Dead Ringer. B.J. Daniels
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it turned out, Patricia was now behind bars awaiting trial. Since he had stupidly sided with her, things had gone downhill from there. He was hanging on to his job with Travers by the skin of his teeth.
But this was going to make it all right again, he told himself. He couldn’t let a paycheck like McGraw get away. His retainer alone would keep him nicely for years to come. He just needed to get Travers’s trust back. He saw a lot more legal work on the horizon for the McGraws. If this young man was Oakley, he would be back in the McGraw fold.
His cell phone rang. Patricia McGraw again. Travers’s young wife wouldn’t quit calling even though he’d told her he wasn’t going to help her, let alone defend her.
Nor did he need to hear any of her threats. Fortunately, no one believed anything she said. Since Travers McGraw was idolized in this county, people saw her as the gold digger who’d married him—and then systematically tried to kill him. She got no sympathy. In fact, he doubted she could get even a fair trial.
“I’m innocent, you bastard,” she’d screamed the last time he’d taken her call. “You did this. You framed me for this. Once I tell the sheriff—”
He’d laughed. “Like anyone will believe you.”
“I’ll take you down with me!”
He’d hung up and the next time his phone had rung it had been Vance Elliot.
Waters slowed to turn into the lane that led up to the main house. He shot the man next to him a glance. Vance looked more like a teenager than a twenty-five-year-old.
The man who might be Oakley stared at the house, a little openmouthed. Waters remembered the first time he’d driven out here and seen it. The house was impressive. So were the miles of white wooden fence, the expensive quarter horses in the pasture and the section after section of land that ran to the Little Rockies.
He couldn’t imagine what it would be like to learn that he was part of this even at his age—let alone twenty-five. If Vance Elliot really was the long-ago kidnapped McGraw twin, then he was one lucky son of a gun.
“You all right?” he asked Vance as they drove toward the house.
The man nodded. Waters tried to read him. He had to be scared to face Travers McGraw, not to mention his three older sons. But he didn’t look it. He looked determined.
Waters felt his stomach roil. This had better be real. If this wasn’t Oakley McGraw he was bringing to Travers...
He didn’t want to think about how badly this could go for him.
Sheriff McCall Crawford happened to be standing at the window as Huck and Wade Pierce had come into work. Wade looked wrung out. She’d heard that his wife was in the hospital with a concussion after falling off a ladder.
McCall watched the two men. She’d inherited Huck when she’d become sheriff. Before that, she’d worked with him as a deputy. He’d made it clear that he thought a woman’s place was in the home and not carrying a badge and gun. Huck hadn’t been any more impressed when he’d been passed over and she’d become sheriff.
He was a good old boy, the kind who smiled in your face and stabbed you in the back the first chance he got. She didn’t trust him, but she couldn’t fire him without cause. So far, he’d done nothing to warrant it, but she kept her eye on him—and his son, Wade. The minute she caught him stepping over the line, he was gone. As for his son... She’d had hopes for him when he’d hired on, seeing something in him that could go a different way than his father. Lately, though...
Both looked up as if sensing her watching them from the window. She raised her coffee mug in a salute to them. Their expressions turned solemn as they entered the building.
Neither man was stupid. Both were hanging on by a thread, and if the rumors about Wade mistreating his wife could ever be proved, he would be gone soon. But in a small community like this, it was hard to prove there was a problem unless the wife came forward. So far, Abby hadn’t. But now she was in the hospital after allegedly falling off a ladder. Maybe this would be the straw that broke the camel’s back.
McCall’s cell phone rang. She stepped to her desk and picked up, seeing that it was her grandmother. It felt strange having a relationship with her after all those years of never even laying eyes on the woman.
“Good evening,” she said into the phone.
“What are you still doing at work this late?” Pepper demanded.
“I was just about to leave,” McCall said. The day had gotten away from her after she dropped her daughter off at day care and came in to deal with all the paperwork that tended to stack up on her desk. Most of the time, she and Luke could work out a schedule where one—if not both of them—was home with Tracey.
But several days a week, her daughter had to go to a day care near the sheriff’s office in downtown Whitehorse. McCall had checked it out carefully and found no problems with the two women who ran it. Tracey seemed to love going because she was around other children. For a working mother, it was the best McCall could do.
“So is there any truth to it?” her grandmother demanded in her no-nonsense normal tone of voice. “Has one of the McGraw twins been found?”
The question took McCall by surprise. For twenty-five years there had been no news on the fraternal twins who’d been kidnapped. Then a few months ago a true-crime writer had shown up at the McGraw ranch and all hell had broken loose. While some pieces of the puzzle had been found, the twins hadn’t been yet.
Now was it possible one of them had been located?
“I heard it’s the boy, Oakley,” her grandmother was saying. “Apparently your theory about who might have adopted out the children was correct. It was the Whitehorse Sewing Circle. That bunch of old hens. You should arrest them all.” Most of the women involved in the illegal kidnappings were dead now. “On top of that, that crazy daughter of Arlene Evans almost escaped from the loony bin last night.”
McCall hadn’t heard about that, either. It amazed her that Pepper often knew what was going on in town before the sheriff did—even though the Winchester Ranch was miles south of Whitehorse.
“Thank you for all the information. Is that it? Or was the bank robbed?”
Pepper laughed. “You should hire me since I know more of what is going on than you do.” It was an old refrain, one McCall almost enjoyed. Almost.
“Well, let me know when you find out something worth hearing about,” Pepper said. “I’m having lunch with the rest of your family tomorrow. Maybe sometime you can come out.” With that, her grandmother was gone, leaving McCall to smile before she dialed Travers McGraw’s number.
* * *
VANCE ELLIOT WATCHED the landscape blur past and wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans.
“You all right?” the attorney asked from behind the wheel of the SUV. The fiftysomething man wore a dark suit, reminding Vance of an undertaker. No one wore a suit like that, not around these parts, anyway. So Jim Waters must be some highfalutin lawyer who made a lot of money. But then, he worked for Travers McGraw, Vance thought as he saw the huge ranch ahead. Travers McGraw probably paid him well.
“I’m a little nervous,” he admitted in answer to the lawyer’s question. He was about to come face-to-face with Travers McGraw and his three sons. He’d heard enough about them to be anxious. Plus, the attorney had already warned him.
“They aren’t going to believe you, but don’t let that rattle you,” Waters said. “They’ve had a lot of people pretend to be the missing twins, so naturally they’re going to be suspicious. But having the stuffed horse will help. Then there is the DNA test. You’re ready for that, right?”
Right.