains. Iris should be able to help expedite that process.”
“Sure, Wade,” his assistant answered. “I’ll be glad to help.”
“Thanks.” He turned back to Nikki. “I’ve got a number of things to take care of at the courthouse and then I’ll be back to read you the will.”
“So formal all of a sudden, Counselor?” she teased. “Is this because you’ve exchanged your cowboy hat for your lawyer hat?”
“Something like that,” he replied “Since I’m now working for you, Miz Powell, there is indeed a protocol to follow. I’ll be back in an hour or two.”
Puzzled by this abrupt about-face, Nikki watched his departure with a hollow feeling in her chest. Iris pursed her lips with a knowing head shake.
“He knows you’re leaving soon and doesn’t like it. Not one bit. He hasn’t taken any real interest in anyone since—”
“Rachel?” Nikki volunteered.
“So he told you about that, did he?” She didn’t look too surprised. “He doesn’t like to talk about her, you know.”
“I can’t imagine he does, given the circumstances.”
“It says a lot that he told you.” She gave Nikki a conspiratorial smile.
Nikki wondered once more if there really could be more to his feelings than she was willing to let herself believe. If only she had more time to find out. But two thousand miles distance was impossible to ignore.
“Iris, do you think we can see about that death certificate now?”
“Sure thing,” Iris replied. “Usually the process takes several days, but Wade has influence with a number of people in Helena. The man has more charm than should be legal. But I guess you know that.” She winked. “If I fax a request with his signature, we should get an official copy for the mortuary in a day or two.”
* * *
Wade left his office in a black mood. What the hell was wrong with him to be in such a funk over a woman he’d known for all of four days? Truth is, he hadn’t even realized how empty his life was until she’d come along and burrowed into that hollow spot he didn’t know existed. She’d be leaving in a matter of days, and suddenly, how to deal with that was his biggest dilemma.
For the longest time he’d thought much like Allie—that professional and financial success would bring contentment—but it never had. There was always a bigger case or a more lucrative deal to chase. If he let ambition and avarice take hold in his life he’d never have enough. Material possessions and professional achievements offered little more than empty promises of happiness. He had his parents to thank for that bit of clarity. They’d ridden the trail together for almost forty years in a strong and happy marriage. Deep down he wanted the same thing, but had given up hope of ever having it after making such a fuckup of his marriage with Rachel. But they’d never really stood a chance with a relationship built on lies. She’d said her vows to one man while secretly pining for another. A lasting relationship had to be built on truth, honesty, and trust.
Trust. That thought brought him back to Nikki. He’d done his damnedest to earn hers, but sensed she still held back. He understood her guardedness but still wished he could pound the shit out of every one of the assholes who’d made her so wary of men.
“Where’s Nikki?” Wade asked Iris when he returned to his office. He felt a surge of irrational panic in discovering her gone. “I told her I’d be reviewing the will with her when I got back.”
“She went over to Wells Fargo,” Iris replied. “Now that she has her ID, she said she was going to get some cash to pay you back, and then see about replacing her credit cards so she can rent a car.”
“There’s no need for her to do all that when I’m happy to drive her.”
For some strange reason the idea rankled him. Maybe he’d just gotten used to being needed, or maybe it was the novelty of it after three years of Allie, but he liked taking care of Nikki.
“I don’t think she likes depending on you so much, Wade. She strikes me as an independent kinda gal, one used to taking care of herself.”
“Maybe more than she should have to,” Wade remarked almost to himself.
Thinking it better to handle the will outside of the office, he grabbed the documents and a couple of sets of keys, jammed everything in his coat pockets, and made a beeline for the bank.
“Hey, Jane!” He greeted the branch manager with a smile. His mood instantly lightened at the sight of Nikki. “Did you get everything taken care of for Miz Powell?”
“I think so,” Jane replied.
“They’ve been wonderful,” Nikki gushed. “I’ve got the cash I need to repay you and a replacement debit card. I don’t think I’ll need anything else until I get home. Thanks again, Jane,” Nikki finished. She stood and gathered up her things.
“If you do need anything else, all you have to do is ask,” Wade said.
“I appreciate that.” Nikki gave him a rueful look. “But I’ve taken advantage of you far too much already.”
“It’s not like that, sweetheart. I haven’t done anything for you I didn’t want to do.”
“No matter how you want to wrap it, I’ve still been an imposition on you.”
He grabbed her arm and turned her to face him. “You are not hearing me, Nikki. Your so-called imposition has been the best thing that’s happened to me in years.”
“You can’t mean that,” she said.
“Yeah.” He grinned. “I do. All work and no play makes Wade a dull boy.”
“Are you finished at your office now?” she asked.
“For a while. I didn’t have anything pressing. I also had Iris move a few appointments to next week so I can help you settle your father’s estate.”
“Estate?” She laughed. “Is that what they call a pickup truck and travel trailer in Montana? The last I heard that was the sum of his worldly possessions.”
“That so? Well, there may be a bit more than you think,” he answered vaguely.
“What do you mean?”
“While I wish I could, I can’t put this off any longer.” He pressed his hand to the small of her back. “C’mon. Let’s take a drive. There’s something you need to see.”
As they drove north on Highway 287 toward Sheridan, Nikki lost herself again in the majesty of the snowcapped mountains and endless acres of grassy pastures where cattle and horses contentedly grazed. She wondered what it would be like to make a life in such a rugged place. Could she be happy in a place like this? Alone, probably not. But with Wade? That was another question comple
tely.
He’d implied that he’d like her to stay, but how could she even consider ditching her life? Not that there was so very much worth returning to but it was the principle of the thing. They barely knew each other. Maybe it was something the young and stupid Nikki would have done, but she was older and wiser now, right? She tasted the salty tang of blood on her tongue and realized she’d chewed through her lip.
“Are you completely surrounded by mountains here?” she asked, more to distract herself than anything else.
“Yeah,” he replied, “but the winters are surprisingly mild. The Ruby Valley is insulated by seven ranges. That’s the Tobacco Root range.” He pointed to the craggy white peaks to the east.
“Where are we going?” she asked when he turned off the main highway and onto what appeared to be a service road.
“You’ll see soon enough. We’re almost there,” he answered cryptically. “That’s the Ruby River, known for some of the best angling in the country.”
“Angling?”
“Fly fishing,” he explained. “People come to this part of the country from all over the world for our prize sport fishing. The Ruby produces rainbows, cutthroats, and graylings in abundance because access is so limited.”
“Limited? Why’s that?”
“Most of this section of river is privately owned. Like this prime piece right here.”
They continued driving almost parallel to the river, then lost it for a few miles until the road abruptly ended. Wade turned into a private drive, came to a stop, and then killed the engine. He gestured toward the river and mountains. “This tract stretches north for two miles, along the riverbank, then extends just as far in that direction.”
Nikki gazed over the wide expanse of treeless landscape covered with grass that stretched for miles. The beauty touched her. “Is this someone’s farm?” She noted the log cabin and old pickup truck parked out front. “There’s no cattle here. Is it abandoned?”
“You might say that. This place used to be a fishing and hunting retreat, but no one’s using it anymore.”
“Is it yours?” she asked, wondering why they were here and where this was going.
“No. It’s not mine.”
“Then why are we here? Who owns it?”
“You do.”
Chapter 16
“Me?” Nikki gasped. “How? I don’t understand.”
Wade turned to face her, his eyes sober, his expression stern. “Pursuant to the execution of Raymond Powell’s will, you, Nicole Marie Powell, are the sole owner of over twelve hundred prime acres in Madison County, Montana.”
“This was my father’s place?” Nikki was at first stunned, then fury set in. “Damn you, Wade! You knew all this time and said nothing?”
“No.” He shook his head. “I didn’t know all of it until this morning when I reviewed the will. The property is yours free and clear, by the way. I pulled all the real estate records and checked for liens.”
“You’ve let me fret and worry for days!” she accused. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?”
“I couldn’t. I swear my hands were tied. Legally, you had no claim to any of it until you could prove your identity, and now you have.”
Nikki was still shaking her head in disbelief when Wade came around to open her door. She hopped down from the SUV and Wade followed, retrieving a thick envelope from his breast pocket. He pulled out a bundle of documents from inside. “According to the plat, there’s two full sections here.”
“Sections? What’s a section?”
“In farming communities land is generally parceled in sections and quarter sections. A section is a square mile.”
Nikki stared dumbfounded over the river, the grassland, and the mountains. “You’re saying I own two square miles of this? How on earth did my father come by all this land? He was a heavy equipment mechanic, for goodness’ sake! You are really telling me that he owned this cabin and twelve hundred acres?”
“Yup. According to Evans, who closed the deals, your father fell in love with the fishing here twenty years ago and bought the first quarter section when land was still cheap as dirt. He added to the property over time when his investments started to pay off.”
“What’s the place worth?” she asked.
Wade pursed his mouth and dug his boot heel into the dirt. “Can’t really say.”
“Surely you have some idea,” she insisted.
“Real estate’s taken a nosedive in the past few years, but my best guess would be about fifteen hundred per acre for the grasslands, plus the cabin.”
Nikki’s performed mental calculations that made her heart race. “That’s got be close to two million dollars!”
“More than that, sweetheart. The waterfront is worth a lot more than the grazing lands. Allie could tell you more precisely about the entire value. She specializes in large acreage and high-end ranch properties. There’s something else,” he said. “Your father also left behind a substantial sum in bonds and annuities.”
“Wh-what do you mean substantial?”
“Close to a quarter million. Your father was either an incredibly savvy investor, or a damned lucky bastard. He bought several thousand dollars of cheap tech stocks in the late eighties—including shares in Dell Computer and Microsoft—that paid off big-time.”
“Oh. My. God.” Nikki’s legs gave way beneath her. She sank to the ground, gaping up at Wade. “I can’t believe all this. It’s all too much to process.”
He squatted down with a grin. “Kinda puts matters in a different light, don’t you think? Now you can tell your be-atch of a boss to kiss your sweet, rosy-red ass.”
Nikki stared at the cabin shaking her head in disbelief. “This is really all mine?”
“Yes, Nikki.” Wade pulled her back to her feet and then produced a key. “I have his will in my hands. We still need to go through the formalities. Do you want to step inside for that?”
“I don’t know,” she murmured. “It doesn’t seem right somehow.”
“You shouldn’t feel that way,” Wade said.
When he unlocked the door and Nikki stepped over the threshold, she wished she had taken some time to prepare herself. The cabin was a distinctly a male domain with a bearskin rug in front of the big stone fireplace that dominated the great room. A number of mounted animal heads—elk, mountain sheep, and even a bison hung on the walls. She noted the hunting rifles and fishing poles and the copies of fishing and hunting magazines scattered about the room. Her gaze lit on a pair of reading glasses sitting beside a half pack of Marlboro red cigarettes, on the side table by an overstuffed leather recliner. “I remember so little about him. I feel like an intruder.” She stroked her fingers over the glasses, suddenly struck by the loss of the daddy she never knew.
“You’re his daughter. Just because you didn’t see each other for a long time, doesn’t mean he forgot that fact. Wanna sit down now, Nikki? I need to go through the legalities of your inheritance. It’ll only take a few minutes.” He handed her a copy.
“All right. But I’m not very fluent in legalese. No doubt you’ll need to interpret it all for me.”
“I doubt that. It’s a very simple will.” Wade opened the enveloped he’d carried inside, reading aloud, “I, Raymond Albert Powell, of Twin Bridges, Montana, revoke all former wills and codicils and declare this to be my Last Will and Testament. I am not currently married. The name of my only child is Nicole Marie Powell. All references in this Will to my ‘children’ are references to the above-named child. I direct that all my debts and funeral expenses be paid from my estate. I direct that my residuary estate be distributed to Nicole Marie Powell of Decatur, Georgia…”
Nikki stood abruptly, blinking against the burning sensation in her eyes. “He tried to make things right between us, but I wouldn’t let him.”
Wade stopped reading. “It’s
not your fault, Nikki. You were only a child.”
“Not when I got the letter,” she argued. “I told you he sent me one. It arrived eighteen months ago but I never read it…well, not until it was too late. I shoved it in a desk drawer and ignored it. I didn’t want to read it, but I couldn’t bring myself to destroy it either. Then when I got the phone call from the hospital telling me Daddy had died, I finally opened it.”
“What did he say?”
“That he was sorry and that he’d always loved me. He said he couldn’t have raised me because he was on the road all the time. He admitted he drank too much and thought I was better off with my mom. He swore he sent me letters and cards for years, but they all came back as return to sender. I never knew anything about them.”
She swallowed down the lump in her throat and covertly wiped her leaky eyes on her sleeve. “My mother had no right to do that to me—to let me believe a lie. My father and I were estranged for twenty years because of it. I always thought he was a no-account loser like all the rest of them, but that wasn’t exactly true. Maybe he wasn’t the best man in the world, and he certainly wasn’t the ideal father, but he was the only one I had. I feel cheated, Wade. The whole damned thing just makes me feel so sad and angry…and empty.”
“So it was his letter that brought you up here?”
“Yeah. I came hoping to find a way to deal with it all. I thought maybe I could lay all the hurt to rest along with him.”
“It hardly seems that he blamed you, given he left everything he owned to you. Shall I continue?”
She nodded.
“I nominate Nicole Marie Powell, of Decatur, Georgia, as the executor without bond or security. My executor shall have the right to administer my estate without unnecessary intervention by the probate court…”
As Wade read through the articles of the will, Nikki wandered the rest of the great room. The television was the old tube-style. Beside it was a rack of VHS tapes. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d even seen a VCR and tapes. She squatted down to the case wondering what he liked to watch. Deliverance and A River Runs Through It held places of honor on the top shelf. Beside these were a number of John Wayne and Clint Eastwood movies and then there was another well-worn case—They Call Me Trinity.
Slow Hand Page 17