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“And?”
“I didn’t really put two and two together at the time, being preoccupied with making sure all my body parts still worked. But now that I think back, I’m pretty sure I didn’t see any rust.”
Chase frowned. “That doesn’t make sense. You mean the break was clean?”
“Yeah. Straight. As if someone had cut it in two.”
“Did you go back and take a second look at the ladder?”
“It’s gone. Zander said Susannah had told him to get rid of it ASAP, so he got Eli to shove it into the Dumpster. They already picked it up. They compact it on the spot, you know. That ladder’s history.”
“That is weird.” Chase was quiet a moment. “Anybody else know you were going up to cut branches that day?”
Trent tried to remember who might have heard. He’d mentioned it several times over the past few days. He’d kept meaning to do it, but he kept getting sidetracked.
“Zander knew. And Eli, I guess. And probably that obnoxious Richard Doyle. He’s been at the house three mornings in a row, sucking up to Sue, though he says it’s about the will.”
Chase nodded. “And Sue.”
Trent narrowed his eyes. “What?”
“Sue.” Chase shrugged. “I’m just saying, if you think Doyle knew, then Sue must have told him. So Sue must have known, too.”
Trent decided to ignore that. Chase had played Sherlock Holmes recently, trying to discover the true identity of Josie’s baby’s father, and his success must have gone to his head.
He actually thought Sue might have sabotaged her own ladder?
Some detective.
“Obviously she had opportunity, but still, she did marry you only a week ago.” The corners of Chase’s eyes tilted up. “You’re an irritating son of a gun, but even you couldn’t have turned her homicidal in a week.”
Trent laughed, glad to see that Chase was just joking. “I don’t know. Guess it depends on what old man Everly’s will says about widows.”
He glanced out the window again, as the trainer led Alcatraz back to the stables. What a gorgeous horse he was. He’d been sired by Chase’s father’s favorite quarter horse, Rampage, a stallion who had definitely lived up to his name. The only one of the Fugitive Four who had been allowed to ride Rampage had been Paul, who’d had such a light hand on the reins and whose intuition about horses had been almost perfect.
“Oh. That reminds me. When I visited Peggy Archer last week, I think I mentioned to her that I’d be cutting back some branches at Everly. Not that I’m implying…”
He paused, remembering. “It was a strange visit, Chase. Harrison actually took me outside and warned me about Peggy. Said a lot of bad feelings got stirred up when Susannah and I got married.”
Chase nodded again. “I can imagine. We’re all married now…something Paul will never get a chance to do. That’s gotta be tough. Still…it’s kind of hard to picture Peggy Archer sneaking into Sue’s barn with a hacksaw, don’t you think?”
“Impossible. Till she gets that new hip, Peggy can barely walk from the chair to the door.”
“So…”
They sat in silence a minute, considering the possibilities—which were, in the end, all impossible. The bottom line was, no one could have known that Trent would use that particular ladder on that particular day.
Finally Chase sighed. “Sorry, pal, it’s just too nuts. Nobody’s out to get you. You must have been imagining things.”
“Possibly. I had just hit my head against an oak root the size of a water main.”
“Clumsy bastard,” Chase repeated affectionately. “Still, women love an injured warrior. I hope you at least have the sense to milk those stitches for a little pity sex.”
“Pity sex?” Trent laughed out loud. “For God’s sake, Chase. How desperate do you think I am?”
“On a scale of one to ten?” Grinning, Chase stood up and headed for the door. “I’d say about a thousand.”
CHAPTER SIX
NEWLYWEDS, Trent decided as he watched Chase and Josie try to assemble the new crib, were disgusting. They should be locked up for the first full calendar year, so they didn’t drive everyone else crazy with their cuddles and kisses and lingering looks of hungry adoration.
Of course, technically Trent and Susannah were newlyweds, too. But that was different. Night and day different.
It was a bright Sunday afternoon, the last weekend in May, and the two couples had been working on the nursery at the Double C for the past two hours. Well, at least Trent and Susannah had been working. Chase and Josie got very little done, seemingly magnetized to one another. Chase couldn’t pass within six feet of his new wife without scooping her into his arms for a cuddle. Josie couldn’t hand him the screwdriver without ending up kissing his neck.
Susannah and Trent, on the other hand, seemed to exist in two separate universes, even when they were standing mere inches apart. In the past two hours, Susannah had met Trent’s eyes only once, the moment he arrived. Her shock had been almost palpable. She obviously hadn’t realized, when she agreed to help Josie today, that it would be a double date.
Trent had glanced at Chase. Good try, pal, he’d messaged silently. Chase had shrugged, his smile not admitting anything.
Though Susannah was clearly unhappy about the arrangement, she couldn’t be accused of being rude. She worked hard. She laughed at Chase’s jokes, and oohed over Josie’s fluffy lamb mobiles and lamb border stencils and lamb-patterned sheets.
It was only Trent who got the invisible man treatment. She talked around him, walked around him, worked around him without skipping a beat.
“Hey, guys. Would you mind working on the stencil border while we assemble the mobile?” Chase wrapped one arm around Josie’s waist. “I don’t want Josie in here with the paint fumes. Not good for the baby.”
Trent gazed over at Susannah, who frowned. He wondered how she was going to get out of this one.
“Do you really think that needs to be done today?” She smiled to soften the words. “The baby’s not due till mid-September, and it’s not even June yet.”
Trent felt her frustration. Back at Everly, peaches were ripening on the trees in record numbers. She’d spent every day of the past month trying to line up buyers. Tomorrow the harvest would begin, with its harrowing fourteen-hour days. Susannah wouldn’t have another free Sunday until late August.
Josie grinned, unabashed. “I know. But I just can’t wait to see it. I’m so grateful that you guys are willing to help. It means so much to both of us.”
Trent glanced at Chase, who beamed and planted a kiss on the top of her head, as if she’d said something marvelous.
Man, the guy was gone on his wife. He clearly didn’t know how to deny her anything. If she’d wanted the baby’s room decorated in angel feathers and bits of the pearly gates, Chase would have driven his truck up to Heaven’s door and demanded they sell him some.
“Okay, then, we’ll be in the study if you need us.” Chase apparently had decided to take Susannah’s silence as a yes. That was absurd, of course. Chase had been Susannah’s best friend since they were babies, and he knew as well as Trent what her frozen face really meant. “Have fun.”
They ambled off, still entwined, still teasing each other, still making silly kissing noises between sentences. When they finally disappeared, Trent turned to Susannah with a smile.
“Wow. You could get cavities, just being in the same room with all that sugar.”
She didn’t smile back. “I think it’s sweet.”
“My point exactly. Sweet like six banana splits and a double hot fudge sundae. Stomachache sweet.”
She studied the stencil. “They’re happy. That’s what marriage is all about. Most marriages, anyhow.” She turned and held the stencil up against the wall, studying it. “I think it’s great.”
Well, of course she did. Whatever Trent thought, she thought the opposite. If he said go, she’d stop. If he said silence she’d sing.
If he said, Come here, Sue, because I want to make love to you until you forget how to be such a bitch…
She’d run.
And, obviously, neither of them would ever forget that this should have been their own sugary bliss. The look in Susannah’s eyes said it all. If Trent hadn’t cheated on her, they would have been the kissing, cooing newlyweds.
She had wanted that, once. Trent knew it had been her most comforting dream. It had helped her endure the loss of her parents, and her grandfather’s brutality.
And he’d killed it.
She would never forgive him for that. Hell, he’d never forgive himself.
But life went on, damn it. Why couldn’t she let go of the past long enough to get through this year without adding more misery to the heaping load they already carried around?
“So let’s see how this works.” He plucked the stencil from her fingers. “Ummm…” He turned it in all directions, trying to figure out how exactly this collection of random slits in a wobbly plastic rectangle was going to end up looking like anything. “Sorry, but…what the hell?”
In spite of her obvious belief that cracking a smile in his presence would usher in the end of the world, he saw the corner of her mouth tuck back.
“It’s a simple stencil, really. Just one color, just one layer. See? You press the stencil against the wall, then sponge over it with paint. What comes through will look like a lamb.”
“Really.” He squinted. It would, he thought, probably help to be drunk. “I’ll have to take your word for it.”
But she didn’t seem to be listening anymore. When he glanced toward her, he was rewarded with a close-up of her tight, round ass. She’d bent over and begun squeezing blobs of white acrylic paint onto the plates that waited on the bright blue drop cloth.
He took a minute to enjoy the sight. Expecting to work hard—and definitely not expecting to see Trent—she’d dressed casually today. Instead of her regular tailored khaki slacks and oxford cloth shirt, she was wearing cutoff blue jeans, frayed up to the danger zone, and a tiny white halter top.
Eleven years ago, he would have grabbed her in both hands and pulled her in for an X-rated squeeze that would have put Chase and Josie to shame. They would have ended up laughing, stumbling and probably covered in white paint.
Today, they lived under new laws. He gave himself that one stolen minute to look, and then turned away before she sensed the heat of his gaze.
“The border goes along the edge of the ceiling, I suppose?” There were still two ladders in the room, from when Trent and Chase had painted the baby-blue walls two weeks ago, and they’d obviously been left for a reason.
She stood on tiptoe to investigate. “Yeah. Chase already drew the guidelines, so we don’t have to worry about spacing. You can start over by the closet. I’ll start by the door.”
Her gaze dropped to his calf, which still had a bandage over Marchant’s six stitches. “Unless…” She waved toward the injury. “If you’d rather not…”
He laughed. “You think I’ve developed a fear of ladders?”
“Probably not.” She actually smiled at that.
For about twenty minutes they worked in silence, atop their own perches on opposite sides of the room. He taped the stencil in place, sponged the paint onto the wall, then moved the stencil and began again.
The lambs looked blobby.… Was he using too much paint? His hands felt too big, mostly thumbs. Though he’d done only five lambs, he was already bored.
He glanced back to see how her wall was coming.
Far better than his, naturally. She had so much more control, so much more patience. He was restless, physical, more comfortable outdoors. He’d always marveled at her ability to sit quietly, to wait, to think things through, to stay on task.
He had none of that. Which was, of course, why he’d botched up his life for so long, making one impulsive mistake after another. What patience he had acquired had come at great cost…and it still didn’t come naturally.
He climbed down, moved his ladder and filled his plate with white paint. He climbed up again, ignoring the twinge in his stitches, and taped the stencil in place. Just before he touched the sponge to the wall, he noticed that he’d taped the lamb upside down.
In spite of his annoyance, he had to laugh. Josie was going to regret letting him get involved with this. “Hey. Remember when Nikki decided she wanted unicorns all over her walls?”
He wasn’t surprised when Susannah didn’t immediately answer. Normally, they avoided “Remember when” as a conversation starter. But he’d spoken without thinking, of course. And besides, damn it, he was tired of pretending that ten years of intimacy and fun hadn’t existed, just because they’d ended in one night of disaster.
She must have decided the same thing, because after only a brief hesitation, she chuckled, too.
“I hope that doesn’t mean what I think it means.” She put down her sponge and twisted her head to see his border. “Have you screwed up already?”
“Yeah. I almost put one on upside down.” He leaned back to let her get a full view of the mess. “Is the paint supposed to drip like that? My lambs look sort of…deformed.”
She frowned, studying his line of white, puffy animals. “It’s not too bad,” she said finally. “You’re using too much paint, that’s all. I can probably go back with the blue and touch it up.”
“Oh.” He stared at his row of lambs, as if they’d betrayed him. “Darn.”
“Darn? You wanted me to say they were awful?”
“Yeah.” He grinned. “I was hoping you’d order me to surrender my sponge immediately.”
“Nope.” She dabbed her own sponge into the white paint. “Sorry. And don’t go making it worse deliberately, just to get out of it. It didn’t work with the unicorns, did it?”
It certainly hadn’t. At five, Nikki had been in love with unicorns, and she’d begged Susannah, Trent, Paul and Chase—who, at nineteen, still called themselves the Fugitive Four—to paint the creatures on her bedroom walls.
Ever sensible, Susannah found a picture to copy, but unfortunately none of the boys had an iota of artistic talent. Trent’s contributions were the worst, looking like everything from rhinos to car keys…but never like unicorns.
Nikki, who at the time was crazy about Trent, adored the weird creations. She egged him on, encouraging him to make them ever wilder, despite Susannah’s frustrated efforts to keep everyone copying the pattern.
Chase and Paul joined in the fun, abandoning the original design without regret. It took a while, but by the end of the day even Sue relented and began adding inventive flourishes to her unicorns, too.
The result was colorful madness, but it had been so joyous, a visible representation of the love and creative camaraderie that had existed among the four friends. It had been one of their happiest days.
They’d all been crushed when, two days later, Arlington Everly had sent one of the ranch hands up to paint over it with a bland eggshell white. It had taken four coats to cover it all, which had given them an irrational sense of pride.
“Okay, but if my lambs all look like unicorns, let it be on your head.” He tapped the sponge against the edge of the plate, making sure it didn’t soak up too much paint. “That was a fun day, wasn’t it?”
He didn’t look at Susannah, but he could feel her tension all the way across the room. He could almost hear her thoughts. She was trying to calculate risk, vulnerability, exposure. Was it too dangerous to agree that yes, she, too, remembered that day with pleasure? Was she somehow in danger if she admitted that, on that one day, they had been happy?
“Yes,” she said finally. “Yes, it was a beautiful day.”
He waited, wondering whether she’d find a way to erase the tenderness with an extra comment. A great day, and isn’t it too bad that you had to go and spoil it all? A great day, but only because we didn’t know how soon Paul would be dead.
She didn’t. The gentle sound of her “yes” hung in the air, untouched. When he looked up, she had already gone back to swabbing the stencil with her sponge.
It wasn’t much. But somehow it felt like a victory.
Suddenly Josie came into the room, holding Trent’s cell phone in one outstretched hand. She crossed the room quickly and stopped at the foot of his ladder.
