By Wednesday, Drew was seriously considering marriage counseling. Since their drive home Sunday night, Kristy hadn’t said more than ten words to him. Most of the time, they were like two strangers passing in the night.
She left for the office before he got out of the shower in the morning and spent her evenings working overtime or at the gym. Tonight, she’d locked herself in their home office.
He’d grilled a couple of steaks in hopes that at least the smell would lure her out and they could talk. But she’d emerged only long enough to make a plate and go back to her computer. Sullen, he’d moved to the den and turned up ESPN as loud as his ears could take it. Not a proud moment, but he couldn’t think of any other way to grab her attention.
Before Hope had gone missing, he and Emily had rarely fought. And when they did it was always about something minor. He hadn’t taken out the trash. She didn’t stand up enough to her mother. The usual things that husbands and wives squabbled about.
After the abduction, everything changed. He and Emily had become so despondent they were barely recognizable to each other. Emily, who’d been with Hope the day the Lanes stole her, had blamed herself, and Drew hadn’t been able to handle her self-incrimination.
After the divorce, Emily agreed to sell their home, the home where Hope had been snatched from the yard. Emily had been steeped in so much grief there that she was slowly dying. On a whim, she’d moved to Nugget, a place neither of them had ever heard of, met Clay, and fell in love. From what Drew could tell, they had a strong marriage, though he suspected that Clay was suffering from some of the same insecurities Kristy was. In a way, they were outsiders, looking in on a family that had been ripped apart by tragedy. And when Hope—the Lanes had renamed her Harper—had come back into their lives, their new spouses had to learn to assimilate as much as their little girl did.
At this point, he gave Emily and Clay’s marriage a better chance of surviving than his own. He turned down the TV and flipped through the channels. It was only eight, too early for the glut of CSI shows. The phone rang, and when Kristy didn’t pick up in the other room, he checked the caller ID and smiled.
“Hey, how’s my cowgirl?”
“You’ll never guess what!” Harper said, and didn’t wait for him to try. “Raylene is keeping her horse, Gunner, at Sierra Heights. Technically, she’s not allowed to because she doesn’t live there, but Griffin Parks said she could, as his guest. And guess what else?”
“I give up.”
“She wants to hire me to take care of him.”
“Oh yeah?” It seemed like a big job for a thirteen-year-old, but Drew didn’t know much about horses. “What does your mom think about that?”
There was a long stretch of silence, which told Drew everything he needed to know. “Harp?”
“She and Clay don’t want me to. But Justin said he’d give me rides back and forth and, Dad, she’s going to pay me fifty bucks a week just for feeding and watering him. Once a week I have to muck out his stall. Can you believe it?”
Drew chuckled. It was nice to hear his daughter so enthusiastic for a change. Her moods were as mercurial as Northern California’s weather. The counselors said some of it was puberty, but a lot of it they attributed to her adjusting to a new life.
“Sounds like a good gig.” He felt a little disloyal to Emily saying that, but what would be the harm? “How come your mom and Clay don’t want you to do it?”
“You know how they are.” He could practically see her rolling her eyes. “They think it’ll interfere with my schoolwork and my chores on the ranch. Silly, right?”
“I don’t know, Harp. Your mom’s pretty smart about these things.” He didn’t want to go against Emily’s rules, but at the same time, he thought the responsibility would be good for their daughter.
“Will you talk to her? Please.”
He didn’t want Harper to get into the habit of running to him every time Emily said no. Yet Kristy’s words rang in his head.
Don’t suffocate her; let her be a thirteen-year-old, and let her pick her own idols.
“I’ll talk to her and Clay,” he finally said. “But, Harper, don’t get your hopes up. When you’re with Mom and Clay, it’s their rules.”
“That’s not fair. What about when I’m with you? Can I do it on the weekends?”
He needed to know more about this Raylene woman before he signed on to anything. Emily didn’t like her, and he trusted his ex’s instincts. “We’ll see. How was school today?”
“Good. It was pizza day. Cody ate four slices and threw up on Katie Rodriguez’s backpack. It was seriously gross.”
“Sounds like it. Is he okay?”
“He’s fine. Mom gave him ginger ale when he got home and Clay still made him do his chores. Are you coming up Friday?”
He wanted to. It was hard going five days without seeing his daughter. But a lot would depend on Kristy and what she wanted to do, since it meant telecommuting for work. It was hard to know when they weren’t communicating with each other.
“I’m planning to,” he said. “Just have to check with the boss.”
“Will you talk to Mom and Clay in the meantime? I’ve got to give Raylene an answer soon or she’ll have to find someone else.”
“You bet. But, Harper, remember what I said. You’re not going to play us against each other, got it?”
“Yeah.” She dragged the word out like it was tremendously taxing to agree, which made him chuckle to himself.
“You do your homework?”
“Yes. Justin helped me with my math, and we’re dissecting a frog in science. I’m lab partners with Sam Shepard. He’s totally annoying.”
“Totally annoying, huh? I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s okay. He’s a good lab partner, at least.”
“That’s important. I’m looking forward to seeing you this weekend. What do you think of checking out Glory Junction? It’s a cute town, and Kristy’s never been.”
“Whatever,” she said. “Call me when you get here. I want to visit Gunner at the stable.”
“Will do. Night, sweetheart, sleep tight.”
After signing off, he texted Emily to call him when she got a chance and went to check on Kristy. It was high time they had it out.
* * * *
Gabe leaned against the stall door and watched Raylene fawn over her horse like the two were long-lost lovers. If he wasn’t so conflicted about her, he’d be jealous. After the scene with Lucky on Monday, she’d made herself scarce. He didn’t like her staying alone in the farmhouse at night, so he’d been sleeping on Logan’s couch. There’d been no invitation otherwise, and it was best to keep it that way, though he’d be lying if he said she didn’t tempt him beyond belief. The last three evenings, they’d eaten wedding leftovers together, watched a little TV, and then she’d go up to bed, leaving him to toss and turn on the sofa.
She was still looking for that goddamned gold, and it really did seem that she wasn’t leaving without it. He hadn’t asked her whether her property was in escrow yet, but the scuttlebutt around town was Moto Entertainment was moving in. According to Owen, citizens were planning to pack the next city council meeting to fight the motocross track.
“It’ll be a damned public nuisance,” Owen had said. “That land should be zoned for agricultural use only. But that Ray Rosser was a slick one. He always knew how to get around the rules.”
Gabe was trying to remain neutral. Raylene had given Lucky and the rest of them an opportunity to buy the land at fair market value, and it did seem unrealistic of them to expect her to hold out for a buyer they deemed acceptable. At the same time…a freaking racetrack?
He gazed around the barn, a new addition to Sierra Heights to appeal to potential buyers who wanted the security and convenience of a gated community and the cache of horse property. In the last year, the real estate market had boomed, and folks priced out of Glory Junction and the other Sierra ski resort towns had found Nugget. Though they were thirty minutes from the slopes, the area had rivers and lakes and enough nature to make weekend warriors happy. Griffin was finally selling houses in the white elephant subdivision he’d bought from bankrupt developers as an investment.
The barn, a traditional gambrel style with a symmetrical two-sided roof and an open center loft, had more than a dozen stalls that opened to a large corral. Everything was freshly painted gray, and there was even a bathroom for humans. Gabe didn’t know much about stables, but he thought this was a pretty nice one. Raylene seemed pleased with it. Then again, beggars couldn’t be choosers.
Unfortunately, Weezer hadn’t been able to stay for a visit. He’d dropped off the horse the day before, returned the trailer in Reno, and caught a flight out. Gabe would’ve liked time to have caught up with his old SEAL buddy.
“This gonna work?” Gabe asked.
“Are you kidding?” Raylene glanced around the barn. “It’s fantastic. I’m hoping Harper comes through.”
Raylene had seen the kid in town with her stepbrothers and had offered her the job on the spot.
“I guess once you get old Gunner here settled in you’ll be taking off.” Gabe scratched the horse’s nose.
“That’s the plan. Just have to find my gold.” She flashed him a tight smile as if to say: You might not think it exists, but I know it does.
“Happy hunting.” He wasn’t going to get into it with her. If she wanted to waste her days digging in the dirt, far be it from him to stop her.
Outside, he heard a truck pull up and a door slam, then boots crunching gravel. A few seconds later, Clay came through the barn doors.
“I want to talk to you.” He jabbed his finger in the air.
“I’m here.” Raylene opened Gunner’s stall, walked to the center of the barn, and put her hands on her hips. “Talk.”
“If your old man knew what you were doing he’d roll over in his grave. Even he wouldn’t have sold that land for a motorcycle park, and Ray always put business first. Everyone knows you’re a spoiled brat, leaving a trail of destruction wherever you go. But this, even for you, is beyond the pale.” Clay reached under his cowboy hat and scrubbed his hand through his hair. “The one thing I thought we had in common was love for this land…for our ancestors and for the legacy they left us. Guess I was wrong.”
He started to walk away when Raylene said, “Make me an offer. Like I told Lucky, I’ll sell it to you for the same price. It’s good, fertile land. Good grazing for cattle.”
Clay turned and glared at her. “If I could afford it I would, for no other reason than to get you out of here.”
“You won’t have to wait long for that,” she spat. “But I think you have a hell of a nerve. You don’t know my situation, you don’t know anything about me, yet you think you have the right to decide who can purchase my property and who can’t. Just like you can’t afford to buy it, I can’t afford not to sell it. Yet according to you, I’m the one in the wrong. Three words, Clay: Get. A. Loan.”
Gabe continued to lean against the stall, watching the match. So far, he’d say Raylene was winning, though Clay had lobbed some doozies. But Gabe pushed off the wall when Clay started coming toward Raylene.
“Let’s keep this civil, folks,” he said, and moved to Raylene’s side. Gabe didn’t think Clay would pick his hands up to a woman, but he could see steam coming out of Clay’s ears.
Clay shot him a look, then did an about-face and walked out.
“Making friends and influencing people, aren’t you, Ray?” He watched all her earlier confidence dissipate like a puff of smoke.
“I wouldn’t do it…I wouldn’t sell unless I had to.”
“How broke are you, really?” He was starting to think she hadn’t been exaggerating her money situation.
“Exactly what I told you before.”
“How can that be, Raylene? I know what Logan got when your dad died.”
She nodded. “First thing Butch did when I got my money was buy hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of equipment for his ranch. Guess who isn’t listed as one of the owners of said ranch?”
“Where was your lawyer in all this?”
“He fought for me. He fought hard, and when everything was hashed out in court I owed him more money than Butch had stolen from me.” She let out a breath. “And the sad truth is I’ve always been bad with finances, because when I ran out of cash there was always more…from Daddy…even begrudgingly from Butch. I used to call it hush money, to overlook his infidelities…his abuse. After moving out of our Denver house and racking up an enormous bill at the Four Seasons, I rented a beach home in Santa Monica for twenty-thousand dollars a month.” When Gabe did a double take because he wasn’t sure he heard her right, she rationalized, “It was built for a silent film star.”
“Oh, well in that case…”
“I thought nothing of spending three hundred dollars on a pair of jeans or eating at Urasawa,” she continued. “In one month, I bought a new truck and a Mercedes Roadster. The next, I booked a week at a spa in San Diego. Then one morning I woke up and there was no more money and no one to tap for a loan.”
“Did you tell Logan?”
“No, and if you do I will kill you in your sleep.”
He sat on a bench near the tack room, trying to comprehend how someone could be that irresponsible…that extravagant. “You’re telling me you pissed through your entire inheritance?”
“Yes, though there wasn’t much left of it after Butch got through with me. The only thing he wasn’t able to get his grubby dukes on was the land. In exchange, he got a lot of other stuff.”
Gabe was guessing that the other stuff was even more valuable than the land and that, unlike Raylene, Butch knew the legend of the gold was bullshit.
“What about the Mercedes? Can you sell it?”
“Repossessed.”
“But you’re out of the beach house, right?”
“It’s a lease.” She sat next to him and huffed out a breath. “I’ve got two more months on it.”
It just kept getting better. “Will selling your land cover you until you can make some money?”
She didn’t answer, letting the silence stretch until he couldn’t take it anymore. “Raylene?”
“Sort of, except I kind of promised some of the proceeds to Lucy’s House.”
“How much?” She really was batshit crazy.
“Half. But it won’t matter, because when I find the gold—”
“There’s no fucking gold, Raylene. Did you cut a deal with these Moto Entertainment people?” He didn’t think so, because if she had she wouldn’t have offered the land to Clay.
“Not yet.”
“What are you waiting for?”
More silence. Then finally, “I don’t want them to have it.”
He didn’t see that she had a choice, unless she moved in with Logan and Annie and lived off them until she got a job and patched her finances together. Raylene was the definition of a hot mess. And yet he couldn’t stop himself from trying to help her.