She was listening, petting the cat again, the shaggy beast having slid onto her lap, but it didn’t seem as if she believed Noah. At least not completely. When she looked up, there were still doubts clouding her eyes. “So why are you in San Francisco?”
“Because of the book. The agent is in the city, so I thought I’d start there.”
She started to say something and seemed to think better of it. Instead she said, “But you never returned to Las Vegas?”
“No. You were gone. Ike and Mom split. She lives outside of Reno, closer to Carson City, really, in a mobile home park. She says she’s dried out.” He shrugged. “Who knows if that’s true, but she sounds okay and gets by. As for Ike the Spike? I don’t know where he is. Don’t care.” Noah met her eyes. “He’s one miserable, mean son of a bitch.”
“No love lost?”
“None to lose in the first place.”
“What about your mom?” she asked.
“I just told you.”
“You don’t see her?”
He shook his head and then said, “When I got out of the army, I found out she lied. My dad was never in prison. He just didn’t want to be saddled with a wife and kid at eighteen. I met him. He sells insurance in Boise. Has a wife, three grown kids, one still in college, and a granddaughter.”
“You have a relationship with him now?”
“That’s overstating it . . . we know of each other. That’s about as far as we’ve gotten. I confronted Cora Sue about her lies, and she said she thought it was best if I thought he’d been rotting away in prison, but I think it was easier for her.” He shrugged. “I talk to Mom once a month, and the guy I’m supposed to think of as my dad every so often. He’s a stranger. His kids—my half siblings? Strangers. I guess if I ever got around to sending Christmas cards, we could do that. But we won’t. At least not in the foreseeable future.”
“If I could see my mom again, I’d want to.”
“After what she did to you? To your brother and sister?”
“Yes. Absolutely. Because I want to know what happened, why she left me, and where the twins are.”
“And then—?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I never get that far, I guess. I’d like to think we could start over.”
Noah scratched his chin thoughtfully, his fingers scraping on the stubble of a day or two’s growth of beard. “Sometimes it just doesn’t work out, wasn’t meant to be.”
The silence stretched between them for a few seconds before she let that subject die. “So, what about you, Noah? What do you do? You know, for a living.”
“I’m a P.I. now, got my license as soon as I said good-bye to the military.”
She stopped petting the cat. “Really?”
“Yep.”
“Where do you live?”
“L.A. But I’m between cases, so I thought I’d do some investigating on my own. Just for me.” He held her gaze and got to the point. “And maybe for you, too. I figured you’d like to find out what happened to your mother. I would, too. Whatever she was caught up in that night in the desert nearly cost me my life.”
One of her eyebrows arched. “I was there, too.”
“You?”
“In Didi’s Cadillac. Special cargo space. I was going to sneak out and meet you, remember?” she charged. He’d seen mention of the fact in the news about Didi’s daughter making claims about a baby exchange and that both she and her mother had been in the desert that night. He’d known about Didi, had remembered seeing the huge white Cadillac, but Remmi’s story had been sketchy, from a distraught minor, and there had been no proof, that he’d seen, of any baby being a part of the explosion and tragedy in the Mojave.
There had been a murder, he knew, a man shot and killed, burned in the conflagration of the Mustang. And someone had definitely tried to kill him. Absently, he rubbed the scar on his neck.
Remmi went on. “That night, Didi came home earlier than I’d expected, and I had to hide. I crawled into the space in the Caddy’s trunk, not knowing what she was planning. I hoped to get out as soon as I could, but she unwittingly took me with her, and I watched through a peephole in the back seat as she drove the twins into the desert. You know about all that, right? Her giving one of the babies to a guy who was supposed to be their father? For money?” She turned a little pale at the memory, and her features had hardened.
“Yeah, I read about it in the papers.” The truth was he’d devoured every bit of information he could find about Didi Storm, the explosion in the desert, and the hunt for a murderer. He’d run away back then, yes, but now it had become his mission to find the bastard who was behind it all and haul his sorry ass to justice.
She asked, “So why were you out there that night?”
“Rebelling against Ike and Cora Sue and the whole damned world, I guess. Ike had laid down the law, so I took his bike behind his back. I was mad. You didn’t meet me, and I was disappointed and pissed. Ended up being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Like me.” She eyed him. “I suppose you read the book?”
“About Didi? Yeah.”
“I think the author’s a fake. I haven’t been able to reach her. The agent sure is, just a P.O. box and an answering service. I checked.”
Now, it was his mouth that smiled. “Well, that’s where I come in.”
“What do you mean?”
“I already talked to her.”
“Who? Maryanne Osgoode?” she said, surprised. “Like she’s a real person?”
“Pseudonym.”
“I knew that name was a fake!” She jumped to her feet, and the cat, caught off guard, leaped to the back of the couch and arched his back to glare at Noah. “She’s an actual human being? An author? Where?”
“Lives in Sacramento,” he said.
“Where did you get this information?”
“Research. There’s a lot on the Internet if you know how to get through a few barriers, and I have a tech who works with me who”—he lifted his hand and tilted it—“is a bit of a hacker. I found out that ‘Maryanne’ even went to Las Vegas and interviewed Didi’s old boss.”
“Harold Rimes?” Her stomach turned sour. “Funny. He didn’t bother mentioning that he was interviewed by her when he called. He’s such a slime.”
“He phoned you?”
“Oh yeah. Just tonight. Claimed Didi owes him money and he wants it back. Even threatened me.”
“Nice guy,” he said dryly.
“What about Aunt Vera—Vera Gibbs? Was she interviewed, too? Someone had to have been to get all that old information on her when she was a kid in Missouri.”
“Oh, yeah, she was interviewed,” he said. “But here’s the kicker: Maryanne Osgoode’s real name is Gertrude Crenshaw.” He waited a beat, then saw her putting it together.
“Trudie?” she whispered, dumbfounded. “My mother had a friend . . . and . . .” Her eyebrows drew together. “Crenshaw? As in Ned Crenshaw?”
“Uh-huh. Your mother’s biographer just happens to have married one of Didi’s ex-husbands.” He let that sink in for a second, then said, “So I’d say that Maryanne Osgoode had some pretty good sources of information.”
“I guess. But I thought Ned was in . . . Montana or—”
“Boulder, Colorado. He was. Until a couple of years ago. Now he’s living in Sacramento.”
“You talked to him?”
“Not yet. I got all this from—”
“Your hacker friend,” she said, standing. She picked up both wet jackets, tossing his to him. “Let’s go.”
“Now?”
“Yeah. Right now. It’s been long enough. Sacramento? What is that? Two hours away? Maybe an hour and a half, if we push it?” she asked, glancing at the digital clock tucked into a corner of the bookcase. Was it really only seven-thirty? It was so damn dark. “We can be there by ten, maybe even nine-thirty if we’re lucky. I’ll drive.”
“I’ll drive,” he insisted, patting his jacket pockets, t
hen his jeans. “Wait a second. I must’ve dropped my wallet. It’s not—”
She reached into her own pocket and, to his amazement, pulled out his leather tri-fold before tossing it to him. He caught it on the fly. “But—wait a sec,” he said, then understood. “You picked my pocket?”
She slid him a sly look. “Kaspar the Great was my stepfather. One of them.”
“The magician,” he said, realizing there was still a lot to Remmi Storm he didn’t know. “But how did you do it?”
“I never reveal my secrets,” she said, and for the first time that night, he caught a glimpse of the teenager who liked to tease him, flirt with him.
“Okay. Then why?”
“I needed to check you out. See if you were being honest.” Her expression turned a little harder. “As I said, I don’t really know you.”
“Did I pass the test?”
“You got a ‘C.’ But it’s good enough.”
Meaning she hadn’t caught him in an outright lie.
Yet.
“When did you have time to check?”
“You were standing behind me, right? In the bedroom?”
“You’re fast.”
“Yeah. And good. Come on.” She snagged a bag from a nearby chair. “I’m still driving.” Her eyes met his as if she was expecting him to challenge her. He lifted his hands in surrender. “And I’m taking my flashlight.”
He didn’t argue.
Didn’t need to.
He had a gun.
CHAPTER 23
“We should never have gotten involved in this. It was a mistake from the get-go.” Ned Crenshaw forked hay into the manger and talked to his wife as he worked They were in the stable, and he was feeding the horses, the front half of the building illuminated, the back still dark, as he’d only flipped one switch. Tonight, he planned to cut his chores short as there was a big football game on TV, and he’d already missed the first half.
Nova, his favorite mare, a bay with intelligent eyes, was in her stall and watching his every move. Nova was due to give birth in the late spring, and her body was just a little heavier than normal, her coat shining under the lights of the stable. She nickered at him, impatient, as he was later with the feed than usual.
“Hey, it’s coming, it’s coming,” he told the mare as the others, Frida, a paint mare in the next stall, and a buckskin gelding farther down the line looked at him expectantly, their ears forward as they snorted to gain his attention. The stable could hold eight horses, four boxes built along either side of a concrete walkway that ran the length of the building. Currently he owned these three, along with a small herd of cattle and a coop full of chickens. Oh, and one dog, a mix of lab, pit, and possibly shepherd, who was currently outside in the woods that cut through these fifty acres and was barking his fool head off.
Probably caught scent of a rabbit or skunk or . . . whatever, but it worried him a little. There were coyotes in the area, and six weeks ago, Bob Hanson, who owned the place just up the hill, had spotted a cougar.
“You worry too much,” Trudie said.
“Maybe. But we’d better get Copper inside.”
“Precisely my point. He’s just doing his dog thing. But now back to the book.” She was currently sitting on a stack of sacks of grain, watching him as he fed the horses. A split bale lay open, most of the hay already fed to the horses, a second bale ready to go.
The book. “It’s nothin’ but trouble, especially since that woman did the flying leap in San Francisco. What the hell, Trudie?”
“That’s nothing to do with us.”
He shook more hay into the manger. Nova snorted her approval as dust motes swirled and strands of hay fluttered in the air. Boy, the dog was really going at it. “Jesus God,” he said, looking out one of the open windows. “What if Copper tangles with a porcupine, or a coyote or a skunk?”
“When’s the last time you saw a porcupine around here?”
“Okay, but we’ve both seen plenty of coyotes.”
“I suppose. But Copper can hold his own, I think. He’s smart and tough. Like you.”
He rolled his eyes and threw the last of the bale into Nova’s manger, the tines of the pitchfork scraping against the concrete floor.
Trudie was one of the reasons he’d left his first wife, Didi Storm, though he hadn’t stepped out on Didi, hadn’t hooked up with Trudie until after he was divorced. Long after. He’d only fantasized about his wife’s taller, leaner, and more grounded friend. Didi had married the magician before Trudie had even moved in with Ned. In the meantime, Trudie had traded in tight dresses for tighter jeans, swapped an abundance of flashy jewelry for a simple gold band, and opted for a warmer, honey shade of blond rather than the near-white platinum she’d sported in Las Vegas. Trudie had even toned down her makeup, though it still took her nearly an hour to get her look just right. And he loved her.
But the main reason he’d left his first wife is that Didi had been freakin’ nuts. Beautiful and sexy as hell, but a stone-cold kook. Insane. He couldn’t count how many objects, from ashtrays to frying pans to books, he’d had to duck when she got mad. Boy, howdy! He’d left without looking back but had felt a pang of regret for her kid. The daughter. Remmi. He’d liked her but had no claim to her, so he’d left her with her loco mother.
When he’d heard about the leaper the other day, Ned had half believed Didi had actually jumped from that hotel in San Francisco.
And here he and Trudie were, eyeballs deep in that damned book. A huge mistake, no matter how much money they were paid. So far, it hadn’t been all that much, but with sales soaring, Trudie had stars—or at least diamonds—in her eyes.
Nova let out an impatient snort.
“Okay, I get it . . . hold your hor—,” he heard himself, saw Trudie smother a smile, and corrected, “Hang on a sec, Nova. I’m getting there. Sheesh. Pregnant females!”
Trudie actually giggled, even though she’d never, to his knowledge, been pregnant herself.
The dog was still going crazy, though the sound was a little closer now. Ned tossed another forkful of hay into the manger, then walked to the open door and whistled loudly enough that Diego, the buckskin, let out a sharp whinny. “Copper! Come!”
Trudie said, “He’ll come in when he’s good and ready.”
“I know, but . . . he’s not usually out this late.”
“Neither are you. We. It’s our fault,” she said, and she wasn’t wrong. They’d had dinner in town, and traffic had been slow. A two-hour trip to Kate’s Steak House had lengthened to well over three. Darkness had fallen in the meanwhile, but at least the rain had stopped, leaving the air smelling fresh.
Ned always enjoyed this time with the horses, doing a familiar job he’d started when he was eight or nine, feeding the stock in a warm stable that always smelled of dust, hay, oiled leather, and horses.
However, the last few days, he’d been tense. Worried. And he didn’t need a shrink to know why.
It was all because of that damned book.
“Come on, Copper, knock it off!” he yelled again, with a little more bite than usual. He pulled the wire clippers from his back pocket, cut open the remaining bale, and, after pocketing the clippers, restarted the feeding.
Trudie didn’t move a muscle to help him with the chores, but that was their arrangement. He dealt with the outside stuff, keeping up the livestock, outbuildings, and exterior of the house. Roof repairs, painting, raking and mowing, gutter cleaning—those were all his jobs. She took care of the inside of the house. Period. But she was a helluva housekeeper, and she never nagged him about his filthy clothes or leaving things lying around. They shared cooking, but only because he was better at it than she was, something they both understood but never mentioned. All in all, they were both happy, or at least he was, and she said she was, until she’d got that wild hair about the book—that had come unexpectedly, out of the blue, and she couldn’t be talked out of it. He knew. He’d tried.
“I wish this whole thing
was over,” he said, meaning the book. She knew what he was talking about. “We should never have agreed to be a part of it. Anything to do with Didi always turns into a disaster.” He looked at her. “I’m talkin’ from personal experience.”
“I know, but it’s a little too late for cold feet.”
“It’s gone too far. That’s all I’m sayin’.” He tossed hay into the next manger. “That woman is dead.”
“She jumped,” Trudie said. And then again, “Nothing to do with us.”
“Hope you’re right.”
“I am.”
He took a break, leaned against the pitchfork. “So, why would she do that? I mean even if you wanted to take yourself out, fine, okay, as long as you don’t take anyone with you, but why make such a big show of it?”
“Some people are like that. Didi was.”
He pronged another forkful and dropped it into the last stall, where the buckskin nickered and shook his head, halter rattling, his black mane shimmering nearly blue under the fluorescent lights.
“It doesn’t feel right. Too much of a coincidence with the publication of the book.”
“I know, honey,” she said, and there was a hint of empathy in her voice. “But you know, there’s nothin’ you can do about it now. And really, nothin’ you could have done about it before, right?” She climbed off the grain sacks and closed the distance between them. “Let it go, cowboy,” she advised in her sexiest voice as he hung the pitchfork on a hook near the door. “Are we done here?” She wound her arms around his neck and pushed her hips into his. A small smile played upon her lips. “Because I have plans for you.”
“You think you can turn around my thinking with your body, is that it?”
“I know I can.” She stared into his eyes in that way that turned his brain to mush, to the point where all he could think about was one thing: sex. She had always known how to silently convey the fact that she was ready, and to prove it, she kissed him on the lips so hard, his heart immediately started knocking and he felt his damned cock begin to take notice. Man, she could turn him inside out.