Read Online The Lawman Meets His Bride by Meagan McKinney - Free Book Online

warm and gummy in hers. Then he removed his cashmere topcoat and folded it neatly over his arm. He was in his forties, thin and slope-shouldered, dressed in a sagging brown suit and cap-toe Oxfords. She did a double-take at Mumford; the baby-faced, bifocaled agent reminded her of one of those teenagers who used to appear on TV game shows and win big money for being so cerebral.
    “I told my story last night to the state troopers,” she explained as the two men stepped inside.
    “Yes, we know you did,” Ulrick confirmed. His intense, probing stare and skeptical smirk seemed more appropriate to an Inquisitor General. “We are required to conduct our own questioning.”
    “I see,” she replied, not really seeing at all.
    Mumford was peering all around the room as if he expected to find an exotic bordello. Despite his fashionable blue suit, something about the youthful agent struck her as decidedly old-fashioned. Then she realized: It was his neat, shellacked hair, which had a part straight as a pike.
    Ulrick produced a handheld tape recorder and thumbed it on. He asked many of the same questions the detective had asked her last night. Except that he placed far more emphasis on exactly what Loudon told her as well as his precise purpose for wanting to go to Billings.
    “Can you elaborate somewhat on his statement that he has an ‘ace in the hole?’,” Ulrick pressed for the second time.
    Constance felt her patience stretching thin. “Do you want me to make something up, Mr. Ulrick? That’s all he told me.”
    Ulrick simply switched to a new line of questioning.

    “Did he say exactly where this ‘ace’ is in Billings?”
    She shook her head.
    “Miss Adams,” he reminded her in a condescending tone, “the tape recorder cannot record a nod.”
    “No,” she snapped back. “He did not tell me where in Billings this ace is being kept.”
    “Did he say where he might go after he went to Billings?”
    So they haven’t caught him yet, she inferred. She felt guilty when a weight seemed to lift from her.
    “No, he didn’t. And frankly, I don’t believe he was in any condition to even make it to Billings.”
    Ulrick’s permanent smirk etched itself a bit deeper.
    “You sound concerned about that, Miss Adams. Are you?”
    “Concerned?”
    “Yes. I get the distinct impression it troubles you that he was in need of medical attention. You seem worried about his well-being. That strikes me as…somewhat odd. After all, this man forced you at gunpoint to—”
    “Excuse me, Mr. Ulrick,” she cut in. “ I never said he ‘forced’ me. That’s your word, not mine.”
    Ulrick’s long, thin nose wrinkled at the bridge when he frowned.
    “I don’t understand, Miss Adams. Are you now saying no gun was involved?”
    “He had a gun, yes.”
    “And did he not threaten you with it?”
    In her heart, Constance knew the strict answer to that question was probably yes. But by now Ulrick had put her in an adversarial mood.

    “Well he showed it to me,” she stipulated carefully. “And it was a bit threatening, yes.”
    “ It was threatening, or he was?”
    “The gun, I meant.”
    Ulrick exchanged a long glance with his younger companion. The tape recorder didn’t record that, either, she thought, keeping the observation to herself.
    “Miss Adams,” Ulrick lectured her in a patronizing tone, “I’m getting the distinct impression that you are actually sympathetic to your abductor.”
    “Your impressions are of no interest to me, Mr. Ulrick. And my sympathies are my private business.”
    “Perhaps. But aiding and abetting a fugitive is the law’s business.”
    Todd Mumford entered the conversation for the first time. His tone was far more reasonable than Ulrick’s.
    “Miss Adams, federal kidnapping charges are filed automatically whether the victim presses charges or not.”
    “That’s your area of expertise, not mine,” she replied curtly. “I’m a Realtor.”
    “Yes,” Ulrick interjected in a