“Wow. This is the property we’re supposedly interested in?” Cisco craned his neck back and looked up at the three-story historic brick mansion in the heart of Denver. “We have really good taste, you know that, Melody?”

“Shut up.” Melody made a face at him and stuck out her tongue.

Cisco could not help but laugh. She was such a funny character. There was absolutely no hint of insecurity in her about doing this. She had made the phone call, arranged the meeting, and had directed him to the location of this house all while using his smartphone’s GPS map. She was bold and brave, and he was really having a tough time reminding himself that they were nothing more than casual acquaintances.

Melody put her hands on her hips and stared up at the house. It was full of all of the old grace and charm that many high society houses in old Western towns were famous for. The front steps were narrow and plentiful. There were ancient trees on either side of the front walk, and the house itself sat up several feet off the main street level. The effect was of a castle on a hill overlooking the street below. The rest of the neighborhood was filled with the same old houses. Wealthy old families owned most of those homes, and Cisco was well acquainted with them all. In fact, this wasn’t his first visit to this street or this neighborhood. He liked it here and probably would eventually purchase a place not unlike this one.

“Wow.” Melody was whispering.

“We’re not in church,” he teased. “You can talk in a normal voice. It’s allowed.”

The sun was setting in the west, and the front windows of the big house looked diamond plated. “Look at this place. Are you sure it’s not a church? It looks pretty darn holy to me!”

“If it’s holy,” Cisco said drily, “then we need to ask for at least fifteen percent off the asking price. I mean”—he waggled his eyebrows at her—“a house full of holes is going to take some major repairs!”

Melody burst into laughter and smacked his shoulder. “You’re so funny. Ha. Ha!”

“Well, you must be the happy couple.”

Cisco turned to see a fairly short, very well-dressed woman heading up the sidewalk. She had parked on the street not far behind Cisco’s own car. She was draped in hammered silver and turquoise jewelry from the huge rings on her fingers to the earpieces of her glasses. Her clothing was top of the line, and she looked as though she were trying really hard to look successful.

“Yes.” Cisco offered his hand. “My name is Cisco. This is Melody.”

“I’m the one who called on the house.” Melody took the woman’s hand after she let go of Cisco’s. “I just love it. You know how men are. They’ll tell you when they hate something but not when it’s something they might consider.”

“Right.” The woman pursed her lips. “I’m Lolly Landry. I’m with Real Estate Brokers here in Denver.” Lolly was staring at Cisco as though she could not place him and it was driving her insane. “You know this house is in the million dollar price range.”

Ah. Now they had come to the crux of this situation. Cisco did not ever remember meeting a Lolly Landry before, but it wasn’t something he would be likely to forget between her overdone jewelry and the ridiculous name. Perhaps they needed to dispense with her hesitation and just cut straight through the bull.

Cisco cleared his throat. Beside him, he could tell that Melody wasn’t really sure what was going on. Cisco narrowed his gaze at Lolly Landry. “My name is Francisco Hernandez. You don’t need to tell me how much the house is. I already know. I know most of the houses on this block and most of them on the next block as well. I know the families. I know their histories. And I also see most of them socially. So, perhaps we can just get on with it?”

It was strange. They had come here under false pretenses. Hell. They had lured Lolly Landry here under false pretenses too! It wasn’t like he was really interested in this house. Well, not exactly. But at the same time, Cisco did not like the idea of this woman thinking that she could treat Melody like a leper because Lolly Landry could not place Melody in her mental database of Denver royalty.

“Well, then!” Lolly’s face lit up like a cash machine. “Shall we go inside?”

“Actually…” Melody began.

Cisco cut right past Melody’s words. “Yes. We should.”

Melody passed him a look of confusion, but Cisco had already decided that he wanted to go inside the house. He wanted to see it. He wanted to show it to her. And he didn’t really know why.

“Then, let’s go inside!” Lolly gushed. “The house is empty at the moment. The previous owners have moved to New York City, so they left the place nearly six months ago. It’s been vacant since then. I’ve told them again and again that I think they should stage it at least, but you know how people are…”

It was very apparent that Lolly did not require any responses to her verbal wanderings. Instead, she rattled on and on about the house’s history, about the school district, about the bus stop, and the proximity to downtown shopping amenities. In the meantime, Cisco laced his fingers with Melody’s and tugged her along in his wake as they entered the house and began to look around.

It was beautiful. There was no doubt about that. Cisco had always wanted a place like this. He liked the elegance and the connection to the old world and the history. The wood floors shone bright beneath antique Tiffany light fixtures that had probably come from the east by railroad. It was an incredibly well-kept home. The ceilings were tall. There were beautiful transom windows above them. And the sweeping central staircase with its elaborate newel posts. It reeked of money and influence and everything that had made Cisco want to go into law and not ranching.

Having Melody at his side somehow made this seem more attainable and even better. He could picture her with an apron around her waist as she made Christmas cookies in the well-appointed kitchen. There would be half a dozen little Hernandez kids running around with their wild black hair and blue eyes. The mental image was so powerful that he felt his heart swelling with pride at something that hadn’t even come to pass yet.

“So, what do you think?” Lolly Landry asked them.

Cisco opened his mouth to ask about the price, but Melody was way ahead of him. “It’s very nice, but I had a quick question for you first.”

“Oh, really?” Lolly raised her penciled-on eyebrows. “And what would that be?”

“Well, I have this ranch outside of Denver on the front range,” Melody explained in a tone of voice that seemed almost as though she were about to throw Lolly a huge windfall of business. “See, it was left to me by my grandparents.”

“Oh, honey!” Lolly patted Melody’s forearm. “You don’t want to live out there! It’s a nightmare of a commute. I know an investor though. He buys up land like that. Pays a really fair price too. I could put you in touch with him.”

“Oh, that sounds like Paul Weatherby,” Melody said with absolute mock sincerity. “He’s had someone calling me for like two weeks almost nonstop! It’s crazy! Because, I mean, Cisco and I have been talking about a house together. You know, but like I’m not really sure I want to sell my ranch because it’s no big deal to just lease the land. And there’s a nice little house on it and everything!” Melody rambled on and on about the ranch and this person who had been bugging her about a sale to Paul Weatherby.

Cisco had a tough time keeping a straight face when it came to Lolly Landry’s reaction. The woman’s giant-sized earrings were so still they looked as though they were about to pull her earlobes off. She was frozen in surprise and maybe more than a little bit of shock.

Cisco wasn’t about to let her get away with pretending nothing had happened either. “Ms. Landry. Do you know anything about Paul Weatherby’s interest in the Farrell ranch?”

“The Farrell ranch?” Landry squeaked. “Why would you think that?”

“Because you are the one who has been pestering the crap out of me!” Melody snapped. “That’s why. So, can you please at least tell me what you know about this situation? Because I’m getting screwed out of the deal, and let me tell you, Ms. Landry. That ain’t going to fly! If you want that land deal to have a prayer of going through, you’re going to have to be straight about it.”

Cisco gazed at the woman. The artificially bright lights inside the stately old home were not flattering to her over made up, over decorated image. He felt as though he were in court trying to work a particularly cagey witness who knew that she was caught but was still stubbornly hoping to get out of trouble without having to give away too much. That at least was easily manipulated.

“Ms. Landry,” Cisco murmured. “I know that I don’t have to prove to you that I could go to any one of these doors, knock, and find a friend or acquaintance on the other side. I know that I don’t have to remind you that my family owns a huge land company. We do real estate deals that would make you pee your pants in excitement.” Cisco paused to let that sink in. “I cannot imagine what that must mean to you to have a man like Paul Weatherby of the Flying W letting you try to put together land deals for him.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Landry snapped. “Weatherby is a police officer. He’s an honest man.”

“Oh, honey!” Melody shook her head. “Don’t lie to yourself. It isn’t at all becoming.”

“Weatherby is a snake,” Cisco said firmly. He pointed at Landry. “And if you don’t want to be tainted by that and everything else he’s up to, then you need to step away from this situation and save your own ass.”

Lolly Landry seemed to fold in on herself. “Weatherby has been leasing that land for years. He wants to buy it. There’s nothing wrong with that plan. The Farrells had no living children. There was nobody to take it over when they died. It’s just sitting there.” Then Landry stared at Melody. “And who are you to say you own it?”

“The Farrells’s granddaughter,” Melody said quietly. Her face was expressionless, but she folded her arms over her chest and glared at Landry. “And don’t pretend you didn’t know that. You did. That’s why you were approaching me. Watson told you that I needed to sign the papers in order to make the sale official.”

“Why wouldn’t you?” Landry burst out. She flung up her hands and spun a little circle right there in the elegant and very empty living room. “Why? It makes no sense! You’ll get a million dollars! Go start over somewhere. You don’t want that place anyway. It means nothing to you. Paul has five years of taking care of that place under his belt.”

“Yes, but if Paul was”—Melody used air quotes—“leasing the land, then the money he was or was not, and mind you we can’t actually get an answer on that, paying to Mr. Watson for that lease has been lost. It was never used to pay the taxes. So, the land is sitting in default, and pretty much every penny of that million dollars you’re bragging that I’ll get will be funneled back into the land. I’ll wind up owing money. Don’t you get it?”

Landry’s face went slack. In fact, Cisco had enough experience reading people to see that this woman was not part of any kind of fraud. She honestly believed that Melody was holding up the sale for no reason and that she would have gotten a huge chunk of change if she’d just sold the ranch to Weatherby. That meant if there was wrongdoing it was on the part of the estate lawyer and possibly Weatherby. Weatherby wouldn’t be honest about it, but he most certainly knew about the taxes.

“You must be joking.” Lolly Landry looked back and forth between Cisco and Melody as though she were following a tennis match. “You have to be joking. Paul said you would stand to inherit a lot of money.”

“I would,” Melody agreed. “I would just immediately owe it to the state. And believe me, he knows that. Because the other night he told us he was going to nudge the state into foreclosing because of the taxes.”

“That’s impossible,” Landry whispered. She covered her mouth with her hand. “Why would he do that?”

“He’s a lying snake,” Cisco snorted. “Or were you believing all of that crap he’s been spreading about the Hernandez family being the big bad family of Denver. How the Hernandez Land & Cattle Company is stealing land and cheating customers and running stolen livestock on their ranch? Do you honestly think that after almost two hundred years our family needs to cheat to be successful at business?”

“I—I”—obviously she had believed that—“I suppose I had never really thought about the possibility of Weatherby lying. He’s a law enforcement official. People generally believe that he knows things that the rest of us aren’t privy to and that is why he says the things that he does.”

“Exactly,” Cisco told her grimly. “People don’t look at his behavior because he’s a cop. They let that give him credibility when it’s actually what he’s using to lie through his teeth.”

Lolly Landry was looking pale and drawn. “I would like to leave now. I think we’re done here.”

Melody gave her a suspicious look of mistrust. “You’re going to run home and call Weatherby to tell him what we know. Aren’t you?”

“No.” Landry shook her head. “I’m running home to make sure I don’t have anything incriminating in my files!”

Cisco let her go. There was no point in trying to force her to give them anything more than she already had. For the moment, this lead had played out. It was time to look for something else.