He had to catch up with a woman who preached the gospel of staying in the moment, but was proving to be an expert at making a quick getaway.

Chapter Fourteen

Cara spotted the enormous luxury SUV parked in the drive from a quarter mile out. She fixed her sights on it, opening up the throttle and clenching her jaw to keep from clacking her teeth on every rut and ridge hidden beneath browning grass and fallen leaves.

Paul Stanton. Paul Stanton. She’d known the man all her days, but for the life of her, she could not form a picture of him. Brown hair—probably grayish brown now. Brown eyes? Probably. Her overriding recollection of the man was he was bland. Handsome enough in a conventional way.

Neat. For some reason, she recalled shirts pressed to a crisp, khaki pants with knife-edge pleats and loafers polished to a high gloss. In other words, the polar opposite of her ruggedly handsome if not a bit rumpled and work-worn father.

It was no wonder her mother had dumped Mr. Permanent Pressed for her father.

“Gah!” she cried when she hit a bump so hard the rear of the gator skittered to the side. She let off the gas until she regained control, then hit it again the moment she felt all four wheels were under her.

The pearly white SUV parked behind her father’s mud-spattered pickup gleamed in the afternoon sunlight. She squinted when the shining chrome trim tossed sunlight back at her. She took pleasure in skidding to a stop right beside the hulking vehicle, sending up a plume of dust and gravel she hoped marred the sparkling paint job.

She killed the engine and leaped from the ATV. She was skirting the back of Paul Stanton’s vehicle when she slid to an abrupt stop. Parked beside the massive car was another. This one low-slung and sleek. A matte silver with an all-too-familiar profile. Hurrying to the rear of the sports car, she knew what she would find.

Missouri plates.

The driver who’d been in such a hurry on the highway had been swerving in and out of traffic, endangering the lives of other drivers so he could get here faster.

Here. To her parents’ little ranch in the Ozarks. Her safe haven. The place she could hide out without anyone knowing where she was. No one except Paul Stanton.

Cara reached into the back pocket of her jeans for her phone but came up empty.

Cringing, she darted a glance at the field she’d sped across to get to them. She had no doubt Wyatt would be hot on her heels, but he would have to come around via the farm and county roads. She couldn’t wait for him. Wouldn’t. She was the one who’d brought this madness to her mother and father’s doorstep. She would be the one to stop it.

Rolling her shoulders back, she circled the corner of the house and came up the front walk. Only then did she register the steady stream of gruff, rhythmic barks. Roscoe, bless him, was standing at attention, his forehead furrowed with concern and the hair on his back standing on end, barking to be let inside to inspect the newcomers.

Walking softly, Cara crooned the old dog’s name as she climbed the shallow steps. She scratched behind his floppy ears, then pressed her forehead to his to calm him. “Who’s in there, boy? Bad guys? Guys with bad hair? Why was Mama talking all funny, huh?”

The dog sat at her feet, his hindquarters hitting the deck with a thump.

“Don’t worry. I’ll get ’em. You stay here and tell Wyatt where we’re at, okay?”

Creeping off the porch, she circled around to the kitchen door. Her mother had hung sheets out to dry in the sun. Cara pictured the state-of-the-art washer-dryer set in the laundry room sitting idle while Betsy Beckett’s linens snapped in the autumn breeze. She could make out the muffled hum of conversation coming from the kitchen, but was too short to catch a peek through the window over the sink.

As quietly as she could, she took the two steps up the back stoop and pressed the button on the screen-door handle.

The click of the latch opening might as well have been a shotgun blast.

Cara froze, tensing every muscle in her body. She listened intently, but no one inside spoke. She bit the inside of her cheek, figuring she’d give it to the count of five before she proceeded.

She only made it to three.

“Well, hello there, Cara.”

She looked up to find Paul Stanton smiling down at her beneficently from the screened back porch. He looked incongruous standing there next to the chest freezer, amid a jumble of discarded boots, rain and cold weather gear and the motley collection of half-dead houseplants her mother refused to give up on entirely.

The man who greeted her lived up to her recollections. His hair was indeed brown, but the close-cropped helmet now sported sleek silvery sidewalls. The buttons on his starched shirt strained across a round drum of a belly. He smiled down at her, but no warmth reached his dark eyes.

“Your mama was under the impression you were headin’ down to Little Rock to catch a flight, but my friend couldn’t locate any information about a flight booked, so we thought we’d hang around a bit to see if maybe you’d changed your mind. Again.” He pressed the flat of his palm to the screen door, and she stumbled back a step as it swung open. “Come on in. We’ve been waiting for you to get home.”

She took two steps back, her sneakered feet crunching the leaves gathered along the side of the porch. “Who’s we?”

He flashed a wide politician’s smile. “Why don’t you come in and we’ll all chat a bit. Your mama has poured us all a glass of her delicious sweet tea.”

Riled by his ingratiating tone, she stood her ground. “Who? What friend? What are you doing here?”