Hard Rain. B.J. Daniels

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СКАЧАТЬ thought Mother was involved with this group?”

      “Apparently. She hired the PI to find out something about Mother’s college years, in particular, the late seventies.”

      Ainsley was quiet for a long moment. “That is odd.”

      “I can’t believe we didn’t hear something about this.”

      “There must not have been anything to it,” Ainsley said. “So, was it nice seeing Brody again?”

      * * *

      SARAH HEARD SOMETHING in Buck’s voice when he called to tell her he’d already heard the news about Maggie McTavish. She braced herself. With the primaries coming up, she knew the kind of stress he was under. He didn’t need this. Worse, he didn’t have anyone he could lean on in DC.

      She couldn’t be with him and that worried her. The problem was that she knew Buck only too well. He was already having second thoughts about his run for president. With this latest news, he would start having even more doubts. He could still pull out before the primaries. She couldn’t let that happen. Somehow, she had to give him the strength to continue, because she knew how much the country needed him. And how much he needed this, even if he was starting to question it.

      “I’m flying in tomorrow morning. Meet me at the airport,” he said to her surprise. “It will give us extra time to talk. I can’t stay away long.”

      “I thought you were in meetings with your advisers for the next few days?” That he wanted her to meet him at the airport was odd. He always left his SUV at the airport. Unlike a lot of politicians, he didn’t have a staff car or hire limos to take him places. He drove himself because, at heart, he was a Montana rancher. No private jet. No driver. No expenses that would raise eyebrows from his constituents.

      “What’s this about a body Harper found on the ranch? I assume that’s why you called me earlier.”

      “I didn’t want to upset you and since there is nothing you can do here—”

      Buck swore. “Frank says the remains are Maggie McTavish’s. He wants to question the two of us in connection with murder.”

      Something hard and cold settled in her stomach. “Question us? About what?”

      “What the hell do you think?” he snapped. “I knew all this was going to come back someday and bite me in the ass, but I never expected this. Pick me up at the airport. We need to get our stories straight before we meet with the sheriff.”

      * * *

      BRODY HAD HEARD his father’s pickup engine rev and knew he was on his way over to his brother’s place to give him the news. He’d hurried around the shop building, but he was too late. He realized as he saw his father racing toward his brother’s house that if he needed him to come along, he would have asked him.

      Of course, Finn would want to tell his brother the news alone. Brody couldn’t bear the thought of how his uncle was going to take it. From what his father had told him, Maggie had been Flannigan’s pride and joy. This news would break the old man’s heart—as if Maggie hadn’t done that when she was alive.

      He hurried to his pickup. What would happen now? He hated to think. But he needed to talk to his dad and uncle. It wouldn’t be long before the news was all over the county. He needed to know what they were going to do about getting Maggie justice.

      His uncle and dad had started the ranch, but their hearts had always been in the blacksmithing part of the operation. When he turned twenty-one he’d taken over the ranching and farming. They’d both been at the age where they were happy to hand over the reins. He had tried to make their lives easier, since both of them had worked hard their whole lives.

      Now as he drove down the road toward his uncle’s place, he wished there was a way to spare them what was coming. Turning into his uncle’s place, he passed the sheriff and drove a little faster, worried.

      As he pulled up in front of his uncle’s house, he spotted his father sitting on the porch alone. “What’s going on?” Brody asked as he joined him. His uncle was nowhere in sight. Brody felt his heart lodge in his throat as he saw his father’s expression. “Is he all right?”

      “The sheriff was here,” Finn McTavish said. While only in his midsixties, he looked older suddenly, his face drawn and haggard. “He told your uncle that the body was Maggie’s and that it was now a murder investigation.”

      “Where is he now?” Brody asked, thinking he shouldn’t be alone.

      “Inside the house.”

      He started in that direction but his father stopped him.

      “Leave him be. He’ll come out when he’s ready,” Finn said.

      “The sheriff... So it’s Maggie, just as I’d feared.” He’d grown up wanting to believe that the beautiful cousin he’d never known had run away to make a better life for herself. He’d actually looked for her in late-night movies since from the photographs he’d seen of her, she was so striking that she could have been an actress or a model. She could have been a lot of things.

      A wave of nausea washed over him. He’d heard stories about his cousin since he was a boy. In fact, his first fistfight in grade school had been over what Billy Loring said his father had said about her. At that time, he’d never seen more than photos of her that his uncle kept on the mantel, but she was family and family was worth defending even if Billy Loring was older, bigger and stronger.

      “When Harper and I found her horse... The rain had washed the wooden box down the hillside. She was buried on Hamilton Ranch, just yards from our land,” Brody said, and turned as the screen door was flung open and his uncle stepped out. Flannigan McTavish looked as if all the air had been knocked out of him.

      “Uncle Flan—”

      “I don’t want to hear another word about my Maggie.” His uncle’s green eyes flashed with anger. “Nor do I ever want to hear you’ve been with that Hamilton girl.”

      With that, he descended the porch steps and walked across the yard toward the shop.

      “Let him go,” his father said. “You heard him. He needs to grieve in his own way.”

      Growing up, neither his father nor his uncle had liked to talk about Maggie, but when pushed, his father had told him that Flannigan had doted on his only daughter and “that was part of the problem.”

      “Nor does he want to hear about Harper, it seems,” Brody said, realizing that he’d known this would be the case. “Don’t you think I heard the rumors growing up about Maggie and JD Hamilton? But even if it’s true and JD killed her, it’s no reason to hold it against the rest of the Hamiltons.”

      His father looked toward the shop. Flannigan had stopped and turned to look back at them. Brody saw the two men exchange a glance.

      “Or is there another reason the two of you don’t want me with Harper?” he asked.

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