Barbara Dunlop - Thunderbolt over Texas

His blue eyes hardened to stone in the bright sunshine, and he snapped the case shut. “I don’t think so.”

Sydney winced.

She’d lost the Thunderbolt. And she’d lost Cole.

Her body suddenly felt too heavy for her frame.

She searched his face, but there wasn’t a crack of compassion, no sign of conciliation. Anything she said now would be a waste of breath.

She blinked once, then turned away. She took a couple of wooden steps toward the curb and put up her hand to hail a cab.

Cole didn’t call her name, and she didn’t look back.

Cole wheeled his pickup into a wide spot in front of Grandma’s house. The flowers were still blooming. The barns were still standing. And the horses still grazed in the fields.

He’d been to Heaven, then Hell, then home again, but the Texas landscape stuck to its own rhythm, not even missing his presence. He killed the engine, trying to shake the vacant feeling that had built up inside him, forcing himself to drum up some enthusiasm for the good news he was about to give his grandma.

He felt the breast pocket of his shirt for the hard, rectangular package, reassuring himself that the last four days hadn’t been a dream-or a nightmare.

He kicked open the driver’s door, snapping himself out of his mood. Nobody needed to know he’d been taken for a fool. They only needed to know the brooch was back. He’d gloss over Sydney’s betrayal and gloss over his own gullibility.

He crossed the dirt driveway and took the front stairs two at a time.

“Grandma?” he called as he opened the door.

She appeared in the foyer, wiping her hands on a dish towel. “I heard your truck. Do you have news?”

He forced himself to smile as he slipped the case out of his shirt pocket. “I have great news. I found it.”

She searched his face for a moment. “And everything’s okay?”

That wasn’t exactly the reaction he was expecting. He smiled wider. “Of course it’s okay. We have the Thunderbolt.” He held the case out to her.

Her pale blue eyes shimmered with tears and she reached for the case, opening it carefully to gaze at the brooch. “Where’s Sydney?” she asked, glancing to the open doorway behind him.

Cole inhaled, turning to close the door. “She’s in New York.”

Grandma stilled. “Why? Why didn’t she come home?”

“She had things to do.”

“What things?”

“Grandma…”

“What things? Cole Nathaniel? This is her triumph-”

Cole winced and bit back a sharp denial.

“-her achievement-”

He clenched his jaw tight to keep himself silent.

“She needs to be here with us to celebrate.”

“Grandma.”

“Don’t you ‘Grandma’ me.” She snapped the case shut.

“She’s gone.”

“What did you do?”

“Sydney is not our friend,” he said as gently as he could.

His grandmother glared up at him, waving the Thunderbolt case. “That’s ridiculous. You’re marrying her.”

Cole ran a hand through his hair, gripping the base of his neck. He needed to get out of here. He needed some air. He needed not to be answering questions about Sydney right now. “No, I’m not marrying her.”

“Oh, yes, you are.” Grandma nodded. “I’m not letting you talk yourself out of this girl. It’s time to grow up, Cole. It’s time to take on your responsibilities.”

“I’ll marry someone else. I promise.”

Grandma shook her head and clicked her cheeks.

Cole sucked in a breath, calming himself down. The sooner he got it over with, the better. “I didn’t want to have to tell you this, Grandma.”

“Tell me what? What did you do to that wonderful girl?”

That was it. Cole had had about enough. “That wonderful girl tried to steal the Thunderbolt.”

“She did not.”

Oh, great. Denial. That was helpful. “I watched her do it.”

Grandma waved a dismissive hand. “Not possible.”

“She’s a stranger, Grandma. You can’t have such blind faith in her.” As Cole had done.

He’d been taken in by her sexy smile and her sultry voice. This was what happened when you started letting emotions mess around with your logic. Or maybe it was his libido that had messed around with his logic.

“She may be a stranger to you, Cole.” Grandma tapped the case against Cole’s chest. “But I know that woman. She did not betray us.”

Sydney was amazing, a con artist of incredible talent. She probably duped old people all the time. Her and that partner, Bradley Slander.

“You do not know her,” said Cole.

“Go get her.”

Cole sputtered for a moment. “I will not go get her. Grandma, she ditched me in a hotel room to go and make a deal.”

“I’m sure she had a perfectly logical explanation.”

“Yeah. It was logical, all right. She wanted to steal the Thunderbolt out from under us.”

Grandma waved away his words.

“I waited five hours,” he explained. “I took the address from the trash bin. I followed her, and caught her and her partner red-handed, bribing some black market criminal.”

The color drained from Grandma’s face.

Cole was sorry to disillusion Grandma, but Sydney had to be stopped. She wasn’t a good person. She was a thief. “I saw them through the window. The three of them.”

“Cole.” Grandma’s voice turned to a hoarse whisper.

“I’m sorry, Grandma.” Nobody wished more than Cole that things had turned out differently. The fake Sydney was one of the most compelling women he’d ever met. Even now, even after everything she’d done to him, he still remembered her laughing voice, her gentle caresses and her emerald-dark eyes. His stomach contracted with regret.

Grandma blinked at him. She gripped the jewel case against her chest. Then she squared her shoulders. “Sit down, Cole. There’s something I have to tell you.”

Perched on the couch, Cole listened with growing incredulity to his grandmother’s confession.

His grandfather?

His grandma?

When she got to the part where she’d taken Sydney into her confidence, he jerked up and paced across the room.

With every word, with every passing second, his muscles tightened into harder balls of anger.

He didn’t blame Grandma, and he didn’t blame Sydney. He blamed his grandfather. And he blamed himself. It was their job to protect the family, to keep them safe.

“She bought it from your half-uncle,” Grandma finished. “Then she didn’t explain it to you, because I’d sworn her to secrecy. She kept my secret, Cole. She let you hate her, and she kept my secret.”

Cole stopped in front of the fireplace mantel, fixing his furious gaze on the picture of his grandfather.

The man was grinning.

Grinning.

Before he was even aware of the impulse, Cole slammed his fist into the wood paneling next to the picture, cracking the veneer, putting four deep dents into the grain.

Strangely, he didn’t feel the slightest pain.

“Did I miss something?” came Kyle’s voice from the foyer.

A deafening silence swept the room.

“Cole and Sydney had an argument,” said Grandma.

“You never punched a wall over Melanie,” said Kyle.

As Cole stared at his grandfather, everything inside him turned to stone. Then his chest swelled with an ache, and his throat went raw.

He was just as bad as the old man.

He’d failed.

He wasn’t there for Grandma, and he’d sent Sydney packing when he should have been down on his knees thanking her.

She’d done his job for him.

“Cole?” Kyle’s voice seemed to come from a long way off. “Any news on the Thunderbolt?”

“It’s here,” said Grandma, holding out the case.

“Isn’t that mission accomplished?” asked Kyle. “So what’s wrong?”

What was wrong? Everything was wrong.

A family crisis had unfolded right under Cole’s nose, and he hadn’t even noticed. And he’d destroyed the woman of his dreams. She was back in New York right now, shutting down the Viking show and killing her career. She didn’t deserve this. She’d stepped in to help, and what did she get in return?

He cringed remembering the insults he’d hurled at her on the sidewalk. He’d actually threatened to have her arrested.

And she hadn’t said a thing. She’d kept his grandmother’s confidence in spite of everything. Everything.

“Cole?” Kyle repeated, moving into the room, all humor gone from his tone.

Cole ignored his brother, slowly turning to meet Grandma’s eyes.

When a man could no longer trust his own judgment, what was left? “I don’t know what to do,” he said.

Grandma took a step forward. “Give her the Thunderbolt.”

He shook his head. It was too late. Sydney was canceling the show, and she’d never speak to him again.

“I thought you were marrying her,” said Kyle, glancing from one to the other.

“They had a fight,” said Grandma. “Get on the next plane, Cole. Go to New York and fix it.”

“I can’t fix it.”

“Yes, you can.”

Could he? Would an abject apology help at all? Would the Thunderbolt help, even now?

There was only one way to find out.

Cole straightened.

He filled his lungs.

“What the hell happened?” asked Kyle.

Cole turned on his heel and brushed past his brother. Grandma could tell Kyle, or not tell Kyle about the forgery. Cole would respect her decision. But right now, he had one thing to do, and one thing only.

He banged his way out the door and practically sprinted to the pickup truck.

In her cramped office on the mezzanine floor of the Laurent, Sydney hugged her arms around her chilled body.

“You fell for him, didn’t you?” asked Gwen as she perched herself on the window ledge.

Sydney closed her eyes and nodded. At least there was one area where she could be honest with her friend. “I couldn’t tell Cole what was really going on, either, and then Bradley showed up…”