Perfect Family (40 page)

A half hour later, Mary presented a will. Jessie read it carefully, then signed it. Melissa signed as a witness and Mary as notary public. Except for her share in the ranch, she left all her worldly goods to Sol. She asked Alex to make two copies—one for her and one to be mailed to Sol.

In that hour, she'd made decisions as to whom she trusted, whom to hold at arm's length. And Alex was among the latter. He'd never been particularly helpful in answering her many questions. It had been obvious that his loyalty was to the Clements family. But to which faction?

She knew from the fleeting expression in his eyes that he understood. But if he resented it, he didn't show it. In some ways, he could be as protective of his thoughts as Ross. An attorney's stock-in-trade?

Several minutes later, they were in his car. She leaned against the door and looked at him, thinking how different he was from Ross, how easy everything seemed for him. His eyes admired her, but they did nothing to make her heart thump harder. There were no charges of electricity making crackling contact between them.

“Mexican, steak, Italian? Whatever my newest client wishes.”

She thought about it for a moment. Not Mexican. She would always equate Mexican with the cantina. She wanted to keep that memory to herself.

“Italian,” she said. “The restaurant we went to before.”

He seemed pleased at that. “Good.”

They reached the restaurant almost instantly. “So that's another reason you like it,” she observed. “It's nearly across the street.”

“My home away from home,” he quipped lightly, but she detected a kind of wistfulness behind it.

She looked at him curiously. “Have you ever been married?” He seemed to live for the Clementses. She wondered whether he had any kind of life of his own. She didn't feel as if she were prying. He apparently knew everything about her.

“Once,” he said. “It lasted five years, until she tired of a small town and a workaholic husband. She was a big-city girl.”

“How could anyone get tired of Sedona? It's magic.”

“Not enough to keep
you
here.”

It could if Ross …

But that was wistful thinking. “I love the bookstore,” she said.

“Do you? Or are you just hiding?”

She glared at him. He was far too close to the mark.

“You could go any place you wish now,” he said. “Paris. Europe.”

“Not without selling the ranch.”

“No, not without selling the ranch,” he said.

The implication was there. He had dangled possibilities, leaving open the offer.

He stopped the car near the restaurant door to let her out. She waited there until he parked and sprinted through the rain to meet her at the entrance, but her appetite had faded. He hadn't accepted her decision. He'd been humoring her, obviously thinking that she would have second thoughts when she had time to consider the money.

What he didn't understand was that she couldn't even comprehend the money. It had never actually been hers. It didn't seem real to her. She didn't think it would ever seem real.

Alex put his arm around her waist in the easy, accomplished way of his, guiding her inside. She stopped and looked at him. “My answer is final. I won't sell.”

Alex sighed. “The buyer has said he will increase his offer. He really wants that land.”

Any lingering instinct to trust him was shattered. “And you think I should accept it?”

“It's far more than the land is worth, certainly a great deal more than the ranch will ever earn,” he said noncommittally. “It's something to consider.”

“I
have
considered it.”

He nodded as they were greeted by the same maître d' who had seated them before. She followed him, but she felt empty. Tired.

It definitely was time to go home.

Rain was falling even harder when they left. They ran for the car, then drove in silence back to his office, where she'd left her car.

Alex felt the distance she'd put between them. It could be measured in miles rather than feet. Everything he'd gained in the past few weeks had been lost in a few moments. But Marc had insisted that he try again. The congressman just couldn't believe that someone would turn down all that money. Her refusal, Marc had claimed, was “the romance of the moment. When she gets home, she'll think about all the things the money can do.”

Marc, who was usually very good at reading people, hadn't a clue about Jessica Clayton.

But then none of them had. Not a single one of them had thought she would turn down millions. And now he'd lost the one advantage he had. He'd seen the trust fade from her eyes.

He drove to his condo. Perhaps he had let his loyalty to the Clementses overtake his usual neutrality. He'd liked Jessica. He'd liked her more than any woman he'd met. Probably for the reason she'd backed away. Her total lack of greed.

Goddammit
.

He parked in the garage, then went up the steps and inside. He went right to the liquor cabinet, poured himself more whiskey than he usually did, and went out on the covered deck that overlooked the valley. Rain was like a curtain.

He sipped his drink, then went inside and called Marc. “I don't think she's going to change her mind,” he said. “It was a mistake to even suggest it.”

He listened for a moment to Marc. “Dammit, I'm not going to listen to you anymore. And she doesn't know anything about those damned bonds. You can tell Cullen that as well.”

Alex slammed the phone down. He felt dirty, angry, frustrated. This should have been so easy.

Jessie couldn't get the conversation out of her mind as she drove down the main Sedona road. It was dark, and the rain fell in sheets. She could barely see the line down the center of the road.

She recounted each word in her mind. Damn Alex. Whenever she thought she might be able to trust him, he'd throw out another tidbit that made her reassess his role in all of this. They all thought they could manipulate her later by dangling temptation in front of her.

She fumed.
Tomorrow
. Tomorrow, she would be home. At least she knew what to expect of Sol. She knew him. He knew her.

She was still a stranger here. A stranger with something that everyone wanted. She felt betrayed. She felt empty.

Jessie shook her head, telling herself to concentrate. She didn't like driving in weather like this. She could barely discern the dividing line on the road. On a good day, it was a drive of twenty minutes or so; tonight it would take forty or more. Her fingers tightened around the steering wheel.

Lights coming from the opposite direction were diffused by the rain. They seemed to come right at her, and she instinctively swerved over to the side of the road. She fought the car for a moment, then found the road again. She breathed, and the trapped air in her lungs came out in a rush.

She was not ordinarily a timid driver, but the narrow and winding road wasn't that familiar. She leaned forward, trying to see better when she noticed a pair of headlights behind. Too close for bad weather. She looked for a place to pull over and let the car pass, but the road climbed here and there was only a dropoff on her right.

Darn it, no one was going to force her to go faster than she felt safe. Once they got over this hill, the road leveled out again and stayed that way to the turnoff toward the Sunset.

She felt a bump from behind, just enough that had she not had both hands glued to the steering wheel, it might have pushed her from the road. She speeded up just a little bit. She wanted to look back at the car behind her, but she didn't dare take her eyes from the road in front.

Another bump, this time a more forceful one. Not an accident this time. She was sure of that. Fear ratcheted upward.

She speeded up again, aware of a sharp curve ahead. She remembered a sheer dropoff at the road's edge. Her hands tightened on the steering wheel. She fought down panic. Where exactly was that curve? Where was other traffic?

She saw headlights coming toward her from the opposite direction. She pressed down on the horn, hoping against hope they would see a car too close behind her. But instead the oncoming vehicle merely splashed more water on her windshield, making it even more difficult to see. It did, however, have the effect of forcing the car behind her to back off.

But once again she sensed the car creeping back up upon her. She shot a glance in the rearview mirror but only saw a dark blob. She couldn't tell what kind of car it was, not even the exact color.

Her knuckles whitened as she searched desperately for a place to slow and stop. But if she did that, what would happen? Did her assailant have a gun? Exactly how far would they go?

She was coming to the long curve when she saw a dirt road go to the left and the faint glow of a light. A house. She made a sharp left turn, praying no one came in the opposite direction. The car started to spin, refusing to slow, missing the driveway and plowing through a fence before slamming to a stop in a ditch.

She felt the impact of the air bag as it exploded like a hammer against her chest. She lost her breath, momentarily stunned. Slowly, she started to reason again, as the bag dissolved in a cloud of white powder.

Fear clutched at her. Was someone out there? Would they come to finish what they had started? The rain was falling too hard, too loudly to hear anything. Lightning flashed nearby and the low roar of thunder rumbled across the valley.

She had to get out. Her hands fumbled at the seat belt. Her fingers were like rubber, unable to function. Finally, the belt came loose. She tried to open the door. Thank God, it gave.

She grabbed her handbag and the envelope with the wills in it and tumbled out, finding her feet sinking into mud. Then she saw a car stopped on the other side of the fence. Was it the car that had bumped her, that had tried to force her off the road?

A man was coming around it, followed by a woman in a raincoat. Then she noticed it was a pickup, a truck. The aggressor had been in a car.

Breathe slowly
, she thought.
You're safe
.

She struggled through the mud. Her chest hurt. Her body ached. The man reached her. “Are you all right?”

She wasn't. She was terrified. She hurt. Her shoes were ruined. She felt herself giggling. That was the last thing she should worry about. “I think so,” she said. “Thank you for stopping.”

Thank God they had
.

“Did you … see a car following me?”

The man looked at the woman, then nodded. “I thought it curious he didn't stop. People usually help each other out here.”

“Did you see what kind it was?”

The man shook his head. “I was watching your car. Come get in the truck.”

He helped her over to the truck.

She turned back and looked at the wreck. She realized she wasn't going to go home tomorrow.

She also knew that she would be staying where someone wanted to hurt her. This time, it was no tap on the head, or a mussed apartment.

This time, someone wanted her dead.

twenty-four

Sarah reached for the phone when it rang. Halden had retired, and she was listening to the late news. Ben was next to her, his eyes glued to the door.

She'd thought about going to bed herself, but she wanted to wait up for Jessie. This would be her last night, and Sarah wanted to make sure all had gone well at Alex's office. Alex, she knew, might well try to change her mind.

But Sarah felt comfortable that Jessie wouldn't do that. The girl had a stubborn streak.

She'd wanted to tell Jessie everything, but everything would be too much. Perhaps when she got to know the family better, when she felt the rhythms of it, Sarah could tell her the entire truth. But then perhaps it was better that no one knew.

Only Ross knew the entire truth now, and he'd been sworn to secrecy. She'd told him in a moment of agony, when guilt became a weight she couldn't bear. He'd taught her how to live with it.

But now the events that happened fifty years ago were like a writhing nest of snakes, each capable of destruction. She could only try to protect Jessie as much as possible. At least, none of the incidents had been deadly.

She only wished she knew who was behind them. She could only guess, and guesses were worth nothing.

So the ringing of the phone startled her. She received few calls this late.

“Sarah?” Jessie's voice. Shaken. Trembling.

Sarah's heart pounded. Her chest hurt. “Jessie? What's wrong?”

“There was … an accident and I've been delayed. I didn't want you to worry. I'm going to call a cab …”

“Where are you?”

There was a silence on the other end for a moment, then a reluctant admission. “I'm not hurt, but a good Samaritan insisted that I go to the hospital.”

“I'll be there immediately.”

Sarah put the phone down, stood, then grabbed a table to keep her balance. The world seemed to spin for a moment. She felt weak, dizzy.
Ross
. She would call Ross.

She sat down and dialed his number.

“Macleod,” he replied brusquely.

“Ross, Jessie's been in an accident. She's at the hospital. Can you go to her?” Sarah wanted to go, too, but she received the impression over the phone that the last thing Jessie wanted was a fuss.

“What happened?” His voice was rough.

“I don't know, but I talked to her. She said she was all right.”

“I'm on my way.”

Sarah was left holding a dead phone.

Ben whined, as if sensing something was wrong.

“It's all right,” Sarah said soothingly, but Ben started pacing restlessly.

She heard Ross's pickup roar onto the road. She closed her eyes and prayed Jessie was really all right. There had been too many accidents. Perhaps it was for the best that she was going home.

Jessie saw Ross charge through the doors of the hospital. His hair was wet and mussed, his shirt partially unbuttoned, his shirttail out.