“About time you showed up,” Keith shouted down the stairs when he heard Tory walk into the house. “I’m starved.” The knot in the bottom of her stomach tightened at the sight of her brother as he came down the stairs. His shirt was still gaping open and he was towel-drying his hair. “What say we go into Bend and catch a movie and then we’ll go to dinner—my treat…” His voice faded when he saw Trask. He lowered the towel and smiled grimly. “I guess you probably have other plans.” He stopped at the bottom step and noticed her pale face. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
“There’s something Trask wants to ask you about,” Tory said, her voice quavering slightly.
“So what else is new?” Keith cast an unfriendly glance at Trask before striding into the kitchen.
“It’s a little different this time,” Trask remarked, following the younger man down the short hallway.
“Oh yeah? Good.” Keith chuckled mirthlessly to himself. “I’m tired of the same old questions.” He seemed totally disinterested in Trask’s presence and he rummaged in the refrigerator for the jug of milk.
Alex was whining at the back door and Keith let the old collie into the house. “What’s the matter, boy?” he asked, scratching the dog behind the ears. “Hungry?”
The sight of her brother so innocently petting the dog’s head tore at Tory’s heart. “Keith—” Tory’s words froze when she noticed Rex’s pickup coming down the drive.
“What?”
“Maybe we should talk about this later,” she said.
“Talk about what?” Keith poured a large glass of milk, then drank most of it in one swallow.
“About what happened five years ago,” Trask stated.
“I thought you said you had come up with some new questions.”
“I have.” The edge to Trask’s voice made Keith start.
“Not now—” Tory pleaded, desperation taking a firm hold of her. She had already lost her father and the thought of losing Keith the same way was unbearable.
Though he felt his stomach tighten in concern as he studied the pale lines of Tory’s face, Trask ignored her obvious dread, deciding that the truth had to be brought into the open. “No time like the present, I always say.” He watched with narrowed eyes as the foreman climbed out of his pickup and started walking toward the house. “Besides, Rex should be part of this.”
“Part of what?” For the first time Keith noticed the worry in his sister’s eyes. “What’s going on?” he insisted. “Don’t tell me we got another one of those damned notes!”
“Not quite.”
“Oh, Keith,” Tory whispered, her voice cracking.
Rex rapped on the back door and entered the kitchen. His eyes shifted from Tory to her brother before settling on Trask and he felt the electric tension charging the air. “Maybe I should come back later-—” he said, moving toward the door.
“No.” Trask swung a chair around and straddled the back. “I think that you can help shed a little light on something I’ve discovered.”
“You’re still going at it, aren’t you?” the foreman accused. He lifted his felt hat from his head and worked the wide brim between his gnarled fingers. “You’re worse than a bull terrier once you get your teeth into something.”
“Trask’s private investigator has come up with another theory about what happened five years ago,” Tory explained, her worried eyes moving to her brother.
Keith bristled. “What do you mean ‘another theory’?”
“John Davis seems to think that your father was innocent,” Trask said, silently gauging Keith’s reaction.
“Big deal. We’ve been telling you that for years.”
“But you wouldn’t tell me who Calvin was protecting.”
“What!” Keith’s face slackened and lost all of its color.
Tory felt as if her heart had just stopped beating.
“John Davis seems to think that your father was covering for you; that you were the man called ‘Wilson’ that was involved with Linn Benton and George Henderson.”
“Wait a minute—” Rex cut in.