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The Rylands of Silver Creek are back and hungry for justice in USA TODAY bestselling author Delores Fossen’s latest heart-stopping suspense!
After returning home to investigate a brutal murder, Detective Landon Ryland is shocked to learn the body was discovered in the home of Tessa Sinclair, a woman he once knew intimately. Seeing Tessa again is like a jolt to his heart. Too bad the beautiful brunette has no idea who she is—or why she’s cradling a newborn. With evidence pointing toward Tessa and the baby being next on the killer’s hit list, Landon refuses to leave their safety in anyone else’s hands. Or admit that losing them would permanently destroy the future he secretly envisioned.
The baby.
She was still crying, and even though the sound was muffled, it was enough for Landon to pinpoint their location. Tessa was headed for the back exit.
And then he saw her.
Tessa saw him, too.
She didn’t stop. With the baby gripped in her arms, she threw open the glass door and was within a heartbeat of getting outside to the parking lot. She might have made it, too, but Landon took hold of her arms and pulled her back inside.
As he’d done by the barn, he was as gentle with her as he could be, but he wasn’t feeling very much of that gentleness inside.
“Please, just let me go.” Her eyes filled with tears. “It’s not safe for you to be with me.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Landon snapped.
She closed her eyes, the tears spilling down her cheeks. “I’m not who you think I am. And if you stay here with me, they’ll kill you.”
Landon
Delores Fossen
DELORES FOSSEN, a USA TODAY bestselling author, has sold over fifty novels with millions of copies of her books in print worldwide. She’s received a Booksellers’ Best Award and an RT Reviewers’ Choice Best Book Award. She was also a finalist for a prestigious RITA® Award. You can contact the author through her website at www.deloresfossen.com.
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Contents
Cover
Back Cover Text
Introduction
Title Page
About the Author
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Extract
Copyright
Chapter One
Deputy Landon Ryland was looking for a killer.
He stood back from the crowd who’d gathered for the graveside funeral, and Landon looked at each face of the fifty or so people. Most he’d known since he was a kid, when he had visited his Ryland cousins here in Silver Creek, Texas.
But today he had to consider that one of them might have murdered Emmett.
Just the thought of it felt as if someone had Landon’s heart in a vise and was crushing it. Emmett and he were cousins. But more like brothers. And now Emmett was dead, and someone was going to pay for that.
Especially considering how, and why, Emmett had died.
Landon knew the how, but it was the why that was causing his sleepless nights. He intended to give the killer a whole lot worse than just lack of sleep, though.
He glanced out of the corner of his eye when he sensed someone approaching. Landon didn’t exactly have a welcoming expression, and everybody had kept their distance. So far.
Since he was on edge, he slid his hand over his gun, but it wasn’t necessary. It was Sheriff Grayson Ryland, yet another of his cousins.
Grayson, however, was also Landon’s new boss.
The ink was barely dry on his contract with the sheriff’s office, but he was the newest lawman in Silver Creek. Newest resident, too, of the Silver Creek Ranch since he’d moved to the guesthouse there until he could find his own place. Landon just wished his homecoming had been under much better circumstances.
“You see anything?” Grayson said. He was tall, lanky and in charge merely by being there. Grayson didn’t just wear a badge—he was the law in Silver Creek, and everybody knew it.
Grayson was no doubt asking if Landon had seen a killer. He hadn’t. But one thing was for certain: she wasn’t here.
“Any sign of her yet?” Landon asked.
Grayson shook his head, but like Landon, he continued to study the funeral attendees, looking at each one of them from beneath the brim of his cowboy hat. Also as Landon had done, Grayson lingered a moment on Emmett’s three brothers. All grief stricken. And that didn’t apply just to them but to the entire Ryland clan. Losing one of their own had cut them each to the bone.
“Tessa Sinclair might not be able to attend, because she could be dead,” Grayson reminded him.
Yes. She could be. But unless Landon found proof of that, she was a person of interest in Emmett’s death. Or at least, that was how Grayson had labeled her. To Landon, she was a suspect for accessory to murder since Emmett’s body had been found in her house. That meant she likely knew the killer.
She could even be protecting him.
Well, she wouldn’t protect that piece of dirt once Landon found him. And old times wouldn’t play into this. It didn’t matter that once she’d been Landon’s lover. Didn’t matter that once they’d had feelings for each other.
Something that didn’t sit well with him, either.
But despite how Landon felt about her and no matter how hard he looked at the attendees, Tessa wasn’t here at the funeral. With her blond hair and starlet looks, she would stick out, and Landon would have already spotted her.
Grayson reached in his pocket, pulled out a silver star badge and handed it to Landon. It caught the sunlight just right, and the glare cut across Landon’s face, forcing him to shut his eyes for a second. He hoped that wasn’t some kind of bad sign.
“You’re certain you really want this?” Grayson pressed.
“Positive.” He glanced at his cousin. Not quite like looking in a mirror but close enough. The Ryland genes were definitely the dominant ones in both of them. “You haven’t changed your mind about hiring me, have you?”
“Nope. I can use the help now that I’m short a deputy. I just want to make sure you know what you’re getting into.”
Landon knew. He was putting himself in a position to catch a killer.
He clipped the badge onto his shoulder holster where once there’d been a different badge, for Houston PD. There he’d been a detective. But Landon had given that up when Emmett was murdered, so he could come home and find the killer.
Too bad it didn’t look as if he would find him or her here.
“I’ll see you back at the sheriff’s office,” Landon said, heading toward his truck. It was only about a fifteen-minute ride back into town, not nearly enough time for him to burn off this restless energy churning inside him.
This is for you, Landon.
The words flashed through his head and twisted his gut into a knot so tight that Landon felt sick. Because that was what the handwritten note had said. The note that had been left on Emmett’s body. Someone had killed Emmett because of Landon.
But why?
Landon had thought long and hard on it, and he still couldn’t figure it out. Since he’d been a Houston cop for nearly a decade, it was possible this was a revenge killing. He’d certainly riled enough criminals over the years, and this could have been a payback murder meant to strike Landon right in the heart.
And it had.
Somewhere, the answers had to be in his old case files. Or maybe in the sketchy details they’d gotten from witnesses about the hours leading up to Emmett’s death. Something was there. He just had to find it.
He took the final turn toward town, and Landon saw something he sure as hell didn’t want to see.
Smoke.
It was thick, black and coiling from what was left of a barn at the old Waterson place. The house and outbuildings had been vacant for months now since Mr. Waterson had died, but that smoke meant someone was there.
Landon sped toward the blaze and skidded to a stop about twenty yards away. He made a quick 911 call to alert the fire department, and he drew his gun just in case the person responsible for that blaze was still around. However, it was hard to see much of anything, because of the smoke. It was stinging his eyes and making him cough.
But he did hear something.
A stray cat, maybe. Because there shouldn’t be any livestock still inside that barn.
Landon went to the back of the barn, or rather what was left of it, and he saw something that had his heart slamming into overdrive.
Not a cat. A woman.
She had shoulder-length brown hair and was on her side, moaning in pain. But she was only a couple of feet from the fire, and the flames were snapping toward her.
Cursing, Landon rushed to her just as the gust of the autumn wind whipped some of those flames right at him. He had to put up his arm to protect his face, and in the same motion, he grabbed her by the ankle, the first part of her he could reach, and he dragged her away from the fire.
Not a second too soon.
A huge chunk of the barn came down with a loud swoosh and sent a spray of fiery timbers and ashes to the very spot where they’d just been. Some of the embers landed on his shirt, igniting it, and Landon had to slap them out before they became full-fledged flames.
The woman moaned again, but he didn’t look back at her. He kept moving, kept dragging her until they were finally away from the fire. Well, the fire itself, anyway. The smoke continued to come right at them, and it sent both Landon and her into coughing fits.
And that was when he heard that catlike sound again.
Landon dropped down on his knees, putting himself between the woman and what was left of the fire. Part of the barn was still standing, but it wouldn’t be for much longer. He didn’t want them anywhere near it when it finally collapsed.
“Are you okay?” he asked her, rolling her to her back so he could see her face. Except he couldn’t see much of her face until he wiped off some of the soot.
Ah, hell.
Tessa.
He felt a punch of relief because she was obviously alive after all. But it was a very brief punch because she could be hurt. Dying, even.
Landon checked her for injuries. He couldn’t see any obvious ones, but she was holding something wrapped in a soot-covered blanket. He eased it back and was certain his mouth dropped open.
What the heck?
It was a baby.
A newborn, from the looks of it, and he or she was making that kitten sound.
“Whose child is that?” he asked. “And why are you here?”
Those were just two other questions Landon had to add to the list of things he would ask Tessa. And she would answer. Especially answer why Emmett’s body was found in her house and where the heck she’d been for the past four days.
“You have to help me,” Tessa whispered, her voice barely audible.
Yeah, he did have to help. Just because he didn’t like or trust her, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t save her. Landon didn’t want to move her any farther, though, in case she was injured, so he fired off a text to get an ambulance on the way.
Both the baby and she had no doubt inhaled a lot of smoke, but at least the baby’s face didn’t have any soot on it, which meant maybe the blanket had protected him or her.
“Did you hear me?” he snapped. “Why were you near the burning barn? And whose baby is that?”
He wanted to ask about that dyed hair, too, but it could wait. Though it was likely a dye job to change her appearance.
Landon couldn’t think of a good reason for her to do that. But he could think of a really bad one—she was on the run and didn’t want anyone to recognize her. Well, she’d picked a stupid place to hide.
If that was what she’d been doing.
She stared up at him. Blinked several times. “Who are you?” she asked.
Landon gave her a flat look. “Very funny. I’m not in the mood for games. Answer those questions I asked and then tell me about Emmett.”
“Emmett?” she repeated. She touched her hand to her head, her fingers sliding through her hair. She looked at the ends of the dark strands as if seeing them for the first time. “What did you do to me?”
Landon huffed. “I saved your life. And the baby’s.”
At the mention of the word baby, Landon got a bad feeling.
He quickly did the math, and it’d been seven months, more or less, since he’d landed in bed with Tessa. And he hadn’t laid eyes on her since. Seven months might mean...
“Is that our baby?” he demanded.
As she’d done with her hair, she looked down at the newborn who was squirming in her arms. Tessa didn’t gasp, but it was close. Her gaze flew to his, the accusation all over her face.
“I don’t know,” she said, her breath gusting now.
That wasn’t the right answer. In fact, that wasn’t an acceptable answer at all.
He didn’t hold Tessa in high regard, but she would know who’d fathered her child. If it was indeed Landon, she might also be trying to keep the baby from him. After all, they hadn’t parted on good terms, and those terms had gotten significantly worse with Emmett’s murder.
Damn.
Were Tessa and he parents?
No. They couldn’t be. The kid had to be Joel Mercer’s and hers, and even though Landon had plenty of other reasons for his stomach to knot, just thinking of Joel’s name did it. That night, seven months ago, Tessa had sworn she was through with Joel, but Landon would bet his next two paychecks that she had gone right back to him.
She always did.
In the distance, Landon heard the wail of the sirens from the fire engine. It’d be here soon. The ambulance, too. And then Tessa would be whisked away to the hospital, where she could pull another disappearing act.
“Start talking,” Landon demanded, getting right in her face. “Tell me everything, and I mean everything.”
The baby and the ends of her brown hair weren’t the only thing she looked at as though she’d never seen them before. Tessa gave Landon that same look.
“Who are you?” she repeated, her eyes filling with tears. “Whose baby is this?” Tessa stopped, those teary blue eyes widening. “And who am I?”
Chapter Two
She couldn’t catch her breath. Couldn’t slow down her pulse. Nor could she fight back the tears that were stinging her eyes. Her heart seemed to be beating out of her chest, and everything inside her was spiraling out of control.
Where was she?
And who was this man staring at her?
Except it wasn’t only a stare. He was glaring, and she could tell from the tone of his voice that he was furious with her.
But why?
With the panic building, she frantically studied his face. Dark brown hair. Gray eyes. He was dressed like a cowboy, in jeans, a white shirt and that hat. But he also had a gun.
God, he had a gun.
Gasping, she scrambled to get away from him. She was in danger. She didn’t know why or from what, but she had to run.
She clutched the baby closer to her. The baby wasn’t familiar to her, either, but there was one thought that kept repeating in her head.
Protect her.
She knew instinctively that it was a baby girl, and she was in danger. Maybe from this glaring man. Maybe from someone else, but she couldn’t risk staying here to find out. Somehow she managed to get to her feet.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” the man snarled.
She didn’t answer. It felt as if all the muscles in her legs had disappeared, and the world started to spin around, but that didn’t stop her. She took off running.
However, she didn’t get far.
The man caught her almost immediately, and he dragged them to the ground. Not a slam. It was gentle, and he eased his hands around hers to cradle the baby. While she was thankful he was being so careful, that didn’t mean she could trust him.
She heard the sirens getting louder with each passing second. Soon, very soon, there’d be others, and she might not be able to trust them, either.
“I have to go,” she said, struggling again to get away from him.
But the man held on. “Tessa, stop it!”
She froze. Tessa? Was that really her name? She repeated it several times and knew that it was. Finally, something was clear. Her name was Tessa, and she was somewhere on a farm or ranch. Near a burning building. And this man had saved her.
Maybe.
Or maybe he just wanted her to think that so she wouldn’t try to run away from him.
“How do you know me?” she asked.
He gave her that look again. The one that told her the answer was obvious. It wasn’t, not to her, anyway. But he must have known plenty about her, because he’d asked if the baby was theirs.
She didn’t know if it was.
Mercy, she didn’t know.
“You know damn well who I am,” he snapped. “I’m Landon Ryland.”
That felt familiar, too, and it stirred some different feelings inside her. Both good and bad. But Tessa couldn’t latch on to any of the specific memories that went with those feelings. Her head was spinning like an F5 tornado.
“Landon,” she repeated. And she caught on to one of those memories. Or maybe it was pieces of that jumble that were coming together the wrong way. “I was in bed with you. You were naked.”
That didn’t help his glare, and she had no idea if she’d actually seen him without clothes or if her mind was playing tricks on her. If so, it was a pretty clear trick.
A fire engine squealed to a stop, the lights and sirens still going, but Tessa ignored them for the time being, and she gave the man a harder look. She saw the badge then. He was a lawman. But that didn’t put her at ease, and she wasn’t sure why.
“Can I trust you?” she came out and asked.
He grunted, and then he studied her. “Is this an act or what?”
Tessa shook her head. Not a good idea, because it brought on the dizziness again. And the panic. “I don’t remember who I am,” she admitted, her voice collapsing into a sob.
He mumbled some profanity and stood when one of the firemen hurried toward them. “An ambulance is on the way,” the fireman said. “Is she hurt?”
“Maybe. But there’s also a baby with her.”
That put some concern on the fireman’s face. Concern in her, too, and she pulled back the blanket to make sure the baby was okay. Something she should have done minutes ago. But it was just so hard to think, so hard to figure out what to do.
The baby was wearing a pink onesie, and she appeared to be all right. Her mouth was puckered as if she were sucking at a bottle, and she was still squirming a little but not actually fussing. Tessa couldn’t see any injuries, thank God, and she seemed to be breathing normally.
“I’ll tell the ambulance to hurry,” the fireman said, moving away from them.
And he wasn’t the only one rushing. The firemen were trying to put out the rest of the blaze, not that there was much to save. There were also other sirens, and she saw the blue lights of a cop car as it approached.
She caught on to Landon’s hand when he got up and started toward that car. “Please don’t let anyone hurt the baby.”
That seemed to insult him. “No one will hurt her. Or you. But you will tell me what I need to know.”
Tessa didn’t think this had anything to do with that memory of them being in bed, but she had no idea what he expected from her. Whatever it was, he clearly expected a lot.
Landon pulled his hand out of her grip and started toward the man who stepped from the cop car. The second man was tall, built just like Landon.
A brother, perhaps?
The second man and Landon talked for several moments, and she saw the surprise register on the other man’s face. He kept that same expression as he made his way to her.
“Tessa,” he said. Not exactly a friendly greeting. “I’m Deputy Dade Ryland. Landon’s cousin,” he added, probably because she didn’t say anything or show any signs of recognizing him. “We need to ask you some questions before the ambulance gets here.”
Tessa nodded because she didn’t know what else to do. The baby and she were at the mercy of these men. Her instincts told her, though, that she should get away, run, the first chance she got.
Maybe that chance would come soon. Before it was too late.
But it wasn’t Dade who asked any questions. It was Landon. He put his hands on his hips and stared down at her. “We need to know what happened to Emmett.”
“He’s dead,” she blurted out without even realizing she was going to say it. “And so is his wife, Annie. Annie was killed in a car accident.”
Where had that come from?
“That’s right,” Dade said, exchanging an uneasy glance with Landon. “Emmett and Annie are both dead.” As Landon had done earlier, Dade knelt down, checking the baby. Then Tessa. Specifically, he looked into her eyes. “She’s been drugged,” he added to Landon.
“Yeah,” Landon readily agreed.
The relief rushed through her. That was why she couldn’t remember. But just as quickly, Tessa took that one step further.
Who had drugged her?
The drug had obviously messed with her head. And maybe had done a whole lot more to the rest of her body.
She had a dozen bad possibilities hit her at once, but first and foremost was that if someone had drugged her, they could have done the same to the baby.
The panic came again, hard and fast. “Did they give the baby something, too?”
“I don’t think so,” Dade said at the same moment that Landon demanded, “Tell me about the baby.”
Tessa latched on to what Dade said about the baby, but she had to be sure that the newborn hadn’t been drugged. It was something they’d be able to tell her at the hospital.
It’s not safe there.
The words knifed through her head, and she repeated them aloud. And something else, too. “Don’t trust anyone.”
They weren’t her words but something someone else had said to her. Important words. But Tessa didn’t know who’d told her that.
Or why.
Obviously, that didn’t make Landon happy. He said some more profanity. Added another glare. “She keeps dodging questions about the baby.”
That caused Dade to give her another look. This time not to her eyes but rather her stomach. Not that he could see much of it, because she was holding the baby, but he was no doubt trying to see if she had recently given birth.
“Did you set this fire?” Dade asked her, easing the baby’s legs away from Tessa’s belly.
Tessa flinched, and Dade must have thought he’d hurt her, because he backed off. But that wasn’t the reason she’d reacted that way. She’d winced not from pain but from his question.
“Someone set the fire?” she asked.
Landon didn’t roll his eyes, but it was close. “Take a whiff of the air.”
She did and got a quick reminder of the smoke. The breeze was blowing it away from them now, but Tessa could still smell it. And she could also smell something else.
Gasoline.
“Someone, maybe you,” Landon continued, “used an accelerant. Based on how the fire spread, I’m guessing it was poured near the front of the barn and was ignited there.”
And the person had done that while the baby and she were still inside.
Oh, mercy. That was a memory that came at her full force with not just the smells but the sensation on her skin. The hot flames licking at her. Her, running. Trying to get away from...someone.
She also remembered the fear.
“Someone tried to kill me,” she said.
Dade didn’t argue with that, but it was obvious she hadn’t convinced Landon. Well, she didn’t need to convince him. There weren’t many things Tessa was certain of, but she was positive that she’d just come close to being murdered. Or maybe the person who’d set that fire had been trying to flush her out.
But why would she have been hiding in that barn?
Tessa didn’t get to say more about that, and maybe she wouldn’t have anyway, because the ambulance came driving toward them. The moment the vehicle stopped, two paramedics scrambled out, carrying a stretcher, and they headed straight for her and the baby.
She studied their faces as they approached, trying to see if she knew them. She didn’t, but then, no one looked familiar. Well, except for Landon, and she didn’t have enough information to know if she could trust him.
Don’t trust anyone.
But if she hadn’t trusted Landon, why had she landed in bed with him?
After cutting his way past Dade and Landon, one of the medics checked her. The other, the baby. And they asked questions. A flurry of them that she couldn’t answer. How old was the baby? Any medical history of allergies? Were either of them taking medications?
“She claims she doesn’t remember anything,” Landon snarled. “Well, almost nothing. She knows Emmett’s dead.”
Yes. She did know that. But that was it. Heck, she wasn’t even sure who Emmett was, but even through her hazy mind, it was obvious that these two lawmen believed she knew a whole lot more than she was saying.
Or maybe they believed she was the reason he was dead.
While Tessa kept a firm hold on the baby, the paramedics lifted them both onto the stretcher. “Will you be riding in the ambulance with them?” one of them asked Landon.
Landon stared at her, nodded. “Please tell me once these drugs wear off that she’ll be able to remember everything.”
“You know I can’t guarantee that. She’s been injured, too. Looks like someone hit her on the head.”
Landon glanced back at the barn. “She could have gotten it there. When I got here, she was on the ground moaning. Maybe something fell on her.”
The paramedic made a sound of disagreement. “It didn’t happen today. More like a couple of days ago.”
“Around the time when Emmett was killed,” Landon said under his breath, and he looked ready to launch into another round of questions that Tessa knew she couldn’t—and maybe shouldn’t—answer.
However, one of the firemen hurried toward them, calling out for Landon before he reached him. “You need to see this,” the fireman insisted.
Landon cursed and started to walk away, but then he stopped and stabbed his finger at her. “Don’t you dare go anywhere. I’m riding in the ambulance with you to make sure you get there.”
It sounded like some kind of threat. Felt like one, too.
The paramedics lifted the stretcher, moving the baby and her toward the ambulance, but they were also carrying her in the same direction Landon was headed. Tessa watched as the fireman led him to the front of what was left of the barn.
Whatever the fireman wanted Landon to see, it was on the ground, because both men stooped, their attention on a large gray boulder. Dade did the same when he joined them.
She saw Landon’s shoulder’s snap back, and it seemed as if he was cursing again. He pulled his phone from his pocket and took a picture, and after saying something to Dade, he came toward her. Not hurrying exactly, but with that fierce expression, he looked like an Old West cowboy who was about to draw in a gunfight.
“What do you know about this?” Landon demanded. “Did you write it?” He held up his phone screen for her to see.
With everything around her swimming in and out of focus, it took Tessa a few seconds to make out the words. When she did, she felt as if a Mack truck had just slammed into her.
Oh. God.
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