looked toward the door, worried that Wade might stop by. When he’d left, she could tell that he hadn’t liked leaving her. Even though he was supposed to be on duty as a sheriff’s deputy, he could swing by if he was worried about her, especially since he was determined to take her home.
Ledger followed her gaze as if he knew what was making her so nervous. “I’ll go,” he said. “But if I find out that Wade had anything to do with this—”
“I fell off a ladder.” She knew it was a lie, and from the look in Ledger’s eyes, he did, too. But she had to at least try to convince him that Wade was innocent. This time. “That’s all it was.”
She met his gaze and felt her heart break as it always did. “Thank you for stopping by,” she said even though there was so much more she wanted to say to him. But she was Wade’s wife. As her mother always said, she’d made her bed and now she had to lie in it for better or worse.
Not that her mother didn’t always remind her that Ledger hadn’t wanted her.
“I’m here for you, Abby. If you ever need me...”
She felt tears burn her eyes. If only that had been true before she’d married Wade. “I can’t.” Her heart broke as she dragged her gaze away from his.
As if resigned, she watched out of the corner of her eye as he put on his Stetson, tipped it to her and walked out.
* * *
ATTORNEY JIM WATERS looked at the young man sitting in the passenger seat of his car as he drove toward the ranch later that evening. Vance Elliot. Here was Waters’s ticket back into the McGraws’ good graces.
He’d bet on the wrong horse, so to speak. Travers’s second wife, Patricia McGraw, had been a good bet at the time. Pretty, sexy, almost twenty years younger than her husband. She’d convinced him Travers wasn’t himself. That she needed a man she could count on. She’d let him believe that he might be living in that big house soon with her because Travers had some incurable ailment that only she and Travers knew about.
He’d bought into it hook, line and sinker. And why wouldn’t he? Travers had been sick—anyone could see that. Also the man had seemed distracted, often forgetful and vague as if he was losing his mind. He’d been convinced that Travers wasn’t long with this world and that Patricia would be taking over the ranch.
Little did he know that she was poisoning her husband.
As it turned out, Patricia was now behind bars awaiting trial. Since he had stupidly sided with her, things had gone downhill from there. He was hanging on to his job with Travers by the skin of his teeth.
But this was going to make it all right again, he told himself. He couldn’t let a paycheck like McGraw get away. His retainer alone would keep him nicely for years to come. He just needed to get Travers’s trust back. He saw a lot more legal work on the horizon for the McGraws. If this young man was Oakley, he would be back in the McGraw fold.
His cell phone rang. Patricia McGraw again. Travers’s young wife wouldn’t quit calling even though he’d told her he wasn’t going to help her, let alone defend her.
Nor did he need to hear any of her threats. Fortunately, no one believed anything she said. Since Travers McGraw was idolized in this county, people saw her as the gold digger who’d married him—and then systematically tried to kill him. She got no sympathy. In fact, he doubted she could get even a fair trial.
“I’m innocent, you bastard,” she’d screamed the last time he’d taken her call. “You did this. You framed me for this. Once I tell the sheriff—”
He’d laughed. “Like anyone will believe you.”
“I’ll take you down with me!”
He’d hung up and the next time his phone had rung it had been Vance Elliot.
Waters slowed to turn into the lane that led up to the main house. He shot the man next to him a glance. Vance looked more like a teenager than a twenty-five-year-old.
The man who might be Oakley stared at the house, a little openmouthed. Waters remembered the first time he’d driven out here and seen it. The house was impressive. So were the miles of white wooden fence, the expensive quarter horses in the pasture and the section after section of land that ran to the Little Rockies.
He couldn’t imagine what it would be like to learn that he was part of this even at his age—let alone twenty-five. If Vance Elliot really was the long-ago kidnapped McGraw twin, then he was one lucky son of a gun.
“You all right?” he asked Vance as they drove toward the house.
The man nodded. Waters tried to read him. He had to be scared to face Travers McGraw, not to mention his three older sons. But he didn’t look it. He looked determined.
Waters felt his stomach roil. This had better be real. If this wasn’t Oakley McGraw he was bringing to Travers...
He didn’t want to think about how badly this could go for him.
Sheriff McCall Crawford happened to be standing at the window as Huck and Wade Pierce had come into work. Wade looked wrung out. She’d heard that his wife was in the hospital with a concussion after falling off a ladder.
McCall watched the two men. She’d inherited Huck when she’d become sheriff. Before that, she’d worked with him as a deputy. He’d made it clear that he thought a woman’s place was in the home and not carrying a badge and gun. Huck hadn’t been any more impressed when he’d been passed over and she’d become sheriff.
He was a good old boy, the kind who smiled in your face and stabbed you in the back the first chance he got. She didn’t trust him, but she couldn’t fire him without cause. So far, he’d done nothing to warrant it, but she kept her eye on him—and his son, Wade. The minute she caught him stepping over the line, he was gone. As for his son... She’d had hopes for him when he’d hired on, seeing something in him that could go a different way than his father. Lately, though...
Both looked up as if sensing her watching them from the window. She raised her coffee mug in a salute to them. Their expressions turned solemn as they entered the building.
Neither man was stupid. Both were hanging on by a thread, and if the rumors about Wade mistreating his wife could ever be proved, he would be gone soon. But in a small community like this, it was hard to prove there was a problem unless the wife came forward. So far, Abby hadn’t. But now she was in the hospital after allegedly falling off a ladder. Maybe this would be the straw that broke the camel’s back.
McCall’s cell phone rang. She stepped to her desk and picked up, seeing that it was her grandmother. It felt strange having a relationship with her after all those years of never even laying eyes on the woman.
“Good evening,” she said into the phone.
“What are you still doing at work this late?” Pepper demanded.
“I was just about to leave,” McCall said. The day had gotten away from her after she dropped her daughter off at day care and came in to
