The Colton Ransom (10 page)

Darla instantly seized his hand in hers and uttered a swarm of endearments. “My baby, oh, my poor baby. I’m right here, honey. Don’t you worry—I won’t let them do anything to you that you don’t want done.”

Maybe it was everything that had happened today. Maybe she had just finally hit her breaking point. Whatever the reason, Gabby looked at her father’s ex-wife and issued a warning. “You let go of my father’s hand and back away, Darla, or I swear that I’m going to punch you out.”

This time, however, Darla tossed her head and stood her ground. She hadn’t managed to get to where she had in life by following any rules of decorum. She was a street fighter and proud of it.

“You and what army?” Darla sneered at her former stepdaughter.

Amanda moved to stand beside her younger sister. Her eyes narrowed as she uttered, “Guess.”

The single word, coupled with a malevolent tone, was enough to make Darla drop the hand she was clutching to her breast. Muttering something unintelligible, she stepped away from her unconscious ex-husband.

Catherine had missed the potential fray because the moment her father passed out, she had run to bring a nurse—and corner a doctor if she came across one. She managed to find both.

Entering, she saw the way her sisters were looking at Darla. Something clearly had gone down. “What?” she asked Gabby.

“I’ll fill you in later,” Amanda promised as they backed up, allowing the medical team to have the access they needed to Jethro.

Darla deliberately moved to the other side, choosing to be away from her former stepdaughters.

For a while, bedlam appeared to have ensued. But, as with the scene at the house, the mood eventually calmed down again.

The prognosis the doctor gave Gabby and her sisters agreed with what their father had told them. He had leukemia.

“But you can treat it, right?” Gabby pressed, looking from the doctor to the nurses who had been called in to assist.

“We could try,” the doctor replied cautiously. “And there might be a slim chance of recovery. However, according to our records,” he continued, looking at the three young women and glancing at the rather gaudily dressed woman with them, “your father made it perfectly clear that he didn’t want any treatment, and I’m afraid I have to abide by his wishes.”

Frustration flared through Gabby’s veins. This was completely unacceptable. “Can’t we overrule him?” she asked.

The doctor shook his head. “Only if Mr. Colton were to be deemed incompetent by the courts.”

Gabby exchanged looks with her sisters and it was clear what she was thinking. Desperate times made for desperate measures.

But Amanda shook her head. “I know what you’re thinking but we’d never be able to prove that. Unfortunately, he’s as sharp as a tack.”

“No ‘sharp tack’ accepts a death sentence,” Gabby insisted. “They fight it and do anything they can to get better.”

“This is Dad we’re talking about,” Amanda reminded her. “Look, we’ll try to reason with him when he regains consciousness again.”

Gabby’s natural optimism failed her when it came to that. “What if he doesn’t?” she posed.

“Let’s just deal with this one step at a time,” Amanda suggested. “How’s the search for Faye’s killer and Avery’s kidnapper going?” she wanted to know.

There was no solace in that department. Gabby shook her head. “They hadn’t made any progress when I left the house.”

It was obvious that Amanda thought her sister needed to be busy doing something and this was certainly a worthy undertaking. “Trevor’s going to need help and you’re the closest to him.”

Gabby laughed shortly. “Depends on your definition of
close.
”

“Look, the man needs someone in his corner right now and it looks like you’re elected,” Catherine said, adding her two cents’ worth. “Standing around here isn’t doing any of us—or Dad—any good, and you might as well see if you can accomplish something on that front.”

“If we can pool together all the money we
do
have,” Amanda suggested, joining in again, “maybe we can buy us some time.”

“
If
the kidnapper ever calls,” Gabby reminded them. As of yet, there had been no contact made.

“He or she will call,” Amanda assured her. “They’re just messing with your mind. It’s called trying to get a psychological advantage. Go,” she instructed. “And keep us posted,” she added.

Her sisters were right. Standing around in her father’s hospital suite was just making her more and more anxious. She had to be doing something, making herself useful. It was either that or slowly lose her mind, thinking about all the things that were happening, things she couldn’t seem to stop or change.

There was also the fact that a part of her felt so deeply for Trevor and that he needed her. He didn’t realize it, but she was his only hope to get through this horrifying ordeal.

“I’ll call,” Gabby promised her sisters just before she left.

Chapter 9

“A
nything?” Gabby asked as she quickly walked into Trevor’s office and found him there.

She’d managed to catch him off guard.

For the most part, since Gabby had left the ranch, he’d spent the time allaying the staff’s fears that there was a killer on the loose who was a threat to their lives, while trying to get to the bottom of who had killed Faye. If he found that out, he was confident that he would find the person who had kidnapped his daughter and who still, hopefully, had her.

He’d just returned to his office less than five minutes ago to make a few notes to himself—he always thought more clearly when he saw the facts written down in black and white. He certainly hadn’t expected to have the youngest Colton woman come bursting into his office like this.

Rather than answer her question, he asked one of his own.

“What are you doing here?” And then an answer suddenly occurred to him. “Your dad’s not—?” As much as he held Jethro Colton in contempt right now, he still didn’t wish him dead.

“No,” she cried, cutting Trevor off. After everything that had happened today, she really couldn’t bear to hear Trevor ask if her father was dead. The very word made her ill. “They’re keeping him in the hospital for now. He regained consciousness for a few minutes, but then he lapsed back.”

He was trying to gauge her mood—was there something she was holding back?—and found that he couldn’t. The youngest of the Colton sisters was not as uncomplicated as he’d initially thought. And she was far more than just a beautiful, empty-headed rich girl. He would have rather have it the other way. He wouldn’t have been attracted to her if all she was was just a shell.

“But he’s going to be okay?” Trevor asked, feeling that it was only proper to ask after the health of the man who ran the ranch and paid his salary. The fact that he thought of Colton as a cold-blooded SOB was beside the point.

Gabby blew out a breath that was more like a shudder. She was having trouble coming to terms with her father’s diagnosis—and his reaction to it. Ordinarily, she would have kept his condition a secret, as she sensed her father would have wanted her to. But the burden of it was just far too much for her. She needed to share it with someone.

“No,” she replied quietly, “actually, he’s not.”

Trevor’s eyes narrowed. “Why? What’s wrong with him? What did the doctors find out?” he asked, thinking that any diagnosis that had been ascertained at this point had to be premature. The old man hadn’t been in the hospital long enough for any definitive tests to be run and evaluated.

Gabby’s answer confirmed his feelings on the matter.

“They’re still running tests, but during that short space of time when he did regain consciousness, my father told us that he had been diagnosed with leukemia.” It hurt her throat just to say the word, and she could feel her eyes stinging. It was a struggle not to cry.

“Leukemia?” Trevor repeated, stunned. He tried to remember if he’d ever heard of anything specific concerning the disease’s prognosis. “They can cure that, right?” he asked uncertainly.

“They can cure
some
strains,” Gabby qualified, then added, “
if
they catch it in the early stages.” And then she went on to say the most important part. “And they get to treat it.”

There was something in Gabby’s voice that told him the situation was less than hopeful. “They caught it too late?” Trevor asked.

“I don’t know,” she admitted, feeling helpless and aggravated at the same time. “My father didn’t say. What he
did
say was that he didn’t want to be treated for the disease.”

“What?” That didn’t sound right. Who wouldn’t want to try to beat a disease they had? “Maybe he doesn’t know what he’s saying,” Trevor speculated. “When he passed out earlier, he might have hit his head and he’s not thinking clearly right now—”

She would have loved to believe that—but she couldn’t. She knew her father far too well for that.

“Oh, he knows what he’s saying. My father was pretty adamant about it,” she recalled as she shared the information with Trevor. “He said he didn’t want to spend his final days being poked and prodded—and sick to his stomach,” she added, paraphrasing her father’s words.

Final days
sounded rather ominous to him. “That means that your father probably doesn’t think the treatment will take.”

Gabby frowned. She’d never allowed herself to give up all hope about
anything
before.

Her optimism was obviously not a trait she’d picked up from her father, Trevor thought.

“I guess,” she murmured.

“So what are you doing here?” Given the circumstances, he still didn’t understand why Gabby had returned to the ranch. “Why aren’t you back at the hospital, trying to talk him into getting treatment?”

Attempting to convince her father to take action right now would
really
fall on deaf ears. “Because the doctors said that my father is now in a coma. I can’t talk to him and I can’t just stand around, doing nothing.” Her eyes met his. “I’ll go crazy that way.” It suddenly occurred to her that Trevor hadn’t answered the question she’d asked when she’d first walked in. “Have you heard anything from the kidnapper yet?” she asked, phrasing her question more specifically so that he was forced to give her some sort of an answer.

“Nothing so far,” he told her, all but grinding the words out. There was a measure of anxiety mixed in with his annoyance, although he tried to hide it.

“Don’t kidnappers usually get in touch with the parents or guardians by now?” she asked, trying not to think about the very real possibility that somehow the kidnapper or kidnappers had got wise to the fact that they had the wrong infant, that
this
child was not going to bring them
any
money, let alone the hundreds of thousands they were undoubtedly anticipating.

And if they
were
aware of that, then what happened to Avery? Would whoever had kidnapped her just abandon the infant, or would something more drastic happen to Trevor’s daughter?

The very thought, even if she didn’t follow it through to its ultimate dire conclusion, chilled her down to the very bone.

“I don’t know,” Trevor bit off, using annoyance as a shield to hide the fact that he was growing progressively more and more worried about his daughter. Because of the note, he knew there would be some communication, but the waiting was killing him. Worrying wasn’t going to bring Avery back. And, he had the feeling, neither would anything or anyone else. It was up to him to find his daughter and rescue her. “I haven’t read up on my latest installment of the kidnappers’ handbook.”

He was upset—she got that and cut him some slack for being even more surly than usual. “So what are we going to do?” she wanted to know.

There was no way he was going to have her come with him. “
We
aren’t going to do anything,” he told her, emphasizing the pronoun she’d used. “But I’m going to go talk to those people on the list you gave me—”

“I’ll come with you,” she volunteered.

“No, you won’t,” he told her firmly.

The last thing he wanted was a distraction tagging along. Right now, he was torn between blaming Gabby for his daughter’s disappearance and being uncomfortably attracted to her. The former was counterproductive, not to mention a waste of time, and he definitely didn’t have time for the latter. The best way to handle both situations was just to not have her around. It was a course of action he intended to follow.

But Gabby had other ideas.

“Yes, I will,” she insisted. When he started to tell her that there was no way in hell he was going to let her and her bleeding heart tag along while he questioned her less-than-savory candidates for the center, she shut him down with a blast of logic. “They’re not going to talk to you, not with that attitude of yours. They’re used to me and, to an extent, they trust me. If there’s anything that any of them know that remotely has to do with the kidnapping, they’ll tell me, not you,” she informed him flatly.

The fact that she qualified her reference to the teenagers’ trust, saying they only trusted her to a certain extent, told him that she had more of a realistic grasp of the situation than he’d given her credit for. Maybe it actually was better if he brought Jethro’s daughter along.

Besides, as he saw it, he didn’t have all that much choice in the matter.

“Okay,” he allowed. “You can come. But I’m in charge of the investigation.”

“Fine with me,” she agreed. This wasn’t about one-upmanship—it was about saving a little girl.

He had his doubts about the veracity of her statement, but he could hope. “Let’s go,” he ordered, heading for the front door. “We’re just wasting time, standing around here.”

“You got it,” she said, eagerly falling in right beside him.

* * *

Questioning the people on the list she had written down for Trevor took the rest of the day. By the end of it, they still hadn’t finished. Several people on the list were still left to question. But those they were going to have to see the following day.

Over the course of that time, Trevor had periodically checked in with Mathilda, asking the head housekeeper if there’d been a call yet. There was no need to specify from whom. The other woman knew exactly who he was talking about.

And each time she told him that there hadn’t, his stomach tightened a little more, twisting itself into a knot.

And each time, just before he hung up, the housekeeper would assure him that, “Don’t worry. They’ll call.”

But Trevor was far from certain that they would, and the longer he had to wait, the less confident he became that his daughter was still alive.

When he ended the call just before they turned around to drive back to the ranch for the night, Gabby could see by the look on Trevor’s face that they were still left dangling.

She was about to ask him about it when he suddenly slanted a glance in her direction and almost belligerently asked, “Just what do you get out of it, anyway?”

For the most part, Trevor never wondered about someone else’s business. But Gabby’s determined involvement with this foundation to help a handful of inner-city teens had stirred up his curiosity to a fierce level. Why would someone like her want to spend her time and her money, not to mention her effort, on that kind of an endeavor?

He knew what he thought was behind something like this. But he wanted to hear it from her.

Trevor supposed that there was a part of him that was hoping she’d say something that would redeem the outlook he had about this sort of a venture undertaken by someone of privilege like her.

“Get out of it?” Gabby echoed. She realized that he’d switched gears and was referring to her working with those kids he’d been questioning. He made it sound like a strict monetary investment for profit and she knew that couldn’t be what he really meant. That sort of view was far too jaded. Trevor couldn’t be thinking of her in that sort of light—or could he?

“Yeah, what do you get out of it?” he repeated. “Are you just slumming amid the ‘poor folk’ so you can feel superior about yourself? Or are you just trying to do something supposedly ‘good’ so you can stand back and make everyone take notice of what a ‘big’ heart you have, stooping down to give a helping hand to a group of underprivileged kids?”

Okay, now he was making her angry, she thought, trying to rein in her temper.

“What I ‘get’ out of it,” she informed him with a touch of irritation in her voice, “is the satisfaction of knowing that because I helped a kid who would otherwise be doomed to a life of menial, insignificant jobs, they can actually make something of him or herself, can achieve their full potential and maybe, just maybe, be able to reach for those stars they could only dream about up to now.”

“In other words, you want to be somebody’s fairy godmother?” Trevor asked mockingly.

Now she was feeling a white-hot anger. What right did he have to presume that just because he’d been around her these past few years, occasionally grunting a greeting in her direction, that he knew anything about her? About what motivated her, what made her tick? He was being a jerk. And maybe trying to get her mad on purpose—or to distract himself from another very real crisis.

“What I want,” she informed him tersely, “is to be somebody’s path to hope.”

“What do you know about hope?” Trevor challenged. “You were born with a silver spoon in your mouth.”

It was growing dark, but he could still see her eyes flash in response to his statement. Almost against his will, he found the sight—and her—compelling. Her fire was drawing him in.

“What I know, Mr. Garth,” she informed him, “is that there, for the grace of God, go I.”

He scowled at her before looking back on the road. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What it means is that although we can’t choose our parents and I was lucky enough to be born a Colton, I could have just as easily been born to poverty.” She might have looked innocent, but she was far from it when it came to knowing the kind of man her father was and had been. “Given my father’s penchant in his younger years to bed any woman with a pulse, I could have easily been born to some poor woman who my father discarded the minute someone else caught his eye, leaving me unacknowledged and, more important, without the promise of any kind of a future.”

She noted that he was quiet. Had she finally managed to get through to Trevor? Having got to know him somewhat, she had her doubts about that.

“That’s what I think of when I see those kids who have something extra, something special, and because of family circumstances, they’re forced to drop out of school to help put food on the table and a roof over their family’s heads. If you find that self-serving, well, I can’t help the way you think. I can only do what I feel is right,” she informed him.

Gabby saw the half smile creep onto his lips. Still angry at Trevor’s presumptions, she shot a single word at him. “What?”

Trevor shook his head, amused and taken with what he’d just witnessed. “You’re something to watch when you get a fire in your belly, you know that?”