Lexie’s pulse slammed as she scrambled to her feet. She had to get out of here.
She laid the wallet back where she’d found it, then rolled up the bra and stuffed it into the hip pocket of her jeans. Reminding herself to replace the key and the tape as she left, she strode back through the kitchen toward the living room. She would have to go out the front door, but after that she could cut around to the back of the house and up across the fields, to where she’d left the ATV.
Still plotting her escape, she entered the living room and stopped as if she’d hit a wall.
Aaron stood in the open doorway, a small but deadly-looking pistol in his hand.
“Well, Lexie, fancy finding you here,” he said.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
LEXIE FROZE WHERE SHE STOOD. HER MIND SCRAMBLED FOR WORDS that might save her. But Aaron’s cold expression told her she wasn’t going to lie her way out of this. She had only one reason to be in his house, and he would already know what it was.
“You aren’t going to shoot me with that gun, Aaron,” she said, masking her terror with bravado. “The police would find my blood spattered all over your living room. They’d find your bullets in my body and powder residue on your hands. The case would be a slam dunk.”
She saw him hesitate, but he didn’t lower the pistol. “Tell me what you’re doing here, Lexie. I’m pretty sure I know, but I want to hear you say it.”
She stalled, scrambling to gather her thoughts.
“Say it!” He snarled the words. This was the easygoing man who’d helped her drive and helped her with the bulls, the man who’d shown up for dinner at the house more often than not. She’d known him all her life. But she hadn’t seen the real Aaron Frye until now.
She took a breath. “I came to look for the truth, and I found it. Callie was sleeping with you. She was here on the night she died.”
His laugh was rough, without humor. “So what? There’s no law against a little healthy fornication. And since you’re looking for the truth, I’ll give it to you in spades. She’d been coming here for years, even while your dad was alive. Call it fair play or whatever the hell you want. He took my woman. I took his.”
“But why did you have to kill her?” Lexie took a step into unknown territory. “Was it because she found out you’d been sabotaging the ranch?”
A smile twisted his mouth. “I didn’t kill the blasted woman. We had a big fight about my selling the property. When I told her I’d be leaving, she threatened to kill herself. I told her to go ahead. I never thought she’d really do it. But I was wrong. I chased after her, tried to stop her, but . . .” He shrugged. “Too late. But it was her choice, not mine.”
He was lying, of course. Callie had loved life too much to kill herself over a man. And even if she’d jumped into the arroyo on her own, she wouldn’t have landed on her back.
But Lexie knew better than to contradict Aaron. She had him talking. She had to keep him going until she found a way out of here.
“What about the rat poison?” She challenged him. “I found traces of it under the sink. Are you going to tell me that Callie grabbed the box on her way out of the house, carried it to the arroyo and hung on to it while she jumped over the edge?”
Again, he responded with that flat, cold laugh. “Well, you’ve got me there, Miss Lexie, so I might as well fess up. Callie found that box in my kitchen by accident and threatened to tell the police if I tried to move away and leave her. That was when we started fighting. Afterward, I saw her lying down there and figured that since she was dead, it wouldn’t hurt to let her take the blame for the goings-on. I tossed the box down after her and left it for the cops to find.”
But the sheriff had mentioned that Callie’s fingerprints were the only ones on the box. How could Aaron have managed that—unless he’d wiped the box clean and used gloves or a cloth to press it against her dead hand before she went into the arroyo?
She decided not to mention that. Flattering him would be more likely to buy her time and information. “That was smart thinking, and it worked,” she said. “Poor Callie couldn’t say a word in her own defense. But there’s one thing that doesn’t make sense to me. Maybe you can explain it.”
“Go on.” His right hand had sagged with the weight of the pistol, but he still kept a firm grip. Making a dive for the weapon would be risky—too risky, Lexie decided. She might be fast enough to surprise him, but she was no match for his strength.
“Just this,” she said. “I know you hated my father, and I know the reason. But why didn’t that all end when he died? Why did you keep attacking the ranch—and our family? We were your friends, at least we thought we were.”
“It’s a fair question,” he said. “But since you’re not going to live much longer, why should I answer?”
His words confirmed her worst fears. Of course, he was going to kill her. He’d killed Callie for less than what she had on him now.
“It wouldn’t be fair to let me go to my grave wondering,” she said, playing along. “Besides, I have a feeling you might enjoy telling me.”
He shook his head. “You always were a pesky little shit. I’ll tell you in the truck. Right now we’re getting out of here. Put your hands behind your back. I might not want to shoot you here but if you don’t cooperate, I can sure as hell break your arm.”
Lexie didn’t struggle as he snapped a plastic zip tie around her wrists. Her only chance of survival lay in getting him to drop his guard. Having her hands bound would make escaping more difficult, but she couldn’t let it stop her.
“You don’t have to do this,” she said as he pushed her out the front door ahead of him. “I can give you the evidence I found. You can go and close on your property, take the money, and leave here for good. We can forget this ever happened.”
“Shut up. You haven’t offered me anything I won’t get anyway.” He used the gun to shove her toward the truck, which was parked a stone’s toss away. Lexie didn’t need to be told that he meant to drive to some remote spot in the desert and finish her.