Page 81 of Deputy Brand Gets Her Man
“And didn’t tell us.”
Ethan tipped his head to one side. “She gave Juanita a day to tell her daughter the truth about her parentage. That doesn’t seem unreasonable to me.”
“Would it have been reasonable if Elena had died tonight?”
Ethan frowned hard. “You’re really angry about this.”
“I am.” He took a breath, paced away, took another. “I really am.”
“You think maybe it’s about more than Willow keepin’ a secret for a day?” Ethan asked. “I’m not the therapist in the family, but?—”
“I trusted her. She broke into my phone. I forgave her. She had Orrin take pics of my father’s diary. I’d forgive that, too. But then she kept my sister from me.”
A soft gasp made him turn to see Willow standing there in the hallway, only two feet away, having heard everything he’d said.
He lowered his eyes, shaking his head and walking away.
Ethan went to his cousin, hugged her, and started filling her in on the details while Jeremiah walked further down the hall to a coffee machine.
As he did, two Texas Rangers approached him, and he knew as soon as he met their eyes that they were there for him.
“Jeremiah Thorne?”
Feet tapped closer. Willow said, “Wait a minute, wait a minute, I’m Quinn County Deputy Brand, what’s goin’ on here? What do you want with him?”
“We just have a few questions, Deputy. This happened outside your jurisdiction on a state highway. That puts it in ours. We can question him here or–”
“We’ll do it here,” she said quickly.
Jeremiah sent her a look that was meant to convey, “Oh, no, we won’t.”
“Here,” Willow repeated, letting him know this was happening. Avoiding it would make him look guilty. “There are some chairs by the window at the end of the hall, out of the way.”
The mothers returned, looking at them curiously as they went back to the waiting room. Then Elena’s adoptive father and husband went to take their turn at her bedside.
Ethan was right beside Willow, and he looked worried. The five of them, Ethan, Jeremiah, Willow, and the two rangers went to the alcove at the end of the hall with a padded window seat, but nobody sat down.
“Mr. Thorne, we need to know where you were tonight, about ninety minutes ago.”
“I don’t recall and I want an attorney,” Jeremiah said in a monotone.
“He was with me,” Willow told the rangers with an impatient look his way. “We were celebrating at the log cabin he just bought in Quinn. All night. Until the phone rang to tell us Elena was in the hospital.”
They looked at each other, looked at Jeremiah. “That right?”
He nodded but didn’t speak.
Elena’s two mothers had wandered closer, pretending to look at flyers stuck by thumbtacks into a corkboard wall.
“What made you suspect him, anyway?” Willow demanded. “Wait, don’t tell me. Anonymous tip?” She knew by the quick look they exchanged that she was right. “Male, disguising his voice resulting in a Batman-like raspy whisper?”
“How did you?—?”
“Because he’s implicated Jeremiah in two other crimes we know for sure he didn’t commit. Jeremiah didn’t even know Elena existed until I told him tonight.”
At that, the cops reacted in blatant disbelief. One even rolled his eyes. “Oh, he knew, all right,” he said. “We aren’t here based on the tip alone, Deputy. Elena Montrose was contesting her birth father’s will, and Thorne was fighting it. How could he not know about her?”
“It was her?” Jeremiah asked, too shocked to maintain silence.
