in twenty-dollar bills should be more than adequate.”
“I’ll go to the bank and get it now.”
Adam was pleasantly shocked, but he didn’t really want any charity from R.J. “I’ll pay you back,” he said. “I’ll start making payments as soon as I get a job.”
R.J.’s brows arched. “You don’t have one?”
“I’ve only been out of the service a month.”
Actually he’d had a couple of offers that he’d turned down. After the military, any job requiring him to be tied to a desk in a stuffy office seemed worse than landing in the enemy’s stronghold.
“We’ll also need a couple of small duffels,” Fred added. “They don’t have to be new.”
“I can provide those, as well,” R.J. said.
Fred grinned. “Then let’s fire up the grill and start cooking. It’s time to bring Lila and Lacy home.”
Adam liked his optimism. And he loved the smile on Hadley’s face.
But still they needed the kidnapper to call.
* * *
THE REMAINDER OF the afternoon dragged by. Adam felt the pangs of being left out of the loop. Even R.J. was contributing more to the girls’ rescue than he was right now, and R.J. hadn’t been told as yet that he was the girls’ grandfather.
In spite of that, R.J. and Hadley had bonded surprisingly well. When R.J. had returned from the bank, fifty thousand dollars cash in hand, she’d accepted his offer to check out some of his prize horses.
After that, they’d cooked supper together. Baked chicken with purple hull peas and fresh tomatoes and corn bread that R.J. had baked in a cast-iron skillet.
Fred and Adam had cleaned their plates. R.J. and Hadley had barely picked at their food. No one had mentioned the fact that the kidnapper hadn’t called.
Now that he thought about it, no one had even mentioned the abduction since they’d discussed Matilda’s call confessing to the missing key and naming Quinton as the most likely one to have taken it.
The fears may not be spoken with every breath, but they were no less real. They were all very much aware that the worst enemy was the ticking clock.
Adam looked out the window and watched as twilight hovered like a black widow spider squatting over its prey. It was after eight—summer days in Texas held on as long as they could.
Hadley tossed the magazine she’d been rifling through to the sofa. “I’m going for a walk.”
“Would you like company?” Adam asked.
“Sure, as long as you don’t expect much in the way of conversation.”
He joined her. They both walked in silence until they were almost out of sight of the house. Hadley walked at a racer’s speed, arms swinging, her hair bouncing about her shoulders. Finally, she slowed her pace.
“I’d like to bring Lila and Lacy to the ranch once they’re home again,” she said. “I think they should get to know their grandfather before the tumor takes over and he starts to lose control of his functions.”
“Did he tell you that’s what would happen?”
“He did. He’s handling it well, don’t you think?”
“I haven’t thought a lot about it.”
“Do you think his other children will move back to the ranch?”
“I don’t know enough about them to even venture a guess.”
“What about you?”
He gave that some thought. “I never pictured myself as a cowboy.”
“I have.”
“When? You didn’t even know my father owned a ranch until today.”
“True, but you have that cowboy swagger. And you always wear jeans and boots. So you look the part.”
“That’s from growing up in Texas.”
He recognized the conversation for what it was—an attempt not to talk about the danger and the anxiety that never let go.
He hadn’t noticed it until she’d brought it up, but he did feel a lot more at home on the ranch than he’d expected. But if he did decide to stick around after the girls were safe, he and his father would have to deal with more kinks than you’d find in a nest of rattlesnakes.
He hoped to be a better father for his daughters than R.J. had ever been. He hoped he got that chance. But how could he stay in Dallas when being with Hadley and not touching her, or kissing her, or crawling into bed beside her would kill him?
“We should go back,” Hadley whispered as if reading his mind.
Hadley turned and set a quick pace as they retraced their steps.
“Is that Detective Lane’s car?” she asked when they approached the house.
“Looks like it could be,” Adam said. “I can’t really tell in the moonlight.”
“Maybe he has news.” Hadley broke into a jog,