Groom 0f Fortune (Fortune's Children: The Grooms Book 5)

by Peggy Moreland

  His own sanity.

  Setting his jaw, he followed her into the kitchen, pulled down heavy mugs from the cupboard and filled them with the thick stew while she hung back, watching, her arms hugging the flannel shirt over her breasts. He gestured with one of the mugs toward the small, crude table, waited until she was seated, then plunked a mug down in front of her and sat down in the chair opposite hers.

  Picking up a spoon, he stirred, keeping his gaze on his stew, watching the steam rise from it. “Think you can tell me now what happened at the church?” he asked after a moment.

  When she didn’t immediately respond, he glanced up to find her gaze on his hands. Her eyes slid up to his. Their gazes met, held for a moment, his narrowing in steely determination, hers going from shy curiosity to fear in the time it took for his heart to take one more rib-threatening kick at the mere sight of her.

  “I’m a cop,” he said gruffly. “You have nothing to fear from me.”

  “You arrested my brother.”

  Link frowned at the accusation in her tone. “I had no choice. The evidence was there against him.”

  She fisted her hands on the tabletop and leaned toward him, her defensive stance taking him by surprise. A lamb turning lioness before his eyes. “Riley didn’t kill Mike,” she said angrily. “You know him better than that. Riley would never harm anyone.”

  Yes, Link acknowledged silently. In his gut, he had known that. In his heart, too, if he thought he had one. But gut instincts didn’t hold any weight in a court of law. Evidence did. And the evidence stacked against Riley Fortune had been damning. So, Link had done his duty, arrested a man for a crime he knew he didn’t commit…then busted his ass to uncover the evidence he needed to clear his name. Now all he needed was enough evidence to win a conviction against the real murderer. But Isabelle didn’t know any of that, nor would he tell her.

  “Do you know who did?” he asked instead.

  He heard her quick inhalation of breath, saw her body stiffen, before she dropped her gaze to the hands she still held fisted on the table. “Yes,” she said, her voice trembling. She slicked her tongue across lips that fear had parched. “I know who killed Mike.”

  “Who?” he asked, needing to hear her name the man his gut told him was responsible for the crime, the man the current evidence pointed to. The man she’d planned to marry. The man he despised for no other reason than Isabelle Fortune had agreed to marry him.

  Slowly she lifted her face until her eyes met his again. “Brad,” she whispered, then said more strongly. “Brad Rowan.”

  The certainty with which she named her fiancé, the venom behind the accusation, took Link by surprise. He’d expected her to defend him, to try to protect the man she loved. “You have proof?”

  “No. But Brad killed Mike. I know he did.”

  With a snort, Link dropped his spoon into the mug and reared his chair back on two legs, eyeing her sardonically. “I know a lot of guilty men who are walking the streets, but without proof, that’s exactly where they’re going to stay. On the streets. The same as Brad Rowan will.”

  Her lips parted on a shocked gasp, her eyes shooting wide. “What! You aren’t going to arrest him?”

  He lifted a shoulder. “On what grounds? On the circumstantial evidence I currently have? On your unfounded accusation?”

  She yanked her hands to her lap and glared at him across the width of the table. “It isn’t unfounded. I heard two men talking in the vestibule.”

  He dropped his chair back to all four legs. “What two men?”

  She waved away the question. “I don’t know. Just two men I overheard talking—”

  The diamond engagement ring she wore caught the light and shimmered, drawing Link’s gaze to it. She stopped when she realized that he wasn’t listening to her any longer, then followed his gaze to the hand she held aloft. She stared at the ring, as if unaware until that moment that she still wore it. Then, with a whimper, she twisted the ring off and hurled it across the room. It bounced off the far wall, then fell to the floor, rolling a few feet before coming to a stop at the edge of a braided rug spread on the floor before the dark fireplace. The diamond caught the light again, glimmered, seeming to wink at Link, as if teasing him with all it symbolized.

  Arching a brow, he slowly shifted his gaze back to hers. “Feel better?”

  She scrubbed her fingers over the spot where the ring had rested for the last several months, as if ridding her skin of something vile. “Yes,” she said, her breath hitching. “Much.”

  He pursed his lips and gave his chin a jerk. “Good. Now, about those two men…”

  She drew in a deep breath, placed her palms over the top of the table as if to steady herself, and then told Link what she’d overheard. When she’d finished, she leaned forward, her eyes unwavering in their conviction as they met Link’s. “He killed him. Brad killed Mike. I know he did.”

  “Did you recognize the voices?”

  She caught her lip between her teeth as she sank slowly back against her chair. “No,” she said, shaking her head. “Though they were both familiar.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Because they were!” she cried, her frustration returning with a vengeance. “I’ve heard the voices before. Where, I’m not sure. But I’ve heard them.”

  Link leaned across the table, convinced that the two unidentified men were the key he needed to put Brad Rowan behind bars where he belonged. And Isabelle held that key. “Think, Isabelle,” he growled. “Think. Without a name, or a place, I have nothing to go on.”

  Her eyes filled with tears and she pressed her fingers against her temples, shaking her head. “I’ve tried,” she cried miserably. “While I was driving through the desert, their voices played through my mind over and over again, but I simply can’t place them.”

  “Could they be friends of your father’s? Employees of his?”

  Her eyes flipped wide and she jumped to her feet, knocking over her chair. “Oh, my God! My parents! They must be worried sick. I’ve got to call them.” She whirled, searching for a phone, but Link lunged across the table, caught her by the arm and jerked her back around.

  “You can’t call your parents, Isabelle.”

  “Wh-what?” she stammered, blinking at him.

  “No calls.”

  “But I have to!” She tugged her arm, trying to pull free. “They’ll be worried. Frightened. I have to call them. I have to let them know where I am, that I’m all right.”

  Link rose and ducked a hip around the edge of the table, rounding it. He caught her other arm and forced her to face him. “Isabelle,” he said, giving her a hard shake when she continued to struggle against him. “Listen to me. You can’t call your parents. The call could be traced.”

  She stilled, her eyes going wide. “Traced?”

  “Yes. Brad, or anyone else who wanted to, could trace the call to this cabin.”

  She shook her head, tears filling her eyes. “But my parents. They’ll be sick with worry. You don’t understand,” she cried, and tried to pull free. “I was kidnapped when I was young. I know what they went through then. How much they suffered. I can’t put them through that again. I just can’t!”

  Link scowled as he held on to her, refusing to let her go. He understood, all right. He knew all about the kidnapping of Isabelle Fortune. The memory of her parents’ faces on the evening news when they’d offered a staggering reward for any information that would lead to the recovery of their daughter would forever be burned on his mind—as would the image of Isabelle’s pale, haunted face when she’d been rescued three days later and returned safely to her parents.

  He released her so quickly, she staggered back a step, unbalanced. “My cell,” he said, and turned for the bedroom.

  “What?” she said in confusion and hurried after him.

  “My cell phone,” he explained, pulling it from its holster on the belt of his wet jeans. He turned and held it out to her. “City issue. Calls can’t be tra
ced through it.”

  She reached for the phone, then glanced up at him in surprise when he didn’t release his own grip on it.

  “You can’t tell them where you are,” he warned, his blue eyes piercing hers. “Or that you’re with me. If you do, you’ll jeopardize your safety and that of your parents’. Do you understand?”

  Frightened by the rigidity of his gaze and sobered by the threat he alluded to, she slowly nodded. “Y-yes. I understand.”

  He released the phone, and she turned away. She punched in her parents’ number, then brought the phone to her ear. At the sound of her father’s voice, she pressed her fingertips to her lips, forcing back tears. “Dad?”

  “Isabelle,” he cried in relief, making fresh tears flood her eyes. “My God, honey, where are you? Are you okay?” He clamped a hand over the mouthpiece and shouted for her mother, telling her that Isabelle was on the phone.

  “Dad,” she said loudly, trying to make herself heard over his shouting. “Please listen. I can’t talk long. I just wanted you to know that I’m all right. That I’m safe.”

  Then her mother was on the phone, sobbing, “My baby, my baby. Isabelle, darling, where are you?”

  “I’m okay, Mother,” she said, struggling to keep the fear from her voice, the truth, not wanting to worry her parents any more than they already were. “I’m with—” She felt Link’s hand clamp over hers and glanced up at him, saw the fierce, silent warning in his eyes. “I can’t tell you where I am or who I’m with,” she explained, her gaze frozen on Link’s. “I just wanted you to know that I’m safe and that I’ll be back in contact with you as soon as I can.”

  “Isabelle!” her mother wailed. “Darling, what is going on? Brad is beside himself with worry. He’s in the library now. Your father’s gone to tell him that you’re on the phone.”

  Ice spilled through Isabelle’s veins at the mention of her fiancé. “I can’t talk to him,” she said, her stomach knotting at the idea of him, a murderer, in her parents’ home. “I have to go. I love you, Mother. Tell Dad that I love him, too.” She quickly pressed the disconnect button, cutting off her mother’s desperate pleas for her to remain on the line.

  Link eased the phone from her paralyzed fingers and Isabelle turned away, covering her face with her hands. “Oh, God,” she moaned. “They sounded so worried. So frightened. This must be just like it was before for them.”

  She felt a hand on her shoulder, the gentle squeeze of comforting fingers through the flannel shirt. She turned and buried her face against his chest. “I can’t do this,” she sobbed helplessly. “I can’t do this to them again. I’ve got to go home. Talk to them. Explain what’s happened. Tell them about Brad.”

  “No.” When she twisted in his arms, trying to free herself from his embrace, Link tightened his arms around her. “Isabelle,” he ordered sternly, “think what you’re saying, what kind of danger you’d be placing yourself and your parents in. Brad’s a murderer. You know that. You heard what those men said. Once Brad knows that you’re aware of the part he played in Mike’s death, he’ll kill you, or try to, at the very least. He’ll have to, in order to save his own hide.”

  “But you didn’t hear them, Link,” she sobbed. “They’re so worried. It’s just like before. I can’t bear it,” she cried, balling her hands against his chest. “I can’t put them through this again.”

  “This isn’t your fault,” he told her, trying to calm her. “And it wasn’t your fault before, when you were kidnapped.”

  “It is,” she argued stubbornly. “I shouldn’t have run away. I should have stayed at the church, found my father and told him what I overheard.”

  Furious that he couldn’t make her understand the danger she was in, he pushed her to arm’s length and gave her a hard shake. “Don’t you know what kind of man we’re dealing with here? Brad Rowan’s crazy. Homicidal. If you’d stayed at the church and told your father what you overhead, Brad would have you by now, and God only knows what he would do to you to keep you quiet.” He watched the blood drain from her face, saw the fear in her eyes and knew that he was frightening her even more than she already was. “Isabelle,” he said, trying to keep his tone even, calm. “You did the right thing by running away. I can protect you here. I can keep you safe.”

  She stared up at him, wet violet eyes searching his. “Here?” she repeated. “We’re staying here?”

  “Yes.”

  “For how long?”

  He set his jaw, wondering again how he’d survive being alone with her for even one night. “As long it takes to get the evidence I need to put Brad Rowan behind bars.”

  “But my parents…”

  He released his hold on her. “As long as they are ignorant of Brad’s guilt, he would have no reason to harm them.”

  “But—”

  “I’ll arrange for twenty-four hour surveillance for both them and Rowan. At the first sign of danger, I’ll have Rowan arrested on suspicion of murder. Until then, I need for him to think his secret is safe, in hopes he’ll make a mistake and lead us to the evidence we need to nail him.”

  Link dropped down onto the lumpy sofa with a weary sigh, scrubbed his hands over his face, then leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his thighs and his fists beneath his chin as he stared at the closed bedroom door.

  Isabelle slept in the bed on the other side of the door. Isabelle Fortune. The woman he’d admired, even lusted after from afar, ever since her return to Pueblo less than a year earlier.

  The irony of the situation didn’t escape him.

  Link Templeton, criminal investigator, lowly employee of the city that the Fortune family all but owned, hiding out in a remote cabin with the Fortune’s only daughter, a woman thirteen years his junior, a woman whose innocence and privileged background was a stark contrast to the streetwise man who’d literally pulled himself from the gutter by his bootstraps.

  As he stared at the door, knowing he was crazy for even thinking about her, an image of her as she’d appeared earlier that evening pushed itself, unwanted, into his mind. Standing in the bathroom doorway like a virginal bride on her wedding night. Her cheeks flushed, that thick mane of black hair framing a classically beautiful face and tumbling to hang past her slim shoulders. Breasts quivering beneath the thin silk that enhanced rather than concealed the feminine curves beneath it.

  He could imagine himself stroking a hand down the smooth column of her throat, covering a breast, almost feel her flesh swell and arch against his palm, the heat rising from her skin to burn with his. Her head would drift back as he stroked her, her eyes would close, her lips part, and he would capture her mouth with his, sip at her sweetness, grow drunk on her erotic flavor, mate his tongue with hers even as he drew her hips hard against his.

  Groaning at the image, he dived his fingers through his hair and held his head between his palms, trying to squeeze the lustful thoughts from his mind. “Crazy,” he muttered under his breath. “Insane. Impossible. Irrational.” Isabelle Fortune was out of his league, out of his realm. And he was out of his mind for even thinking about her. His job was to protect her. Nothing more.

  Promising himself that he would remember that, he snatched his cell phone from the sofa beside him and quickly punched in a number.

  “Hank,” he said when his partner answered. “It’s Link.”

  “Where the hell are you? Isabelle Fortune has disappeared, and the whole town is in an uproar. The chief wants you on the case.”

  “Isabelle’s with me. We’re at your cabin in the mountains.”

  “Whoa. Back up, buddy, and say that again.”

  Link sighed and dragged his palm over the top of his head, mussing his hair even more. “I’ve got Isabelle,” he said again. “She’s with me. I followed her when she left the church. She wrecked her car during the storm, and I picked her up and brought her to your cabin.”

  “Damn, Link. Brad Rowan is one angry groom. But his black mood doesn’t come close to touching her old man’s. Hunter Fortune’
s got the entire police force out looking for his daughter. He’ll have your ass over a fire for this one, I can guaran-damn-tee it. You better get her back here, and fast.”

  “No.”

  “No! Man, have you lost your mind? This is the Fortunes you’re dealing with, and you’re not exactly on their top-ten list since you arrested Riley and threw him in jail.”

  “I know,” Link said in frustration, “but I can’t bring her back. She knows that Brad killed Mike Dodd.”

  “The hell you say! Has she got proof?”

  “No. That’s the problem. Just prior to the wedding, she heard two men who alluded to Brad’s involvement in Mike’s murder, but she can’t identify either one of them.”

  “So you’re going to keep her under wraps until she can?”

  Link’s scowl deepened. “It’s the only way I know to keep her alive.” He glanced at the door, then lowered his voice. “Listen. I need you to get me a list of all the wedding guests. I’m sure the Fortunes have a copy, but keep your reasons for needing it under your hat. I don’t want them to know that Isabelle’s with me, or that she suspects that Brad is the murderer.

  “I need you to keep an eye on her parents,” he continued, “as well as Rowan. If he shows any sign that he suspects Isabelle is aware of his guilt, arrest him and hold him on suspicion of murder until I can get there.”

  “What about her car? Do you want me to have it towed in? A set of wheels like that? Somebody’s bound to come along and strip it, and make a killing on the parts alone.”

  Link dragged a hand over his hair. “No. If you do, someone might suspect that you know something, know where she is. I’d rather her family suffer the financial loss of the car than have them face the emotional loss of their only daughter if Rowan should trace her back here to the cabin.”

  “Right.”

  “And cover for me, will you? Make up some story about me chasing down a lead in another city. Or, hell, tell ’em I quit. I don’t care. Just don’t let on that you know where I am or who’s with me.”

  “My lips are sealed. And, buddy,” Hank added, “watch your back. That Rowan is a cold son of a bitch and madder than a rabid dog. If he finds out you’ve got Isabelle…”