Santa In Montana (Calder Saga 11)

Green Calder Grass

Their land…their family…their pride. When the Calders fight for the things they love, they fight to win.

Jessy Niles Calder grew up on the Triple C ranch, six hundred square miles of grassland that can be bountiful or harsh, that bends to no man’s will—just like a Calder. As Ty Calder’s wife, Jessy finally has all she’s ever wanted. But even in the midst of this new happiness there are hidden enemies, greedy for the rich Montana land, and willing to shed blood to get it. Not to mention Ty’s ex-wife Tara, causing trouble wherever she goes. And soon Jessy will be faced with the fight of her life—one that will change the Triple C forever.

Don’t miss Janet Dailey’s brand new novel

of romantic suspense,

DRAWING FIRE,

available in August 2011.

High clouds drifted above the Blue Ridge Mountains as a hawk swept down from a barren granite summit, its wings spread wide, soaring over the rolling terrain below. Wheeling only once, the hawk flew through vast, moving shafts of light casting farms and fields into alternating bands of sun and shadow. Sheltered by nature, the rich land of Virginia’s valleys had been tilled for generations and tamed long ago, unlike the ancient mountains that rose abruptly from them, clad in their namesake haze of indigo. The hawk made a banking turn, spotting a moving object below. Its sharp eyes quickly identified a vehicle traveling along Route 231. But it took no interest in the dark-haired man behind the wheel and swung west toward the Shenandoah.

With eyes as keen as the hawk’s, the driver saw it lift away, then refocused his attention on the road ahead, catching glimpses of forest on the verge of spring. A pair of sunglasses shielded his eyes from the morning glare. The cut of his cheekbones and jaw line were on the hard side. Although only in his early thirties, RJ Bannon looked more experienced than that.

As he let a truck pass him, he glanced again at the steep slopes of Old Rag, a solitary outcrop of the Blue Ridge, the only one with a bare rock summit. A smile of remembrance softened the line of his mouth as he recalled climbing that mountain as a boy, scrambling over giant boulders to beat his brothers and father to the top.

The experience got him into rappelling and free climbing by the time he was twenty, something he very much doubted he could do now, twelve years later.

Bannon sat up straighter when he felt a twinge near his spine, an unwelcome reminder of the bullet still lodged there. In most respects, he was as strong as ever, something his brothers had taken into account when they’d asked him to open the backcountry cabin the three of them shared. He’d gone up two days ago, a jolting drive over ruts that the winter had deepened, to look the place over. Nothing too dire. The roof was still on, minus a few shingles. The well was working and, after a little persuasion with a wrench, so was the plumbing. A critter or two had taken up residence beneath the floorboards—he’d flung open all the windows and gotten into the crawl-space with a flashlight to make sure it had vacated its winter lodgings. Nothing there but drifts of fur.

After that it had been nice to get out into the air, and do the hard work of clearing away and chopping fallen branches around the property for firewood and kindling. When he was done, he hadn’t wanted to leave. But now that he was on the road, he wasn’t sure when he’d get back out again. With Deke and Linc out of the state on assignment, Bannon didn’t feel much inclined to hang out at the cabin on his own.

He drove on, humming some old song to himself, toward Wainsville. He could see it in the distance. Not his home town, but he’d been happy enough there, wanting to live in a town that time forgot, until Wainsville had been “discovered.” Now its friendly old houses were overshadowed by condos and too many trees had been taken down to make room for them. The town even had a couple of office parks on land that had been bought cheap and developed with no thought to tradition. The surrounding area was still beautiful and largely rural, but an influx of hedge-fund titans who’d cashed out had come here. Their new, out-size mansions were everywhere and their nouveau riche attitude rankled the locals.

Bannon scowled as he passed a just-built one that sat on raw soil, an eyesore from any angle. Construction debris was half-heartedly controlled by an orange plastic fence that flapped in the breeze. He didn’t have a good reason to feel superior. After all, he lived in a condo, mostly so he wouldn’t get stuck with maintaining the place. Being a cop, you made decisions like that. He stopped at his condo long enough to pick up an envelope of paperwork and headed out again.

The sun grew brighter as Bannon drove through town, turning left at a small complex of textured cinderblock buildings on the other side of Wainsville. Someone had made an effort to landscape around headquarters—yellow daffodils, the eye-popping yellow of crime scene tape, were blooming in rows of unvarying straightness. He bet the chief of police approved.

He parked in what had once been his slot and switched off the engine, looking up at the narrow windows under the eaves. They were too high to see in from the outside, but it was a safe guess that everyone was right where they usually were. Except him.

Out of habit he used the reflection of the wire-gridded glass to look behind him as he went up the front steps. What would it be like, he wondered, to not feel compelled to check every corner, every shadow, every movement for danger? But the habit of constant watchfulness had been drilled into him the hard way.

Bannon spared a fraction of a second to check himself out before he opened the door. His dark hair was windblown and his jaw was outlined with stubble after two days up at the cabin. Forget the uniform. He still wore the torn jeans, scuffed workboots, and banged-up leather jacket that had served him out in the woods. Too bad. He was here and he was on time. Chief Hoebel would have to deal with him the way he was.

His boots were old and they didn’t make much noise on the gleaming tile floor of the hallway as he walked down to the young officer on desk duty. Fair-haired and freckled, Kyle Rasmussen was a new guy, a fact almost anyone could conclude just from his spotless uniform and shiny new gun belt, laden with forty pounds of regulation-issue junk.

“Can I help you?” Rasmussen studied him with curious, almost innocent blue eyes.

It took Bannon a second to realize that the new cop didn’t recognize him. Without saying a word, he reached inside his jacket and flashed his badge. The officer shrugged, looking a little surprised, and went back to reading a binder with bulleted lists and line illustrations, a manual on police techniques that no one took seriously. Bannon suppressed a smile and headed down the hall where the chief’s office was locked.

When he reached the outer office, Bannon flicked a glance at the closed door to the chief’s inner sanctum then focused on Chief Hoebel’s assistant behind the desk. The blond and blue-eyed Jolene Summer had the phone cradled to her ear—with both hands. That, and the low flirty tone of her voice made it easy for Bannon to guess she was talking to her boyfriend.

Looking up almost indifferently, she cupped a hand over the mouthpiece and whispered, “The chief had to go out. He said to leave your paperwork with me.”

Irritated that he’d come this far to hear that, Bannon smiled at Jolene anyway and passed her the manila envelope with his paperwork. Retracing his steps, he headed back to the front. Near the door to the basement, he automatically glanced at it then hesitated when he read the sign on it.

DORIS RAWLING. CASE FILES MANAGER.

An image of the fifty-something woman flashed in his mind—average height, slimly built, iron-dark hair with stylish streaks of silver-white, warm brown eyes and lips that were always ready with a smile for him.

Bannon looked at the new title again, realizi

ng she had been promoted from evidence clerk sometime in the last several weeks. But he had a feeling she hated being stuck in the windowless basement with its chill-inducing cement floor.

As he opened the steel door, he called out a greeting and descended the studded metal stairs. When there was no reply to his call, he ventured forward. The floor-to-ceiling metal grates that enclosed the Evidence Control Unit closed off the lines of sight. Bannon looked through them for a new person on duty, then swung around a corner, spotting the top of Doris’s head at a makeshift computer workstation, by the end of a long table half-hidden by the bulging file folders stacked on the station’s long table.