Shifting Calder Wind (18 page)
Read Shifting Calder Wind Online
Authors: Janet Dailey
“As long as you make the right ones,” Tara added with false sweetness. “Otherwise there is such a thing as malfeasance. If the actions you take are deemed not to be in the best interests of the ranch, as owner, Cathleen has a legal right to step in and take over.”
“None of this is really any of your business, Tara,” Jessy snapped, her patience exhausted. “Why don’t you just stay out of it?”
“You would like that, wouldn’t you,” Tara countered smoothly. “Without me around, you think you have a better chance of talking Cat into accepting your decision.”
“Cat knows I would never do anything to jeopardize the Triple C. It represents my children’s future. I would do whatever it takes to protect both.”
“I always thought you would,” Cat said. “But I also thought I knew you, Jessy. Now I wonder if I ever did at all.”
Fighting back tears, Cat whipped around and headed for the door. Tara lingered a moment, a pleased look in her eyes. Then she hurried after Cat. Jessy’s first impulse was to go after Cat, but she sensed she would just be giving Tara another chance to fan Cat’s distrust.
Chapter Eleven
I
n the den, Jessy went through the motions of comparing the invoice total against the check amount before adding her signature, but the numbers didn’t register. Just outside the window, Cat and Tara had their heads together. Jessy could imagine the sympathetic noises Tara was making while adding a few sly insinuations.
n the den, Jessy went through the motions of comparing the invoice total against the check amount before adding her signature, but the numbers didn’t register. Just outside the window, Cat and Tara had their heads together. Jessy could imagine the sympathetic noises Tara was making while adding a few sly insinuations.
As if the present situation wasn’t complicated enough, now Cat had put this new twist on it. Something had to be done before this rift between them became any wider. But what that could be Jessy didn’t know.
Not until both women had climbed into their cars and left did Jessy lay the pen aside and reach for the ranch phone directory. With a finger on the number for the feedlot, she dialed it and waited. After a dozen rings, Laredo answered.
“It’s Jessy. We have trouble.”
“I thought we might. She was in a temper when she came by here.” He didn’t bother to refer to Cat by name, confident she was the source. “I figured she would unload on somebody, and it seemed very likely you would be that person. What’s the problem?”
On the off chance someone might walk in, Jessy kept her voice pitched low and gave him a bare-bones answer. When she mentioned Tara’s role, Laredo responded with a soft whistle.
“I didn’t figure on the ex sticking her nose in,” he admitted thoughtfully. “She doesn’t like you, you know.”
“It’s mutual,” Jessy replied grimly, then suddenly wondered, “How do you know that?”
“I talked to her once.”
“When?” She felt more uneasy than before.
“Down south.”
She heard the front door open, followed by the sound of boots. Speaking at a normal level, Jessy said, “It’s impossible for me to get away right now. Explain it to Duke for me,” she added, using Hattie’s name for Chase. “Let me know what he says.”
“Got company, do you?” Laredo guessed. “In that case, why don’t we meet tonight at the old barn. Is ten o’clock too early?”
“That will be fine.” She looked up as Jobe Garvey walked into the den. “I’ll talk to you then.”
All the windows at the Boar’s Nest were propped open, allowing a welcome breeze to flow through the interior. Chase sat in a wooden chair, a towel draped around his shoulders, his fingers clutching it tightly together at his throat. Hattie stood behind him, a pair of scissors in one hand and a comb in the other.
“I can’t believe how fast your hair has grown.” She ran the comb down the back of it and held the ends flat with its teeth. “Do you know it’s almost long enough to cover your scar? Which, by the way, is healing nicely.”
When she made the first snip, Chase asked warily, “Are you sure you know how to cut hair?”
“I did my husband’s for years.”
“I saw a picture of him at your place. He was bald.”
“Only on top. He still had to have the sides trimmed.”
As the scissors made steady progress along the nape of his neck, Chase warned, “Watch my ear.”
“Look on the bright side,” Hattie told him. “If it should accidentally get nicked, you have a nurse right here. Now keep your head down.”
Chase tucked his chin lower and grumbled, “Something tells me you are a better nurse than a barber.”
“Are you always such a grump?” she chided. That sobered him. “I don’t know. I don’t remember.”
“Now, that isn’t entirely true,” Hattie admonished while deftly switching from comb to scissors, snipping, and switching back again. “You’ve remembered a few more things.”
“Yeah, from when I was child,” he admitted, unimpressed. “It’s not exactly important to remember that one time I caught a fish with my bare hands when Buck and I were skinny-dipping in the river.”
In his mind’s eye, he could see again the dappling of sunlight on the water, feel the fish’s firm but slippery sides, hear Buck’s gleeful shouts, and smell the odor of the river. It was a happy memory, but one that didn’t bring him any closer to knowing who tried to kill him or why.
Caught up in the past, Chase almost missed the faint humming noise carried by the breeze. The instant he became aware of it, his head came up, his body stiffening.
“Will you hold still,” Hattie said in exasperation.
“Wait a minute.” He held up a hand. “I hear something.”
Hattie paused to listen. “It’s a vehicle.”
“Coming this way.” He let go of the towel and stood up.
“Maybe it’s Jessy.” Hattie darted him an anxious glance.
“Maybe.” But it was that uncertainty that had him moving toward the corner of the cabin where they had rigged up a hiding place for him, under a bunk bed, disguising it to look like a set of storage drawers.
Before he had taken three steps, a horn honked twice. After a short pause, it sounded again.
“That’s Laredo,” Hattie said with surprise, recognizing their prearranged signal. “What’s he doing back here in the middle of the day?”
“I doubt if he’s coming to bring good news,” Chase replied, his mind already racing to anticipate what it might be.
Of all the potential problems he had considered, none of them were even close to what Laredo told him. The set of his jaw hardened when he heard about Tara’s part in the confrontation between Cat and Jessy.
“Good God,” Chase muttered in disgust. “And my son was once married to a woman like that.”
“She is a looker, Chase,” Laredo said in Ty’s defense.
“She is a divisive bitch,” Chase declared and shot a skeptical glance at Laredo. “Would you have been taken in by her?”
“I don’t know.” Laredo thought about it. “When I was younger, if she had turned those dark eyes on me . . . maybe. But I’m older now, and a little wiser. I expect that’s what happened with your son.”
“That’s beside the point. Right now our problem is with Cat,” Chase stated as his thoughts turned inward to examine his options. “The last thing we need right now is a battle for control of the ranch.”
“Jessy gave me the impression that’s exactly what she thinks will happen if she can’t get Cat settled down soon.”
“Who would have thought leasing the feedlot would cause such an uproar?” Chase muttered to himself.
“I didn’t understand myself why your daughter would consider it a betrayal,” Laredo admitted. “But on the way here, I remembered some gossip I picked up at your funeral. From what I gathered, you spent most of your life fighting to gain title to ten thousand acres of rangeland within the ranch boundaries. Tara was mixed up in it somehow, but I never got the straight of that. I do know that shortly after your son was killed, she deeded the land over to you, but kept the right to live in the house she built there.”
“Wolf Meadow. Dy-Corps had leased the mineral rights to it from the government so they could strip-mine the coal on it,” Chase recalled in a sudden flash of memory. “I can remember Ty telling me about it.” He had an image of a hospital room, of being surrounded by tubes and monitors, and of a tall, broad-shouldered man with a dark mustache standing by the bed—the same man he had seen lying dead in the coulee. His son. He felt a deep swell of tenderness and pride and a sudden tightening ache in his chest.
Hattie laid a hand on his shoulder. “You see, it is coming back, Duke.”
“I wish you could remember your daughter.” Laredo helped himself to some coffee. “She seems to be the passionate kind. Everything is black and white—you’re either for me or against me. Proud was the word people kept using at the funeral.” Cup in hand, he returned to the table, swung a chair around and straddled it. “Jessy didn’t give me a blow-by-blow account of all that was said, so I’m just guessing. But most daughters think their dads can’t do any wrong. In your case, it’s probably more true than in others. Cat wants everything to stay the way it was. Suddenly Jessy isn’t doing the things Cat is convinced you would. On top of that, it’s happening too fast after your funeral. More than likely she believes being in charge has gone to Jessy’s head. I’d be willing to bet that’s what Tara is telling her.”
“I can’t fault Cat for fighting for what she believes is best for the Triple C.” While he could admire her reason, Chase was still irritated by her actions.
“It will take some tall convincing to make her back down,” Laredo warned. “Personally I don’t think it can be done short of you stepping forward.”
“There might be another way.” He turned to Hattie. “Do you have a paper and pencil?”
“I’ll get it.” She moved away from the table.
“You said you were meeting Jessy tonight?” Chase glanced at Laredo.
“Ten o’clock.”
“Good. I’ll have a note for you to give her—one that she can show Cat. Hopefully I can word it in such a way that Cat will be convinced Jessy has acted as I would.” His mouth curved in a dry smile. “Presumably my daughter will recognize my handwriting.”
Laredo lifted his cup, speaking against its rim. “Our luck, she’ll think it’s a forgery. Especially if Tara hears about it.”
“If nothing else, it should gain us some time,” Chase said as Hattie returned with a writing tablet and ballpoint pen.
With agonizing slowness, the minute hand ticked its way closer to ten o’clock. Five minutes before the hour, Jessy rose from the big desk, a high tension running through her nerves. Leaving the den, she made her way to the living room. As expected, she found Sally sitting in Chase’s favorite chair, watching television.
“I’m going for a walk and to get some air, Sally,” Jessy said, trotting out her carefully rehearsed excuse. “Will you listen for the twins just in case they wake up while I’m gone?”
“Of course.” Sally managed a wan smile of assurance that didn’t even come close to reaching her pain-filled eyes.
“Thanks. I won’t be long.” Jessy’s glance touched briefly on the wadded-up tissue in Sally’s hand, a sure indication she had been crying again.
She was almost sorry that Tara hadn’t followed through with her plan and spoken to Sally about staying with her. The woman was breaking her heart over Chase.
Outside The Homestead, Jessy paused at the top of the steps and skimmed her glance over the ranch yard. Ten minutes earlier she had heard a vehicle and assumed it was Laredo. But there was no sign of his pickup.
She descended the steps and struck out for the old timbered barn, adopting what she hoped would be perceived as a strolling pace by anyone who might see her. Tall yard lights cast wide pools of light at intervals, their brightness dimming the twinkle of stars in the night sky.
When she reached the barn, Jessy had to force herself not to glance guiltily over her shoulder. She didn’t think anyone was about, but she couldn’t be certain of that.
Striving to make every action appear normal, she stepped into the barn and immediately flipped the wall switch, turning on the lights that ran the length of the barn’s wide alley. Her heightened senses immediately registered the rustling of straw and the slightly musty odors of hay and horse. Pausing, she scanned the interior, paying special attention to the many shadowy areas made even darker by the overhead lights. The Welsh pony thrust its nose over the top of its stall and blew softly. It was the only movement she detected.
Nerves taut and at a loss as to how to kill time until Laredo arrived, Jessy walked over to the pony’s stall. “How are you tonight, Sundance?” The pony lipped at the hand she extended to it. “Sorry, no carrots. I’ll make sure Laura brings you some to morrow.”
“Down here.” The low-voiced call came from her left.
Her pulse instantly rocketed, an indication of the jumpy state of her nerves. She gave the pony a parting scratch and wandered down to the next stall. It was empty, the door open, a bed of fresh straw on the floor. When she glanced inside, she saw Laredo perched on the feed bunk, chewing on a stalk of straw.
“Right on time.” He pushed off the bunk, coming soundlessly erect. His lips parted in a grin that showed the whiteness of his teeth and the straw clenched between them. He removed it, a devilish twinkle in his blue eyes. “I like a woman who doesn’t keep a man waiting.” He observed the flicker of annoyance in her expression that told him she was not amused by his trite remark. “Smile, Jessy,” he admonished lightly. “You don’t do it enough.”
“Find me something to smile about.” The line of her mouth thinned in grimness.
He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. “I may have an answer for your problem right here.”
“What is it?” she asked with a sudden lift of interest.
“Duke wrote it.” He passed it to her and watched the eager way she shifted into the stall opening to allow the light to fall on it. “Basically it indicates he intended to explore the possibility of leasing the feedlot. The idea is that you show it to Cat, tell her you came across it in one of the desk drawers. With any luck it will go a long way in convincing her that her father was thinking along the same lines.”
Propping her back against the stall’s door frame, Jessy studied the note. It looked like idle jottings, listing the pros and cons of leasing the feedlot. “It doesn’t really say he planned to lease it.”
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