Gambling on a Dream (16 page)

“I will.” Forsyth smiled and nodded toward them all. “It was nice to meet you.”

Tilly opened the door and held it. “You gotta come to the American Legion sometime. We vets get together about every Friday night.”

“Thanks for the invite. I will sometime.” He looked back at Dawn. “I’ll order something for the headache.”

“Thanks,” Dawn said as the doctor left the room.

“Wow, imagine him knowing your sister.” Tilly closed the door after him.

“I’m told it’s a small Army.” Wyatt moved back to stand next to her bed. “What did you find out?”

Tilly cleared his throat and shifted his feet. “The brakes were cut.”

Dawn couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “What?”

Tilly scratched at the gray scruff growing in at his cheek and nodded. “I saw the cut in the line myself. Whoever did this was hoping you’d wreck.”

“And no doubt not walk away from the crash. Blackwell Road is full of turns, not to mention the creek.” Wyatt shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and paced the length of the small room. “If my mailbox hadn’t slowed you down before you hit that old oak tree in my front yard, Lord only knows if you would’ve survived.”

“I crashed in front of your house?” She got a flash of memory--a mailbox with a name painted in black.

He ambled to her side and sat in the chair next to the bed. “I’d just finished repainting that darned mailbox before you crashed into it.”

Tilly chuckled and leaned against the wall. “She didn’t like your paint job, eh?”

She couldn’t help but smile. “I’m sorry.”

“Mailboxes can be replaced. You can’t be.” Wyatt’s grin and the intensity of his eyes made her breath catch and her heart beat a little faster. He laid his hand on her shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. The sensation tingled through her.

No way could she respond to him.

Another knock on the door echoed through her head like a gunshot, and much to her disappointment, Wyatt let go of her. Tilly opened it, and her mother and father rushed into the room. Tilly waved and exited after they entered.

Her mother came to the bed and hugged her. “Oh, my baby, are you okay?”

She glanced at Wyatt, who stiffened as if he was ready to leave, but something in his gaze had her believing he didn’t want to go.

“I’m fine, Momma.” She hugged her father.

He kissed her forehead next to the bandage. “What happened?”

“I’ll tell you later.”

“Hey?” Her brother’s voice came from the doorway.

She let go of her father and stared as Talon edged through the door. In his arms, he carried a beautiful little girl with hair the color of wheat and big hazel eyes. “Talon?”

“I have someone I’d like you to meet.” He took a few steps toward her bed. “Jessie Mae, this is your aunt Dawn.”

The little girl snuggled close to Talon’s shoulder. In her other arm, she held a raggedy stuffed animal that might have been a bear, and sucked on her thumb.

“Hi, Jessie Mae.” She swallowed and met her brother’s gaze. “That’s why you disappeared?”

He nodded and looked at Jessie Mae. Dawn wasn’t sure she’d ever seen so much love shining from her brother’s normally cold eyes as she did in that moment.

“She’s gonna be living with me from now on.”

* * * *

He and his brother-in-law stood in the parking lot of the county impound. Staring at the sheriff’s truck, he shook his head and shoved his hands on his hips. “You know we have to get rid of the kid. We can’t have him running off his mouth again.”

“Did you figure out who else has been talking?” His brother-in-law moved around the front of the Ford, looking over the damage.

“I have a few ideas. I think it was Ella Larson’s girl, Annie. But according to what I heard, she left with Charli Quinn this morning for Nashville.”

The peacock stopped looking over the truck. “I’ll take care of the Demello kid.”

He scowled at his brother-in-law and pointed at the truck. The idiot had one thing he had to do and fucked it up. “Like you took care of the bitch?”

The idiot stopped in front of him. He thought he was a big deal because he carried a few muscles and was a few inches taller than him. “It’s not my fault she hit the damned mailbox and slowed her momentum. If she’d hit just the tree or landed in the creek, she’d be dead.” The peacock married to his sister puffed up his chest. “It was you who didn’t want me to just put a fuckin’ bullet in her head. Now what?”

Turning away, he took his hat off and wiped sweat from his brow. He needed another hit soon. His need for coke was coming sooner and sooner. He couldn’t function without it anymore. “We have to scare her enough so she can’t focus on catching us.”

“And how the hell do we do that?”

He looked over his shoulder at his partner and smiled as a plan formed. “You’ll see.”

* * * *

Wyatt paced the hall outside of Dawn’s room. Seeing her in that hospital bed brought back every bad memory he had of the shooting.

“So, who do you think has it out for my girl?”

Wyatt turned at the sound of Tom Madison’s voice. He cleared his throat and shrugged. “Whoever killed those kids.”

Tom wiped his hand across his mouth and nodded as he sat in a chair along the wall. “Of course, question is what triggered them into hitting Dawn?”

“I think talking to Demello last night was the trigger.” Wyatt sat beside the former sheriff and his father’s best friend. “The murderer shouldn’t have known he talked, but it seems like he does.” He leaned over his legs and looked down at his hat in his hands. “Thing is how did they find out?”

Tom steepled his fingers on his lap and peered at them as if deep in thought. “Hard to say. Maybe someone tipped off the killer.”

“Maybe. But who?” He squinted down the corridor. The only people in the know, as far as he knew, were the police and the DA. “Sure, the kid could’ve said something to someone on the outside, but I doubt it. He’s scared shitless.”

He looked over his shoulder as Tom stretched his long legs out in front of him, crossing his scuffed cowboy boots at the ankles. “Do you think someone inside the department might be involved?”

Wyatt sat up. “I doubt it. I’ve known every one of those guys all my life, and I’d trust my life with any one of them.”

Tom pursed his lips. “Sometimes, the guy least suspected of a crime is the most guilty.”

The door to Dawn’s room opened and Talon entered the hallway. He glanced at Wyatt and Tom. As he approached them, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket. Talk about freaking shockers. Seeing Talon Blackwell with a kid topped the list.

Talon leaned a shoulder against the wall and tilted his head to look at his boots. “So, am I still on the short list of suspects?”

Tom looked at Wyatt, waiting for his response too.

Twirling his hat in his hands, he took a deep breath. Wyatt didn’t have any evidence exonerating Talon, except what his gut told him. “Are you willing to tell me what you were doing in front of the Longhorn on the morning Chris Larson was killed?”

Talon shifted his feet and turned around to lean his back on the wall. With a smirk, he shook his head. “I can’t. But I will tell you the reason I was in town had to do with my daughter.”

“Were you meeting someone?”

Talon met his gaze with eyes that could freeze carbon dioxide into dry ice. “Yeah, but I’m not telling you who, so stop asking. Like I said, I was in town to meet someone who had information about that little girl in there.” He pointed toward Dawn’s room. “Her mother doesn’t want to be named, and I respect that request even if I hate the reason for it.”

Tom sighed and stood. “She doesn’t want anyone to know she had your child?”

Talon looked at the man who had raised him as his own with hard eyes. “Can you blame her? I’m one of the infamous Blackwell bastards. Besides, I’m an ex-con.”

With a frown, Tom shook his head and tilted it toward the floor. “I’m going back in.”

After Tom went through Dawn’s door, Wyatt faced Talon. He would never understand what Talon’s beef with his stepfather was, but now wasn’t the time to ask. “So, her mother’s from Colton?”

Talon only shrugged.

“I know you went to Las Vegas.”

That registered a response. Talon scowled and straightened. “Who told you?”

Wyatt glanced at his hat and sat it on his head. “I’m a Texas Ranger. I have my contacts. But even if I didn’t, your sister has hers. I know you flew out of Dallas last Wednesday night and stayed at a hotel called the Lazy Cactus. Let me see if I can figure out what you were doing while you were there.” Leaning back in his plastic chair, he counted each point he made on his fingers. “The girl's mother is from Colton. You showed up at Black Diamond Casino where Maggie Pratt is a showgirl on Thursday nights. Thanks to the Colton grapevine, I also know Aida Mae Pratt is excited Maggie’s got a job on some cruise ship. Although she makes it sound like she’s a cruise director, we all know Maggie’s an exotic dancer.”

He smiled and looked at his extended three fingers. “Doesn’t take too much math to add this up. Maggie Pratt is that little girl’s mother. She called you and told you to come get the girl.”

He tapped the three fingers against his temple. “Or rather, she contacted her sister. You were at Beth’s the night Larson was killed. She didn’t want you parked outside of her place, so you parked your truck down the street and around the block. That’s why you were in front of the Longhorn. Though, I have no idea why you’d be there at four in the morning. Unless she didn’t want to risk anyone seeing you at her daycare center.”

Talon fisted a hand and chuckled, but it was as humorless as his amber eyes. “Guess that’s why you’re a hot shot Texas Ranger, huh? But I’m not admitting to anything.”

Wyatt stood and rubbed the scruff on his cheek. He needed a shave. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.”

As he headed down the hall, Talon’s low voice stopped him. “McPherson, if you fuck my sister over again, you won’t like the consequences.”

He turned and glared at his childhood best friend. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Talon flashed an arctic smile as he passed him. “You’re a smart guy, figure it out.”

Talon nodded to the nurse seated behind the station in the intensive care unit. “I’m here to see Rachel McPherson.”

The nurse, whom he vaguely recognized as someone he'd gone to school with, frowned and closed the chart on the counter in front of her. “Only family and close friends are allowed to see her.”

“Believe it or not Rachel and I are close friends.”

Before he turned away, she pursed her lips and leveled her gaze on him. “You have five minutes.

With a single nod of his head, he turned away from the desk and headed toward the room his mother had told him was Rachel’s.

The nurse didn’t try to stop him as he opened the door. The air in the dim room was heavy with the scent of antiseptic and the incessant beeping of a heart monitor. He swallowed as he took in the machines and IV attached to the woman lying in the bed.

She looked small and frail, something Rachel had never been. The sight of her broke his heart. As he stopped next to her bed and sat on the chair, she turned to meet his gaze. He had no idea what to say to her, but he couldn’t leave the hospital without seeing her.

“Talon?” Her voice was weak and hoarse.

He nodded and averted his eyes to his hat, which he held with a death grip. “You know there was a time I wanted to die. I had a plan, and even thought about doing it. But in the end, I couldn’t go through with it.”

She turned away.

Swallowing the dredged up pain of the memories, he went on. “When I was sent to prison for something I didn’t do, I was done. Done with being the bastard son of Jock Blackwell. Done with constantly fighting for everything I’ve ever had. Done with life.”

“I’m so tired of the pain, but I hate the pity in everyone’s faces more. Why didn’t God just take me too?” The sorrow cracking through her weak voice shot through his heart.

He reached over and brushed strands of red hair from her cheek and forehead. “I know it seems like the only way out, but death isn’t the answer.”

“My mother bathes me.” She stared up at him with beautiful blue eyes so full of pain and self-disgust it soured his stomach. “Did you know that? She doesn’t trust that I can do it myself. Wyatt moved in with our parents because of me. He hasn’t lived at home since his sophomore year of college. What the hell do I have to live for?”

He wiped the tear from her cheek. “They love you. They do these things to take care of you, to help you heal. You have a lot to live for, Rachel.”

Huffing, she looked at the ceiling. “I have nothing. My fiance is dead, and I will never be able to have a child. Did you know that was all I ever wanted?” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

“You still have your family. And you still have your friends. Let us know what you need us to do for you and what you don’t. Rachel, we are all here for you. You just have to let us in.”

But Rachel McPherson never let anyone too close, including the people who loved her. He’d bet that was the real reason she never brought her fiance home, no matter how much she loved him.

She turned away and he stood. He’d left Jessie Mae with his mother long enough. “The next time you get that low, call me.”

Meeting his gaze again, she reached for his hand. “You’ve always been there for me, Talon. Thank you for being such a great friend.”

He smiled and squeezed her cool fingers. They reminded him of twigs of straw that would break with the gentlest of pressure. “I’ll always be here.”

The door opened and a nurse came in. His five minutes were up. He let go of her hand. “I’ll see you later.”

As he passed the nurse, he nodded and then headed out the door. Damn it, was he going to let himself get caught in Rachel McPherson’s web again?

* * * *

Tilly unlocked the door to Dawn’s office.

Wyatt entered and turned on the lights. “Thanks. I won’t be long.”

Dawn’s lieutenant shrugged. “She told me to let you, and only you in.”

He nodded and glanced around the familiar office. Before she’d taken over the job of sheriff, Zack Cartwright had sat in here. Wyatt and Zack had spent a lot of time here mulling over clues while looking for the cattle and horse thieves a few months ago. Now, he and Dawn were looking for a murderer and drug dealer.