“It matters to me.”
He glanced at her.
There it was, that tenderness. The same light in his eyes that she’d seen in the mountains. She was sure of it. Almost sure. She needed to hear the words from his lips. “You do believe me, don’t you?”
“I believe you.”
Warmth flooded through her. She might be in bad trouble, but at least Jace believed in her. And knowing that gave her just enough hope to carry on. “So what can we do?”
“Find out why Barstow wanted you dead in the first place, then use it to prove you were set up.”
She could see where he was leading. “And the only way to find that out is to look at the accounts I was working on, see what Barstow thinks I know.”
“That’s right.”
Shanna settled into the passenger seat and set her sights on the road ahead. The miles whirred under the truck’s tires just as thoughts whirred in her head. She knew she should be thinking about what she’d worked on in previous weeks, but all she could wrap her mind around was the ache in her arms, the longing in her chest, the need to hold her baby again.
She hadn’t said a word to Jace about her daughter. Here she’d been suspicious of him for not sharing the details of his life when she hadn’t trusted him with her own…especially her most precious detail of all. But now it looked like he might be the only person she could trust. “We need to make a short stop when we get to town.”
He arched his brows in a silent question. “Not your apartment. The police will be watching it. That’s the first place they’ll expect you to go. That or the bus station.”
“Not my apartment. My friend Linda’s place.”
“This Linda, she works with you?”
“She’s my best friend…and Mr. Barstow’s assistant.”
“And you think she knows something?”
“About the hunting trip? No. Linda thought Barstow inviting me along meant I was getting a promotion.” She allowed herself a bitter smile. Anthony Barstow’s world was very different from anything she or Linda had imagined, and so were his plans for Shanna. “But if I’m going to get into Talbot to search the company’s records, I’m going to need a security card. And I don’t think it would be a good idea to use the one with my name on it.”
“Linda will give you hers?”
“Yes.” At least she thought so. And while she was getting the card, she could give Emily what might be the last hug they would ever share.
Jace nodded. “Point the way.”
______
Jace had to be out of his mind.
Shifting on the truck’s worn-out seat, he piloted the beater onto Palmer’s Main Street. He was driving straight into a bad situation, he knew that. A situation that might land him back behind bars. But he didn’t know what else to do.
Or at least, what else he could live with.
It would be easier if he didn’t buy Shanna’s story. If he thought she was capable of aiming a rifle at a man and pulling the trigger. If he believed she had it in her to look him in the face and lie. But he didn’t. And no amount of cooked-up evidence was going to convince him otherwise.
Walking away wasn’t an option. Not anymore. He couldn’t leave Shanna to fend for herself, and he couldn’t forget Roger. And he sure as hell couldn’t let Barstow get away with buying and selling justice like he did uranium ore.
“Where does Linda live?” Jace asked.
“She bought one of the new condos down off Country Club Road.”
“Nice.” Jace didn’t know Palmer well, but he knew Barstow’s assistant must be making pretty good money to live in that area. He could still remember the locals moaning their worries about Palmer’s transformation from cattle town to yuppieville, and their fears it would become a second Jackson. But that was before the energy boom took hold. Now the old ranch culture was being overrun, not by national forest land and latte shops, but by oil derricks and strip mines.
Too bad.
Not that he had anything against men who worked in the oil fields and mines. But the men in charge, the ones with clean fingernails and filthy consciences like Barstow? They stank more than the oil derricks and were more poisonous than uranium waste.
Shanna pointed out a turn, and he took it. The groomed lawns of a golf course flanked one side of the road, fancy houses the other. It took about a blink to get to the Mountain View Condominiums. Palmer might be the most populated town in the county, but that didn’t mean it was large. Large in Wyoming was reserved for mountains and sky.
Jace pulled to the side of the road around the corner from the address and switched off the engine. The truck clunked loudly as it died. It was amazing the two-hundred-dollar investment had gotten them so far. It would stand out in this neighborhood, but that couldn’t be helped. His biggest worry was the police staking out Shanna’s friend’s condo. “We’ll circle past her place first, make sure no one is waiting for us.”
Shanna nodded.
“I know Linda’s your friend, but let me talk to her. At least at first.”
He was waiting for an argument, but Shanna just nodded again.
They climbed out of the truck and completed the circuitous trek before approaching the friend’s door. There was no sign of surveillance. So far, so good. If he was in the lead, he could control the situation, focus on getting the security card and getting out. The less information they gave Linda about where they’d been and where they were going, the less she’d have to tell the sheriff or deputies when they, inevitably, came to question her.
Jace let Shanna lead him to the right door and press the doorbell. Waiting for an answer, she glanced down the street. She raised to her toes, then bounced back down, flat-footed.
“More concerned about your friend’s support that you want to let on?”
Before she could answer, the porch light flashed on. The door jolted inward. A well-dressed, long-haired brunette stared with wide, brown eyes. “Shanna!”
“Linda, I’m so glad to see you.”
“Shanna! What happened? What’s going—” Shanna’s friend’s attention narrowed on Jace, as if suddenly realizing he was there. “Who the hell are you?”
“A friend.” He glanced down the street. No sign of police, but he didn’t like the noisy scene they were making at the door. “Can we come in?”
“Come in?” she parroted. She turned back to Shanna without stepping aside. “What happened? On TV they’re saying…horrible things.”
“We’ll explain inside.” Jace pushed his way past Linda, pulling Shanna with him. He closed the door safely behind them.
“You wouldn’t believe what I’ve been through, Lin.” Shanna held out her arms to give her friend a hug.
Linda didn’t respond. “I think I deserve an explanation.”
Jace stepped forward, placing himself between Shanna and her friend. “We need your help, Linda. Shanna needs your help. And for now, you’re going to have to trust her.”
“Mommy?”
Jace looked down, following the sound of the little voice.
A girl with strawberry-blond hair and twinkling eyes darted around the brunette’s legs and reached her little arms up to Shanna. “Mommy! You’re back!”
CHAPTER EIGHT
JACE WATCHED SHANNA SCOOP THE girl up and hug her tight. Shanna closed her eyes, petting the girl’s hair. Teardrops wound down her cheeks.
Shanna had a daughter?
Jace shook his head. She’d never said a thing. Never even given him a hint there was a little girl tied up in this. A child to protect.
“The police are looking for you, Shanna.” Linda’s voice cut through Jace’s jangled mind.
Shanna didn’t open her eyes. She twisted at the waist, rocking her little girl back and forth.
“Did you hear me? They say you killed Ron Davis. They say you’re dangerous. They say—”
“Hold on.” Jace held up a hand to silence Linda. “We can’t talk about this right now. We need your help.”
Linda looked at him as if he’d just said the most outlandish thing she’d ever heard. “I don’t even know you.”
“Shanna needs your help.”
“Shanna is wanted for murder.”
“It’s all a mistake, Linda,” Jace said.
“They had her picture on CNN.”
“Shanna didn’t kill Ron Davis. She didn’t kill Roger Harris.”
Linda shook her head. “That’s not what they said. It was on TV.”
“They lied, Linda. Anthony Barstow killed those men.”
“No, on TV they said…”
Damn. This was like talking to a boulder. “Linda, Anthony Barstow tried to kill Shanna, too.”
“Mommy?” The little girl’s voice shrilled with panic.
“Sorry,” Jace said to Shanna. He hadn’t wanted to freak the little girl out, but he needed to make Shanna’s friend understand. “We need your help, Linda. We need your help finding the truth.”
“The truth?” Linda shook her head again. She stepped back and reached for something on a table near the door.
A phone.
Jace grabbed her wrist. “There’s no need to call anyone. Just hear me out.”
“Let me go.”
He didn’t want to hurt this woman, but he would before he let her make a phone call that would spin this mess totally out of his control.
As if he had control now.
“It’s okay, Linda,” Shanna said, finally managing to pull her attention from her daughter.
Her friend looked from Jace’s hand to Shanna and back again.
“Please, Linda. I didn’t shoot anyone. You have to believe me.”
Linda glared at Jace. “You’re hurting me.”
Jace loosened his grip, but he didn’t let go. He could see now that Linda wasn’t about to listen to anything he said, let alone hand over a security card. Hell, he was probably lucky the phone wasn’t a gun.
The little girl had pulled away from Shanna’s neck and was looking at him, a pensive pucker to her mouth.
A new jolt of surprise went through him. A daughter. Shanna had a daughter. Why hadn’t she told him? What the hell was he going to do now?
Shanna took a step toward her friend. “Please, Linda. I’ll explain everything. Then if you still want to call the police, you’re more than welcome.”
Linda hesitated. Five seconds. Ten. She released the phone.
Jace stuffed it in his coat pocket.
Shanna set her daughter down. The girl wrapped her little arms around her mother’s legs and clung. Shanna stroked the girl’s hair, focusing on her friend. “I don’t know what they told you, Linda, but I didn’t do anything.”
“The police came by Talbot. The police and the sheriff. They said…” Linda glanced at the girl. “They said you were involved in a shooting.”
At least Linda was calmer now, thinking, even aware of what she was saying in front of the little girl. A good sign.
Shanna shook her head. “It was a lie.”
“Then why would they say it?”
“I’ll tell you everything. Explain everything.” Shanna raised her eyes to Jace. “Could you play with Emily for a second?”
Jace paused. Telling Linda everything was a bad idea. Even though Shanna had convinced her to turn over the phone, the woman still seemed so confused and frightened, he wasn’t sure what she’d do. The more they told her, the more he feared would get back to the Palmer police… back to the county sheriff.
Not only that, but Jace had no idea what to do with the little girl. Not that he disliked children. Not at all. But from what he remembered about Darla’s kids, little Emily’s questions promised to be more probing than Linda’s.
“Please?” She gestured into the heart of a spacious great room where a television played a cartoon about a red dog. “She can watch Clifford. It’ll give me a chance to explain the situation to Linda.”
“Explain the situation?” Jace gave her a warning look he hoped she could read.
She shot her own pointed look back. “Yes. I need Linda to understand what happened. All of it. I’ll just be a few minutes.”
“Right.” A few minutes, provided Linda swallowed the wild tale a lot more readily than she had so far. Not that he could blame her. God knew, he’d had his own problems.
A tug on his coat brought his attention back to the little girl. Wide green eyes turned on him. Tear tracks still glistened wet on her cheeks, but she no longer looked afraid. Mommy was making things better, he supposed. That’s how Emily would see it.
If only it were that easy.
“I have Power Rangers,” she said.
He wasn’t sure what to say. “Really?”
“Yeah. They’re super cool.”
Jace almost groaned. Seeing those cute, vulnerable little eyes staring up at him was more than he could take. He stepped farther into the condo. The television. He’d make for the television. “Why don’t you watch your show? See? The red dog is doing something over there.”
“I have a red Power Ranger you can play with. He’s a boy.”
“I see.” He pointed again at the cartoon. “Clifford is red.”
“I have the pink Ranger and the yellow Ranger, too. But they’re girls.”
What a joke. He’d meant to control this situation, and at the moment he couldn’t even control a child probably too young to go to kindergarten.
He made one last-ditch effort. “What about the TV?”
“You can play with the yellow one if you want to.” She handed him the little yellow-suited plastic woman, though judging from her pout, the offer was a major sacrifice.
“Uh, can I play with the red one?”
Pink lips curved into a wide smile. She scampered away. A moment later she was back, thrusting a red-suited man toward him. “He’s the leader.”
Jace took the toy. He vaguely remembered a variety of Power Rangers television shows from years ago. They must be replaying the series on cable. Or maybe they were making new ones, or even movies, for all he knew.
He studied the little red man. “The leader, huh?” With Emily playing with the two female Rangers, Jace doubted the red guy was anything but a figurehead.
“Yeah. The Rangers fight bad guys and help people. He’s the best fighter of all.”
“That’s cool.”
“He can fight all the bad guys. He can keep them from hurting Mommy.”
So much for keeping the details from the little girl.
“He can, can’t he?” she asked. “He can help Mommy? He can keep her safe?”
Looking into that tender face, there was only one answer he could give. “Yes. He can.”
She beamed at Jace as if he himself was the red Ranger.
Man, was he in trouble.
He glanced back at Shanna. She was still in the front hall with Linda, her hands splayed out in front of her, pleading her case to her friend in a hushed voice.
Maybe pawning off Emily on him had done more than prevent tender ears from hearing more about Shanna’s ordeal. Maybe Linda was more open to her friend without a strange man hanging around. Maybe…
Headlights prismed in the leaded-glass sidelights flanking the front door.
Adrenaline spiked his pulse. “Shanna?”
Shanna followed his gaze to the window, then she turned back to him, her face pale.
CHAPTER NINE
SHANNA PEERED THROUGH THE SIDELIGHT flanking Linda’s front door. A black-and-white Palmer PD cruiser came to a stop behind the beater truck, its lights shining on the spot where the license plate should be.
She grasped Linda’s hands. “I need your help.”
“I can’t lie to the police.”
“Don’t lie. Just stall them. Long enough for us to get away. Can you do that?”
“I don’t know.”
Maybe Shanna was asking too much.
Linda had grown up with a tough family life. From what she’d told Shanna, the sheriff had often come to her house to break up
fights before her father had finally died while driving drunk. Shanna bringing this kind of thing back into Linda’s life was traumatic for her friend. “I’m so sorry to do this to you, Linda. You’ve got to believe me, if there was any other way…”
Linda shook her head as if breaking herself from a trance. “There is a way. Turn yourself in.”
“I can’t do that. Not yet.”
“Why not? What good does running do, Shanna? Are you going to run all your life?” Linda looked past Shanna. Her mouth shifted into a worried line.
Shanna knew she was looking at Em, but she couldn’t follow her friend’s gaze. Even thinking about leaving her daughter again made tears well up. “I have to find out why Mr. Barstow wants me dead. I have to get some kind of evidence. They won’t believe me otherwise. No one will.”
Linda glanced out the window.
Shanna was afraid to look. Afraid to see if the officer had gotten out of the car. Afraid to see how close he was to the door. “Please, Linda.”
“I’ll stall them. But I can’t lie. I don’t want to go to jail.”
“No. None of us wants you to go to jail, Linda.” Least of all Shanna. Not only was Linda her best friend, she was the only person she’d trust with Emily. If Linda wasn’t able to take care of Em, Shanna didn’t know what she’d do.
But that wasn’t the end of the favors she needed. “There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Your security card.”
“My security card?” Linda frowned. “For the office?”
“I need to borrow it. And your number.”
“Why?”
“The evidence I need. Finding out why Mr. Barstow wants me dead is my only chance to clear my name.”
Linda nodded, as if the situation was finally sinking in. She started for the kitchen, motioning for Shanna to follow.
Shanna shot Jace a look, then went after Linda. Jace and Emily met them in the kitchen.
Linda rummaged through her purse and pulled out a piece of plastic the size of a credit card. She handed it to Shanna. “Four-four-six-two.”
Shanna stuffed the card into her coat pocket and repeated the number, committing it to memory. “Thank you, Linda. You’re the best.”
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