The Mountain Between Us (22 page)

“I'm not as naïve as some people.” Cassie nodded toward Lucille. “Gerald is handsome and charming, and no doubt has plenty of money socked away. But in my experience all men are liars and he's no different.”

“Humph.” Rick gave a snort of disgust and turned away.

“I wouldn't say all men are liars,” Maggie said. “Though Gerald certainly is.”

“Jake was a liar,” Cassie said. “And your ex doesn't seem to have been overly concerned with the truth. Even Jameso lies. He probably told you he'd stand by you and the baby, didn't he? But that won't last. Boys like him, the ones who don't want to grow up, are the worst.”

Maggie opened her mouth to make some searing retort, but all that came out was a choking sound. Her pulse pounded in her temples and her fingers ached. She looked down and was surprised to see she was holding the stapler, as if ready to bash Cassie over the head with it. “Shut up,” she finally managed.

Cassie ignored the rebuke and stood. “I'll handle dinner with Gerald,” she said. “After all, I am an actress.” She lifted her chin and strode out of the office like a queen taking leave of her humble subjects.

“Bitch,” Maggie said as the door closed behind Cassie's rigid form.

“She is,” Lucille agreed. She straightened. “But in this case, she may be exactly what we need to deal with someone like Gerald. The two of them probably think more alike than we'd like to know.”

“I can't believe she said all that, about men and—” Maggie shook her head.

“And about Jameso?” Lucille patted Maggie's arm. “She doesn't know what she's talking about. Jameso loves you and he's a man of his word. Those are two things I'm sure of.”

But what can I be sure of?
Maggie thought as she watched her friend leave. She wasn't even certain how she felt about Jameso, never mind what his feelings were for her. She'd gone from newly divorced to torrid affair to expecting a baby fast enough to give anyone whiplash.

“So an old maid like Cassie thinks she's an expert on men.” Rick shook his head. “If it weren't for the town needing the money, I'd wish old Gerald luck in taking Cassie for everything he could get.”

“Cassie can't stand not being the queen bee in any situation,” Maggie said. “In this case, she gets to play a starring role in the big drama . . . and if it works out she'll take all the credit for saving the town.” Rick's reminder that Cassie really didn't have much experience with men had cheered Maggie. Cassie didn't even know Jameso very well, so how could she say he wouldn't stick with Maggie? She'd merely wanted to wound Maggie as one more way of getting back at Jake. “You should find out where she and Gerald are having dinner and spy on them,” she said.

“I just might do that. Or I could send my ace reporter.” He cocked one eyebrow at her.

“I was only joking, Rick. Whatever Cassie gets up to with Gerald, it isn't news.”

“It may not be anything we can report, but it's important to the town. And I want to know what Cassie is doing. I don't trust her.”

“If Cassie loves anything, it's Eureka,” Lucille said. “She won't deliberately sabotage the council's plan.”

“But Cassie is Cassie,” Rick argued. “If Pershing says or does anything to piss her off, she's liable to let him have it right there, fake gold shares be damned.”

“Then one of us being there can't stop her,” Maggie said.

“You could head off trouble. Distract her by spilling a drink or pretending to go into labor.”

“I'm only three months pregnant.”

“Then you'll think of something else.”

“No, Rick, I cannot spy on Cassie. She'll never let me check out a library book again.”

“Don't think of it as spying. Think of it as a night out on the town, paid for by the
Miner
.”

“We don't even know where they're going.” She tried one last protest.

“I'll find that out and let Jameso know. You be dressed up and ready to go tomorrow night.”

She could refuse. Spying was not in her job description. But she didn't feel like making the effort. Rick was relentless and besides, part of her was curious to know what Cassie was up to. She didn't believe for a minute that Cassie was going out with Gerald in order to help Lucille. Cassie didn't go out of her way to help anyone but herself. So maybe Gerald had something she wanted after all. The question was, what was it?

 

Olivia had never seen so much snow. It towered in drifts pushed to either side of the narrow street and made mountains in the vacant lot behind the Dirty Sally, where D. J. and the other plow drivers dumped it by the truckload. Swirls of falling flakes obscured the horizon and made a white curtain out the front window of the saloon.

“Is it going to fall like this all winter?” she asked, turning back to the bar.

“Now that it's started, it doesn't show any signs of stopping, but you never know.” Bob set his empty beer mug on the bar with a thump. “At least the snow sent most of the tourists packing.”

“If not for the tourists, what would you complain about?” she asked. She refilled the beer mug and slid it toward Bob. “This one's on me.”

“Well, that's mighty generous of you.” He toasted her with the mug. “Thanks. And to answer your question, I'd find plenty to grouse about. Want to hear my opinions on the federal government?”

“No, thanks.” Jameso lifted a beer keg into place beneath the counter. “Why are you giving away the profits to Bob?” he asked Olivia.

“He helped Lucas with his Christmas play. I appreciate it.”

“Glad to see you can make yourself useful,” Jameso said.

Bob ignored the jibe. “That's a sharp kid you got there,” he said. “He asks good questions and he doesn't mind letting an old man rattle on about stuff that happened half a century before he was born.”

Olivia took no credit for Lucas's brains. “He's always been that way,” she said. “Wanting to know about everything. I don't know where he gets it.”

“From what I've seen, his mom and his grandma are pretty bright themselves.” Bob winked.

“You ought to take some credit for Lucas turning out the way he has.” Jameso began emptying a rack of clean beer glasses, sliding them into the slots to hold them upside down over the bar. “I mean, good parenting means good kids, right?”

“I think most parents do the best they can and hope things work out,” Olivia said. “I certainly didn't know anything about raising children when I had Lucas.”

“I read somewhere that babies in the womb learn to recognize voices, so when they come out, they recognize their parents,” Jameso said. “Do you think that's true?”

“How would I know?” Olivia asked.

“You're a mother. Don't mothers know these things?”

“I guess it's true.” She remembered a newborn Lucas, his head tracking her by the sound of her voice before he could really see well.

“Makes sense to me that they respond to what they're used to hearing,” Bob said.

Jameso racked the last glass. “I've been talking to Maggie's stomach a lot, just in case.”

Olivia giggled at the picture of Jameso holding a conversation with Maggie's belly. “You're really excited about being a daddy, aren't you?” she asked.

He flushed a dark red beneath his beard. “Excited. Scared.” He shrugged. “Hard to tell the difference sometimes.”

Olivia pulled out the cutting board and began slicing lemons and limes, ready for the evening bar crowd. “And you really didn't know Maggie was pregnant before she told you?” she asked.

He frowned, dark brows coming together in a V. “How would I know that?”

“There are signs, you know. She was late with her period. Sick in the morning . . . stuff like that.” Signs that had let her know right away that she was carrying a baby, even before the pregnancy test had confirmed the information.

“Guys don't pay attention to that stuff.”

“Most guys would just as soon pretend all that stuff didn't exist.” Bob took a long pull on his beer.

Both men looked so unnerved, Olivia almost laughed. She'd been so attuned to the changes in her own body, she hadn't imagined D. J. hadn't even noticed. Had he really had no idea she was pregnant when he decided to take off for Iraq?

The sudden tightness around her heart hurt, a wave of guilt and anxiety as a thought struck her with the force of an arrow. Had she been the one in the wrong here, letting him go off to Iraq without knowing about the baby? She'd assumed he was running away from his responsibilities, but maybe if she'd talked to him instead of assuming he would guess what was going on, she would have saved them all a lot of hurt.

C
HAPTER FIFTEEN

T
o Maggie's surprise, Jameso agreed with Rick's plan to spy on Cassie and Gerald's dinner. “I wouldn't miss it,” he said. “A fancy meal on Rick's dime and free entertainment, too.”

“I'm still not crazy about the idea,” she said. “But at least Cassie will have another woman on her side if Gerald tries anything.”

“Cassie's probably hoping he'll try something,” Jameso said. “She probably carries a sharpened letter opener in her purse and knows how to use it for more than opening the mail.”

The note of respect in his voice made Maggie look more closely at him. “Are you afraid of Cassie?” she asked.

“Yes, ma'am. She once threatened to arrange to have a county garbage truck back over my motorcycle if I didn't stop racing up and down the street in front of her house at night. She made me believe she'd do it. She's a woman who takes revenge seriously, so Gerald is the one you ought to be worried about tonight.”

Cassie had certainly held a grudge against Maggie's father, Jake, long after he died. But considering how poorly the men in her life had treated her, maybe Cassie's bitterness was justified. Apparently, Cassie's father had used her as a glorified maid and nursemaid, and rumors were that Jake had led Cassie on in some way, possibly breaking her heart.

“I feel sorry for Cassie,” Maggie said. “Even if I don't like her very much.”

“She wouldn't appreciate your pity.” Jameso maneuvered the Jeep into a parking space between piles of snow in the lot behind the restaurant in Montrose. Maggie started to push open her door, but Jameso stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Allow me.”

Amused, she waited while he exited the car and came around to open the door on her side. He'd dressed up for the evening—well, he wore a white dress shirt beneath his leather motorcycle jacket, and he'd trimmed his beard and tried to tame the wild mane of his hair. In deference to the weather, she wore fleece-lined snow boots, wool trousers, and a fisherman's sweater that clung to the beginnings of her baby bump. She couldn't decide if she looked pregnant or like she'd eaten too many doughnuts.

The restaurant Gerald (or was it Cassie?) had chosen was a Victorian building that featured dark beams, weathered brick walls, and dim lighting. Jameso cursed as he knocked his head on a hanging lantern in the entrance that gave off the glow of a fifteen-watt lightbulb. “I don't see how we're going to find anyone in here,” he muttered. “It's like a cave.”

“Then they'll be that much less likely to see us,” she said.

They followed the hostess to a table for two in a shadowy corner.

“What does it matter if they see us?” Jameso asked when they were seated. “We'll tell them we decided to have a romantic dinner together.”

“Cassie will know neither one of us can afford this place.” Maggie opened the leather-bound menu.

Jameso's eyes widened as he took in the prices. “I should have made Rick pay me up front,” he muttered.

“Too bad I can't have wine,” she said, studying the impressive array of vintages on the separate wine list. “We'd really make Rick cough it up.”

“Humph.” Jameso half-turned in his chair to survey the dining room. “Do you see them anywhere?”

“Over by the fireplace. Right under the elk head.” The blazing logs cast a golden glow over the couple. Cassie wore an old-fashioned, lacy dress, pearl drop earrings, a silk flower in her hair, and too much makeup. She looked like an aging madam in some western melodrama.

“Is she really wearing red lipstick?” Jameso sounded horrified.

“Shh, she'll hear you.”

He turned back to Maggie and lowered his voice. “I wish I could hear them. We need to be closer.”

“No, we don't.”

She studied the couple from behind her menu. Cassie was animated, hands waving, eyelashes fluttering. Gerald smiled charmingly and laughed at something she said. They looked harmless, but without any dialogue to provide context, their actions had an air of desperation Maggie hadn't recognized before. Gerald was a scammer, but was part of his scam the need to not be alone? And what about Cassie, relishing the chance to be the center of a man's attention—even if that man was a liar and a cheat?

“What are you looking so worked up about?” Jameso asked.

She lowered the menu. “I was thinking I shouldn't be so hard on Cassie,” she said. “Lonely people will do a lot of things that don't necessarily make sense.”

A waitress arrived to take their order—steaks with all the trimmings, with stuffed mushrooms and Caesar salads. Maggie's mouth watered in anticipation.

When they were alone again, Jameso leaned across the table toward her. “You're not lonely, are you?” he asked. He looked wary, as if afraid of her answer.

“No, but I was in those months after Carter left.”

“Are you saying you ended up with me because I was the closest warm body?”

She shouldn't enjoy seeing him look so uncomfortable, but she was pleased to know her answer mattered to him. “No, I didn't want to go out with you, remember?”

A little of the stiffness went out of his shoulders. “And why was that again?”

“You were too young. Not my type.”

He grinned. “Too wild and dangerous.”

Too irresponsible.
But she didn't mention that.

A particularly loud burst of laughter from Gerald drew their attention. “I never knew Cassie was so amusing,” Jameso said. “I can hardly remember ever seeing the woman smile.”

“She's playing a part: the charming heiress.” Since her debut in the Founders' Pageant this fall, Cassie had discovered a love of acting. And Maggie could admit the ordinarily dour librarian was doing a good job tonight. Gerald seemed captivated. “I think she's charming him,” she said.

“Good. The better mood he's in the more likely he is to agree to the deal. The town can get some of its money back, plus the satisfaction of a little revenge.”

The waitress delivered their salads and Maggie picked up her fork. “What if the plan backfires and Gerald goes to the police?” she asked.

“He won't.” Jameso stabbed at his lettuce. “A crook won't risk an investigation into his own doings. Besides, offering stock in a speculative mine isn't against the law. Reggie will make sure the town dances right along the line of legalities.”

“I hope so.”

They ate in silence, Maggie relishing every bite. When she finished, she pushed the plate away and sighed. Jameso smiled. “You enjoyed that.”

“I'm enjoying this.” She indicated the room around them. “It's nice to get away for some quiet time. Just the two of us.”

“And Gerald and Cassie. But hey, I know what you mean. I should take you out more often.”

“You should.” But her smile let him know she wasn't overly serious. She didn't need fancy dinners or gifts from Jameso—she only needed him to be with her. She needed him to be a man she could depend on.

Their steaks arrived, fragrant and sizzling, and all conversation ceased while they paid tribute to the meal. Across the room, Cassie and Gerald enjoyed steak also and shared a bottle of red wine. The fire blazed and classical music played softly from hidden speakers overhead. A Christmas tree in the corner sparkled with hundreds of tiny white lights, and snow fell in a lacy curtain past the window. A warm haze of contentment settled over Maggie. She had good food, good company, and the sense that all was right in her world.

“I have to go out of town for a couple of days.”

Jameso's words intruded into her pleasant fantasy. She blinked at him. “Go where?”

“Montana. I have some business I have to see to.”

What business? Jameso didn't have business. And he never went anywhere, other than to Telluride to ski—except the time when he'd left town to avoid seeing her with her ex-husband. “But it's almost Christmas,” she protested.

“I'll be back. I'll only be away a couple of days.” He sounded very matter-of-fact, but Maggie thought he looked guilty.

“What kind of business?” she asked.

“You've never taken such an interest in my comings and goings before.”

She flushed. This was true. She'd been very careful not to pry. She didn't want him to feel hemmed in. “I'm just curious why you'd need to leave this close to Christmas. And in this weather.” She nodded toward the window.

“It's winter. You have to expect a little snow. I'll be fine.”

“And this can't wait until after the holidays?”

“No, it can't. But I'll be back.”

She pressed her lips together to hold back angry words. She didn't want him to leave, but she'd already made that clear, and what right did she have to ask him to stay? They weren't married, after all. They weren't even living together. And she'd been so careful not to interfere with his life that doing so now seemed shrewish.

“Gerald, are you saying I shouldn't invest in the Lucky Lady?” Cassie's voice rose, overly loud in the hushed restaurant.

“I merely think there are safer investments for a woman in your situation,” Gerald said, not as loudly but still carrying.

“But you're going to invest in the mine, aren't you?”

“Shhh. Keep your voice down.”

If anything, Cassie spoke more loudly. “You haven't answered my question.”

“I'm considering investing,” he said. “But I have more money to play with. I can afford to take certain risks.”

“Yeah, he has Eureka's money,” Jameso muttered.

Maggie shushed him and leaned forward to catch Cassie's next words. “Granddaddy's money is all I have to my name.” Cassie simpered like a southern belle in a melodrama.

“Then your best bet is a stock fund. I have several I could recommend.”

“But Granddaddy would so like the idea of investing in a gold mine. He made so much of his money that way, you know.”

“Please keep your voice down,” Gerald said again. He scowled and looked around him. Maggie dove under the table.

Jameso's head appeared beside hers beneath the tablecloth. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“I'm pretending I dropped a fork. I didn't want him to see me.”

“Oh, was I talking too loudly?” Cassie's voice rang clear. “I get so excited at the thought of all that gold.” She giggled. Maggie wondered how much of that giggle was acting and how much was due to the wine.

Gerald cleared his throat and Maggie risked sitting upright once more. “My understanding is that the town has only a limited number of shares to offer,” he said.

“Yes, that's why I was all the more anxious to get in on the deal,” Cassie said. “But you think stocks would be a safer bet?”

“Yes, I do.”

“But what about the mine? I hate to think of some stranger, someone I might not trust, buying the town stock.”

“You trust me, don't you?” Maggie didn't dare look directly at Gerald, but she could hear the smile in his voice.

“Yes, I do,” Cassie said.

“I think I might invest in the mine,” Gerald said. “It appeals to my sense of adventure.”

“If I know you're going to buy the shares, I won't feel so bad letting the opportunity pass me by.”

“Then I propose a toast.” Gerald raised his wineglass and Cassie clinked hers to his. Maggie had to settle for water.

“That sounds promising,” Jameso whispered. He picked up the small menu the waitress had left. “Should we have dessert?”

“Definitely.” If she couldn't have wine to calm her nerves, a heavy dose of chocolate would do.

“Hello, Maggie. Did Rick send you here to spy on me?”

Startled, Maggie sloshed water onto the table. She stared at Cassie, who stood by their table, looking pleased with herself.

Maggie glanced toward the table where Cassie and Gerald had been seated. Gerald's chair was vacant. “Where's Gerald?”

“He went to the men's room. I saw you two the moment you came in; luckily Gerald never noticed. So did Rick send you to spy on me, or did you have the idea on your own?”

“What makes you think anyone's spying on you?” Jameso asked. “Maybe I wanted to take Maggie out for a nice meal.”

“I know Rick.” She patted her hair. “What did you think of my little performance?”

“You were brilliant,” Maggie said. It was true; she doubted she could have pulled off such an act with a man she despised.

“I was, wasn't I? Well, I have to go now. I don't want Gerald coming back and getting suspicious.” She fluttered her fingers in a wave and hurried away.

Jameso stared after her. “That woman is a piece of work.”

“I sort of admire her,” Maggie said.

“You do?”

“She hasn't had an easy life. From what I gather, her father wasted the family money and Cassie had to look after him and her ailing mother. She clearly has pretentions of living a glamorous life but never was able to do so. Yet, she still has her pride. Outsized or misplaced, it keeps her going and there's something to be said for that.” Pride could be armor and a shield, protection from hurt.

“Yeah, well, I still say she's a piece of work. And I wouldn't trust her in a fight.”

An odd expression to use, she thought. Was that how he judged people—on whether or not he could count on them to back him up in a fight? Clearly, her father had fallen into the category of trusted co-combatants. A known brawler, Jake had used his fists to back up his opinions and defend his friends.