Atonement. B.J. Daniels
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sorry my brother hurt you,” Dillon said as the Montana countryside blurred past, a tableau of shades of green from the new bright grasses to the deeper, richer shades of the cool pines. The mountains rose around them, most still snowcapped.
“It was my own fault.” She turned as if to gaze out at the passing landscape.
“You must have seen something good in him. Isn’t it possible he really did want to change? Really did want everything he said he did?”
She let out a sound that made him hurt inside. “Better to think that than I’m a fool who was taken in by a handsome cowboy, right?”
He could see that Tessa had thought herself smarter. She’d let herself be fooled by a man. She hadn’t yet learned that love was a heart thing, often with no brain involved.
He glanced in the rearview mirror. He hadn’t thought to check for a tail. Then again, he hadn’t thought he needed to. There were cars and pickups and a couple semis behind them. If they were being followed, he couldn’t tell.
“There was no warning?” he asked, hoping to get her talking about Ethan.
“The signs were there. I just chose not to see them.”
“Signs?”
“He’d been more moody in the days right before he left. Antsy and uncharacteristically impatient. More secretive, too. If I asked him where he’d been or what he was looking at on the computer—”
“He had a computer?” This surprised Dillon. Ethan had ranted about the new technologies on his visit two years ago. He’d said that was why he worked on ranches. He didn’t have to learn how to use a computer, let alone a smartphone.
Tessa’s chuckle had a bitter edge to it. “No, he didn’t own a computer. Other than his old pickup and his saddle, had he ever owned anything?”
“So he used yours. Do you still have it?” He could see that she understood at once.
“I checked it after he left. I thought...” She looked away.
He knew exactly what she’d thought. An online romance with another woman.
“He had said he was looking for a new saddle. I showed him how to use a search engine. He wasn’t dumb. He didn’t ask for my help after that.”
Dillon knew his brother wasn’t shopping on the internet for a saddle. So what had he been looking for? “Did he find a saddle?”
Another short laugh. “He wasn’t looking for a saddle. He was looking for a gun.”
“A gun?” Dillon asked.
“He had guns—a .357 he kept rolled up in its holster beside the bed, and a hunting rifle, a .30 Winchester, that hung on the rack in his pickup. Both were old. I suspect they meant something to him?”
“Our uncle Jack gave him the .357 before Jack died. The Winchester was our grandfather’s.” Dillon was a little surprised, given his brother’s lifestyle, that he’d somehow managed to hang on to them.
He’d never thought of Ethan as being sentimental. Nor had he seemed like someone who cared about possessions. More and more Dillon was realizing how little he knew his twin.
He cracked his window, needing air. The more he learned about his brother, the more sick at heart he became. The lush spring Montana landscape was a tapestry of contrasts, from the new bright green grass to the dark pines of the mountains, from the blinding white snow capping the peaks to the cloudless blue of the sky. The sweet scents reminded him of springs when they were boys.
The one thing he knew now without a doubt was that Tessa had known his brother. When and for how long? Well, that was still the question, wasn’t it? But he wouldn’t be looking for his brother unless part of him believed her, believed Ethan was alive.
“So what kind of gun was he looking for online?” He couldn’t fathom that, even if Ethan had wanted another gun, why he would look for it on the internet. Not when he could pick one up at a local gun show. Again, it didn’t sound like his brother.
“He’d deleted the sites he went to. But I hadn’t told him about how the computer kept a history of the sites visited.” She shrugged, giving away more than she probably meant to. Even back when they’d been talking marriage, she hadn’t completely trusted the man she’d fallen in love with.
“Why would he feel the need to lie about what he was looking for?” Dillon asked after a moment.
Tessa seemed to pull herself out of the past. She came out of it angry again, but he suspected it was more with herself than Ethan. “Why would he lie about everything? I have no idea. I just know that he was looking at antique rifles. I saw on one site that a similar rifle to the one he was viewing went for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
“So he was just looking.”
“I guess so. He’d been saving his money. I thought for a house for us, but he could have been saving it to buy a rifle, for all I know.”
Odd. Again not like his brother. Dillon couldn’t see him wanting an antique rifle even if he could afford it. So what was that about?
“Did you ever ask him?”
She nodded. “He got defensive, said it didn’t have anything to do with me and that I should stay out of his business. It was the same day the man had stopped by whom he said he owed money to.”
“The day you heard Ethan mention the name Halbrook?”
She nodded. “Ethan stormed out, but came back later and apologized. He was gone the next morning with my money.”
“But he left the photo,” Dillon said.
“Only because he dropped it, he was in such a hurry to clear out.”
“Maybe. The thing is, if he was in trouble, which I think we can assume, then maybe he dropped it on purpose, knowing you would find me.”
* * *
TESSA SCOFFED AT that. “Why didn’t he just contact you himself if he wanted your help?”
“Because he’s too stubborn. Ethan likes to believe he can take care of himself. He wouldn’t ask for my help ever.” He looked over at her, something soft and tender in his gaze. “But he would want you to find me because he’d know I’d take care of you and the baby if anything hap—”
“You think he sent me to you?” She couldn’t help but laugh. “Ethan didn’t exactly seem worried about what was going to happen to me and our baby when he took my money and left.”
“I think you’re wrong about that.”
“Wouldn’t it have been a whole lot easier if he’d just left me your name and address?”
He turned his attention back to the road. She saw his jaw work. “Would you have come all the way to Montana to see his brother?”
She studied him for a moment. “No.”
“I didn’t think so. You strike me as an independent woman with a lot of pride. Ethan obviously knew you. He knew you’d track down the ranch from the photograph.” He glanced over at her. “He knew you were smart and resourceful. He knew you’d find me.”
Tessa let that sink in as she watched the countryside blur past.
She had never seen such beautiful, remote country. They had traveled along Interstate 90 through pine-studded mountains past Paradise Valley and over the Bozeman Pass. From there they drove along clear rivers, winding through more mountains to reach Butte, home of the huge open-pit mine, before leaving behind civilization again.
She hated reliving those last few weeks with Ethan. Worse, she hated to admit even to herself how badly he’d hurt her. How badly she’d let him.
Could Dillon be right? Had Ethan cared about her and the baby?