Wanted Woman Page 12

  Maggie saw Jesse’s worried expression.

  “The actual kidnapper is dead,” he said, obviously hoping to put an end to any thought she might have of looking for the kidnapper. “He confessed.”

  “I read about that in the newspaper articles. The former Dennison Ducks production manager might have stolen me from my crib, but according to the paper he did it on someone else’s orders.”

  Jesse smiled. “I wouldn’t believe everything you read in the newspaper. Especially in Charity’s.”

  “Then you think the kidnapper has been caught?”

  He rubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw. He hadn’t shaved in at least forty-eight hours. “I didn’t say that.”

  She smiled, relieved he didn’t lie to her.

  “I’d agree that Bud Farnsworth wasn’t the mastermind behind it,” he continued. “I think the first step is to prove that you are Angela Dennison. You already have Wade’s DNA test results. I’ve checked and they can be compared to your DNA to determine if you’re his daughter, but then you will still need Daisy Dennison’s DNA to prove you are Angela.”

  She stared at him, surprised by something she’d heard in his voice. “You really do believe I’m Angela.”

  He nodded slowly as if he didn’t want to believe it.

  Maggie fought to hide her relief. Tears burned her eyes. Dammit, she would not cry. She’d let herself cry only that once in the tent, she wouldn’t cry now.

  But she hadn’t realized how badly she wanted this man to believe her. Needed him to. It validated the risks she’d been taking and so much more. This man who’d helped her that first night on the highway…there was something about him that had kept him in her thoughts ever since.

  And that worried her. Just as this feeling she had when she was around him that she was safe. He made it hard to remember that there was a formidable killer after her. She wasn’t safe. Would never be safe until Blackmore was behind bars.

  And now she’d put Jesse’s life in danger, as well.

  JESSE SAW a determined look come into her brown eyes.

  “I have to find the people responsible before they find me,” she said.

  “Now wait a minute—”

  “You were born here, right? You know these people. I was kidnapped here.” She was pacing again and talking fast. “How did Blackmore find me? Did he know this production manager who supposedly took me out of the house that night? And why kill me? It doesn’t make any sense to kill to cover up a twenty-seven-year-old kidnapping. But I have to find out.”

  “Yeah but hold on,” he said getting to his feet. “You start trying to get proof of who you are and asking a lot of questions and you’ll bring the killer right down on you. You need to go somewhere safe and stay there until I find out who is behind this.”

  “No way.” She was staring him down even though she had to look up to do it. He had her in height, girth and strength and yet he could see that she would take him on in a heartbeat if that’s what it took.

  “If you’re right, Blackmore has already killed three people and wounded you and he almost caught up to you last night,” he said trying to reason with her. “You can’t take the chance that next time he won’t miss.”

  “You’re right,” she said, throwing him off guard. “All I would be doing is waiting around for him to find me and kill me.”

  He told himself she’d given in too easily. There was a gleam in her brown eyes that he didn’t like.

  Before he could open his mouth, she said, “That’s why I’m going to announce to the world that I’m Angela Dennison—and I know the perfect place to do it.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Rozalyn Sawyer’s party?” Jesse exclaimed.

  “I saw the ad in the newspaper. Everyone in town is invited. It’s the perfect place to make my debut as Angela Dennison,” Maggie said leveling her gaze at him, daring him to try to stop her. “The Dennisons will be there, won’t they?”

  “The ones who aren’t in jail.”

  “Let’s start with them then,” she said as if it were a done deal.

  “You can’t be serious. No way.”

  Her eyes were shiny and bright, her jaw set in stubborn determination. “I’m a target no matter what I do. But once I announce that I’m Angela Dennison at this party one of two things will happen. Blackmore will get out of Dodge, figuring it’s over, there is nothing he can do now.”

  “Or he’ll kill you because then he will know where you are and how to get to you.”

  She smiled and nodded. “Exactly.”

  “And you think this is a good plan?”

  “Come on, you know I’m right.”

  “I know you’re suicidal,” he said.

  “It will be like hiding in plain sight,” she argued. “I will be a harder target to hit because everyone in town will be curious about me, right? They’ll be watching me everywhere I go in a town this size. I’ll be front-page news. Only someone really desperate will try to hurt me with all that heat on me.” She smiled. “I’m right and you’re starting to see it.”

  “Yep, it’s definitely the fastest way to get yourself killed,” he said, but he knew he didn’t fool her. She had a good point and as much as he wished otherwise, he was starting to see some merit to her crazy scheme.

  “Of course, I wouldn’t want to spoil the party so I would do it at the end.”

  “How very thoughtful of you,” Jesse said, hating that she was right. She was already in danger. Announcing who she was wouldn’t add to that. Maybe it would even make her safer, although he wasn’t counting on it.

  “Under two conditions.” He held up his hand before she could interrupt. “Keep in mind that I have every right to lock you up in jail if you don’t agree.”

  She clamped her lips shut, eyes narrowed as he proceeded.

  “First condition, you never leave my side the entire night,” he said.

  She rolled her eyes as if to say, “Don’t push your luck.”

  “Second, do you know anything about firearms?”

  “Let me see,” she said cocking her head to inspect the one he was wearing. “That would be a Glock nine-millimeter, ten-shot magazine, steel slide, double-action trigger, autoload.”

  “But can you shoot one with any accuracy?” he asked, only a little surprised at her knowledge of firearms.

  She mugged a face at him. “I don’t happen to have my marksmanship certificate with me but my father used to take me to the indoor firing range and I always hit what I aimed at.” Her smiled faded. “I guess Dad thought it was a skill I might need one day.”

  So it would seem. “Shooting at a target is one thing, firing at a living, breathing person is a whole different ball game,” Jesse said.

  “You told me you never killed anyone,” she reminded him.

  He shook his head. “That doesn’t mean I never shot anyone.” He waved her next question off. “It was a long time ago. I was young and cocky and foolish.”

  She studied him openly as if she still found him to be at least two of those. But her look said she didn’t find that to be a bad thing. “This will work,” she said as if she thought he still needed convincing.

  He smiled ruefully. “I wish I didn’t agree with you but it sounds as if Blackmore is already in town. The best way to protect you is as Angela Dennison because you’re right, everyone will be watching you. The news will spread like wildfire. And hopefully, it will make you a harder target to hit. That doesn’t mean he won’t try to kill you.”

  She nodded. “He’s risking so much, I can’t believe he’s acting alone. Unless I can find a connection between him and the Dennisons or Timber Falls….”

  He groaned. “Which of course you’re not going to be doing.”

  She shot him a look. “I have to find out why I was kidnapped, who was behind it and why they want me dead. You aren’t going to try to stop me, are you?”

  “I could put you in jail for breaking into two businesses,” he pointed out.

  Sh
e smiled and shook her head. “Then I would be easy pickings for Detective Blackmore. He would try to take me back to Seattle for questioning in Norman’s and Clark’s murder and I would never make it there alive.”

  Jesse quaked at the thought. “What makes you think he won’t try that anyway?”

  “You’ll stop him,” she said and looked up at him.

  At that moment, he would have wrestled bigfoot for her. “You have a lot of confidence in me, more than is warranted, I fear.”

  “I know you’re going to help me find whoever is after me.” Before he could argue the point, she added, “And you need my help. I’m the only one who can identify Blackmore as the man on the pier who shot Norman and tried to kill me. But I need proof. Unless I can find the connection between Blackmore and my kidnapper…”

  He cocked an eyebrow at her. “It’s been twenty-seven years. What makes you think you’ll find the real kidnapper after all this time? Even if he lived in Timber Falls back then, it doesn’t mean he does now.”

  She smiled. “You don’t believe that any more than I do. Blackmore wouldn’t be trying to kill me if he thought I couldn’t uncover something—and not just that I’m Angela Dennison. There has to be more.”

  “It’s just crazy that anyone would try to cover up a kidnapping with multiple murders.”

  She nodded. “So the motivation isn’t fear of prison for kidnapping charges. It’s much more personal and complicated than that.”

  He stared at her. “What is worse than losing your freedom?”

  She shook her head. “That’s the way you and I think. Someone else might be just trying to save his skin.”

  “Like Blackmore.”

  She nodded. “Or keep their part in the kidnapping a secret because they regretted what they’d done so many years ago and now would lose their family, friends, social standing…. I don’t know. Different values for different folks, right?”

  Yeah. But he had another theory. Some people cared only about themselves and did what made them feel good no matter how many people suffered because of it.

  He realized he was thinking of his mother and when he looked up, Maggie was frowning at him.

  “Did you get enough to eat?” he asked as he went back into the dining area to clear his dishes.

  “Gobs,” she said following him. “I’m going to need something to wear to the party, a drop-dead dress—if you’ll excuse the expression—one that won’t show that I’m carrying a gun,” she said then seemed to realize that she’d never answered his question. “You asked me if I could pull the trigger if someone was intent on killing me. Someone who already killed my father, who for the record was a very kind nice man. A killer who has already tried to kill me once?” She met his gaze. “In a heartbeat.”

  He saw that she believed it. He prayed if push came to shove, that she could do it to save herself. Because everything about her told him, that like her adoptive father, she was a very kind nice person. And the more he knew about her, the more interested he became in this woman.

  He set to work washing the dishes in the sink to quell those feelings. She moved in beside him, opening one drawer and then another until she found a clean dish towel, completely ignoring his, “I can do these, really.”

  “If I couldn’t shoot the person after me,” she said as if he hadn’t spoken, “I wouldn’t stay with you.” She picked up one of the plates and began drying it carefully. “I know that I’m jeopardizing your life by being here.” She put the plate in the cabinet and looked over at him. “You’re risking your life because of me. I have to be able to do the same for you.”

  “That’s the last thing I want.”

  “Too bad, because that’s the way it is,” she said and stepped to him, standing on tiptoes. Her lips brushed across his cheek like a sweet whisper, sending sparks shooting along his nerve endings.

  He flinched and stepped back.

  “Sorry,” she said looking both surprised and confused.

  “You shocked me, that’s all. Static electricity, you know.” He could see the lie reflected in her gaze.

  She studied him. “You shock easily.”

  He laughed, feeling like a fool, and took the dishrag over to the table, putting distance between them, but still intensely aware of her. He could smell the scent of her on his skin, a faint tangerine fragrance that lingered like the memory of her touch.

  No woman had ever affected him like this. He told himself it was because he couldn’t have her. Might never be able to have her. But he knew it was a hell of a lot more than that or his heart wouldn’t ache the way it did at the thought.

  “Okay, what’s going on?” she asked behind him. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Jesse. But I feel like there is something else going on between us and I know you feel it, too.”

  He turned to find her framed in the sunlight spilling in from the window, her hair burnished mahogany, her eyes fired with gold, her hands firmly planted on her shapely hips.

  “What is it you aren’t telling me?”

  Maggie knew she couldn’t be wrong about the energy that sparked red-hot between them. “I know you’re attracted to me. So what is it? You trust me, don’t you? You don’t think I killed Norman or—”

  “No! I trust you,” he said.

  “Well, I know you’re not…”

  “Gay?” He laughed. “No.”

  She frowned. “Then, I must be wrong about you being attracted me?”

  He smiled ruefully and shook his head. “That’s not it, believe me.”

  “Then what? Jesse, every time I get near you, you shy away as if you’re afraid for me to touch you.”

  He met her gaze, his expression pained. “My father had an affair with Daisy Dennison twenty-eight years ago.”

  She stared at him at first uncomprehending. “You think I might be…” She laughed.

  “Sorry, but I don’t see the humor,” he said.

  “It’s just that when I realized I was Angela Dennison and that Wade was in jail for shooting the sheriff, among other things, I wished anyone else in the world was my biological father.”

  “Be careful what you wish for, huh?”

  She nodded. “That’s why you want the DNA tests.” She groaned inwardly. “What if we are half sister and brother?” The thought hurt. She couldn’t believe her disappointment, it felt soul deep. Not that she hadn’t always wished for a sibling but not Jesse. Not this man she’d wanted since the first time she’d seen him. She trusted him with her life but she wanted more. She wanted to know what it felt like to lie in his arms and—

  Suddenly she felt like crying. She hadn’t realized until that moment how much she’d been hoping that Jesse would make love to her before she had to announce to the world that she was Angela Dennison and wait for a killer to come after her.

  “How quickly can we get these DNA tests?” she asked.

  JESSE FELT the cell phone vibrate. “Hold that thought.” Once and for all, they would find out who had fathered Angela. They couldn’t find out soon enough to suit him. He reached in his pocket, pulled out the phone and saw who was calling. “I still have forty-five minutes before I have to check in,” he said to Sissy.

  “Trust me, I wouldn’t be calling you but Daisy Dennison is demanding to talk to you and I mean now. You think I’ve got attitude?”

  “I get the picture.” He shot Maggie a look. “Put Daisy through.”

  “Have you heard the news?” Daisy barked.

  “What news is that?” he asked warily.

  “Wade made bail!”

  Wade made bail? He looked over at Maggie again. Damn, this only made things more dangerous for Maggie until he could find out who was behind her kidnapping. If they were both right and she was Angela Dennison. “When did this happen?”

  “Yesterday afternoon. No one notified me. He was released first thing this morning. That means he could be on his way to the house at this very minute,” Daisy cried.

  “You have a restraining or
der on him,” Jesse pointed out.

  “The same one he broke last time when he tried to kill me.”

  Jesse wanted to point out that his brother wouldn’t have been shot and would still be sheriff and handling this if Daisy hadn’t provided Wade with the gun. Better yet, if they hadn’t been struggling over it. “I guess I could talk to Wade—”

  Before he could explain that his hands were tied until Wade did something illegal, he heard a noise outside his front door. The soft scuff of footfalls on the steps. He tensed and motioned to Maggie to go up stairs and stay hidden and silent.

  The knock at the door startled him. He hadn’t heard a car engine. Whoever was at the door had walked up the mountain. His first thought was Detective Rupert Blackmore.

  As Maggie disappeared up the stairs, he headed for the door, saying into the phone, “Mrs. Dennison, I’m going to have to call you back—” He opened the door. “Daisy.”

  She smiled, obviously satisfied that she had surprised him. “I’m glad you’ve dropped that ridiculous Mrs. Dennison stuff,” she said, stuffing her cell phone into her purse as she pushed her way into the cabin. “I need to talk to you.”

  She wore an off-white linen suit. Her purse and shoes were white-and-brown and matched. Her hair was brushed back from her face and she looked younger.

  For a woman who’d been a recluse for years, she certainly had become social since her husband had gone to jail.

  Jesse closed the door and leaned against it, arms folded over his chest, watching her as she stopped in the middle of the room and looked around.

  “You share your father’s talents, I see,” she said turning to look back at him. His father had built the house Jesse and Mitch had lived in as boys.

  “If this is about Wade making bail—”

  She waved a hand through the air. “I’ve decided to hire a bodyguard since my gun was taken as evidence.”

  Jesse lifted a brow. A bodyguard? He guessed he should be glad she hadn’t decided to purchase another weapon. “Do you really think that’s necessary?”