Secrets and Lace (Lonely Lace #2) (13 page)

Before the tears on her cheeks burned scars an astronaut could see from space.

Chapter 16

Doors slamming outside pulled Robbie from his sleep. He hadn’t gotten much the night before, as he’d worked out how he’d drop the money to Caracus. The man was an evil bastard and might still want to take Johnson’s death out of Robbie’s back.

But Robbie and Ronan had agreed on the signal – doors slammed hard.

Robbie moved from the futon in the office to the stall as fast as possible. Bethany stirred as he pushed the blankets around.

Words muffled, Ronan’s voice carried from just outside the door. He hadn’t said anything about bringing anyone. Maybe he talked on the phone. Just in case, Robbie pulled his shirt back on and started working on the buttons. No wait, he had mentioned needing a witness. Hopefully it was just one of the hands. The last thing Robbie needed was someone from town to spread gossip around. 

A female’s voice joined Ronan’s as they stepped inside. He recognized the timbre of that particular woman’s words. He closed his eyes, nauseous from his chest to the bottoms of his feet.
Oh, shit.
Ronan had set him up and he had nowhere to go.

Bethany stirred and suddenly there stood Ronan, blocking the only way in or out of the situation. His smile had an evil twist just at the edges. His eyes mocked Robbie.

Before Robbie knew what had happened, Amelia had fled, slamming the door behind her.

From between grinding teeth, Robbie muttered. “You bastard.” Something about dissolving Amelia’s marriage had slipped into his awareness, just before pure anger ripped through him like habanero heat.

Ronan stepped forward, careful to eye his unfaithful wife and include her in his comments – biting as they were. “Have no doubt that I will get what I want now. I have my witness. And she has hers.”

Robbie tucked his chin, focusing his gaze hard on Ronan’s face. “What the hell does she need a witness for? You’re the married one.”

Tilting his head, Ronan murmured. “Interesting. Here I thought this whole time you really might be married to Amelia.” He looked at Bethany, or maybe glared was a better word. “Since I can’t have children, or legitimate ones at that, I’ve worked on obtaining MacAllister James’s guardianship to maintain ownership of Lacey Caverns. Looks like, I might actually get that as well as free myself from a cold wife.”

He tossed a large cash-laden manila envelope in Robbie’s direction. Reflex and pride demanded he catch the package, even though it required both arms. Robbie bit down on the pain as more tissues tore in his shoulder.

Ronan pointed at Bethany. “Yours you’ll get per our prenup agreement and not a day before the divorce. Consider your allowance and cards invalid.” He laughed and half-bowed out of the stall. “Pleasure doing business with ya’ll.” He whistled as he ambled out of the barn.

Robbie breathed in deeply through his nose and out through his mouth. He’d lost Amelia her son. Their son. Ronan would go after Mac like a Rottweiler on steak. Anything to keep Lacey Caverns. He’d always been that way. Even when he’d been in love with Kelsey Redbird and his parents had forbidden the match because of her heritage.

From the floor, Bethany shoved herself to a sitting position. “Wait a minute. Did he pay you to sleep with me?” She pushed herself up from the ground, standing, and holding onto the railing for stability. She turned unfocused eyes on him, trying to blink away the tranquilizer effects.

Robbie nodded. “Yes, he did.”

She stuck her tongue in her cheek and walked toward him, poking a finger in his chest. “Then that makes you more of a whore than me.” Stepping back, Bethany smirked, unconcerned with her smeared makeup and mussed hair or the draping clothes she barely wore. “I hope it’s worth it.” And she left.

Somehow, Robbie had gone from being certain the plan he’d laid would be perfect for his future to being certain he didn’t
have
a future.

Dropping the package like a rattlesnake, Robbie spun and leaned his hands on the wall, focusing on the ground. What did he need to do? There were a lot of things going on that Slate and Amelia had kept from him. He wasn’t quite sure what exactly it all was, but he needed to get to the bottom of the truth before he could do anything to fix what he’d apparently broken. Guilt curdled his insides.

He stooped to pick up the large envelope. He didn’t need to count it. Ronan had an irritating habit of doing what he said he was going to do. That’s why the thought of him going after Mac filled Robbie with such fear. If Ronan wanted something, he usually got it – come Hell or high water, or both.

First, Robbie needed to speak with Amelia.

He whistled for Revenge. The horse poked his head from the opening above the stall door, snickering and shaking his head. Robbie hefted a sigh. “Yep, I’m a dumbass. Don’t rub it in too much. We need to get back to Lonely Rivers. Now.”

Tucking the money into his saddlebag, Robbie then drew on his jacket and walked Revenge outside to the empty courtyard, because what else could a person call the vastness of Ronan’s front yard? He climbed onto the high saddle. Clicking his tongue, Robbie moved with Revenge, heading toward Lonely Rivers and the woman he’d never really escaped.

~~~

Revenge’s horseshoes clip-clopped over the pavement of the drive, slowing as they got closer to the house. Robbie didn’t wait until he’d come to a complete stop. He swung his leg over the pommel and dropped to the ground, legs bent to absorb the shock. Standing with his duster stiff to his legs, Robbie looked around. Where would she go?

Ronan’s fancy-ass truck stood belligerently in the center of the blacktop between the barn and the house, giving no indication where she would have gone.

Robbie didn’t know Amelia anymore, at least not who she’d become. Where she would go when she was upset wasn’t something he’d be privy to after four years away. But she’d never been a barn girl. She loved horses, but she didn’t exactly run for the outdoors when she wanted to relax back in the day. No, she’d always run for home and tea.

Since Lonely Rivers was home now, it only made sense that she’d have her tea in the house. Just to be sure, he checked inside the barn where Mac and Slate worked on a baby horse covered in bandages. He looked worse off than Slate did. Neither looked up when Robbie poked his head through the narrow opening. He closed the door before he interrupted them. What he needed to say to Amelia would be easier without an audience.

Long strides carried him up the steps to the front door and into the foyer. Sobbing – that he’d caused – signaled him from the kitchen. Exactly where he’d imagined she’d be.

He stopped in the doorway, just shy of being seen. The bright red, chipped teapot whistled cheerily into the room. The sound slammed Robbie into memories of Amelia crying about things the kids at school would say like calling her a slut because she dated him, the trouble her parents gave her because of him, and all the other times Robbie would find her nursing loose leaf tea and its soothing qualities.

Never having appreciated all she’d done for them… for him… the pain she’d suffered over the years because of him came to the forefront and the guilt ate at his gut. He had to make it right for her. He had to make her see that he’d never wanted her in pain – ever.

He loved her. Loves her. Always.

She sniffed. “I know you’re there, Robbie. You’re ruining my tea. Just go away.” Her deadpan delivery gave Robbie pause. Emotional screaming he expected. Sobbing outrage with things thrown his way he’d accept. But apathy seemed so out of character for Amelia concerning them, Robbie worried he might have lost her for sure. The possibility tore through him with serrated reality.

“I can’t. You sent me away before. I’m not missing out on any more of my son’s life because you don’t want me here.” He stepped into the kitchen and crossed his arms as he leaned against the wall.

Her humorless laugh fell between them like a porcelain plate, cracking on the edges. “I didn’t send you anywhere. You ran and you told Ronan to tell me goodbye. Remember?” She lifted her green eyes to him, the heated pain reassuring on so many levels.

Her emotions he could handle, it meant she still cared. But wait — “What? No, I—”

“For Hell’s sake, Robbie, quit the damn lying!” She slammed her hand on the granite counter and stared with such anger. “I’m done with it. You didn’t have to sleep with Bethany. Of all people.” She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. “Bethany James. That’s like… I can’t even.” She straightened again and shook her head. “I actually feel sick and now Ronan thinks I should ask for a divorce.”

Robbie lifted his hand and tilted his head to the side. “Wait, you James people are twisted. I didn’t marry you. I would remember that, okay?”

She stood from the stool, brusquely pouring hot steaming water from the pot to a bowl-sized mug. She repeatedly dipped a greenish-hued teabag in and out of the water. She let it fall into the water, grabbing the sugar dispenser from the side bar and a small spoon. Finally, she stopped. “No. We didn’t get married. Not you and I exactly. But I…” She swallowed, pink coloring her cheeks differently than the tears had. “Ronan gets everything that belongs to Mac and the guardianship of him, if I’m not legally married. I don’t know quite how it works, but his lawyers assure me it’s legal and the judges are all on Ronan’s payroll.”

She sighed. “Slate had an ID card of yours and we went on the Salish reservation and got married. He pretended to be you. Same look, same signature. We even have wedding photos. It was about a month after you left.”

Robbie’s shoulders sagged, well the bad one as much as it could when any movement caused it pain. “Why didn’t you tell me? You and my brother kept so many secrets. My son. My land is almost lost. Apparently I have a damned wife. What else did you keep secret?”

Slate stepped into the kitchen, turning to rest his butt on the island counter. “Amelia, I put Mac down for his afternoon nap. I suspect he’s in your room playing on the Ipad you left on your nightstand.”

He looked at Robbie from one eye framed with a nasty cut and swelling and spoke from lips oversized and discolored with abrasions down his chin. “How about this one for secrets, little brother? If we lose the ranch to Ronan’s bank, we also lose any claim to the mining rights in the caverns. We will literally lose everything. Everything, Robbie. We’ll be kicked out of here. Ronan has already said he’ll take Amelia and Mac when that happens, if she’ll marry whomever he picks. But you and me? We’re gone. Off MacAllister land.”

Losing family land that had been owned by a MacAllister for multiple generations wasn’t an option. Robbie had always known he’d have a place to return to at Lonely Rivers. He couldn’t lose the only home he had. “How much debt do you have with Ronan?”

Slate delivered what felt like a slightly rushed speech. “Just for Lonely River we only owe back taxes that we borrowed for which comes to about twenty-thousand. But it’s the costs of staying in business that have buried us.”

“Cut the explanations. Just tell me how much.” Robbie eyed his brother. He guessed at fifty, maybe seventy-five-thousand. He could help do something about that.

Slate cleared his throat. “Three-hundred-thousand.”

“Three-hundred?” He couldn’t say thousand. The amount was farther away on the achievability scale than even he could comprehend. His voice fell to a whisper and he ignored the issues with Amelia for a second. “How could you get that high into debt with a James?”

“How could you accrue enough gambling debt that someone wants to kill you?” Amelia bit out.

Touché. “He wants to kill me because I beat one of his hired hands to death out of self-defense. But you’re right. Debt is debt and it sounds like combined, we’re sitting at about half-a-million bucks. Who has that much money?” Robbie rubbed the bridge of his nose between his forefinger and thumb. Besides Ronan. He looked up, taking in both Slate and Amelia. “What happens if we
are
married? What does Mac get?”

Amelia shrugged. “Everything when he turns eighteen, but the male guardian – you as his father – would get fifty percent control at this stage. And with each birthday you get like two more percentage points until he turns eighteen at which point they all roll over to him. It’s really weird. Lots of legalities.”

“Break the will.” Robbie didn’t understand.

Amelia sipped her tea, lowering her cup after a long drawn out drink. “We’ve had lawyers and estate specialists who all have worked so hard but can’t get past the knots. I tried. Slate has tried. Even Ronan tried to see if it could be done.”