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“I need to rethink my approach,” she said. “I’ll drop you off at that…quaint place, and you can get your pictures.”
Jillian said it as if Kaitlyn were a kid with her first camera, or a selfie addict with a phone camera. She didn’t react. She’d grown used to it, and if there was one aspect of her life she was confident of, it was her skill with a lens.
“Drop me off?” was all she asked.
Jillian nodded. “Then I’ll go into town, such as it is. If this family is as well-known around here as they appear to be, surely there’ll be someone around willing to gossip.”
So now you’re a gossip columnist?It was all Kaitlyn could do not to say the words out loud. But she knew she’d already strayed too close to the edge with the woman. She couldn’t afford to lose this gig; the payment for the rehab center was due next week.
Last time, last time, last time, she chanted inwardly. She’d committed to paying for her mother’s rehab one last time, more so she could walk away free than with any kind of hope it would take, since she’d long ago given up believing in miracles.
Then, eyeing Kaitlyn speculatively, Jillian added, “You seemed to connect with him.”
Apparently he does go for the needy type.
The words echoed in her head. “If you’re thinking about trying for a needy vibe, you know you don’t pull that off very well,” she said, her tone much dryer in her mind than it came out of her mouth. So much for keeping her sarcasm to herself.
Luckily for her, Jillian took it as a joke. “Of course I don’t. Besides, you do it naturally. People let their guard down around you.” Kaitlyn was a little surprised at the perceptiveness of that observation. She needed to keep reminding herself that Jillian didn’t get to where she was by being stupid or unobservant. “So, perhaps you can wheedle something out of him. Some secret maybe, that I can use.”
“What makes you think there is something like that?”
“Please. Everyone has something to hide.”
Kaitlyn wasn’t so sure about that. Then again, Frank Buckley’s words came back to her.That wild child of the Raffertys…Just what kind of wild had he been? The kind who indeed had something to hide? Or simply the kind who had gone through the type of pain she knew too well, and had lost his way for a while?
Wild child.
The words also reminded her of her own thought, the first time she’d seen him, that he moved like a panther or some other big, wild cat.
“—you set him up for me, then I’ll move in for the kill shot.”
Kaitlyn snapped out of her thoughts. “Kill shot? What exactly are you after?”
Jillian waved a hand. “Just lure him in, get him talking. Like you did yesterday. Find me a pressure point.”
Kaitlyn smothered a rueful chuckle. Lure him in? As if she were the kind of woman who could lure a man like that. Lure required allure, and that was Jillian’s bailiwick, not hers. Although she had to admit she’d thoroughly enjoyed the time she’d spent with him yesterday. There were advantages to not being the kind of woman men immediately want to impress. Exceptions like the smarmy professor aside, she usually got to see the real person, who they genuinely were, instead of the façade put on for a woman they were attracted to.
And if it turned out she really, truly liked that real person she saw, and ended up wishing for more, well, that was her problem.
And of course, now that she knew Jillianwantedher to talk to him, her wayward brain would make doing so that much harder.
When they arrived at the ranch this time, the gate was open, and she felt a stab of regret. She would have enjoyed watching him ride up again on Flyer. And ride back. She’d always loved horses, and had wanted to learn to ride, had even started lessons back before. That’s how she always thought of it, back before. Back before the end of her life as she’d known it.
With the ease of long practice—after all, more years had passed since that night everything had changed than she’d had before it—she redirected her thoughts. Thought about what she’d found in her additional research last night, going through the archives ofThe Defender’s website, old issues that had been scanned and added, going back to the days when the paper had first begun. Someone had had the foresight to save a copy of each edition, even then. She wondered what that person would think to see how those more-than-a-century-and-a-half-old issues were being read now, on a device that would seem as impossible as a trip to the moon must have.
She found the journey through history as engrossing as the book version, if only because it was fascinating to see the things that brought that life alive, the advertisements in the later editions, the announcements of births, deaths, and weddings, mentions of names she’d already encountered, including Rafferty.
Which eventually brought her to the more recent piece that had clarified much for her. An obituary for Kyle Rafferty, native son, killed in heroic action overseas at the too young age of forty-one. Beloved husband of Margaret, and father to Keller, Chance, Rylan and Cody.
The father who had created that painting that it hurt Ry to even look at. Probably just as it hurt her to look at the watch she wore. Yet she did it. Probably for the same reason that painting hung there, in plain, everyday view. Because some things—and some people—should never, ever be forgotten.
Chapter Ten
“Welcome to theRafferty Ranch,” his mother said politely.
Ry noticed the blonde’s fingers never stopped tapping on the polished stone of the counter she stood next to. And the frequent glances at the phone she held. Impatient? That was the vibe, anyway.
“Thank you,” Jillian said, but it sounded rote. She gave the woman welcoming her into her home the merest of nods before returning her gaze to the phone. Ry’s temper, usually safely caged, flicked its tail. Quinta, Mom’s ever-present Aussie, gave the blonde a quick sniff and turned her back on her. Ry registered that as well.
