“You’re going to give up?” he mocked. “Just like that—turn tail and run? Hell, if you’re in this for the money, you’d better get a little more backbone, be ready to stick up for your lies—”
“It’s not a lie!” she hissed, stepping so close to him that she had to angle her face up to glare at him. “It’s the God’s honest truth. You have a son, Jenner McKee, a wonderful little two-year-old boy that I’d just as soon never met you. I don’t want a red cent of your money and I don’t need your sick attitude. I made a mistake when I slept with you, but I don’t regret it, because I’ve got a child that I wouldn’t give up for the world. So now that I’ve had my say and you’ve had yours, let’s just call it even!” Fury pulsed through her blood as she turned on her heel, started for the door, then felt fingers as strong as steel wrap over her forearm and jerk her around again.
She nearly slammed up against him and noticed his face had changed. No longer merely mocking, his features had turned harsh with disdain and disbelief. The slashes of cheekbone and rigid angle of jaw revealed a deeper emotion, a hatred so intense it burned in his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re game is, lady, but don’t think for a minute that just because I can’t walk on my own yet, or that I might never be able to, that I’ll let any woman walk in and stomp all over me.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” she said icily.
“Good. ‘Cause if I hear that you’ve been spreading your lies around town, believe me, I’ll make your life a living hell. My family’s been through enough grief and scandal in the past few months—they don’t need any more.”
“Don’t worry about it, Jenner,” she said, attempting to yank her arm away. “As far as I’m concerned, we never met!”
His nostrils flared as he studied the lines of her face. “You’d better not be lying,” he growled, his fingers still painfully gripping her arm. “’Cause you’ll live to regret it.”
She wondered why she’d ever been so naive as to dream about falling in love with him. “You know, that’s the trouble with you McKees. Every last one of you. Always making threats to get your way. You think that all your money gives you the right to run people off their land, force them to sell their businesses, give up whatever it is they think is valuable, and then tell them what to do in the bargain, but you’re wrong, Jenner. All of you are dead wrong. You’re no better than the rest of us!” She wrenched her arm away and stormed out of the house.
The nerve of the man! To think that she’d fantasized about him!
Outside, the air was cool against her hot cheeks, and the dog let out a bark as she ran down the steps and across the asphalt to her car. Rage burned through her body as she climbed into her little Nova. Pumping the gas, she switched on the ignition and wondered at the tender little spot of disappointment and hurt beneath her blind fury. What had she expected? That he would tell her that he’d been searching for her, that he loved her, that he was thrilled to know that he’d fathered her son? Did she really think that he’d want to know about Cody, that he might even want a family? “Damn it, Beth, you are a fool!” she told herself as the car’s engine coughed and died. “Come on, come on, not now!” Again she pumped the gas and twisted her key in the ignition. With a bang, the engine fired. She threw the car into reverse, pulled a U-turn, then slammed the gears into drive and sped out, her tires screeching a little. She snapped on the radio. Garth Brooks was wailing a country tune with some kind of love-gone-wrong lyrics and she changed the station to hear on old Rolling Stones tune about getting no satisfaction.
“You and me both, Mick,” she grumbled, twisting the steering wheel and roaring away from the Rocking M Ranch and Jenner McKee. Now she could go forward with her life, close the chapter containing her silly dreams about a lonesome cowboy, and think about her future. There was Stan to consider. Stan who wanted to marry her, Stan who swore he loved her, Stan who accepted Cody, even though he had grown kids of his own.
Unlike Jenner.
Her throat tightened over a sob and she forced it back; she refused to give in to tears. She was too mature to cry over a lover who couldn’t even recall her name. She sniffed loudly, turned up the volume, and told herself that she’d visit her mother for another day or so. Then she’d make hasty tracks back to the Willamette Valley and begin her life with Stan, a life she’d been putting off for reasons she’d never been able to name. On Monday she’d start looking in earnest for a new job.
She should be on cloud nine. Obviously Jenner would never be a stumbling block in her life—she’d have her son all to herself.
Why then did she feel so miserable?
Jenner watched the Nova’s taillights disappear down the lane. He took another sip of his whiskey, but felt no pleasure from the drink.
Who was that woman? She was pretty enough, he supposed, and only a few inches shorter than his own six feet. Long red-brown curls had cascaded down her back, and her eyes, a shade somewhere between green and gray had blazed with defiance, almost as if she had been challenging him not to believe her. Determination had been chiseled into the set of her jaw and her cheeks had been flushed.
A woman to reckon with. A beautiful woman. A smart woman.
But the mother of his child? No way!
He hobbled over to the bar and splashed the remainder of his aged Kentucky whiskey down the sink. He wasn’t drunk, just felt a little fuzzy around the edges and wished that he’d been stone-cold sober when he’d faced her. Then maybe he could make some sense of her visit.
He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and snorted. What would she want with him? An unshaven, broken-down cowboy with a bad attitude and a taste for expensive whiskey. What was she really asking for?
Money. Women always wanted money.
Then why hadn’t she started making demands right then and there? Maybe he should have offered to write her a check, forced her hand, made her show her true colors. Or maybe she wasn’t sure she could pawn the kid off as his. Maybe his remark about blood types had scared her. But surely if she’d had the nerve to show up here, she would’ve covered her bases. She seemed too bright not to have taken care that her story would hold up.
He wondered if he had slept with her. Probably. Though he wasn’t proud of it, he’d slept with a lot of women, had a lot of one-night stands three or four years ago, in a vain attempt to erase Nora Bateman from his mind. Funny, he hadn’t thought of Nora in months, and yet at one time he’d thought she was the love of his life. Well, he’d been a fool. There was no such thing. He knew that now. Nora was married to a stockbroker and living in Denver, spending the man’s money faster than he could earn it.
Good riddance, Jenner thought. The pretty daughter of a neighboring rancher, Nora had shown her true colors before Jenner had been stupid enough to ask her to marry him. He was lucky to be rid of her.
So what about Beth? He tried to remember her. Could he really have spent a night alone with her, made love to her, then completely forgotten about her? Or was she just trying to get at him and the McKee fortune? It had happened before and would certainly happen again—as long as his family had money.
Wasn’t that the reason there was so much speculation about his father’s death and concern that he’d been murdered? A man as wealthy and ruthless as Jonah P. McKee was certain to make more than his share of enemies. At first, everyone had thought that Jonah had downed one too many at the Black Anvil Saloon and had lost control of his Jeep in the foothills, but now the sheriffs department along with a private investigator the family had retained were certain that Jonah had been intentionally killed—run off the road somehow so that his Jeep plunged over the guardrail rimming the highway on Elkhorn Ridge, then nose-dived into the bottom of Stardust Canyon.
Lately, more and more townspeople seemed to have come to the conclusion that Jonah had been murdered. Even Jenner’s older brother, Max, believed it. Jenner didn’t know what to think.
The fire at the stables where Jenner had been injured had been set by an unknown arsonist, and
now the authorities believed that the two incidents—Jonah’s death and the devastating fire at the ranch—were connected. Max had seen a suspicious figure near the stables just before the blaze had been set, but no one knew who the culprit was.
In Jenner’s opinion, it was a helluva mess and complicated by his own circumstances. Whoever had set the fire had been the cause of his injuries, and if Jenner ever got five minutes alone with the guy, he’d strangle the bastard with his bare hands. He shoved the hair out of his eyes and hobbled back to his father’s chair. He needed time to rest and think. Beth Crandall, whoever the hell she was, had dropped a bomb that was sure to explode if he didn’t do something fast.
He closed his eyes and the image of Beth’s face floated through his mind. It seemed as if he almost remembered her, as if a likeness of her teased the corners of his mind. Her name wasn’t completely unfamiliar, and he felt, if he really concentrated, that he could recall a night of lovemaking in a hotel in Portland with a beautiful woman with green eyes and an easy smile.
But he’d always been careful. Never trusted a woman to keep herself from getting pregnant. Even when a woman had sworn to have taken care of birth control, he’d used condoms. He didn’t want any disease nor did he want to inadvertently spawn a child.
Another hole in the woman’s story.
He thought back to the woman in the Portland hotel. It had been soon after he’d won first place riding bareback in Dawson City and he’d ended up in the Willamette Valley, still celebrating his victory. She’d been pretty enough and her name had been Beth or Bess or something similar, but he didn’t remember her as being so determined or so stubborn... or so damned alluring.
Maybe he’d been without a woman for too long. Ever since his affair with Nora Bateman had ended badly, he’d made it a point never to get too involved with a woman. He hadn’t had any trouble keeping that vow.
As far as he could see, nothing had changed.
Jenner’s grandmother and his mother returned less than an hour later. Though Mavis and Virginia had never been close while Jonah was alive, his death seemed to have given them a common purpose. Mavis had doted on her only son and accepted Virginia as her daughter-in-law, but Virginia had resented the older woman’s intrusion into their lives. Now that he was gone, they found solace and comfort in each other, their shared grief bonding them when even the birth of Jonah’s children had not.
Jenner heard them prattling on, talking loudly as they entered the back door and snapped on lights from one end of the house to the other. They found Jenner sprawled in his father’s favorite chair. They didn’t believe he had his own plans or that he’d made a vow to himself. Come hell or high water, he was going to leave the Rocking M and make a life for himself.
Mavis, her black cane more decorative than functional, walked quickly into the den. Though she was pushing ninety, she was still spry enough to get around without much help and she kept herself up. Her white hair was rinsed with blue to set off her eyes and she had it done faithfully every week at the Cut and Curl Beauty Shop on Elm Street. Though slightly stooped in the shoulders, she didn’t look her age. No cataracts marred her shrewd vision, no arthritis dared flare up in her joints. Mavis McKee was still a strong woman, one to be reckoned with.
“I don’t completely trust that man,” Mavis was saying. “Too...oily. He doesn’t tell you everything he knows.”
“You don’t have to trust him. Rex Stone is the best private investigator for miles around,” her daughter-in-law disagreed. “Without him, the Sheriffs Department would have closed the investigation and Jonah’s murderer would have walked free.”
“He still may,” Mavis insisted. “Hammond Polk is an idiot.”
Virginia sighed loudly. “I know, but at least until the next election, he’s the only sheriff we’ve got. That’s why we have to be thankful for Mr. Stone.”
“Not much better, if ya ask me.” Mavis made a sound of disgust deep in her throat, but managed a smile for Jenner who had only listened to their discussion with half an ear.
“Still up?” Virginia asked her son and Jenner felt the urge to bolt again. His mother bounced from one end of the emotional scale to the other. Her smile was always bright and cheery for him, but at other times, when she thought he didn’t see, her expression turned bleak and sometimes her bottom lip trembled as she struggled with her new role as widow. She slid a glance at the opened bottle of whiskey on the table, but held her tongue. “I thought the doctor said you should rest.”
“All I can do,” Jenner said sullenly. Hell, he hated dealing with this. He tried not to snap, but he resented having to be cared for and treated as if he were a child. “I’ve had enough rest to last me the rest of my life. Besides, I had company.” He might as well tell them what had happened here before Beth decided to contact the family herself.
“Company?” his mother asked, and Mavis’s gaze seemed to sharpen on him. “Who?”
“A woman. Said her name was Beth Crandall.”
“Harriet Forrester’s girl,” his mother said, the corners of her mouth tightening with disapproval.
Tucking her cane beneath her legs, Mavis took a seat on the edge of the couch and tried to act disinterested, but Jenner caught the glimmer of fascination behind her glasses. “What did she want?”
Jenner’s smile was humorless. “She had some cockamamy story about her kid. Claims I’m the father.”
“Father? Oh, Lord.” Virginia’s back stiffened slightly, the way it always did when she felt the need to defend herself or one of her brood. “But that’s impossible...isn’t it?”
“I think so.”
“Don’t you know?”
“Nothing’s ever certain.”
“But Harriet Forrester’s daughter... did you ever... I mean...” A scarlet flush bloomed from her neck, coloring her cheeks. “How old is the child, anyway?”
“Two. His name is Cody.”
“Well, there you go. You were involved with Nora Bateman three years ago.” Relief threaded through her voice and she managed a smile, which Jenner didn’t answer.
“That’s about the time Nora and I parted ways.” From the corner of his eye, Jenner saw a movement of his grandmother’s head. As if she was nodding.
“Certainly you weren’t so foolish as to get involved with her while you were seeing Nora.”
“Not during, but maybe after.” Jenner closed his eyes. “I don’t remember her.”
“Not at all?” Mavis asked.
Jenner shrugged his shoulders and wished he hadn’t brought up the subject. The less his mother knew about his personal life, the better. As for his grandmother, she seemed more interested than he would have expected.
“She’s as callous as her mother. Imagine, after all this time, coming here and demanding—”
“She didn’t demand anything.” Jenner cut Virginia off. His eyelids flew open.
“But she must want something. Money, I suppose.”
“She said she didn’t,” Jenner said irritably. Why was he defending Beth Crandall? Didn’t he have the same suspicions his mother was voicing?
Crossing the room, Virginia rubbed her arms as if experiencing a sudden chill, then turned on the gas and struck a match to light the chunks of oak resting on the grate in the fireplace.
“So you’re telling me there’s a chance she could be telling the truth.”
“As I said, I don’t know.”
“What do you mean—?” The fire caught, blue jets sizzling upward as the gas-fed flames sought new fuel and licked hungrily at the mossy logs.
“I mean there was a time in my life when... when I didn’t really pay much attention.”
“That’s vulgar!” Virginia said. “How could you?”
“I’m not saying it was right. It just happened, okay? I’d see a pretty woman, we’d start talking, have a few drinks, and next thing I knew...oh, hell, what does it matter now?” He didn’t have to explain himself to his mother, for God’s sake. The time of one-night stan
ds, of loving ‘em and leaving ’em had only been a short period in his life—the time after Nora. He’d been a fool. He didn’t need his mother or his grandmother reminding him about it.
“Jenner—” Virginia began to reproach her son.
“I’m not in the mood for a sermon.”
Mavis waved her hand in the air as if to dissipate the argument simmering between mother and son. “Right. What’s done is done. Water under the bridge and all that. Maybe we all just need to calm down. I don’t know about you, but I could use a cup of coffee and some of Kiki’s berry pie if there’s any left.”
Virginia didn’t like being dismissed, but she cast her son a look that indicated the argument wasn’t over and headed off to the kitchen at the far end of the house. As the click of her heels on the hardwood floor faded, Mavis’s smile disappeared. “I think you should know about Beth,” she said in a whisper, “but there’s no reason to upset your mother.”
“I should know what about Beth?” Jenner said, feeling the hairs prickle at the back of his scalp, the way they always did when he smelled trouble.
“I’m the reason she’s here.” Mavis seemed almost proud of herself.
“I don’t understand—”
“I wrote to her. Told her to come and visit you.”
“You did what?” Jenner thundered, anger surging through his veins as he glared at his grandmother. “Damn it, Mavis, tell me this is some kind of sick joke.” But he could read the single-minded glint of determination in her eyes as she met his furious gaze.
“No joke, Jenner.”
His hands clenched the arms of his father’s recliner, and for the first time in his life, he wanted to strangle the feisty little woman who he had heretofore adored. She’d actually written to some woman to come and visit him—some small-town girl he barely remembered. To do what—claim that her son was his? Was Mavis crazy?