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She struggled to remember the original question. But then she met his eyes, and her mind went completely blank. Another shot of desire raced through her system. He was a fantasy man come to life, all strength and purpose, silhouetted by the mountains and the smooth blue sky. She suddenly wished with all her heart that the life she had here was real.
Two
The ingenuous, puzzled expression on Niki’s face told Sawyer two things. One, she hadn’t the first clue who he was. And two, there was a reason his Uncle Charles had risked everything for an affair with Gabriella.
Niki’s eyes were large, dark fringed, beautiful, clear green beneath perfectly arched brows. Her cheeks were pink, her face heart-shaped, and her mouth was a lush bow of red that telegraphed a lethal combination of eroticism and innocence. If Gabriella had even a fraction of Niki’s enticing sensuality, Charles could be forgiven absolutely.
“Reed said you all grew up on the ranch.” Sawyer changed the topic, intent on learning as much as he could about her cover story.
“Reed and Caleb grew up here,” Niki responded, her attention going back to the view. “I’m their half sister.”
“You grew up somewhere else?”
“Boston.”
Boston, not D.C. It was only a slight alteration, and the tactic earned his respect. Deception 101—keep your story as close to the truth as possible.
While they conversed, random shouts and the squeals of children crossed from the crowd of people around the house.
“A remarriage?” Sawyer pressed.
Niki shook her head. “Just me and my mom.”
Another true statement. “Did you visit here in summers?”
“I never knew my father.”
“Interesting story?”
“Not really,” she said. “My mother passed away a few months ago. That’s when it came to light.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” On a human level, Sawyer couldn’t help but be sorry that she’d lost her mother. His own mother had died when he was in his early twenties. Though the Laytons were never the most loving or attentive of parents, he still missed her.
“Thank you,” said Niki.
They both fell silent.
“Do you wonder why she kept it secret?” he asked.
She shot him a curious look, and he realized it was time to back off.
“You must be hungry,” he said, nodding toward the barbecue.
But instead of picking up on the topic change, her voice took on a faraway tone. “I came as quite a shock to them.”
“Reed and Caleb?”
“Yes.”
Sawyer quickly readjusted. “It must happen a lot these days. Strangers showing up, claiming to be relatives. You know, what with all the new social media and technology.”
“And DNA doesn’t lie.”
“You took a DNA test?” Sawyer couldn’t quite keep the astonishment from his voice.
“Of course. How else could we be certain? And, yes, I am hungry.” She abruptly pulled back from the rail and started toward the crowd of people.
It took Sawyer a moment to recover. Niki was actually a Terrell? In addition to a dozen or so judges, politicians and captains of industry, Gabriella had slept with a rancher from Colorado.
It didn’t fit her pattern. And, unfortunately, it meant Sawyer had just lost some of his leverage. He couldn’t threaten to out Niki with Reed and Caleb if they were truly her brothers. That got him wondering if they knew who she was. Were they playing along with the ruse to protect her, or had she kept her true identity a secret from them?
If they knew the truth, then he was working against the entire Terrell clan, not just Niki. He scrambled to wrap his mind around that possibility. If they were all on alert, then a single misstep on his part would be a disaster.
He quickly caught up to her as she climbed the small rise toward the house. “You must have been excited to find them,” he probed.
When she answered, there was a tightness to her tone.
“You mean because I went from being all alone in the world to having two of the greatest brothers in existence? Yes, I was excited to find them.”
He tried to decipher her meaning. Were they great brothers because they were protecting her secret? “So, no other siblings?”
“None,” she answered briskly, skipping into a jog.
She paused by a blue-and-white cooler, flipping the lid, dipping in to pull out a soft drink.
Sawyer hung back, pausing at the edge of the crowd.
“Travis Jacobs.” Another cowboy stepped up and offered his hand.
“Sawyer Smith.” Sawyer shook, forcing himself to regroup. More than ever, he knew he had to take his time with this. Finding the diary was going to be a marathon, not a sprint.
“I hear we’re neighbors,” said Travis.
“Word gets around fast.”
“I’m Mandy and Katrina’s brother. We have the spread that borders southeast of the Terrells.”
“Mandy and Katrina are sisters?” Sawyer’s research had told him as much, but the two women certainly didn’t look anything alike.
“Jacobs, both of them.”
And both married to Niki’s brothers, which tied Travis to Niki, as well. If the Terrells and the Jacobs were anything like the Laytons, family was family, and they’d protect their own.
“Beer?” Travis asked, filling the temporary gap in conversation.
“Sure.”
Travis crossed to the nearest cooler and extracted two cans of Budweiser, returning to pass one to Sawyer.
“The Raklin place?” Travis asked.
“That’s the one.”
“Good graze in the high country. Water issues in late September, but I expect you’ve looked into that.”
Sawyer popped the top of his beer, letting his gaze focus on Niki as she spread mayonnaise on a hamburger bun then layered on slices of pickles. Katrina was beside her, laughing and chatting one moment, then talking low into her ear the next. He hadn’t expected this much of a shield around Niki. In fact, he hadn’t expected anyone to be close to her at all.
“I hear the water-license issue is going to be resolved soon,” he said to Travis.
Travis laughed. “Anybody define ‘soon’ for you?”
Sawyer couldn’t help but smile at Travis’s skepticism. Truth was, the long-term viability of the Raklin place as a working ranch was the least of Sawyer’s worries. He only expected to own it for a few months. Dylan Bennett, the ranch manager’s son from the Layton family’s Montana ranch had agreed to come out and run the spread in the short term to keep up appearances.
But as soon as Sawyer was done with Niki, his lawyers would put it back on the market. And, if the water license proved a stumbling block to selling, Sawyer could solve it with a single phone call. Charles might be the senator from Maryland, but he golfed with the senator from Colorado, and he had a whole lot of D.C. markers he could call in.
Assuming, of course, Gabriella’s diary didn’t get him kicked out of office and thrown in jail first.
“We’ve been fighting that particular war for a couple of years now,” said Travis.
“Need any help?”
Travis arched a brow.
Sawyer took a swig of his beer, realizing it had been foolish of him to offer. “I know a couple of politicians,” he explained.
“My brother was elected Mayor last year. I think he’s got the political angle covered.”
“Good enough, then.”
There was no sense in taking on somebody else’s fight. Sawyer’s attention strayed back to Niki. He obviously had enough trouble on his hands.
“Since there is no earthly reason you would buy yourself a cattle ranch in Colorado,” Dylan Bennett opened as soon as Sawyer came in through the front door of the Raklin place.
The man had parked himself in the living room of the ranch house, boots up on a worn, leather ottoman. “And since you’re calling yourself Smith—unimaginative as hell, by the way. I’m guessing somebody’s in trouble.”
“We’re the Laytons,” Sawyer responded drily, pausing to plunk his Stetson on a wall peg in the entryway and rake a hand through his short hair. “Trouble is our middle name.”
Dylan glanced around the expansive, recently updated living and dining areas of the big house. It was roomy and nicely finished, with gleaming hardwood, freshly painted walls, and a myriad of high ceilings, hewn wooden beams and panoramic windows.
“Pretty deep trouble,” he drawled. “Judging by how much this place must have set you back.”
“You always were smarter than the average cowboy,” Sawyer drawled, moving into the living room.
“You want to catch me up?” Dylan stretched back in the worn armchair.
By contrast to the house, the furnishings were grim. They consisted of the leftovers the Raklins hadn’t bothered to pack up, a worn brown sofa, a creaky armchair and a dated, arborite table with four mustard-yellow, vinyl chairs with spindly metal legs.
“You bring any beer?” Sawyer asked Dylan before sitting down.
“Stocked the fridge.” Dylan cocked his head toward the kitchen where the Raklins had left four high-end, fairly new appliances. “Didn’t make much sense to waste a trip through town.”
“Good thinking,” Sawyer approved, carrying on through the dining room to the kitchen.
He liberated a couple of bottles of Coors from the refrigerator door then made his way back to Dylan.
“It’s Charles, isn’t it?” asked Dylan as he accepted one of the icy-cold beers.
“What makes you say that?” Not that Sawyer had any intention of denying the truth to Dylan. Dylan was on their side. He’d been loyal his entire life.
As teenagers, the two men had run pretty wild together whenever Sawyer visited the Montana ranch. They stole liquor from the cook’s pantry, borrowed more than one ranch pickup truck, got into fistfights and picked up girls. Their exploits had cemented a friendship, and Sawyer would trust Dylan with his life.
Dylan looked pointedly around the ranch house. “You bought yourself ten-thousand acres of prime land. As cover stories go, it’s the very definition of overkill. I figure the only reason you’d go to this much trouble is to protect Charles’ Senate seat.”
“You nailed it,” Sawyer agreed, dropping onto the old, lumpy sofa and taking a swig of his beer. It was cool against his throat, dry from breathing in the dust of the construction site.
“You’re blending,” Dylan stated.
“In with the locals,” Sawyer confirmed. He and his uncle had concocted the plan together.
“What the hell did Charles do to warrant this level of complexity?”
Sawyer knew he shouldn’t smile. It was a serious situation. But Dylan was right, they were cleaning up a big mess with high stakes, and that situation inevitably involved Uncle Charles.
“You ever heard of Gabriella Gerard?” Sawyer asked.
“Can’t say that I have.”
“She was a D.C. legend, infamous around the town. Nobody knew where she came from, but everyone agreed she could have launched a thousand ships with one crook of her baby finger.
Word on the street is that she had affairs with some very powerful men. She accepted their gifts and their money, used their stock tips to get rich. She apparently squirreled away their secrets in a tell-all diary. And then she died. And the diary is nowhere to be found, neither is her daughter Niki.”
“I take it Charles is featured in the diary?” Dylan guessed.
“And the daughter is featured in Colorado, in Lyndon Valley to be precise, in hiding.”
“Is she Charles’ daughter?”
“No chance of that. The dates were way off.” Plus, Sawyer now knew she was Wilton Terrell’s daughter.
Dylan gave a single nod of understanding, peeling at the corner of the beer label with his thumb. “You’re here to get the diary.”
Sawyer responded with a mock toast. “Indeed, I am. Charles would prefer his wife not find out he cheated.”
“Understandable.”
“He’d also prefer the Elections Commission not know about certain campaign contributions.”
“Also understandable.” Dylan took a swig of his beer.
