Lone Wolf Lawman. Delores Fossen
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Two
Weston waited for Addie’s reaction, and he didn’t have to wait long.
She shook her head, her bottom lip trembling just a little before she clamped her teeth over it. It only took a few seconds for Addie to process what Weston had just told her.
And to dismiss it.
“Why should I believe anything you say?” she asked.
Weston had no trouble hearing the hurt in her voice. No trouble hearing the anger, too. Yes, he was responsible for both, and while he’d never intended to hurt Addie, he also hadn’t wanted a serial killer to have free rein to keep on killing. Too bad he’d failed.
Addie was indeed hurt.
And the killer was still out there.
Of course, Addie knew that better than anyone else: her own sister-in-law had been one of the Moonlight Strangler’s victims.
“I’m sorry,” Weston said, knowing his words wouldn’t be worth much. “But it’s true. I have proof the Midnight Strangler’s coming after you, and we need to talk about that.”
Judging from the way her eyes narrowed, he’d been right about that apology not meaning much.
Addie didn’t jump to ask about his proof.
Her blond hair was gathered into a ponytail, but she swiped away the strands that’d fallen onto her face during their scuffle, and she whirled around so that she was no longer facing him. At least she didn’t try to make a run out of her office again, but she might do just that before this conversation was over.
Even though it had only been three months since Weston had seen her, she’d changed plenty. He had watched her for about a half hour before he’d gotten the chance to pull her into the office for a private chat. When she was in the barn earlier, Addie had been working with one of the horses, and she had actually smiled a time or two. She looked content. Happy, even.
Definitely something he hadn’t seen when she was in San Antonio.
There, she’d been wearing dresses more suited for office work than the jeans and denim shirt she was wearing now. And she definitely hadn’t been happy or smiling during their chats at the bar and in his hotel room.
No.
Most of the time, she’d been on the verge of losing it, and had been trying to come to terms with learning exactly who she was. Weston certainly hadn’t helped with the situation by sleeping with her.
After several long moments, she turned back around to face him. In the same motion, she took out her phone from her jeans pocket. “I’m calling Jericho.”
Jericho, her oldest adopted brother. He was also the sheriff in the nearby town of Appaloosa Pass, the job once held by her late father. Weston definitely didn’t want to tangle with any of the Crockett lawmen, not just yet anyway, so that’s why he reached for her phone.
“I want to find out who you really are,” Addie snapped. “And you’re not going to stop me from doing that.”
It was a risk in case she tried to get her brother to arrest him or something, but Weston decided to see how this played out. Eventually, he’d have to deal with Jericho anyway. It was a meeting he wasn’t exactly looking forward to since Jericho had a reputation for being a badass, no-shades-of-gray kind of lawman.
“Jericho,” Addie said when her brother answered. She put the call on speaker. “I need a favor. Can you check and see if there’s a Texas Ranger by the name of Weston Cade?”
Weston heard Jericho’s brief silence. Was he suspicious? Definitely. But the question was—what would Jericho do about it? If he came storming back to the house, it might trigger something Weston didn’t want triggered.
“Why?” her brother asked her.
“Just do it,” Addie insisted, “please.” She sounded more like an annoyed sister than a woman whose lip had been trembling just moments earlier.
More silence from Jericho, followed by some mumblings, but Weston did hear the clicks of a computer keyboard.
“Yeah, he’s a Ranger in the San Antonio unit,” her brother verified. “Why?” Jericho repeated, but he didn’t wait for an answer. “And does he have anything to do with that SOB scumbag you met in San Antonio, the one who slept with you and—”
“I’ll call you back,” Addie interrupted, and she hung up. She dodged his gaze when she slid her phone back into her pocket.
Weston doubted she’d put a quick end to that call for his sake, but it did give him a glimpse of what she’d been going through for three months. She had obviously told Jericho about her brief affair with a man who’d seemingly disappeared from the face of the earth, and her brother clearly didn’t have a high opinion of him.
SOB scumbag.
Well, the label fit. Weston didn’t have a high opinion of himself, either, and he hadn’t in a very long time.
Addie wouldn’t believe that he had plenty of regrets when it came to her. After all his lies, she would never believe that he’d fallen in bed with her only because of the intense attraction he had felt for her.
An attraction he still felt.
Still, he shouldn’t have acted on it. He should have just kept his distance and tailed her until her father made his move, no matter how long that took.
“Start from the beginning,” Addie insisted, turning her attention back to Weston. “And so help me, every word coming out of your mouth had better be the truth, or I’ll let Jericho have a go at you. I don’t make a habit of letting my big brother fight my battles for me, but in your case I’ll make an exception.”
Weston figured that wasn’t a bluff.
The beginning required him to take a deep breath. “Two years ago I went to my fiancée’s office to see her. I’d just come off an undercover assignment and hadn’t seen her in a few weeks. Her name was Collette, and I walked in on someone murdering her.”
Hell, it hurt to say that aloud. It didn’t set well with Addie, either, because she made a slight gasping sound.
“It was my birth father,” she supplied. “I saw a list of his known victims. All sixteen of them, and Collette Metcalf was one of them.”
Weston nodded, and it took him a moment to trust his voice again. “I didn’t know it was him at the time, and I didn’t get a look at his face because he knifed me and ran out. I obviously survived, but Collette wasn’t so lucky. She died by the time the ambulance arrived.”
She touched her fingers to her mouth. It was trembling again, and Addie leaned against the edge of her desk, no doubt for support. “Your name wasn’t in the reports I read of the murders.”
“No. The FBI and Rangers thought it best if they didn’t make it public. They didn’t want him coming after me to tie up loose ends. The killer hadn’t gotten a good look at my face because I was still wearing my undercover disguise. But he must have found out who I was because letters from the Moonlight Strangler started arriving three months ago.”
“Three months?” she repeated under her breath.
Addie no doubt picked up on the timing. Weston doubted it was a coincidence that the letters started arriving shortly after he met her.
“The killer mentions me in these letters?” she asked, and Weston had to nod.
That meant the Moonlight Strangler had perhaps already been watching Addie and had seen Weston with her. Or maybe the killer had been watching him. Either way, Weston figured the killer had started sending those letters because he knew about Addie and him sleeping together.
“All the letters and envelopes were typed,” Weston continued, “so there’s no handwriting to be analyzed. No