by Unknown
“We were kids and it was already loose.”
“The hell you say. It wasn’t loose.”
Kaycee sat down in a chair and kicked off her boot. “I won’t let him hit you, Sheriff. Do what you have to do. I don’t wanna go to jail. I’m not going anywhere.”
Jace swallowed hard and took her hand in his. They waited while Danger went out to his Jeep and retrieved the tracker.
“I’m sorry, darlin’. All I wanted to do was keep you safe. It seems as if I’ve endangered you more by bringing you here.” He leaned down and brushed his mouth across Kaycee’s lips. “Forgive me, for everything?”
Danger hesitated, taking in the scene of Jace kissing Kaycee. He chewed his lip. He’d kick his own ass if he could reach it. He cleared his throat.
Jace broke off the kiss, straightened up and turned to face Danger. “None of it makes sense, besides that strange note, Rodney is a clinker. There’s no connection to Kaycee, other than the fact he was banging Jillian.”
Danger squatted down and attached the device with thumb and forefinger. It snapped in place. He looked up at Jace. “So was at least one other man. I suspect one of the semen samples will match the perp’s DNA. The thing is they all had sex with Jillian a few short hours apart from each other.” He paused and eyed Jace.
Jace shook his head. “I did not have sex with Jillian the night she was murdered.”
“What about that day?”
Kaycee gasped. “No. Jace was with me. We were in the barn.”
“All day?”
“No. Not all day, but most of the day.”
“So, there were some hours there when you had ample opportunity to have sex with Jillian here, before you and your wife met in the barn?”
“Jesus Christ, Danger. Whose side are you on?”
“The side of justice.” Danger held up a hand. “I’m only asking the same questions the D.A. will ask you, only he won’t ask as nice.”
“Yes. I had opportunity. We were alone in the house together for some time. Did I have sex with her? Not from her lack of trying, but no, I didn’t touch her.”
“Did she touch you?”
Jace inhaled. Exhaled slowly. “Yes. She was waiting in my bedroom when I came out of the bathroom from taking a shower.”
“What were you wearing?”
“What?” Jace scowled. “What difference does that make?”
“In the eyes of a jury, it might make a big difference if you came out dressed or naked.”
“I was wearing a towel.”
“What happened?”
“Jesus, Danger.”
“Answer the question,” Kaycee said in a strained voice.
“She tried to remove my towel and copped a feel. Nothing happened. I did not have sex with her. I put her out of my bedroom, like always, relocked the door, and dressed. A little while later, I joined Kaycee at the stables.”
Danger scratched his head. “According to you both,” his glance took in both Jace and Kaycee, “Kaycee never met Rodney Blake. Correct?”
Kaycee nodded. “I never met the man.”
“So why the hell kill Rodney?” he asked, puzzled by the mystery of it. “And why kill Doc Snelling? The two men were as different as daylight and dark.” He requested a refill of coffee. “There has to be a connection. It has to be Kaycee, since she’s the one he’s after. You’re certain you never met Rodney?”
“I’m sure,” Kaycee snapped, losing patience. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to lie down awhile.”
“One other thing, Kaycee.”
She arched a brow and waited for the question.
“You have any idea why Smitt might want your medical records?”
Kaycee glanced at Jace then squared her shoulders. “It’s possible I’m pregnant by him. You think that’s good enough reason, Sheriff, to murder four people? Obviously, he does.” She whirled and left the room.
“Fuck!” Again, all eyes turned to Duel.
Jace growled deep in his throat. “She’s not pregnant by Smitt Davis.”
“How the hell could you let Jillian in your bedroom?” Duel asked.
“For the last time, I did not let her in my bedroom.” Jace raked fingers through his hair in utter frustration. “I’ve never invited Jillian to share my bed, not one time ever in my life. She invited herself. I never asked her to take a shower with me. I did not let her touch me at any time.”
Duel held up his hands. “Okay. So when you told me in Reno you were afraid you might murder her, it was because she’d invited herself to your bed?”
A collective gasp, then utter quiet filled the room.
“Damn,” Duel muttered and flashed a quick look at Danger. “Jace didn’t mean he was actually going to kill Jillian. He…uh…wanted her dead and was afraid he’d lose his temper and murder her. Shit, that’s not what I mean, either.”
“Duel,” Dianna gritted. “Just, shut-up. You aren’t helping.”
Jace rubbed his hands together and laughed. Might as well as laugh, instead of killing Duel. “Okay. Since we’re all gathered around here, I guess it’s time everyone hears the news. Kaycee and I are expecting triplets.”
“Jesus,” Wild and Dianna said together.
Duel’s lips parted, but no sound came out—then he laughed. His laughter bubbled over and he gripped his belly. All heads turned to him. He wiped tears from his eyes and patted Jace on the back and snickered. “Christ, J.D., when I mentioned making babies, I didn’t mean three at once.”
“Go ahead and have your fun, Duel. Your turn’s coming,” Jace snapped. “I hope the woman you fall for gives you hell.”
“I don’t understand,” Taylor said quietly. “Why did she say her babies belong to Smitt Davis?” Taylor flashed Jace an accusatory glare. “What the hell is going on?”
They all stared at Taylor.
“If you’ll excuse me, Danger, I need to check on Kaycee,” Jace said, ignoring Taylor’s question.
Danger stood up. “Listen, I have to go anyway. I’ll be in touch as soon as I have something more to report. I’m letting you off the hook for not bringing Kaycee by my office yesterday. If I’d just learned I was going to be the father of triplets, I would have wanted to go home and drink myself into a stupor—with coffee that is.” He chuckled. “I can find my way to the door.” He turned back and eyed each one of them. “I’d suggest the rest of you leave the ranch. If Davis is the perp, none of you are safe. He knows the area quite well.”
He sighed. From their closed expressions, it was obvious not a one of them was going to pay heed to his advice.
* * * *
When Danger got back to his office, he made a point of sifting through the sacks of evidence piled on his desk. “Sonofabitch.”
There it was, at the very bottom of a bag from Rodney’s crime scene. Why in hell didn’t someone inform him of a friggin’ note? He frowned at the blood-spattered paper, lifted it by the corner and read. He wanted to touch my woman. For that, he died.
“Jesus.” The man was deranged.
He slapped a hand down on the desk.
What did it mean?
In some way, had Rodney Blake threatened to touch Kaycee Remington? Or was the killer referring to the fact Rodney had banged Jillian? Or even Cynthia?
Or he could take it one-step further and wonder if the note referred to Rodney’s wife, Mary Lou.
Were they all way off in thinking it was Smitt Davis?
Maybe it was a stranger.
No one had seen Smitt around town. The truth was, it’d been years since Smitt moved away. As far as he knew, the man had never returned to Montana.
Maybe it was someone local. The mayor?
Damn it, he still had to question Clyde and Cynthia Hemphill. Crap!
He needed to talk with Mary Lou, too.
Sometimes he hated this friggin’ job!
Chapter Twenty-Five
Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie.
~Mae West
(Night
After Night)
Rimrock Sheriff’s Dept.
December 23, Tuesday 2:30 p.m.
Mayor Clyde Hemphill stood behind his heavily pregnant wife. He placed his hands on her shoulders and helped ease her bulk onto a chair. Danger noted the way Cynthia wrung her hands as she settled herself across from his desk.
She kept licking her lips.
He’d never understood what it was about a woman licking her lips that drew his attention, but it always had. And it had always made his dick twitch to life, especially when he first met and married Lacey. God, he’d had the hots for her from the first moment he saw her.
These days, his cock didn’t twitch for his wife at all. He wished he knew why he’d stopped wanting her. But he felt nauseous at the thought of sleeping with her.
Of course, having to look at Clyde and Cynthia, two of his least favorite people in Rimrock was enough to turn anyone’s stomach.
He shifted his gaze to the mayor. Clyde reminded him of a fish. His face came together at a sharp angle, the same way a fish’s face joined. He also had thick, rubbery lips and bulging, whiskey-colored eyes without a single eyelash.
Clyde’s hairline was beginning to recede. He kept the sandy blond strands cropped off in a short crew cut that exposed his pink scalp. He was tall, skinny as a rail, and cool as a cucumber under fire.
Cynthia, on the other hand, sweated. A petite woman with vibrant-colored hair as red as a fire engine, she controlled the natural curl by keeping it bobbed off at the neck. Large freckles spattered her face and arms, and her green eyes were restless. She was cute, in the girl-next-door sort of way. When she wasn’t pregnant, she was skinny as a stick and busty to the point she looked like she’d topple forward onto her chest.
He couldn’t help wondering why the couple was so damned nervous. What did they have to hide? He decided to toss out some bait and see what he reeled in.
Danger made a steeple of his hands and reared back in his chair. “I suppose you’ve heard about the Rodney Blake, Jillian Remington, and Doc Snelling’s murders?”
Clyde stiffened as though he’d just been insulted. “I can’t see what their deaths have to do with my wife or me.” His face glowed red as a sunset.
Cynthia sobbed into a tissue. “Poor, poor, dear, sweet, Jillian, she was my dearest friend.”
He grunted and barely kept from rolling his eyes. “I doubt it.”
Damn it, he had three people dead in his town. He wasn’t in the mood to mollycoddle the mayor and his sluttish wife.
“You’re accusing my wife of lying? How dare you! I’ll have your job!”
Danger lifted his gaze to stare down the mayor. Clyde blustered with the best. Well, he could bluster too, when necessary.
“You want my job, Clyde? You’re more than welcome to it. Come next election, do me a favor and vote me out of office.”
Cynthia squeezed out more crocodile tears and delicately blew her nose into a tissue. “Of course, I barely knew poor Rodney. I’d only met him once or twice.”
His jaw dropped. Christ, did the woman actually think no one in town knew about her and Rodney?
“His sweet wife is so very pregnant,” she continued, weeping. “I’m lucky to have my Clyde, but I want you to know, Sheriff, I’m genuinely upset over Rodney’s death.” Realizing her gaffe, she stuttered. “An–and poor Jillian’s too, of course an–and Doc Snelling’s. The entire thing is just tragic.”
Danger sighed. Yeah, he’d just bet she was upset over Rodney’s demise.
Clyde patted her shoulder and leaned down to press a rubbery kiss against her mouth, while he stroked her distended belly.
He thought he’d vomit. Christ, these two deserved each other. “Since you and Jillian were such good friends, I bet you’re aware she was pregnant and there’s a good chance the baby is Rodney’s.”
Cynthia surged to her feet. “Rodney would never have slept with the sow!”
“Now, Cynthia, sweetheart, don’t get upset. Think of our baby.” Clyde urged her back into her chair. “Remember, you really didn’t know Rodney well enough to judge what he’d do.”
Her green eyes glittered like spears of jade. Anger replaced her grief over poor Jillian’s untimely death. “I knew him well enough to know he wouldn’t have touched Jillian,” she snapped.
Danger heard Clyde’s sharply indrawn breath.
Cynthia stood up, tucked the soiled tissue into her purse and huffed. “Everyone knows she was carrying on with Jace Remington. He’s been her lover for years. I imagine Jillian was pregnant by him.”
“And how do you know this, Mrs. Hemphill?” he asked smoothly.
Cynthia squared her shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes. “Well, Sheriff, Jillian told me herself she’d been carrying on with Jace right under his poor wife’s nose. She even told me she and Jace had sex frequently before his wife’s arrival. In fact, he left Jillian’s bed to go greet his wife on the day Kaycee arrived. Ask Dianna. Jillian swore Jace’s sister practically caught them in the act.” Cynthia sniffed. “She said one woman would never satisfy a stud like Jace. Who knows how many bastards he’s fathered?” She grabbed Clyde’s arm. “Clyde and I are so lucky to have planned each one of our children. And we’re both looking forward to the birth of our new baby. If there’s nothing else, we must go now. We have to pick the boys up from school. I’m sure you understand.”
Her tone clearly stated she didn’t give a shit if he understood or not.
“Yes,” he replied. He eyed Clyde’s pale, sweaty complexion. “I’d like to speak to you alone, later this evening, Clyde, if you would please come back.”
“Bu–but it’s close to Cynthia’s time to deliver,” he replied nervously. “I don’t like leaving my wife alone for very long. Since Doc Snelling is gone, when Cynthia’s time comes, I’m going to have to take her into Havre. With this being her fourth baby, she’ll most likely deliver fast.”
Danger smiled. “Yeah, I’ve heard those horror stories of having to deliver one’s own baby. But I’m not asking you, Clyde. I’ll see you around five.”
Clyde paled even more. Interesting.
“It won’t take long,” he continued, standing up and walking to the door with them. “I need to talk to you, in private.”
Clyde shuffled, licked his fish lips, and cleared his throat. “Very well, Sheriff. I’ll return in a couple of hours, but it better be good or else I’m requesting your resignation. I will not be harassed nor stand by and watch my dear wife suffer because you can’t do your job and find the killer terrorizing our town!”
Danger bit his jaw to keep from snorting. He nodded, then snapped his fingers. “Oh, yeah, since you and Jillian were such close friends, I wonder, Mrs. Hemphill, if you have any idea who else Jillian might have been having sex with?”
Cynthia’s green eyes blazed. “Jace Remington is the only man she ever told me about. She loved him.”
Shit!
“I thought with you two being such close friends and all, you probably shared stories, compared notes, so to speak?” Danger suggested innocently and waited.
Her temper exploded. “I’ve never had sex with Jace Remington,” she snapped.
“Rodney Blake?”
“Never!”
“Huh. Wonder where all those ugly rumors came from?”
Frost rimmed her green eyes. “I have no idea who started such lies! I love my husband too much to betray him. Look, Sheriff, it’s not like Jillian and I shared the same men,” she said through clenched teeth. “I’m a very happily married woman. My husband keeps me well satisfied.” She patted her belly. “As you can see.”
“I meant no offense, Mrs. Hemphill. I was hoping you knew any other men Jillian might have slept with in the last seven weeks?"
She hesitated. “No, only Jace, as far as I know, what makes you think there was anyone else, Sheriff?”
“Oh, just the fact there was three different viable samples of sperm collected from Jillian’s body. One of them matched Rodne
y’s DNA profile, but he wasn’t the father.”
Her lips tightened. “The cheating son of a bitch,” she snapped. “Poor Mary Lou.”
Danger coughed. “Right. I’d be willing to bet one of those samples will prove to be the father of her baby.”
Clyde’s thick lips worked as though he was a fish out of water trying to suck in air.
“I’ll be back in a little while, Sheriff,” he mumbled, clearly unhappy about having to return.
“I’ll be waiting for you, Clyde.” He reached around them to open the door.
Duel nearly fell in when the door swung inward and Clyde and Cynthia Hemphill stormed past him. Cynthia hesitated for a second, blushed, then hurried past Duel without a word.
Danger lifted an eyebrow. “What was that about?”
“What? Cynthia’s dramatic pause and red face?”
“You two know each other? Biblically?”
Duel grinned. “Don’t you know her Biblically?”
Danger snorted. “Not from her lack of offers, I can assure you.”
“When I was a randy teenager, I used to bang her behind the barn at two o’clock every Saturday afternoon, regular as clockwork. The best piece of ass around at the time. She wanted Jace, but he wouldn’t touch her. I never understood why until I discovered what Jillian did to him. He wouldn’t touch another female because he was afraid of what she might do to him or her.”
Duel made his way to the coffee pot and poured a cup. “Cynthia’s the one who started calling Jace, J.D. For that reason, he hates being called J.D. I’d be hammering away at Cynthia and when she climaxed, she sounded like a damn goat neighing, Jaaaay Deeeee at the top of her lungs, no matter if it was me or someone else doing the banging. Inevitably, word got around she was putting out and other boys showed up. We’d pull a train on her, and damn if she didn’t love it. Anyway, I guess she fantasized each boy was Jace fucking her because it was always his name she screamed.”
Danger pounded his desk with the palm of his hand and wiped tears from his streaming eyes. “Jesus! I always wondered why he hated being called J.D.”