Dark Horse

Chapter Four

Cull knelt beside the dark-haired woman on the pavement, terrified that he might have killed her. He heard people come running out of the café. Someone was calling 9-1-1 as he touched the young woman’s shoulder. She didn’t stir.

“Is she alive?” someone cried from in front of the café. “The 9-1-1 operator needs to know if she’s breathing and how badly she’s injured.”

Cull took the young woman’s slim wrist and felt for a pulse. But his own heart was pounding so hard, he couldn’t tell if she had one. He leaned closer to put his cheek against her full lips and prayed.

With a relief that left him weak, he felt her warm breath against his skin. As he drew back, her eyes opened. They were big and a startling blue as bright as the Montana day. A collective sigh of relief moved through the crowd as the woman tried to sit up.

“Don’t move,” Cull ordered. “An ambulance is on the way.”

She shook her head. “An ambulance?” She seemed to see the people around her. “What happened?”

“You stepped out into the street,” he said. “I didn’t see you until it was too late.”

“Please let me up. I’m fine.”

“But I hit you with my truck.”

She sat up, insistent that she was fine. “Just help me to my feet.” She glanced around on the ground next to her. “Where is my purse?”

Just then Sheriff McCall Crawford pushed her way through the crowd. “What happened?” she asked as she knelt beside the woman.

“She stepped into the street,” Cull said. “I hit my brakes but—” He’d had so much on his mind. He hadn’t even seen her until she’d stepped off the curb.

“I told you,” the woman said. “You didn’t hit me. You might have bumped into me and then... I must have fainted.” She looked around her. “If you would just hand me my purse...”

The sheriff glanced around as well, spied her large shoulder bag and handed it to her. “Are you sure you’re all right, Miss...?”

“St. James. Nikki St. James.”

“Still I’d like the EMTs to have a look at you,” the sheriff insisted.

“That really isn’t necessary. I feel so silly. If I had been paying attention...”

“No,” Cull said. “I was the one not paying attention.”

The ambulance arrived and two EMTs jumped out. Cull stepped back to let them get to the woman. Nikki St. James. He frowned. He’d seen that name somewhere recently.

The sheriff pulled him aside. “I’m going to have to write up a report on this. I suggest you call your insurance agent.”

“She said she was fine.”

“It doesn’t appear that you actually hit her,” the sheriff said. “More than likely she just stepped off the curb and fainted when she realized she’d stepped in front of your truck. But as a precaution, let your insurance office know. They might want you to get her to sign something.”

In front of his pickup, the EMTs were helping the woman to her feet. Cull heard her say she needed to go to her rental car. She was late for an appointment.

“I’m not sure you should be driving,” one of the EMTs said.

“I can take you wherever you need to go,” Cull said, stepping forward. “I agree. You shouldn’t drive.”

Tears welled in her eyes. “Actually, I would appreciate that,” she said. “I’m not familiar with this area. As shaken as I am, I would probably get lost.”

“Where are you headed?”

“A ranch outside of town. The Sundown Stallion Station—are you familiar with it?”

Cull stared at her, feeling all the blood drain from his face. He remembered now where he’d seen her name before. On a scratch pad on his father’s desk.

* * *

SHERIFF MCCALL CRAWFORD watched Cull help the woman into the passenger side of his pickup. He looked more shaken than Nikki St. James did.

She tried to still the bad feeling that had settled in her stomach as she watched Cull slip behind the wheel. She’d seen his face when the woman had told him where she’d been headed—to his ranch.

McCall could no more help her suspicious nature than she could flap her arms and fly. She’d heard about scams involving people who appeared to have been hit by vehicles. It usually involved a payoff of some kind.

As she watched Cull start his truck and pull away, she couldn’t help wondering who Nikki St. James was and, more to the point, what she was after. Did she really have an appointment at the ranch? Or was she a reporter trying to get a foot in the door?

Travers McGraw had been forced to get a locked gate for the ranch entrance because of the publicity about the kidnapping. With the twenty-fifth anniversary coming up next week, McCall worried that Cull had just been scammed.

She looked toward the café, suspecting someone in there had witnessed the accident. Wouldn’t hurt to ask and still that tiny voice inside her that told her there was something wrong about this. Also she could use a cup of coffee.

As Cull drove past, she saw him glance at the woman in the passenger seat of his pickup. He looked worried. McCall thought he should be.

Nikki St. James was looking out the side window as they passed. She seemed to be interested in someone inside the café.

McCall turned to see redheaded waitress Abby Pierce standing in the window.

* * *

NIKKI TRIED TO RELAX, but she could feel Cull’s gaze on her periodically as he drove. That had been more than risky back there. He could very well have killed her.

Her original plan was for Ledger. She’d seen how kindhearted he was. It was one thing to have Travers on her side, but she needed at least one family member she could count on. She’d hoped her stunt would make him more amenable to helping her once he knew who she was.

With Cull, she wasn’t sure. At first, he’d been so scared that he would have done anything for her. But then she’d seen his shock when she’d told him where her appointment was.

As he drove south, she said, “Thank you for doing this. I hate to have you going out of your way for me.”

“It’s not out of my way. Your appointment is with Travers McGraw?”

“Yes.”

His gaze was like a laser. “He’s my father. I’m Cull McGraw, his oldest son.”

She’d feigned surprise. “I knew Whitehorse was a small town, but...”

Nikki saw suspicion in his eyes as they met hers. He would have been a fool not to be suspicious and Cull was no fool. She could see that right away.

She recalled the change in him she’d seen after she’d mentioned her name—and where her appointment was. Had the sheriff said something to him to make him question the accident?

He’d said little since they’d left the small Western town behind them. This part of Montana was rolling prairie where thousands of bison had once ranged. In the distance she could make out the Little Rockies, the only mountains on the horizon.

Wild country, she thought, watching the cowboy out of the corner of her eye. It took a special breed to live in a place where the temperature could change in a heartbeat from fifty above to fifty below zero.

Nikki tried to relax but it was hard. There was an all-male aura about Cull that seemed to fill the pickup cab. She would have had to be in a coma not to be aware of the handsome cowboy, even with his scowling. Did he suspect that what happened back there had been a stunt? She should have stayed with her original plan and waited for Ledger.

Too late to worry about that now. With relief, she saw the sign for the turnoff ahead. Her pulse jumped when she saw the Sundown Stallion Station horse ranch come into view. It reminded her of every horse movie she’d ever seen as a girl. Miles of brilliant green grass fenced in by sparkling white-painted wooden fence that made the place look as if it should be in Kentucky—not the backwoods of Montana.

Cull McGraw hit the remote control on the massive white gate that she knew had been erected not long after the kidnapping to keep out the media and morbidly curious. People not so unlike herself.

The gate swung open without a sound, and after he drove the truck through, it closed behind them.

She was really doing this. Her grandfather had taught her that nothing was out of line to get a story. She would get this one. Her head ached and she was regretting her stunt back in town. It almost got her killed and it hadn’t worked. Cull seemed even more distrusting of her.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him glance over at her. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

Nervous, scared, excited, terrified. “I have a little headache,” she said. She’d hit the pavement harder than she’d planned.

He looked worried and guilty. She felt a sharp stab of her own guilt. But she quickly brushed it away. She had to know the truth about her father. Even as she thought it, a lump formed in her throat.

What if her grandfather was right and she couldn’t handle the truth?

This case was definitely more than just a book for her; she could admit that now. She’d come here to prove that Nate Corwin had been innocent.

“Nate Corwin was a philanderer,” her grandfather told her the day before she’d left for Whitehorse, Montana. “Of course, he was having an affair with Marianne McGraw. He loved women with money. It’s why he married your mother.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Too bad you can’t ask your mother, but she’s off on some shopping spree in Paris, I hear. But then again, she’d just defend him like she always did,” Wendell St. James had said. “Don’t come crying to me when you find out the worst.”

“I’ve never come crying to you,” she’d pointed out.

“Smart girl,” he’d said.

When she’d first confronted her mother about what she’d found out, Georgia had told her that her father had never liked Nate.

“It was because Nate was his own man,” her mother had told her. “Daddy tried to hire him right after we got married. But your father flat out refused. ‘I’m a horse trainer, not some flunky who sits behind a desk, especially a newspaper one.’” She’d chuckled. “You can imagine how that went over.”

Nikki could. “So there is no truth in the newspaper accounts that he was cheating on you?”

Her mother had smiled. “Your father loved me and adored you. He couldn’t wait to finish his work at the ranch and get back to us.”

“Why would he leave us if that were true?” she’d asked.

“Because his true love was his work and horses. Yes, he was away a lot because of his job, but he wouldn’t have cheated,” her mother had said simply.

Cheated? Or done much worse?

“I’ll get you some aspirin when we reach the house,” Cull said now as he drove along the tree-lined drive. “If you feel too ill, I’m sure you could get your appointment changed to another day.”

She shook her head. “Aspirin would be greatly appreciated. I really can’t put this off.”

The sun flickered through the dark green of the leaves. Ahead, the big white two-story house loomed.

Nikki looked over at him, torn between apprehension and excitement. She was finally going to get into the McGraw house. “I’m a little anxious about my appointment.”

“Yes, your appointment.”

She didn’t like the way he said it and decided to hit him with the worst of it and get it over with. “I’m nervous about meeting your father. I’d thought maybe he would have told you. I’m a true crime writer. I’m going to write a book on the kidnapping.”

Cull swore as he brought the pickup to a dust-boiling stop in front of the house. He seemed at a loss for words as he stared at her and she stared right back as if unable to understand the problem. A muscle jumped in his jaw, his hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly she thought it might snap. Those blue eyes had turned to ice and peered out just as cold and hard.

Fortunately, they were both saved. The front door of the house opened; a woman appeared. Nikki knew at once that she was the notorious Patricia “Patty” Owens McGraw.

She’d been able to learn little about Patricia Owens, the nanny, or Patty Owens McGraw, the second Mrs. McGraw, other than the fact that she was from a neighboring town and had gotten Ted to divorce Marianne so he could marry her sixteen years ago.

The only photo she’d seen of Patty the nanny had been a blurry black and white that had run in the newspaper at the time of the kidnapping. It showed a teenager with straight brown hair, thick glasses and a timid look in her pale eyes.

That’s why Nikki was surprised to see the woman who came out to the edge of the porch. Patty was now winter-wheat blonde, sans the ugly eyeglasses, and any sign of timidity was long gone. She wore a large rock on her ring finger and several nice-sized diamonds on each earlobe—all catching the sunlight and glittering wildly. The dress she wore looked straight from some swank New York City boutique, as did her high heels and the rest of her tasteful adornments.

Patty had been nineteen the summer when she’d gone to work as a nanny at the ranch, which would make her about forty-four now. Her husband, Travers McGraw, was sixty.

Frowning, Patricia spun on one high heel and marched back into the house, leaving the front door standing open. She didn’t look happy to see that Cull had a woman with him. Had Travers told his wife about Nikki?

She stared at the rambling, infamous house she’d only seen in grainy newspaper photographs—and always from a distance. Was she really going to pull this off? Her heart was a low thunder in her chest as she opened her door and stepped out of the pickup.

She tried to wrangle in her fears. The clock was ticking. She’d done this all before. Once she showed up, anyone with a secret started getting nervous. It usually didn’t take long before the mystery began to unravel.

Nikki had only days to discover the truth before the anniversary, which was usually plenty of time to make progress on a book. But from the look on Patricia’s face before she’d disappeared back inside the house, and Cull’s cursing inside his pickup, it was going to be an uphill battle.

* * *

CULL KNEW HE’D acted impulsively. He should have listened to Sheriff Crawford. Instead he’d offered the woman a ride only to realize she was going to the same place he was—and for a reason he would never have imagined.

“True crime writer?” he repeated as he climbed out of the pickup after her. Had his father lost his mind?

He’d looked up to see his stepmother appear in the open doorway looking like she’d sucked on a lemon before she’d gone back inside in a snit. Did she already know about this? If not, when she found out, she would go ballistic. He felt the same way himself.

Cull wanted to storm into the house and demand to know what the hell his father had been thinking. Not that it would do any good, he thought, remembering the newspaper story.

He saw Nikki St. James rub her temple where she’d hit the pavement. Even if she’d stepped in front of his pickup on purpose, he grimaced at the thought that he could have killed her. He reminded himself that he’d promised her aspirin, while a part of him wished he’d almost hit the gas harder back in town.

Mostly, he was just anxious to see his father. The only one more anxious, he noticed, was Nikki St. James. His father had no idea what he’d done.

Raised voices came from the house. Had Patricia seen the newspaper article and the increased reward her husband was offering? If so, she was already on the warpath. Even after twenty-five years, there was too much curiosity about their family. So much so that they seldom had guests out to the house. They’d isolated themselves from the world and now his father had invited the worst kind of reporter into their home.

What did his father even know about this Nikki St. James? Had he checked out her credentials? One thing was obvious, Cull thought as he walked with her toward the house. All Hades was about to be unleashed.

He hesitated at the porch steps, noticing something he hadn’t before. Clearly this woman wasn’t from around here, given the way she was dressed—in slacks, a white blouse, pale coral tank and high heels—and the faint accent he hadn’t been able to place. It definitely wasn’t Montanan.

“Hold up,” Cull said to her backside as she continued up the steps.

She stopped midway but didn’t turn until he joined her. She looked pale and for a moment he worried that she was more hurt that she’d let on. She touched her temple. He could see that it was red, a bruise forming, and his heart ached at the sight. No matter who she was or what she was doing here, he hadn’t meant to hurt her. If only he’d been paying attention...

“Maybe you should sit down for a minute,” he suggested.

“I’m fine. Really.”

She didn’t look fine and he felt guilty in spite of how he felt about her being here. He actually felt sorry for her. She had no idea what she was getting into.

“Look, I’m not sure whose idea this was, but it was a bad one. What you’re about to walk into... My family—”

He didn’t get the chance to warn her further, let alone try to talk her out of this before it was too late. His stepsister, Kitten, stormed out of the house and across the wide porch to block their path. Kitten was sixteen and at the age that she thought everything was about her. He could see from the scowl on her face that she’d been arguing with her mother—as usual.

“My mother is impossible,” the teen said around a wad of gum. She was dressed in a crop top and a very short skirt and strappy sandals, as if headed for town, a big expensive leather purse slung over one shoulder. “Can I borrow your truck?”

“No, Kitten,” he said, and started to push past her.

“One of these days you’ll regret being so mean to me,” the girl said, then seemed to see Nikki. “Who’s this?” she demanded, narrowing her eyes suspiciously as she took in the woman next to him. “You finally get a girlfriend, Cull?”

Chapter Five

Nikki guessed this teenager blocking their way must be Patty’s child, the one she’d brought back with her to the ranch when the girl was just a baby. That would have been about sixteen years ago, making the young woman standing in front of her sixteen, if Nikki’s math was correct.

The nanny, Patricia “Patty” Owens, had left the ranch after the kidnapping only to return nine years later with a baby. The father of the child had never been revealed. Was it possible this teen was Travers’s?

“Back off, Kitten,” Cull said as he and Nikki ascended the rest of the steps. “I’m not in the mood.”

“Why is everyone in such a bad mood today?” the teen demanded, clearly taking it personally.

Nikki stepped through the front door, followed by Cull, then stopped, wanting to take it all in. But she wasn’t given a chance.

“Cull? Is that Ms. St. James with you?” a deep male voice called from an open doorway off to her right. “Please have her come in.”

“I’ll get you those aspirin,” Cull said as Nikki turned toward the open doorway.

Travers McGraw seemed preoccupied, one hand on his forehead, his elbow resting on the large oak desk in front of him.

Nikki stopped in the open doorway, studying him for a moment. She’d seen dozens of photographs of Travers McGraw, most taken right after the kidnapping. He’d been a big, strong, handsome man, dark-haired with the same pale blue eyes as the two sons she’d seen.

The past twenty-five years had not been kind to him. While his hair hadn’t turned as white as his ex-wife Marianne’s, it was shot with gray and there were deep lines etched around his eyes. He seemed to have shrunk in size, his body thin, his shoulders stooped.

But as he looked up, his smile was welcoming.

“Mr. McGraw, I’m Nikki St. James,” she said, stepping forward to extend her hand. “The crime writer.”

He seemed to come alive as he got to his feet. Hope burned bright in his eyes with such intensity that the weight of it hit her hard. He was depending on her to solve the case.

“Please, call me Travers,” he said as he shook her hand, clasping it with both of his. “I’m so glad you’re here. I didn’t hear you come in.” He glanced toward the open doorway. “I thought you were going to call for directions to the ranch.”

“Actually, I ran into your son Cull in town—” literally, she thought “—and he brought me out.”

“Wonderful,” Travers said a little distractedly. “All that matters is that you’re here and you’re going to find out what happened to the twins.” He rubbed his temples as if he had a headache, too.

She hoped she didn’t make it worse. She started to reiterate that she couldn’t make any promises, but she didn’t get the words out before Patty burst into the room.

“Tell me I’m misinformed,” Patricia said, looking from Nikki to her husband, her blue eyes wild with anger. “Tell me you haven’t brought this...this...woman into our home.”

“Patricia.” He sighed, looking defeated again. “This is not the place to—”

“Not the place? This has to stop. I thought we decided—”

“You decided,” he said, looking a little less beat down. “I will never stop looking for them.”

His words fanned the flames of the woman’s fury, but seemed to leave her speechless for a moment.

“We need to talk,” Patricia said to her husband between gritted teeth.

“I’m sure we will,” he agreed as he sat back down behind his desk and motioned for Nikki to take a seat. “But right now I need you to leave and close the door behind you.”