sir, I didn’t. I’ll let the miss tell you.”
“Why does she have such robust security?” Jasper asked. He got that protection was necessary when you were as wealthy as Sadie, but her fence seemed overboard. Was there a reason or was she just paranoid? She did not strike him as the paranoid type.
“It’s remote country out here,” Finley said.
“How many guards?”
“Eight.”
Eight guards for a residential home. “I’d like to talk to the one in charge.”
“That’s Dwight Mitchel. Former Special Forces. Had a bit of financial trouble during his divorce. You wouldn’t know it but Sadie has more heart than most in this world. When most first meet her they might get the wrong impression.”
Jasper’s impression had been based on attraction. Her car would stamp her as rich. Is that what Finley meant?
“She likes her money but she spends most of it on her charities.” Finley looked up and around the no-expense-spared bedroom. “A first look at her doesn’t reveal much about her other than appearances, but inside she’s a well of humanity. You have to see her as she lives here to truly know her.”
Comparing the Sadie he’d seen step out of a Ferrari to the one he met in the hospital, he had to agree. She was more than a rich, beautiful woman to Jasper, and just how much had him putting himself in check. Not only would living so remotely bore him to death, the idea of domesticating gave him hives.
* * *
Sometime later, Sadie roused. Jasper heard her and came awake, something he’d learned to do long ago. She moaned in pain. He rose up from the cot Finley had provided along with some bedding. Going to the bedside table, he helped her sit up against several pillows. While she overcame a wave of agony, he took a pain pill from its container and handed that to her along with a bottle of water.
After she swallowed and sat with her eyes closed awhile, she blinked and met his. “What are you doing up?”
“Watching over you.”
At first a warm and content look drooped her eyes, but then she saw the cot. Her eyes opened more. “What is that?”
“I asked Finley to put it in here. I’m going to guard you until you can move around on your own.”
“That isn’t necessary. In fact, it’s...it’s improper and...presumptuous on your part!”
“I can see how you’d look at it that way. I can assure you my only motive is to protect you.” And get to the bottom of her mystery—which included far more than Bernie King’s murder.
“There’s plenty of other rooms. Go stay in one of them.”
“I will—when you’re better and not this defenseless.”
Her mouth opened and a few audible breaths stammered out. “Are you always this bullheaded?”
He grinned, a natural thing her petulant face and direct question brought on. “Yes. I have a reputation of solving cases faster than most. No one’s ever been harmed under my watch, either.”
“You’ve done this before?”
“Many times.”
“What are you? A detective or a bodyguard?”
“I was a cop and a detective before I joined DAI. I often stayed with family of victims until I caught the killer.”
She studied him thoughtfully. “That sounds unconventional.”
“It is, which is why I like working for Kadin Tandy.”
Her questions seemingly satisfied for now, she glanced down at herself, smoothing covers and patting the demure neckline of her nightgown. Then her hand stilled.
“How did I get into this?” she asked.
“One of your maids changed you. I waited outside the door. She said you woke but barely.”
She blinked once, and again. Then her gaze traveled down his body and back up to his face, noticing him differently than before, less combative, much warmer. Even under the influence of painkillers she seemed rested, and as long as she didn’t move, relatively pain free.
“Do you feel up to talking?” he asked.
“Sure. About what?”
He moved around the bed and went to the chairs, sitting down. “Why don’t we start with Bernie? Who was he to you and when is the last time you saw him?”
She rolled her head and looked up at the ceiling, obviously upset. “He’s what made me start the Revive Center. I met him on a trip to San Francisco, one of my few and far between getaways. He was sitting against a building, holding a cup and nodding off. He’d been drinking. A policeman approached him and tried to order him to leave.” She rolled her head to look at him. “Bernie chose an upscale spa to take his nap.” She smiled fondly and looked back up at the ceiling. “I intervened. I don’t know what made me. I took Bernie to my hotel, sat him down in the restaurant and gave him coffee and food. When the alcohol wore off, he told me his story. He lost his wife to cancer a few months ago, and then his daughter committed suicide, leaving him alone and facing a crisis he didn’t have enough strength to handle.”
Jasper let her have a few moments to her thoughts, feeling how deeply moved she’d been with Bernie. She showed him a glimpse of her true self, not the one hiding in Wyoming.
“On that particular trip I was scouting for a location for a business. I hadn’t decided what kind of business yet, I only knew I wanted to be involved in some kind of charity. Animal rescue. Health. I hadn’t thought of the homeless, but meeting Bernie made me realize how passionate I felt about them.” She looked at Jasper again. “People will shove the homeless aside before they’ll do anything to fix the problem. Where do people expect them to go? They wouldn’t be in the street if they had somewhere else to go. Bernie had nowhere to go. He made me want to do something.”
“Bernie stayed with you while you started the Revive Center?”
“I put him in rehab first. He had to quit drinking. Once he completed that, then I set him up in an apartment. He needed psychiatric care because of his losses. He did that pretty extensively for a few months. By then I had some space lined up and the apartment building under construction. I kept Bernie in his own apartment. We’d meet once a week so I could check on his progress. He slowly improved. We got to know each other very well.”
She drifted off and Jasper would love to know what her last sentence had made her remember. How much had she told Bernie? Maybe Bernie—other than Steven—was the only other living soul who really knew Sadie Moreno from a remote area of Wyoming who seemed to have carried at least some of her past with her to her new life, namely, the Ferrari.
“Why did you move to Wyoming?” he asked.
Her rumination on the past ended and Jasper watched her eyes grow guarded as she looked at him. “I wanted to get away from the life my father had.”
“What
