by Julie Miller
“Stop right there,” she said.
He did as she asked and raised his voice when he spoke to cover any noise Lily might make. “Your grandfather is dead. You killed him just like you did Todd.”
“My grandfather was going to send me away. He knew about...things. He said I was a demon and had to be locked up. Me? Do I look like a demon to you?”
As a matter of fact, she did. Chance shook his head. “You look like a young woman in very deep trouble. Let me help you. Give me the gun.”
“No,” she said, crying now. “It’s too late. It’s been too late for a long time.”
“I know about Jimmy Brighton,” Chance said. “I know he didn’t kill Wallace. I think you know who did.”
“Jimmy,” she said and for a second, there was a note of longing in her voice. “Why did he give the police that stupid, phony name?”
Probably to protect his family and White Cliff, Chance thought. But it was possible there was another reason as well. “Maybe it’s how he thought of himself in relation to you—larger than life. He would have done anything for you.”
“I know.”
“How did you meet him?”
“One night after Wally left, the closet door suddenly opened and Jimmy was just here. I’d never seen him before. He said he’d hidden away and listened to us have sex many times and fantasized what I must be like but I was even more beautiful than he imagined. He was so strange but he was fascinated with me. He admitted he was a virgin but wow, you could have fooled me.”
“Is that why you asked him to cover for you after you killed Wally?”
She shook her head violently as tears trickled down her cheeks.
“Tell me about it, Tabitha. What were you and Wally doing down in Boise?”
“I wasn’t in Boise,” she protested.
“I think you were. I think you went there with Wally. Why?”
It took her a few seconds until she resumed speaking through trembling lips. “I...got...pregnant,” she mumbled.
“Was it Wally’s baby?”
For a minute, it didn’t look as though she would respond and then finally, she gave an almost imperceptible nod. “He said he would marry me. That’s what I wanted. I wanted out of this town. Wally was older, he could stand up to my grandfather. It was perfect. Wally said we would run away to Mexico. But when we got to Boise, he bought a lot of beer and stopped at a motel. He snuck me into his room. He said it was to protect me because I was underage... We had some beer. He got stinking drunk and finally admitted he was really taking me down to Nevada because he knew someone there who would give me an abortion, no questions asked. I said no way. How could he lie to me like that? And then he told me to grow up and stop whining. He was going to dump me, I could see it written all over his face.”
“You got in a fight,” Chance said.
“Yeah. Eventually he passed out. I saw his knife and I picked it up and stared at it and then I stared at him... I don’t know, he snorted in his sleep and something just...snapped. I went nuts. The next thing I knew, he was dead. I took his ring so it would look like he was robbed. I wasn’t thinking real straight. I got in his van and drove home. There was a lot of blood on the steering wheel and the upholstery. It smelled like death in there. I smelled like death. I came here to see Jimmy. I told him... I told him the baby was his. He insisted on driving the van back to Boise and confessing...it just all got out of control. And then he killed himself!”
“And you lost your baby.”
“Grandpa knew that’s why I was sick. I told everyone it was because of Wally, but he just somehow knew I was lying. The truth was I hated Wally by then, I was glad he was dead, I would have killed him all over again if I had the chance.”
Goaded by the rage that must have overcome her as she heard this description of her brother’s death, Betsy suddenly pushed her way past Chance and screamed at Tabitha. Lily appeared in the doorway. Tabitha aimed the gun at Betsy, then apparently saw Lily as a larger threat and aimed at her. Chance didn’t think twice. He fired his weapon. Tabitha screeched and dropped her gun as Betsy suddenly ground to a stop, one arm supporting the other, head bent forward, back heaving as her heavy sobs bounced off the walls.
Chance kicked Tabitha’s weapon across the floor. He’d aimed for and hit her gun hand but she seemed impervious to everything, even pain, and stared right through him. He yanked what appeared to be Todd’s shirt off the bed and wrapped it around her hand to stem blood loss. Then he put an arm around Betsy and led her to the door where Lily stood, eyes wide, gaze riveted to Todd’s body on the cot.
“Lily,” he said softly. “Lily?”
She tore her gaze from the cot and looked up at him. “It’s so terrible,” she whispered. “It’s such a waste.”
“I know.” He’d never in his life wanted to hold someone the way he wanted to hold her right that moment. Close to his heart, protected by his arms. “We need the police and an ambulance,” he said gently.
She nodded woodenly and turned away.
* * *
LILY WALKED BACK into the police interrogation room and slipped her phone into her purse. “Gerard and Kinsey will be here tomorrow to take Charlie back to the ranch.”
“I think Seth will actually be sad to see him leave,” Chance said.
The police detective returned to the room, as well. “This is what’s happening, folks,” he said as he sat down opposite them. “First of all, Boise police knew all along that the man who confessed and subsequently killed himself wasn’t the murderer. They say they were close on the heels of the truth and they appreciate the information you’ll be able to share. Secondly, since you aren’t pressing kidnapping charges against the Brightons and seeing as Betsy Connor confirms your story of what happened in the basement, you can go. However, there’s a federal prosecutor bringing Jimmy’s remains up here tomorrow and he wants to talk to you about your evidence against DA Block. We’d appreciate it if you stuck around Greenville for a couple more days.”
“Of course,” replied Chance. “We’re at the inn down the street.”
“I guess burying Jimmy at White Cliff is as close to a happy ending as Elizabeth is going to get,” Lily said.
Chance reached for her hand. “I think so. There are a lot of victims here because of Tabitha and Jeremy. I’m just thankful you and Charlie aren’t two of them.”
She squeezed his hand and nodded. “Or you,” she whispered.
Kinsey and Gerard met them the next day at the inn. The White Cliff/Greenville tragedies were still headlining news stories, not just in Greenville, but all across the country. The mixture of teenage sex, violence and survivalist upbringing made for juicy tabloid reporting that Lily did her best to shield Charlie from seeing. Buried in the back pages was the story that interested her more: the disappearance of what appeared to be the corrupt DA of Boise, Jeremy Block.
“I can’t believe he’s just disappeared,” Kinsey commented as she packed Charlie’s gear into the back of Gerard’s car.
“I just wish they’d caught him,” Lily said as she buckled her son into the car seat she’d bought for his journey back to Hastings Ridge.
“I bet you’d give anything to visit him behind bars,” Kinsey added.
Lily did her best to return Kinsey’s smile, but the worry of not knowing exactly where Jeremy was wouldn’t go away. She’d heard he’d crossed into Canada and fervently hoped he just kept going.
Kinsey spontaneously hugged her as though she could tell what Lily was thinking. Maybe she could. They’d become close the summer before and that friendship now promised to grow even stronger.
“Thanks for taking Charlie back with you to the ranch,” Lily said. “We’ll be there as soon as we can.”
* * *
BY THE TIME Chance drove the old truck over the cattle guard onto
Hastings Ridge land, they were ready to enjoy a reprieve from media attention. Days of law offices and police stations had exhausted them both. Officials had agreed to give them a couple of days to settle things at the ranch before coming back to Boise where the ongoing investigation into the DA office and Jeremy Block’s corruption needed information only Lily could provide.
That meant they’d be back in the thick of things very soon, but for now they were home.
“I placed you and your family in jeopardy when I was here last summer,” Lily murmured as they drove down the gravel road. The first snow of the season had flown but it was only a light dusting. The black cattle in the fields stood out against the newly white earth and Chance felt a part of himself kind of thaw.
He put his hand over hers. “Don’t think of it that way. There isn’t a person here who doesn’t love you both.”
“We should have called and told them we were coming home a day early,” she said.
“You wanted to surprise Charlie, remember?”
“Yes, but now it seems silly. I should have at least warned Grace or Kinsey that we’d be here at dinnertime.”
“You’re forgetting, Lily. There’s always enough food on that table to feed everyone for about three days. Stop worrying.”
“I’m trying,” she said. “It just seems impossible we’re finally nearing the end of this ordeal. I’ll feel better when Jeremy is caught but I bet you a million dollars he’s on the other side of the world by now. The man is a survivor. Kind of like a cockroach.”
“You’re a survivor, too,” Chance assured her. “Look, we’re almost there,” he added as they crested the hill and caught a glimpse of the ranch house below.
The main house and a few outbuildings were nestled on a large promontory created by a U-bend in the river that snaked through Hastings land. Wooded acreage rose up the slope north of the house, land that eventually reached a huge plateau complete with splendid examples of spreading oak trees that had been standing for decades. Past the plateau, an old mining ghost town quietly crumbled to the earth. The town had seen its share of tragedy, both in the past and more recently when Gerard’s former family met untimely deaths by falling through a floor.
South of the house, the road followed the river, ending at last at Gerard’s house which he now shared with his fiancée, Kinsey. They had passed Chance’s own A-frame cabin a mile or two back while Pike was in the middle of constructing a home for himself north of the ranch house. Frankie, the youngest brother, still bunked at the main house. Well, he did when he was home, which wasn’t a whole lot.
Daylight this late in the year disappeared comparatively early and so now, at twilight, the house was brightly lit and a curl of gray smoke rose into the sky. Chance drove down the road and circled back next to the house, parking in the area set aside for that purpose. The headlamps swept the porch as he turned and they saw the back door burst open and a small figure dash outside accompanied by three smaller shapes—the dogs.
As soon as the truck stopped, Lily opened her door and jumped to the ground. Chance got out of the truck, but stopped short of advancing, wanting to give Lily the space he instinctively felt she needed. Charlie flew into his mother’s arms. She twirled him around while the dogs barked and ran after their own tails.
Lily finally stopped spinning and just hugged Charlie until he slipped back to the ground and ran back into the house. She looked across the yard and apparently saw him leaning against the truck. Stretching out her hand, she smiled and he went to join her.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Phone calls were made and people started to gather. By the time Grace set a roast on the large trestle table, everyone had heard the latest news and welcomed Lily and Charlie “home.” They all acted like she belonged there with them and it was hard not to buy into all this goodwill. Did Chance find their acceptance of her threatening? She couldn’t tell for sure. He was sensitive enough to her feelings by now that she knew he wouldn’t go out of his way to hurt her, but she wasn’t interested in trapping him, either.
She looked across the table and met Kinsey’s gaze.
“I’m riding out to the ghost town tomorrow,” Kinsey said. “I want to sketch. Do you want to come with me?”
“I’d love to watch you draw,” Lily said. “Call me in the morning. It’ll kind of depend on how Charlie does.”
Chance had obviously overheard this conversation. “I’d be happy to take Charlie on an easier ride tomorrow to check out the cattle Gerard and Pike brought down from the hills.”
“Do you think he’s capable of that?” Lily asked.
“With help, sure.”
Frankie had actually joined them for dinner and he sat down next to Kinsey and smiled at Lily. Since all of the Hastings brothers had individual mothers, there were differences in their appearances and to a large extent, their temperaments. Chance could be a mischief-maker and a flirt, but Frankie had something else going on, as well. There was a darker side to him. He’d spent most of his youth in and out of trouble with the law, chosen friends poorly and tried everyone’s patience. Lily didn’t know him as well as she knew the others, but the one and only time they’d had a private conversation, he’d admitted he knew he’d been labeled the black sheep of the family and that was fine with him.
As far as looks went, he carried his share of the Hastings gene pool very well. He’d be thirty next year and while he looked friendly enough most of the time, there was also an experienced, tested quality to his eyes. His hair was lighter than Chance’s or Gerard’s, almost blond in the summer, darker now that fall had arrived with winter nipping at its heels. He sat next to Charlie who adored Frankie.
At the head of the table, Harry Hastings, the patriarch of the family, held rule, but he looked a lot more relaxed than he had the last time Lily had seen him. Then he’d just returned from his honeymoon and summer was in full swing. He’d had a lot on his mind. Tonight he looked almost cheerful, and he smiled often.
When dinner was over, Chance announced that Lily and Charlie would be staying with him at the A-frame. Lily had made this decision when Chance revealed his house was off the main road and few people knew about it. It seemed like a nice refuge and that’s what she wanted right now—refuge.
And, to be honest, time with Chance. There were issues to settle.
“But Mommy, I don’t want to go,” Charlie said.
Frankie ruffled Charlie’s hair. “We’ll do it next week, sport, don’t worry.”
“Do what?” Lily asked.
Pike explained. “Frankie and Charlie and me had planned to spend tonight in a tent.”
“But it’s cold outside,” Lily said.
“Inside the house, Mommy,” Charlie said with a grin. “We’re going to roast marshmallows and sing campfire songs and Uncle Frankie is going to tell me a scary story about the hanging tree.”
The hanging tree was called that for a reason. Four bank robbers had made off with the town’s payroll decades before. Three had been caught and hung while the money and the fourth man had disappeared forever. The story went that the dead men were left to rot at the end of their ropes because no one cut them down. Lily cocked an eyebrow at Frankie and said, “You’re telling him what exactly?”
“A watered-down version,” he whispered.
“The campfire is the fireplace,” Pike added. “Sorry about getting the little guy’s hopes up, we just didn’t expect you home until tomorrow.”
“Grandpa Harry said the dogs could sleep in the tent with us,” Charlie whined. “Please, Mommy!”
“It must be a pretty big tent,” Lily said.
“Not big enough,” Pike said as an aside. “I’ve got my sights fixed on the sofa.” He took off his glasses. There was a new look in his eyes, one Lily hadn’t seen before. She touched his arm. “Is everything all right, Pike?”
&n
bsp; “Just fine,” he said quickly.
“Please, Mommy,” Charlie said as he tugged on Lily’s hand. “Can’t I sleep in the tent? Just for tonight. Please?”
Lily looked at Chance who shrugged those impossibly broad shoulders. She looked at Pike and Frankie, two men she knew would protect Charlie no matter what the cost. Besides, he’d been here with them for two days already. “Sure,” she finally said. “Of course.”
“Okay, sport,” Frankie said. “Let’s set up the tent.”
Lily looked from one man to the other. “Good luck, you guys. You know where I am if you need me.”
She watched Charlie trot off with the two men, smiling to herself. It was going to be gut-wrenching taking him away from here, though she knew eventually that was going to happen. But maybe she could find a job in town and a little place for them to live where Charlie could still visit occasionally.
“Ready?” Chance called.
“I want to help Grace and Kinsey with the dishes...”
“Not tonight,” Grace said as she walked past with a stack of plates. “Tonight, Gerard and Harry are washing, Kinsey and I are drying. Shoo.”
After climbing back into the truck, Chance sat there for a second and stared at her. “What?” she asked. “Is something wrong?”
“I’m just surprised,” he said.
“At what?”
“At you. I’m surprised you’ve agreed to come spend the night at my place without Charlie or anyone else to ride shotgun.”
“Do I need someone to ride shotgun?” she asked sweetly.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, you do,” he said, and started the truck.
She was quiet for a few moments as he drove out of the yard and back up the road. “I thought it would give us a chance to talk,” she finally said as he turned off on the winding road that she surmised would lead to his A-frame.
“It’s funny,” he mused. “We’ve had time since everything happened but we haven’t mentioned what’s between us even once.”