“No. I never got to talk to her before she died. Maybe she was just suspicious.”
Thomas made a sound like a wounded animal. “That would be just like her. She was always watching us, couldn’t keep her nose out of our business. I hated having her living in our house. I could see how close Tricia was getting to her. I would see them with their heads together. I’d walk into a room and they’d both shut up as if they’d been talking about me. I’m sure they were. I’d failed Tricia over and over. I couldn’t even give her a child.”
She had to keep him talking. Brick was edging closer. Once he was close enough... “Tricia loved you. That’s why she broke off the affair. She wasn’t leaving you.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” he scoffed. “Do you really think I wanted anything to do with her after she’d been with him? After she’d had his baby? That was supposed to be our family. Our family. Not his.”
Mo felt a shock race like fire through her veins. Joey. “Thomas, the baby, you didn’t...” She couldn’t breathe as she saw the answer in his eyes. “You killed him.”
“He was going to die anyway.”
She felt bile rise to the back of her throat. She was going to throw up. “You let Natalie take the blame.”
“She would have done it if I hadn’t. Don’t you think I watch the news? She’s under investigation for other murders. You know how badly I wanted a family. I gave up my dreams. I gave up everything.” His gaze hardened. “Why haven’t you tried to get away or take the gun away from me, Mo?”
“And give you an excuse to coldcock me with the gun and throw me over this wall?”
Thomas took a step toward her. She stepped back and he advanced again, this time pinning her in the corner of the rooftop.
She reached back, supporting herself with one hand, pulling out the letter opener with the other. “Thomas, don’t do this.”
“You’ve left me no choice. I begged you...” His voice broke. “Climb up on the ledge, Maureen. I don’t want to hit you. Make this easy on yourself.”
“On you, you mean.”
BRICK SAW THAT time had run out. He was close now. But not close enough. Thomas had Mo trapped in the corner at the edge of the roof.
“Thomas!” he called out, making the man jump and begin to turn. He’d seen Mo reach behind her as if to steady herself on the short wall an instant before he caught the glint of something long and lethal in her hand.
As Thomas saw Brick, he must have also seen Mo’s movement out of the corner of his eye. He swung the gun toward her. The weapon in his hand arced in a circle as she ducked the blow aimed at her head.
The gun caught her in the back, doubling her over on the narrow short roof wall. Turning, Thomas got off a couple of wild shots before he grabbed Mo, lifting her to push her over the wall.
Brick charged, watching in horror as she was lifted up. He saw the flash of the object in her hand as she drove the weapon into Thomas’s side. He let out a scream of pain. She struck him again as Brick grabbed him from behind and brought him down to the rooftop. But Thomas didn’t release Mo, taking her down with him at the edge of the roof.
Belatedly, Brick saw that Thomas hadn’t lost his grip on his gun. The man grabbed Mo and put the barrel against her temple.
“You both should have stayed out of it,” Thomas spat and pulled the trigger. As he did, Mo stabbed the man in the throat with what appeared to be a letter opener at the same time Brick fired his own weapon. Thomas’s shot was so close, it had to be deafening for Mo. But fortunately, the bullet missed. Brick’s, though, had found its mark. Thomas crumpled to the ground next to her.
Brick quickly pulled Mo up into his arms. He held her, refusing to let her go as he called 911.
Chapter Twenty
There was nothing more wonderful than a summer day in the Gallatin Canyon of Montana. Unless of course it was a warm summer night on the Fourth of July with everyone on the Cardwell Ranch gathered to celebrate.
Brick found Mo down by the creek. She’d spent most of the morning in the kitchen with his mother and aunts, preparing the picnic feast they’d had earlier. He’d loved watching Mo with the other people he loved. His mother had taken to her, and his father seemed pleased that Brick hadn’t let her get away. It made his heart swell to see how easily she had fit into the Cardwell-Savage clan. The two of them had moved into a larger apartment in Big Sky. Though anxious, Brick had known to give Mo time.
So much had happened, maybe not even the worst of it on that rooftop in Billings. Mo had lost so much. But if the woman was anything, she was resilient. He’d never met anyone stronger or more determined. In the weeks since, everything had come out about Tricia’s and Joey’s murders. Jeffrey and JP Palmer were still behind bars, both denied bail because they were flight risks. Jeffrey had money stashed all over the world. Passports with new identities had been found for both of them, although JP swore he had no idea what his father had been doing.
Thomas’s body had been cremated, his ashes dumped in the Yellowstone River. Brick had stood beside Mo as they watched the last of him wash away. Once the slug from the campground tree was compared to the bullets in Thomas’s gun, they’d known who’d taken the potshots at them outside of Red Lodge. Nor had it taken much to find out that Thomas had hired a private investigator to track Mo. He had known that Mo
