Loe raamatut: «The Coltons of Texas»

Chapter 1

She’s not going to get away with it. That was all Chris Colton could think as he listened to the tearful story Angus and Evalinda McCay unfolded before him. Holly McCay wasn’t going to get away with keeping her in-laws from their beloved twin grandsons, all they had left of their son after he died.

Chris leaned back in his chair in his northwest Fort Worth, Texas, office and glanced at the pictures the McCays had handed him. One was of blond-haired, brown-eyed Holly McCay and her now-deceased husband, Grant. The other was of the McCay twins, Ian and Jamie.

“But they don’t look like that anymore,” Evalinda McCay said sadly. “Our grandsons weren’t even a year old when that picture was taken, and that was more than six months ago. Holly won’t even let us see them. She’s been like that ever since Grant...” She dabbed a tissue at her eyes.

“Don’t worry, Mrs. McCay,” Chris said, steel in his voice. “I’ll take this job myself—I won’t hand it off to an associate. I’ll find your grandsons for you. And your daughter-in-law, too.”

Angus McCay cleared his throat. “I don’t like to speak ill of my son, Mr. Colton, because he’s gone and can’t defend himself. But he was blind to what his wife was really like. She trapped him into marriage—”

“They hadn’t even been married seven months when Ian and Jamie were born,” Evalinda McCay clarified in a shocked tone.

“Grant’s will made her the trustee for their boys,” Angus McCay continued, as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “And...well...”

“The money is all she cares about,” his wife threw in. She put her hand on her husband’s arm. “I know you don’t like to put it so bluntly, Angus, but you know it’s true.” Her gaze moved to Chris. “Holly took the boys and left town three weeks before Christmas. Right before Christmas...” She choked up for a moment before continuing. “Grant’s fortune is tied up in a trust for Ian and Jamie, but Holly is the sole trustee. Which means she can spend the money any way she sees fit, without any real oversight.”

Angus McCay added, “And since she won’t tell us where she is...won’t even let us see them...” He sighed heavily. “We don’t even know if they’re alive, much less healthy and happy.”

“We tried to get custody of the boys through the courts right after Grant died,” Evalinda McCay said, her wrinkled face lined with worry. “But grandparents don’t seem to have any legal rights these days. Our lawyer said he’s not optimistic—not even to force Holly to let us have some kind of visitation with Ian and Jamie.”

“The police won’t help us, because Holly hasn’t done anything wrong,” Angus McCay said gruffly.

“Except break our hearts, and Ian’s and Jamie’s, too, for that matter—but there’s no law against that,” Evalinda McCay put in.

“You don’t have to say any more.” Determination grew in Chris. If it was the last thing he did, he’d find Holly McCay and her eighteen-month-old sons for Mr. and Mrs. McCay. Not just because no one had the right to deprive good and decent grandparents like the McCays access to their grandchildren. But because the children deserved to know their grandparents. That was the real bottom line.

Not to mention it made him sick to think of Holly McCay isolating her children from their relatives for money. His foster parents hadn’t abused him, but he’d known ever since he was placed with them when he was eleven that they were in it only for the money the state gave them.

“We tracked Holly here to Fort Worth, but then the trail went cold. That’s why we decided to hire you, Mr. Colton,” Angus McCay said now. “You know this part of the state—we don’t.” He glanced at his wife, who cleared her throat as if to remind him of something. “And there’s another thing. It’s all over the news here in Fort Worth about the Alphabet Killer in Granite Gulch.”

Chris stiffened, wondering if the McCays knew about his family’s connection to the serial killer. But Angus McCay continued without a pause and Chris relaxed. “We know Granite Gulch is forty miles away, and we know all the targets so far are women with long dark hair. But who knows? That could change at any time. And Holly...well...despite everything, she is our daughter-in-law. If anything happened to her...”

He trailed off and his wife picked up the thread of the story. “We heard on the news the last victim was Gwendolyn Johnson, which means the killer is up to the Hs now. And Holly’s name begins with H. No matter what she’s done to us, Mr. Colton, she’s Ian and Jamie’s mother. They’ve already lost their father before they ever had a chance to know him. I shudder to think of those two innocent babies orphaned at such a young age.” She turned to her husband and nodded for him to continue.

“We don’t know what it will cost,” Angus McCay said, “but we have some money saved. Whatever your fees are, we’ll double them if you make this job your top priority. And we’ll give you a bonus if you find Holly within a month. We have to find her, Mr. Colton. And the boys,” he added hastily.

“That won’t be necessary,” Chris said, thinking to himself that Holly McCay didn’t deserve in-laws as caring as the McCays obviously were. “I won’t even take a fee for this one—just cover the expenses and we’ll be square. But I’ll find your daughter-in-law and your grandsons for you, Mr. and Mrs. McCay. You can take that to the bank.”

Evalinda McCay unbent enough to smile at Chris with approval. “You’re a good man, Mr. Colton. I knew we were doing the right thing contacting you.” Her smile faded. “When you find Holly, please don’t tell her anything. She might take the boys and disappear. Again. No, I think it’s better if you just let us know where she is and we’ll take it from there. If we can just see her...talk to her...if she can see us with our grandsons...she can’t be that hard-hearted to keep us away when she knows how much Grant’s boys mean to us.”

Chris nodded. “Yes, ma’am.” He wasn’t convinced Mrs. McCay was right, but he wasn’t going to say so. If Holly McCay had fled right before Christmas, taking her twins—and their money—with her, she definitely could be hard-hearted enough to prevent the McCays from being a part of her sons’ lives. It’s all about the money for her, he thought cynically. Just like my foster parents. It’s all about the money.

* * *

Holly McCay pulled up in front of her friend Peg Merrill’s house, parked and turned off the engine. But she didn’t get out right away. She adjusted the rearview mirror of her small Ford SUV with one hand and tugged her dark-haired pixie-cut wig more securely into place with the other. She hated the wig, even though she’d repeatedly told herself it was a necessity. It was already too warm for comfort, and it was only the first day of May. What would she do when the north Texas heat and humidity blasted her in July?

Ian and Jamie hated the wig, too, because it confused them. Just like the other disguises she’d donned had confused them before they came to Rosewood. Her eighteen-month-old twin toddlers were too young to put their emotions into words, but Ian had started acting out recently, refusing to put away his toys or eat the food on his plate without coaxing. Even his favorite mashed potatoes—which he called “smashed ’tatoes”—didn’t seem to tempt him.

And Jamie had begun clinging in a way he never had before. Almost as if he was afraid his mother would disappear from his life. He didn’t even want her to leave him with Ian to play with Peg Merrill’s kids while she went grocery shopping in nearby Granite Gulch—and Jamie loved playing with Peg’s children. Until a month ago he’d never been the clinging type.

Holly sighed softly. If only, she told herself for the umpteenth time. If only Grant hadn’t died. If only he hadn’t left all his money to their twin boys in an unbreakable trust, but instead had made provision for his parents. If only Grant’s parents weren’t so...so mercenary.

Not just mercenary, Holly reminded herself, shivering a little even though it was a warm spring day. Deadly.

She gave herself a little shake. “Don’t think about that now,” she muttered under her breath, doing her best Scarlett O’Hara imitation. She pasted a smile on her face and glanced at the mirror again to reassure herself she presented a normal appearance. Ian and Jamie didn’t need a mother who was always looking over one shoulder. Who was paranoid that somehow the McCays had tracked her down to— Stop that! she insisted. You’re not going to worry about that itch between your shoulder blades... Not today.

She was going to have to worry about it soon, though. And make some hard choices. If she packed up Ian and Jamie and everything they owned—which wasn’t all that much, just what would fit into her small SUV—and moved away from their temporary home in Rosewood, she’d be on her own again. No Peg to help her by watching the twins while she ran errands, like grocery shopping or driving the forty miles into Fort Worth—or the seventy-plus miles into Dallas—to withdraw cash from one of the branch banks there.

But it wasn’t just Peg’s help with Ian and Jamie she’d miss. Peg was like the older sister Holly had always dreamed of, and she would miss that...a lot. Besides, what would she tell Peg? She couldn’t just disappear without a word, could she? Peg would worry, and it wouldn’t be right to do that to her friend. Especially since the Alphabet Killer had everyone in Granite Gulch and the surrounding towns terrified.

Holly sighed deeply, gave one last tug to her wig, then scooped up her purse and headed for Peg’s house.

* * *

Down the street, Chris sat slumped in the seat of his white Ford F-150 pickup truck, parked two houses away beneath the shade of a flowering catalpa tree. He watched Holly McCay walk up the driveway, skirt Peg’s SUV parked there and make for the front door. The male in him noted her slender but shapely figure in jeans that lovingly hugged her curves, and her graceful, swaying walk. The PI in him ignored both—or tried to.

He shook his head softly, forcing himself to think of something other than the way Holly McCay looked. It’s a good thing she isn’t a professional criminal, he thought instead, because she’s lousy at it.

Oh, she’d done her best to avoid detection, he’d give her that. The short dark-haired wig she was wearing was an effective disguise of sorts. And she’d paid cash for everything—there’d been no paper trail of credit or debit purchases to follow. No checks written, either. But she’d transferred a large sum of money from her bank in Clear Lake City south of Houston to the Cattleman’s Bank of Fort Worth, where she’d opened a new account when she moved to the Dallas–Fort Worth area. That had left a paper trail she hadn’t been able to avoid, since she’d used her own driver’s license and social security number. That was how the McCays had tracked her this far.

True, she’d varied the bank branches she’d used to withdraw funds, so no one could stake out one branch and wait for her to show up. That showed she was smart. But she’d slipped up by withdrawing cash from the Granite Gulch branch. Yeah, she’d done it only once, but it stood out in neon letters, since it was out of the pattern—all the other branches had been in Fort Worth or Dallas. And once Chris had known that, he’d searched Granite Gulch and the surrounding area for a woman with twin toddlers who’d recently moved in. No matter what color her hair was, no matter how much she tried to fade into obscurity, everyone remembered the twins. Especially eighteen-month-old identical twin boys as cute as buttons.

And Holly McCay was still driving her Ford Escape with its original Texas license plate tags registered in her name. Duh! Once he’d located a woman with twins in Rosewood, the next town over from Granite Gulch, he’d staked out the Rosewood Rooming House, where by all accounts she lived, and bingo! There was her Ford SUV with those incriminating tags.

She was registered at the rooming house using her real name, too, which had made confirmation a piece of cake. He’d almost picked up the phone to call the McCays and tell them he’d located their daughter-in-law...but he hadn’t. He wasn’t sure why. Was it because a warning light had started blinking that very first day when they turned over everything they knew about Holly’s banking transactions? Information they shouldn’t have had access to...but somehow had?

Or maybe it was the self-satisfied expression on Evalinda McCay’s face when she thought Chris wouldn’t see it, when he’d been perusing the financial reports they’d handed him and he’d glanced up unexpectedly. The expression had been wiped away almost instantly, replaced with the look of worried concern she’d worn earlier. But Chris’s instincts—which he trusted—had gone on the alert.

He’d been a private investigator for nine years, ever since he’d received his bachelor of arts degree in criminology and criminal justice from the University of Texas at Arlington. From day one he’d trusted his instincts, and they’d never steered him wrong. Only an idiot would go against his instincts in his line of work, and for all his laid-back, seemingly good-old-Texas-boy persona, Chris wasn’t an idiot.

He’d also run a credit check on the McCays the same day they’d come to see him—standard procedure for all his clients these days. He never took anyone’s word they had the wherewithal to pay him—he’d been burned once early in his career and had learned a hard lesson. The credit report on the McCays had come back with some troubling red flags. They were living beyond their means. Way beyond their means, and had done so for years, despite Angus McCay’s well-paying job as a bank president down in Houston. Even though Chris was taking this case pro bono and wouldn’t be paid except for expenses, that credit report had given him pause.

Now he was glad he hadn’t called the McCays for several reasons, not the least of which was that he knew Peg Merrill, had known her all his life. If she and Holly were friends, then Holly couldn’t be the woman the McCays had made her out to be. Peg had an unerring BS meter—she’d nailed Chris on a few things over the years—which meant Holly couldn’t have fooled Peg about the kind of woman she was. To top it off, Peg reigned supreme in one area in particular—motherhood. The worst insult in her book was to call someone a bad mother. No way would she be friends with a woman who was a bad mother.

Besides, Peg was his sister-in-law. Former sister-in-law, really, since Laura was dead. But he wasn’t going there. Not now. Sister-in-law or not, Chris didn’t want to be on Peg’s bad side. Especially not on a pro bono case he’d already been having second thoughts about.

* * *

Chris waited until Holly McCay strapped her twins into their car seats and drove away before he got out of his truck. He shrugged on his blazer to hide his shoulder holster, then settled his black Stetson on his head and ambled toward Peg’s house, determined to find out whatever he could about Holly McCay from Peg.

“Chris!” Peg exclaimed when she opened the door. “This is a surprise. Come on in.”

“Unca Chris!” Peg’s two-year-old daughter, Susan, made a beeline for Chris when he stepped inside, and he bent over to swing her up into his arms. A cacophony of barking from three dogs—one of which had been Chris’s gift to Laura not long before she died—prevented anyone from being heard for a couple of minutes, but eventually Peg’s two dogs subsided back to their rug in front of the fireplace in the family room.

Chris settled into one of the oversize recliners, still cuddling Susan against his shoulder while his other hand ruffled Wally’s fur. “Hey, boy,” he murmured, gazing down at the golden retriever Laura had adored. If his heart hadn’t already been broken when Laura died, it would have broken at losing Wally, too. Chris had given Laura the puppy thinking they’d soon be moving from their apartment into a house with a large fenced yard. But that dream house sat vacant now—Chris couldn’t bear to live there without Laura. And an apartment was no place for a growing dog, especially since Chris was rarely home. So when Peg and her husband, Joe, volunteered to adopt Wally, Chris had reluctantly accepted their offer. At least he’d still get to see Wally, he’d reasoned at the time—he was always welcome at the Merrill house.

Chris and Peg chatted about nothing much for a few minutes. About Bobby, Peg’s napping one-year-old son, who was already starting to walk. About Joe’s thriving gardening center in Granite Gulch, the Green and Grow. About Chris’s highly successful private investigation business—which he’d thrown himself into even more thoroughly after Laura’s death—and the fourth office he’d nearly decided to add in Arlington.

When Susan’s eyelids began fluttering, Peg reached to take her daughter from Chris, but he forestalled her. “I’ll put her down for her nap,” he told Peg, doing just that. When he came back, Peg handed him a frosty glass of iced tea prepared the way he preferred it, with two lemon wedges, not just one.

They’d just settled back into their spots in the family room, Wally at Chris’s feet, when Peg put her own glass of iced tea down on a coaster on the end table and said, “So what’s wrong?” She didn’t give Chris a chance to answer before she continued, “I didn’t want to say anything in front of Susan—you would not believe how much she understands already. I told Joe he needed to watch his language now that Susan is so aware—and she mimics everything he says...especially the bad words.” Chris laughed, and Peg said, “But something’s up. You wouldn’t be here in the middle of the week, in the middle of the afternoon, if something wasn’t wrong.”

Chris shook his head and smiled wryly. “You must have second sight or something.” He hesitated, considering and then discarding his original idea of pumping Peg for info about Holly McCay on the sly. “The woman who was here a little while ago—”

“Holly?” Peg’s surprise was obvious.

“Yeah. Holly McCay. I’ve been hired by her in-laws to find her.”