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She grinned and relaxed against the back of the wooden chair. “I remember you got a little brown birth-mark on your hip.”
“You don’t have to go that far back,” he said dryly. “Just back to the time when Noah Rider was foreman here on the T Bar K.”
“I can do that. What you want to know about him?”
Seth shook his head. “Not him. I want you to try to remember anyone and everyone that Dad had feuds with back at that time.”
“Oh, Lord,” she groaned. “Looks like we’re gonna be here a while.”
Later that afternoon, Seth stared at the list he and Marina had compiled. He wasn’t sure why he felt that his father was somehow connected to the murder. It wasn’t that he thought Tucker capable of killing anyone, even in the heat of one of his rages. And anyway, Tucker was dead, he couldn’t have killed Noah. But Tucker and Noah had been close. The foreman had always backed Tucker in anything and everything. The two of them together might have angered someone so badly they’d sworn revenge. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense. Especially since no one had attempted to kill Tucker. But then as far as Seth was concerned, homicide never made any sense.
Fifteen names were on the list. Yet there was only one that generated much of his interest. Rube Dawson. From what Ross had told him at lunch, Rube was still a neighbor. And as far as Ross was concerned, the old man was the last person to be involved in Noah’s death. But it was far too early for Seth to exclude anyone from the list. Especially when he remembered very well that Tucker and Rube had once had a big squabble over the ownership of a racehorse.
Stuffing the list in his pocket, he went out to the kitchen and told Marina he’d be gone for a while. Outside, he climbed in his black pickup truck and headed off the T Bar K. When he reached the point where the ranch road branched with the main county road, he turned to the right in the direction of Rube Dawson’s place.
Twenty minutes later, he pulled onto a red dirt road, rumbled across a cattle guard, then drove a quarter mile through foothills dotted with green juniper and piñon pine.
When the Dawson homestead finally came into view, Seth was taken aback. Even though it had been many years since he’d visited the place with his father, he’d not imagined it would look like this. True, the Dawsons had always been on the poor side, but the present state of the place went beyond the lack of money. The small, stucco house was badly in need of paint and shingles. The barns and outbuildings were also in sad neglect with sagging roofs, missing boards and flaking paint. Fences were leaning and in some spots completely resting on the ground.
Apparently Rube wasn’t lifting a finger around here, Seth thought with disgust as he parked his truck next to a dark, older-model sedan and an even older Dodge pickup truck with rusted fenders.
The moment he stepped to the ground, he was met by a white dog that appeared to be part border collie. The wag of his tail assured Seth the dog was friendly and he paused on the path to the house long enough to bend and greet the animal.
“Don’t worry, mister, Cotton won’t bite.”
Seth glanced up to see a young boy somewhere between ten and twelve years old standing on the small front porch. Blue jeans and a baggy T-shirt covered his painfully thin body. Thick blond hair tickled his eyebrows and he swiped at it with an impatient hand as he carefully watched Seth’s every move.
Leaving the dog, Seth walked over to the porch, noticing all the while that there was no yard to speak of around the house, just a few clumps of sage and hard-packed red earth.
“Hello,” he said to the boy. “Does Rube Dawson still live here?”
The boy nodded as his blue eyes narrowed with wary speculation. “Sure does. He’s my grandpa. I call him Pa.”
The news jolted Seth. Rube only had one child and that was Corrina. This was Corrina’s child! But that shouldn’t surprise him, he quickly rationalized. Years had passed since he’d left San Juan County. More than enough time for her to marry and have a son of this age.
“Do you think I might talk to him?” Seth asked.
The boy swiped once again at the corn-colored hair pestering his eyes. He needed a haircut, Seth decided, and a few good meals to put some meat on his bones.
“What’cha wanta talk to him about?”
“Matt! That isn’t any way to greet a visitor!”
Seth recognized the female voice even before she stepped from behind the screen door and onto the porch. It was Corrina. And for a moment he couldn’t speak or think of one sensible thing to say. After all these years he’d never expected to see her again and now that she was standing before him, he was suddenly flooded with memories of more innocent, simpler times.
“Hello, Seth,” she said in a low, warm voice.
Vivid blue eyes stared back at him and he got the impression that she was just as surprised to see him as he’d been to find her here on this broken-down ranch.
Stepping up on the porch, he offered her his hand. “Hello, Corrina. How are you?”
He could sense her hesitation, then finally she reached up and slipped her hand into his. The contact was brief, but long enough to feel her work-roughed palm.
Her eyes darted down and away from him as her fingers reached up to the tangle of chestnut curls brushing her shoulders. “I’m…fine, Seth. Just fine.”
She looked back at him and Seth watched with bemusement as faint pink color swept across her cheeks. If finding him on the doorstep was embarrassing to her, he couldn’t imagine why. He’d not seen her in twenty years and even then the two of them had been little more than acquaintances who’d sometimes talked with each other at school. There was no way she could have ever known that he’d had a crush on her. Because he’d not told anyone about it. Especially not her.
Seth smiled, hoping to ease the tension he could see in her slender body. “That’s good. I’m…surprised to see you here.”
She let out a nervous little laugh, glanced at the boy, then back to Seth again. “Probably not as surprised as I am to see you.” She rubbed her palms down the front of her jeans. “Uh—what are you doing here?”
He cleared his throat as he felt Corrina’s son watching him closely. “I wanted to talk to Rube. I thought he might be able to give me some…help.”
“Help?” Corrina repeated blankly.
She was just as pretty as he remembered, Seth thought. Maybe even prettier now that the years had matured her into a woman. Her skin was milky white, making her blue eyes even more vibrant. The riot of curls teasing her shoulders was thick and unruly, their color consisting of myriad shades varying from cinnamon to ginger. A few errant strands clung to her high cheekbone and he watched her brush them away with the same impatient gesture as her son’s.
“Yeah,” he answered. “I guess you’ve heard about all the trouble over at the T Bar K?”
She nodded and he found himself looking at her lips—full and soft, their mauve color dark against her white teeth. Did she have a husband? he wondered. There was no ring on her hand. But that didn’t mean some man hadn’t put his brand on her in another way. Matt was proof of that.
“Yes,” she answered. “It’s pretty much been the talk of the county. I’m sorry, Seth. I’m sure the whole thing has been hard on your family.”
Matt came to stand beside his mother. “How can Pa help you?”
Corrina put her arm around her son’s slender shoulders. “Seth, this is my son, Matthew. We don’t have much company out here, so you’ll have to forgive his manners.”
We don’t have much company. Did she and Matthew live here? he wondered.
Seth momentarily pushed the question out of his mind and offered his hand to the sullen child. “Hello, Matthew. I’m Seth Ketchum.”
Matthew was clearly pleased to be greeted as an adult rather than a child, but there was still a suspicious look in his eyes as he shook hands with Seth.
“Are you one of those rich Ketchums that live next to us?”
“Next to us” meant at least ten miles away as the crow flied, but Rube Dawson’s property did butt up to a portion of the T Bar K. And out here in New Mexico it was the same as West Texas—land was usually measured in sections.
“Matt!” Corrina scolded. “It’s not polite to ask someone about their finances!”
Seth merely chuckled. “Well, I’m not all that rich and part of my family lives next to you,” he told Matthew. “But I don’t. I live down in Texas. In San Antonio, where the Alamo is.”
“Oh,” Matthew mumbled, then a flicker of interest passed over his face. “Do you know Aaron?”
Seth nodded. “He’s my nephew. Are you two friends?”
Matthew nodded. “Yeah. We ride the same school bus together. He’s younger than me, but he’s pretty cool.”
“Mr. Ketchum is a Texas Ranger,” Corrina said to her son.
Matt’s blue eyes suddenly widened with disbelief. “You mean, like the one on TV?”
“That’s right,” Corrina replied. “Except that Seth is the real thing.”
Matthew’s mouth fell open as he stared openly at Seth. “You’re not wearing a badge or gun.”
Seth grinned. He didn’t know why, but something about the boy touched him. Maybe it was the vulnerable look in his eyes or the way he sidled close to his mom as though he couldn’t trust the outside world.
“That’s because I’m here as a neighbor,” Seth explained.
Corrina gestured toward the screen door leading into the house. “Dad’s inside, if you’d like to talk to him,” she invited.
“If he’s busy I can come back some other time,” Seth offered.
She cast him an odd look. “Dad’s never busy. He—uh—he’s retired now.”
Without waiting for him to reply, she opened the door and stood to one side to allow him entry. Seth slipped past her and into a dimly lit living room packed with mismatched pieces of older furniture. The house wasn’t air-conditioned, but there was a water-cooled fan blowing through vents in the ceiling. The moist breeze was enough to make the room temperature tolerable.
“Dad’s sitting out on the back porch,” Corrina stated as she ushered him down a short hallway and into a small kitchen with worn linoleum and white metal cabinets.
Along the back wall of the room, Corrina pushed open another screen door and motioned for Seth to follow her.
“Wake up, Dad,” she said in a raised voice. “Someone is here to see you.”
Rube Dawson was sitting in a metal lawn chair at one end of the screened-in cubicle. His face was red, his eyes bloodshot. Graying brown hair lay in limp hanks against his head and edged down over his ears. A blue plaid shirt was stretched taut over his rounded belly.
Seth didn’t need to see the empty beer bottles sitting on the floor next to his chair to tell him that Rube was a continual drinker.
“Hello, Mr. Dawson. Remember me?”
The older man twisted his head around and squinted long and hard at Seth. “Yeah, I think I do. You’re a Ketchum. Seth, isn’t it?”
Seth nodded while deciding Rube apparently hadn’t ruined all his brain cells with alcohol. “That’s right. I’m Seth. Ross’s older brother.”
Nodding, Rube reached a hand toward Seth and the two men shook hands.
“Sit down, son,” Rube invited warmly, “and tell me what this visit is about.”
Seth took a seat in a webbed lawn chair to Rube’s right. From the corner of his eye he could see Corrina lingering in the doorway, almost as if she was afraid to leave her father alone with him.
“Would you like a cup of coffee, Seth? Or some iced tea?” she offered.
He looked at her. “Tea would be nice. Thanks.”
She disappeared from the doorway and Seth turned his attention to Tucker’s old friend.
With slow, easy movements, he settled back in the chair and crossed his boots at the ankles. “I thought you might be able to help me, Rube. I’m up here trying to help my family find out who killed Noah Rider.”
Rube grimaced and swiped a thick hand through his hair. “That was a hell of a thing. I couldn’t believe it when I heard about it. Noah hadn’t been around here for years. Who would have wanted to kill him?”
Seth studied him closely. “I don’t suppose you’d kept in contact with him?”
Rube shook his head. “Nah. It’s been about twenty-two, twenty-three years since he left here. After he left here I think I ran into him a couple of times after that. And that was by accident over at Le Mesa Park.”
“What was he doing back then?”
“Training racehorses for some rancher down in Texas. Don’t know where. That’s been too many years ago for me to remember.”
Since the remains of Noah had been discovered on the T Bar K, the San Juan County Sheriff’s Department had sent Chief Deputy Daniel Redwing to Hereford, Texas, to search Noah’s last known residence. Redwing hadn’t found much for them to go on. The man had apparently been living a simple, modest life. From what the deputy had gathered from the man’s neighbors, Noah had lived alone and rarely had visitors. At the time of his death, he’d been employed at a local feedlot. Physically demanding work for a man in his sixties.
Which could only mean that Noah hadn’t possessed a nest egg for his older years. He’d been forced to work to supplement his monthly social security check, Seth mentally concluded.
“Well, at the time he was killed he was working full-time at a feedlot. His employer told a San Juan County deputy he never missed work and was surprised when Noah had told him he wanted a day off to drive up here to New Mexico.”
“Hmm. So, old Noah was working,” Rube said thoughtfully. “That doesn’t surprise me. He was always a damn sight more ambitious than me.”
That was quite an understatement, Seth decided as he focused his gaze on the back view of the Dawson place. Like the front, there was no yard, just red packed earth dotted with rocks and a few clumps of scraggy sage. Beyond, some twenty yards away, a network of broken-down corrals joined one end of the barn. Except for one black horse, the pens were empty. From the looks of things, Seth figured they’d been empty for several years.
“So you’re retired now,” Seth commented.
Rube leaned forward and rubbed a hand over both knees. “Yeah. I had to give up ranchin’. Just got too old and stiff to sit a saddle. And I couldn’t afford to hire help. Sold off all my cattle and the horses, too.”
Footsteps sounded just behind Seth and he glanced over his shoulder to see Corrina walking onto the porch carrying a tray with two glasses of iced tea.
As she approached him, her gaze met his briefly then fell swiftly to the tray in her hands.
“I hope you like it sweet,” she said quietly. “I already had it made.”
She bent toward him, and as he picked up one of the glasses, he caught the faint scent of flowers on her hair. The sweet fragrance reminded Seth how very long it had been since he’d took any sort of notice of a woman. “I’m sure it will be fine. Thank you, Corrina.”
“I’ll bet I don’t have to tell you that Corrina is the light of my life,” Rube said to Seth as his daughter handed him the other glass. “I don’t know what I’d have done if she hadn’t come to live with me. She takes care of me just like that sister of yours took care of Tucker before he died.”
Seth’s gaze settled on Corrina’s face. Her smooth features were unmoving, giving him little or no hint to what she was thinking about her father’s comments.
“I’m sure you must really appreciate your daughter,” Seth replied.
Rube tilted the tea glass to his lips. After several swallows, he said, “Like I said, Corrina is the light of my life. I couldn’t make it without her.”
Totally ignoring her father’s possessive praise, Corrina quietly walked off the porch. Inside the small kitchen, she walked to the double sink and, balancing her hands on the ledge of the counter, she bent her head and closed her eyes.
Seth Ketchum! Dear Lord, what was a sergeant in the Texas Rangers doing here?
“Mom, is something wrong?”
Matthew’s voice jolted her. With a guilty start, she quickly turned to him, while carefully hiding her shaking hands behind her back. She couldn’t let her son, or anyone, for that matter, know what seeing Seth Ketchum had done to her.
“No, Matt. Nothing is wrong,” she lied. “Nothing at all.”
Chapter Two
