Branded (25 page)

It took supreme effort in that moment to lock down James's simmering frustration. This woman didn't understand the magnitude of the situation they were all in. Her father might very well hold the key to a twelve-year mystery. The hell of his sister's murder. All those years of not knowing what had happened to Cass. Of
who
had happened to Cass.

His gut tightened. His sister had lain dead and alone, no comfort and no justice. That would not stand. James and his brothers owed the truth to
the sister they all had failed. But he knew that to get that truth, he and Deacon and Cole had to handle this skittish woman with care, and he summoned his calmest voice. “If you'd just let one of us speak with your father—”

“No,” she said tightly. She stood up, her bag in hand, her eyes lifting to connect with his. “My father is ill. Not right in his mind. He's medicated. He didn't know what he was saying. He doesn't even remember saying it.”

James bit back the urge to snarl,
And my sister is dead.
“You said he had the diary—”

“It was just ramblings,” she insisted, her tone as tense as her body language. “From the past. Something he remembered in the past. Something he'd wanted to find, no doubt, and hadn't.”

Who was she really trying to convince, him or herself? He ground his molars. Shit. Didn't matter, and he wasn't going to bother with arguing. Not now. The woman in front of him was trying to protect her father and pushing her would just make her dig her heels in and resist more. For now, he'd back off.

But they'd find a way to get the information somehow.

“Thank you for patching him up, Doc,” James said in a careful voice.

She looked momentarily startled, as if the last thing she had expected from him was to drop
the subject. Then relief and professional distance settled over her features. “I'll get that prescription.”

He watched her walk up the path, then disappear inside the clinic. Maybe this was a wild-goose chase. Maybe Sheriff Hunter was just a sick old man with wild ravings about a past he couldn't remember, a past that didn't exist. But, either way, the Cavanaugh brothers were going to find out the truth.

About Cass's disappearance.

And her killer.