Sherryl Woods - Courting the Enemy

If discovering that she had feelings for Grady had surprised her, if the depth of her desire for him had startled her, then the discovery that she trusted him was the most shocking thing of all. Feelings-lust-had nothing to do with common sense or logic. They were matters of the heart.

But trust, especially when it involved an old enemy, required more. It meant that both her heart and her head had examined the facts and found Grady Blackhawk trustworthy.

But what if you’re wrong? a tiny voice in her head demanded. What if Grady is simply sneakier and more clever than you ever imagined?

Then she would pay a terrible price in guilt and self-recriminations, she concluded. But it was her decision to make, not the Hansons’, not even Caleb’s.

And the bottom line was that she had learned to trust her instincts where Grady was concerned. He might want her ranch, but he was not the one out to hurt her.

Someone was, though, and she intended to find out who.

Though the prospect was very distasteful to her, Karen called Caleb’s parents in Arizona first thing in the morning. They knew more about the old feud between the Oldhams and the Hansons than she did. They also knew more about the high hopes Maggie Fletcher had had where Caleb was concerned.

When Caleb’s father answered the phone, she couldn’t hide her relief. He would give her straight, thoughtful answers, not a diatribe against Grady, which was all she could have expected from Mrs. Hanson.

“This is old news, but I assume you’ve got a reason for asking about it,” Carl Hanson said.

“There’s been another incident,” Karen told him. “The fence along the highway was deliberately cut this week.”

“That’s a pretty obvious place for a person who wanted to do any real damage, don’t you think? You were bound to spot the problem.”

That hadn’t occurred to Karen before, but he was right. Anyone hoping to cause a serious loss of her herd would have cut the fence in some place less likely to be discovered until it was too late.

“What do you think that means? Was it just a warning?”

“Or maybe some kids up to mischief,” he suggested.

“If this was the only thing, maybe,” she said thoughtfully. “But coupled with the incidents in the past, I don’t think so.”

“Could have been it was meant to throw suspicion on Grady, so they wanted you to find it right off,” he said.

“That makes sense,” she agreed. “But who would gain anything by that? Has anyone else ever expressed interest in buying the ranch? Are the Oldhams in any position to buy it to protect the water rights?”

“Not unless they’ve had a sudden windfall,” he said. “Besides, that agreement worked out years ago is airtight. They don’t have anything to worry about.”

“What about Maggie Fletcher?” Karen asked reluctantly.

Caleb’s father sighed. “Ah, yes, Maggie. Now there’s a sad situation. Her father was expecting her to pair up with Caleb. He wanted to see the two ranches joined. I don’t know which of them was more disappointed when Caleb chose you. I know her father blamed her, told her she wasn’t woman enough to catch Caleb. I always thought the way he treated her was downright cruel.”

“Would she hate me enough to try to ruin the ranch?”

“She wouldn’t, but that father of hers is another story. I wouldn’t put anything past Jack Fletcher. I told Caleb to keep an eye on him when those last incidents took place, but you know my son. He didn’t want to believe it. More likely, he just wanted to believe Grady was behind it.”

This wasn’t the first time that Karen had gotten the feeling that the animosity between Caleb and Grady ran deeper than one man’s desire to own land belonging to the other.

“Was there more going on between Caleb and Grady than I know about?” she asked.

Mr. Hanson hesitated. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“The feelings and bitterness seemed to run awfully deep, at least on Caleb’s part. Was it just about the ranch?”

“The ranch is the only thing I know about,” Caleb’s father insisted, but something in his voice suggested he was holding back.

That false note lingered in her head long after she’d hung up the phone. When Grady arrived, she poured him a cup of coffee before he could protest, then gestured toward a chair.

“I need to get to the bottom of something,” she said as he regarded her warily.

“Okay.”

“How well did you and Caleb know each other?”

“We didn’t,” Grady said tersely.

“Oh, come on. You must have. I know you contacted him more than once about buying the ranch.”

“That doesn’t mean I knew him, just that I had my lawyer make repeated inquiries.”

She regarded him skeptically. “You never even met?”

“Never.”

“But he hated you,” she said. “Hate that deep doesn’t come from some intellectual dispute over a piece of land.”

“Some people are passionate about what’s theirs,” Grady countered.

She studied him intently. “There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there? You’re as tight-lipped about this as Carl Hanson.”

He regarded her with surprise but not dismay. “You asked him about this?”

“Just this morning. He wouldn’t answer me, either.”

“No, I imagine he wouldn’t,” Grady said, his expression wry.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Can’t you drop this? It’s not important. If Caleb had wanted you to know, he would have shared it with you. The same with Carl.”

“Well, you’re here and they’re not,” she said with a hint of exasperation. “Tell me, Grady. Why did my husband have it in for you? Why was he so determined that you not get this land?”

“That’s easy,” he said, though he didn’t meet her gaze. “Because it was his and he was possessive.”

“You’re talking about the land, but it went beyond that. I can see it in your eyes.”

“You’re imagining things.”

Karen lost patience. “Dammit, Grady, tell me. Was it about a woman? Did you and Caleb fight over some woman?”

Grady sighed heavily. “Not the way you mean,” he said finally. “And it wasn’t me.”

“You’re talking in riddles,” she accused.

His lips curved slightly at that. “Apparently it’s a family trait. My grandfather does that, too, when he doesn’t want to answer a question.”

“Well, I intend to keep coming back to this one until you give me a straight answer,” she said. “So why not get it over with?”

“Okay,” he said with obvious reluctance. “This was about my father and Anna Hanson.”

Stunned, Karen stared at him. “Caleb’s mother?”

He nodded.

“But how? When? Before she married Carl?”

“No, unfortunately, it was much later. They almost ran off together.”

Karen couldn’t seem to take it in. “Anna Hanson almost abandoned her family to run away with your father?”

“They would have left, if my father hadn’t been killed in an accident on his way to get her. He was late because he had stopped to try to explain to me why he wouldn’t be home. She blamed me for his death. It’s irrational, I know, but she couldn’t blame herself.”

“My God,” Karen whispered. “And Caleb knew?”

Grady nodded. “He knew. He’d seen them together, and he found her bags packed on the night of the accident.”

“What about Carl?”

“He knew as well, but he acted as if nothing had happened. For the sake of his pride, I suppose, he pretended that Anna had never had any intention of going anywhere with my father. He and Anna just went along with their marriage.”

Karen thought about her husband, about the occasional dark looks he had cast at his mother, about the tension that sometimes flared between him and his father. He’d never been able to bring himself to blame either of them for the choices they had made back then, and Charlie Blackhawk was dead, so he had blamed Grady, instead. All of that anger and hurt had been directed at the only person who’d been as innocent of blame as Caleb himself had been.