“A guy has to wonder about a woman like you.”

Quinn’s lips brushed Constance’s ear as he said this, and he pulled her against him. She was suddenly very aware of his gender—excitedly, dangerously aware.

“A guy has to wonder what?”

“If that deep feeling goes into the bedroom with you, too,” he breathed, each word tickling her ear provocatively.

This was the last stand for her feminine resistance. Deftly she ducked sideways, freeing herself from his embrace.

“In the bedroom?” she repeated, her tone bantering. “Of course it does.”

“I’ll bet with that clear conscience of yours, you sleep like a baby.”

She stared at him for a long moment. He met her gaze and held it. Quietly she answered, “I used to.”

Dear Reader,

The 20th anniversary excitement continues as we bring you a 2-in-1 collection containing brand-new novellas by two of your favorite authors: Maggie Shayne and Marilyn Pappano. Who Do You Love? It’s an interesting question—made more complicated for these heroes and heroines because they’re not quite what they seem, making the path to happily-ever-after an especially twisty one. Enjoy!

A YEAR OF LOVING DANGEROUSLY continues with Her Secret Weapon by bestselling writer Beverly Barton. This is a great secret-baby story—with a forgotten night of passion thrown in to make things even more exciting. Our inline 36 HOURS spin-off continues with A Thanksgiving To Remember, by Margaret Watson. Suspenseful and sensual, this story shows off her talents to their fullest. Applaud the return of Justine Davis with The Return of Luke McGuire. There’s something irresistible about a bad boy turned hero, and Justine’s compelling and emotional handling of the theme will win your heart. In The Lawman Meets His Bride, Meagan McKinney brings her MATCHED IN MONTANA miniseries over from Desire with an exciting romance featuring a to-die-for hero. Finally, pick up The Virgin Beauty by Claire King and discover why this relative newcomer already has people talking about her talent.

Share the excitement—and come back next month for more!

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Senior Editor

The Lawman Meets His Bride
Meagan McKinney

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MEAGAN MCKINNEY

is the author of over a dozen novels of hardcover and paperback historical and contemporary women’s fiction. In addition to romance, she likes to inject mystery and thriller elements into her work. Currently she lives in the Garden District of New Orleans with her two young sons, two very self-entitled cats and a crazy red mutt. Her favorite hobbies are traveling to the Arctic and, of course, reading!

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Epilogue

Chapter 1

I’ll let the machine take it, Constance Adams resolved when the telephone chirred at 5:05 p.m.

After all, the business day was over. And she had been on the go, virtually nonstop, showing homes since eleven this morning. Maybe it was the freakish winter weather, unseasonably warm and sunny, that was deceiving the tourists. For some reason, it seemed as if every upwardly mobile family east of the Mississippi was clamoring for a vacation home in Mystery, Montana.

It had been a long day of smiles and small talk, and she was tired. Ginny had already gone home, and Constance was on the verge of locking up the office when the phone rang. Nonetheless, something oddly insistent about the sound, or perhaps it was only her efficient nature, made her pick up before the answering machine could click on.

“Mystery Valley Real Estate,” she answered. “This is Constance Adams speaking.”

“Yes, Miss Adams, I’m sure glad I caught you.”

Her first impression was confusing. The male voice sounded impatient and curiously…strained, she decided. But he went on talking before she could give it any more thought.

“My name is George Henning,” the voice continued, and she recognized a trace of Northeast accent in the vowels. “I wonder if it would be possible to have a quick look at one of your listings?”

“Of course, Mr. Henning. If you’ll just tell me what time is convenient for—”

“No, I mean may I have a look right now? You see, I’m quite pressed for time. I need to catch a plane later, yet this cabin has just caught my eye. I like it.”

“Cabin?” Constance repeated, somewhat surprised. “You must mean the place at the end of Old Mill Road?”

“Yes, that’s the one.”

She hesitated, her surprise tinged by annoyance. The Mill Road cabin was her listing, all right. One of Hazel McCallum’s properties. And while it was a quaint, rustic hideaway in the mountains, it hardly represented a fat commission. It was a little too remote, a little too basic, for most of her clients. Still…she hadn’t exactly been swamped with offers.

“Well, Mr. Henning, it is rather late. I mean, it would take me some time to drive up into the mountains from here. May I ask—where are you right now?”

“In front of the cabin, actually. Saw your name on the sign. I called on my cell phone.”

“Oh, I see.”

A cell phone, she thought. Yes, maybe that explained the curious flattened sound to his voice. At any rate, she should have simply said no, not today. But something about his urgency compelled her to hesitate, and he allowed her no time to harden her resolve.

“I know it’s late, Miss Adams, and I do apologize for the inconvenience. But I really am pressed for time. This place looks fine from outside. A quick peek at the interior, and maybe we could reach terms today?”

She frowned slightly, and a skeptical dimple appeared at one corner of her thin, expressive lips. The caller sounded intelligent and well-spoken.

Yet, the urgency in his tone puzzled her—perhaps even worried her a bit.

Inexplicably, however, she found herself giving in.

“All right, Mr. Henning. Since you’re in a hurry. I’ll leave right now. I should be there in about forty minutes.”

The moment she hung up, however, Constance realized what a stupid thing she had just agreed to do: meet a stranger, as night came on, way up on a god-forsaken slope of the Rocky Mountains.

She almost called him back to cancel. But if he was catching a plane later, she reasoned, then maybe she was tossing a sale right down a rat hole. This cabin was no hot-ticket item, she reminded herself. The woman in her was nervous, but the business-woman in her won the brief debate.

She settled on a commonsense compromise. She quickly dialled her parents’ number. At twenty-eight, she was the oldest of eight brothers and sisters, five of whom still lived at home in the summer. So there was usually no problem catching someone.

“’Lo?” answered sixteen-year-old Beth Ann’s voice.

“Hi, it’s just me,” Constance told her kid sister. “How’s the home front?”

“Thanks to Pattie it’s a major suckout, that’s how it is,” Beth retorted, anger spiking her voice. “I’d rather just stay at school until bedtime. Least I’d be with my friends. I swear to God, Connie, if Mom ’n’ Dad don’t give me or her your old room, I am going to move into the basement. I am so sick of her spazoid mouth.”

“Look, don’t drag me into your feud. You two are a circus act. Is Mom home?”

“Uh-huh. She’s upstairs hanging curtains with Aunt Janet. Want me to get her?”

“Don’t bother,” Constance said.

In the background she heard an angry glissando of piano notes from the music room. Thirteen-year-old Pattie practicing—and no doubt in a pettish mood about it, if Constance remembered her own violin lessons accurately.

“Listen,” she told her sister. “I’m on my way to show someone that cabin on Old Mill Road. It’s kind of remote up there, so I’m just playing it safe. If you guys don’t hear from me in, mmm, two hours or so, give me a buzz. If there’s no answer at my place, try my cell phone, okay?”

“’Kay,” replied Beth Ann, who seemed to resent first syllables lately.

“Hey,” she added, her voice suddenly merciless in its teasing. “That’s the Eighth House, ’member?”

At first Constance only wrinkled her brow in puzzlement. Then, catching on, she felt her pulse leap.

“You still remember that silliness?” she asked her sister. “I almost forgot it.”

That was true, but Constance had to wonder why recalling such “silliness” made her pulse quicken. Last summer she had driven Beth Ann to Billings for a statewide cheerleading competition. Beth had talked her into visiting one of the many astrologers who set up stands in Freedom Park.

“Beware the Eighth House,” the psychic had repeated several times, frowning over her chart. Meaning, Constance had assumed then, the Eighth House of the Zodiac—Death.

It was Beth Ann who first suggested that, in her case, the Eighth House also pertained to the real-estate business. She insisted that Constance check the dates of her listings. Sure enough, Hazel’s cabin was indeed number eight on the list.

“Thank you for the cheery reminder,” Constance said drily. “Gotta get now. You remember—if you guys don’t hear from me in a couple hours, somebody call me.”

“Beware,” Beth Ann repeated in a ghoulish voice just before she hung up. “Beware the Eighth House!”

Only hours before he called Constance Adams, lying through his teeth, Assistant U.S. Attorney Quinn Loudon had not yet become a desperate fugitive from the very law he was sworn to uphold.

“Just take a few deep breaths and relax,” Lance Pollard advised his client as the two men ascended the marble steps of the old courthouse in Kalispell, Montana. “You’re a lawyer. You know the drill by now. This is just routine pretrial procedure today, I was promised. You’re still a free man.”

“Routine?” Quinn repeated, his smoke-colored eyes flashing anger. “All that time I was secretly assembling a case against Schrader and Whitaker, those two were laughing up their sleeves at me. They set me up, Lance. And you know damn well they killed Anders. We haven’t been able to find the guy in weeks. Sheriff Cody Anders could clear me. He saw everything like I saw it. But where is he? He’s dead, is what.”

Quinn’s jaw set in a deep knot of anger as he and his attorney moved through the magnificent hallway.

The courthouse building had been declared pompous when built at the twilight of the 19th century, but seemed impressive now at the dawn of the twenty-first. A cathedral-like vaulted ceiling topped a huge central lobby with frescoed floors.

However, the building’s quaint charm eluded Quinn today. Nothing could charm him lately. Without Sheriff Anders being found, he knew he had the same chance against his accusers as an icicle in hell.

“Remember,” Pollard coached him as the two men followed a stair railing of antique brass up to the private judicial chambers on the second floor. “The main focus today is the discovery process. The prosecution has to lay out whatever evidence they supposedly plan to enter against you. I’d bet some big money they haven’t got diddly. You know damn good and well it’s easy to get a grand-jury indictment. Barely one in five ends up in a conviction.”

“Yeah, well pardon me all to hell,” Quinn responded bitterly, “for not taking comfort in those odds. If I had a one in five chance of dying during an operation, would that be comforting?”

“You watch,” Pollard insisted, as confident and relaxed as Quinn was not. “Judge Winston will dismiss the whole mess.”

Quinn’s frown etched itself deeper, emphasizing his handsome Irish upper lip.

“Mess” didn’t even begin to describe what was happening to him. A mess could be cleaned up. But this false charge against him could become a death sentence. At best it would be a permanent stain on his record and reputation. He could also be disbarred, disgraced. Worst of all, an inner demon he had hoped was dead and buried in the past might be rearing its ugly head again.

The two men approached an elderly security guard manning a metal-detection station.

“Afternoon Mr. Pollard, Mr. Loudon,” Hank Ingman greeted them politely.

Pollard stepped through the detector’s beam. Quinn handed Hank his metallic briefcase, then opened his summer-weight topcoat to show him the .38 snubby in its armpit holster.

The U.S. Attorney’s office in Billings received enough threats annually to warrant arming its staff. Quinn offered the weapon, but as always the guard merely waved him around the detector.

“If their case is all smoke and mirrors like you claim,” Quinn resumed as they bore toward Judge Winston’s chambers, “then why was my bond set so high? Christ, Lance, don’t you realize Winston has the discretion to decide—today, right now—I’m a risk for flight? If he revokes my bond, the only way I’ll leave this place will be in handcuffs. With Cody Anders missing and me in jail, they’ll have won.”

“Quinn, you seem to think Schrader and Whitaker are little tin gods or something. One’s a borderline-senile judge, the other’s a paid dirt-worker for the road-construction lobby. They don’t own the legal system.”

Relax, Quinn thought scornfully as anger made his jaw muscles bunch tighter. Yeah, right. Here he was, a brand-spanking-new Assistant U.S. attorney only recently sent out west from D.C. No friends in high places, no good-old-boy support network, and he had to go into hock just to pay a bail bondsman. Yet here he was, up against men so rich they drilled oil wells as tax write-offs.

Again Quinn recalled that afternoon this past April. He and Sheriff Cody Anders were standing in the quiet hallway outside Schrader’s slanted-open door. Neither of them could miss the scene inside the door: Whitaker handing the thin Swiss briefcase to Schrader. Remember, Jerry, Whitaker’s suave baritone joked, it’s not the money that matters—it’s the amount. And then both men laughing as Schrader started counting the tightly banded bills….

Pollard’s voice rudely jogged Quinn back to the here and now.

“Let me do all the talking,” he ordered as he knocked on the solid oak door of Winston’s chambers.

Quinn took a deep breath to steady himself.

A bailiff he recognized, but didn’t know by name, let both men in. Immediately, Quinn was put on guard by the ominous scene inside the comfortably appointed chambers.

As he had expected, neither Judge Jeremy Schrader nor attorney Brandon Whitaker were present. Only Judge Winston, federal internal affairs prosecutor Dolph Merriday, and two armed U.S. Marshals from the Justice Department.

The armed marshals were not routine and instantly alerted Quinn to danger. The bailiff was already armed—which most likely meant the marshals were here to “escort” Quinn to the federal lockup in Billings.

“Thank you, gentlemen, for being prompt,” Judge Winston greeted the new arrivals. He bent his shaggy white, leonine head to study the notes spread out before him on a wide pecan-veneer desk. “Please have a seat.”

Winston radiated a sober, proper steadiness that usually had a calming effect on Quinn. Not so today as he and Pollard slacked into chrome-and-leather chairs arranged before the desk. Suddenly aware his scalp was sweating, Quinn stood back up to remove his topcoat.

After some preliminary questions to refresh his memory, Winston addressed himself to the prosecutor.

“As you know, Dolph, one reason for this meeting is to determine what evidence you intend to proffer. But I also have to determine if said evidence warrants litigation. Now, I’ve read Judge Schrader’s deposition. I agree it’s quite damning.”

Winston’s stern gaze cut to Quinn, and again, despite his innocence, those old feelings of guilt lanced him deep. The leopard cannot change its spots.

“However,” the judge continued, “at this juncture it’s a classic standoff. One man’s word against another’s. If you have no further evidence besides hearsay, I’m inclined to dismiss right now.”

Pollard sent Quinn a triumphant grin. But Dolph Merriday spoke up quickly.

“There’s more evidence, Judge Winston. Pursuant to a search warrant issued in the District of Columbia, certain items were seized during a search of Mr. Loudon’s residence in Washington. This was discovered hidden behind a cooling vent.”

Quinn felt the blood drain from his face as Merriday unzipped a canvas tote bag and set several stacks of new one-hundred-dollar bills on Winston’s desk.

“In addition to nearly seventy thousand dollars in cash,” Merriday said, “we found this list with it. A handwriting expert has determined that it was written by Loudon. It contains the names of various officials in the Montana Department of Highways. Loudon obviously hoped to bribe others besides Judge Schrader. It’s a classic construction-kickback scheme, and Loudon hoped to be their legal go-between.”

When he first saw the money, Quinn just sat there gawking like a fool. A moment later, however, angry blood hammered at his temples. He came suddenly to his feet.

“That’s a bald-faced lie!” he shouted. “This is a setup! They killed Cody Anders and now they aim to get rid of me. Of course I wrote the list. I intended to investigate those men. But the money was planted. Schrader and Whitaker are the perps here, not me, and Merriday is either their partner or their dupe.”

“Quinn,” Pollard urged him, “calm down and shut up.”

But he was past calming down, Quinn realized desperately. Already one of the U.S. marshals was reaching for the cuffs on his utility belt. A cold panic seized him—if they locked him up, he’d never clear his name. He would be remembered always as the very demon he had fought so hard to defeat. Either he got away now, or his fate was sealed.

In a heartbeat the .38 snubby was in his hand.

“Quinn!” Pollard shouted. “What in bleeding hell are you…?”

But it was too late for oaths, too. As the marshals went for their guns, Quinn aimed deliberately high and sent two quick slugs thwapping into the wall just above their heads, forcing them to take cover.

From shout to shots was a matter of mere moments. Caught completely off-guard, the bailiff had not even drawn his pistol. But he still stood, solid as a meeting house, before the room’s only door. Quinn lowered one shoulder and literally knocked him aside as he bolted into the hallway.

At the end of the hall, old Hank had his gun out, his face a mask of confusion.

“Quick, Hank!” Quinn shouted as he sprinted toward him. “Judge Winston needs you!”

The guard was too rattled to question the order. Quinn barrelled past him as the two marshals and the bailiff took off after Quinn. For a moment, Hank got in their line of fire, and Quinn gained a precious lead.

Just as he hit the stairs, however, there came a hammering racket of gunfire behind him.

Quinn felt a bruising blow between his shoulder blades. But the Kevlar vest he routinely wore these days absorbed the bullet’s lethal impact. He had started down the steps when a second bullet punched into the back of his left thigh.

He almost lost his footing as fiery pain erupted between his hip and his knee. But sheer determination not to let himself be sacrificed by crime barons kept him on his feet.

The wound hurt like hell, but luckily it wasn’t slowing him down yet. Quinn got his second break of the day a few moments later—he heard his pursuers burst out the front of the courthouse and automatically run toward the parking structure across the street.

Earlier, however, Quinn had avoided the parking structure because of the annoying queue out front. Instead, he had parked around the side on Willow Street. That chance decision gave him a precious few minutes’ head start.

It took very little time to get beyond the Kalispell city limits. Although relatively large, as Montana towns went, the population was barely 12,000. Thus he cleared town with no cops on his tail. But he knew his luck couldn’t hold forever. He had to get off the roads as quickly as possible, find some place to take a better look at his wound.

With town well behind him, he unleashed the powerful V-8 engine, pushing speeds of eighty-five and ninety on the winding secondary road. Traffic remained scant as he sped toward the rugged, granite-tipped mountains. His leg felt numb and hot, but didn’t seem to be bleeding much.

As the confused churning of his thoughts settled somewhat, Quinn couldn’t prevent an unwelcome question from the depths of his heart. The ease with which he turned criminal back there in Kalispell, when the situation demanded: he wondered if that was just intense will to survive, or part of an inherited “skill.”

His smoke-tinted eyes kept flicking to the rearview mirror. So far, still all clear. But he reminded himself he had to find a suitable place to hide, and soon. Unfortunately, he could think of absolutely no one, out West anyway, he could trust. Schrader and Whitaker knew everyone who mattered, including his own boss at the Department of Justice.

By now the engine was lugging, making the climb into the mountains. The last road sign he remembered seeing had said Old Mill Road. He knew it by name only. The car shuddered when pavement abruptly gave way to a sandy, rocky lane. There were washed-out places where the chassis scraped bottom.

Suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, Old Mill Road simply made a sharp turn and ended at a wall of trees. Just as suddenly, an old cabin loomed up on his right. Quinn had to lock the brakes and skid into the overgrown grass out front to avoid crashing into the trees.

He put the transmission in park, turned the car off, then gave the cabin a brief inspection from the car. Clearly uninhabited, judging from the overgrown yard, the split-log structure had a solid cedar-shake roof and several sash windows secured with strong batten shutters. A bright new white-and-green sign in the yard advertised MYSTERY VALLEY REAL ESTATE and listed the Realtor as Constance Adams.

Quinn, still seated in the car, saw that only a couple hours of sunlight remained. This place was well hidden. With luck, maybe he could hide here until he figured out some kind of operating plan to clear himself. Right now it was hard to even get his thoughts straight.

Breaking into the cabin, however, did not seem like an option. That was a top-of-the-line padlock on the door, and those heavy shutters would not be easy to jimmy.

He wondered if he should just give up his wild plan—in fact, just give up, period. He was a fool to think he could elude a manhunt. For one thing, it was colder up here at this altitude—he could feel it even sitting in the car. It would be even worse after dark.

But again the harsh realization struck him with almost physical force: it wasn’t just sure prison time he faced, and for a crime he never committed. It was also fatal surrender to a dark destiny, the affirmation of evil handed down in the bloodstream. At least, that’s how others would see it. Quinn was no hermit who thumbed his nose at society; he cared very deeply what others thought about him.

That last thought steeled his will.

He took another look at the sign. He’d have to come up with some cock-and-bull story for the Realtor, assuming one would even come out this late. He had no clear idea how far away Mystery was. But he knew he had to try.

He took his cell phone out of his briefcase and tapped in the number on the sign.

Chapter 2

Once her Jeep started climbing out of the verdant valley, winding higher on Old Mill Road, Constance felt Beth Ann’s “Eighth House” nonsense lift from her like a weight.

It was a gloriously fine day, much more like early May than late January. White tufts of cloud drifted across a sky blue as a deep lagoon. Even this late in the afternoon the sun had weight as well as warmth. It felt good through her wool skirt and blazer.

Below her, in Mystery Valley, Hazel McCallum’s cattle clustered around feed stations in pastures that once again soon would be rich with sweet grass, timothy and clover. Hazel’s next wheat crop would be heading up, too. If this weather held, planting season would come very early this year.

Seeing the cattle queen’s realm spread out below like a panoramic painting made her decide to call Hazel. After all, this was the first nibble on that old cabin, which had been sitting vacant ever since old Ron Hupenbecker passed away back in the ’80s. Hazel didn’t really need the money, of course. Even the low prices for beef lately hadn’t hurt her valley empire much.

But Mystery’s matriarch seemed eager to know someone was living there again. “An empty house on my land,” she once confided to Constance, “makes me feel like I’ve broken a promise.”

She fished the cell phone out of her purse and tried Hazel’s number.

“Hello?” Hazel answered immediately in a youthful voice that belied her seventy-five years.

“Hazel, hi, it’s Connie.”

“What’s cookin’, good-lookin’? Haven’t heard from you in days. I was hoping maybe you’d run off to have a fling with one of my cowboys.”

Constance laughed. “You’d love it if I did, wouldn’t you?”

“So might you, so go right ahead. Tell you what…whoever you pick, I won’t even dock his wages.”

“Hazel, my God! I’m not even half your age, yet I end up doing all the blushing.”

“Hon, I grew up on a ranch. Nothing makes me blush. Oh, I know you like smart men who read books and talk about great painters. A girl with your looks, going all the way overseas to spend her vacations alone at stuffy museums with idiotic names like Santa’s Soap.”

“It’s Santa Sophia,” Constance corrected her, laughing, “and it’s a magnificent cathedral in Istanbul. Besides, I’m not always alone—I’ve met some very fascinating men at museums. Believe it or not, cowgirl, there’s life outside the rodeo.”

“Oh, stuff those highbrow types. Cowboys have their good points, too.”

“Sorry, Hazel. I just can’t warm up to men who treat their boots better than their women.”

Both women enjoyed a good laugh, for the joke had a nubbin of truth to it. Despite the ease and affection of their banter, however, Constance knew that Hazel was dead serious about that fling offer—and even better if it led to something more permanent.

Constance had gradually taken on the status of one of Mystery’s most glaring marriage holdouts. Two of her younger siblings were married, a third engaged. When Hazel pressed her about it, she usually demurred with the excuse that she hadn’t found “the one” yet. But that was only a partial truth, and Hazel knew it as well as she.

And even now the wily old cattle queen must have sensed the tenor of her thoughts.

“The burnt child fears the fire,” Hazel said gently. “But, dear, does one bad burn mean you must remain in the cold forever?”

Constance slowed down for a rough section of road, trying to ignore the sudden tightness in her throat. She loved Hazel; in fact, she considered the town matriarch her closest friend. But the candid old gal sometimes forced her to confront facts Constance would rather ignore.

In the cold. Aptly put, she decided. Career-wise she was content and becoming more so. She loved her family, and she loved Mystery. Overall, she considered herself blessed and felt humble enough to admit it. But Hazel was right. Romantically speaking, she was trapped out in the cold—in a sort of lovers’ Purgatory, that lonely and hopeless dwelling of those neither loved nor loving.

“Doug Huntington was your one permissible youthful indiscretion,” Hazel assured her. “He fooled me, too, Connie, and you know very few folks ever pull the wool over this gal’s eyes.”

No, Connie thought, trusting was no crime. But because of trust, she had nearly married a career criminal. Only weeks before she was to marry Doug, he had suddenly left the state. But being jilted was only the beginning. About the same time he left for parts unknown, she had started receiving the first of many massive credit-card bills. Thousands of dollars in purchases she never made—and none of the cards had been stolen. He had copied the ID numbers and gone on a telephone and Internet spending spree with them.

Bad enough that she had to pay all the bills, since the cards were not reported missing. Adding final insult to grievous injury, many of the bills were for women’s fine lingerie and jewelry; she had paid the bills for Doug’s little sex kittens.

Her only emotional salvation from the mess was to bury it like a squirrel buries acorns. To go to the police would mean reports and maybe a trial, and she couldn’t relive it again and again; it would break her. So she never reported him and never heard from him again. No one saw it outwardly in her bearing, but that trauma of the heart had orphaned all her hopes for romance. Since then, her confidence had been badly shattered when it came to judging men and their character. She doubted if she could ever pick up all the pieces again.

“Well, anyway, I didn’t call you to rake up the past,” she told her friend. “Possible good news. I’m on my way to show the old Hupenbecker place to a potential buyer.”

“See?” Hazel perked up in triumph, never one to be sidetracked from an unpleasant topic. “You feared no one would ever call. It just needed a little time, was all. Just like you. Give it a little time, and grass will push over a stone.”

“Time,” Constance told her wryly, “is a rare commodity when you’re trying to build up your own real-estate company.”

“There’s always time for love,” Hazel insisted. “But you have to allow it an appointment now and then, busy lady.”

“Maybe I will,” Constance said with little inward conviction. “When business slows down a little. Right now it’s booming, and I’m lucky if I have time to heat a microwave meal, much less meet my significant other. Speaking of business—wish me luck. Five minutes, and I’ll be showing the cabin.”

Before she hung up, Hazel asked, “To a man or a woman?”

“Man. One who seems used to ‘politely but firmly’ getting his way, too.”

“Hmm,” was all Hazel said to that, yet her oo-la-la tone suggested plenty. She added quickly, “Make sure to show him that lovely creek out back. Jake McCallum himself built the stone bridge over it. The State Historical Society wants to put a plaque on it, the silly featherheads. The oldest stone bridge in Montana.”

“I will,” Constance promised before she thumbed her phone off and put it away.

The road was almost all sand by now, and she shifted to a lower gear, the plucky little Jeep surging upward. Only now did it occur to her to wonder why a man in such a hurry would have time to be poking around out here in “Robin Hood’s barn,” as Hazel called the wild country.

She slid through a final, dogleg bend and spotted a fairly new, loden-green Lexus parked in the overgrown clearing out front of the cabin. George Henning himself, she presumed, was leaning rather oddly against one front fender.

He looked nothing like she’d expected him to. He was no mountain man in search of an out-of-the-way cabin; instead she had a quick first impression of a business suit-clad but slightly disheveled man in his middle thirties. The short, neatly cropped black hair contrasted noticeably with his pale complexion. His handsome wingtips and subdued silk necktie suggested he belonged to the fast and furious urban jungle, not cool mountain heights.

But in spite of his dark, conservative attire, she still didn’t fail to notice his pleasing physique: easily over six feet tall, wide at the shoulders, slim at the hips, an Olympic swimmer’s wiry, lithe build.

That’s some professional attitude, Ms. Adams, she chided herself as she parked behind his car and set the handbrake. She slid from behind the wheel, smoothing her skirt with both hands.

She felt a little flush of annoyance when he made no effort whatsoever to walk over and introduce himself. Instead, he remained leaning against his car, regally waiting for her to attend to him.

“Mr. Henning? Hello, there! I’m Constance Adams, the listing agent on the property.”

He gave her a closemouthed smile. Yet even that small politeness seemed to cause him great effort.

“Miss Adams, thanks for agreeing to come out so late. I do appreciate it.”

“Please don’t mention it. I enjoyed the drive, actually. I haven’t been up here in some time. I tend to forget how lovely it is.”

“Yes, it is,” he replied curtly, a note of impatience creeping into his voice.

Instantly her annoyance at him shaded over into dislike. He was big city and too busy for her. The fact that she was putting in overtime on his account didn’t rate at all. His time above all else was tantamount.

He’s the customer, she tempered to herself. Still she didn’t appreciate the rude treatment. Nor the strange feeling she had whenever she looked at him. It seemed horribly akin to attraction, and after Doug, she was going to have none of that.

“Since you had to wait for me,” she said, “I assume you’ve already seen the bridge?”

He gave her a blank look. “Bridge? I…actually, no. I caught up on some work while I waited.”

So he didn’t even bother to explore out back. It struck her as almost incredible that anyone serious about buying the place would not have stepped around back for a peek, at least. He seemed to resent her questions and made a big production out of looking at his watch to remind her he was in a hurry.

But it wasn’t her way to let others treat her like a menial servant—not even for a potential sale. The more you pressure me, Mr. Henning, the longer it’s going to take, she resolved.

“And what kind of work do you do?” she asked politely as the two of them began walking toward the cabin. She noticed that he favored his left leg.

“I’m self-employed,” he replied, irritation clear in his tone and his face. He acted as if each word were being wrenched out of him. “I’m an investment advisor.”

“How interesting.” She was playing his game with a coy vengeance, becoming more chatty and polite in proportion as he grew irritated and terse. “And where are you from, Mr. Henning? Surely you’re not from these parts, or I’d recognize you.”

“Look, Miss Adams, I don’t mean to rush you. Or to offend you. But I really do need to hurry. Could we just skip all the polite chitchat? My flight leaves soon.”

Again the imperious tone was back, as if he were the lord of the manor and she some lowly supplicant.

Constance fished the key out of her purse. Instead of unlocking the heavy slab door, however, she deliberately aimed for the back corner of the cabin.

“Oh, but Mr. Henning, you simply must see the creek and the bridge first,” she insisted, her voice saccharine-sweet. “The owner herself insists. It’s positively charming back here.”

He scowled and lingered in front of the door, his face exasperated. He tapped his watch.

Tap it till it cracks, Constance thought, willing away her attraction to him. I don’t live in your pocket.

“Nonsense, Mr. Henning, you can see them from here. I promise, you won’t miss your plane or muss your shoes.”

If he felt the barb she’d just thrust into him, Constance couldn’t tell it. He gave up and headed toward her. She wasn’t sure if he was simply limping, or limping and trying to cover it.

“Look at that! Dead of winter, yet the fox grapes and wild mint are flourishing back here,” she pointed out. “The mint makes a delicious mountain tea.”

“How interesting,” he replied from a stoic dead-pan, mimicking her. His voice sounded machine-generated.

Not bothering to get his permission, Constance walked the short distance to the bridge. She wondered how he could not be captivated by the beauty of this spot.

The creek formed a clear little pool beneath the stone arch of the bridge. The water’s calm, glassine surface wrinkled with each wind gust. Golden fingers of sunlight poked through the leafless canopy of trees surrounding them. From the bridge she could look straight down and glimpse the silvery flash-and-dart of minnows.

He joined her on the bridge, pointedly ignoring the view. His cool, smoky stare riveted to her.

Why, his face is sweaty, she noted. But it was quite brisk weather up here, practically no humidity. She felt chilly even with her wool blazer, while he had no topcoat at all.

She pointed toward some mossy boulders half-submerged at the water’s edge. “Those always put me in mind of green-upholstered stools. Aren’t they fascinating?”

His stony silence implied he couldn’t care less. Constance noticed how his shadow seemed long and sinister in the waning light. She’d left her sunglasses in the Jeep, and when she looked up at him she was forced to lift a hand to shade her eyes from the low sun.

“Miss Adams,” he began, laboring to speak, “I confess I don’t give a tinker’s damn about those rocks. Now…are you going to unlock that cabin or not?”

Or not? His pointed emphasis on those last two words altered her mood. Suddenly she was fully aware of his intimidating physical advantage over her. She wondered, for just a moment, what might happen if she said not. But she decided she didn’t want to find out.

“Of course.” She gave in, stepping around him and walking down off the bridge. “But to be frank, Mr. Henning, I can’t imagine you being very…at home up here. As you can see, this is a nature lover’s hideaway. The place isn’t even wired for electricity.”

“I’ll use a portable generator,” he replied curtly. “It’s just for vacations, anyway.”

By now her dislike for this rude, intimidating man made Constance desirous of discouraging him. Like Hazel, she wasn’t simply interested in selling the cabin—she wanted to match it up with someone who appreciated its rustic charms. This creep would be bored by the Grand Canyon.

She unlocked the heavy padlock, slid it from the hasp, and swung the front door wide open, flooding the dark, musty interior with light.

“Pretty basic,” she told him, which was certainly true. The unfurnished cabin was partitioned into two rooms, with a sleeping loft over the largest.

Only a few braided rugs covered the floorboards.

“I need a little more light,” he told her, crossing to one of the shuttered windows. He slid it up, slid back the bolt lock on the heavy batten shutters, and swung them wide.

She only wanted to be rid of this man. She stayed back in the doorway, saying nothing to further a sale.

He glanced around indifferently.

“Well,” he said after a few moments, adding nothing else. She noticed that his eye coloring was variable according to the light—the smoky tint she noticed outside seemed almost like a teal blue in here. He really was extraordinarily good-looking, if one could see past that sneer of cold command. And that ashen complexion…it seemed curiously unhealthy in light of his robust build.

“Thank you,” he told her with another cursory dismissal. “I’ll give it some thought and call you.”

Despite her desire to be rid of him, Constance could hardly believe her ears. The man had been downright desperate to see the place. But now, clearly, his tone was cold—he had no intention whatsoever of calling her, she could tell.

“Fine, Mr. Henning,” she replied with a bare minimum of civility. Never mind her wasted time; at least she’d be rid of him. “Now I really must get back to Mystery.”

“Let me close the shutter and window,” he offered quickly as she started toward them. She could have sworn his limp seemed more pronounced when he crossed to the window. For the first time, she noticed the small tear in his trousers on the back of the left thigh. A dark stain ringed it. The tear and the stain was at odds with the man’s impeccable attire, and she wondered if it had anything to do with the fact that he was in a hurry.

“You forgot to bolt the shutter,” she pointed out as he turned to join her.

“No, it’s fine,” he assured her, his tone brooking no debate on the matter.

She was on the verge of pointing out that it clearly was not locked—she could see a seam of daylight where the shutters failed to join tightly.

Then she spotted it on the bare wooden floor, brightly illuminated in the sunlight flooding through the front door: a glistening scarlet drop that could only be fresh blood.

For a long moment she paused, on the edge of her next breath, cold dread filling her limbs as if they were buckets under a tap. She glanced around and spotted another drop, another—several of them, all marking places where he had walked.

A terrible sense of foreboding gripped her. She had to grab hold of the door to steady herself. Henning, meantime, had stepped outside, waiting for her to lock up.

“Mr. Henning?” she said without turning around.

“Yes?”

“Are you…I mean—Mr. Henning, are you…bleeding?”

The moment she asked, some instinct warned her she should have pretended not to notice. His next comment verified her instinct.

“I’m sorry you had to notice that, Miss Adams. I truly wish to God you hadn’t.”

Fighting a sudden, watery weakness in her calves, she turned toward the yard to confront him. And encountered the single, unblinking eye of the gun in his hand.

Chapter 3

The moment she spotted the gun, Constance felt her heart surge. For a few seconds, an exploding pulse made angry-surf noises in her ears.

He wasn’t actually pointing it at her, but he certainly hadn’t pulled it out for show-and-tell, either.

“I’m sorry, Miss Adams,” he repeated. “You’re too observant for your own good. It would’ve been much…simpler if you hadn’t noticed those bloodstains.”

Maybe it was the influence of too many movies, but the possible significance of his words made her go numb with fright.

That same fear must have addled her reason, she decided, judging from her next comment—which surprised her at least as much as it seemed to surprise him.

“You deceitful bastard!” She spat the words at him with a contempt unmitigated by her fear.

Bastard…the word had a B-movie feel in her mouth, yet it came out automatically from the depths of her anger and indignation. If she had been burned by a dishonest fiancé, this was infinitely worse. So far as she knew, Doug had never sunk to the level of holding a gun on someone.

However, even more surprising than her comment was his reaction to it.

The impact on him was visible and startling. Something desperate and frightened flashed in those variable eyes of his. Not anger, precisely, but somehow she had touched a very raw nerve.

“No,” he told her. “No. It’s…”

His voice trailed off, and he waved his free hand in a dismissive oh-what’s-the-use gesture. “It’s not what you think,” he finished, offering no more.

“Mr. Henning, please, I don’t—”

“It’s Quinn Loudon, not George Henning.”

“Well who ever you are, I don’t understand. You say it’s not what I think it is. I assure you, I don’t know what to think.”

He still stood outside in the newly gathering darkness. Instead of answering her, Loudon cast a nervous glance back toward the road. The temperature was going down with the sun, and she saw him shiver in his business suit.

“Come with me,” he told her.

Alarm made her pulse race. “Where…where are we going?”

“Look, just get a grip, would you? We’re not going anywhere. I’m not a rapist or a killer, and believe me, I don’t want you here any more than you want to be here. Right now I just want to hide the cars behind the cabin, and I want you in my sight while I do it, all right? Do you think both vehicles will fit back there?”

“I really couldn’t tell you,” she said cautiously. “Hiding cars from the law isn’t my specialty.”

“Who said I’m hiding anything from the law? Maybe I am the law.”

She looked at the gun in his hand. “No you’re not. You’re just a criminal swaggering around like a big man, frightening unarmed women. What’s next, a raid on a daycare center?”

Now anger did indeed spark in those compelling eyes of his. But he slipped the gun back into its holster under his jacket.

When she still refused to move outside, he seized her under one elbow and tugged her out into the yard. His grip felt strong as a steel trap and intimidated her into passivity. He could do plenty of damage without a gun, she had to admit to herself with a chill inching down her spine.

“Get in,” he ordered her, opening the passenger door of the Jeep.

The moment she did, she remembered the keys were in the ignition. By the time he’d limped around to the driver’s door, she had managed to lock both doors and scoot behind the steering wheel.

She keyed the ignition and the engine coughed to life. She ground the gearshift into reverse just a moment before he smashed out the driver’s window with the butt of his gun.

She went nowhere. The parking brake held. His hand like a warm vise pressed into her throat.

“Don’t test me,” he growled in a low, rough voice. “I’m a very desperate man, Miss Adams.”

Only one question looped through her mind: Would he really hurt her?

One part of her didn’t think so—some things about him just didn’t seem to tally up as criminal—a violent criminal, at any rate. His speech, for one thing, and his appearance.

Then again, she recalled bitterly, he wouldn’t be the first callow man who fooled the decent with good tailoring. Doug, too, had been a natty dresser with impeccable manners. And face it, she admonished herself. He’d played her like a piano.

Closing her eyes, she surrendered the need to fight. The crime playing out now wasn’t about credit cards and sweet lies of love. She knew nothing about the man before her. The only thing she did know was that he was at least giving her a warning—something Doug had never done. If she was a fool and underrated the man’s evil capacity, she could end up dead. So she had to take heed. She had to.

He leaned one meaty shoulder through the window and took the car keys. She moved over into the passenger’s seat as if he burned her.

Noticeably favoring his hurt left leg, he climbed in and drove the Jeep around back. He parked as close to the cabin as he could.

“Should be just enough room for my car,” he muttered, thinking out loud, his face lean and pale.

“You’re not really an investment advisor, are you?” she asked as he pushed her in front of him as they went around the cabin for his car.

He shook his head. “I’m a lawyer. I’m with the U.S. Attorney’s Office out of Billings. Or at least I was,” he added in a bitter afterthought.

A great cover, she told herself, for a criminal to pose as the law.

On the other hand, she did note he had the serious lawyerly type down pat.

Except for the hole in his leg.

They got into the Lexus and moved it to the rear of the cabin. In the ensuing silence, she finally asked the question she feared she already knew the answer to. “So what’s wrong…what happened to you?”

“I was shot,” he told her bluntly. “About three, four hours ago. At the courthouse in Kalispell.”

She ratcheted up her courage a few more notches and asked, “By whom?”

“I couldn’t tell you the gentleman’s name. He was one of these rude assholes who shoot you without introducing themselves.”

She said nothing. There was no point in tossing back a retort, such as maybe he was shot because he was doing something he shouldn’t have. By the tight expression on his face, she wasn’t going to get any more information out of him. For right now at least.

When he did finally say something, mostly to end the painful silence between them, he was still evasive.

“I understand how all this must appear to you, but the process of observation defines only one reality. Others you haven’t observed are just as real.”

“Well, you certainly can talk like a lawyer.” Or his guilty client, she thought pointedly.

He surprised her by smiling, although there was no mirth or playfulness in it. “I suppose I do. But I don’t put the noose before the gavel.”

He pushed her inside the cabin.

“With those shutters closed it’s getting dark in here,” he observed. “Any lanterns or anything?”

“Candles, I think,” she responded reluctantly. “Try the cabinet near the sink.”

He limped over, rummaged in the cabinet, and produced several squat votive candles and a box of kitchen matches. He lit two of the candles, and set both of them on the floor. Then, emitting a weary sigh, he gingerly sat down between the candles and supported his back against the cabinet. She noticed he was shivering again.

She was still holding her purse. She thought about her cell phone, then remembered that someone in her family should be calling her soon to check on her. Her fear, momentarily forgotten while they moved the cars, now returned in full force. The man had shown all the tenderness of a wounded lion. He wouldn’t take kindly to any more tricks. Staring at his large form and tough, weary expression, she suddenly realized the truth of the “eighth house.” She should have never come up to the mountains and shown the cabin. It had proven disastrous.

“Do you have to pace like that?” he sniped.

“I’m sorry. The gun makes me nervous,” she confessed.

“I put it away.”

“Yes, but it’s right there, handy. Isn’t it?”

He ignored her, sleeving beads of sweat off his forehead. His wound was getting worse, she realized when she noticed his pain-clouded eyes. Despite her fear and anger, she felt a twinge of pity for him.

“Who shot you?” she repeated. “The police?”

He shook his head. “Not the same police you have in mind. It was federal marshals.”

She halted, shocked into immobility. Federal marshals…his crime or crimes must be serious.

He gave a snort at the look on her face. “If you can’t handle the answers, don’t ask the questions.”

“You needn’t worry about what I can handle.”

She started pacing again.

“Will you please sit the hell down?” he demanded. “I’m getting a crick in my neck watching you.”

“I’ll sit down,” she agreed, doing so. “Now will you please tell me what’s going on, Mr. Loudon?”

For some time he simply ignored her question. Finally he nodded. When he spoke, his voice showed the strain he’d been through lately.

“I’ll leave out the names and just cut to the chase. Basically, I was sent out here from Washington, D.C., to assist on a massive, ongoing investigation into kickback schemes involving the Montana Department of Highways. Or I guess I should say allegedly involving them.”

“I’ve heard the word all my life,” she confessed, “but I’m not exactly sure what a ‘kickback’ is.”

“It just means a slice of the pie. Cost overruns are a venerable part of construction profits. You know, the doubling or even tripling of a project’s estimated price after the work is underway. Most in government understand this and seldom bring indictments over it. But lately there’s been a corps of new, reform-minded attorneys in the Justice Department. We’re trying to change the business-as-usual graft.”

He hesitated, as if trying to gather his thoughts. The front door stood open, the wedge of sky it revealed turning purplish blue in twilight. A breeze wafted, making the candles gutter. For a moment Constance smelled the clean, nose-tickling tang of the evergreens on the lower slopes. It only made her more miserable to be his captive.

“One day last spring,” he resumed, “I had to go see a certain judge in Billings. It was a touchy matter—I had already, under federal guidelines for internal review, subpoenaed certain phone and financial information on some attorneys he knew on a social basis. I’m allowed to do that, without notifying anyone, so long as no charges are filed.”

This time when he hesitated, on a sharp intake of hissing breath, she knew it was his wound.

“Anyway, I intended to ask the judge’s permission to execute a search warrant. I wanted agents to seize the private financial records of a certain state legislator, a guy I suspect is at the heart of the kickback scheme.”

A spasm of pain crossed his face, etching his handsome features even deeper in the candlelight.

“I never did talk to that judge. The county sheriff and I were on the verge of knocking on his office door when we saw the door was open a crack, and the judge was inside with a…ahh, let’s call him an attorney who represents certain road-construction bosses. This attorney was also one of the guys I had been investigating. Right before my ears and eyes—and the sheriff’s—he hands a briefcase stuffed with money to the judge.”

“A bribe?” she encouraged him to continue when he hesitated.

“The wise guys never use that word. It’s usually called a contribution, but damn straight it was a bribe. I knew it and the sheriff knew it. Schra—I mean, this judge regularly rules on cases involving the attorney’s clients.”

He paused, and she watched him touch a dry tongue to chapped lips. “Does that thing work?” he asked her, pointing to the hand pump bolted to the sideboard of the sink.

“I think so. It’s cistern water, but up here it’s safe to drink.”

She resisted the urge to help him when he struggled to his feet. He pumped the air out of the pipes, then waited for the rusty water to run clear. She watched him cup his hand and drink greedily.

“Anyway,” he said, picking up the thread of his story again as he joined her on the floor, “I made one very stupid mistake. I forgot all about the hallway security cameras that are standard equipment now in courthouse buildings. The tapes are routinely reviewed, at fast speed, and any unusual events are reported. So there the sheriff and I were, caught on film outside the judge’s door. And of course the date and time were recorded, too.”

“I see. So the men who were inside had sure knowledge that you came to the door and saw them?”

He nodded, his face morose and pensive in that flickering, yellow-orange light.

“Exactly. At first I thought it was just the security cameras that might have them worried. Us standing outside the door when the bribe came down. But now the sheriff’s missing. And I realize they must know, or at least suspect, that I’ve been building a case against them. They’ve turned my own game against me.”

“How do you know?”

His voice was sharp with bitter resentment. “The sheriff was just a good old boy retired from the fed that I knew and liked. We had lunch whenever we both had to go to the courthouse. He had nothing to do with the situation, just the wrong place, wrong time. Now he’s missing.” He stared at her, his eyes dark and sunken in his pain-filled face. “When they realized what we saw they knew it’d be damn hard to off an assistant U.S. Attorney in the middle of an investigation, but Cod—I mean, the sheriff, he was a piece of cake. They made him disappear, then they set about turning all the evidence against me, even that tape. You see, I was carrying a briefcase, too. So it was totally logical to simply suggest that I had come by that day to bribe the judge. Then, seeing he was with someone, I supposedly changed my mind and left without knocking.”

“But how could they prove such a charge from that tape?” she asked, incredulous.

“They couldn’t, of course. But the judge swore out a deposition that I tried to bribe him soon after that. So the tape became corroborative evidence, one more nail in my coffin. And believe me, they’ve planted far more incriminating evidence against me since then. The newfound cash in my apartment in Washington was why I had to escape today.”

He fell silent, evidently exhausted by the effort to tell her all this. Then Constance noticed the fresh bloodstain growing under his leg. His wound was bleeding again.

Looking at his haggard features, it occurred to her for the first time. He just might not make it.

It might mean her own salvation. If he died, she could escape.

But gazing closer into his pain-filmed eyes, she felt a deep sympathy well up inside her. Despite his holding a gun on her, despite everything she’d suffered because of Doug’s treachery, Loudon made her want to believe him. He had an earnestness that was hard to look away from, and his story was related in such a fashion that it didn’t make sense to her he’d use his last strength to tell her lies. There was no purpose to any lies now. She was still his unwilling prisoner.

However, neither could she forget Hazel’s remark about Doug: Even the devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.

His voice suddenly sliced into her thoughts.

“Here,” he told her, handing her a black leather wallet.

The wallet was opened to a photo ID that bore the official seal of the U.S. Justice Department. It identified Quinn Loudon as an assistant U.S. Attorney.

“I believe who and what you are,” she told him carefully, handing it back.

“But anyone can turn rotten, right? Is that what you’re implying?”

“You’re bleeding,” she pointed out, sidestepping his question. But in fact he’d hit the proverbial nail right on the head—“good guys” were not guaranteed by badges and IDs. The headlines proved, every day, that good guys became bad guys for the right price.

Loudon pulled his shirttails out and ripped off a strip of the material. Quickly he folded it into a makeshift bandage.

“Turn your head,” he ordered her.

When she hesitated, he simply shrugged. “Suit yourself, I’m not bashful.”

When she heard his belt buckle clinking and realized he was lowering his trousers, she did quickly turn away while he tied the cloth around his wound.

“All right,” he told her a few moments later. “Peep show’s over.”

“You’ve got to get to a doctor,” she told him. “That wound could infect.”

“Nix on that. By law doctors have to report every gunshot wound. I’ve already figured out what I need to do first. I’ve got one possible ace in the hole, but I’ll need to drive to Billings if I mean to play it.”

“That’s a 400-mile drive,” she reminded him. “You’ll never make it.”

“Probably not,” he agreed. “That’s why you’re going to take me. And we’ll have to use your vehicle. By now mine has to be the object of a state-wide search.”

“No,” she said. “I’m afraid. I…your story is quite convincing. But it’s only your word. Besides, even if I chose to believe you—this is obviously a very serious situation. I just…I can’t, I’m sorry. I’m just too afraid.”

“I don’t recall asking you,” he reminded her, and a sinister tone of menace had entered his voice—or so it seemed to her in her fright.

“I can’t,” she insisted.

“Yes, you can.”

“All right then, I won’t.”

“Actually, it’s best that you refuse. That way you don’t become an accessory or get charged with aiding and abetting a fugitive. It’s this that will force you, and that’s what you’ll tell the authorities later.”

His hand slipped inside his suit jacket and emerged with the gun. Again he didn’t aim it at her—but he held it in plain view as a reminder.

“You will drive me to Billings, Miss Adams.” His stare pierced her. “End of discussion.”

I’m in deep, thought Quinn, and going deeper.

Despite the long drink in the cabin, the inside of his mouth tasted as dry and stale as the last cracker at the bottom of the barrel. He hadn’t eaten all day, and his pinched stomach felt like it had been pumped.

Additionally, even the black plastic bag covering the smashed window didn’t entirely keep out the cold. Constance Adams’s Jeep did not ride nearly so smoothly as his Lexus. Each time it bounced over a hole or rut on Old Mill Road, pain exploded in his thigh. But even at its worst, the physical pain was nothing compared to his inner turmoil.

His criminal actions earlier today, in Kalispell, while certainly censurable could at least be partially defended. They had caught him completely flat-footed, unprepared, and he simply reacted in a panic. After all, his freedom was on the line. He had been fighting the threat of wrongful imprisonment as well as ensuring his ability to disprove the phony charges against him.

But now…now it was a whole new criminal ball game. He had taken a hostage under the implied threat of violence. Only sheer desperation could have driven him to such an action. “Beyond the pale” hardly described his conduct now.

The heater was blowing, and he wasn’t shivering now. He opened the passenger’s window to let the cold night air revive him a bit. A sliver of nascent moon hung over the serrated mountain peaks, golden against a blue-black evening sky.

Constance Adams had said nothing during the ride back down to the valley floor and the interstate highway. Now she finally spoke up.

“Mr. Loudon? If you really are innocent, as you say, you should easily be able to clear yourself, shouldn’t you? Won’t your actions now just make things needlessly worse for you?”

“Easily? Believe me, given the men I’m up against, it would be easier to write my name on water.”

There was so much more to it, he thought in a welter of despair and misery, that she just couldn’t understand from outside the situation. The money planted in his apartment back east, for example. He realized now that this scam involved more players than just Whitaker and Schrader. Others were involved, and there was some sort of sub-rosa accord between them.

Quinn wished he could make her understand the enormity and complexity of his situation. He hardly knew the woman, but something about her made him believe she could be a strong ally if he could somehow win her trust.

Something else suddenly occurred to him, and a prickle of alarm moved down his spine.

“Do you have a road map of Montana?” he demanded.

“In the glovebox, I think. But we won’t need it. I’ve driven to Billings plenty of times.”

“Yeah, on the interstate,” he replied as he opened the accordion folds of the map. “But do you know the back roads?”

“You mean all the way to Billings? No. Why take back roads? We aren’t in your car.”

He flicked on the dome light to study the map. “I just realized there’ll probably be an APB out on me. Checkpoints will be set up along the main routes. I can’t risk it.”

“You really think it’s that important to the police?”

“You kidding? I fired on federal agents. They’ll raise six sorts of hell.”

“You fired at them?”

“What, you think they shot me because they don’t like my face?”

“You didn’t tell me…I mean….”

She trailed off, too taken aback to speak. He could feel a new level of tension in the Jeep.

“If it makes any difference,” he told her, “I didn’t exactly fire at them. I fired deliberately high to miss them.”

While the overhead light was on, he felt her glance keep touching him, then quickly sliding away. Even mired in pain and worry, he couldn’t help appreciating her good looks. Understandably, this latest revelation had left her somewhat whey-faced. But she had stunning amber eyes and medium-length hair the color of burnt sienna. The only feature even slightly out of harmony with the serenity of her face were her somewhat witchy eyebrows. But he liked them. Liked them a lot. She was the kind of woman who looked liked she could play angel or devil depending on her mood. In truth, if they’d met under any other circumstances, he’d have let her known without a doubt he was attracted to her.

But he had other worries now. Big ones. He quickly worked out a route, along secondary roads, that would be safer but considerably longer. He turned the light out just before Old Mill Road—smooth blacktop now—leveled out on the floor of Mystery Valley.

“Just go on past the interstate,” he directed her. “Take County Line Road east.”

He sat back in the seat and allowed his ruminations to turn toward the situation at hand. Despite all that had happened to him, Quinn couldn’t really say he was surprised by what Schrader and Whitaker were up to. They were corrupt, and greed was a powerful motivator.

He wasn’t sure, however, about prosecutor Dolph Merriday. True, the man had real facility with a cliché—scratch a federal prosecutor and you’ll find an ambitious politician. But something bothered Quinn about the man. Above all, prosecutors were negotiators. But his unyielding stance…

Constance Adams abruptly interrupted his ruminations.

“Mr. Loudon?” She looked at him from the wheel, hesitating, thinking, her pretty lips curved down. “If—if your story is true, then I know you don’t want to become a real criminal by kidnapping me. There’s a state-trooper post ahead at Oxbow. You can turn yourself in there, and if you do, I promise you I’ll press no charges. We’ll call this a lift.”

He greeted her suggestion with a harsh bark of laughter. “And will you give me a lollipop, too, Miss Goody Two-Shoes?”

After that dig, he could almost whiff the anger coming off her.

“Why is it such a joke?” she demanded. “You could avoid kidnapping charges—”

“I can’t,” he cut her off tersely. “You’ve watched too many crime shows on TV where crusading lawyers always ensure that justice prevails. In real life innocent people are framed all the time.”

“So your rights are more important than mine, is that it? Why should I be victimized because you supposedly were?”

“Curiosity killed the cat, that’s why. All you had to do was keep your mouth shut when you saw that blood on the floor. The unlocked shutter didn’t give me away—the blood did. Once I knew you’d seen it, I also knew you’d report me.”

“I see. I’m being punished for showing a little concern.”

“I don’t want to punish you.” The truth of his words stabbed him and forced him to grow silent. With difficulty, he added, “But things are the way they are, that’s all. Now just shut up and drive.”

“Please let me stop at Oxbow,” she repeated, her voice pleading. “I know you don’t want to become a common criminal.”

“Look,” he answered harshly, his patience worn by the pain of his leg, and the pain in his soul, “I’ll keep it to a simple command—shut your damned mouth and drive.”

He noticed she had been checking her watch every few minutes. She did so again now.

“Got a hot date?” he asked her.

“What if I did? Doesn’t really matter, does it? My time is yours now—gun man,” she added pointedly.

Her words cut far deeper than she realized.

He sank farther down into the seat and morosely surveyed the situation. Ms. Constance Adams would never know how hard it all sat with him. He’d spent his childhood in a series of foster homes after his real parents—both of them drug addicts—had gone to prison for holding up a liquor store to support their habit.

His last foster home had been the best—police Lieutenant Jim Westphal and his wife Ceil had loved him like their own son. From Jim, Quinn had caught the crime-fighting bug. He geared his whole life toward a career in law enforcement. He wanted, more than anything else, to be one of the good guys in the war on crime. As if only that could erase all the pain and humiliation his real parents had caused him.

And now, as if there were some kind of dark, blood destiny coursing through his veins, he, too, was officially a criminal. Certainly he would never hurt this woman whom he held against her will; violence, at least, was not in him. She had no idea that his gun was empty and he had no more bullets for it. Somehow it had been easier to bluff with an empty weapon—he could never have pointed a loaded gun at her.

But the thought was little consolation. With every mile they drove, he sank deeper and deeper into anguish. It just didn’t seem possible that fate could be so cruel—could in fact force him into the very role he’d fought his entire life to avoid.

Again he noticed her nervously check her watch. He opened his mouth to ask her about it again. But before he could speak, a telephone chirred, the sound muffled by her purse.

Someone was calling for her.

Chapter 4

The phone rang a second time, a third. With every ring, Constance could feel her body stiffen. The ache to grab it and scream for help was smothered by the fear of the gun in Loudon’s pocket. Every ring was torture.

It was Beth Ann, or someone else in her family, checking up on her as she’d requested. By now they would have already called her house, too. Obviously, Constance told herself, the only option was not to answer. That alone would set her family in motion trying to find her.

But she underestimated her captor’s shrewdness. He evidently didn’t trust her complacency.

“Answer it,” he ordered her.

At the same time he grabbed the steering wheel with one hand.

He spoke quickly. “I know you figure by now that I won’t shoot you. You’re right about that. But I swear by all things holy—you send even one hint to that caller, and I’ll dump both of us into that ditch just like that.”

Steep runoff ditches ran along both sides of the road, and the Jeep was moving at fifty-five miles per hour. She knew he could well be bluffing. But he jerked the wheel to warn her, and her heart missed a beat when they nearly swerved into the ditch.

“Answer it,” he ordered tersely as the phone continued to burr. “And no tricks.”

She fished the cell phone out of her purse. Loudon leaned his head close to hers, listening in.

“Hello?”

“God, ’bout time you answered, pokey,” Beth Ann’s voice complained. “What took you so long?”

When Constance hesitated, Loudon again jerked the wheel. The Jeep’s tires spewed gravel when they brushed the narrow shoulder. She felt her throat tighten with fear.

“I was passing two logging trucks,” she ad-libbed. “I had to wait until I got around them.”

“Oh. How’d it go? Did the guy buy the old Hupenbecker place?”

“He’s still debating, I guess.”

“Sure took you long enough. Is he cute?”

The Jeep hit a slight dip, and Loudon’s cheek brushed hers. She felt the rough masculine feel of his beard shadow. She forced herself to keep her tone light.

“Boys are cute, little sis. Men are handsome.”

“Well, is he handsome?”

“Can’t say,” Constance replied reluctantly but truthfully.

“Woo-woo! Are you still there with him?”

Constance took a sideways glance at Loudon. He shook his head and mouthed the word, no.

“No,” Connie whispered.

“Can’t hear you! We must have a bad connection.” Fuzz backed up Beth Ann’s assessment. “Well, at least the guy wasn’t an ax murderer. I gotta go now. I’m baby-sitting for the Campbells. Later, skater.”

Constance felt her heart sink as she put the phone away. If anything did happen to her, it was Friday and no one would be likely to seriously worry about her absence until Monday when her business associate, Ginny Lavoy, would miss her.

Another hazard, she thought bitterly, of having no love life. There was no one to miss you right away.

“‘Can’t say,’” Loudon repeated, a trace of whimsy mixed with his exhausted tone. “That’s a left-handed compliment if I ever heard one.”

“I didn’t mean to give you even a left-handed one,” she said, dead hope in her voice.

Loudon smirked and checked his watch. “Bad news travels fast,” he told her, turning on the radio to catch the top-of-the-hour news broadcast out of Helena.

The national news came first, the usual litany of political squabbling and natural-disaster news caused by abnormally warm ocean currents. Then the announcer turned to state news.

“The sound of gunfire erupted today at the Federal Court Building in Kalispell. Quinn Loudon, Assistant U.S. Attorney, literally blasted his way to freedom when U.S. Marshals attempted to place him under arrest. Loudon had appeared for pretrial proceedings stemming from charges of bribery and racketeering.

“According to witnesses, during the exchange of fire Loudon was wounded in one leg. He successfully eluded officials and escaped from Kalispell. A massive manhunt is presently underway, according to federal prosecutor Dolph Merriday.

“‘Quinn Loudon has lived a life of deceit,’” Merriday told reporters during a press conference only hours ago, ‘so today’s actions are no real surprise.’ According to Merriday, even Loudon’s superiors at the Justice Department did not realize Loudon’s parents were both career criminals who served long prison sentences.

“‘We caught him in the act, so he blasted up a courthouse to get free,’ Merriday added. ‘But his kind always foul their nests sooner or later.’”

The story was over in thirty seconds and the announcer moved on to other news. Constance felt a sudden numbness at the mention of Loudon’s criminal parents. While nothing in the news story actually contradicted anything he had told her, it lent an official—and damning—authority to the notion that he was a very dangerous felon.

Loudon turned the radio off, cursing softly.

“Well that flat does it,” he declared bitterly. “The bastards broke the knife off in me this time.”

Flat does what, she wondered, frightened by the desperation in his tone.

Loudon lapsed into a brooding silence.

Lance Pollard was right, he told himself. The case against him was indeed all smoke and mirrors.

Unfortunately, a cynical proverb he’d learned in law school was also true: No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people. Smoke and mirrors were enough to convict a man. Well, no doubt Schrader and Whitaker were dancing on his grave already. But damn them, anyway. He wasn’t in it just yet.

Constance had said nothing. Now, as he fell quiet, the awkward silence became unbearable.

“Now, at least, I understand your steamroller methods,” she told him. “This is obviously a very big deal if it led the state news.”

“I know what you’re thinking. There were two unpleasant details I left out of my story to you. Two details called my mother and father.”

The bitterness and hurt in his voice made her think of the pain Doug Huntington had caused her. What if she had been branded a criminal because she slept with one?

“Since when did children get automatic criminal status from their parents?” she asked coolly.

“They don’t. It was a cheap shot by Merriday.”

“Yes. And besides, you deserve credit for having done a lot in the criminal world all by yourself.”

He flinched. Then he almost laughed. “You are one difficult woman. And your damned sense of fair play only makes what I’m doing right now that much more reprehensible. Truly I’m sorry, Miss Adams, I really am. I just…I had no choice but to drag you into this. They didn’t mention on the radio that Sheriff Cody Anders is missing either. I don’t want to go missing like he did, so it’s got to be this way.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered bitterly, not looking at him.

“You still don’t believe me, right?” he pushed.

“No,” she admitted.

After a long silence, he replied inexplicably, “Good girl. You didn’t even know me until a little while ago.” His voice almost seemed to be fading like a weak radio signal.

They passed through the bright glow of a yard light, and she noticed the haggard pockets under his eyes.

He’s exhausted, she thought, and he’s probably lost a lot of blood.

Even as she felt pity welling inside her, a more practical side of her warned against it. Ask every convict in a prison, and he’ll swear he’s innocent, she reminded herself. This was not a field trip they were on; she was his unwilling hostage.

He lapsed into silence, either dozing or close to it. She watched the blacktop streak past under the headlight beams, trying not to dwell on Dolph Merriday’s troubling words: Quinn Loudon has lived a life of deceit.

Constance wasn’t sure how long her passenger had dozed. She suddenly started when his voice abruptly ended the quiet inside the Jeep.

“Where are we?”

“About ten miles west of Bighorn Falls.”

“Is that all?” he complained.

“I’m driving the nighttime speed limit. Would you like me to go faster?”

“No,” he said irritably. Montana state troopers were notoriously vigilant after dark.

“You insisted on taking the back roads to Billings,” she reminded him. “This route is far less direct.”

“I know what I said,” he snapped at her.

He was awake, but his voice sounded exhausted. Something occurred to her.

“Have you eaten anything today?”

“No, but we can’t stop anywhere. I can’t risk it.”

“There’s a few granola bars in the glovebox,” she told him.

He handed her one, too, and they both ate in silence for a few minutes.

Constance was the first to break it.

“You mentioned something about having an ‘ace in the hole’ in Billings. May I ask what it is?”

When he answered, his voice had lost its snappish tone. “I’d better not get too specific with you. You’ll be going to the police eventually. And you may end up being grilled by the same goons who’re trying to put handles on me.”

“I take your point.”

“Now you’re catching on. Actually I doubt if what I have is an ace. But with luck, maybe it’ll turn out to be a king or a jack. So far it’s my secret. All on my own, I was putting together a case against…the two men who are trying to set me up. I kept my efforts secret because I was afraid to jeopardize security until I have some idea just how high up the corruption goes.”

Quinn thought about how one secretly obtained court order had allowed him to painstakingly assemble a damning paper trail from phone and financial records. As huge amounts of money were released from the Federal Highway Fund to a major Montana road-construction firm, he had traced subsequent “portfolio diversifications” by the firm’s attorney— Brandon Whitaker.

Over time a clear pattern emerged. So regular you could plot it like a graph. A pattern known as “the kickback curve” among prosecutors. After each federal payment to Montana, Whitaker initiated lucrative transactions involving preferred stocks and leveraged buyouts. It was only circumstantial. But it would warrant judicial examination; Quinn was sure of that.

Despite her resolution to remain skeptical, Constance again felt herself wanting to believe her abductor. True, he was holding back specific details. But ever since their paths had crossed earlier, he had insisted on his innocence.

He didn’t really need to bother doing that—he had a gun, after all. A true criminal would simply rely on intimidation to gain her compliance.

Once again he lapsed into a long silence. His labored breathing became more obvious to her as he nodded out once more. Before long, his head had slumped onto her shoulder.

No question about it now; he was fast asleep. She glanced down. The greenish glow of the dashboard lights showed that his coat was open.

I could maybe get the gun, she thought.

But then what? She knew full well she wouldn’t use it, and he probably knew that, too.

She thought about her cell phone. Had he been thinking like a real bad guy, he would have taken it from her. But he didn’t. She could get it out, dial 911, and perhaps whisper to the emergency operator. Give their location and let the police take it from there.

Yet, she made no move to try. It wasn’t just fear he’d wake up and catch her. As much as she hated to admit it, she was starting to see this mess from his perspective, too.

If he was innocent—a strong possibility in her mind—then she might be condemning him to prison—or worse. If he were simply running to get away, Billings was the last place he’d head for. From frontier days to the present, Montana fugitives chose the Canadian Rockies to the north as their favorite refuge from the law.

Even as all this looped through her mind, a blue-and-yellow sedan eased by her in the passing lane—a Montana state trooper.

Her pulse leapt into her throat. The cop wasn’t pulling her over, just passing on his way to someplace else.

Flick the bright lights on and off a few times, she thought. That cop will pull you right over.

And then what? Loudon was armed and desperate—this time he might not aim high.

Wracked by indecision, she did nothing as the red-glowing taillights receded ahead.

She assumed Loudon was sound asleep. So hearing his voice made her nearly crawl out of her skin.

“Missed your chance,” he told her in a sleepy voice. “S’matter, you soft on crime?”

“Maybe I don’t want to get caught in the middle of one of your shootouts.”

“Oh. Here I thought maybe it was my sexy eyes.”

Heat came into her face. “I could floor it and still catch that cop.”

“You’re the driver.”

Despite his exhaustion, she detected a smug, mocking tone to his voice. He had called her bluff. It wasn’t bad enough that he had kidnapped her—now he had to toy with her to amuse himself.

“Since you’re awake, kindly remove your head from my shoulder.”

He complied, slumping against the passenger’s window.

“Do you know how nice you smell?” he murmured sleepily. “Your perfume is Gardenia Passion, right?”

He was right, but she said nothing. He didn’t even wait for a reply, going back to sleep immediately.

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