“What did you discover?” she asked again. The topic held her interest long enough to get her out of fear’s immediate clutches.

  With his thick blond hair ruffled, the blue eyes focused, Paul gave her a quick glance, before returning his attention to the road in front of them. And the mirrors that gave him views all around them.

  She was watching, too.

  They had to watch.

  She just didn’t have to let the fear debilitate her.

  “That I was jealous of your little sister. That’s why I was always on you about jumping into immediate action every time she called. Not because you were enabling her, but because I wanted you to jump like that for me. Instead, I’d be pushed aside for her. I got to the point where I dreaded your phone ringing anytime we were together.”

  Shocked, she stared at him. Remembered the mirror hanging from the side of her door. Checked it out. Seriously.

  Saw the cars. And...wow.

  The great Paul Wright had been jealous? She’d secretly feared, subconsciously even, in the beginning, that she’d never have what it took to hold someone like him long term. That maybe no woman had what it took to keep happy a man who had everything.

  And he’d been jealous? Feeling like he wasn’t as important to her as Kelsey had been?

  Yet...when she’d called, once again tending to Kelsey, needing his help, he’d dropped everything to be there for her.

  “You were right,” she said, what she’d finally acknowledged to herself sometime over the past day or two. “I was enabling her. Maybe if I’d let her flounder, wallow in her emotional distress, a little more, she’d have found her own backbone sooner. Maybe none of this would have happened...”

  “Don’t.” His tone firm in a way she couldn’t remember ever hearing before. “Maybe Kels should have stood on her own two feet more, but she was who she was, Hale. A person whose emotions were intense and whose brain interpreted them first before seeing logic. And you...with your patience and loyalty and unconditional love...you helped her see the logic. And maybe...taught her how to see if for herself. Maybe that’s what really happened here. Kelsey had learned, from and through you, how to handle the emotional burst without falling apart. Maybe you’d shown her, through the years, that pausing long enough to be able to think, rather than always just reacting, was the way to be happy...”

  Her gaze firmly locked on the mirror outside her window, Haley blinked back the tears his words brought to her eyes.

  “Maybe it was some of both,” she said softly.

  Glad to put another painful part of their past to rest.

  * * *

  “Grab your bag—we need to go.” Paul pushed his head into the adjoining door to Haley’s room long enough to speak, and then pulled it back out again. Loaded up his shaving bag, packed his computer and waited.

  They hadn’t been in their rooms half an hour.

  “What’s going on?” Haley appeared a few seconds later, her bag in hand. Her hair in its ponytail, the nearly makeup-free face, the shorts and sandals...did nothing to tone down the natural beauty she’d seen as a curse, feeling she’d never measure up to her glamorous sister and mother. She’d never seen how she’d always shone so much brighter to him.

  “We’ll leave the reservation open,” he told her, heading out the door, first, to check the hall, and then holding it for her to exit. “I just found something we need to check out. I’ll tell you about it in the SUV.” Where he could be more certain he wouldn’t be overheard.

  Gladstone’s minion—if he only had one of them—would have to lay low at least for an hour or two after ditching the white car, but depending on how much money was at stake, how much Gladstone was doling out, there was no telling what the guy would do to get the job done.

  That was the thing about money. It sustained life. Provided a lot of good.

  And a whole lot of bad, too.

  They made it to the SUV without mishap and Paul pulled away as quickly as he could. He’d seen no evidence that anyone was following them, but he wasn’t taking any chance of being caught unaware, either.

  “I’m hoping that time is on our side,” he said as he sped away, their destination already typed into the GPS system on his phone. “The guy knows I saw him. He knows we’re onto him. I’m sure the car has already been ditched. And if he’s at all the professional we think him to be, he’s going to take a minute to reassess and find a different mode of operation or risk getting caught—which means he doesn’t get paid.”

  And there was the little issue of jail time, too, if it could be proven that he’d taken murder-for-hire payment. Or even, assault-for-hire payment.

  He was tending toward the murder part, however. “With Kelsey’s death, officially ruled accidental, Noah’s death, which looked accidental or at least self-inflicted, and now Charles Downy’s death being ruled accidental, I think we have something bigger on our hands than we knew.” He told her the stark truth. She had the right to get herself out at any time.

  “You don’t think the deaths are accidental.”

  “Charles Downy was a horseman his entire life. The chances of him being thrown at the edge of a mountain he’s been riding for forty years don’t seem all that likely to me.”

  “His first name was Charles.” She was watching her mirror. And ahead, too.

  “Yeah. And there was no evidence of any criminal record. He was forty-five, born to money, but not the kind that gets you recognized everywhere you go. His family money came from ranching, two generations ago, and then simply being good businessmen, managing their money, investing. He was philanthropic...”

  “Did he have kids?”

  “No.”

  “And a wife?”

  He took a deep pause. Reminding himself that Haley wanted him to do what he did to the best of ability. “That’s who we’re going to see, Haley. They were high school sweethearts—he was a senior her freshman year. She doesn’t know we’re coming. I’m hoping we can just drive onto the property and knock on the door. And that she’ll agree to speak to us.”

  “And the plan if she does?” She didn’t miss a beat. And, if possible, his affection for her grew.

  And maybe, the thought intruded, just maybe, when the job was done, they really could be friends. He’d like to know that she was in his life. Would like to be in contact now and then, without any chance of bringing in the bad stuff that went along with their being in love.

  They couldn’t have a healthy love, but...perhaps...a healthy friendship?

  She turned to look at him. Waiting for an answer. The plan.

  “I’m doing it straight up,” he told her. “Other than an explanation for your presence. You work for me, by the way,” he said. “And I don’t intend to mention the baby. No need to hurt her more than necessary until we know what we’re dealing with. I need to find out what she knows, and based on the little I could find on social media—a writeup from a charity ball they attended—I suspect that she doesn’t know her husband was having an affair. Something isn’t adding up here—a man who’s kept his nose clean all his life is suddenly having an affair, housing a pregnant woman, hiring someone to keep an eye on her, and then they both end up dead?”

  “But it has to be him who hired the lawyer to warn Gladstone off when Kelsey found out he was using her credit cards, right? He wanted to keep Gladstone away from Kels.”

  “Maybe because Gladstone is a big Vegas name. Could be he didn’t want the notoriety.”

  “And he could have been protecting Kels.” Her tone was soft, reminding him that, no matter what, Haley was going to see the best in her sister. And for her.

  He turned because it was time. Hadn’t seen anyone on their trail.

  “Did you find any evidence that Downy had ever been to Sister’s?” she asked then.

  “No, but that’s what the ranch is known for, what makes it as successful as it is. Men can go there with confidence that their visit will be completely anonymous.”

  “What does make sense is that the man met Kels, fell in love, and then they both got in over their heads,” she offered.

  “Except that doesn’t explain Noah’s urgent messages. Or the fact that a rich kid would risk his life to deliver them.”

  “We’re back to Sister’s aren’t we? If Charles Downy met my sister there...and they really did fall in love. And he was trying to live a double life...the whole thing could put Sister’s in a really bad position...” Her voice faded, as though she was thinking it all through as she spoke.

  But he was right with her, and moving forward, too. “It makes sense,” he said. “If Kels worked there, she had any number of wealthy clients. And would have had to sign confidentiality agreements. The two of them, thinking they were going to have a life together...could put the reputation of the ranch at stake. If one of the young women got pregnant, and word got out, if someone feared that Kelsey had blackmailed Downy, for instance, all of the other wealthy clients would have to think twice about just how secure the ranch was to them. If one woman did it, so could another and...”

  “Which would also explain someone coming after me when we visited. He was probably sent after me when you started showing Kelsey’s picture around...”

  “And if they find out we’re speaking with Downy’s wife, we’re putting her in danger, too,” he said. “But for all we know, she’s already on their list. They don’t know what he’d have told her. Maybe nothing. Maybe this will be a horrible shock to her, and your sympathy will be greatly appreciated. I’m counting on you to comfort her, to clean up my mess, so to speak, if what I have to say breaks her heart.”

  Haley’s nod was stiff. “She has to be warned,” she said.

  “And maybe she’ll allow us to look through her husband’s records so that I can find anything that points us in the direction of the baby.”

  “Like what?”

  “I have no idea. If that baby was sold, or adopted, someone has to know about it. Maybe there’s a payment to whoever that someone is in Downy’s things. Something his wife wouldn’t recognize. She’d think it was a business deal. But if I can get access to his accounts, I can follow up on every payment he made, find out where the money went and why.”

  He’d also be able to confirm whether or not any of Downy’s accounts made payments to Sister’s Ranch at about the time Kelsey would have become pregnant. Something Haley would figure out.

  He turned. Found the address. And was able to pull up a long drive that circled near a double front door.

  Pieces were falling into place.

  He might not have it all right, yet. But they were getting there.

  Finally.

  * * *

  “I can’t...” Shaking her head, the dark tumble of curls falling over her shoulders and shadowing her face, Sandra Downy fell to the silk-threaded gray-and-maroon couch in the small welcoming room off to the right of the marble foyer inside the front door. Tears filled her eyes as, hands shaking, she reached for a tissue from the gray-and-maroon glass holder on the table beside her. “You’re telling me that Charles had an affair?” She got the words out, but her voice cracked.

  As had the expression on her beautiful, though fragile appearing, face as Paul had broken the news to her. He’d shown her the photo on his phone first, asked if the man depicted there was her husband. She’d answered immediately. Saying the shirt he was wearing was hanging upstairs in his closet, still. And Paul had told her how he’d come to have the photo. That her husband had been seen going in and out of a house in Vegas that had been paid for by one of his companies.

  “We believe he may have been having an affair...” Paul said, taking a seat in the chair perpendicular to the distraught woman as Haley sat down beside her. Not too close as to be cloying, but there if she was needed. Paul had been right about her ability to bring comfort to emotional moments.

  For once she was thankful for her lifetime of practice.

  And not just so they could get the information they needed to find the baby. Seeing the suffering on a stranger’s face, Haley wanted to help the woman in any way she could.

  “We don’t think it was habitual activity,” she said softly, much like trying to reassure a parent that while a child’s diagnosis wasn’t good, it wasn’t necessarily terminal, either. You couldn’t take away what was, but maybe you could direct inner vision to whatever brightness was there. “It doesn’t appear that Charles was a womanizer. As a matter of fact, it looks like this one time was it.” Haley didn’t know that he’d stayed in the motel room with the street woman. He could have just given the woman the money for the room. After all, she’d said that he was kind.

  Sniffing, her lips trembling, Sandra nodded. Blinked a few times as a fresh pool of tears formed in her eyes. “I just...it’s just... I thought losing him was the hardest thing I’d ever have to go through, and now this...”

  “We have reason to believe that your husband, and...the woman...didn’t die by accident,” Paul told her. But as she raised a shocked face, her chin dropping as her mouth hung open, he quickly added, “This is just conjecture at this point. But there’s been some other activity, provable offenses, that seem tied to both your husband and the woman and I’ve been hired to help find the truth.”

  All true. And not giving any more than he had to. Paul was good.

  Damned impressive, actually.

  And kind, too.

  Which impressed her a whole lot more.

  “I was hoping...you’d be able to help me out,” Paul said in a coaxing, but respectful tone. “If you could answer some questions...”

  Sandra sat up straight. Wiped her eyes. “I’ll do what I can. If my husband was murdered, if there’s even a chance of that, I’ll do whatever it takes to find out who did it.”

  Haley felt for the woman as though the emotions were her own—partially because they were also her own. She wanted to tell Sandra that she understood, that she knew how it felt to find out not only that your newly deceased loved one had been living a double life about which you knew nothing, but also that murder was likely involved. She wanted to tell her about the baby.

  For the moment, she just took Sandra’s hand. Gave it a squeeze. And when Sandra’s fingers curled around hers, Haley held on, too.

  Paul started with simple questions regarding Charles’s routines. His habits. His interests. He asked how and when Charles had taken up horseback riding, how many horses he had. None of it seemed to shed any light on the situation they were investigating, but Haley trusted him to know what he was doing.

  Sandra seemed to as well, as the woman answered all of his questions quietly. And kindly. She shuddered once. Teared up a time or two. But she didn’t break.

  Something else Haley could relate to.

  The interview was excruciating, and yet, in some way, it seemed almost...healing...too. Helping someone else through the painhad dissipated her own sting a small bit.

  “That’s all then,” Paul said almost a half hour later, standing. And for the first time since they’d entered the house, Haley faltered. That was it?

  They hadn’t learned anything.

  Not that would help them in any way. He hadn’t even asked for the thing he’d said they were coming to find. The financials. The only way they were going to know who Downy had been paying. The only way they had half a hope of finding out how Downy and Kelsey had met.

  Or why she’d felt compelled to change her name to Maya.

  How could he just walk out of there?

  Why would he do that?

  Wasn’t he as serious about helping Kelsey as she’d thought?

  “Oh...just one more thing,” Paul said just as Haley and Sandra were rising. “Would you mind if I had a look at your husband’s credit card accounts?” he asked. “My specialty is putting seemingly innocuous things together to find missing pieces. Any charges he might have made, in the vicinity of other facts we’ve already collected, could be all it takes for us to get to the truth.”

  “Sure.” Sandra shrugged. Shook her head and said, “I have no problem with you having access to whatever you need.” She named her late husband’s most commonly used passwords. “As I said, whatever it takes...”

  Haley’s momentary lack of faith kind of stung her for a second. She trusted Paul with her life. With her sister’s memory and with her sister’s baby’s life.

  But she’d doubted his ability to do what he’d said he was going to do with the interview?

  Sandra offered a cup of tea to Haley, while Paul had his time at Charles’s desk and on his computer, and, wanting to be of whatever comfort she could to the woman, Haley looked to Paul, saw his nod, and accepted.

  Her job might be to keep Sandra occupied, but she found herself pulled toward the emotionally damaged woman, wanting to be with her in their shared suffering.

  Wanting to know more about the man Kelsey had fallen in love with.

  And to know if the man could have sold his own child.

  Or worse.

  Chapter 19

  The need to accomplish things quickly was all in a day’s work to Paul. Knowing how to get where he needed to be, helped. And still, his fingers fumbled a time or two on the keyboard as he thought about Haley off in the house where he could neither see nor hear her.

  What if whoever had been following them knew where they were?

  What if he’d just left both Sandra and Haley off on their own where they’d be easy prey?

  As far as he knew, there was no one else in the house.

  Sandra had opened the door to them herself.

  And she’d mentioned putting on the pot for the tea she’d offered Haley.

  Clearly, she’d have help keeping up the five-thousand-square-foot home that, according to tax records, she and Charles had been in for more than twenty years. But that didn’t have to mean live-in staff.