Into Dust

“YOU’RE PUTTING THE ranch up for sale?” Destry Grant West sounded as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Dad, why? I know you haven’t been happy since...”

Russell Murdock could see that his daughter didn’t even want to say Sarah’s name. “Since Sarah broke our engagement?”

Destry let out a breath of obvious frustration. “I’m sorry that you’re hurt, but, Dad, she was all wrong for you. Surely, you realize that now.”

He didn’t want to get into this with his daughter. Destry had forgotten no doubt what it was like to be so in love with one person that no one else would ever do.

“You understand then why I want to sell the ranch and move away,” he said. “Not too far. I have to be able to see my grandchildren.”

She nodded, her smile sad. It was clear that she worried about him. Her fear, though, was that Sarah wouldn’t remarry Buckmaster Hamilton. His was just the opposite.

He hoped that someday Destry would understand that Sarah was in danger as long as she was around Buckmaster. It was why he had to get her away from him for good. Why he still couldn’t leave her. It was all too complicated to explain to his daughter, but still he tried.

“I know how you feel about Sarah, but a quack doctor stole her memories, replacing them with ones that terrify her.”

“Dad, you don’t really believe—”

“I know it for a fact. At first I was as skeptical as you that a brain could be wiped clean of memories or that false ones could be planted, but it’s true. It’s modern science. I believe that Sarah’s husband did something so horrible that he had this doctor remove the memories and take her away from the past twenty-two years.”

Destry was looking at him with a mixture of love and pity.

“I know you must think I am the most gullible man in the world...” He smiled and nodded, knowing that was exactly what she thought. “But Sheriff Curry was able to track down the doctor—or at least where he was—and verify that he was experimenting with brain wiping.”

“Dad—”

“I’m the only person she can trust.” His voice broke and he saw that he wasn’t making any headway with his daughter. He looked to her like a man blinded by love for the wrong woman.

“She broke your heart when she gave you back the diamond engagement ring,” Destry said kindly, but firmly. “She chose Buckmaster. You have to let her go.”

He nodded. He was wasting his breath. “Which is why I have to sell the ranch. You and Rylan don’t need the property, so I’ve put it on the market.” He didn’t add that he was planning to use the money from the sale to relocate—with Sarah.

He also didn’t tell his daughter that the quack doctor, Dr. Ralph Venable, was back in the States. All his instincts told him that the doctor would be contacting Sarah—if he hadn’t already.

She was going to need him—and soon. She’d been having flashbacks of memory that scared her when she was with him. And now Buckmaster had won the primaries. He had the Republican nomination.

The only fly in the ointment would be if Sarah’s memory came back and she knew the truth about what had happened all those years ago—and did something...crazy.

* * *

THE RING WAS CONSERVATIVE, the diamond not too large, the setting classic and tasteful. Buck held it up to the light. The owner of the jewelry store seemed nervous. He kept watching the door as if he expected photographers to show up any minute.

“I’ll take this one. I’ll need it sized.” Sarah’s hands were small. “She wears a six.” At least she used to. Surely, disappearing for twenty-two years wouldn’t have changed her ring size.

“It will only take a few minutes,” the owner said and hurried to the back.

Buck walked around the jewelry store. This had been impulsive. Now he wondered if Sarah would be upset with him. He couldn’t imagine why. But then he couldn’t imagine why she hadn’t moved in with him already.

Except that she must feel that he’d been stringing her along for the past year and a half, first because he was married and even after Angelina’s death, keeping her living on the ranch—but insisting she move into he main house only recently—and all because of his presidential campaign.

But what choice had he had under the circumstances, he thought with a curse. He wasn’t the one who’d left, the one who’d driven into the river in the middle of winter trying to kill himself. He wasn’t the one who, failing that, had taken off for twenty-two years, leaving behind six daughters. Nor had Sarah gone alone. He thought about the doctor she’d spent those years with, an older man, a man who apparently dealt in making memories disappear. And planting false ones.

Buck shook his head. At times he knew he hadn’t forgiven Sarah for what she’d done. Even when he told himself that she might have been suffering from postpartum depression, that the crackpot doctor was to blame for Sarah not being able to remember the years she’d been gone, that he himself had to take some of the blame, it didn’t help.

He feared he didn’t know this Sarah. That fear was like a small hard stone that had settled in his belly. Usually, it didn’t bother him, but sometimes...

Like when he crossed paths with Sheriff Curry, who had his own theories about Sarah. Curry thought Buck might have reason to fear for his life. The sheriff thought Sarah had returned home to harm either his campaign or him. Maybe even to possibly kill him once he was president.

“Your ring is ready,” the jeweler said. He was all smiles, as if he couldn’t wait to brag that he’d sold a diamond engagement ring to a future president.

Buck realized his mistake. He should have had one of his staff handle this. Now this would be all over the news before morning.

“Thank you,” he said and quickly left. He still had miles to go before he saw Sarah. Too much time to second-guess what he’d done or what he planned to do.

Buck used his hands-free phone to place a call to Ainsley, his oldest. He would tell her about the engagement, ask her opinion. He depended on her for advice. Her phone went straight to voice mail.

He started to call Olivia, but knew she was busy with the baby. Bo was pregnant with twins and hadn’t been feeling well. Harper had gone out of town with Brody. Kat might be around. But she wasn’t a good one to ask advice from. She didn’t have her sister Ainsley’s diplomacy. And right now he didn’t need an analytical discussion of the pros and cons.

All of his girls were busy living their own lives. He thought of Cassidy and had a strange feeling of foreboding as he tapped in her cell phone number. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d talked to her. Worse, he had no idea even where she was.

The foreboding feeling was so strong that it scared him. He just needed to hear her voice, make sure she was all right. Her phone rang three times before her voice-mail message answered.

* * *

“YOUR NEW FRIEND AGAIN?” Jack asked as he drove and watched Cassidy check her phone out of the corner of his eye.

She shook her head. “It’s my father.”

Earlier the new friend who’d betrayed her had called. Jack had been right. Cassidy had been on her way to meet said new friend when she was almost abducted.

The friend had left a message. “Hey, where are you? We’re waiting, but getting really worried. Call me.”

“Do you think it’s possible she and her boyfriend weren’t in on it?” Cassidy had asked hopefully. “She says they’re worried. Maybe I should—”

“No, they want you to call because they need to know where you are,” he said. “Believe me, your friend and her boyfriend were in on it. Sorry.”

She nodded. “I guess I was just hoping it wasn’t true, you know?”

He did know. Just as he was hoping that his father wasn’t in on this either.

“You might want to turn your phone off or at least put it on vibrate.” He didn’t think anyone was tracking her via her cell phone. Not yet anyway.

She complied, her expression puzzled.

“Is it unusual for your father to call you?” he asked, guessing at what might be bothering her.

“I can’t remember the last time he called before today.” She looked up at him. “Odd, don’t you think that he should pick now to call?”

Jack did. He wondered if whoever was behind her abduction had jumped the gun and sent the candidate a kidnapping demand. Until that moment, he hadn’t really considered that this might be about money.