Westin Family Ties. Alice Sharpe
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they had in common—missing parents. But while he’d coped by closing himself off, she’d opened like a flower to accept everyone and everything into her heart. He’d asked her to marry him on their second date and she’d laughed at him, but he couldn’t help himself. After that, though, she’d asked him several times how he felt about children and he’d always said someday, meaning “someday a long time from now,” when he was ready, when he figured it out.
And maybe in the back of his mind he’d assumed she’d wait forever. Wasn’t what they had between them enough? Why add complications?
Now he wondered, was she right? Had he been putting her off because he was afraid—
Afraid? Since when was he afraid of anything?
He turned around. An hour later, figuring his out-of-state license plate made the truck stand out like a white star on a black stallion’s forehead, he pulled into the alley behind Cassie’s apartment. He’d been away for four hours—it was entirely possible she would be gone…
He’d just grabbed the stair handrail when something about the garage window to his right caught his attention. It was one of those multipaned affairs, and where before it had been intact, it now had a red rag stuffed through one of the openings. He detoured to take a closer look. Sure enough, the pane closest to the interior lock was broken.
He pulled on the cloth, and as he did so, the unmistakable stench of the fuel additive the gas company adds to warn a user of a leak assailed his nostrils. This was immediately followed by the bam-bam images of glass shards on the workbench below the window and then the sight of the heater against the wall, its fuel pipe unscrewed from the stove, a crescent wrench on the floor beneath it.
He took the stairs two at a time and grabbed the knob, prepared to fling his body into the wood panel if it was locked. It was. He easily kicked in the old, flimsy panel, then followed the sound of running water and the aroma of soap into the kitchen, where he found Cassie leaning awkwardly over the sink, using the detachable faucet spray to rinse out her long hair.
He grabbed her shoulders from behind and she screamed as she turned. She was still holding the spray and it hit him in the eyes.
“Cody! What are you doing?” she screeched, as he pulled on her hands.
“Come with me. Now!”
“Wait just a minute. You can’t—”
“There’s a gas leak,” he yelled, almost carrying her to the door. She grabbed her handbag in passing and went with him willingly then, and somehow the two of them flew down the stairs in record time.
They had just hit the ground running when Cody saw the flick of a light through the garage window and registered a faint, audible click. A millisecond later, the whole building exploded.
The blast propelled them forward. He did his best to be the one who hit the ground first to cushion Cassie’s fall. A second later, burning debris rained down around them, and he sheltered her as best he could. They’d landed behind a hedge, which also helped.
They sat up when it seemed the worst was over. The garage and the two apartments above it had been reduced to a burning pile of rubble. Neighbors began to come out of their houses.
Cody helped her to her feet and pulled her back when she started to leave the shelter of the hedge. Who knew if the bomber lay in wait? They stood there a moment, gasping at the destruction. Then he turned her to face him, pushing a tangle of wet hair away from her eyes. “Someone rigged that heater, Cassie. My God, someone tried to kill you.”
“I hear sirens,” she said. “We have to get out of here.”
“But the police—”
“No, Cody, I don’t want to talk to the police. All the questions I can’t answer, the jewelry and everything— Please, I can’t face that right now. I just want to get out of Cherrydell.”
He stared down at her, at war with himself. They should stay long enough to report what happened and face things head-on. But that wasn’t what she wanted…?.
“Let’s put our personal problems on hold for a while and make sure you survive to give birth,” he said. “Come back to the Open Sky with me. We’ll talk to Sheriff Inkwell. At least he knows you.”
Eyes wide, lips trembling, she nodded.
Chapter Four
Cassie couldn’t stop turning to gaze behind them at the traffic, looking for—well, a killer. “What kind of person tries to blow up a pregnant woman?” she asked, very aware of the quiver in her voice.
“The kind who smothers an old woman to death in her sleep,” Cody said, sparing her a quick glance.
Every mile that passed beneath the truck’s tires vibrated inside Cassie’s body. Even the baby seemed aware that things were changing fast; only the periodic rolls and gentle kicks reassured Cassie that the blast hadn’t harmed him or her.
Cody had driven them down the alley with his lights off, exiting by going through a driveway halfway down the block that connected the alley to the street. He’d driven slowly and methodically, while constantly checking the rearview mirror until he announced he hadn’t seen any sign someone was following them.
But Cassie couldn’t let the hunted feeling go. Someone at the Priestly house was targeting her and, by default, her baby. Would they be able to outrun that someone?
“Who do you think did this, Cassie?” Cody asked, as they hit a major road and he picked up speed.
She shot him a look, then turned in her seat to stare ahead. Evening had given way to night, and there was nothing to be gained by staring at a bunch of headlights. “How should I know?”
“Do you have any ideas? Any gut feelings?”
“Well, it has to be someone in that house or someone connected to them, right? My money is on Emerson Banner or maybe even Victoria. They both made no bones about how much they resented Mrs. Priestly hiring me. Still, trying to blow me up? Seems a little over the top, doesn’t it?”
“What about Banner’s son?”
“Robert? Did you meet him?”
“Kind of.”
She shrugged. “He was always nice to me, you know, pleasant. More importantly, he was great with his grandmother, and she just adored him. As for his sister, Donna, she’s nice, too. A little distracted right now. Her husband disappeared a day or so after Mrs. Priestly’s murder…”
“Wait. Isn’t that suspicious timing?” Cody interrupted.
“Yes. The police were questioning Donna about him. There’s no doubt Donna will inherit from her grandmother, so it seems possible Kevin might have been involved in Mrs. Priestly’s death. But why go after me? I’ve never even seen the man.”
“Face it,” he said. “It could be any of them.”
Cassie rubbed her arms to try to shake off the chill. Apparently misinterpreting the reason she was shaking, Cody handed her a sheepskin jacket he’d stashed behind the seat, and she shrugged it over her shoulders. It smelled like him, of the earth and aftershave, and it gripped her heart with its forgotten familiarity. “Do you think the same person who planted the jewelry on me tried to kill me?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m still trying to figure out why anyone would do that.”
“All I could figure was someone stuck it in there in the hopes I wouldn’t notice. Then they planned to follow me and swipe my suitcase and recover the jewelry. That way I’d be blamed and the thief would make off with a bundle. It was really nice stuff. I told Mrs. Priestly she should put most of it in a safe deposit box, but she liked to have her things nearby.”
He spared her a long look. “That’s not a bad guess. Or maybe someone wanted to discredit you so you couldn’t inherit.”