Secrets and Lies: He's a Bad Boy\He's Just a Cowboy (49 page)

“What woman?”

“Heather Leonetti.” Sands took a swallow from his bourbon and smiled as the liquor hit the back of his throat. “You know who I mean—Heather Tremont Leonetti, the girl who married that rich banker six years ago.”

Tremont
. The name sent a jolt through him. Jackson’s fiancée was a Tremont. She had a younger sister…a pretty girl who had married well, above her station… .

“It seems as if Turner and Mrs. Leonetti knew each other a few years ago. Before she was married. Met up on a ranch owned by Turner’s uncle, Zeke Kilkenny. Now, Kilkenny won’t say much, won’t even return my calls, and his housekeeper, Mazie, usually a gossip, wouldn’t breathe a word about what went on between Brooks and Heather Tremont, who, by the way, was in an on-again, off-again engagement with Leonetti, but I did some digging. Came up with a few names. One of the ranch hands who used to work for Kilkenny, Billy Adams—he said Heather and this cowboy were damned thick, and another girl who worked up there during the summers—” He set down his drink, reached into the front pocket of his jacket—a shiny pinstripe—and pulled out a small notepad. Licking his fingers, he flipped through the pages. “Here it is. Yost. Sheryl Yost. Seems she had a thing for our boy Turner, as well. Anyway, she was more than happy to tell me anything I wanted to know. According to her, Brooks and the Tremont girl had an affair, kind of a summer fling. Eventually he rode off into the sunset and left her—this seems to have been his M.O. at the time—and she ended up marrying Leonetti.”

Thomas, who had been interested, wasn’t impressed. “Lots of people have one last fling before they get married.”

The fat man’s lip curled outward and he moved his head from side to side. “Maybe. The thing of it is Mrs. Leonetti had a baby. Not eight months later. And the kid don’t look all that Italian, if you get my drift.”

Thomas held his glass halfway to his lips. “Brooks’s?”

“Again, your guess is as good as mine,” Sands replied in his oily voice. “But I found out that Dennis Leonetti had some tests done a few years back and he can’t father children. His sperm count is near zero.” Sands picked up his drink and finished it in one long swallow, then snapped open his ratty leather briefcase and fumbled through some papers. “Now, all of a sudden, Heather Leonetti, who’s managed to ditch Leonetti and strip him of some of his money—she’s shown up on Brooks’s doorstep, at the very ranch you want to buy, and he practically does back flips. He’s in San Francisco now—has a friend of his, Fred McDonald, run the ranch while he’s gone.” Finding his report, he slid it across the glass expanse of the tabletop.

Thomas picked up the typewritten pages. “In San Francisco…to meet the child?” he asked, reaching into his pocket for his reading glasses.

Sands leaned closer. He grinned in pleasure. “He’s there for tests. Been to a hospital. The staff is pretty mum, but my guess is it has something to do with the kid as the boy’s got leukemia. Heather’s kept it a secret, but she and Leonetti split up after the kid was diagnosed. My guess is Leonetti found out he wasn’t the boy’s dad and gave Heather the old heave-ho.”

Thomas set his unfinished drink on the table. He didn’t like this. Not when children, sick children, were involved. “The boy?”

“Is in remission, from what I get out of it. I don’t know why she told Turner about the kid now, but she did…or at least it looks that way. Maybe she wants to take up with him again now that Leonetti’s out of the picture. Again, your guess is as good as mine.”

Thomas’s voice was scratchy. Much as he wanted the Badlands Ranch, and the oil he suspected was pooled beneath the dried-out fields, a child complicated things. He’d always been a sucker for his own children, even Jackson, though he’d made too many mistakes where his firstborn, his bastard, had been concerned. He’d tried to atone, but Jackson hadn’t heard of it. He sipped his drink, didn’t taste the expensive blend. Hell, a kid. Brooks had a kid. A sick kid. This complicated things.

“You want me to keep digging?”

Thomas’s head snapped up and he felt beads of sweat on his brow. “Yes. Please. Let’s see if there’s anything else.” He folded the report neatly and stuffed it into the inner pocket of his jacket.

Sands grinned and plopped an ice cube into his broad mouth. “You’re the boss.”

* * *

C
LOSED-IN PLACES MADE HIM
restless, and this doctor’s office, complete with diplomas on the wall and soft leather chairs, didn’t ease the knot of tension between Turner’s shoulder blades. He felt trapped and hot, barely able to breathe. His legs were too long to stretch between his chair and the desk, so he sat, ramrod straight, while the doctor shifted the papers in a file marked LEONETTI, ADAM.

That would have to change. Turner would rot in hell rather than have his son labeled with another man’s name—a man who really didn’t care one way or the other for the boy. As soon as possible, Adam’s name would be Brooks. Heather would have to change it. There were no two ways about it; Turner intended to lay claim to his son.

Dr. Thurmon was a portly man with thin silver hair and a face right out of a Norman Rockwell poster. Behind wire-rimmed glasses, Thurmon had gentle eyes and Turner trusted him immediately. He’d always had a gut instinct about people, and usually his first impressions were right on target.

Thurmon took off his glasses. “Good news,” he said, casting a smile at Heather, and Turner saw her shoulders slump in relief. “The marrow’s a match and I didn’t have a lot of hope that it would be. Siblings are the best source for transplants. But—” he lifted his hands and grinned “—we lucked out.”

“Thank God,” Heather whispered, tears filling her eyes. Without thinking, Turner wrapped a strong arm around her and they hugged. His own throat clogged, and he fought the urge to break down. His son was going to be well.

“While this is still very serious, Adam is in good shape,” the doctor went on as he polished the lenses of his glasses with a clean white handkerchief. “We have his own marrow, taken while he’s been in remission, and now Mr. Brooks will be a donor. And as well as Adam’s doing, there’s no reason to anticipate that a transplant is necessary, at least not in the near future. But Adam will have to stay on his medication for a while.”

Heather’s voice was shaky. “And if he relapses?”

Dr. Thurmon’s lips pressed together. “Then a transplant will be likely. We’ll reevaluate at that time.” He closed the file. “But let’s not worry about it just yet. Right now, Mrs. Leonetti, your son is as healthy as can be expected.”

“Thank you!” Heather cast a triumphant glance at Turner and smiled through the tears shimmering in her eyes.

“Does this mean that Adam can do anything he wants?” Turner asked.

The doctor nodded. “Within reason. I wouldn’t want to have him become overly tired. And I’d keep him away from anyone you know who has a contagious disease.”

Heather froze as Turner said, “Then there’s no reason—no medical reason—why Adam couldn’t visit me at my ranch.”

“Absolutely not,” the doctor replied, and Heather’s smile fell from her face as Turner and Dr. Thurmon shook hands.

She walked on wooden legs along the soft carpet of the clinic, past open doors with children sitting in their underwear on tables and mothers fussing over their kids as they waited. She turned by rote at the corner to the exit and found herself in the elevator before she let out her breath.

“That wasn’t necessary,” she said as the elevator descended.

“What?”

“I told you I’d let Adam visit.”

“Just making sure you didn’t find a reason to weasel out of it.”

“I wouldn’t—” She gasped and nearly stumbled as Turner slapped the elevator button and the car jerked to a stop.

“You kept him from me for five years. You admitted that you probably wouldn’t have told me about him until he was eighteen if he hadn’t gotten sick! You probably would have kept him from me if your bone marrow had matched. When I think about that—” He slammed a fist into the wall and Heather jumped. Turner’s face suffused with color. “Well, things have changed. He does know me and soon you’re going to tell him that I’m his father and—”

“I can’t just blurt it out! He’s only five!”

“Then he’ll have fewer questions.”

“But—”

“Don’t fight me on this, Heather,” he warned, leaning over her, his face set in granite. “I’ve lived up to my part of the bargain. Now I expect you to come through.”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Turner stared deep into her eyes and some of his hard edges faded a bit. “Oh, hell,” he muttered, trying to control himself. He flexed his hands, then shoved them impatiently through his hair. “Look, the last few days, we’ve both been worried—on edge and we…well, we fell into a pattern of trusting each other and playing house.”

Stung, his words cutting deep, she couldn’t respond, just swallowed at the swelling in her throat.

“But now we know that Adam’s safe. You don’t need me anymore. Or at least not right away. It would be easy to step back into our old lives—you go your way, I go mine.”

Oh, Turner, you’re so wrong. So very wrong,
she thought desperately. Perhaps he could forget her easily, but she’d never forget him. Never! She’d already spent six years with his memory; she was destined to love him, if just a little, for the rest of her life.

“But that’s not going to happen. Now that I know about Adam, my way—my path—is wound with his. That can’t change.”

Fear took a stranglehold of her heart. “What’re you saying, Turner, that you want custody?” Her knees threatened to crumple, and she leaned hard against the rail in her back.

He slapped the button again and, with a groan of old gears, the elevator continued on its descent. “Not yet. I’m not stupid enough to try to take him from you, but from this point onward, I’m going to have some influence over him.” He sent her a look that cut clear to her bones.

“How much ‘influence’?”

“That’s up to you, Heather.”

“Meaning?”

“As long as I see him often, and I’m not talking one weekend a month, I won’t challenge you in court. But…” His eyes glittered ominously, with the same gleam she’d seen whenever he was trying to break a particularly stubborn colt. “…If you come up against me, or try any funny stuff, you’ll be in for the fight of your life.”

The elevator landed and the doors whispered open to a crowd of onlookers. One man was frantically pushing the call button; other people whispered about the wisdom of getting onto a temperamental car.

Turner cupped her elbow and guided her through the crowd.

“You really are a bastard,” she whispered under her breath.

“Why thank you, darlin’. I’ll take that as a compliment.” With a smile as cold as a copperhead’s skin, he shoved open the doors.

Outside, fog had settled over the city, bringing with its opaque presence the feel of nightfall. Heather, shivering, slid behind the wheel of her Mercedes. Turner hauled his long body into the passenger seat, propped his back against the door and stared at her.

“If you moved to Gold Creek, I wouldn’t feel any need to demand partial custody,” he said.

She shot him a look of pure venom and switched on the ignition. “Me move back to Gold Creek? I’d rather die first.”

“Are you willing to take a chance on a custody hearing?”

Her hands tightened over the wheel.
Please, Turner, just leave it alone!
“This wasn’t part of the deal. You asked me to bring Adam to your ranch for a week or two and I intend to, but I’m not moving. Just because you’re Adam’s father, doesn’t give you the right to bully me.” Muttering under her breath, she eased the car into the flow of traffic traveling through the city.

“Is that what I’m doing?”

“From the first time I stepped into your barn.”

He turned his attention to the roadway. In the fog, brake lights glowed eerily and crowds of pedestrians crossed the streets at the stoplights.

“You’ve got a week,” he said as the light changed. “I’ll expect to see Adam then.”

“But I have work—”

“So do I.” He rubbed a big hand over the faded spot of denim covering his knee. “I’ve been gone long enough already. Fred can’t watch my place forever. Work out whatever you have to, but bring Adam to the ranch.”

She wanted to argue, to find a way out of the deal because she knew that if she took Adam to Badlands Ranch, it wouldn’t be long before she lost her son as well as her heart to Turner Brooks.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“
I
THINK YOU’RE MAKING
a big mistake.” Rachelle eyed her sister in the mirror of her bedroom, grimaced, then adjusted one of the shoulder pads in Heather’s gown. Layers of raspberry-colored chiffon and silk, the dress was to be worn at Rachelle’s wedding. “You can’t let him have the upper hand.”

“What choice do I have?” Heather asked, holding her hair up and frowning at the sight she made. Modeling the elegant dress only reminded her of weddings and just how far apart she and Turner had grown. The city girl and the cowboy. An unlikely combination. An unlikely
explosive
combination. “He’s holding all the cards.”

Rachelle shook her head furiously. “I saw him with Adam. He wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize his son’s well-being. Hold still, will you? I think this should be taken in a little in the waist…what do you think?”

“That you’re being overly concerned. You’re the bride. No one will be looking at me.”

Rachelle’s brow puckered as she slid the zipper down her sister’s back. “If it were up to me, Jackson and I would’ve taken off on his Harley, driven straight to Lake Tahoe and gotten married without all this fuss.”

“So why didn’t you?” Heather asked, stepping out of the dress.

“Because
His Majesty
wants to make a statement.”

“I heard that,” Jackson called from the living room of Rachelle’s tiny apartment.

“Well, it’s true.” Rachelle’s eyes lighted as she zipped a plastic cover over the gown. “You’re tarnishing your rebel image, you know, by doing the traditional wedding and all.”