It wasn't until two o'clock that Emily finally realized she was hungry. She had snacked on a granola bar earlier, when she'd stopped to water Molly, but her stomach had been just about the last thing on her mind.
She'd been too busy remembering. Remembering the many times she'd ridden this same countryside, gone off on her own to commune with nature—as her father had called it—to be alone, to dream her dreams. How innocent she had been, even as she'd lived with the damning thought that something was very wrong with her mother. Living with the frightening, mind-blowing thought that the woman was not her mother at all.
Emily drew Molly to a stop at one of her usual resting spots next to a small, fast-running stream and dismounted. Tying Molly's reins to a branch on a nearby tree, she left the horse to graze in the long grass, then lifted the canvas bag from the saddle horn and sat down on her favorite large rock that jutted out over the stream.
Fried chicken. Definitely the fried chicken. She rummaged in the insulated bag, taking out a small see-through container holding a leg and a wing—her favorites—and unwrapped the clear plastic wrap holding some celery and carrot sticks. She'd eat, then refill her canteen from the stream, and be on her way, already knowing that she'd have plenty of time to reach the cave before it got too dark.
She looked to the sky, just to double-check the time she'd glimpsed on her watch, and frowned as she saw the line of black clouds over the coastline. Damn. She hadn't been paying attention—and Weather Willie just lost the bet on his sweet bippy. There was going to be a storm, and it wasn't going to slip to the south.
Why hadn't she been paying attention? Unless she hadn't wanted to look back, to think about the possibility of a storm, because that would have meant she would have to postpone her camping trip.
She took one longing look at the chicken, stuck one crispy chicken leg between her teeth, and refilled her half-empty canteen from the stream. Tucking everything else back into the bag, she then untied Molly and mounted her with the ease of long practice, using the rock as her step up.
Once in the saddle, Emily looked toward the dark clouds again, and then toward the hills. Could she make it? She lifted her head, sniffed the air, at last becoming aware of the increase in the wind, all of it blowing in off the ocean.
If she turned back toward the ranch, she'd be riding straight into the storm. If she rode toward the cave, the sanctuary she'd always kept stored with dry wood for a fire, and which held her camp stove and other supplies in a large plastic container she'd dragged up there two summers ago, she might be able to outrun the storm.
Definitely the cave was the lesser of two evils. Besides, the last thing Emily wanted to do was go back to the ranch. Not yet. She gave a flick of the reins, heading Molly toward the hills.
She didn't look back, because looking back wouldn't help her. The storm was coming. That was all she had to know.
If she had looked back, she might have caught a glimpse of Josh Atkins, remounting his own horse, ready to follow her wherever she led.
Because Emily was right. The storm was right behind her.
* * *
Martha watched as Meredith slid her arms into a full-length raincoat Joe held out to her. "Are you two sure you want to do this? Patsy is highly disturbed, and she hates you both. This could get nasty. Perhaps you should wait, give it a few days, then speak with the doctor again?"
"I can't do that, Martha," Meredith told her. "Joe told me the doctor said Patsy's suicide attempt was a cry for help. Hate me or not, I'm all she's got. She has to have directed that cry to me."
"Then let me come with you," Martha suggested, reaching for her own coat. "She may need to see you, but she doesn't need to see Joe. I'm sorry, Joe, but just the sight of you might set her off. I'm sure I can convince her doctors to let me accompany Meredith into Patsy's hospital room."
Joe looked at Meredith, who nodded her agreement, and within minutes they were in the car and on their way. Forty minutes later, with the windshield wipers losing their battle with the windblown rain, they arrived at the gates of St. James Clinic, a part of the state's institution for the criminally insane.
Martha watched Meredith closely from the back seat as Joe drove through the gates, for Meredith had once resided here, after the engineered automobile accident had robbed her of her memory. Patsy had brought her here, to these grounds, and left her, unconscious, where the staff would find her, recognize her as Patsy and lock her up in a mental institution.
The amnesia, or as the doctors at St. James had termed it, her "disassociative fugue," had only been a bonus to Patsy, who had believed that only Meredith's insistence that she was not Patsy would be enough to keep her sister locked up for years and years.
"Are you all right?" Martha asked as she and Meredith exited the car in front of an imposing pair of doors cut into the dark brick building and stepped under the overhang, out of the worst of the weather.
"Yes, I'm fine," Meredith said as Joe went to her, gripped her hand tightly in his.
"Maybe so," he said, trying for some sort of gallows humor perhaps, "but I'd still like to put a name tag on you, just so these guys remember who you are—and who you aren't."
"They were very kind to me in the short time I was here, before I went to Mississippi," Meredith said quietly. "I can only hope they're being as kind to Patsy."
Meredith need not have worried, for once inside the large foyer they were greeted by a young doctor who immediately took her and Martha upstairs to the infirmary. "I've bent a few rules here, Mrs. Colton, but this is a pretty extraordinary case. Dr. Wilkes? It's nice to meet you. According to everything I've read in the newspapers—and I admit to following this story with great interest—you were a major factor in returning Mrs. Colton to her family."
"Thank you," Martha said, her sharp brown eyes seeing the institution for what it was, a prison with few amenities for the criminally insane. The paint on the walls was dull, the windows all barred, and the general atmosphere was as gray and chilly as this November day. "It looks like you have the same budget woes as we do in Mississippi, Doctor," she said as an attendant unlocked the last of a set of three secured doors leading to the infirmary.
"Budget cuts are the bane of my life," the doctor agreed with a wry smile. "Still, we do what we can. Do you mind? I have to stay with you, as does Dave, our attendant."
Meredith stepped through the doorway without answering, and the doctor, Dave and Martha followed her. The room they entered was long and narrow, with equally narrow beds lining both walls. Surprisingly, other than the last one on the left, the beds were empty. But in that last bed lay Patsy Portman, her head turned away from the doorway, her wrists and ankles in cloth restraints, her left wrist heavily bandaged.
"Go slow," Martha warned Meredith, taking her arm for a moment. "Just say hello, and see where Patsy wants to go from there."
Martha followed close behind Meredith, then stopped some ten feet from the bed as Patsy turned toward them, the fire in her eyes looking like Hollywood special effects. Martha felt a shiver trace icy fingers down her spine as she looked into the face of Patsy Portman—a face stripped bare by insanity, turned ugly even in its patrician beauty.
"Well, well, well, look who's here," Patsy said, her grin grotesque, drool running from one corner of her mouth. Antipsychotic drugs, Martha decided. They often had side effects that included drooling, twitching, and sometimes even a blank expression that could appear almost masklike. Patsy wore that mask now, but it didn't expand to include those hot, searching eyes.
"Patsy," Meredith said, reaching out a hand, then drawing it back. "Are you…are you all right?"
Patsy's grin widened. "Oh, yeah, I'm great. This afternoon we're having a pool party. Last night it was a first-run movie in the assembly room, and tomorrow we're having Queen Elizabeth to tea. Am I all right? God, Meredith, you were always such an idiot!"
The doctor stepped forward, but Martha held out an arm, silently motioning for him to stay where he was, say nothing.
"Yes, you always were the smart one, weren't you, Patsy?" Meredith said, her tone surprising Martha, because it sounded so much like her own professional tone. She guessed that Meredith hadn't been in therapy for five long years without learning a few tricks of the trade. "Always prettier, too, Patsy. Everyone said so."
Patsy's smile turned Cheshire-like, and the woman actually looked as if she were about to preen, to purr. "And everyone was right, too," she crowed, even going so far as to toss a come-hither wink at Dave, the strapping attendant. Then, just as suddenly as that mood had hit, it disappeared, to be replaced by Patsy's trembling bottom lip, and even a tear. "Merry, you've got to help me. You're the only one who can help me."
"That's why I'm here, Patsy. I was told you needed my help." Meredith looked to Martha, who nodded, and then she stepped closer to the bed. "We're taking care of Joe, Jr. and Teddy, Patsy. We always will."
"I know. I could hate you more if you weren't so damned good. But it isn't enough. I'm never going to get out of here, Merry. Not this time. So you have to help me. Before my mind goes, before these damn drugs they're forcing on me make me forget. You have to find my Jewel."
"Your—What do you mean, Patsy?"
"Jewel! Not a what. A who. My daughter, Merry. The one that bastard Ellis Mayfair stole from me. That was my only mistake, you know," she went on, the cunning look back in her eyes. "I shouldn't have killed him until he told me where he'd taken her. I've looked, Merry. I've spent a fortune, looking for her. She's out there, I know it."
"And you named her Jewel?" Meredith asked, stepping even closer, placing her hand in her sister's. "But that was so long ago, Patsy. If whoever you hired couldn't find her in all this time—"
Patsy's knuckles turned white as she gripped Meredith's hand, so that Dave stepped forward, ready to assist. "Idiots! I hired idiots! You and Joe have more money than God, Merry. You can find her. You have to find her. I'll give you a month, Merry. A month, or next time I'll slice deeper. I mean it, Merry, I'll slice clear through to the bone." Her lips drew back over her teeth. "You slice lengthwise, Meredith, down the arm to open the artery, not across the wrist. I know how. I know how, and I'll do it. These idiots can't stop me."
Dave pried Patsy's fingers loose and Martha turned Meredith by touching her shoulders, then led her out of the room.
"Does she mean it, Martha?" Meredith asked as they rode the elevator back to the lobby. "Will she really kill herself next time?"
"It doesn't matter what I believe, Meredith," Martha told her quietly. "It's what you believe, and what you can live with."
Meredith gave an abrupt shake of her head. "We're going to find her, Martha. We're going to find Patsy's daughter. I don't know how, but we're going to do it. We have to!"
Six
Emily had pulled her rain poncho from her backpack when the wind picked up, even though the sound of the thin plastic, slapped hard by that wind, always set Molly to dancing, her ears flicking as she objected to the strange noise.
She pulled up the hood overtop her Stetson as the wind got worse, coming at her from the rear, nearly pushing her forward in the saddle. The sky was getting darker, too soon to be losing the light, and as she neared her hill—her private hill—the branches of the trees around her whipped in the air. The long grass was bent nearly sideways, and one small, dead branch had come flying past her, heavily catching her on the left shoulder.
Then the rain came. Slashing, stinging, cold as hell. The sky lit with lightning, boomed with thunder, and a near waterfall kept running off the brim of her Stetson, then blowing into her eyes. She could barely see, barely navigate, and she put most of her faith in Molly's surefooted judgment and the mare's memory of their destination.
For the last one hundred or more yards of the way, Emily had to dismount, lead Molly uphill through the scrub and rocks, beneath the blowing trees. But the cave was up there, large enough for both her and Molly, dark and damp, but blessedly dry and out of the wind and rain.
She slipped off her backpack and grabbed the flashlight from the outside ring that held it at the ready, the strong light cutting through the teeming rain as she searched out the well-hidden mouth of the cave.
There. There it was. The opening was nearly obscured by the growth of grass, and almost blocked by a freshly fallen limb. "Damn," Emily muttered, wondering how she'd get Molly over that branch and into the cave.
She braced the flashlight against a small rock, aiming the light toward the cave entrance. "Where's a good forklift when you need one?" she asked herself, already reaching for the coiled rope on her saddle, planning to tie one end around the branch, the other around Molly's saddle horn. She might not be able to move the heavy limb, but Molly could.
Emily's fingers were stiff inside her leather gloves, icy cold and clumsy as she tried to tie the rope around the heaviest part of the limb. Then the sky lit, bright as noon, and the heavens broke in two with a crack of thunder that shook the hillside.
"Molly, no!"
Emily dropped the length of rope and ran toward her mount, who was already badly spooked, her eyes rolling in her head. Before Emily could reach her, there was another blinding flash of light, another clap of thunder, and Molly reared, wheeled and took off down the hillside.
Emily watched the mare run off, taking with her the sleeping bag, the food, the water, and even the backpack Emily had shrugged out of, hanging it around the saddle horn by one strap. The flashlight had also come to grief, and lay smashed where Molly's hoof had crushed it. Gone, everything was gone, either broken or heading back down the hill on Molly's back, and Emily was very much alone on the hillside with nothing but the clothes she stood up in and the stupid length of rope.
The rain, which had already been falling in earnest, doubled in intensity so that, Emily knew, a sheep standing out in such a downpour, and stupid enough to look up, would drown—or so she'd been told. Emily did lift her head to take one look at the black sky, but quickly lowered it again. She was dumb to be out here, but she wasn't as dumb as a sheep!
Clawing her way, Emily half stepped, half crawled over the sharp branches of the limb, and left the rain behind her as she all but fell onto the floor of the cave.
So dark. She had to crawl, feel her way, until at last her fingers touched the plastic container holding her camp stove. Her handy-dandy automatic fire starter was in her backpack, but she was sure she'd left a box of kitchen matches in the container. Please God, let her have matches.
Teeth chattering, fingers stiff with cold, she flipped open the lid of the container, grateful she'd not seen the use of putting a lock on plastic, which could be cut open by anyone who really, really wanted to see what was inside. Not that she could have cut it open, because her knife was in her backpack and her backpack was heading downhill on Molly, but then being grateful for small favors was, it seemed, going to be all she had right now.
It took minutes, felt like hours, for Emily to pull out the small camp stove, rummage in the bottom of the container and find the box of kitchen matches that would light the propane in the portable tank. Once it was lit, she could use the flame to ignite some small bits of dry shrub, then light the wood fire she always left ready to go before she broke camp.
She might be hungry, she might be on foot, stranded until the storm was past her, but at least she could be dry and warm.
* * *
So much for Josh's tracking skills. The woman was gone, lost in the artificial night and rain so fierce that his vision was limited to only a few feet in front of him.
He should have followed her more closely, shortened the gap between them before she turned her horse into that thick stand of trees at the base of the hill. But he hadn't, and now she was gone, out of sight, and he was slowly drowning as he sat his horse, wondering where to go next, what to do.
And then he heard it. Off to his right. A noise. A crashing. The sound of an animal in pain.
He guided his horse toward the noise, now a screaming that sickened him in his gut. His own mount tossed its head, absorbing the panic of that raw scream, and Josh had to fight to keep his seat as he relentlessly moved toward something he didn't want to see.
Dismounting, he firmly tied his mount's reins to a stout branch and proceeded on foot, toward the barely discernible shape of a fully-loaded horse down and flailing.
The woman. Where was the woman? Where was Emily Colton?
Don't let her be under the horse.
Josh circled the mare, gingerly reaching for the dragging reins, all the while talking, trying to soothe the panicked mass of bone and muscle and razor-sharp hooves. All the while, he scanned the scene as best he could, looking for Emily Colton, not finding her.
He dragged his full attention to the horse. All four legs were flailing, and obviously not broken. That was one small favor. In fact, it would appear that the horse was more frightened than injured, and that the heavy load on its back was giving it most of its trouble—rather like a turtle flipped onto its shell and powerless to right itself.
But more than the weight was holding the mare down. Sure enough, there was a backpack dangling from the saddle horn, the second strap caught up in a branch that now bent all the way to the ground.
"They make these things stronger every year, almost stronger than steel. Must be those new space-age materials I keep reading about. Yeah, well, snared like a rabbit in a trap, weren't you, girl?" Josh said, removing the backpack from the saddle horn, then giving Molly a solid whomp on her hindquarters so that she struggled to her feet. The mare would have run off again, but Josh had a firm hand on the reins, and a basically gentle saddle horse was no match against his skills. Within moments, Molly was standing quite still, looking rather embarrassed that she had caused such a fuss.
"Where's your lady, girl?" Josh asked the horse, stroking the mare's white-blazed face. "Where did you leave her?"
Maybe Dr. Dolittle could talk to the animals, and there was that book about a guy who whispered to horses, but Josh knew he'd pretty much struck out when Molly dipped her head and began chewing on some damp grass close against the base of a nearby tree.
He'd have to find Emily Colton on his own, and dragging two horses with him while he was at it, because only an idiot would try to move, mounted, through these dense trees.
The woman was more trouble than she was worth, and seemingly born to get into trouble, into scrapes she needed to be bailed out of by some dumb sucker who believed it his duty to help damsels in distress. That was how Toby had gotten involved with Emily Colton, and now here he was, next in line to audition for the role of knight errant.
Man, talk about having a bad feeling about something; Josh sensed danger in this whole, mixed-up situation. Danger to Emily Colton, who was out in the middle of nowhere without her horse or supplies, and danger to himself, who for some ungodly reason actually felt worried about her.
Josh returned to his own mount, untied him and led him back to Molly, then looked uphill as if some sort of divine intervention would show him where Emily and Molly had parted company. Was the woman lying hurt somewhere? Broken leg? Broken neck?
And then he saw it. Through the dark and the lashing rain, he saw it: smoke.
Lifting his head, he sniffed the air like a hound ready to go on point. Yes, definitely wood smoke. Yet it was raining, all the wood from here to the Pacific was wet, too wet to burn. How the hell…?
"Come on, kids, let's check this out," he said to the horses, urging them forward, one lead in each hand, his shoulders straining as the animals made known their reluctance to climb the hill.
His boots slipping on the wet ground, Josh kept moving forward, moving straight up the hill, seeing the path Molly had made in her panicked descent whenever helpful lightning flashed, momentarily illuminating his way.
The smell of wood smoke got stronger, and Josh's stomach growled as if the smell of a campfire equaled the aroma of meat cooking on a spit hanging over that fire. He was cold, he was wet, his boots weren't made for hill-climbing, and Josh's temper was riding a razor edge as he moved on, sure his shoulders would be pulled from their sockets as the horses reacted to the next crash of thunder.
Lightning flashed, and Josh tensed for the boom that would surely follow, but in that moment of illumination he saw a length of whitish rope lying on the ground, one end tied to the base of a thick, leafy branch.
"What the—?" He stopped, and when the wind whipped around, it sent an even stronger whiff of wood smoke to his nostrils. Squinting, he could swear the smoke was coming from behind the tree limb, coming straight out of the hillside.
A slow smile crept over his face, and he tied Molly to a tree branch, then led his own mount forward. What a woman could start, a man nearly always had to finish. He tied the loose end of the rope to his horse's saddle horn, and then walked the animal backward, so that the tree limb, heavy with rain, began to slowly inch away from what he was sure would be the mouth of a cave.
* * *
Emily was feeling pretty proud of herself, even as she worried about Molly. But the storm would be over in the morning, and Molly would either return to the cave on her own, or Emily would find her somewhere on the hillside. She believed that because she needed to believe that, and since she couldn't change anything, she did her best to pretend that everything was all right, would be all right.
Molly wouldn't go back to the ranch on her own, Emily was at least sure of that. No, she'd stick around, waiting for Emily to find her, and then look ashamed as she tried to root in Emily's pocket for a carrot.
Which wouldn't be there, because Emily had already eaten it.
Emily had also stripped herself to the skin, getting out of all her wet clothing once she'd gotten the fire started, laying her clothing on rocks near the fire after she'd wrapped herself in the old wool army blanket she kept in the container.
For the past ten minutes, now that her teeth had stopped chattering, she'd sat on a smooth rock beside the fire, enjoying her dinner. Cans of ravioli, a hand can-opener and her camp stove had transformed the small cave into a five-star restaurant, even if Emily had barely waited for the ravioli to be warm before hungrily spooning it into her mouth.
She was just raising the spoon to her mouth one last time, to lick it, when the tree branch at the mouth of the cave began to move.
Earthquake?
No, that couldn't be. Everything would be moving if it was an earthquake.
The tree limb kept moving, opening the mouth of the cave to the wind and rain, and letting the wood smoke more naturally find its way out into the night, even as Emily moved more deeply into the cave.
She held the blanket close to her as she looked longingly at her clothing for a second or two, then watched the mouth of the cave, knowing a bear wouldn't have moved the branch, and wondering what could be out there that was as strong, and as dangerous, as a bear.
Why didn't she have her rifle? Why had Molly run off with the thing tucked into a leather scabbard on the saddle? Why had she been so dumb as to come up here, into the hills, in the first place?
Nothing happened for the next few seconds. The branch was gone, and the night was quiet, even the thunder ceasing long enough for Emily to be able to hear her own heart rapidly beating in her ears.
And then she saw a hat, a Stetson. The hat was attached to a tall, black slicker-clad male-type body that walked into the cave on cowboy-booted feet. She couldn't see the face, but she recognized the boots. Stupid thing, to recognize a pair of boots, but these were a sort of beigy snakeskin, and very distinctive. She even remembered that Toby had told her his brother had won the boots in one of his rodeos.
She felt very naked under the blanket, which she was, but she also was mad. Madder than hell. The man had followed her! There was no other answer, no other explanation.
God, would she have to take the next space shuttle in order to get away from people, away from this one most intimidating person?
"Evenin', ma'am," Josh Atkins said once he was standing on the other side of the fire, looking straight at her. He pushed the hood of his slicker from his head, then touched the brim of his drenched Stetson as if bidding her good day.
"Go away," Emily said, wincing as the power of her frantic voice echoed inside the cave. "Just…just go away."
"Be the gentleman, you mean?" Josh asked, taking another step in her direction. "You're asking the wrong man, Miss Colton, if it's a gentleman you're looking for tonight. Besides, I've got two horses out there, and they need to come inside. It'll be cramped, but we can do it."
"Two horses?" Emily spoke in spite of herself, hope flaring that Josh Atkins had found her Molly. "Are they both yours?"
"Only if I was into horse thieving, which I'm not. I found your mare down near the base of the hill. What happened? Did she throw you? Or are you dumb enough to leave a horse's leads trailing in the middle of a storm? Horses aren't dogs, Miss Colton. They don't sit or stay on command."
"And just when I thought I was going to have to thank you for finding my horse," Emily said, one corner of her mouth definitely trying to slide into a sneer. "Well, don't just stand there—get them in here."
"Used to giving orders, are you?" Josh tipped his hat back on his head, his harshly handsome features clearly shown in the light from the fire. "Funny, but that's not how it works out on the range. Each man takes care of his own horse."
Emily tried to hug the blanket even closer. "I—I can't. I…I'm not…"
"Yes, I had noticed that," Josh drawled, his gaze going to the shirt and jeans and underclothes spread out to dry near the fire. "In that case, we'll make a trade. I bring in your horse, and you open another can of that ravioli I must have been smelling even halfway down the hill. Deal?"
Mutely, Emily nodded. "And then you'll leave?"
She watched as Josh tipped back his chin and laughed, a clearly amused yet rather sarcastic sound that put her teeth on edge. "Leave? Miss Colton, there's the mother of all storms going on out there, in case you didn't notice. It'll probably go on for days. Leave? I'm not going anywhere. Neither of us is going anywhere. Which is pretty handy, because you and I have a few things to talk about, don't we?"
Emily actually felt the blood draining from her face, even as her body grew hot. "I have nothing to say to you that you'd listen to, Mr. Atkins. You've already drawn your own conclusions, not that I care what you think."
"You care what everybody thinks, Emily Colton, or you wouldn't have been riding up here to hide with a storm coming in. So let's not kid ourselves, lady. I'm here to tell you about my brother, to let you know just how much you destroyed when you let him walk blindly into that death trap. And then, if you have the guts, the gall, you can tell me why you did it, try to make me understand."
Emily blinked back tears even as she bit back a sharp reply. She just looked at him levelly and said, "The horses won't get any drier standing outside, Mr. Atkins."
He returned her stare for a few moments, then replaced his Stetson, lifted up the hood of his slicker, turned on his heel and headed out of the cave.
"Oh, God," Emily groaned, sinking to her knees. She had nowhere to go, nowhere else to run. She was here, and Josh Atkins was here, and neither of them were going anywhere until the storm passed. Days. He said it might be days. How could she possibly survive in this cave with him for days? And nights…
Emily got to her feet, quickly gathered up her still-damp clothing and ran to the back of the cave, out of the light, to get dressed.
* * *
Meredith stood at the French doors, her arms folded tight over her chest, and watched the rain that lashed across the patio. She heard footsteps behind her and asked, without turning around, "Did you hear the latest weather report, Joe? Is there any sign of this letting up?"
His large hands touched her shoulders, began kneading the tightness out of them, and she relaxed as much as she could, leaning back against his strength. "No change, sweetheart. This storm is going to hang on for another day and night, and then a second storm could come in from offshore. Or it could miss us entirely, go south."
"In other words, they don't know," Meredith said, sighing. "Why do they say it might go here, or it might go there? Why don't they just admit it—they have no idea what the weather is going to do. All their computers, all their science, and my grandmother Portman's bunion was a better indicator."
Joe bent and kissed the side of her throat. "That's it, sweetheart, take out your anger and frustration on the weatherman. He probably deserves it."
Meredith turned in his arms, smiled up at him. "I know I'm being silly, Joe. Did you make that call?"
"To Austin? Yes, I caught him just as he was heading to his father's house for the weekend. Peter's fine, by the way, as are all the McGraths. Anyway, Austin said he'd postpone his trip and stop by here tomorrow, to get as much background information from us as he can."
"It's difficult to believe that the Austin I remember as a child has had such a full and sometimes tragic life. But I'm really amazed that he's actually a private investigator, and that he was so much help to you when Emmett…"
"When Emmett tried to kill me," Joe finished for her, leading her over to one of the overstuffed couches. "Austin was a great help to us all, Meredith, and when he and Rebecca fell in love, well, I wish you had been here to see the way she blossomed, began to glow."
"I'm just glad they're here now, that Austin agreed to move here from Portland so that Rebecca could stay near us. So, he's coming here tomorrow?"
"Eight o'clock," Joe confirmed, nodding. "Rand has faxed me copies of a lot of information that was found in Patsy's papers, although what they do is just pretty much rule out a lot of leads. No, don't frown, sweetheart. If this Jewel is out there, Austin will find her."
Meredith smiled wanly, shaking her head. "I can't seem to get rid of my memory of the way Patsy sounded as we left her. She means it, Joe. She will kill herself. And let's face it, she's never getting out of that institution. With us taking care of her boys, the only thing keeping her going is the chance to maybe see her Jewel again. I can't help wondering, Joe, if she'd never gotten pregnant, if that man hadn't sold away her baby only hours after her birth…well, maybe Patsy wouldn't be so sick and none of these past ten years would have happened."
She looked down at her hands that twisted in her lap. "And if I had told you I even had a twin sister…"
"Don't," Joe said, gathering her into his arms. "Patsy wanted you to leave her alone. She even faked her own death so that you'd leave her alone. We can't look back, see how things might have been different if we'd acted differently. They happened, sweetheart, and now we're together again. I don't want to waste a moment of our new time together, thinking about the heartache of the past."
Meredith lay her head on Joe's shoulder and looked toward the French doors, toward the lightning that flashed in the night. "It's what we want for Emily, isn't it?" she asked quietly. "That she put the heartache of the past behind her and get on with her life. Her timing could have been better, but I guess she really needed to be alone, to think things out before she speaks with Martha. Do you really think she's safe out there?"
"Safe and dry, sweetheart," Joe said confidently. "Our Emily's had a lot of experience in taking care of herself, being on her own. She'll be fine."
Seven
It was while unsaddling Molly that Emily saw the gash. "She's cut," she said, automatically turning to Josh Atkins, a man—she had just silently sworn to herself—she wouldn't speak to even if her hair caught on fire and he was the only one within fifty miles with a canteen of water.
But this was different. This wasn't about her, this was about Molly.
Josh deposited his mount's saddle near the fire, obviously planning to use it as a pillow, and walked over to look where Emily was pointing.
"She was so wet, I didn't notice at first, but this is blood," Emily said, her stomach twisting into a knot as she withdrew her hand, looked at the blood on her fingertips. She bent closer to the mare's neck, trying to see the severity of the cut. "God. Do you think it needs stitching?"
"Hard to say," Josh told her, then took a folded blue-and-white handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it against the wound. "First we clean her up, then we decide."
"It's my fault," Emily said, her bottom lip trembling. "I never should have listened to Weather Willie."
The makeshift compress held tight against Molly's neck, Josh turned to look at Emily. "You want to run that one by me one more time? I don't think I understand."
"Weather Willie," Emily said, clumsily wiping her hands on her jeans, then dragging the backs of her hands across her cheeks, to rid them of the tears that had escaped her stinging, rapidly blinking eyes. "I listened to the radio this morning, and Weather Willie promised that the storm would go south of us, would miss us. He's never right, and I know it. I just wanted out of there so badly."
"Yeah, you are pretty lousy at running, not that it seems to have stopped you. And damn if each time you run somebody else doesn't go and get hurt," Josh said, and Emily's shoulders tensed, as if preparing to ward off a blow. "Here, take a look at this," he then said, obviously not caring whether or not his last words had offended her, hurt her. "It's not that bad a cut, although she does have several scrapes, doesn't she? Probably ran too close to a tree, and probably when she lost that sack of food you were telling me about—all that fried chicken we aren't going to get to eat. I've got some antiseptic in my saddlebags. That ought to fix her up."
"Don't bother," Emily replied stiffly. "I have my own first-aid kit. I'll take care of her. I'd phone down to the ranch, for help, but the phone's broken. Molly must have rolled on it. Yeah, well, you just go make up your bed, so that I know where to make up my own—which will be as far from yours as I can get it."
"I don't think so," Josh told her, shaking his head. "Or maybe you haven't noticed. It's raining out there, Miss Colton, and in here, that fire of yours is dying for lack of fuel. Unless you've got another stash of dry wood, I think we're going to have to be a lot closer together than you're planning on, if we want to get through the night without hypothermia. In case you were wondering if yet another Atkins was willing to die for you. Because this one isn't, even if staying alive means also keeping you alive."
Emily looked at him, looked over at the fire, and then turned her back, picked up her backpack and stomped to the other end of the cave. Once there, in the semidark, and feeling safer, she said, "You have a sleeping bag strapped to your saddle, and mine is guaranteed for temperatures a lot colder than we're having tonight. I'll be fine."
"Good for you," Josh said, unrolling the sleeping bag tied to the back of his saddle, then using it to cover his mount's bare back. He then picked up the heavy wool army blanket Emily had been using earlier and draped that over Molly's back. "Now, guess who has the only sleeping bag left? Unless you don't care what happens to these horses?"
"I don't care what happens to you," Emily said, knowing she was being ridiculous, petty, spiteful. She took in a deep breath, let it out slowly. "Isn't there any other way?"
"Sure," Josh said, efficiently arranging the remaining articles—Emily's rifle, his own saddlebags—then picking up Emily's saddle and placing it next to his. "In the old days, men used to kill their horses, gut them, then slip inside their bellies to get out of the wind and snow. Supposedly, the warm bodies kept them safe for hours."
Emily's eyes narrowed as she glared at Josh across the dying fire. "Was that really necessary? Did you have to tell me that? No, don't answer me, of course you did. I do really hate you, Mr. Atkins," she said, turning off the propane in order to save fuel.
They'd need that camp stove again tomorrow, and for more than heat, and she knew it. Josh knew it. Josh knew the fire was going out. Josh knew the only way they could both stay warm was to crawl into that sleeping bag together. Josh knew too damn much!
"What are you doing now?" she asked as he gathered up his flannel-lined slicker, and her own thin plastic poncho.
"We need to keep as much of the weather outside as we can, although we can't block the whole entrance, not with the fire still going." He reached for the length of rope he'd untied, recoiled, after moving the branch. "Here, give me a hand with this."
After several false starts, Josh somehow managed to secure the ends of the rope across the mouth of the cave, tying them to stout bushes at either side of the entrance. He was drenched to the skin by then, once he was done, but the rope finally held taut and tight. When he hung the slicker and poncho over it, like clothes drying on a line in a suburban backyard, the opening of the cave was covered by at least half.
"That should hold," he said, heading for his saddle bags, rain dripping off his long brown hair that now lay plastered to his well-shaped head.
He pulled out a length of toweling and rubbed at his wet head, then smoothed his hair back with both hands. Emily involuntarily inhaled a quick breath as she watched as he then stripped off his vest and shirt, so that he was bare to the waist, his tanned, sleekly muscled skin glowing in the firelight. She saw a long, whitish scar on his side, another riding high on his chest, probably trophies from the rodeo ring. "Wh-what do you think you're doing?"
"Trying not to freeze to death," he said, pulling a clean, plaid flannel shirt from his saddlebag. "The jeans have got to go, too, so unless you're into free shows, I suggest you turn your back."
He hadn't finished speaking before Emily did just that, her face burning even as it was turned away from the fire. She could hear him pulling off his cowboy boots, and listened as he grunted a few times, probably having to wrestle with the tight, wet jeans in order to remove them. Then the slap of heavy denim being unfolded and shaken and, at last, the sound of a zipper being zipped.
Emily exhaled, not realizing until then that she'd been holding her breath. She turned and looked at him as he sat down on the saddle, began pulling on warm woolen socks before reaching for his boots.
"All done, and you didn't peek. Good for you, Miss Colton. Now, if you give me a minute to pull on these boots, I can turn around so I can do you the same favor. Unless you plan to sleep in those damp clothes?"
Did she trust him? Perhaps more to the point, did she really want to climb into her sleeping bag while wearing jeans damp at the hips, nearly dripping wet at the hems? No, she didn't. Not really.
Glaring at him, she unzipped her backpack and pulled out her only change of clothes, a flannel shirt in a plaid closely resembling the one he wore, and a pair of jeans. She withdrew two pair of woolen socks and some fresh underwear, which she first rolled into a ball inside the backpack and then hid inside her folded shirt before he could see them.
The last thing she needed was for Josh Atkins to learn that she'd brought along tiger-patterned bikini underpants and a matching underwire bra.
"Turn around, please, Mr. Atkins," she ordered, tipping up her chin.
Josh's smile was rather like Toby's, except not quite so innocent. "For a quarter," he said, holding out his hand. "One of those from the Denver mint, with the states printed on the back. I still need Pennsylvania to complete my set."
"Go to hell," she said, heading for the darkest part of the cave. She undressed quickly, trying to stay as "dressed" as possible even as she stripped, pulled on dry clothes. All the while, she had one eye trained on Josh Atkins, making sure his back stayed turned.
"You may now resume your customary sarcastic stance," Emily gritted out, knowing she was being petty.
"You're welcome," Josh answered brightly, and Emily shivered, her nerves bristling. There was no dealing with this man. None.
She peeked at her slim gold wristwatch as she walked back toward the fire, skirting the now cold camp stove, the plastic container and her unzipped backpack. The cave was large, but getting more claustrophobic by the minute. She hesitated, stopped and then laid out her damp clothes over the container, before stuffing her discarded underwear in a zippered compartment of her backpack.
She unzipped another compartment, bringing out her wide-toothed comb and a fabric-covered elastic band, plus her folding toothbrush and travel-size tube of toothpaste. A small burgundy hand towel, a squeeze tube of liquid soap, and she was ready for her nighttime rituals. She might be in the wilderness, but there were certain amenities of civilization she would never abandon.
Surprisingly, she saw that Josh was holding his own toothbrush as she joined him at the fire. "I didn't know cowboys paid much attention to the National Dental Association recommendations," she said, reaching for her cup of water that she'd left on the ground.
"What's the matter, Miss Colton? Too domestic for you? Don't worry, I won't be asking for a kiss good night…or anything else."
There was nothing to say to follow up such a statement, so Emily chose not to answer, possibly prolong this uncomfortable conversation. She just sat down on her favorite flat rock, turned her back and brushed her teeth, the sound of the brush seemingly echoing off the walls of the cave. She rinsed her mouth with water from the cup, but couldn't bring herself to spit it out on the ground, so she swallowed it. He was right. This was all just too domestic, too intimate…too unnerving.
She kept her back to him as she combed her hair, dry now, and a riot of tangled curls. She didn't know that those curls shone brightly in the firelight, that her head looked topped by fire itself—warm, touchable fire that flowed down onto her shoulders.
"I'll…check on the horses," Josh said from behind her, his voice sounding a little strained. Or maybe, Emily thought, it was the sound of the storm raging outside that had put this edge in his voice.
"Okay," Emily said, pulling back her hair, ruthlessly securing it in a ponytail at the base of her hairline. "I don't know about you, but I'm exhausted, even if it is only nine o'clock. Besides, I'm hungry and we can't eat anything else if we want the food to last, and I'm getting cold again and want to get inside the sleeping bag."
"Yeah," Josh said. "We can do an inventory of your food and mine in the morning, combine what we've got. Oh, and about the sleeping bag? I see that you've got a ground sheet, and so do I. That'll keep us dry, but it won't do much to hold off the cold of the ground in here, because sunless caves don't exactly collect any heat during the day. Doubling them up will help some, but since we can't both fit inside your sleeping bag, we're going to have to unzip it completely and use it as a blanket for the both of us. It's our shared body heat that's going to keep us from hypothermia. But you've already figured that out, right?"
Emily watched as Josh went over to the horses, adjusting their blankets, making sure their leads were well-secured beneath the rocks he'd used to keep them at least superficially tied. He checked the bandage on Molly, obviously satisfied with what he'd seen.
He was so tall, his shoulders so broad, even as she could see that his upper body was in the shape of a T, narrowing to a flat stomach and tight waist, a compact backside and long legs hugged by his tight jeans.
He was all whipcord muscle and easy grace. When he walked, in those boots of his, his entire body moved with each long stride, carrying his energy with him, his confidence swinging along with his arms. He was the Marlboro man without the dangerous cigarettes, the rugged, solitary hero on the cover of a Louis L'Amour novel, the secret dream of every silly teenage girl who'd ever been to the rodeo.
And he was going to be sleeping next to her tonight, sharing his body heat with her tonight.
Would sleep ever claim her?
Would morning come soon enough?
Would she wake in his arms, turning toward his heat during the night?
If she did, what then?
"He hates you, remember?" Emily muttered under her breath, and then reached for the folded ground cloth, knowing she would have to make the bed she would lie in. "And you're not all that cracked up about him."
* * *
Josh stayed with the horses longer than necessary, fussing over them, checking each of their hooves, quietly talking to them as the storm kept them both skittish. Then he went to the front of the cave, inspecting the makeshift windbreak, looking out into the night sky, watching the rain that showed no sign of letting up.
They could be here for at least one more day and night, as the hillside was rapidly turning into a mud bath that would make it nearly impossible for the horses to safely get down to flat country.
Could he do this for another day and night? Hell, could he make it through this one night?
He hadn't counted on being in Emily Colton's company for more than a few hours. He'd wanted to talk to her, tell her about Toby, make her see how gravely she'd injured his brother, injured him.
And, yes, he'd wanted to hear her side of the story. He figured he owed her that much, if only because Toby had loved her. Maybe there had been some sort of extenuating circumstance, some reason she'd run away, left Toby to die alone. If there was, he needed to hear it.
He especially needed to hear it now, now that he'd felt himself dangerously sliding into that same trap Toby had embraced so eagerly. A trap laid by a riot of chestnut curls, a pair of large, innocent blue eyes and a matched set of dimples in her sweetly beautiful face.
She was no china doll, not the least bit fragile-looking. Her build was fairly athletic, with good shoulders and narrow hips. Dolly Parton wouldn't have to worry about any competition in the bust-size department, and yet…and yet there was just something about the way she moved that was so entirely female, so enticing….
Josh shook his head, shook himself back to reality. He was here because this woman had caused the death of his brother. Not deliberately, but caused it just the same. By the sin of omission, the sin of not being straight with Toby, not telling him who she was, why she was hiding in Keyhole—not telling him that she might be bringing danger to Keyhole.
And she'd left him. She'd let him rescue her, take a bullet for her, and then she'd left him.
Josh wasn't about to forget that.
Having run out of chores, and his resolve back in place, Josh returned to the campfire to see Emily trying to arrange the opened sleeping bag over the layered ground sheets.
"Here, let me help you," he said, grabbing onto the sleeping bag and spreading it carefully. "Nice material. Light, and yet probably warmer than it looks."
"It's new," Emily said avoiding his eyes as she gave the material a two-handed pat, as if making sure it wouldn't move, fly away. "Right or left?"
Josh hadn't been paying attention. "Pardon me?"
"I said, right or left?" Emily repeated. "I sleep on my right side, so I'd like to be on the right, if that's okay with you?"
He also slept on his right side, and had a quick mental image of the two of them sleeping, spoon-like, his belly to her back, his arm snug around her waist, their legs entangled underneath the covers.
"Left," he said, longing to clear his throat, which had suddenly gone tight—almost as tight as his jeans. He dropped his hands, clasped them together in front of himself, hoping the dark of the cave would do the rest. "I'll take the left side. But we'll have to lose one of the saddles, share one, or else we'll be too far apart. Body heat, remember?"
"We'll try it first my way, which means you on your side, and me on mine," Emily told him stiffly, even as she crawled across the sleeping bag, her bent head nearly colliding with his knees. She pulled back the cover, slid beneath it, her head resting on the seat of the saddle. "Man," she said, moving about, clearly trying to get comfortable, "I haven't done this in a long time."
"Slept with a man?" Josh winced, his mouth moving way too much faster than his brain.
"I've never—" Emily covered her face with both hands for a moment, then angrily yanked the covers up and over her shoulders. "I haven't slept here in the cave for a long time. Get your mind out of the gutter, please, Mr. Atkins. Your brother was a gentleman."
"Yeah," Josh grumbled, stepping over Emily's body and sitting down on his saddle, ready to remove his boots. Damn, the woman was a virgin. How the hell had that happened? Was the whole male world blind? Doggedly, he kept insulting her. "He sure was a gentleman. And look where that got him."
Emily remained silent, which was probably a good thing, and Josh tossed his boots to one side, then slid his long body under the sleeping bag.
He lay on his back, looking up at the dark roof of the cave, one arm bent behind his head as he wished himself anywhere but where he was at this moment. The dying fire cast strange, moving shadows against the craggy roof, and an ever-changing wind often blew smoke back into the cave, to hang high against the rock.
Ghost riders in the sky. Josh could see them up there, shades of old cowboys, riding their ghostly horses through eternity. Was that his destiny? Without Toby around to settle him, ground him, would he spend the rest of his life following the rodeo circuit, taking odd jobs in the off-season, growing old and tough and doing it all alone?
What else was out there for him? A home, a family? Toby had been his family—did he really want another? Could he survive losing another? Losing Toby had damn near destroyed him.
Josh turned his head to the right, unable to see the color of Emily's hair in the darkness, but able to discern the outline of her slim body beneath the sleeping bag. Emily Colton had a family. A large family. Where had that gotten her?
She couldn't take too much comfort from them, or she wouldn't be here, hiding away in a cave rather than staying safe and warm with her loved ones. Hell, her loved ones had damn near gotten her killed.
Maybe there was something to say for his solitary life, a life without entanglements.
So he'd end up with arthritic knees and a bad back. He'd wear his scars, and his injuries, and he'd soon spend more time in bars tossing back beers and reminiscing about the good old days than he would in the ring. The rodeo was a mistress, a tough mistress, a demanding mistress.
Maybe he'd been following that mistress for too long. If he'd only broken away sooner, turned his back, Toby might be alive now…and he wouldn't be here, in a damp cave, trying to keep his mind and hands off the woman who'd helped kill him.
Josh held his breath, listening in the dark for the sound of Emily Colton's breathing. The horses whinnied and blew softly, the fire crackled as it burned down and the wind continued to howl. Thunder rolled off in the distance.
And yet, through it all, he swore he could hear, not Emily Colton's breathing, but the chattering of her teeth. Not that she'd say anything, not that she'd complain.
Stubborn woman.
Idiot man. Idiot because he worried, idiot because he cared. He sat up, pushed his saddle out of the way, then lifted the covers up and over his shoulder as he turned on his right side.
He moved closer, until he felt the stiffness of her rigidly held body, then lay down, his head mashed uncomfortably on the high-rising back ridge of her saddle. It didn't matter. Being uncomfortable didn't matter. Because he'd never sleep tonight, not with the heat of Emily Colton's body burning into him, not with his arm wrapped around her thin waist, his fingers itching to touch what lay higher—her smooth stomach, the rise of her breasts.
He couldn't remember ever passing a whole night with a woman in his bed. He certainly knew he'd never spent the night with a virgin.
Eight
"G randma's going to be so happy to see your new braces, Sparrow," Meredith said, smiling into the rearview mirror at Emily, who did not smile back.
"I'm not going to show her," Emily said, barely opening her lips to speak. "I'm not going to show anyone. Sophie called me Metal Mouth. And Amber said how now I could get in radio stations all the way from San Francisco. She said I was one big antenna head."
"Sisters. They tease," Meredith said on a sigh. "And remember, both Sophie and Amber had braces, and their brothers teased them. It's a family tradition, handed down from child to child, and just shows how much they love you."
"Well, I don't like them much right now, and I hate these braces. They hurt and I can't chew gum and Inez wouldn't let me have corn on the cob last night. She sliced it all off the cob. It doesn't taste as good that way."
"It's true, sweetheart, there are sacrifices to be made. But just remember that soon your teeth will be all nice and straight and that prettiest smile in the whole world will be even prettier." Meredith took another peek in the rearview mirror. "Emily, push your seat belt lower over your belly, okay? It shouldn't be riding so high on your waist, in case we have an accident."
Emily did as she was told then, because she was in a bad mood anyway, groused, "I don't see why I can't sit up front with you. I haven't sat in the back seat since I was a baby."
"The seat belt up here is broken, Sparrow, and we're going to get it fixed tomorrow. In the meantime, pretend you're the lady of the manor, and I'm your chauffeur, okay?"
Emily brightened at that. "Does that mean I can give you orders?"
"Your wish, madam, is my command."
Giggling, Emily folded her arms over her belly, tipped back her head and commanded: "To the ice cream parlor, my good man, and step on it!"
"What about your grandmother?"
"Oh, yeah. Well, we'll pick her up on the way. Grandma likes ice cream, too."
"Yes, ma'am, anything you say, ma'am," Meredith agreed, tipping an imaginary hat to her "employer" in the back seat, and Emily laughed, her smile wide, her braces forgotten.
A tune Emily particularly liked came on the radio and she asked Meredith to turn up the volume. They both began to sing along, Emily laughing when Meredith stumbled over a few of the words.
Happy. They were so happy. And then Meredith looked in the rearview mirror again, probably to see Emily's smiling face, and her hands tightened on the steering wheel.
"Now why is that car following us so closely? The road's deserted except for the two of us, and it's a passing zone. Oh, just go around me if you're in such a hurry," Meredith said, addressing the occupant of the following car as if the driver could hear her.
Emily turned in her seat, trying to look out the rear window, but the seat belt restricted her movement. She sat forward once more, feeling the power of the car as Meredith stepped on the gas.
"Sit front, Emily, and hold on. There's barely any shoulder here in front of the ditch. I'm going to pull off up ahead, where there's a rest zone, and let this idiot driver by. He's so close I can't even see his grill."
Emily did as she was told, reacting to her mother's calm yet deadly serious tone, closing her eyes as the scenery whipped by, the interior of the car quiet because Meredith had pushed the button that turned off the radio.
And then it happened. A bump. A bump from the rear. Once. Twice.
"Hey!" Emily yelled, angry, but more frightened than anything else. "Hey—cut it out! Mom, make him cut it out!"
But Meredith didn't answer except to say, "Cover your face with your hands, Sparrow! Protect your face!" because a third bump, harder than the others, had sent the car onto the small shoulder of the road, the right rear tire blowing as it dropped down from macadam to gravel. Meredith struggled to regain control, but couldn't get the two right wheels back up on the macadam.
They kept going, but now they were going sideways, sliding, heading hood-first into the ditch…then stopping all of a sudden, so that Emily's body was shoved forward, roughly pulled back by her shoulder harness. Her head was jarred to the right as the car tipped onto its side, and she hit the side window, and everything went black…
"Mommy…" Emily blinked, and just blinking made her head hurt so badly. "Mommy…"
She opened her eyes again, fighting the pain, and looked toward the front seat. There was her mommy, still sitting in the driver's seat, her forehead bleeding.
No. There was her mommy, pulling open the drivers' side door, leaning in, looking at Emily.
Two mommies?
Oh, her head hurt. Emily's head really, really hurt. "Mommy, something's wrong with me. I can't see right. Mommy, my head hurts. And my belly's sick. I'm going to be sick."
"Shut up, you whiny little brat!"
Emily looked at her mother, at both of her mothers, and began to cry. One of the mommies had yelled at her. Shocked—in shock—Emily watched as one of the mommies opened the back door and crawled in beside her.
"Here, drink this. It will make you feel better."
"Don't want…don't want…"
Emily felt her head go back as her mommy pulled hard on her hair, and the next thing she knew she was choking on a horrible-tasting liquid…which was also the last thing she knew until she woke up in the hospital, hours later, to see one of the mommies looking down at her in the bed.
"Which mommy are you?" she asked, her mouth dry, her head aching.
The mommy looking down at her just smiled….
"No! You're not the right one, you're not the right one! Where's my mommy? What did you do with my real mommy? Mommy? Mom! Mom!"
"Wake up, Emily. Come on. You're having a dream. Just a dream. Wake up for me, wake up now."
Emily opened her eyes and looked straight into the piercing blue eyes of Josh Atkins as he hovered just above her. His shaggy hair fell forward over his forehead, and he had a heavy, golden-brown stubble on his cheeks. His mere closeness made her pulse leap, her mouth go dry.
Emily's heart still pounded hurtfully in her chest, but she was coming awake now, the nightmare was fading. She wasn't in the hospital. She wasn't eleven years old. She was in her cave. She was lying down, and Josh Atkins, who hated her, was leaning over her, his body pressed close to hers.
"Get off me!" she ordered, pushing at his shoulders with both hands. "Just get your big, stupid self off me!"
He stayed where he was. "Not exactly a morning person, are you?" he asked, then slowly withdrew, to lie down beside her as she shivered at the withdrawal of his body heat. "Want to tell me about it? That must have been one hell of a dream."
Emily would have gotten up, except that she was already chilled, and the fire was out, and it was still raining outside the mouth of the cave, the dawn gray, forbidding. "No-o-o, I don't want to tell you about it. I'm too busy wishing you on the other side of the world."
"Nice. Real polite of you," Josh said, pulling his saddle forward from where he'd pushed it last night and settling himself against it, half lying, half sitting. "You were calling for your mother. Your real mother. I'm not a rocket scientist, but I have read all the newspaper stories that have been out there lately. You were in the car, weren't you, the day Meredith Colton's sister ran her into a ditch, then changed places with her? How'd she do that anyway? The papers were sort of vague. I mean, that St. James place was more than a half hour's distance away from the crash site. How did she get Mrs. Colton there, and then get back to the car where you were? Didn't anyone pass by? Didn't anybody stop?"
Emily's hands closed into fists at her side. She didn't want to talk about this, just wanted to forget it. Yes, her questions had been answered, all of them, but the dreams, instead of fading, had only become more clear. Used to be, she couldn't remember Patsy climbing into the back seat, couldn't remember having medicine poured down her throat. That memory had come back after Patsy's confession. Maybe that was why the dreams wouldn't go away. Maybe she had to live through the whole thing, just one time, before she could tuck her memories away, lock them behind a closed door in her mind.
She pushed herself up a little, dragging part of the sleeping bag with her as she leaned against her saddle. She should be telling Martha Wilkes what she remembered now, not Josh Atkins. Still, the nightmare was so vivid, still scaring her, and if she didn't tell someone, anyone, soon, it would probably haunt her all day.
"She drugged me, then somehow got both Mom and me into her own car. She tied a white handkerchief around the antenna of Mom's car, so that it just looked like a disabled vehicle, abandoned and awaiting towing, which is why nobody stopped. Who stops to look inside an empty car?"
"Smart, I suppose. Then what?"
Emily pushed a hand through her hair, then tugged at the band holding it, pulling it off, then shaking her head so that her curls tumbled around her shoulders. She raised a hand to pull the curls forward, to cover her cheeks, hide her expression…then stopped. Sophie had made her too aware of her "ostrich" mannerism for Emily to take any comfort in it anymore.
"Patsy—that's my mom's sister—said she drugged Mom, then put her out of the car on the St. James grounds, where the authorities would find her, recognize her as Patsy because Patsy had once been an inmate—patient—there, and treat her. Lock her up. Which they did. And with Mom having amnesia? Well, it certainly didn't help Mom, but it sure helped her sister."
"And you?"
"I don't remember, of course, but Patsy explained that she went back to the scene—the whole thing must have taken about two hours—parked her car down the road, put a white handkerchief on that antenna, then carried me back to Mom's car. Actually, she didn't make it back to the car before someone came along to help her, but she just acted all dazed and confused, saying she'd been in an accident and was trying to take me somewhere to get help. She's quite an actress, Patsy is, and wearing Mom's clothes, carrying me…well, it worked. It shouldn't have, but it did. It worked for ten long years."
"Nobody ever checked on Patsy's car? The one that was left on the side of the road? Saw the damage? I mean, there must have been damage to the front end, where she rammed your car."
Emily turned her head, looked at Josh. "Deductive reasoning," she said, smiling ruefully. "Now I know where Toby got it from. Yes, they checked on that car, but it was stolen—Patsy had stolen it—and it had been wiped clean of prints. The conclusion was that some teenagers had stolen the car, gone joy riding and then panicked, run, after hitting our car."
"Panicked. But took the time to wipe off any fingerprints. You know, Emily—Miss Colton—if anyone ever wants to go handing out blame or feeling guilty about how easily Patsy Portman carried this whole thing off, there'd be a long, long line of candidates for the honor."
Emily nodded. "I know. But you have to remember something else. This was Joe Colton's wife. Senator Joe Colton's wife. All he cared about was Meredith, and me. We were all right, and an investigation, even an arrest, would have plastered the whole thing all over the newspapers. Mom—Patsy—asked him to let it go, told him the only thing that mattered was that she and I were all right. He listened to her, and the police listened to him. Case closed. Oh, and you can stop calling me Miss Colton. I think we've gone beyond that, don't you?"
"Don't you, Josh," he answered, throwing back the sleeping bag and reaching for his boots. "All right, Emily. How about you get the camp stove lit and boil us some water for coffee, while I take care of the horses. As you might have noticed if you lifted your nose a fraction, it's time to muck out the cave."
Emily smiled evilly, somehow feeling much better. Good enough to tease. "Gee, I thought that was you," she said, then pulled the covers over her head until he'd grumbled, then walked away. Only then she did dare to emerge from under the sleeping bag cover, find her own boots and warm coat, and then go search out the travel packets of instant coffee she'd luckily packed in her backpack.
Fifteen minutes later, she and Josh were sitting cross-legged on the sleeping bag, sipping steaming coffee. "I hope you don't need cream, because I don't have any. I always take mine black."
"This is fine," Josh said, taking another sip from one of the chipped ceramic mugs Emily kept stored in the plastic container. "I guess it's time for that inventory now. I've got beef jerky, some packs of instant oatmeal—although we might want to check the expiration date—and a bag of M&M's."
"A bag of M&M's? That's all you have?"
He shrugged rather sheepishly, and Emily had to look away, because he looked so damn appealing, even with—or maybe because of—his morning beard.
"Hey, I didn't plan on being out here. The way I figured it, I'd see you, talk to you, and be back in my bunk at Rollins Ranch before nightfall."
Emily tipped her head to one side, looked at him closely. "Yes, about that. How did you know I was coming up here? Did you follow me?" She sat back. "You did. You followed me. I sort of thought you might have, and maybe you even said something about it. Yes, I'm sure you did. But I was too upset and cold last night to give it much thought. You followed me, Josh Atkins. How could you do that?"
"Because we need to talk," he answered, returning her stare. "Because I need to know how Toby died, why Toby died. I want to know why he thought you were worth dying for, and I by God sure want to know how you could leave him there on the floor, dying, and just walk away."
Emily shook her head. "No. I can't talk about that. I will not talk about that."
"Funny," Josh said, getting to his feet, looking down at her. "I don't remember giving you a choice." He walked to the mouth of the cave, flung the contents of his mug into the rain, then pulled his slicker off the makeshift clothesline. Shrugging his arms into the slicker, he bent low, ducking under the rope, and went out into the storm.
To get away from her? To calm down, cool down in the slashing rain, before he touched her…shook her until she told him what he wanted to know?
Emily wasn't sure.
* * *
Rebecca looked up from the grant application she was trying to decipher, and smiled as she saw Martha Wilkes walk into her office. "Back so soon?" she asked teasingly. "And why aren't I surprised?"
Martha dipped her head slightly, smiled. "I take it you were expecting me."
"Oh, yeah. I was expecting you. Tatania, on the other hand, was just plain hoping you'd be back. You two really hit it off, you know. Not that she's started chattering like a magpie, but she is interacting more with the other children since your visit yesterday. She even told Billy Rogers to shut up when he began singing during grace at dinner last night. Quite the little mother, our Tatania. I think, given half a chance, she'd soon be the leader in her age group here at Hopechest. I—we all can't thank you enough."
"I just talked to her," Martha said, ever modest about her own skills. "That's all she really needed. Someone to talk to her, someone to listen."
"We all talked to her, Martha," Rebecca reminded her. "We all listened, not that she said anything. No, you did something special, and if we could bottle it, all the kids here would be the better for it."
"Thank you," Martha said, giving in, not wishing to hear more, as she hadn't come here this morning for praise. "Rebecca? I was wondering…"
Rebecca folded her hands on the desktop and leaned forward slightly. "Are you going to ask if we could use another volunteer around here? Because if you are, the job's yours. The pay is lousy—nonexistent—but the fringe benefits are great. I already spoke to Blake—that's Blake Fallon, he runs the place—and he said I should put you in a half Nelson and drag you back here until you agreed to help us."
Martha frowned. "Fallon? Would that be any relation to Emmett Fallon? The man who tried to kill Joe?"
Rebecca nodded. "Yes, Blake's his son. Emmett was never a great dad, and Blake actually ended up as one of Mom and Dad's foster children, like me. Blake considers running Hopechest part of his payback to Mom and Dad for, as he tells it, saving his life. Ironically, it was Blake's devotion to my dad that pretty much sent Emmett over the edge, so that he tried to kill him. Blake's still dealing with that, poor guy. I think he's afraid he could end up like his dad, but that will never happen. Blake's one of the good guys."
"Circles," Martha said, shaking her head. "It's amazing how everything goes in circles. Circles within circles." She smiled slightly, looking at Rebecca. "And one of those circles expanded to bring me here, to California, to the Hacienda de Alegria, to Hopechest Ranch—to Tatania. Do you believe in fate, Rebecca?"
"Around here, it's kind of hard not to," Rebecca told her seriously. "What are you saying, Martha?"
Martha took in a deep breath, let it out slowly. "Well, for today, I guess I'm asking if I can visit with Tatania again, maybe take her into town, buy her some ice cream. Talk."
Rebecca bent her head, hiding her expression, then looked up at Martha again, her large, blue-gray eyes sparkling. "I think that would be wonderful, Martha. I think that would be really, really wonderful." She stood up, walked around the desk. "How about I take you over to Blake's office, where Holly Lamb can give you the papers you need to fill out in order to become an official volunteer?"
Martha stood, smoothed down her skirt. "Yes, I'd like that. Let's start making things official. I already took the liberty of seeing about having my credentials transferred to California. But you probably knew that already, didn't you, Rebecca? You already figured out that this may have begun as a trip, a chance to help Meredith—but that it's turning into a lot more."
"Yes, I rather sensed that," Rebecca said, leaning forward to give Martha a quick kiss on the cheek. "You'd be surprised at how easy it is to become a part of Hopechest, to become a part of the Colton family. So welcome home, Martha. Welcome home to you, and to Tatania."
"This might not work out, you know," Martha said quickly. "I know you said Tatania has no other family, but that doesn't mean I'd be approved to—"
"Are you looking for somewhere to live?" Rebecca interrupted as they walked down the hallway toward Holly Lamb's small office.
"I went on the Internet last night, as a matter of fact, and checked out a few properties for sale in Prosperino," Martha answered, feeling her cheeks growing hot. "I wouldn't have any trouble selling my house in Mississippi, and I know of at least two psychologists who've offered to either have me join them here as a partner, or sell them my practice back home. I've made good investments over the years, and can pretty much live off the interest, plus the money I'd get for my house, the practice. And, of course, I could run a small practice out of my new house—I'm looking at properties that include an attached office."
Martha shook her head, smiled at her own daring. "Am I crazy? Am I rushing things? I'm not usually so…so impromptu…but this just, well, this just feels right to me, Rebecca. I lay awake all night, going over things in my mind, and this just seems right."
"Someday I'll tell you how I came to be at Hopechest, how I came to be a Colton—and how I met the person who made me whole, the way you've just found Tatania. It always seems right, Martha," Rebecca said, "when we finally find our home."
Nine
Emily liked camping out in her cave. She liked being alone, having time to think. When you've been raised in a big, loving but loud family—even as much as you loved them—you needed a place that was your own.
Meredith and Joe had understood that, bless them, and Emily had been given permission to be herself, which is the best thing you can be given—the right to be your own person.
But now her "alone place" had been invaded by Josh Atkins. The cave wasn't hers anymore, because he was there. Her morning wash was hurried, she'd felt horribly conspicuous and almost naked just because she had to brush her teeth while he was there. Her trip outside, made in her slicker and damned uncomfortable in the first place, was an embarrassment to her.
She couldn't do this. She couldn't stay here with him, in this cave, until the storm passed.
And she couldn't leave until the storm passed.
She was stuck, she was here, and neither of them were going anywhere.
"That's quite a look you've got on your face, Emily," Josh said as he reentered the cave, slipping out of his slicker. "Almost as if you've been contemplating saddling Molly and heading out of here. But no, I'm wrong. Only an idiot would consider trying to get back to the ranch right now, considering that it's more than a three-hour ride in fair weather."
Emily glared at him, wishing he didn't look so good, so manly, so competent. Or so smug.
"How nice that you don't think I'm an idiot," she told him, her teeth clenched. "It's about the only rotten thing you've not thought about me."
Josh hung his slicker over the rope once more and approached the cold campfire. "There's not a dry stick of wood out there, although I am going to take your axe and cut some of the drier underbranches, then drag them in here and hope they dry out enough to make at least a small fire tonight. It'll be smoky, but it's all we've got."
Emily nodded her agreement. "I'll help. There are a couple more caves, higher up on the hill, and maybe there's some dry brush or something that's blown into them. But you'll have to check them out, because there are bats in those caves and I won't go inside."
"Bats, huh? I was wondering why there aren't any bats in this cave, to tell you the truth."
"It's because it's just a small cave, Dad said." Emily looked around her once safe haven, a space that was about the size of a two-car garage, and only about fifteen feet high. "There's a cave up higher that has two entrances, one on either side of the hill. The bats like it better there."
There was a full minute of uncomfortable silence before Josh spoke. "Okay, so we've decided that we're not going anywhere. We are going to try to gather some wood. And we know you don't like bats. I don't like bats, either. Now what? See any good movies lately?"
Emily directed a long, dispassionate stare at this infuriating man, who just smiled back at her. "I thought I'd read my book," she said tightly. "I came up here to be alone, not to entertain guests."
"Especially unwanted guests," Josh replied, his smile growing wider. "But you have to admit, Emily, I do come in handy. I'm taking care of the horses, and I've noticed that you've already ripped into my stash of M&M's."
"You drank my coffee," Emily shot back, then sighed. "Oh, this is ridiculous! I'm not going to talk to you about Toby, so you can just get that idea out of your head. You don't like me, it's clear you don't like me, and anything I'd say would just give you another reason to glare at me like I just crawled out from beneath some slimy rock."
"So you did leave him there to die."
"No!" Emily stood up quickly, headed for her poncho, pulled it on over her head. "But I am why he died. Do you think I don't know that? I'm going to look for firewood," she ended, and bent low, slipping under the rope, knowing she'd feel safer out in the storm than she did looking into Josh's eyes.
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