Warrior Son. Rita Herron

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      She struggled to recall the case the man she’d run into was talking about, then searched through her files. The fifth file she pulled had to be it.

      The murdered man’s name was Carlton Langer. He was twenty-five, just graduated from college and was traveling across country to sow his oats before he settled into a full-time job.

      She rubbed her forehead as she recalled the details of the case. Carlton had been brutally stabbed three times in the chest. The knife had sliced his aorta and he’d bled out immediately.

      Judging from the angle of the blade and the fact that the knife was missing, she’d had to rule it a homicide. She turned to her computer and pulled up the news reports that had followed the stabbing and noted that a man named Tad Hummings had been arrested the day after the brutal assault.

      According to the officer who arrested him, Hummings had been high on drugs and the murder weapon had been found in his house with his fingerprints on it. Later, when he’d come down off the drugs, he didn’t remember anything.

      She rubbed her temple. It sounded as if he’d blacked out. She read the drug tox screen. Cocaine.

      His brother Dale had hired a lawyer who’d argued that the drugs had caused Hummings’s erratic, violent behavior.

      But a man was still dead, and Tad Hummings was sent to prison.

      She closed the file. Dale Hummings blamed her, but she hadn’t made a mistake. His brother had. There was no question about Langer’s cause of death, either.

      Joe McCullen was a different story. She picked up the phone to call Howard and see if he’d finished that tox screen.

      * * *

      ROAN DROVE TOWARD the prison where Barbara had been incarcerated. He might be jumping the gun, but he’d always suspected she’d lied about setting the fires on Horseshoe Creek.

      A cigarette butt had been found in the ashes of the barn fire, the same brand she smoked.

      His phone buzzed. Maddox. “Deputy Whitefeather.”

      “I got a lead on Romley. He was spotted in Cheyenne. I’m on my way to check it out. You’re in charge.”

      Stan Romley worked for Gates and Arlis Bennett and had taken a job at Horseshoe Creek to spy on the McCullens.

      “I’ve got it covered,” Roan said, although he was thirty miles from town. But if anything came up, he’d rush back.

      “Call me if you need backup,” Roan said.

      Maddox agreed and hung up. Roan pulled up to the guard’s station and identified himself. The guard waved him through and he parked. The wind howled as he waited outside to enter, then it took him another ten minutes to clear security.

      Barbara had been placed in a minimum-security prison to serve out her year sentence for aggravated assault against the sheriff and against Scarlet Lovett. She’d cut the brake lines on the woman’s car, and Scarlet had nearly been killed when she crashed into the side of the social services building where she worked.

      Barbara had pled out to a lesser sentence and had to sign an agreement that she wouldn’t file for an appeal in return.

      He took a seat at the visitor’s station, and a guard escorted Barbara to a chair facing him through a Plexiglas partition. A seed of sympathy for her sprouted inside him—he knew the story. She and Joe McCullen had had an affair when Maddox and his brothers were children, and she’d gotten pregnant with Bobby.

      When Joe’s wife, Grace, had died in a car accident, Barbara had no doubt expected Joe to marry her. But that hadn’t happened. Her bitterness had festered. When Joe died, she’d hoped her son would inherit his share of Horseshoe Creek.

      Joe had included him in the will, but neither Barbara nor Bobby were satisfied.

      The woman looked pale and angry, her dyed blond hair now mixed with muddy brown. For a moment, she studied him, obviously wondering what his agenda was.

      She’d been volatile when she was arrested. Prison had drained the fight from her.

      He picked up the phone and waited until she did the same.

      “Ms. Lowman,” he began. “Thank you for seeing me.”

      She shrugged, her eyes fixed on him. “Didn’t realize I had a choice.”

      No, she was at the mercy of the justice system now. “How are you?”

      She frowned. “What? Like you care?”

      She was right. He didn’t really care. She’d tried to kill an innocent woman. Scarlet was one of the nicest people he’d ever met.

      “Why are you really here, Deputy?” Barbara asked.

      Roan narrowed his eyes. “I thought you might be ready to tell the truth about the fires at Horseshoe Creek. I could speak to the judge on your behalf and arrange an early parole if you confess.”

      Barbara’s sarcastic laugh echoed over the line. “Right. I confess to another crime and you’ll get me out of here earlier? What kind of fool do you think I am?”

      “I don’t think you’re a fool at all,” Roan said. “I think you resented Joe for not marrying you, especially after you waited for him all these years.”

      “Who said I waited for him?”

      “You never married.” He leaned closer to the Plexiglass. “Did you even date anyone else, Barbara? Or did you sit at home hoping he’d call?” He lowered his voice, taunting her. “Did you keep thinking that next month or next year he’d finally admit that he loved you and make you his wife?”

      Barbara’s nostrils flared. “How dare you.”

      “I understand your anger,” Roan continued. “You gave Joe a son just like Grace did, but her sons got to live on the big ranch. They got to have Joe’s name and grow up in the house with him. They got a real father. Yet McCullen kept you and Bobby on the side. Made you live in the shadows and take whatever little pieces he had left over from his real family.” He paused for effect. “He was ashamed of the two of you.”

      She lurched up, body shaking with fury. “You bastard. Joe loved me and Bobby.”

      “If he’d loved you, he would have introduced you to his sons. He would have married you.” Roan remained seated, his expression calm, his eyes scrutinizing her. “But he didn’t, and every day, every month, every year that went by, your bitterness grew. Then...what happened? Maybe you gave him an ultimatum, that you’d expose him to Maddox and Brett and Ray, if he didn’t marry you.”

      “That’s ridiculous,” Barbara said, although the guilt that flashed in her eyes indicated he’d hit the nail on the head.

      He raised a brow. “But he still refused. That must have torn you up inside.”

      Barbara sank into the chair again and looked down at the floor, her face wrenched in pain. “He felt guilty about his wife’s СКАЧАТЬ