Keeping Christmas Part 18

BEAU STOOD at his office window, waiting. He really did have one h.e.l.l of a view.

"You wanted to see me?"

He turned to look at his brother standing in the office doorway. Carl was wearing a Western shirt, jeans, boots. His gray hair needed to be cut and his white Stetson cleaned. Carl Bonner looked nothing like the multi-millionaire he was.

Beau instantly regretted calling his brother into the office. Mason was wrong. Carl had more money than he would ever use. Nor was he apt to dream up some lame kidnapping plot that had failed to get a million and a half out of Beau anymore than he would give Dixie the jewelry box hoping she would find the photographs inside.

Because that would mean that Carl knew about the photos. Knew about Sarah's past. And how was that possible?

"Thought you might like to join me in a drink," Beau said, and motioned his brother in.

"Little early for me," Carl said, but closed the door and entered the office. "What's up?"

Beau poured himself a Scotch, figuring he was going to need it. "I wanted to ask you about Dixie."

"Dixie?" Carl said, frowning.

"Have you seen her?"

"Not for a while. Is something wrong?"

Beau took his drink back to his desk and sat, motioning for Carl to do the same. "She's in Montana."

Carl's brows lifted as he took a seat. "What's she doing up there?"

"Trying to find out more about her mother's family," Beau said, sorry to hear his words edged with criticism.

Carl nodded. "Bound to happen."

Beau opened his mouth to argue the point and closed it. He didn't want to fight about this. "She found some photographs in that jewelry box you gave her."

Carl frowned. "Photographs?"

"Apparently from Sarah's life before me," Beau said.

"You didn't know she kept them?"

"No. Did you?"

"What are you asking?" Carl said quietly.

What was he asking? What possible reason would Carl have for purposely giving Dixie her mother's jewelry box if he knew there were old photos hidden inside? None. Carl wouldn't want to hurt the girls. Not only that, Dixie'd had the jewelry box for years and had only just now found the photographs.

Beau rubbed his temples feeling a headache coming on. "Never mind me. I'm just in a foul mood." He'd made the mistake of not telling Dixie the truth straightaway. Instead all he'd done was whet her curiosity and when Dixie got on the scent of what she thought was a secret, she was like a hound dog after a buried bone.

"Sarah had a sister," Beau said. "She never mentioned it to me, but Dixie found out somehow."

Carl shook his head and said nothing.

"What?" Beau demanded.

"Nothing, it's just that you knew Sarah had a life before you."

"I didn't care about her past," Beau snapped, not wanting to admit that Sarah had lied to him. Maybe that's what hurt the most.

"I remember the night the two of you met," Carl said.

Beau felt all the air rush from him. He swallowed hard, picked up his drink and downed it. He'd forgotten about the first time he'd seen her.

CHANCE STARED UP at Glendora's apartment building windows as the body was loaded into the ambulance. Christmas lights strung across the front entry slapped the side of the house in the wind. A piece of newspaper blew by. Somewhere in the distance a horn honked, brakes squealed.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Chance said, steering Dixie toward the pickup, all the time watching the street and residences around them. For all he knew, the killer might be watching them at this very moment.

"You know she didn't fall down the stairs."

He could hear the anguish in her voice. The woman had been her aunt. Dixie had promised to send pictures of Rebecca's children to her. He put his arm around her as they neared the pickup.

"I'm so sorry, but it could have been an accident. You heard them say the elevator wasn't working," he said.

Dixie shook off his arm and climbed into the pickup. As he slid behind the wheel, she snapped, "Do me a favor. Stop trying to protect me from the truth."

"I don't know what the truth is and neither do you," he said as he watched the crowd disa.s.semble and the cops leave. "We probably will never know what really happened to her."

"I led a killer straight to her. I just as good as murdered her," Dixie said.

He looked over at her, seeing how hurt and angry and scared she was. "Dixie, this isn't your fault."

"If I hadn't found those photographs in my mother's jewelry box..."

"Your mother kept them obviously because she couldn't part with them and had no idea that someday you would find them and this would happen," he said. "What you're not considering is that the man in the photograph has known about Glendora for years."

"Maybe he didn't know where she was, though, until I led him to her."

Chance shook his head. "It doesn't make any sense. Why kill Glendora? What did she really know? That Rebecca was another man's child? She didn't even know the man's real name. The photos were gone. So why kill her? We'd already been there. She'd already told us everything she knew."

Dixie knew what he was saying was true. It didn't make any sense. She took the photographs from her purse and studied them again. "He's tying up all the loose ends, probably wishing he'd done it years ago. But now maybe he has has to." She looked over at Chance. "For whatever reason, he is more desperate to keep that life a secret." to." She looked over at Chance. "For whatever reason, he is more desperate to keep that life a secret."

"To protect himself?" Chance asked. "Or someone else?"

She shook her head. "Rebecca's his illegitimate daughter. What if he doesn't want her to know who he is?"

"Maybe."

"And why did my mother change her name from Elizabeth Worth to Sarah Worth when she went to Texas?"

They had more questions than answers as Chance headed out of town, all the time watching his rearview mirror. They hadn't been followed to Livingston. He was sure of that. Just as they hadn't been followed to Glendora Ferris's apartment.

"I know you're going to think this is crazy," she said as she glanced behind them. "But I feel as if the man has more to lose now than ever before. He's determined to bury the past and me with it."

THE FIRST TIME Beau had seen Sarah Worth she'd been in the small cafe not far from the Bonner farm, sitting with Carl and Mason, talking.

He recalled how she'd looked up, their gazes meeting. Carl or Mason had introduced him.

"Beauregard Bonner?" She'd smiled as if she'd liked his name. Liked him.

h.e.l.l, he'd always told himself it was love at first sight. But now he knew that she was more than familiar with the name. Because her lover had been using it. Rebecca's real father.

"So did Sarah tell you anything about her baby's father that first night before I came in?" Beau asked his brother now, trying to keep the emotion out of his voice.

Carl shook his head.

"d.a.m.n it, Carl, if you know who he is..."

"Did you ask Mason?"

Beau stared at his brother. "You think she told Mason?"

Carl shrugged. "Mason's the one who bought her a cup of coffee and invited her over to our table."

"Mason has always been a womanizer." Sarah was a beautiful woman. What man wouldn't have been interested? He remembered how surprised he'd been when he'd seen the baby sleeping peacefully in the carrier on the chair next to her. He'd fallen in love with both of them. "I'm sure Mason lost interest the moment he realized she had a baby."

Carl shrugged again. "I saw Mason talking to Sarah quite a few times in town. Looked like pretty heated conversations."

"Come on, you were always talking to Sarah. Looked pretty serious at times." Beau regretted his words instantly. But he was sick to death of Mason and Carl constantly back-biting. They were more like brothers than Beau and Carl, jealous and convinced Beau liked one more than the other.

Carl was smiling now. "Sarah and I liked to talk about books. You were always busy trying to make more money. If you think I envied you because you had Sarah..." His smile broadened. "You're d.a.m.n right I did. She was a fine woman and you were d.a.m.ned lucky that she loved you."

Beau felt even more like a heel. "I'm sorry."

"Look," Carl said reasonably, "Sarah's dead. What difference does any of this make now?"

"Because Dixie is determined to find out," Beau snapped. "I'm afraid for her. She's convinced that I hired someone to...kill her to keep her from learning the truth."

Carl raised a brow.

"You don't really think I would do that, do you?" Beau demanded. "All I can figure is that the man Sarah was with before me got wind of what Dixie was doing and doesn't want her digging in the past."

"Why do you think that?" Carl asked.

"Who else? I guess he doesn't want any of this coming out especially considering that when he was with Sarah he called himself Beauregard Bonner."

Carl laughed and shook his head. "Everyone always wanted to be Beauregard Bonner."

"Even you?" Beau asked.

Carl laughed harder. "Not a chance. I like being in the background, out of the line of fire. But it would explain how Sarah came to this part of Texas. Otherwise it is one h.e.l.l of a coincidence to just happen to meet the real Beauregard Bonner, wouldn't you say?"

"You think she came here looking for him?"

"Or his family. After all, he'd abandoned her and her daughter, right?"

Beau nodded. Carl was right. It would explain the way she'd looked at him the first night he'd met her. By then, she must have realized the other man had been an imposter. And worse.

"You'll have to tell Rebecca. You don't want her to find out from someone else."

Beau rubbed his hand over his face, his head aching. This was the last thing he'd ever wanted to tell his oldest daughter. There was already bad blood between them. And now this.

"I know how I felt when the old man used to swear I wasn't his son," Carl said thoughtfully. "Was all right by me. I always hoped I wasn't related to the son of a b.i.t.c.h. He used to say he had more b.a.s.t.a.r.ds around than a female barn cat."

Beau had always heard rumors that Earle Bonner had children all over Texas. He hadn't married Carl's mother, so Beau could definitely understand why Carl would want anyone for a father other than the one he'd had.

Beau cursed their father's soul to h.e.l.l for the way he'd treated Carl. Beau had tried to make up for it, but all the money in the world couldn't take away the hurt from a father who hadn't wanted his child. Just as Mason had said.

"I would give anything if none of this came to light," Beau said as his brother fell silent. "I tried to convince Dixie not to do this but-"

"She's Dixie and definitely your your daughter." daughter."

Beau lifted his head, hearing something in his brother's voice he'd never heard before. "Do you hold a grudge about the old man's will?"

Carl leaned back in his chair. "I wondered when you'd get around to that." He laughed and shook his head. "h.e.l.l, Beau, I don't know what to do with half the money I have thanks to you. You've been more than generous when the fact is, you didn't have to give me a cent. Our old man is rolling over in his grave right now because of what you've done for me."

Beau didn't know what to say. The old man had always shown favoritism, making it no secret to anyone, especially Carl, that he preferred Beau. But when Earle Bonner had left Beau the farm, he hadn't thought he was doing him a favor. In fact, he'd talked about leaving the farm to Carl, saying Carl deserved to be stuck on the farm the rest of his life. The old man died before the first oil well came in a gusher.

"It was a c.r.a.ppy deal, the way things turned out."

Carl grinned. "Are you kiddin'? Things turned out great. Stop beating yourself up." He rose to his feet. "Just for the record, I didn't know there were any photos hidden in that jewelry box. I retrieved it from where you'd thrown it in the trash because I thought Dixie should have something of her mother's one day."

Beau nodded. "I wasn't thinking clearly back then. I couldn't bear to see anything of hers. You did right."

"I try," Carl said. "Tell Rebecca before she finds out from someone else." He paused. "You don't look good, Beau. You've got to start taking care of yourself." He tapped his fingers over his heart. "Life is short, Beau. Enjoy it a little. h.e.l.l, it could all end tomorrow."

Carl left, leaving Beau staring after him. He couldn't help feeling there was still a whole h.e.l.l of a lot unsaid between them, no matter what Carl professed.

Hadn't he known there were secrets from the past? Secrets that, when they came to light, were going to blow his life to h.e.l.l.

DIXIE LOOKED OUT at the Montana landscape of towering mountain peaks, snow and endless sky, all her fears coming together in a rush. "What if Glendora was murdered and before she died, she told her killer about Amelia? We have to warn her," she said, digging out her cell phone.