She got the impression he had been standing in the doorway for some time studying her.

His dark hair was wet, and water beaded on the dark curls of his chest hair that formed a V, disappearing into the towel wrapped around his slim hips.

“I’m sorry, the door was open,” she said quickly.

He was as big a man as she’d first thought, a few inches over six feet and broad at the shoulders. Solid looking, she thought. Not like a man who worked out. More like a man who worked.

He settled those dark eyes on her. Everything about him was dark.

“You’re new here,” Cade Jackson said, as if roping in his irritation. “You don’t know me, so I’m going to cut you some slack. Get out. I don’t know what your game is, Tex, but I’m not playing.”

Available in November 2009 from Mills & Boon® Intrigue

Christmas Crime in Colorado by Cassie Miles & Nick of Time by Elle James

Christmas Awakening by Ann Voss Peterson & Beast of Darkness by Lisa Renee Jones

Safety in Numbers by Carla Cassidy & Christmas Confessions by Kathleen Long

Classified Christmas by BJ Daniels

Guardian’s Keep by Lori Devoti

Mission: Christmas by Lindsay McKenna & Susan Grant

BJ Daniels’s life dream was to write books. After a career as an award-winning newspaper journalist, she sold thirty-seven short stories before she finally wrote her first book. Since then she has won numerous awards, including a career achievement award for romantic suspense.

BJ lives in Montana with her husband, Parker, two springer spaniels, Spot and Jem, and an ageing, temperamental tomcat named Jeff. When she isn’t writing, she snowboards, camps, boats and plays tennis.

To contact BJ, write to her at PO Box 1173, Malta, MT 59538, USA, e-mail her at bjdanielsmystery@hotmail. com or check out her website at www.bjdaniels.com.

CLASSIFIED CHRISTMAS

BY

BJ DANIELS

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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This one is for Jody Robinson, for her encouragement and support and friendship.

Chapter One

This year was different. Cade Jackson couldn’t swear why exactly, just that he wasn’t anticipating the anniversary of his wife’s death with as much dread.

Maybe time did heal. Not that he didn’t miss his wife. Or think of her. Especially with the anniversary of Grace’s death only days away. He just didn’t hurt as much when he thought of her. Nor after six years did he think of her as often.

There was something sad about that, he thought, as he watched the other ropers from the top rung of the corral. The thunder of hooves raised a cloud of dust that moved slowly across the enclosed arena.

Outside, snow continued to fall, promising a white Christmas. He breathed in the comforting scent of leather and horses, both as natural to him as the lay of the land beyond the arena walls.

Snow-covered open prairie ran to the deep cut of the Missouri River as it wound its way through Montana, the dark outline of the Little Rockies that broke the horizon.

He felt as if he’d come of out of a coma. Everything looked and smelled and felt new and different. He’d missed a lot of holidays with his family, lost in that dark place that his grief had taken him. But this year he felt as if he might make it through the holidays without having to hide out at his cabin or in his ice-fishing shack until Christmas was over.

Cade felt an odd prickling just under his skin and looked toward the window. Snow fell in huge flakes that floated down blanketing the earth with both cold and silence. He frowned at the sudden sense of apprehension he’d felt just moments before. What had that been about?

He shook it off. He wasn’t going to let the old ghosts get to him. He was finally feeling as if he might make it.

ANDI BLAKE discovered a manila envelope on her desk when she got back to the newspaper from lunch. She’d spent her first morning at the Milk River Examiner cleaning off her predecessor’s desk, only a little unnerved by the fact that he’d been murdered, thus the opening.

Glen Whitaker hadn’t been neat. After boxing up all of his notes, she’d cleaned the desk, scrubbing away months if not years of grime.

She gave the envelope only a sideways glance as she slipped off her jacket and hung it over the back of her chair.

The envelope was addressed to her and had a Whitehorse postmark. Nothing unusual about that except for the fact that it was addressed to Andi West, the name she’d gone by as a television newscaster in Fort Worth, Texas.

She felt a shiver of trepidation. No one here knew her as Andi let alone Andi West. Her full name was Miranda West Blake. She had been named after her father, Weston Blake. He was the one who’d nicknamed her Andi.

To put Fort Worth and the past far behind her when she’d applied for this job though, she’d used Miranda Blake and now wrote as M. W. Blake.

She’d thought by moving to Whitehorse, Montana, and using her real name that she would be able to escape from the terror that had run her out of Texas. Had it followed her?

Her heart pounded. All her old fears came back in a wave of nausea. Was it possible there was nowhere she could get away from it?

Fingers trembling, she picked up the envelope, turning it in her fingers. The contents felt light. And the package didn’t sound like it was ticking. Something slid inside making her jump.

Her fear, though, gave way to anger. She was sick of being scared. She’d given up everything she loved because of some psycho. If he’d found her…

Taking out her letter opener, she sliced through one end of the envelope and carefully dumped the contents onto her desk.

She’d gotten enough of these at the television station that she knew what to expect.

A white cassette tape thudded to the desktop an instant before a piece of newspaper fluttered down beside it, surprising her.

She frowned and picked up the tape. It was file-card size. There was nothing written on it. She glanced at the CD player on her desk and wondered where she might find a cassette player that played this size tape.

Not that she would play it. She’d learned it was better not to listen to the calls although she’d read most of the letters before handing them over to the police. Except the police hadn’t been able to find her stalker let alone stop him or the threatening letters and calls.

Putting down the tape, she turned her attention to the other item from the envelope. As she unfolded the newsprint, she saw that it was a clipping of a local newspaper brief about a woman named Grace Jackson who’d died in a one-car rollover south of town.

She felt a wave of relief. Apparently someone thought the story warranted a follow-up. That’s all this was.

True it was odd because the accident had happened six years ago Christmas Eve.

But at least it wasn’t connected to Texas. Or her. She tried to relax.

Still the fact that it had been sent to Andi West bothered her. Who besides the newspaper publisher, Mark Sanders, knew her television name?

Just then Mark Sanders came in the door.

She held up the clipping and he took it from her as he walked by her desk, glanced at the story and handed the clipping back saying, “Yeah, that was real sad. They hadn’t been married long.” He started to walk off.

“Do you want me to do a follow-up?” she asked his retreating back.

He stopped to glance over his shoulder and frowned. “Can’t see any reason. It’s been what—”

“Six years,” she said.

“Right. No reason to bring it back up,” Sanders said.

“Someone sent it to me.”

“Just file it. You’re covering the Parade of Lights tonight, right? It’s a pretty big deal in Whitehorse. You sure you don’t mind shooting it, too?”

“No problem.” She didn’t bring up the name thing. It was possible, she realized, that Mark Sanders had told someone who she was thinking no one in Whitehorse, Montana, would care let alone cause her any trouble.

“I’ve got it covered,” she assured him, imagining what her best friend back at the television station in Fort Worth would say if he knew she was covering parades for a small-town weekly newspaper, taking the photographs as well as writing the stories.

She hadn’t talked to Bradley since she’d left Texas. Maybe she’d call him. She was sure he was probably worried about her since he’d tried to talk her out of coming up here. She missed him and hadn’t wanted to call until things were going better. She didn’t want to hear him say I-told-you-so. Even though he was right. She feared this move had been a huge mistake.

But she had some time to kill before the Parade of Lights and she really needed her friend.

“Hello?”

Just the sound of Bradley’s voice brought tears to her eyes.

“Hello?” The apprehension she heard in his voice surprised and worried her.

“It’s me,” she said quickly. “Are you all right?”

“Hey.” Instantly he sounded like his old self again. “I’m fine. I just thought it was someone else calling. I’ve been getting some obscene telephone calls. I might enjoy them if I was straight,” he said with a laugh. “I am so glad you called. I have been worried to death about you. I was beginning to think you’d forgotten about me.”

“No chance of that,” she said, tucking her feet up under her. It was almost like old times talking with him over a delivery pizza and old movies.

“So how bad is it?” he asked.

“It’s…interesting.”

“I told you not to take that job. You must be bored to tears. You haven’t been banished, you know. You can get on the next plane and be back in Texas in a matter of hours. I’ll pick you up at the airport.”

She laughed. It was tempting.

“So how horrible is it in the wild, wild West?” he asked. “You can tell me.”

“It’s freezing cold for starters.”

“I know. I confess I’ve been watching the weather. I knew you were going to freeze your cute little behind off.” He laughed. “Seriously, how are you?”

“Homesick for you, for warm weather, for Mexican food.” She smiled. “There isn’t any in Whitehorse.”

“Imagine that,” he said with a smile in his voice.

“So how are things at the station?”

“It’s been bloody hell. There was practically a revolt over your job even though everyone knew the position was only temporary.”

Her boss had promised to hold her job for six months.

“So who got it? Anyone I know?”

Bradley let out a dramatic sigh and she knew.

“Rachel,” she said. Rachel was as close a female friend as she’d had at the station. “I’m happy for her.”

“Oh, please,” Bradley said. “You can be honest. It’s me, remember?”

Andi laughed. It felt good. “You’re just jealous because she won’t let you try on her shoes.”

“I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.” She hated to ask, but she had to. “Has the station received any more threats addressed to me?”

That telltale beat of silence, then, “I made sure they were turned over to the police.”

Hearing this surprised her. She’d thought the threats would stop once she wasn’t on the air anymore.

“I’ll bug the cops until they find this freak and lock him up so you can come home.”

She smiled through her tears. “You’re a good friend.” She hung up, glad she’d called him. She felt better about her decision to come to Montana. If the television station was still getting threatening letters for her, she was much better off being as far away from Fort Worth as she could get.

As she started to file away the news article about the woman who’d died in the single-car accident, she stopped to read it through again, still curious why anyone would have sent it to her.

The deceased woman, Grace Jackson, had apparently been driving at a high rate of speed when she’d lost control of her car south of town. The car had rolled numerous times before landing in a ravine where it had caught fire.

As she had the first time she’d read it, Andi shuddered at the thought of the poor woman being trapped in the vehicle and burning to death. There were so few vehicles on the roads up here and miles between ranches let alone towns. Even if the car hadn’t burned, the woman probably would have died before someone had come along.

According to the article, Grace Jackson had been married to a Cade Jackson. Wasn’t the sheriff’s name Jackson? Carter Jackson, as she recalled from reading back papers to familiarize herself with the town.

She wondered if Cade and Carter were related. Pretty good chance given their names. The sheriff’s name had come up quite a lot in the news—including the murder of the reporter who’d had this desk, Glen Whitaker.

She looked again at the manila envelope the newspaper clipping and tape had come in, checking to make sure there wasn’t a note that she’d missed. Nothing. The envelope had been mailed in Whitehorse so at least it was from someone local.

She filed the story, still a little anxious, though, that at least one person in town knew her other name.

As she pocketed the cassette tape, she wondered where she could find a tape player.

THE PARADE of Lights definitely was an event in Whitehorse, Montana. Andi stood on a curb with the rest of the county that had turned out, everyone bundled up for the cold, snowy December night, as one homemade float after another cruised by.

The air was filled with excitement, the stores along the main street open and lit brightly for the event. The smell of Christmas trees, hot cider and Native American fry bread wafted in the chilly air.

The streets were packed with not only townspeople, but also apparently ranchers and their families had come in from miles around for the event.

Andi shot a dozen photographs of the floats, surprised at how many there were given the temperature and how much work had gone into some of them.

She liked the small-town feel, which surprised her. It felt like an extended family as she heard people visiting and calling greetings from the floats.

Just as she was finishing up, she heard someone call out, “Cade!”

She looked up to see an attractive woman waving from one of the floats. Andi followed the woman’s gaze to a man leaning against the building yards to her right. She could see only his profile, his face in shadow under the brim of his Western hat, but he was tall and all cowboy. He wore boots, jeans, a sheepskin coat and a Stetson, the brim pulled low, dark hair curling out from under the hat at his nape.

From the way he stood, back in the shadows, she got the impression he had hoped to go unnoticed.

Cade Jackson? The husband of the deceased woman from the newspaper clipping?

Andi lifted the camera and impulsively snapped his photograph. As she pulled the camera down, he disappeared into the crowd.

Cold and tired, she returned to the newspaper office just down the block, anxious to get her photographs into the computer. Warmer, she decided to go ahead and write up her story even though it was late.

She knew she was just avoiding the small apartment she’d rented on the other side of town. It wasn’t far from the newspaper given that Whitehorse was only ten blocks square. She usually drove to work out of habit more than necessity, although she didn’t relish walking through all the snow.

The apartment was small and impersonal to the point of being depressing. In time she would make it hers, but right now she preferred the newspaper office to home.

After she put in the photographs and wrote cutlines for each, she sat down at the computer to write an accompanying article.

Her mind wandered, though, and she found herself calling up the photograph of the cowboy she’d seen on the main street tonight, the one the woman had called Cade. How many Cades could there be in Whitehorse?

The publisher had said Cade Jackson and his wife, Grace, had only been married a short period of time before her death. That meant there should be a wedding announcement in the file, she thought, unable to shake her curiosity as to why someone had sent the cassette and clipping to her.

Five minutes later, she found the wedding announcement and photo. The two had married November 14—just weeks before her death.

Andi studied the photograph of the groom, comparing it to the one she’d taken of the cowboy she’d seen on the street tonight. Cade Jackson. The two were one and the same.

The cassette was still in her pocket. Now more than ever she was anxious to find a player and see what was on the tape.

Intent on the cowboy, Andi finally looked at the wedding photo of the bride, Grace Browning Jackson. Her mouth went dry, her heart a hammer in her ears.

She knew this woman.

Except her name hadn’t been Grace Browning. Not even close.

Chapter Two

Andi Blake stared at the photograph, telling herself she had to be mistaken. But she knew she wasn’t.

It was Starr, she’d stake her life on it. Starr Calhoun wasn’t someone she could have forgotten even if the first time Andi laid eyes on her wasn’t indelibly branded on her memory. They’d both been only young girls. Andi remembered only too well the look they’d shared before all hell broke loose.

And it wasn’t as if Andi hadn’t seen Starr Calhoun since, she thought with a chill.

It made sense, Starr masquerading as this Grace Browning woman and marrying a local yokel. Starr Calhoun had been hiding out here, using marriage as a cover, waiting. Waiting for what, though?

Her brother Lubbock! He’d been arrested only an hour away from Whitehorse six years ago. She felt a chill as she realized she was meant to come here. As if it had always been her destiny. As if Starr Calhoun had called her from the grave.

She shivered and glanced toward the front window of the newspaper office along the main street, suddenly feeling more than a little paranoid.

A few shoppers straggled past. The Christmas lights still glowed in the park across the street by the train tracks. Next to the old depot, a half dozen passengers waited by their suitcases. Whitehorse’s depot had closed years ago, but a passenger train still came through. Passengers had to call for tickets and wait outside until the train arrived.

Andi got up and closed the front blinds, doublechecking the front door to make sure she’d locked it.

It didn’t take her long to find a more recent photograph of Starr Calhoun on the FBI’s most wanted list. She printed the photo, standing over the printer as it came out. The copy wasn’t great. But then the original had been taken from a bank surveillance camera.

That had been six years ago August. Wearing masks and carrying sawed-off shotguns, a man and woman had robbed a series of banks across Texas amassing an estimated three million dollars over a two-week period.

During what turned out to be their last robbery, there had been an altercation and the mask Starr Calhoun had been wearing was pulled off by a teller exposing her face to the surveillance camera.

A warrant had been issued for Starr Calhoun, but she and her accomplice had gotten away and had never been heard from again. Nor had the money been recovered.

The accomplice was believed to be her brother Houston Calhoun, a known criminal who’d done time for bank robbery.

The Calhoun family shared more than their distinctive pale blue eyes and curly auburn hair. Nor was the robbery six years ago the first time Starr Calhoun had been caught on a bank surveillance video camera.

She was first filmed at the age of three when her infamous parents Hodge and Eden Calhoun hit a bank in Orange, Texas, with all six children in tow ranging in age from fifteen to three.

Hodge and Eden had eventually been caught, their children put into foster care and scattered to the wind.

Andi made a note to find out the latest on the rest of the Calhouns. At least she had a good idea where Starr had disappeared to, she thought, studying the wedding photograph.

She couldn’t help the small thrill she felt. Her instincts had been right. As a reporter, she’d made a point of keeping track of the infamous Calhoun family. Whenever a news story from any part of the country mentioned one of the Calhouns, her computer flagged the story for her.

That’s how she’d seen the article about Starr Calhoun being ID’d in the bank surveillance tape six years ago. Also the lesser story about her older brother Lubbock Calhoun being arrested not long after that.

She’d forgotten about where Lubbock had been arrested, though. It wasn’t until she’d been looking for a job away from Fort Worth that her job search had popped up a newspaper reporter position in Whitehorse, Montana, on her computer and triggered the memory of Lubbock’s arrest.

Too excited to wait until she saw him the next day, she had called her friend Bradley. Bradley Harris worked in fact-checking at the news station. The two had become good friends almost at once. He loved Tex-Mex food and old movies and was safe because he was gay and Andi didn’t date men she worked with. Actually she didn’t date at all—too busy with her career, she told herself.

“Why Montana? It sounds like a one-horse town,” Bradley had joked when she’d told him about the job, leaving out the part about Lubbock being arrested near there. “Surely there is somewhere closer you could disappear to. Wait a minute.” He knew her too well. “How close is this town to where Lubbock Calhoun was arrested?”

Bradley was one of the few people who knew about her interest—or obsession as he called it—in the Calhoun crime family. She’d thought he wouldn’t make the connection.

Reluctantly she’d showed Bradley on a Montana map on her computer. Lubbock Calhoun had been arrested for an outstanding warrant in a convenience store in Glasgow, Montana, six years ago—an hour away from Whitehorse.

“I think it’s a sign I should check into this job,” she said and waited for Bradley to talk her out of it.

And Bradley had tried, pointing out that it had been six years, Lubbock was probably just passing through Montana, and “What could you possibly learn after all this time? Not to mention, you’ll be stuck in One Horse.”

“Whitehorse,” she’d corrected, the job having taken on more appeal with the possible Lubbock Calhoun connection.

“I’m worried about you and this thing with the Calhouns,” he’d said. She suspected he knew why they held such interest for her because he was the best researcher she’d ever known. But he never let on.

He’d finally given up trying to stop her, knowing how desperately she needed to get out of Fort Worth. And how she couldn’t turn down even a remote chance to learn more about the Calhouns.

Coincidence? Starr coming to Montana, marrying a cowboy from Whitehorse and Lubbock being arrested just miles away? No way. Andi felt her excitement building. There was a story here, the kind of story that had propelled Andi’s rise in broadcast news. That and her instincts when it came to investigative reporting.

And while she might have had to give up television news for a while, a story like this would definitely assist in her return when the time came.

Eagerly she planned how to proceed. She had to get the whole story and that meant hearing Cade Jackson’s side of it, she thought as she looked up his address in the phone book.

As she took it down, she couldn’t help but wonder. Did Cade Jackson know who he’d married? Or was he in for the surprise of his life?

CADE JACKSON walked home from the parade through the underpass beneath the tracks as the passenger train pulled in.

The night was cold and dark, the streets snowpacked and icy. He breathed in the air. It felt moist, the clouds low, another snowstorm expected to come in by tomorrow morning.

A white Christmas. He could hear carols coming from one of the cars’ radios as it passed. He quickened his step, anxious to get back to his apartment behind the bait shop. Going to the parade had been a mistake. Now he felt antsy. He thought about driving out to his cabin on Nelson Reservoir, but it was late and he was tired.

The parade had brought back memories of Grace and the night they’d come to the parade together, cuddled close as music played on a float with a Western band. She’d looked over at him, her eyes bright with excitement, her cheeks flushed from the cold. And he’d kissed her.

He could still remember the way she’d tasted. Sweet and just a little pepperminty from the candy cane she’d eaten. He recalled the way she felt in his arms and how happy he’d been. Newlyweds. They’d been newlyweds and he’d thought they had years together ahead of them.

That was the night they talked about having children, he realized as he finally reached the bait shop. He started around back to his apartment in the rear when he saw that someone had left a note on the shop’s front door.

He stepped over to pluck it free before going around to the back. While he locked the bait shop door, like most everyone in Whitehorse, he left his apartment door open.

Stepping inside, he flipped on a light glad to be distracted from his thoughts as he opened the note. Something fluttered to the floor, but he was busy looking at the note, surprised he didn’t recognize the handwriting. He knew everyone in Whitehorse, having grown up in the area. He and his brother, Carter, had been raised down by Old Town Whitehorse to the south, but they’d both gone to high school here.

The town of Whitehorse had sprung up to the south closer to the Missouri River breaks, but when the railroad had come through in the 1800s, the town had moved north, taking the name with it.

The note read: “Mr. Jackson, I need to talk to you, M. W. Blake.” There was a local phone number at the bottom. And four little words that ruined his night. “It’s about your wife.”

The word “wife” jumped out at him. He glanced down at the floor and saw the business card at his feet. Bending, he stooped to pick it up. This he recognized. The logo was from the Milk River Examiner, the local weekly newspaper.

Under it was the name: M. W. Blake

Under that was the word: Reporter

He crumpled both the note and the business card in his fist. He didn’t have any idea who M. W. Blake was and he didn’t care to know. The last thing he planned to do was talk to a reporter about Grace.

ON THE WAY HOME after leaving a note for Cade Jackson at his bait shop, Andi realized she couldn’t wait until morning to find out what was on this cassette tape. She called the publisher and asked if anyone had a tape player that took regular-size cassette tapes.

His daughter just happened to have an old one she no longer used, he said. If she stopped by, she was welcome to borrow it. He also had a couple of tapes she could use if she needed to tape something.

Mark Sanders had bent over backward since she’d applied for the job. She’d told him she needed a change of pace. He, in turn, had needed a reporter after Glen Whitaker had been murdered. Not a lot of reporters wanted to come to Whitehorse, especially after they found out what it paid.

Sanders had been worried that Andi had too much experience and wouldn’t be staying long.

“Whitehorse is nothing like Fort Worth,” he’d said with a laugh. “Maybe you’d better come up here and have a look-see before you take my offer.” He had already apologized for how little he could pay her.

She’d had to convince him that Whitehorse was exactly what she was looking for. She didn’t tell him her real reason. Only her friend Bradley knew that.

Back at her apartment, Andi took the cassette tape from her pocket and popped it into one side of the player. Hitting Play, she turned up the volume and went into the kitchen to pour herself a glass of wine.

At first all she heard was static. She was beginning to think that the tape was blank as she took the wine bottle from the fridge.

But as she reached for a glass, she heard a woman’s voice on the tape and froze.

Like a sleepwalker, she moved into the living room, the wine bottle in her hand as the tape continued.

She didn’t recognize the voice—she’d never heard Starr Calhoun speak. Nor did the woman have much of a Texas accent. No, it was what the woman was saying that captured all of Andi’s attention and convinced her that the voice was that of Starr Calhoun.

On the tape, the woman talked about robbing a series of banks. After a moment, a male voice could be heard on the tape. Her accomplice.

The tape went to static but Andi didn’t move. Couldn’t. She stood too shocked to do anything but stare at the tape player.

Who had sent this to her?

And why?

And where had it been the last six years?

She told herself not to look a gift horse in the mouth. Why not just revel in her good luck at having a story like this dropped into her lap?

But she knew that hadn’t been the case. It was no coincidence someone had sent her this. Just as it was no coincidence she was here. Was it possible that someone had sent her the job notice, counting on her need to escape Fort Worth and her interest in the Calhouns? With Lubbock’s arrest just miles from here the person who’d sent her the job notice knew she wouldn’t be able to resist.

Just as she wouldn’t be able to resist breaking this story once she had all the facts.

She stepped to the player, her fingers trembling as she rewound the tape and listened to it again before she went to the kitchen and poured herself a healthy glass of wine. She was shaking now, the realization of what she had in her possession starting to sink in along with the apprehension.

She needed to talk to her friend Bradley. He’d been her sounding board through the whole secret-admirer-turned-stalker trauma in Texas. She dialed his number, needing him to be home.

“So how’s the weekly newspaper business,” Bradley said after they’d exchanged pleasantries about the weather in Montana versus Texas and he’d told her the TV-station gossip.

She hesitated but only for a moment before she told him about the story she’d stumbled across. Bradley, being Bradley and a journalist at heart, was ecstatic.

“What an incredible story,” he cried. “So you were right about there being something to Lubbock Calhoun’s arrest up there. Well, that’s why you’re the hotshot news celebrity and I’m the lowly researcher,” he joked. “And to have this story dropped in your lap…” He suddenly turned serious. “Oh, sweetie, I almost forgot. I saw on the news that Lubbock Calhoun was released from prison three weeks ago and has already broken his parole.”

Her heart leaped to her throat. Lubbock was on the loose?

“You don’t think he’s the one who sent you the information, do you?” Bradley asked.

“Why would he?” she asked, although she already knew.

“Isn’t it obvious? He figures a hotshot reporter like you will find the money,” Bradley said.

She bristled at the hotshot reporter comment. “I work for a weekly newspaper.”

“Now you do. Stop being so modest. You are a great reporter. Lubbock must have seen you on TV during one of your stories that made national news,” Bradley said. “Sweetie, I don’t like this. I think you should hightail it back to Texas. If Lubbock Calhoun’s feeding you this information, then it’s too dangerous. The man is a hardened criminal.”

“You know I can’t come back to Texas.”

“But can you stay there? What if I’m right and he’s hoping you find the money for him?”

“It would make quite the story,” she said, only half joking.

“Sweetie, but what if you don’t find the money?”

“For all I know Starr faked her death and has already spent all the money,” Andi said and took a drink of her wine, unnerved by the news about Lubbock. “Don’t forget Houston. He could have already blown the money. No one has seen him since he and Starr pulled off that last robbery six years ago.”

“If Houston was her accomplice,” Bradley pointed out. “We know it wasn’t Lubbock. He didn’t resemble the man in the bank surveillance photos. Plus he was arrested on an old warrant so he wasn’t even a suspect in the robberies apparently.”

Andi had been thinking about the millions of stolen dollars. “You can bet one of the Calhouns has already spent that robbery money.”

“If that were the case, wouldn’t Lubbock Calhoun know that—if he’s the one who sent you the information?” Bradley asked.

He made a good point.

“Maybe he doesn’t know what happened to the money—or Starr or Houston. Maybe he’s winging it just like me,” she said.

“Maybe. Or maybe Starr hid the money, planning to take off with her new identity, but hadn’t planned on losing control of her car and dying.”

“That’s another possibility,” she admitted. “That’s the problem. There are too many possibilities.”

“Oh, wait,” Bradley said, “but if Starr had hidden the money, surely her husband would have found it by now. Unless he did find it!”

“Is there some way to find out if any of the stolen money ever turned up?” she asked.

“The robberies were during the day, right? Banks have what they call ‘bait’ money. It’s traceable. So if any of it has surfaced…I’ll see what I can find out and get back to you,” he said, sounding as excited as she felt about the story.

She gave him her new cell phone number and they both promised to keep in touch.

After she hung up, she shot a glance at her front window as a car drove slowly by. Lubbock wasn’t just out of prison, he’d already broken parole.

Quickly she stepped to the window and closed the curtains, telling herself that the smartest thing she could do was to take everything she knew to the local sheriff, Carter Jackson, Cade Jackson’s brother.

But then the story would break prematurely. A story that belonged to her. And not the whole story. Not to mention that she might never find out who was sending her the information or what they wanted.

She checked to make sure her door was locked before she rewound the tape and listened to it again, her mind racing. She took one of the blank tapes Mark Sanders had given her and put it in the second cassette deck and made a copy of the original.

Wouldn’t anyone who wanted the story to come out have gone to the sheriff? Or the FBI? Or if not that, a major television station?

Whoever had given her the newspaper clipping and the tape wasn’t after a story—or justice. No, they wanted something else. Bradley had to be right. They wanted the money.

She took the tape out of the player and stared down at it. The big question was what was she going to do with this?

Chapter Three

The Jackson Bait Shop was on the edge of town. The sign was weathered, the building small. As Andi got out of her car the next morning, she wondered how Cade Jackson made a living in such a remote place selling bait.

Or was he living off the three million dollars Starr had stolen?

Andi had gone into the newspaper early, gathering everything she could find on Cade Jackson. There hadn’t been much. A local cowboy, he’d grown up on a ranch south of here near what was called Old Town Whitehorse.

Since then he’d won some horse-roping events and caught a few big fish that had made the newspaper.

His only claim to fame just might turn out to be marrying Starr Calhoun, she thought as she saw that the Closed sign was still up in the bait shop window. There were no store hours posted. Did anyone even fish this time of year?

She knocked at the door and waited on the small landing out front, hugging herself, trying to keep warm. She guessed he was already up since the Great Falls Tribune newspaper box next to the door was empty. It had snowed again last night, coating the entire town with a couple of inches. The snow glittered so bright it was blinding. But it was the breeze that cut through her, chilling her to the bone. She’d had no idea it would be this cold up here.

As a gust of wind whirled snow around her, she instinctively reached for the doorknob. To her surprise, it turned easily in her hand, the door falling open.

She was hit with a blast of warm air. She leaned into it, stepping into the room and closing the door behind her as she tried to shake off her earlier chill.

Apparently Cade Jackson sold more than bait. The room was divided into four long aisles by three high shelves filled with lures and jigs, rods and reels, paddles and oars, nets and an array of boat parts and sporting equipment.

Cade Jackson was nowhere in sight but she thought she heard water running somewhere in the back.

She moved through the shop toward the sound. It was warm in here and she was in no hurry to go back outside into the cold.

But she reminded herself: for all she knew this man had known about the robbery, might even have gotten rid of his wife to keep all the money for himself.

But if he had the three million dollars or even some of it, he didn’t appear to be enjoying it much, she thought as she saw his living quarters.

The shop opened onto a small apartment. The lack of stuff made her wonder if anyone could live this simply. Certainly not Starr Calhoun.

For a moment Andi considered what she was doing. This felt all wrong. Not to mention she couldn’t guess what Cade Jackson’s reaction was going to be to not only her being here, but also what she had to show him.

What if she was wrong?

She wasn’t and she knew it.

But she still felt apprehensive. She had no idea what this man was like. The fact that Starr Calhoun had married him was a clue, though. Andi was wondering if she’d made a mistake coming here alone.

She was no fool, though. In her large shoulder bag, along with a copy of the cassette she’d made and the boom box, she had a can of pepper spray and her cell phone.

“Mr. Jackson?” she called from the doorway into the apartment. No answer.

She called his name again. The sound of running water stopped. “Hello!” she called out. “Hello?” She stopped to look at a bulletin board filled with photographs of fish being held by men, women and children. Some of the fish were as huge as the grins on the many faces.

When she looked up, she was startled to find the apartment doorway filled with a dark silhouette. She got the impression Cade Jackson had been standing in the doorway for some time studying her.

To make things even more awkward, his dark hair was wet and droplets of water beaded on his lashes as well as on the dark curls of his chest hair that formed a V to disappear into the towel wrapped around his slim hips.

“I’m sorry, the door was open,” she said quickly.

He smiled either at the fact that he had her flustered or because of her accent. “The shop isn’t open yet, but then again you don’t look like a fisherman,” he said eyeing her. “Nor do you sound local.”

“No, I’m neither,” she said, getting her composure back. He was even more handsome up close and personal.

He cocked a dark brow at her.

“I’m Miranda Blake. I left my business card and a note on your door last night? But I can wait while you dress.”

He’d looked friendly before. He didn’t now. “M. W. Blake, the new reporter over at the Examiner?” He was shaking his head and moving toward her, clearly planning to show her out. “I don’t talk to reporters.”

“You’ll want to talk to me,” she said standing her ground as she put her hand on her shoulder bag, easing the top open so she could get to her pepper spray.

He stopped in front of her and she caught a whiff of his soap. Yum. He stood a good head taller. She had to tilt her face up to look into his eyes. Eyes so dark they appeared black. Right now they were filled with impatience and irritation.

“I’m afraid you’re mistaken about that, Tex.”

“I have some information about your wife,” she said, determined not to let him intimidate her but it was difficult. The look in his eyes alone would frighten someone much larger than herself. She clutched the pepper spray can in her purse.

He was as big a man as she’d first thought, a few inches over six feet and broad at the shoulders. Solid looking, she thought. Not like a man who worked out. More like a man who worked. That surprised her given that selling bait and tackle couldn’t be all that strenuous.

He settled those dark eyes on her. Everything about him was dark. She tried to imagine someone like Starr Calhoun with this man. Starr with her wild, curly auburn hair and those pale blue eyes, as fair as this man was dark.

“You’re new here,” Cade Jackson said as if roping in his irritation. “You don’t know me. So I’m going to cut you some slack. I don’t want another story about my wife’s death. It’s Christmas and I don’t need any more reminders that she’s gone, all right?”

“I think you’d better look at this,” she said, slipping her hand from the pepper spray can to the copy of the photo taken from the bank’s surveillance camera. It had gone out to all news media six years ago, but she doubted it had made it as far as Whitehorse, Montana.

Cade didn’t take the photo she held out. He stood with his hands on his hips, dripping on the wood floor of the bait shop, the white towel barely wrapped around his hips showing way too much skin.

“Please. Just take a look and then I promise to leave,” she said.

With obvious reluctance he took the copy of the photograph. She watched his expressive dark eyes. Recognition then confusion flashed in them. “What the hell is this?”

“It’s your wife. Only her name wasn’t Grace Browning. It was Starr Calhoun. That photo was taken by a surveillance camera in the bank she robbed six years ago—not long before she showed up here in Whitehorse.”

“Get out,” he said. “I don’t know what your game is, Tex, but I’m not playing.”

“Neither am I,” she said as he reached for her arm. “Starr Calhoun was one of the infamous bank-robbing Calhouns from Texas,” she said, dodging his grasp, her hand again clutching the can of pepper spray in her purse. “The three million dollars she and her male accomplice stole was never recovered.”

“If you don’t get out of here right now, you’re going to be sorry,” he said through gritted teeth. “What the hell do you keep reaching in that purse for?” He grabbed her arm.

As he jerked her hand out of the shoulder bag, her finger hit the trigger on the pepper spray.

ON THE LAPTOP propped up in her kitchen, Arlene Evans studied the latest applicant on her Meet-A-Mate site with pride as she whipped up a batch of pancakes.

Since she’d started her rural online dating service she’d had a few good-looking men sign up but none who could match Jud Corbett, a former stuntman and actor, who liked long walks in the rain, horseback riding, dancing in the moonlight and was interested in finding a nice cowgirl to ride off into the sunset with.

Arlene had proven she was a great matchmaker when she’d gotten the Whitehorse deputy sheriff together with that Cavanaugh girl.

But that was nothing compared to who she had picked out for the handsome Jud Corbett.

Her very own daughter Charlotte. True, Charlotte wasn’t a cowgirl, so to speak, but she could ride a horse. And Jud Corbett was just what her daughter needed right now.

Charlotte had seemed a little down lately. But a man like Jud Corbett could bring her out of it quick!

The two would make beautiful children together, Arlene thought with longing as she broke a couple of eggs into the batter and stirred as she admired Jud Corbett’s good looks. If she were twenty years younger…

“Are the pancakes about ready?” her son Bo demanded. At twenty-one, Bo had gotten his looks and personality from his father, damn Floyd Evans to hell.

Floyd had up and left them a few months ago. The divorce papers were somewhere on the overflowing coffee table. The bastard had left her with their three children to finish raising.

Not that the three weren’t pretty much raised since the oldest, Violet, was in her thirties, unmarried and no longer under the roof, but that was another story. Bo was of legal age, although that didn’t seem to mean anything other than he drank beer in front of her now. Charlotte had just celebrated her eighteenth birthday, eating most of the cake all by herself before going out with her friends and getting high.

The phone rang before Arlene could come up with a proper retort for her son. It rang another time but neither of her offspring seemed to hear it.

“Let me get that, why don’t you?” Arlene said doubting they got her sarcasm, either, since neither seemed to hear anything over the blaring television.

“Mrs. Evans?” a woman said on the other end of the line.

Arlene didn’t correct her. “I’m not buying anything,” she snapped and started to hang up the phone.

“I’m calling about your daughter Violet.”

Arlene put the receiver back to her ear. “Yes?” she asked suspiciously. Calls about Violet were never good.

“My name is Myrna Lynch, I’m the media coordinator here at the state hospital. Your daughter Violet would like you all to come up for Family Day.”

“Family Day?” Arlene Evans echoed into the phone. “You can’t be talking about my daughter. Violet is completely out of it and the last time I came up there to see her you guys wouldn’t even let me in.”

Arlene was still mad about that. As if she enjoyed driving clear up to the state mental hospital to be turned away.

“No one told you?” asked the woman whose name Arlene couldn’t remember. “Your daughter Violet has made remarkable progress. She’s no longer in a catatonic state.”

“What are you saying? She’s not nuts anymore?” How was that possible? “Did she tell you what she did to end up there?”

“Mental illness is a medical disorder that is treatable, Mrs. Evans. Your daughter is getting care that will let her be a responsible member of society again,” the woman said, clearly upset at Arlene’s use of the word “nuts.” “In order to do that, she needs to work through any issues she has with her family. So can I tell the doctor you and your family will be here Saturday?”

“Wait a minute. Issues? She tried to kill me!” Arlene bellowed.

“Your daughter doesn’t recall any of that, Mrs. Evans.”

Arlene just bet she didn’t.

“Violet needs the support of her family. I’m sure you want to do what is best for her.”

Arlene bristled at the woman’s tone. “I’ve always supported Violet. You have no idea what I have done for that girl and what did I get for it? Why she—”

“Mrs. Evans, if you can’t attend family day Saturday then—”

“I’ll be there,” she said with a sigh.

“Violet has asked that her brother and sister also attend,” the woman said.

Arlene glanced over at her daughter Charlotte curled up on the couch chewing on the end of her long blond hair. Bo was slouched in the recliner, a jumbo bag of corn chips open on his lap and an open can of beer at his elbow, in his own catatonic state as he stared at some reality show on the television where a woman was shrieking at one of the other contestants.

“Turn down the damned TV,” Arlene yelled, covering the mouthpiece. “Can’t you see I’m on the phone?”

Neither of her grown children responded.

“I have to bring Charlotte and Bo?” Arlene asked the woman, turning her back to the two. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea for them to be around Violet.”

“It’s important for Violet’s healing process.”

“Well, whatever is important for Violet,” Arlene snapped. “Never mind the rest of us. She really is better?”

“I think you will be surprised when you see her. We’ll plan on your family Saturday.”

Arlene hung up, wondering how Violet could surprise her more than she had. Her old-maid daughter had plotted to kill her and even gotten her brother and sister involved.

Arlene could never forgive Violet for that. She’d been so sure her daughter would never get out of the mental hospital and now this. Family Day.

Surely those fools at that hospital weren’t really considering letting Violet out?

As she spooned the pancake batter into the smoking skillet, the scent of oil and sizzling pancake batter filled the kitchen and adjoining living room.

Behind her, Charlotte made an odd sound, then sprung up from the couch to run down the hall, her hand over her mouth. It was the fastest Arlene had seen the girl move in years. A moment later she heard Charlotte retching in the bathroom.

“What on earth is wrong with her?” Arlene demanded of her son.

He glanced away from the TV to scowl at his mother. “What do you think? She’s pregnant. Haven’t you noticed how big she’s been getting? Where have you been?” He looked past her and swore. “Damn it, Mother, you’re burning the pancakes!”

CADE JACKSON swore as he wrenched the can of pepper spray from Andi.

Unfortunately the spray nozzle had been pointed in the wrong direction—her direction. Fortunately only a little had shot out. Enough that her eyes instantly watered and she began to cough uncontrollably.

He grabbed her, cursing with each step as he tried to drag her to the back of his apartment. She fought him, although it was clearly a losing battle, unaware of what he was trying to do until he shoved her out the back door and into the fresh air.

She took huge gulps, tears running down her face as she coughed and tried to get the fresh air into her lungs.

He stood for a moment shaking his head, his arms crossed over his bare chest, his dark eyes boring into her.

“I think you’re going to live,” he said, giving her can of pepper spray a heave. It landed in the deep snow out by the trees along the Milk River and disappeared. “Now get the hell off my porch.”

He stepped back inside, not even looking chilled though still only wearing a towel, and slammed the door behind him. She heard the lock turn.

ON THE OTHER SIDE of the door, Cade Jackson took a ragged breath and looked down at the grainy photograph still clutched in his hand.

It wasn’t Grace. True it looked enough like her to be her twin. Enough like her to rattle the hell out of him.

The woman in the photograph, Starr Calhoun, had robbed a bunch of banks and gotten away with three million dollars?

He wanted to laugh. Not for a minute would anyone believe that this Starr Calhoun was Grace except some wet-behind-the-ears reporter. It was beyond crazy.

He realized he was shaking. From anger. From shock. From the scare she’d given him. Earlier, for just a fleeting panicked instant, he’d thought the woman in the photo was Grace.

It was clear why the reporter had thought so as well as he took one last look at the photo. Even the poor quality print revealed a little of Grace in this woman and it shook him to his core. It was the eyes. She had Grace’s eyes.

The reporter had made an honest mistake, he told himself as he balled up the photo of Starr Calhoun and tossed it in the trash can. The rumpled-up photograph landed on the note and business card the reporter had left the night before. M. W. Blake. He still wanted to break her pretty little neck for giving him such a scare. And that stunt with the pepper spray…

He shook his head as he returned to his apartment at the back of shop to get dressed. Someday he would look back on this and laugh. Let Tex wait by the phone. He wouldn’t be calling her.

Still he felt shaken by the encounter. Anyone would have been rattled, though, he told himself, after being caught coming out of his shower first thing in the morning by someone like Ms. Blake. He’d foolishly left the shop’s front door open after getting his newspaper this morning. Maybe he’d better start locking his apartment, as well.

When he’d first seen her standing there, he’d been a little surprised but he sure hadn’t expected what was coming. Not from someone who looked like her, small, demure, sweet looking and sounding with that Texas accent of hers. And a determination that rivaled his own.

Too bad he couldn’t shake off the worry that pressed on his chest like a two-ton truck. The woman wasn’t foolish enough to run the story, was she?

As he started to leave, he went back into the shop to retrieve the photo, note and business card from the trash. Smoothing the photo, he felt his original jolt of surprise. He quickly folded the paper and stuck all three items in his coat pocket as he headed for the door again.

Cade would just show the photo to Carter, have him find out who this Starr Calhoun was and put an end to this foolishness before the reporter made a fool of herself and tarnished Grace’s memory. That, after all, was the benefit of having a brother who was sheriff.

Cade glanced at his watch, knowing where to find his brother this time of the morning. At the same place he was seven days a week, the Hi-Line Café.

Leaving his Closed sign in the window, Cade headed for the café just a few blocks to the west. It was one of those beautiful December days, cold and crisp, the sky a crystalline-blue, the clouds mere wisps high above him and the new snow brilliant and blinding.

It was supposed to snow again by evening, he’d heard on the radio this morning before his shower. The shower brought back the image of M. W. Blake standing in his bait shop. He remembered now that his first impression had been one of male interest—before he’d found out who she was and what she wanted.

He recalled being a little taken aback by the sharp pang of desire he’d felt. But given how long it had been, he supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised. The feeling had been more than lust, though. He’d actually been interested.

Even before she’d opened her mouth, it had been clear she wasn’t local. She was wearing some fancy black boots with a gray pin-striped three-piece suit and a lightweight leather coat, her long dark hair pulled up to give him a good view of her long, graceful neck.

When she’d turned, he’d been thrown off guard by how young she was. It was the freckles she’d failed to completely hide with makeup and those wide green eyes. Wisps of dark hair curled on each side of the high cheekbones. She was a stunner. The soft Southern drawl was just icing on the cake.

He swore under his breath. She wasn’t even half as appealing when it turned out she was a damned reporter, though. And it had only gotten worse when he realized she was a reporter who didn’t have her facts straight. What could he expect of someone who was obviously too young to be anything but a rookie?

As he passed the big bare-limbed cottonwoods along the Milk River etching dark against the bright day, he thought of the fall day he’d met Grace and felt a sharp jab of longing.

The woman in the photo hadn’t been Grace, but even the resemblance to her made him hurt all over again. He cursed the damned reporter all the way to the café.

Sheriff Carter Jackson was sitting at the counter. Cade dropped onto the stool next to him and motioned to the waitress that he would have the same thing he always did. Coffee.

“Good mornin’,” he said to his brother as the waitress slid a cup in front of him.

“Is it?” the sheriff said.

The waitress brought Cade extra sugar packets. He tore open a half dozen and poured them into his cup.

“If you don’t like coffee, why drink it?” Carter asked irritably.

“Who says I don’t like coffee?” He poured in most of the small pitcher of milk the waitress brought and glanced at his brother, wondering what had put Carter in such a foul mood. He suspected he knew. Eve Bailey.

Carter had been trying to get Eve back for months now. They’d dated in high school but Carter had married someone else. Now divorced, he wasn’t finding Eve Bailey very forgiving. Not that Cade could blame her, although it was clear his brother had always loved her.

“You’re up early,” Carter said, eyeing him. “What’s goin’ on with you?”

Cade had planned to show his brother the photo of Starr Calhoun and tell him about the ridiculous claim made by the new reporter in town. But something stopped him.

“Nothin’,” Cade said. “Just thought I’d join you for a cup of coffee this morning.”

His brother turned now to stare at him. “You sure you’re all right?”

“Don’t I look all right?” Cade shot back.

“You look a little peaked.”

Cade concentrated on his coffee, telling himself he was a fool not to show his brother the Wanted poster and put an end to this. So what was holding him back?

“You’re usually out in your ice-fishing house by now,” Carter said, sounding suspicious. That also went with having a sheriff for a brother.

“I haven’t got my house out yet,” he said, although that had been his plan just this morning. Before his early visit from Tex. Normally as soon as Nelson Reservoir froze over he would be on the ice.

“I heard Harvey Alderson speared a nice Northern the other day,” Carter said.

Cade nodded. “The photo’s already on the wall at the shop.” Harvey had come straight there to have his photograph taken. It was a Whitehorse tradition.

“Maybe you’re starting to realize there is more to life than fishing,” his brother said, sounding as if he thought that was progress.

On any other day Cade might have argued the point. “So how is Eve?”

“She’s impossible as ever,” Carter groused. “And I don’t want to talk about her.”

Cade laughed as he watched his brother wolf down his breakfast and between bites, go on and on about Eve. Some things didn’t change and today Cade was damned glad of it.

ANDI FINISHED her story on the Parade of Lights and laid out the page for the next day’s edition, trying to keep busy.

She’d expected Cade to call. He hadn’t.

Wouldn’t a man who’d been given evidence that his wife was a known criminal call? Unless he’d already known and was sitting over in his bait shop planning how to keep her from telling another living soul.

She slammed the drawer on the filing cabinet and cursed mildly under her breath. It was time to use her ace in the hole: the cassette tape.

It was dangerous, but once he heard the voice on the tape, he would confirm that the voice was Starr Calhoun’s and she would have the proof she needed. She hoped that faced with even more evidence and his own innocence in all this, he would break down and tell her everything about his relationship with Starr.

Unless of course he wasn’t innocent.

Andi couldn’t help the rush of excitement she felt at just the thought of playing the copy of the tape she’d made for him. Maybe she should have told him about the tape when she’d shown him the photo.

No, she thought, given how angry he’d been she doubted he would have listened to the tape. He had needed time to calm down, to let it sink in, to realize he couldn’t hide from the truth.

Right. But how was she going to get him to listen to the tape if he refused to talk to her again? The man was obviously more stubborn than she had anticipated. She’d been convinced, guilty or innocent, he wouldn’t be able to rest until he heard her out. So much for that thought.

She sighed as she sat down and checked her schedule. She didn’t have another story to cover for several days. The newspaper would hit the stands in the morning and she would have a whole week before the next edition. She couldn’t believe how laid-back weekly newspaper work was compared to broadcast news in a metropolitan city.

But it would work out well for her. She’d need time to mine this story. Time to convince Cade Jackson to talk to her.

That was the problem. To get the story she wanted, she needed Cade’s side of it. She needed to know how he and Starr had met, how she’d deceived him into marrying her.

Andi felt a twinge of guilt. Cade hadn’t just been furious this morning. He’d seemed stunned. Even though he denied the photo was of his wife, she’d seen his shock. He’d recognized Starr.

What would his reaction be when he heard his wife’s voice on the tape, callously planning the bank robberies with her accomplice? Unless, of course, Cade was her accomplice.

No, the man caught on the bank surveillance cameras had pale blue eyes. Cade Jackson had dark, expressive eyes. Nor was he built like Starr’s accomplice.

If Cade Jackson was involved, then it was from the sidelines. Which didn’t mean he hadn’t known who his wife really was—or that he didn’t know what had happened to the robbery money.

A thought struck her like a bolt out of the blue. How badly had Starr deceived him? Hadn’t the article in the newspaper about her death said that the car had rolled numerous times before catching fire? Her body had apparently burned beyond recognition.

What if Starr had faked her death just as Andi had first suspected? What if she was somewhere living off that three mil with her accomplice? Then who had been killed in the car wreck?

Mind racing, Andi realized the pieces still didn’t fit. Lubbock was out of prison and missing. But whoever had sent her the job information about Whitehorse knew she had information about Lubbock’s arrest in Montana. That meant the person knew about her interest in the Calhoun family. Might even know about her connection to the Calhouns.

She groaned, realizing how that was possible. A few years back, she’d driven over to the prison where Amarillo Calhoun had been sentenced. The eldest of the Calhoun children, Amarillo had followed in his parents’ footsteps, his life of crime going from bank robbing to murder.

She’d seen him sitting in the glassed-in cubicle. Their eyes had met. He must have recognized her because he told the guard he didn’t want to speak with her—backing out on their interview. Her face had been all over the TV news. She’d just broken a big news story. That was right before she’d gotten her newscaster job in Fort Worth.

So it was possible Lubbock knew who she was and why she would jump at digging into this story.

If her friend Bradley was right, then Lubbock was after the missing money. Or Starr and the money, if she’d faked her death. Or there was Houston Calhoun, who’d disappeared the same time as Starr.

Clearly if Lubbock had left her the tape and newspaper clipping, he wasn’t interested in the truth coming out. And he wasn’t the only one, Andi thought. Cade Jackson wouldn’t want a story about his wife being Starr Calhoun, the bank robber, hitting the news, either, she thought, remembering the look on his face when he’d recognized the woman on the Wanted poster. If he’d loved his wife as much as he appeared to, what would the truth do to him?

She pushed the thought away. She’d never backed down from a story and wasn’t going to now. The best stories rose out of someone’s pain. This was one of those stories.

A niggling concern wormed its way into her thoughts, though. Whoever was sending her the information was playing her like a marionette until he got what he wanted. Then what?

Her phone rang, making her jump.

“Hello?”

Silence.

“Hello?” she said again, feeling suddenly spooked. Lubbock?

Then to her relief, Cade said, “It’s me.” He didn’t sound happy about it, though.

She waited, suspecting he was sorry he’d called and might even hang up.

“I need to see you,” he said gruffly.

“All right. Do you want me to—”

“I’m right outside.”

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