Page 16 of River Legacy
He cleared this throat and said, “We’d better get back.”
She nodded, feeling like a girl after her first kiss. Only her real first kiss hadn’t been anything like this. Her lips still tingled, or she would have thought she’d imagined it. She warned herself not to get too attached to this cowboy. She was having fun: that was all this was. When the weekend was over, she was going back to her old life, this place and this cowboy only a nice memory.
“I’m surprised we haven’t heard from your father,” Ryder said as if also thinking about how temporarythis was. This adventure had an expiration date. Still, she wished he hadn’t brought her father up.
“You just had to go and spoil this beautiful day,” she joked. “Seriously, thank you for the horseback ride. I haven’t enjoyed anything like it for a very long time.”
He looked surprised by that and maybe not quite sure she was being truthful. He really didn’t trust her, but who could blame him after the way they’d met? “I thought you’d be making plans to leave by the time you got up this morning. Not everyone appreciates the solitude, the silence, the absence of everything the city has to offer.”
“I can understand why you’d think that,” she said, although wondering why he was saying this. Because of the kiss? Because he hadn’t expected to feel anything and wished he hadn’t? He didn’t need to tell her that this was short-term. She knew how he felt about her father—and her as well, given that he thought she wouldn’t even last a night here.
They rode in silence for a few minutes. “I could have contacted my father by now if I had wanted to, you know. You have reminded me several times that the ranch has a landline, since I don’t have my cell. All I’d have to do is call, and I’m sure my father would send someone to pick me up.”
Ryder looked a little sheepish. “I wasn’t suggesting that you should do that. I just wanted you to have that option.” He sighed. “Knowing your father, I wouldn’t be surprised to find a helicopter sitting in the front yard when we return to the house.”
Men, she thought with a silent groan. That kiss must have really scared him. Why else would he keep reminding her of not just her father, but their so-called weekend arrangement?
Whatever his reason, she’d had enough. “Race you back?” She didn’t wait for his answer as she spurred her horse and took off. Let him try to catch her.
Wendell Forester felt his chest squeeze his breath from his lungs as he looked at the latest death threat. It had been shoved under his hotel room door while he was in the shower. He’d gotten a variety of threatening letters over the years. Those hadn’t bothered him. When you ran an empire like his, you made enemies. But these latest death threats had a ring of promise to them.
Someone didn’t just want to scare him, they really wanted him dead.
Coming to Billings hadn’t been only about trying to close a merger deal between Claude and his daughter. He’d desperately needed to get away to some place he’d thought would be safe. But the death threat that had been pushed under the door proved that his alleged killer not only knew he was in Billings, but had come here after him.
He thought about taking the note to the authorities, but knew it was useless. There wouldn’t be fingerprints or any way to find the device the note hadbeen printed on—just like the first one he’d taken to the FBI.
From the time he’d been knee-high to a grasshopper, raised dirt-poor, he’d been on his own. It was what made him so successful. He went after what he wanted, and he didn’t give up. He picked up his phone and called Brice Schultz, the bodyguard who was supposed to be watching his room. No answer. Odd, he thought and tried JJ Gibson. Again, no answer.
Walking to his hotel room door, he opened it to find the hallway empty. Was it possible they’d both gone off somewhere? Not if they hoped to stay employed. He closed the door and looked around his hotel room. Anyone could have put the note under his door. It didn’t take a room key to go to any of the rooms on the different floors. He’d brought his own security where he didn’t have to worry about it.
He started to call Claude, but remembered he’d sent him off on a wild-goose chase. There was no way the man was going to get Victoria away from the cowboy. It was as he’d said: Claude was only a catalyst. If there was any chance that Victoria might be interested in Ryder Stafford, then Claude could push them together. It was a long shot. It wasn’t as if he thought his daughter would do something drastic like marry Ryder Stafford to spite him.
No, he’d failed miserably in the Getting His Daughter Married department. It was time to fly back to Dallas where he would hire more security. All he had to do was get there alive. Even as he thought it,he knew that whoever was after him could still get to him. He thought of his daughter and worried that he’d put her in the line of fire as well by insisting she come to Montana this weekend.
Maybe worse, Ryder Stafford had her. What if he was the one who’d been sending the death threats? The moment he thought it, he realized he was wrong. He’d always been a pretty good judge of character. Stafford had been upfront with him. He wasn’t sneaking around putting death threats under hotel room doors.
Also, he’d allegedly left town with Victoria. Maybe it was time Wendell found out if his daughter really was at the Stafford Ranch—and safe. After all, the text saying she was at the ranch with her fiancé had come from Ryder’s phone.
He realized he should have called right away to find out if she really was there since he didn’t believe she was Ryder Stafford’s fiancée. If someone wanted to hurt him, a sure-fire way to do it would be to use his daughter. Which was another reason he wanted her married.
The woman who answered the phone at the Stafford Ranch hadn’t known Victoria and said Ryder had gone out on a horseback ride. She could have him return the call. He’d declined and hung up.
There was only one way to find out if she was safe. He’d have to go to the ranch. Pulling out his phone, he called his pilot only to learn that there was no airport near the ranch that could accommodate the jet.
Swearing, he called a local rental agency to have a car delivered. As he hung up, there was a knock at his door that made him start. He turned to look at the door. He hadn’t succeeded in life by being afraid of anyone or anything. But wasn’t that the problem? He barreled his way through to get what he wanted, unconcerned by who got hurt in the process. Was it any wonder he was getting death threats?
“Mr. Forester?” a male voice he recognized called from the other side of the door.
He moved swiftly to the door and threw it open. “Where the hell have you been, JJ?” he demanded.
Wendell saw something in the man’s eyes before JJ quickly masked it. Not even his security guards liked him.
“I was just down the hall.”
“Really? Then, why didn’t you see whoever shoved a death threat under my door?”
“I thought Brice—”
