“But you kept records. You came down here with weapons and equipment. You were sneaking around my house.” Her face suddenly suffused with color, her eyes hard. “You spied on me. You thought I took her. And, for all I know, you torched my shed.”
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“I’ve done a lot of things, some of them pretty stupid lately, but, trust me, I didn’t set the fire.”
“You were there,” Shea said, fingering his bottle, not drinking from it.
“And you had all kinds of spy gear and weapons and information on Shannon,” the shortest one, Aaron, pointed out.
“I jumped to conclusions, because I had nowhere to look.”
Shannon pointed a finger at his chest. “So you decide to harass me?”
“I was just looking for my kid.” Travis sighed and leaned back in his chair, taking a long tug from his bottle, barely tasting the beer. He held her gaze, ignored the three brothers. “And I was grasping at straws. I’m sorry.” He motioned to the sling on her arm. “I had nothing to do with the fire. Really. I drove down from Oregon. That night was my first opportunity to see what was what.”
“And instead of knocking on my door, or calling, you chose to slink around the place like a thief in the night.”
“I didn’t want to start making accusations until I knew a little more about you.”
“By spying on me.”
“Yes.”
“You son of a bitch!”
He pushed himself toward her again so that he was certain she could hear every word. He could smell the scent of soap on her skin, the lingering smell of antiseptic from the hospital. “You have to understand one thing, Ms. Flannery—” He sensed all three brothers tense, coiled, as if ready to spring. He didn’t care. He would almost welcome a physical match so that he could unleash all of his pent-up frustration. Inching his nose closer to Shannon, he muttered harshly, “I would do anything, you got that? Anything to find my kid. So, I apologize if I inconvenienced you, if I bothered you, because, yeah, I did spy on you. And I would do it again. In a heartbeat. Anything! If it meant getting Dani back!”
“Ever the protective father.” She couldn’t hide her scorn.
Her barb hit its mark but he didn’t back down. “I just didn’t know whether you were involved. I had to rule you out.”
“And have you?”
“I think so, but that kind of leaves me with nowhere to turn,” he added sourly. “So, as soon as the authorities remove me from the list of suspects in the fire, which is bound to happen soon”—he glanced over to Shea who was seated stock-still at the end of the table—“I’ll give up this part of the wild-goose chase and go back to square one.”
She swallowed. Travis didn’t let his eyes stray down to where the movement of her throat and her escalating pulse were visible. He sat back down in his seat and took another swig from his long-necked bottle, tried not to feel overwhelmed with fear. Pool balls clicked. On the television the scene switched from golf to baseball.
Shannon drew a long breath. “For the record, Settler, I agree with you on one point: I’ll do anything, and I mean anything, to make sure my daughter is safe as well.” As if seeing the protest rising in his throat, she added tensely, “Just because I gave her up for adoption doesn’t mean I don’t love her, or that I don’t have maternal feelings for her. I gave her up because I did, and do, love her. It…It was the best thing for her. I was sure of that or believe me, it wouldn’t have happened. Now…” Her teeth clenched. Her chin began to wobble. With an effort she took control of her emotions. “So don’t fight me, okay? I’ll help you any way I can. And…to that end…I think I might know something that will help.”
Travis stilled, waiting.
Shannon glanced at her brothers. Travis saw the tallest one—the guy from the police department, Shea, give a nearly imperceptible nod.
“You might not have been so far off in coming here.”
“What?” Travis’s eyes bore into hers. “You contacted Dani? You know where she is?”
“No, no.” She held up a hand. “Slow down, cowboy. I have no idea where my, er, your daughter is. Haven’t seen her since she was ten minutes old.” A shadow passed behind her eyes. Even in the darkened room where men huddled at the bar, hovering over their microbrews, and the strains of some Mexican music were faint, but present, he saw that fleeting umbra of pain.
“Then…?”
She told him. About the weird phone call. About the feeling that she was being watched. About the burned birth certificate, Dani’s birth certificate.
He felt as if he’d been kicked in the gut. “Son of a bitch!” Travis hissed. One of his fists slammed into the tabletop, causing the basket of chips to hop. Several heads at the bar swiveled toward them.
One of the men shooting pool said, “Shit!” as his shot careened in the wrong direction. He glared at Travis while the man he was playing against smothered a smile.
Travis didn’t give them a second glance. “Who?” he demanded, and she shook her head, lifted a tired shoulder. “Who would do this?” His head was spinning. Dani’s disappearance and the charred piece of her birth certificate had to be linked. But how? And why? And who, damn it? No one had mentioned this before; no one had told him that his kid was linked to what was going on down here. For the love of God, where the hell was Dani?