Читать книгу Double Play: Ambushed! / High-Caliber Cowboy - B.J. Daniels, B.J. Daniels - Страница 12

Antelope Flats, Montana

MOLLY WAS SICK of sagebrush. She’d been driving on two-lane blacktop highways for what seemed like days, passing through tiny dying towns and miles and miles of barren landscapes.

Not far inside the Montana state line, she saw what appeared to be a small cluster of buildings on the horizon. A mirage in the middle of nowhere. A few miles up the road, she spotted the city limits sign: Antelope Flats.

She couldn’t believe her eyes. She’d expected small, but this town was even smaller and more isolated than she’d imagined. She’d expected it would be backwoodsy, but not to this extent. The western town seemed trapped in another time, the buildings straight out of an Old West movie.

She drove through town. It didn’t take long. Then she turned around, stopping to shake her head and laugh. Well, she’d wanted to disappear in a place where Vince and Angel would never think to look for her. And it appeared she’d gotten her wish.

Getting into her role, Molly had put on at least five pounds, changed her makeup, lightened her hair and bought herself some conservative clothing, something she thought a woman like Jasmine Wolfe might have worn. Coming from the South and a wealthy Atlanta family, Jasmine had to have a whole lot of conservative in her background.

Molly had watched the newspapers as she worked her way toward Antelope Flats. Jasmine Wolfe’s body hadn’t been found as of yesterday. Nor had the woman turned up.

As Molly drove back into town, she couldn’t help but wonder why a woman with Jasmine Wolfe’s money and background would want to live here, let alone marry the sheriff.

The town seemed even smaller this time around. If she had blinked, she would have missed it. She pulled up in front of the small brick building on the edge of town with the sign Sheriff out front. It was late and she’d worried that she might not catch him before he left for the day.

But as she turned off her car engine, she noticed a car marked Sheriff was parked in front. No other cars were on the street except for a few muddy pickups at the other end of town outside the Longhorn Café.

She glanced toward the front window of the sheriff’s office but the slanting sun was shining on the glass, making it more like a mirror. She took a breath and reminded herself that she was the daughter of Maximilian Burke. Even rusty from lack of sleight-of-hand practice, she could do this.

But she didn’t kid herself, she would have to give the performance of her life to pull this off. If she blew it, she had a lot worse to worry about than attempted fraud charges.

Taking her purse and the first newspaper article and photo, she got out of the car and walked to the door of the sheriff’s department. Tentatively she tried the door. Unlocked. She pushed the door open, sliding a little too easily into the other woman’s skin, a little too easily into that former life of lies, as she stepped inside.

BY LATE AFTERNOON Cash had made a half dozen calls as well as copying Jasmine’s case file. He was surprised that he hadn’t been relieved of his job yet. He knew it was only a matter of time.

Cash had covered his tracks as much as possible and was just finishing up when the phone rang. He picked it up, afraid it was going to be Investigator Mathews with bad news.

It was Jasmine’s insurance company calling back.

“It took a while for me to find the policy,” the agent told him. “This particular policy was canceled almost seven years ago due to the car being stolen?”

Something like that. “I need to know if an accident claim was filed. In September seven years ago? It would have been right after she bought the car.” Cash listened to the shuffle of papers.

“None that I can see. September? Sorry. No claim.”

He raked a hand through his hair, leaning back in his chair, letting go of the breath he’d been holding. So Jasmine hadn’t filed a claim or reported the accident. He thanked the agent and hung up.

Now all he could do was wait. But he’d been waiting for either a call that Jasmine’s body had been found or that he was being suspended until the investigation was completed.

But neither call had come. Everyone in the city offices next door had gone home for the day.

He got up from his desk, too anxious to sit any longer. He should go home. If Mathews caught him in his office… He moved to stand in the back doorway. Here he could catch the faint breeze in the pines out back. The spring evening was hotter than normal and his office had no air-conditioning. Hell, few places in Montana had air-conditioning.

He didn’t want to leave just yet. He was waiting for a call back from the Dew Drop Inn, a bar on the outskirts of Bozeman. He knew Mathews would eventually check on the matchbook found in Jasmine’s car. Cash hoped to beat him to it. Mathews would be furious, but Cash would have to deal with that when it happened.

Right now, he needed answers, answers he should have gotten seven years ago. All these years he’d pretended Jasmine was alive. He couldn’t pretend anymore. At any moment, Mathews would call to say her body had been found in a shallow grave on the farm, that she’d been murdered.

For years, he’d put his life on hold, unconsciously waiting for that call. Now, it seemed the wait might be over.

Behind him he heard his office door open. He turned. His heart seized in his chest, all breath gone, all reason evading him as he stared at the woman standing in the doorway.

“Jasmine.” Her name was out before he could call it back.

She looked startled, as if she hadn’t seen him standing at the back of the office.

His heart lodged in his throat, his senses telling him something his mind refused to accept now that her car had been found. Jasmine was alive?

“I…I…” She started to turn as if to leave and he finally found his feet, lunging forward to stop her, half-afraid she was nothing more than a puff of smoke that would scatter the moment he touched her.

She took a step back, seeming afraid, definitely startled. He stopped just feet from her, struggling to rein himself in, fighting to believe what was before his eyes. My God, could it really be her? Jasmine? Alive? He could only stare at her. How was this possible?

She stared back, her green eyes wide. “I was looking for Sheriff Cash McCall,” she stammered, still angled as if she might bolt at any moment.

He cleared his throat, confused. “I’m Sheriff Cash McCall,” he said, realizing with a start that there was no recognition in her expression.

“I’m…I’m—”

“Jasmine, Jasmine Wolfe,” he said, the cop in him thinking of the blood found in her car, the seven years no one had seen her or the fact that she didn’t seem to know him from Adam.

She shook her head and held up what appeared to be a newspaper clipping, the edges torn, the print smudged as if she’d spent a lot of time looking at it. “I’m not sure, but I saw this and I thought…”

He took the clipping she held out, glanced away from her just long enough to recognize the Associated Press story about the discovery of her car.

“The woman looked like me….” She stopped. “This was a mistake.” She reached behind her for the doorknob.

“No.” He hadn’t meant to speak so sharply. “Please, don’t go.” He took a breath, tried to slow his racing pulse, tried to make sense of this. He’d been expecting a call that her body had been found, not this.

He stared at her, unable to take his eyes from her. Somehow Jasmine had survived. True, she looked different in ways he couldn’t put his finger on. But one thing was perfectly clear, she was more beautiful than even in his memory.

But where had she been all these years? And why was she looking at him as if she’d never seen him before and was as shaken by what she saw?

He stared into her eyes. She’d didn’t remember him.

Or maybe she did and was only pretending not to.

All he knew for sure was that if Jasmine had escaped the grave, then she would be back after only one thing. Vengeance.

MOLLY KNEW SHE WAS GAWKING but she couldn’t help it. To say Sheriff Cash McCall was nothing like she’d imagined was a major understatement. And it wasn’t just because he was drop-dead gorgeous. Which there was no denying he was. Tall, broad-shouldered, blond and blue-eyed but rugged looking. He wore western-cut jeans, boots and a short-sleeved, tan uniform shirt. A blue jean jacket hung over the back of his desk chair and close at hand was a pale gray cowboy hat.

It wasn’t his looks that surprised her. It was the feeling that she’d been headed here her whole life. As if everything else had just been time spent waiting for this moment.

She met his gaze and quaked inside at the rush of feeling. There was some powerful chemistry here that drew her to him and at the same time, warned her to be careful. Very careful.

“Jasmine,” he said again in his deep voice. “I can’t believe this.”

The sound of his voice seemed to echo in her chest, a drumming like that of her pulse. She tried to steady herself. Calm down. This is working. Just as she’d thought, she looked enough like the woman with the changes she’d made to fool even Jasmine’s fiancé. As Max would have said of one of his magic tricks, “This definitely plays.”

The talent required to perform magic or a con was showmanship. Only a small percentage of the act was the actual trick. It was amazing what could be done with a little misdirection.

She shook her head and backed away, using everything Max had taught her. “This was a mistake. I’m sorry.”

He closed the distance between them, his fingers clamping over her wrist. He was strong but she cried out more in surprise than actual pain.

He quickly released her. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. Please. Don’t go.”

She had him. So why did her instincts tell her to run? The “tricks” with her father hadn’t been this up-close-and-personal. She could see the combination of hope and naked relief in his eyes. He loved Jasmine.

Molly knew what it was like to lose someone she’d loved. Clearly, Sheriff Cash McCall had never gotten over that loss. She hadn’t considered that after seven years he might still be in such pain. She didn’t have to look to know that there was no wedding band on his left hand. She doubted there was even a woman in his life. But what guy would wait around for a woman seven years knowing she might be dead or just never coming back?

Sheriff Cash McCall obviously.

He seemed to be staring at her in a kind of bewildered amazement. “If there is any chance that you’re Jasmine—”

“There isn’t,” she said.

“Please. Something made you come here.”

Right. Two killers and the need for a place to hide.

“Please,” he said again. “Sit down for a moment. What do you have to lose?”

She didn’t even want to think about that. She must have been out of her mind. Her father’s genes obviously coursed through her veins because she’d latched on to this idea without thinking it through. She hadn’t expected to feel like this.

He smiled reassuringly and stepped back, giving her space. “Won’t you sit down? Please.”

There was a kindness in his voice, a calmness in his movements, although she could see how badly he needed her to be his fiancée.

All she had to do was load the hat—slip in the rabbit that she would later pull out as if by magic. She had him right where she wanted him. So why did she feel so miserable about it?

And even more alarming, why did she feel like he had her?

Either way, she couldn’t walk away now. She was in too deep. She had no choice but to stay and play this through. She couldn’t admit that she’d known all along she wasn’t the missing woman, whereas if she stayed, he would realize eventually she wasn’t his lost love. He would be hurt. She would feign disappointment, sorry that she’d gotten his hopes up. No harm would have been done.

Right, you just keep telling yourself that.

She gave him a tentative smile and took the chair he offered her. He pulled up one next to her rather than go behind the desk. She could see that he didn’t know what to do with his hands. They were large, the fingers long and finely sculpted, tanned from the sun, callused from some type of manual labor and definitely strong.

She shifted her gaze to his eyes, the same pale blue as summer skies. There was something so appealing about Cash McCall….

“Why do you think you’re not Jasmine?” he asked quietly.

That one was easy. But she could hear Max saying, “Don’t be a fool. Have you forgotten Vince and Angel and what they’ll do to you if they catch you? Stall for time. You’re safe here. And there just might be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, kiddo.”

She felt sick and realized she was more like Max than she’d ever admitted. She had only thought of herself. And now she was in trouble. So like Max.

“I know I look like her, but I can’t see how…” She made a motion with her hand, swallowed and looked around the office. It was sparsely furnished. A gold-framed photograph on his desk caught her eye.

“Your family?” she asked, indicating the photo of a group of blond, blue-eyed people standing at a wide porch railing.

“Shelby insisted on a family portrait,” he said, looking uncomfortable. “She also insisted I put it on my desk. Shelby’s my mother. She’s a bit…bossy at the moment, probably always has been.” He shook his head before she could ask what that meant. “It’s a long story.” He leaned forward a little, obviously trying to relax. Or at least make her think he was relaxed. “Tell me about you.”

Going in, she knew she couldn’t lie about her name or her past—at least the past seven years of it because he was bound to check. There was no reason to anyway, since those years had been innocuous enough and her pattern of living would suggest that she’d been unsettled, lost, searching for something.

“For as long as I can remember, I’ve traveled from one place to another,” she said honestly. “My name is Molly Kilpatrick. At least that’s what I’ve been going by.” She’d learned at an early age that it was always best to blend as much truth as you could with the lies. It made keeping the lies straight that much easier. You just had to be careful that you didn’t start believing your own lies.

Meanwhile, she needed to make it clear that as far as she knew, she was Molly Kilpatrick and any confusion on her part as far as her resemblance to Jasmine Wolfe was innocent. Even if he found out that she was the daughter of Maximilian Burke, she figured her father’s death could easily explain her alleged lapses of memory.

“I’ve always had the feeling that something happened in my past, something traumatic that I want to forget, and that’s why I can’t remember,” she continued. She described her life pretty accurately, at least the years since her father died.

When she finished, she saw that the sheriff was studying her intently. Magicians called it “the burn” when someone is watching you with an unblinking stare, looking behind your words and sleight of hand to see the “trick.”

Cash felt like pinching himself. Jasmine. He couldn’t have been more shocked or relieved. While she was saying she didn’t believe she was Jasmine, he was looking at her face, the color of her hair, the sound of her voice, her mannerisms. All Jasmine. Only just different enough to account for the fact that she’d been lost for seven years.

“This is amazing,” he said when she stopped talking. The cop in him told him he should be paying more attention to her story, but the man in him could only stare in wonder. Somehow Jasmine had survived—and found her way back.

To him, he realized with a start.

He would have expected her to contact her family. Or her old roommates. Except Sandra Perkins was married to Kerrington Landow now and who knew where Patty Franklin was.

He just found it hard to believe that she could come to him. Not after the last time he’d seen her. But maybe she really couldn’t remember what had happened between them any more than she could remember him.

He tried to concentrate on what she was saying as she told her story haltingly, stopping occasionally to lick her lips. He tried to remember that mouth. It had been so long. Would it be the same if he kissed it?

When he’d thought of Jasmine over the years, the memories had been sharp and painful. Now though, as he studied her, he realized he’d forgotten how he’d felt, that initial first attraction, or how she’d tasted when he’d kissed her.

She stopped talking, then added, “That’s why when I saw the article about Jasmine Wolfe…” Her eyes met his.

He remembered that pale green color. Only he’d remembered it as reminding him of cool jade, not warm tropical waters as it did now.

“You’re not sure how many years you’ve lost?” he asked, trying to pay more attention.

She shook her head, catching her lower lip in her teeth. It was something he couldn’t remember Jasmine ever doing.

“When I read that there was a search going on for her, I thought that if there was even a chance that I was…” She stopped, licked her lips again. “I didn’t want people to keep looking for her if… I didn’t want her family to…” She shook her head. “You must think I’m a fool to come here.”

Jasmine had never been a fool. Nor could he imagine her thinking herself one. “No, you’re no fool,” he said studying her. “Can you remember anything about the day you disappeared?”

She shook her head slowly and let out a small laugh. “I didn’t even know I’d…disappeared.”

He smiled realizing that, from her perspective, that was probably true. “Have you seen a doctor about your memory loss?”

She nodded. “He said sometimes a blow to the head can cause it. I would imagine that’s where I got this.” She lifted a lock of her blond hair away from the left side of her forehead.

The scar was shaped like a crescent moon, pale white and about an inch and a half long. He drew in a breath and let it out slowly. Head wounds bled a lot. That would explain all the blood in her car.

He felt a wave of relief. Not that she didn’t look and act like Jasmine, but the cop in him had questioned how she could be alive given the large amount of blood that had been found in her car. The blood loss, the head injury, couldn’t those both contribute to memory loss? And couldn’t that explain why she’d just disappeared for seven years?

“You don’t know how you got the scar?” he asked.

She shook her head. “It was just there one day when I looked in the mirror.”

He could see that the scar had scared her. He tried to imagine just looking in the mirror one day and seeing a scar and not knowing when or where you’d gotten it.

It should have scared her, he thought. It certainly did him, just trying to imagine how she’d gotten it.

She absently touched the scar with her fingers. “I think I came here hoping to find…myself.” Her voice broke a little and tears glistened in her eyes.

He’d never seen Jasmine vulnerable before. That he did remember. It took everything in him not to pull her into his arms. But he was a stranger to her. And she was clearly scared. The last thing he wanted her to do was bolt.

“I realized when I saw the photograph that I’ve put my life on hold for years waiting for something I didn’t understand.” She frowned. “Does that make any sense to you?”

He wished it didn’t. He’d done the same thing and hadn’t consciously realized he was doing it. With a start, he remembered that Bernard would be flying in. “Your brother—stepbrother—Bernard is on his way here. If he’s not already here.”

Her eyes widened in alarm. She shook her head. “But what if I’m not Jasmine? I don’t want to get his hopes up.”

Cash doubted Bernard’s hopes would be raised by the thought of Jasmine being alive. Bernard had inherited everything when Archie had died, as far as Cash knew. And knowing even as little as he did of Bernard, Cash couldn’t see Bernard wanting to share it with a stepsister back from the dead.

“It would be like him losing his sister all over again,” she was saying. “And I couldn’t bear to think I had a brother only to have him snatched away if I’m right and I’m not Jasmine.”

Losing Bernard wouldn’t break anyone’s heart, Cash thought. “You don’t have to see him if you’d rather not.”

Her relief was almost palpable. “It’s not that I don’t want to see him. Later. If I really am Jasmine. Isn’t there some way we can keep this quiet until we know for sure?”

He hated to tell her how impossible that would be in a town the size of Antelope Flats. He had to tell State Investigator John Mathews. But he had no way of reaching him at this hour. Cash couldn’t see what it would hurt to wait. Mathews would do everything he could to keep the story from blowing wide open, but he would want to question Jasmine—and in her state, Cash feared she would take off again.

Cash knew he was just making excuses.

What he needed was time. Before anyone else got involved, he had to be sure in his own mind that she really was the woman he’d spent seven years trying to forget.

“Maybe there is a way to keep it quiet,” he said, watching for her reaction. “I can take your fingerprints and send them to the FBI. They have Jasmine’s on file.”

“How long will it take to get the results?” she asked without even a blink.

He would send them to his friend in the FBI. With luck he would know by tonight, but he didn’t tell her that. “It usually takes a week. Maybe more.”

She seemed relieved rather than upset by that news. He got the feeling that things were happening too fast for her.

“I’ll just stay in a motel out of sight until then.”

“Your brother will be staying at the only motel in town.”

She looked surprised, then worried. “What can we do?”

We? A sliver of doubt embedded itself under his skin. He told himself he was just being a cop. She had come to him, she needed his help. Of course, she would say “we.” So why was he suddenly suspicious of her motives?

Because she’d involved him so slickly into a conspiracy to keep her existence a secret. It worked perfectly into his plan to have her to himself until he could decide if she was really Jasmine—and what she wanted.

But he had to wonder if it also worked perfectly into some plan she had.

“If anyone finds out that I came to you before we know for certain if I’m Jasmine… Can you imagine what would happen if the newspapers got hold of this story?”

He could well imagine. His life had been blown wide open for months after she’d disappeared. But she didn’t need to sell him any further on hiding her. “There might be a way to keep you hidden until we have proof that you’re Jasmine.” He let the words hang in the air for a few moments, not wanting to act too eager. “You can stay with me.”

Her surprise almost seemed genuine. “Oh, I couldn’t.”

“I have a large house. There is plenty of room. It is the only way to stay hidden in a town this size. Unless you’d rather not, under the circumstances.”

She frowned. “Circumstances?”

“The general assumption was that you were abducted by a man at the gas station who is now in prison,” Cash said. “But for several reasons I don’t think that was the case.”

“What reasons?” she asked, sounding more curious than worried.

“First off, the man serving time in prison right now was offered a deal if he told them what he’d done with you. He didn’t take the deal. I don’t think he was the one the station clerk saw get into your car.” He was watching her, not exactly sure what he was looking for, just a feeling that he should be leery of her. Especially if she was Jasmine.

“Secondly,” he continued when her expression didn’t change. “You would never have gotten into your car with a stranger even if he was holding a gun on you. You’d been taught what to do because kidnapping was a real threat given your family’s wealth. The only reason you would leave with the man at the station was because you weren’t afraid of him.”

That last seemed to finally get a reaction out of her. “You think I knew the man who abducted me?”

He nodded slowly. “A man who left you for dead seven years ago.”

“You’re telling me that if I’m Jasmine Wolfe, I’m lucky to be alive.”

“Oh, I think you got very lucky. The problem is, if I’m right, your assailant won’t be happy to hear you’re alive and can identify him.”

“But I can’t! I don’t remember anything about that day.”

“My point exactly. You could be in the room with a killer and not even know it. Until it was too late.”

She bit her lower lip as if considering that she might be in danger. “I guess the safest place I could be now is with the town sheriff,” she said with a nervous laugh. “Right?”

He cleared his throat and met her eyes. “Right.” Unless, of course, she was going home with the prime suspect in Jasmine’s disappearance and attempted murder.