The Hopechest Bride
Kasey Michaels
If it's the last thing I do, Emily Blair is going to pay for my brother's death!Hell-bent on revenge, darkly devastating Josh Atkins had come to Prosperino wanting only one thing from Emily Blair. Penance. If his little brother hadn't been so intent on protecting the youngest Colton heiress from the machinations of her deranged "aunt," he might still be alive. But when Josh's angry words and false assumptions caused a guilt-ridden Emily to flee from the family she'd just been reunited with, the rodeo cowboy knew he must make amends. Then he wound up stranded with her on a rocky hillside. And it was then that Josh discovered there's a very fine line between disdain…and desire!
JOE COLTON’S JOURNAL
I’m still reeling from the bombshell that all these months my “wife” was really Meredith’s psychotic identical twin sister, Patsy Portman! It makes me see red every time I think about this evil impostor taking over my wife’s life while the real Meredith was struggling to get back to me. Yet there was a part of me that always felt in my heart that the woman who was under my roof was not my life’s companion and soul mate. Finally being able to hold my cherished wife in my arms again was pure bliss…. Unfortunately, a dark cloud shadows my adopted daughter’s happy homecoming. Emily feels responsible for the death of Toby Atkins, who gave his life protecting her during this entire Patsy debacle. Now his revenge-seeking older brother, Josh, has arrived in Prosperino and is making ridiculous accusations against sweet Emily. But underneath the bitter animosity between Emily and Josh is a smoldering attraction that can’t be denied. Could there be wedding bells in their future?
About the Author
KASEY MICHAELS
is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of more than sixty books that range from contemporary to historical romance. Recipient of the Romance Writers of America RITA Award and a Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times Magazine, in addition to writing for Harlequin and Silhouette, Kasey is currently writing single-title contemporary fiction and Regency historical romances elsewhere. When asked about her work for THE COLTONS series, she said that she has rarely felt so involved in a project, one with such scope and diversity of plot and characters.
The Hopechest Bride
Kasey Michaels
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Meet the Coltons—
a California dynasty with a legacy of privilege and power.
Emily Blair: The younger woman. Though his brother was killed in the line of duty while protecting her, she thinks that the only thing Josh Atkins wants from her is revenge.
Josh Atkins: The older man. He’d come to Prosperino to get even with the cold, heartless witch who had lured his naive brother into a trap. But as he gets to know this sweet, warmhearted woman, could his mission be changing to marriage?
Jewel Mayfair: The love child. Having been found by a private investigator, this psychologist is sad to learn about her mother, Patsy, but welcomes the chance to meet her Colton cousins….
Patsy Portman: The deranged sibling. Now that the jig is up, the real Meredith turns out to be Patsy’s true champion by finding a good lawyer for her unstable twin.
Contents
San Francisco Gazette
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
San Francisco Gazette
**BULLETIN**
A Tale of Two Wives
Former Senator Joseph Colton, Wife and Family Live Decade-long Nightmare
by Wanda Harris
(Prosperino; AP) The sleepy town of Prosperino, California woke to a nightmare this morning as it was revealed that esteemed former Senator Joseph Colton has been the victim of a ten-year-long impersonation and tragic hoax that has all but shattered the prosperous Colton family.
Colton, head of Colton Enterprises, has lately been in the national news after two unsuccessful attempts on his life, attempts made allegedly by a disgruntled former business associate, Emmett Fallon. Fallon is now under arrest and awaiting trial.
Details of this new revelation as concerns Joseph Colton remain sketchy, but Detective Thaddeus Law of the Prosperino Police Department has confirmed that one Patricia Portman, a convicted murderer, had somehow taken the place of her identical twin sister, Meredith Portman Colton, wife of the former senator. Portman successfully impersonated her sister over the course of a decade, until her true identity was revealed upon yesterday’s return of Meredith Colton.
Meredith Colton, well-known in the Prosperino area for her various charitable works, has spent that decade in an as yet unidentified locale, reportedly a victim of amnesia. This amnesia, a highly-placed source in the police department reports, made it easy for Portman to slip into her sister’s life at the family estate, the Hacienda de Alegria.
For those ten years, Portman was, to family and community, Meredith Colton, and bore Joseph Colton one child, a son, Teddy, age eight. The Senator, however, has been ruled out as a possible willing coconspirator, and there are, at this time, no plans to indict him along with Portman.
Portman, soon to be indicted for, as Law stated, “a laundry list of charges,” is currently being held for questioning at the county jail. Although Law refused to comment further, other sources report that attempted murder and fraud charges are being prepared, with an arraignment to be held at an undisclosed time, possibly as early as this afternoon.
The more bizarre aspects of this case, and there are many, have caused national attention to be drawn to Prosperino and the Colton ranch, attention that will not soon fade.
(Related stories and photos on the Colton family, holdings and history in Section B, page 1; see TWO WIVES)
One
Joe Colton threw down the newspaper in obvious disgust, and turned to glare at his oldest son. “All right. Who the hell is this Wanda Harris, and who did she talk to out of Law’s office? Damn it, Rand, I can’t believe this. It has only been twenty-four hours, and the wire services have already picked up on the story. I can have the phones controlled here at the ranch, but we’re going to have a million reporters camping outside the gates like damned vultures! Trucks. Lights. Satellite dishes. Idiots trying to breach the fences. Your mother can’t handle this, Rand. We’ve got to do something.”
Rand bent to pick up the newspaper, laid it on the desk in Joe’s study. “Dad, speaking as an attorney now, there’s only so much we can do. Freedom of the press, and all of that.”
Joe wasn’t listening. He was too busy pacing, hands clenched into fists, talking to himself. “And Teddy! Damn it, why did she have to mention Teddy? And to say I won’t be indicted? Indicted for what? Would anyone actually believe that I would have been a willing partner in Patsy’s scheme? Hell, obviously that reporter did. She wondered enough to ask the question and print an answer. Because of Teddy, I suppose. What a mess. Harris is making it all sound like some kind of tabloid scandal.”
Rand rubbed at the bridge of his nose and winced. “Yeah, I know. It was bad enough when the news came out about Emmett, but this one does have all the makings of a tabloid feeding frenzy. You can keep it low-key on Colton Enterprises stations, and my cousin Harrison won’t allow anything sensational in his publications—but this definitely is not going to go away overnight, Dad. You’re a former senator and business magnate, your sister-in-law unbelievably impersonated your wife for ten long years, you fathered her child—”
“I did not— Oh, God,” Joe said, collapsing into the huge leather chair behind his desk. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly as he looked at his son. “Teddy’s not my child, Rand,” he said carefully, looking toward the shut door to the hall. “And that’s when I should have known. She—Patsy—came to me, all excited, telling me she was pregnant, but I knew that wasn’t possible. I knew I was sterile, and had been since that bout of mumps years ago. Your mother and I learned that when we tried to conceive after Michael’s death and couldn’t. But Patsy didn’t know. I should have known then, sensed something then. Teddy’s eight. This mess lasted eight more years than it should have. If only I hadn’t forgiven Patsy, believed that she’d made a mistake, had a short affair because I wasn’t…because I wasn’t paying her enough attention, meeting her needs. God, you’re right. The whole thing does sound like fodder for the tabloids.”
His son remained silent for some moments, lost in his own thoughts, then asked, “Who is the father? Do you know?”
Joe shook his head. “No, and I don’t think I want to know.”
“Teddy might want to know,” Rand put in tightly, avoiding his father’s gaze.
Joe pushed back his chair, stood up. “Not now, Rand, don’t go all ethical on me now. I can’t think about Teddy’s parentage now. I can’t think about that, or the fact that your mother, when she saw Teddy and Joe, Jr. last night, remarked on how they looked very much like brothers. Because if I were to think that Joe is also— No. Like I said, I can’t think about any of this now, about how blind I was, about the mistakes that were made. All I can do is protect your mother, Rand. We all have to protect your mother.”
“That’s a given, Dad,” Rand said, walking over to the window and looking out into the courtyard, to where Teddy and ten-year-old Joe, Jr. were kicking a soccer ball. “Joe showed up on our doorstep, just an infant, only shortly before Mom’s accident, remember? Just before Patsy took Mom’s place here at the ranch. We all know how crazy Patsy is about Joe, about Teddy. It was almost as if the rest of her children, natural, adopted and foster children, were cut out of her life, leaving just those two boys. Could it be? Is it possible that Patsy left Joe on our doorstep, then arranged to move in herself and mother her child?”
Rand turned away from the window and looked at his father. “I think we need DNA tests, Dad. I think we need to know exactly what went on when Joe came to us. For Joe’s sake. And if Teddy isn’t to grow up believing you to be his father, maybe we need DNA testing on him, too. The last thing we need in this house, Dad, are more secrets.”
Joe slowly nodded his head. “I’ll talk to your mother, see what she wants to do. But not yet, Rand. She’s too overwhelmed as it is, and very worried about Emily.”
“We’re all worried about Emily, and I’ve been giving something some thought for a few days now, even before we all came here to the ranch. I know I’m rushing things here, but I watched Emily when we were with Mom’s psychologist in Mississippi. Dr. Martha Wilkes—a good, caring woman Mom really trusted. I was thinking, Dad, maybe we could get Dr. Wilkes to come out here for a while, stay at the ranch? Talk Mom past this media circus we’re sure to have, help her adjust? And maybe talk with Emily while she’s at it?”
“It’s one step,” Joe agreed, sighing. “We have to start somewhere, don’t we? God knows I feel the need to do something. Go ahead, Rand, call the doctor and see if she’s agreeable. We’ll pay all her expenses, of course, and have her here as our guest. And after that, find out if we can visit Patsy at the jail later today. I have some questions for her, and possibly a deal to make with the woman.”
Once upon a time there had been a small toddler-aged girl who was placed in the foster system after the deaths of her parents.
And once upon a time a fairy princess and her big, handsome prince had rescued that little girl from the system, taken her into their fairy-tale palace and raised her as their own. Adopted her, gave her their name while preserving the name of her parents, making sure the little girl still saw her grandmother while that good woman was alive.
Once upon a time that little girl was happy, loved, cherished. She lived in the fairy-tale palace, surrounded by foster and adopted brothers and sisters, adored by her new parents.
And then, when the girl, Emily Blair Colton, was eleven, the wicked witch destroyed all that happiness.
One fateful day, as Emily’s adoptive mother, Meredith Colton, drove the child toward town, to visit her grandmother, there was an accident. A planned accident that drove Meredith’s car off the road, tumbled it into a ditch.
Meredith was knocked unconscious, as was Emily, and when Emily awoke, still strapped into the seat belt in the back seat, she saw two mommies. Her good mommy, and the evil mommy. The wicked witch. Frightened as only an eleven-year-old could be, Emily fainted, and woke much later in the hospital, to see just one mommy.
But which mommy?
Not her mommy. Oh, no. Her real mommy would never yell at her, put a hand across her mouth to stop her from crying. Her real mommy wouldn’t have somehow changed from laughing and loving to cold and accusing. Her real mommy would call her “Sparrow,” and read her stories each night, and never yell, never call her “you bad, bad child.”
Ten years. Ten long, dark years the wicked witch had stayed and the good mommy had been gone. Lost.
Nobody listened, nobody believed. Or did they? Someone finally had believed Emily. Someone had believed her enough to try to kill her, here at the ranch, here in her own bedroom. Someone had felt it necessary to shut up the child who was now a woman, yet still also the child who questioned, who still believed her good mommy had been stolen away by the wicked witch.
Because of that somebody, Emily had nearly died. Three times. And somebody had died, had died protecting her, had died saving her…had died loving her.
“It’s my fault,” Emily said aloud in her quiet bedroom, the yellow November sun slanting through the windows, onto her coverlet. “Toby’s dead, and it’s all my fault.”
Detective Thaddeus Law pushed a fresh cup of coffee across the scarred wooden table, then waited as Patsy Portman lifted the cup and drank deeply. A department video camera perched on a tripod in a corner of the room was loaded with a fresh tape and ready to go after their lunch break, which had just ended. He hit the remote button, starting the machine, then once more recited his name, Patsy’s name, the date, the place, the time. Once more he read Patsy Portman her Miranda rights, which she once again agreed to waive.
Everything was set, ready. He looked to his left, at the two-way mirror, and nodded. He’d begin now, ask the questions the men behind that two-way mirror had suggested.
Patsy Portman was dressed in the royal blue T-shirt and scrub pants imprinted with “Prosperino Jail” on the shirt back and one pants leg. Yet she still held her head high, her perfectly combed hair and makeup-free but still classically beautiful face so at odds with her attire, as were her carefully manicured fingernails.
It was only her eyes that told the true story of Patsy Portman. Those flat, dead eyes that could flash manic in an instant. Those eyes that held so many secrets, so much sorrow…and more than a hint of madness. She’d asked for her pills, twice, then refused to tell Thaddeus where they were, who had prescribed them. Without her medication, the thin veil of sanity was rapidly slipping away.
The door to the interrogation room opened and Sgt. Kade Lummus stepped inside, clad in his sharply creased navy uniform pants, his crisply starched dark gray department-issue shirt. “Her lawyer’s here,” he said with a tip of his head toward the hallway. “You want me to send him in?”
“I don’t need a lawyer,” Patsy said, glaring at Thaddeus. “I’ve done nothing wrong. Nothing. I’m the victim here, remember.” Her left eyelid began to twitch, but she kept her hands carefully folded on the edge of the table. Tightly folded, her knuckles white with strain. She was holding on, but she’d soon crack, go to pieces or to a place inside her mind where nobody could reach her.
It was now or never, Thaddeus decided, as soon they’d get nothing from the Portman woman. He looked toward the mirror once more. “Send him in, Kade, and then join us. Ms. Portman,” he continued, leaning his elbows on the tabletop, “I know you waived your Miranda rights. You waived them several times, in fact. But even the innocent are advised to accept the services of a lawyer, and Mr. Roberts is one of the best defense attorneys in the state.”
Patsy gave a toss of her head. “Sure. And who’s paying him? Joe? The man’s demented, lost his mind. Why not just lock me up and throw away the key? And my name is Colton, Thaddeus. Meredith Colton. I was a guest at your wedding, remember? I believe we gave you crystal. Baccarrat crystal. Do try to keep that straight in your head, all right?”
“Kade,” Thad called out as the door opened once more and attorney Jim Roberts entered the room, Gucci briefcase in hand. “Three more coffees, if you please. This is going to take a while.”
“Ms. Portman,” Attorney Roberts said after introducing himself, “I’m advising you not to say another word until we’ve been able to confer. And I’d like to have you examined by a psychiatrist as soon as possible.”
“Why? Because Joe says I’m nuts? Oh, yeah, he’d love that, wouldn’t he? He’d just love that. You’d all love that.” Patsy shook her head, then glared up at the attorney, her eyes spitting fire. “No deal. No shrinks. Bring one in here and I’ll have the cops throw out the both of you. I can do that, you know. I have my rights.”
“Yes, you do, Patsy. You do have rights. So let’s forget the doctor for the moment. We’ll take this one step at a time. Detective Law?” the attorney asked, looking at Thad. “I’d like a few moments alone with my client.”
“I am not your client,” Patsy said angrily. “There is no way in hell I’m going to let Joe Colton pick my lawyer.” She shook her head, laughed, a hint of the mania Thad had already glimpsed creeping into her voice. “Man, then I would be nuts, wouldn’t I?” She closed her eyes tightly for a moment, her face contorted, before her features smoothed once again. “Oh, hell, why not? Thaddeus, take a hike why don’t you, and we’ll see what Joe’s offering. He is offering something, isn’t he? They always do…they always do…they always— What? You’re waiting for a bus, Thaddeus? Get out of here!”
Roberts gave a small jerk of his head, indicating that Thad should leave the room, which he did after switching off the video camera, going to join Joe and Rand Colton behind the two-way mirror, but turning off the sound that was piped in from the interrogation room to maintain attorney-client privilege.
“I hope he can persuade her to cooperate before she loses all control,” Thad said, watching as Joe Colton turned away from the glass, his whole posture one of extreme fatigue. “She’s hanging on by a thread, you know. Must be all that practice she’s had, impersonating your wife.”
“He’ll get her to cooperate, Thad,” Rand said, putting a hand on Joe’s shoulder. “All of a sudden Silas Pike is singing his lungs out up in Keyhole. He’s identified Patsy as the woman who hired him to kill Emily. And then there’s Sheriff Toby Atkins. Pike’s facing Wyoming’s stiffest sentence for killing a police officer, remember? He doesn’t have many bargaining chips, and he’d sell his own mother up the river for a chance at serving his time in the most modern facility available.”
Thad nodded. “Oh, he’s singing all right. I got a fax this morning, Rand, one you’re not going to like. According to Pike, he was responsible for Nora Hickman’s hit-and-run death last year. You know we haven’t had any luck solving that one, but Pike knows particulars only the killer would know, so we’re pretty sure we’ve got our man. He says the same woman who hired him to do Emily, hired him to kill Nora, supposedly to shut her up about something. We’ll level charges, of course, but it’s going to be about two lifetimes before Wyoming is done with him. I’m sorry, Joe. I’m really sorry.”
“Poor Nora,” Joe said as Rand rubbed his father’s back. “She worked for us for years, was a part of the family in many ways. Why would Patsy need to silence her? Nora couldn’t have known anything, could she?”
“We’ll find out, Dad,” Rand told him, looking at Thad. “We’ll find it all out, if Jim can get Patsy to agree to an insanity plea in exchange for being committed to a psychiatric hospital. According to Jim, both the district attorney and the judge he spoke to are amenable to a not guilty by reason of insanity plea, if she tells all. She can’t testify against Pike if she’s judged mentally incompetent, but Wyoming says it doesn’t need her, not with Pike spilling his guts faster than the stenographer can type his confession. She goes away, she stays away, and in exchange, as Jim is probably telling her now, we’ll keep Joe, Jr. and Teddy, continue to raise them as they’re being raised.”
“We would have done that anyway,” Joe said, glaring at his son. “It sounded like a good idea when I first had it, but not now. I don’t like threatening her this way.”
“Nobody likes it, Dad, but if we’re going to have answers, and closure, we’ve got to get Patsy talking, don’t we?”
There was a rap on the two-way glass, and they all turned to see Jim Roberts motioning for Thad to reenter the interrogation room. Thad turned up the volume once more, before rejoining the lawyer and activating the video camera.
“It worked,” the lawyer told them all in a whisper, standing close to the glass as Thad went through his little time-and-place speech one more time, “and thank God it did, because this woman is highly disturbed. Highly disturbed. I would have pressed for an insanity plea in any case.” More loudly, looking at Thad, he said, “My client is willing to plead in exchange for immunity from prosecution and commitment to a psychiatric facility, and will make a complete statement immediately. Can we get a stenographer in here?”
“A mother’s love,” Joe said in the small, dark room beyond the two-way mirror. “Even sick as she is, we could touch her love for Teddy and Joe, Jr.”
“There will still be press, Dad, but it will blow over much more quickly now, as Jim can plead to have everything handled in chambers, without anything said in open court. Pike gets punished, and Patsy is placed in an institution for the criminally insane, most probably for the rest of her life.”
“And we get our answers. All the answers,” Joe said, taking a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “It’s enough. It’s got to be enough.”
Josh Atkins shifted his body slightly in the saddle and looked across the distance, toward the outbuildings, the red tile roof of the Hacienda de Alegria.
Must be nice, living in a place like this. Safe, protected. Money coming out your ears.
Money to buy safety, to buy silence. Money enough to sweep all the nastiness under a hand-braided rug and forget about it, go on your merry way, get on with your life. Laugh, dance, sing. Eat good food, sleep in a warm bed.
While Toby lay in his cold grave. Forgotten in his cold grave.
Josh tipped back his Stetson, exposing his thick, unruly brown hair, the piercing blue eyes that narrowed toward the rapidly setting sun. His skin was deeply tanned, with sharp lines around his eyes from a lifetime spent squinting into that sun, riding the range in between stints on the rodeo circuit. Slashing lines bracketed his mouth, grown deeper, harder, since the news had come to him about Toby just as he was up for a big ride in Denver.
Josh’s body was whipcord lean, taut, and solid muscle. Taller than Toby, older than Toby by four years, definitely less handsome than Toby, whose boyish good looks had mirrored a pure and caring soul.
There was nothing pure or caring or good in Josh’s soul as he glared toward the Hacienda de Alegria. There was only hate, a deep and abiding hatred he’d fed with newspaper articles about the grand and glorious Coltons, a hate he nurtured every time he looked at photographs of his brother. His laughing, loving brother who had died because Emily Colton had tricked him into thinking she loved him.
That was how Josh saw it, and he had reason to believe he was right. He had the letters Toby had sent him, letters full of the beautiful Emma Logan, how much Toby admired her, loved her, damn near worshipped her.
Emma Logan. Emily Colton. One and the same woman, the woman who had come to Keyhole, Wyoming, hiding her identity, hiding her reasons for being there.
Josh remembered Toby’s first mention of Emma Logan, how he had checked her out in his capacity as sheriff, because her physical description had closely matched that of a female connected to a car-theft ring operating in Keyhole. How Toby had berated himself in the letter that had followed, explaining to his brother that he’d been wrong about Emma, that the beautiful young woman had come to town to try to forget losing her fiancé in a traffic accident, to try to rebuild her life.
Toby had thought he was just the man to help her do exactly that, and Josh had laughed over his brother’s letters after that, as Toby had told him of his visits to Emma’s cottage, the mega-cups of coffee he drank at the local café where she worked, just so he could be near her. He spoke of her sweet and dimpled smile, her thick mane of long, chestnut-red hair, the graceful way she moved, the softness of her large blue eyes.
Toby had fallen, fallen hard.
And all that time, Emma Logan had been lying to Toby. Emily Colton had been using Toby. Using him so that she’d feel safe, knowing that she’d come to Keyhole, not to get on with her life, but to hide from whoever it was she believed was trying to kill her. All of that, and more, Josh had learned from Toby’s enraged fellow officers in Keyhole when he’d come from Denver to bury his brother.
If she’d told Toby, alerted him to the danger, then maybe Toby would still be alive.
But she hadn’t told him, and Toby had died not knowing why, and probably still believing Emma Logan might have one day loved him. He’d died, alone on the cold floor of a motel cottage, and she hadn’t even stuck around to explain. She’d just left him there as he lay bleeding to death, and she’d run, run back to her cushy family and her money and her life.
Bitch. Cold, heartless, conniving bitch.
Josh pulled on the reins, turning his mount, heading back the way he’d come, back to the nearby ranch where he’d taken a temporary job, just so that he could be near the Hacienda de Alegria, just so he could be near Emily Colton. One day meet Emily Colton. One day tell Emily Colton exactly what he thought of her.
Then maybe he could finally learn to deal with his own guilt.
Two
Meredith Colton shivered in her tan wool cape that still carried the cloying, slightly sickening smell of Patsy’s dramatic perfume. The perfume was a reminder, as all the clothes in her closet were reminders, that her sister had lived in her house, lived her life, for the past ten years.
She needed to go to town, to shop, to supplement the few items of clothing she’d brought with her from Mississippi. But the furor over Patsy’s treachery and Meredith’s return to Prosperino had yet to completely dissipate, and Meredith wasn’t certain she was strong enough yet to face down the world for the sake of something as mundane as a wardrobe.
So she stuck with her own clothing, was grateful for the pairs of jeans and cotton sweaters her daughter Sophie had given her, and tried to concentrate on the good things. The many, many good things that had happened since her return to Hacienda de Alegria.
She had grandbabies. Wasn’t that amazing? She and Joe were grandparents, several times over. There had been deaths in the time she was gone, but there had also been births, and marriages. The children she had borne, and the children of her heart, had grown, matured, and she was so proud of them all she could just burst.
And Joe. Her dearest, beloved Joe. The man in her dreams, the faceless man who had sustained her, haunted her.
Seeing him again, having him hold her once more, was worth any pain, any sacrifice. Having him near, having his love, had done more to heal her aching heart than anything else.
But nothing could keep her from worrying about Emily, her little Sparrow. It had been Emily who had paid the dearest price, spending years feeling as if her mother had rejected her, having her life threatened. And now, now that it was all over, when Emily should be happy, the child was burdened with the belief that she had cost a good man his life.
Joe said that it probably would be best if Emily never learned that Patsy, in her confession, had told the police she’d ordered the hit-and-run murder of Nora Hickman because she’d overheard Emily and Nora talking about “the two mommies” and worried that Emily had found an ally who might help uncover Patsy’s deception.
The records of Patsy’s confession were sealed, so Emily would never have to know if no one told her, and Meredith agreed that Emily had enough guilt hanging from her slim shoulders without knowing about Nora.
Yes, Patsy’s confession was sealed, and Patsy was, even now, very tightly locked up in an institution for the criminally insane, just as she had been so many years previously, after murdering the father of her firstborn child.
Patsy had been very tightly locked up then, and had gotten out, gotten out to wreak her havoc on the Colton family. Was she locked up tightly enough this time? It was a question Meredith had to ask herself, even as she shivered in the chill, walking through her sad and neglected gardens as twilight fell on a damp, rainy day.
In exchange for telling her story, Joe had agreed to keep Joe, Jr. and Teddy, raise them as his own. They now knew that Joe, Jr. was also Patsy’s biological child. They also knew that Patsy had been still actively seeking the infant taken from her at birth so many years ago.
Patsy had fixated on her children, when she hadn’t fixated on hurting Meredith, taking her place, stealing her life. And it was her children that had prompted Patsy to cooperate. Joe was even continuing the hunt for Patsy’s first child, futile as that might be.
So Patsy was locked up, Meredith was home, and it was time to put the past in the past, get on with the future.
Did Meredith feel safe yet? No. No, she didn’t, she couldn’t. She had yet to feel quite whole, as there were still some gaps in her memory, and she’d gotten one new shock after another as her family gathered around her—still the same family, yet so different.
Her children weren’t children anymore. They had husbands, wives, children of their own. Lives of their own.
And Joe. The years had not been kind to him; Patsy had not been kind to him. Meredith would give her last breath to see the taut lines around his mouth fade into a smile, her hope of heaven to have him lie quietly beside her in sleep, rather than tossing and turning, obviously in the grip of a nightmare.
Time. That was what they needed. Just some time. Wasn’t that what Martha Wilkes had told her? Time to heal, time to forgive.
Of all of those hurt by Patsy, Meredith’s heart most went out to Joe, Jr. and Teddy. If nothing else, Patsy had been a good if too indulgent mother to her two boys, and they both missed her terribly, were too young to understand that there was a new mommy in their lives now, a new mommy who looked like their old mommy, yet wasn’t the same.
When Joe had told Meredith about Joe, Jr. and Teddy, she had wept, partly for the boys, partly for her husband. How he must have suffered when Patsy told him she was pregnant with Teddy, when he knew he couldn’t be the father. Yet he had loved “Meredith” enough to forgive her affair, had been man enough to claim Teddy as his own, never knowing that he’d once more been the victim of her sister’s deception.
And Joe, Jr. Patsy had admitted that he was hers, the product of a casual liaison with some unknown man. She’d admitted that she’d left Joe, Jr. on the Colton doorstep, knowing he’d be taken in, knowing she planned to join him in a few short weeks. The deviousness of the woman, the near-brilliant manic imagination of the woman.
In exchange for Meredith and Joe continuing to raise the boys as their own and hunting for the baby she had named Jewel, Patsy had talked for hours, for days, outlining her deception, filling in blanks with a sort of fierce pride that just emphasized her mental illness.
She’d tried to poison Joe the night of his sixtieth birthday, had hinted that there had been other plans for other attempts on his life. That had been a shock, a very big shock. She’d laughed as she admitted to being surprised to learn that she wasn’t the only one who wished Joe dead, that Emmett Fallon had also been trying to kill the man.
But her most particular glee had come in exposing Joe’s brother, Graham, as the father of her son, Teddy. She’d even admitted to blackmailing Graham in order to keep her silence.
Poor Joe. Poor, deluded, betrayed Joe. He hadn’t wanted to tell Meredith about Graham, but after one horrible nightmare from which she’d had to wake him, he’d finally blurted it all out. He told her that Rand knew, and he knew, but nobody else knew, and Meredith urged him to keep silent, for Teddy’s sake, at least for now. She didn’t know if this was the right or wrong thing to do, whether it was fair to Graham’s other children, Jackson and Liza, but she did know that Joe, Jr. and Teddy were Coltons by name, and Portmans by birth. She would raise both boys as if they were her own, and with no regrets.
Meredith stopped in front of the fountain, the one that had haunted her dreams and begun her long road back from the amnesia that had plagued her since the accident Patsy had engineered so many years ago. She put out a hand, catching the cool water as it ran over the rim, listening to the gentle sound of it.
“It’s a lot bigger than the fountain back in Mississippi,” a woman’s voice said from somewhere behind her, “but I think we could have put it together the way we built that one, given enough time and a few margaritas. Hello, Meredith. Your husband thought maybe I ought to visit here for a while, if that’s all right with you?”
“Martha!” Meredith wheeled around to see Dr. Martha Wilkes standing on the patio, shivering in her thin coat not made for a raw November California day. The psychologist was smiling, her dark face lit with humor even as her brown eyes measured Meredith, her patient of five years.
Joe had invited her? What a wonderful man! Just what she needed, to talk with Martha, the one person who understood everything, the one person who wouldn’t demand answers because she knew, she knew it all. The one person Meredith could talk to without reserve, without worrying that she might say something hurtful, might have forgotten something important to the other person. The one woman who might be able to help Emily. Meredith’s heart swelled with hope.
“Well?” Dr. Wilkes asked with a smile. “It’s been a long trip, Meredith. Is that all you’re going to say? ‘Martha?’”
Meredith launched herself into her friend’s arms. “Oh, my God—Martha!”
Emily knew more than her parents thought she knew. She’d gone to Rand when she learned that Patsy Portman had made a full confession, and she’d railed at him, pleaded with him, until she’d learned everything, including the knowledge that her conversation with Nora Hickman had directly led to that good woman’s death. Well, Rand hadn’t exactly told her; she’d guessed most of it. It had been easy to think badly of herself, blame herself for anyone’s misfortunes.
She also knew now that Silas Pike had followed her when she’d fled the Hacienda de Alegria, and had found her in Keyhole, helped by Patsy’s description of her unique, long chestnut-red hair.
The hair Toby had so admired. The hair that had been her vanity, so that she hadn’t cut it, hadn’t worn a wig, hadn’t disguised herself. She’d been so sure she was safe. She should have cut her hair. Dyed it. Done something.
The guilt she felt was crushing, debilitating. And never-ending.
Emily admired her mother’s courage, the woman’s ability to look for happiness where she could, embrace the family that had not seen through Patsy’s deception for ten long years. She was amazed as she watched her mother slide almost effortlessly back into the ebb and flow of daily life at the ranch, her smile always bright even if her eyes were sometimes sad and wistful, her strength of will so obvious to anyone who looked.
Emily envied her mother’s courage as well, because she had none of her own. She used to, she was sure of that, but she still had horrifying nightmares about Silas Pike, nightmares where he walked toward her with his curious limping gait, his eyes cold and hard, his Fu-Manchu mustache not quite hiding the leer of his smiling mouth and the large gap between his two front teeth. He walked toward her relentlessly, a gun in his hand, saying, “Well, if it isn’t little Emily Blair…or would you rather I call you Emma Logan?”
She felt stripped naked, not just to her real name, but to her fears, the fears that had followed her ever since the night she’d first seen the outline of a man in her bedroom and known that he’d come to kill her.
But that lingering fear was nothing compared to the guilt. Toby had trusted her, Toby had loved her, and yet she hadn’t trusted him enough to confide in him, leaving him unprepared to enter her motel cottage and come face-to-face with Silas Pike and his cocked pistol.
So much guilt. Because she hadn’t told him. Because she hadn’t loved him.
Emily dug the toe of her ancient cowboy boot into the dirt as she stood alongside the corral fence, wishing she could find the shutoff switch to her brain, locate the erase button to the tape that rewound and rewound inside her head, day and night, night and day.
She was supposed to talk to Dr. Wilkes later today, and had promised her mother that she would, but she knew it would be a fruitless exercise. Nobody else could erase that tape for her; she was going to have to live with what she’d done, what she hadn’t done.
She was glad Dr. Wilkes could be so helpful to her mother, but her mother had been a victim, and she had no guilt. Emily knew she herself had not been a victim. She’d been proactive all her life, always stating her case firmly if not believably, and then protecting herself as best she could, fighting her own battles.
Right up until the moment Toby Atkins had stepped in to fight her largest battle for her, and died saving her stupid, stubborn life.
Emily turned away from the fence rail, knowing she’d left it too late to take a ride, try to clear her head at least for a little while, and bumped smack into a tall, hard body that blocked her way.
“Emily Colton?” the man asked as she looked up into Toby Atkins’s blue eyes.
She blinked, swallowed, stepped back a pace. “Who—who are you?”
“The name’s Atkins,” he told her, his eyelids narrowing around Toby’s blue eyes— No, not Toby’s eyes; Toby’s eyes smiled. “Josh Atkins. Ring any bells?”
Emily took yet another step backward, her spine colliding with the rail fence. She’d run out of room, had nowhere to run, no place to hide. “Josh…Josh Atkins? Toby’s brother?”
No wonder she’d seen Toby in his eyes. But that was all of Toby that could be seen in this lean, hard-eyed man. He wore a huge, sweat-stained Stetson with the front brim folded up on both sides, as if he often rolled the brim between his hands when the hat wasn’t shoved down hard on his head. Instead of a sheriff’s uniform, like his brother’s, he wore heeled cowboy boots, dusty stovepipe-legged jeans that fit like a second skin, a sky-blue cotton shirt and a brown leather vest that skimmed his belt buckle.
If he’d had a six-gun strapped to his thigh, she wouldn’t have thought it seemed out of place, as he had the look of a real, old-time cowboy about him, a cowboy about to face off in the middle of a dusty street, guns blazing.
His face was lean, too, darkened by the sun, his nose straight, lines carved into his cheeks and forehead, deep lines radiating from the outside corners of his eyes. His mouth was a wide, unsmiling slash over barely exposed, bright white teeth. A hard yet handsome face. An unforgiving face.
And he hated her, hated the ground she stood on. Nothing could be more obvious.
“How…how did you get in here?” Emily asked when she could find her voice, although she hadn’t found much of it because the question came out in a sort of squeak. “The main gates are still guarded.”
“Not to a cowboy delivering a mare for stud,” he told her, tipping back the curled brim of his hat with one leather-gloved hand. “I’m working at the Rollins ranch a couple of miles from here.”
“Oh,” Emily said, swallowing hard once again. “I—I didn’t know. Toby told me you ride the rodeo circuit.”
“I do, but when the season’s over I hire myself out to ranchers. Toby probably told you that, too.”
Emily nodded, looking away from those hard, hard eyes, that unyielding mouth. “Yes. I think he did. But you worked ranches in Wyoming.”
“No reason for me to be in Wyoming anymore, is there, Miss Colton? No reason at all.”
Emily pressed both hands to her cheeks. “Oh, God.” She sighed, tried to marshal her nerves, dropped her hands to her sides once more. “I should have tried to contact you, shouldn’t I? I mean, you have a right to know what happened that night. Toby…Toby saved my life.”
“Yeah, so I’m told. And to reward him for that service, you left him bleeding on the floor and took off. Left him alone to die. You have a strange way of saying thank you, Miss Colton. Well, that’s enough for now, isn’t it? I’ll be seeing you again. Again and again. You can sort of consider me your conscience, Miss Colton. Your guilty conscience.”
“No!” Emily yelled at his back, for Josh Atkins had turned on his heels and was already climbing into the truck with Rollins Ranch painted on the door of the cab. “No, it wasn’t like that! I didn’t— Oh, God,” she ended, all but collapsing against the fence rails as the truck drove out of the stable yard, toward the main gate. She hugged herself as she watched the truck drive away, tears running down her face. “It wasn’t like that…it wasn’t like that.”
Josh pulled to the side of the road about a mile from the Colton ranch and cut the engine, pounded his gloved fists against the steering wheel.
“Damn,” he said once, then twice, then over and over for as long as his breath held out. “Damn, damn, damn!”
Well, wasn’t he the hero? He ought to get out of the truck, see if he could round up a couple of fuzzy bunnies, then stomp on them. Pull the wings off a few butterflies, drive to town and grab a lollipop out of the mouth of some defenseless baby.
Had he ever seen such hurt in anyone’s eyes? Even before he’d said a word, opened his dumb mouth, he’d seen the despair in the way she’d stood at the fence, the defeat in her posture, the weight of the world dragging at her slim shoulders. He’d seen injured animals, plenty of them, and could almost smell them, smell the fear. Emily Colton had been drenched in fear and hopelessness, even before he’d stepped up behind her and made his presence known.
So then he’d kicked her. Hey, she was already down—so why not? She deserved it, didn’t she?
“Oh, God,” Josh breathed, shaking his head. “I must be losing whatever’s left of my mind.”
He lay his head back against the headrest, closed his eyes and saw Emily Colton’s face. She was just as Toby had described her a million times in his letters. Small, but not too small, with good shoulders for a woman, and straight long legs that looked damn good in jeans.
She’d had on a denim jacket lined with sheepskin, the hem of the jacket just nipping at the top of her small waist, giving her an air of fragility belied by her clothes.
But it was her face that gave away the whole game, even as he’d refused to see what was there. Those sad blue eyes, that flawless yet too-pale skin, the way she sort of hunched her shoulders protectively, as if prepared for life to give her a punishing whack—another whack, because she’d already had a few, hadn’t she?
And that hair. God, how Toby had all but waxed poetic about that thick mane of chestnut hair. Toby had once had a chestnut mare just about that same color. He wondered if Toby had made the connection, and doubted it. Emily Colton was one hell of a cut above a rangy old mare that was all Josh could afford to buy his baby brother for his fifteenth birthday.
So, okay. So she was pretty. Beautiful. As beautiful as Toby had said in his letters. And she was hurting. Was she hurting about Toby? Josh wondered….
“It doesn’t matter, damn it! She killed him,” he said, sitting up once more, reaching for the key still in the ignition. “She killed him as much as if she put the bullet in his chest herself. And I’m not going to let little Miss Blue Eyes forget that. Not for a very, very long time.”
Three
Meggie James had all the fair-haired beauty of her mother and the never-say-die determination of her father. At the moment, that determination was directed at trying to pull herself up on the coffee table so that she could get her chubby hands on her mother’s teacup.
“No way, sweetheart,” Sophie Colton James scolded with a smile, redirecting her daughter by holding out a teething ring River’s Native American grandmother had fashioned out of thin strips of rawhide.
“Can you believe how much she loves this thing?” Sophie asked Emily, who was holding her own teacup out of the baby’s reach. “I’ve threatened to start calling her Fido, but River just laughs and says his grandmother raised a lot of kids and knows what she’s doing. I suppose so,” she ended, grinning down at Meggie, who had just learned how to lower herself to her plump bottom and was now chewing on the teething ring for all she was worth.
Emily watched as Meggie actually cooed at the rawhide circle, then stuck it in her mouth once more. “It is ugly, isn’t it? I know Mom told me about the thing when Maya’s little Marissa was at the ranch the other day, just about gnawing on Mom’s shoulder because she’s cutting another tooth. In fact, I think Mom said she wishes she’d had a gross of the things when we were growing up,” Emily said, grinning down at the contented baby who was happily drooling all over her pretty pink coveralls. “Of course, she also said she’d often thought about keeping us all on stout leashes, but I think she might have been kidding about that one.”
“Mom’s great, isn’t she? She’s back in stride, handing out love and advice, just as if she’d never been…well, never been away,” Sophie said, lifting her teacup. “I can’t tell you how happy we are that Meggie’s finally learned how to get back down once she’s pulled herself up. I think Riv and I slept about three minutes all last week, always having to go into her bedroom and lay her back down in her crib. But when I told Mom about it, she said to put the pillows over our heads and let Meggie cry, because eventually she’d let go and figure out that she can get back down all by herself. To hear Mom tell it, we weren’t doing Meggie or ourselves any favors by constantly running to her.”
“Did you let her cry?” Emily asked, reaching for a homemade cookie Maya’s mother, Inez, had baked only that morning and asked her to take with her to Sophie’s house.
Sophie winced. “Not for the first night after Mom’s advice. We just couldn’t do it. I kept thinking she’d fall, hit her head, all that good stuff you swear you’ll never think about, but that you think about all the time once you have babies of your own. But the second night Riv made me watch the clock for ten minutes, and only go to her then—or if we heard a bang,” she added, shaking her head. “Seven minutes later, everything was quiet. Riv waited a few minutes more, then sneaked into her room and there she was, sound asleep on her belly, with her rump stuck up in the air. We haven’t had a problem since.”
“Moms and grandmothers,” Emily said, sighing. “They give good advice, don’t they? Or they think they do.”
“Oh, now that sounds ominous,” Sophie said, picking up Meggie, who had begun rubbing her eyes. “Let me put this one down for her nap, and I’ll be right back. Because being Inez’s cookie delivery person wasn’t the only reason you rode over here this morning, was it?”
Emily watched as Sophie and Meggie headed for the hallway and stairs, then sat back in her chair, admiring the way her sister had decorated the living room. Part Mission, part antique, somehow Sophie had made it all work beautifully, from the western prints on the walls to the Oriental carpet on the broad-planked floor.
She’d like her own place, her own apartment, but the Hacienda de Alegria was so large that it would be difficult to explain to her mom and dad that she felt cramped, felt the need for her own space. Especially now, with Meredith only back at the ranch for less than two weeks. It had never been right to leave Joe, who had been so unhappy, and it couldn’t be right to leave now, with Meredith home again at last.
Still, much as they loved her, Emily was beginning to feel smothered by that love. They watched her, as if she were a fragile vase teetering on the edge of a mantel, ready to fall, smash into a million pieces on the hearth. And now not only were her parents watching her, but Dr. Martha Wilkes was also here, living in the house, eating at the table, being so nice and kind and caring.
The woman was wonderful, really. But Emily felt as if she were constantly under a microscope, so that she was careful to always keep her guard up. Keep smiling, keep helping around the ranch, keep her hurt and despair hidden, locked behind her bedroom door, crying only in the shower, so that no one would hear her. She’d been taking an awful lot of showers lately….
Sophie came back into the room and sat down on the couch with a sigh. “There, that’s done. She’s been changed and put into jammies, and we’ll have blessed peace for about two hours, if we’re lucky. Then playtime with Daddy, a bath and dinner—and probably another bath, as Meggie’s gotten pretty good at blowing raspberries at us with her mouth full. That’s a real treat when she’s eating mashed beets, let me tell you. Riv puts her down for the night and sings to her—but you didn’t hear that one from me, okay, as he’d probably deny it. He’s a wonderful, wonderful father.”
Emily looked at her sister, at the smile on Sophie’s lovely face, a face still carrying the scar of a mugger’s attack. Funny. When Sophie had first run back to the ranch, to hide there, hide her face, it was assumed by everyone that she’d have plastic surgery the moment the surgeon said it was time. But then she’d gotten pregnant, and then there’d been Meggie to take care of, and it was as if Sophie had forgotten the scar even existed. She was too busy living her life, loving her life, to see it.
“You’re happy, aren’t you, Soph?” Emily asked, knowing the answer. “I mean, you have a sort of glow about you.”
“Oh, dear,” Sophie said, sitting up straight. “It shows? We wanted to wait until Christmas to tell everybody, but if you see it, Mom and Dad are bound to see it.”
“See what?” Emily asked, confused.
“That we’re pregnant again,” Sophie announced, lightly pressing her hands to her flat belly. “We hadn’t planned another baby this soon, but now Meggie will have a little brother or sister to play with, and we like that idea. Riv is already planning an addition to the house.”
“That’s how Mom and Dad started, isn’t it? And the Hacienda de Alegria just grew and grew. I’m so happy for you.” Emily smiled, while inside she sighed, silently crossing off the idea of coming to live in Sophie’s spare room for a few weeks—at least until Dr. Wilkes went back to Mississippi. It had been a bad idea anyway, one born of desperation.
Laughing, Sophie answered, “True enough, Em, but Riv and I don’t have plans to repopulate the entire earth—just our small part of it. Okay, now tell me what’s on your mind, and don’t tell me ‘nothing,’ because I won’t believe it.”
“I’m that transparent, huh? I thought so, which is one of the reasons I was hoping to come hide out with you guys for a while,” Emily heard herself admitting, so that she quickly picked up another peanut butter cookie and shoved half of it into her mouth—right next to her foot.
“You want to get away from the ranch? Why?”
Emily pushed a hand through her hair, tucked a heavy lock behind one ear. “Okay, I’ll tell you. Mom’s sicced Dr. Wilkes on me, that’s why, among other things. The other things I can live with, but Dr. Wilkes gives me the creeps. It’s like she can see straight through me.”
“And can she?” Sophie asked, doing a fair job of looking straight through her sister herself.
“Oh yeah. Straight through me, Soph. It’s scary.” Emily put both hands to the back of her neck, then pushed up, so that her mass of wavy hair all piled high, then fell to her shoulders once more when she moved her hands, making a chestnut cloud around her head. A quick shake of her head and those curls covered half her cheeks and most of her expression. She hadn’t even known what she’d done.
But Sophie did.
“Ah, the old hide-my-face-behind-my-hair trick,” Sophie said, wagging a finger at Emily. “You do know that’s a dead giveaway, don’t you, sis? Emily’s early-warning system reaction to impending trouble. You’ve been doing that since you were a kid.”
“I have?” Emily went to shake her head, stopped herself. “You’re making that up.”
“Oh, really? I’ve got examples, Emily, and I’m more than willing to share. Like the day Mom came into the living room and asked who had broken the glass in a picture frame in the library, and forgotten to take away the baseball that had done the job. That time Dad asked for volunteers to muck out the stalls because half the hands were down with food poisoning. The day the phone rang and it was Mrs. Hatcher, your second grade teacher, calling to talk to Mom. And it wasn’t to say that Emily Colton was her prize student.”
“Mrs. Hatcher. Ugh! The woman accused me of eating paste. Double ugh! And I’d only taken a small bite.”
“Ah, so you do remember. But the point I’m trying to make is that the moment you felt the slightest bit in danger, you found a way to pull your hair over your face, like an ostrich hiding its head in the sand. It was always a dead giveaway. Trouble comes, and Emily hides behind her hair. It’s as dependable as Inez’s success with peanut butter cookies.”
Emily felt her cheeks flushing, and raised one hand toward her hair before quickly clasping her hands together in her lap. Was her hair always destined to betray her? “I hate my hair,” she said quietly, but with a wealth of feeling. “I should shave it all off.”
“Don’t you dare, Emily Colton! You’re a beautiful woman, but that hair of yours is absolutely extraordinary. Why, I could pick you out in a crowd of thousands, just from one glimpse of that head of hair. You have enough for five people, all on your one head. And the color! You can’t get that out of a bottle, Emily. I know, because I tried one time, in college. I ended up looking like a circus clown.”
“Lots of people could pick me out of a crowd because of this hair of mine,” Emily said, blinking back sudden tears. “Oh, damn. Sophie, what am I going to do? Toby Atkins is dead because of me, and his killer told the police that one of the ways he could track me was because of my hair. People remembered it, remembered me, and Silas Pike was able to find me because of it. Toby Atkins died because Silas Pike was able to find me.”
Sophie was silent for some moments. “Oh, wow,” she breathed at last. “So you’re blaming yourself for Toby Atkins’s death? Because of your hair?”
Emily shook her head, sniffed back tears. “No, not really. Not just the hair. But I should have disguised myself, Sophie, or at least cut my hair, hidden my hair. I’m not stupid, I know my hair is distinctive. I’m guilty because I was arrogant, Sophie. I thought I was so smart. I thought I’d hidden myself brilliantly. And then I didn’t tell Toby the truth. He was a sheriff, Sophie. I should have trusted him, told him, and then he would have been prepared when trouble came.”
“You said all this to Dr. Wilkes?” Sophie leaned forward when Emily remained silent. “Emily? You did tell her, didn’t you?”
Emily shook her head. “I didn’t have to. She knows it was all my fault. Everyone knows,” she said, a sudden mental picture of Josh Atkins’s hard, condemning eyes making her shiver. She banished that image quickly, knowing it would be back, to haunt her dreams, cloud her days. “That’s why she’s here, to help me work through my guilt. Like that’s going to happen. Like she can somehow change what happened.”
Sophie stood up, walked around the coffee table, sat down on the arm of Emily’s chair and put her hand on her sister’s shoulder. “You do know, Emily, that you’re doing again what you said you did about your hair. You’re assuming that Dr. Wilkes believes you’re guilty. I doubt she’s as harsh a jury as you’ve been to yourself. Because I see it another way, sis. I see a young woman running scared from a murderer, running for her life, and yet trying to hang on to as much of her former life as she can. I see a young woman who knew Toby Atkins was falling in love with her, and was too honest to lead him on, make him her protector, put him in danger. You nearly died that night, Emily, and Toby Atkins saved your life. He’s a hero, Em. Don’t demean his sacrifice. Don’t make him into a victim, into your victim. He deserves better than that.”
Emily looked up at her sister, then buried her head against Sophie’s side, sobbing.
Josh Atkins felt like a stalker. Probably because that was what he was doing—stalking Emily Blair Colton. His every free hour was spent with his horse tied to a tree as he crouched behind scrub and looked down on the Hacienda de Alegria. He watched the comings and goings at the ranch, waited for Emily Blair Colton to put up her head, sniff the wind and then leave the safety of her well-guarded sanctuary.
Go somewhere where he could get at her, get to her, remind her that he was here, that he wasn’t going away.
He’d picked up the Rollins Ranch mare two days ago, and hung around the Hacienda de Alegria until his presence began drawing questioning looks, then had to leave before Emily showed up at the stables. Since then, there’d been no reason, no good excuse, to bring him back to the Colton ranch.
So he’d propped himself against a lamp post on Prosperino’s main street, hoping to see Emily Colton come to town to go shopping, to have her hair done, to eat lunch with some friends. That hadn’t worked, either. Prosperino wasn’t that small a town, but the Coltons were pretty obvious by their absence. Not a single Colton had walked or driven down Prosperino’s main street, and Josh could be sure of that, as he had memorized the photographs he’d cut out of newspapers covering the story about Patsy Portman.
Which had brought him back to this hill, this well-concealed vantage point. Another couple of weeks at this, and he’d earn his Stalker merit badge, while losing what was left of his mind.
He might have had no luck in meeting up with Emily, but he had learned a lot about the Coltons, starting with everything he’d read in the newspapers, and added to during his research at the Prosperino Public Library. He might be a cowboy, but he was a community-college-educated cowboy, and he knew how to use the microfiche machine, knew how to go through old newspaper files and find what he wanted.
The Coltons were a good family. He didn’t want to admit that, even to himself, but by all accounts they were a good, fine, upstanding family, from Joseph Colton right down to the youngest member.
Hopechest Ranch thrived because of the early interest shown by the Coltons, and all of the family was still heavily involved in the financing of the haven for troubled children, some of them even in the day-today running of the facility.
The Coltons had raised their own children even as they’d taken on any number of foster children, even adopted some of them, like Emily Blair Colton. It was one thing for a wealthy, successful man to throw money at a charity, but it was another thing entirely for that man to become so involved, so much a part of the solution.
And it wasn’t as if the Coltons always had it easy, been born with silver spoons in their mouths and immune from trouble. Joe Colton had served in the armed forces, then built his empire with his own hands. He’d served his country again as a United States Senator. Joe and Meredith Colton had lost a son to a traffic accident. One of their daughters had almost been killed by a mugger in San Francisco. Joe Colton himself had nearly been murdered by a disgruntled employee.
Not to mention the entire family being duped for ten long years by Meredith Colton’s mentally unbalanced twin sister. That had to be the topper.
So maybe the Colton life wasn’t a fairy tale complete with the rich and benevolent king and queen and populated by happy, carefree princes and princesses.
But did that excuse Emily Colton from guilt in the death of his only brother? Josh didn’t think so. Emily Colton could have run to a dozen different places, put herself under the protection of one of her brothers, or even turned to Joe Colton, who would have surrounded her with armed guards.
Instead, she had run away. She’d run straight to Keyhole, Wyoming, and to Josh’s brother, who was just the kind of guy who saw himself as a knight in shining armor, out to put a smile back on the face of the pretty young princess who’d somehow come into his orbit.
“I should have known,” Josh muttered under his breath as he watched the lights coming on inside the sprawling ranch house. “I should have read Toby’s letters more carefully, realized he was getting in over his head. I should have left the circuit and gone to Keyhole, checked Emma Logan out for myself.”
And he would have, except he’d been chasing another gold buckle, following the rodeo circuit from town to town in Oklahoma and Texas and even New Mexico. Everywhere but Keyhole, Wyoming. Chasing the points, chasing the dream, chasing the buckle of a champion. A grown man acting like a kid, while a kid was wearing the uniform of a sheriff and laying down his life in the line of duty.
Who was the younger Atkins? By age, Toby had been. But by deed, Josh knew himself to be the child, the little boy who’d yet to grow up, take his share of responsibility—that share he’d gratefully dropped after almost single-handedly raising Toby.
It had been his turn, or so he’d told himself. He’d been a man when he was supposed to be a boy, and he’d spent the last ten years trying to capture some of the blessed freedom from responsibility most children experienced in their growing-up years.
At least that was his excuse, the one he told himself when he looked at yet another gold buckle, at the prize money he’d spend at least half of as fast as he’d earned it on the back of a bucking bronco.
A few more years, a few more seasons, and he’d settle down, buy himself a small spread with the savings he did have, raise horses and cattle and break broncos to saddle for those who would ride, but not take a chance on breaking their necks to tame a mount.
He would have bought that spread, too, and Toby would have left his sheriff’s job in Keyhole and come with him. Josh had planned it all, vaguely, but now that plan seemed as solid as the rock walls of the Grand Canyon, as if he’d only been months away from leaving the circuit. Months away from removing Toby from Keyhole.
Josh took off his Stetson and raked his gloved fingers through his hair. That was how it would have been, if Emily Colton hadn’t come into Toby’s life. It was.
Josh had to believe that. He had no other choice. Otherwise, the guilt was all his….
Four
Martha Wilkes sat near the French doors with her hands folded in her lap, looking out onto the patio and Meredith’s fountain.
The gardens were fairly bare now, but so well-landscaped that they were still attractive to the eye as the California version of winter approached from the Pacific. It was so peaceful here, so beautiful, and yet the Hacienda de Alegria had been the scene of a ten-year-long nightmare.
Martha had just completed another session with Meredith, although neither of them called them sessions. They just talked. Talked about the house and how Meredith was putting it back to the way it had been before Patsy’s rather overblown decorating ideas had changed the casual comfort of the house into something stiff, and formal, and cold.
Meredith’s bedroom furniture, which had been stored in one of the outbuildings, was now back in the repainted master suite, as was Joe, who had not slept there for many years. Meredith might not know it, but she was performing a sort of exorcism, banishing her twin sister’s presence from this most private sanctuary of her marriage.
“Does it bother you, Meredith, that there was a time when Joe did share that room with Patsy?” Martha had asked over cups of green tea.
“He didn’t know,” Meredith had replied quietly, then looked Martha square in the eye. “But I’d be lying to you if I didn’t think that possibly he should have known. Lovemaking…well, it’s such an intimate thing, such a unique thing, so special to the two people involved. His wants, my needs, the way we used to laugh and talk long into the night afterward…how could he not have noticed the differences?”
“Is it possible that, at first, he blamed the accident? You supposedly had suffered an injury to your head, remember,” Martha remembered suggesting. “And after that, after Teddy? He had his own room from that time on, didn’t he? He would have divorced you—Patsy—if it hadn’t been for the many years of love that had built your marriage wide and high and deep enough to convince Joe to hang on through the bad times.”
“The bad times,” Meredith had said, sighing. “Yes, that’s one way of thinking about it all. The worse in our for better or worse.”
“Yes, Meredith. Just as you hung on through the bad times you now remember, when Joe was so depressed after your son’s death, and again when Joe learned he was sterile. You stuck with him, and in his turn he was, by God, going to stick with you. He loves you, Meredith. He has always loved you. He tolerated that woman in his bedroom, but he never loved her. He loved the memory of you.”
Martha closed her eyes, recalling the thoughtful look on Meredith’s face when she’d finished speaking. She’d gotten through to Meredith, that had been obvious. But, then, Meredith wanted help, wanted Martha’s counsel, was eager to put answers to lingering questions, and then get on with her life. Meredith was anxious to grab at her new happiness with both hands, after a decade spent believing she’d been a murderer, a woman with the most sordid past imaginable. A woman with no family, no love, no real hope.
And if Martha could help Meredith find hope again, feel free to embrace love again, then she would do everything in her power to make it all happen. Because Meredith was more than her patient, she was also her friend.
Martha didn’t envy Meredith. That would be ridiculous, considering the hell that woman’s life had been, and looking at the struggles that still awaited her these next months, until the patterns of a lifetime overtook and erased the bad years. But she did wish, when she was being Martha, illogical woman, rather than Dr. Wilkes, professional therapist, that she could wake up one morning and find her family, her children, her love of life, her hopes for the future.
How had she gone from optimistic girl to this automaton who went through her days, her years, with only her career to show for the trip? No family, few friends. How had she come to be nearly fifty years old, and then wonder where her life had gone? Too late for children. Probably too late for a husband—not that she had ever thought of marrying, even as a young girl. She’d had her career, had longed for her career.
But children? She hadn’t realized how empty her arms and heart would feel, at fifty, because of a decision she’d made at twenty.
“Excuse me?”
Martha blinked away her thoughts and turned in her chair, to see yet another slightly familiar face standing behind her. She’d met so many Coltons, biological and adopted and just plain assimilated into this huge, loving family. But she thought she could put a name to this particular face. “Rebecca? Rebecca McGrath? Do I have that right?”
Rebecca smiled as she approached, sat down in the chair placed at a right angle to Martha’s. Martha admired the understated grace with which the tall, slim young woman moved, even as her belly swelled with pregnancy. “Yes, Dr. Wilkes, you do. Could I possibly bother you for a few minutes? Professionally.”
“Professionally?” Martha carefully slid her psychologist shield up and over her own tender heart, prepared to be friendly, but not make herself vulnerable—or betray any confidences if Rebecca had come to ask questions about Meredith. “Does this have to do with Meredith? I think I recall that you are one of Meredith and Joe’s foster children. You work as a teacher for the learning disabled at the Hopechest Ranch now. Am I right?”
“You have a good memory, Dr. Wilkes,” Rebecca said, nodding her head. “Especially when I think you must have been introduced to at least thirty of us that first night. And, no, this isn’t about Mom, although I do want to tell you how much we all appreciate the way you’ve helped her over the years. Things could have turned out very differently if Mom hadn’t had you to guide her through.”
“Your mother is a very strong woman, Rebecca. I don’t think there’s much that could knock her down for long. Now, how can I help you—if I can help you.”
Rebecca pushed her long, brown braid back over her shoulder and leveled her intelligent blue-gray eyes at Martha. “This would be strictly pro bono, Dr. Wilkes, as most everyone who helps at Hopechest does so without payment. I thought I should make that clear up front.”
“I do pro bono work, Rebecca. And I’d be happy to help. Is it one of the children?”
Nodding, Rebecca said, “Yes, it is. Tatania. She’s seven, and a real sweetheart. Her father is unknown, and her mother died about three months ago, not that the home life was all that great, according to reports from the social worker who’d been assigned to Tatania nearly from birth.”
“Drugs? Prostitution?”
“Neglect,” Rebecca clarified. “Pure and simple neglect. It happens. Anyway, there was a house fire, which is how her mother died. Tatania was burned, but not too badly, and she came to us two weeks ago. I’m involved because one of the counselors at Hopechest worried that Tatania might be dyslexic, but she’s not. She’s just too shy and scared to participate in anything—her lessons, interacting with the other children, playtime. Nothing. I think I’ve heard her say ten words at one go, tops.”
“Trauma from the fire? From the loss of her mother? You know, even neglectful mothers are loved by their children. Sometimes more fiercely than you’d imagine. They become little parents themselves, taking care of mommy.”
“Anything’s possible, I suppose.” Rebecca shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know what’s going on, Doctor. That’s why I’m here. We do have a list of child psychologists, but they’re overworked as it is. Plus, Tatania is African American, and I thought…well, that is, I wondered if…”
“If seeing another black face might help?” Martha finished for her, smiling. “Don’t be embarrassed, Rebecca. You’re right. Tatania might feel more comfortable talking to me. When can I see her?”
Rebecca spread her hands palms up, smiled. “Is anything wrong with right now?”
Martha’s professional smile turned into a very real grin. “Not a thing, Rebecca, not a thing. Just let me get my coat.”
Emily backed away from the entrance to the living room, feeling like an eavesdropper, and at the same time feeling as if she’d just gotten a call from the governor, giving her a last-minute reprieve.
Dr. Wilkes was going to Hopechest Ranch, and that meant that Emily didn’t have to talk to her this afternoon, as she’d promised Sophie. It was the one stroke of good luck she’d had in months, years.
Oh, she’d talk to the woman, eventually. After all, she had promised Sophie she would. But if she could put off that talk for another day, another few days…a week? Yes, that would be good, too.
Emily backed up another few paces, then turned around, smacking straight into Joe Colton. “Um, hi, Dad. Fancy meeting you here.”
“Emily,” Joe said, looking at her intently. “You wouldn’t be hiding from Dr. Wilkes, would you?”
“Who? Me?” Emily bent her head, tugged at the sides of her hair with both hands, so that it fell forward over her face. “No. Of course not. I—I was just heading for the kitchen to tell Inez how much Sophie liked the peanut butter cookies Inez had me take over to her.”
“Uh-huh,” Joe said, putting his large hand around Emily’s elbow and heading toward his study. “Come on, Em, we’re going to talk.”
Emily bit her bottom lip so that she didn’t have a momentary throwback to her childhood and whine, “Must we?” and allowed her father to lead her to a leather chair before he went around the desk and sat in his large chair.
This wasn’t good. Nice talks took place in the living room, or if in the study, they would both comfortably sit on the large burgundy leather couch. But Joe Colton sitting behind his desk meant they weren’t going to talk. They were going to discuss.
Joe was the sort of man who would never raise a hand to any of his children, to anyone. But the man could discuss a person straight into wanting to dig a hole and then pull it in after her. He just had a way of making you feel so sorry for anything you did wrong, so embarrassed, so upset that you’d disappointed him, that you’d do anything to never have to disappoint him again.
“How are you, Emily?” Joe said once they were both settled, his gaze loving and yet even more penetrating than Dr. Wilkes’s professional gaze by at least one hundredfold. “Truly.”
“Tr-truly?” Emily stammered, her mouth dry, her lips stiff. “Fine. I’m fine. Honest, Dad.”
Joe sat forward, rested his elbows on the top of the desk, his gaze never leaving her face. “Really. So you’ve been to town, shopping? Gone to see a movie with friends? Even talked to any of your friends? To Liza?”
Emily turned her head away, bit the inside of her cheek. “Liza’s busy in Saratoga, Dad, with Nick and the baby. We’ve talked, and we e-mail each other, but—”
“Liza tells me you haven’t answered any of her e-mails, and that each time she phones you’re not available. Liza’s a continent away, Emily, and worried sick about you. Don’t do this to her.”
Emily mentally hefted a shovel and began digging that hole she wanted to climb into. “I’m sorry, Dad. It’s just—it’s just that I’m not really good company right now. Liza would be on a plane in ten seconds, and that’s not fair, either. I’ll write to her this afternoon. I promise.”
“Uh-huh.”
Okay, the hole was about to get deeper. Joe’s last “Uh-huh” warned Emily of that. “There’s something else?” she asked, trying not to wince.
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