braced himself as he walked to his pickup and put the final box into the back. He heard Fiona get out of her car and walk toward him. He figured it could go several ways. She would try seduction or tears or raging fury, or a combination of all three.
Hands deep in the pockets of her jacket as she approached, she gave him a shy smile. It was that smile that had appealed to him that first night. He’d been vulnerable, and he suspected she’d known it. Did she think that smile would work again?
He felt guilty for even thinking that she was so calculating and yet he’d seen the way she’d worked him. “Fiona, I don’t want any trouble.”
“Trouble?” She chuckled. “I heard you were moving out today. I only wanted to come say goodbye.”
Chase wished that was the extent of it, but he’d come to know her better than that. “I think we covered goodbye the last time we saw each other.”
She ignored that. “I know you’re still angry with me—”
“Fiona—”
Tears welled in her green eyes as if she could call them up at a moment’s notice. “Chase, at least give me a hug goodbye. Please.” Before he could move, she closed the distance between them. As she did, her hands came out of her jacket pockets. The blade of the knife in her right hand caught the light as she started to put her arms around his neck.
As he jerked back, he grabbed her wrist. “What the—” He cursed as he tightened his grip on her wrist holding the knife. She was stronger than she looked. She struggled to stab him as she screamed obscenities at him.
The look in her eyes was almost more frightening than the knife clutched in her fist. He twisted her wrist until she cried out and dropped the weapon. The moment it hit the ground, he let go of her, realizing he was hurting her.
She dived for the knife, but he kicked it away, chasing after it before she could pick it up again. She leaped at him, pounding on his back as she tried to drag him to the ground.
He threw her off. She stumbled and fell to the grass and began to cry hysterically. He stared down at her. Had she really tried to kill him?
“Don’t! Don’t kill me!” she screamed, raising her hands as if she thought he was going to stab her. He’d forgotten that he’d picked up the knife, but he wasn’t threatening her with it.
He didn’t understand what was going on until he realized they were no longer alone. Fiona had an audience. Some of the apartment tenants had come out. One of them, an elderly woman, was fumbling with her phone as if to call the cops.
“Everything is all right,” he quickly told the woman.
The older woman looked from Fiona to him and back. Her gaze caught on the knife he was holding at his side.
“There is no reason to call the police,” Chase said calmly as he walked to the trash cans lined up along the street, opened one and dropped the knife into the bottom.
“That’s my best knife!” Fiona yelled. “You owe me for that.”
He saw that the tenant was now staring at Fiona, who was brushing off her jeans as she got to her feet.
“What are you staring at, you old crone? Go back inside before I take that phone away from you and stick it up your—”
“Fiona,” Chase said as the woman hurriedly turned and rushed back inside. He shook his head as he gave Fiona a wide berth as he headed toward his apartment to lock up. “Go home before the police come.”
“She won’t call. She knows I’ll come back here if she does.”
He hoped Fiona was right about the woman not making the call. Otherwise, he’d be held up making a statement to the police—that’s if he didn’t end up behind bars. He didn’t doubt that Fiona would lie through her teeth about the incident.
“She won’t make you happy,” Fiona screamed after him as he opened the door to his apartment, keeping an eye on her the whole time. The last thing he wanted was her getting inside. If she didn’t have another weapon, he had no doubt she’d find one.
Stopping in the doorway, he looked back at her. Her makeup had run along with her nose. She hadn’t bothered to wipe either. She looked small, and for a moment his heart went out to her. What had happened to that professional, together woman he’d met at the party?
“You need to get help, Fi.”
She scoffed at that. “You’re the one who needs help, Chase.”
He stepped inside, closed and locked the door, before sliding the dead bolt. Who’s to say she didn’t have a half dozen spare keys made. She’d lied about the building manager opening the door for her. She’d lied about a lot of things. He had no idea who Fiona Barkley was. But soon she would be nothing more than a bad memory, he told himself as he finished checking to make sure he hadn’t left anything. When he looked out, he saw her drive away.
Only then did he pick up his duffel bag, lock the apartment door behind him and head for his truck, anxious to get on the road to Montana. But as he neared his pickup, he saw what Fiona had left him. On the driver’s-side window scrawled crudely in lipstick were the words You’ll regret it.
That was certainly true. He regretted it already. He wondered what would happen to her and feared for the next man who caught her eye. Maybe the next man would handle it better, he told himself.
Tossing his duffel bag onto the passenger seat, he pulled an old rag from under the seat and wiped off what he could of the lipstick. Then, climbing into this truck, he pointed it toward Montana and Mary, putting Fiona out of his mind.
* * *
THERE WERE DAYS when Dana felt all sixty-two of her years. Often when she looked at her twenty-eight-year-old daughter, Mary, she wondered where the years had gone. She felt as if she’d merely blinked and her baby girl had grown into a woman.
Being her first and only daughter, Mary had a special place in her heart. So when Mary hurt, Dana did too. Ever since Chase and Mary had broken up and he’d left town, her daughter had been heartsick, and Dana had had no idea how to help her.
She knew that kind of pain. Hud had broken her heart years ago when they’d disagreed and he’d taken off. But he’d come back, and their love had overcome all the obstacles that had been thrown at them since. She’d hoped that Mary throwing herself into her accounting business would help. But as successful as Mary now was with her business, the building she’d bought, the apartments she’d remodeled and rented, there was a hole in her life—and her heart. A mother could see it.
“Sis, have you heard a word I’ve said?”
Dana looked from the window where she’d been watching Mary unsaddling her horse to where her brother sat at the kitchen table across from her. “Sorry. Did you just say cattle thieves?”
Jordan shook his head at her and smiled. There’d been a time when she and her brother had been at odds over the ranch. Fortunately, those days were long behind them. He’d often said that the smartest thing he’d ever done was to come back here, make peace and help Dana run Cardwell Ranch. She couldn’t agree more.
“We
