him. Her attention volleyed between his face and his gun, which he lowered to his side.
“I was getting something from Gabriel’s office when I glanced out the window and saw you,” she finally said. “We didn’t expect you. Judging from the way you were sneaking around, you didn’t want us to see you.”
No, he hadn’t wanted the killer to see him.
“I had to come,” he told her. “I found out...something.”
Ivy flinched a little and came even closer until she was only about a foot away from him. She hadn’t changed much in the past ten years. She was almost thirty now and still had that thick, dark brown hair that fell just past her shoulders. Still had the same intense eyes. He couldn’t see the color of them in the darkness, but he knew they were sapphire blue.
Despite Theo’s not wanting to feel anything, he did. The old attraction that for some stupid reason felt just as strong as it always had. But he was also feeling something else. The anger. That’s why he kept watch around them.
“I guess you heard about the wedding. Are you here to see your sister?” she asked.
“No.” Best not to get into the fact that he hadn’t seen his kid sister, Jodi, in a long time. Because that was a different set of bad memories. Not because he didn’t love her. He did. But Jodi was a reminder that he’d failed her, too. She’d nearly gotten killed the same night as Ivy’s folks, and he hadn’t been able to stop it. Now, all these years later, she was marrying Gabriel Beckett.
So obviously Gabriel and Jodi had managed to work through their shared painful pasts. He guessed they’d found their “normal.”
“It’s not safe for us to be out here,” Theo explained. “We need to get in my truck so we can talk.”
She didn’t budge, but she did follow his gaze when he looked around again. “You heard about the threatening letter,” Ivy said.
No, he hadn’t, but it got his attention, and Theo shook his head. “What letter?”
Ivy huffed, and she finally lowered her gun. “The latest one had a warning that my brothers, my sister and I would all be murdered on the anniversary of our parents’ deaths.”
Which was only two months away.
Ivy’s tone practically dismissed the threat her family had gotten. But Theo wasn’t dismissing anything. “You get a lot of letters like that?”
“Enough. Emails, too, and the occasional phone call from blocked numbers. If you didn’t know about that, then why are you here?” she asked without hesitating. “And why did you say it wasn’t safe for us to be out here?”
“Because it’s not.” He took a deep breath. “You know I’m a special agent in the DEA?”
Her mouth tightened, and she nodded. “Gabriel says you’re what law enforcement calls a joe.”
That was the slang term for it all right. An agent who went into deep cover, sometimes years at a time. Just as Theo had done. In fact, he was less than a month out of a three-year assignment where he’d infiltrated a militia group to track the sale of drugs.
“Yes,” he verified, “and I have access to criminal informants who give me intel from time to time. According to one of those informants, there’s a killer coming here to the ranch tonight.”
Her eyes widened. Then narrowed just as fast. She looked ready to bolt, of course, but he saw her quickly rein that in. “How reliable is this so-called intel?”
Good question. “Reliable enough for me to come to a place where I know I’m not welcome.”
She stayed quiet a moment. “You could have just called,” Ivy pointed out, confirming his notion about his not being welcome.
He shook his head. “According to the informant, the killer managed to bug both the sheriff’s office and Gabriel’s house.”
Theo saw another punch of concern on her face, maybe some skepticism, too, and she had another look around as Theo did. “This killer is connected to my parents’ murders?”
“The informant says the killer is.” Theo paused. “But the informant also said this is the same guy who murdered your folks.”
Ivy groaned. Mumbled some profanity under her breath. “We know who killed them. Your father, Travis Canton. And he’s sitting in jail right now because there was more than enough evidence to prove he’d done it.”
No, there was more than enough evidence to convict him. That was splitting hairs, but since his father couldn’t remember if he’d murdered the Becketts, Theo still had his doubts.
“Travis hated my parents,” Ivy reminded him as if he’d said those doubts aloud. “He threatened them just hours before the murders. And when the deputies found him by the creek, he had my father’s blood on his shirt.”
All of that was true. What she could have added was that Travis was an alcoholic who’d experienced blackouts, both that night and others. He could have killed the Becketts in a drunken haze and not even remembered.
Or someone could have set him up.
Someone waiting to finish the job by killing the Becketts’ children.
“Your father was the sheriff at the time of his murder,” he continued. What he was about to say would be old news to her, but he wanted to remind her that everything might not be black-and-white here. “Your mother was a former cop. They had plenty of enemies because of the arrests they made over the years. One of those enemies could be coming after you tonight, and that’s why you don’t need to be standing out here.”
There was a bit more worry in her eyes this time when she glanced around. But she still didn’t budge.
Now it was Theo’s turn to mumble some profanity. “Look, I know Gabriel, Jameson and your sister, Lauren, won’t want me inside—”
“Lauren’s not here and won’t be coming. She left town around the same time you did and hasn’t been back.”
Theo couldn’t fault her for that. Lauren was the youngest, had been barely eighteen when she’d been made an orphan. Like Theo, she had no doubt wanted a fresh start.
“I’m sorry,” he said, because it sounded as if Ivy was hurt that Lauren wasn’t there. It was a hurt he understood. “Hell, maybe my own sister won’t want me here, either. But can we at least sit in my truck while I convince you that this threat could be real?”
“And how will you do that?” she asked. Yeah, he’d been right about that skepticism.
“I’ve got a recording from the criminal informant. He knew some things about the night of the murders. Things that weren’t revealed to the press. He says the killer told him those things.”
Her attention slashed toward the house. “Gabriel will need to hear this.” And now there was some urgency in her voice.
Yes, he would. Jameson, too. And Jodi. “But not inside. Remember, there could be listening devices. If the killer knows we’re onto him, it could send
