Secret Bodyguard. B.J. Daniels

all these years.”

      He nodded, trying to think of a good reason a mother would abandon her baby.

      “Do you want me to keep digging?” Dylan asked. “I have another case that’s going to tie me up for a while but after that—”

      Jesse nodded. He couldn’t leave the Crowe case, not now. And after thirty years, what was a few more days?

      “Then you’re going to stay on the Crowe estate?” Dylan asked.

      He nodded, his thoughts torn between this shocking news and Amanda Crowe. “The old man called me this morning and told me he wants me to drive her wherever Amanda wants to go. He thanked me for keeping an eye on her. And obviously someone on the Crowe estate thinks they know who I am or they wouldn’t have put the newspaper clipping under my door.”

      Dylan looked uneasy and Jesse nodded in agreement.

      “I know I’m walking a tightrope here,” Jesse acknowledged and told him about Gage Ferraro.

      “Now everyone is looking for Susannah, including Gage, if he isn’t just stringing J.B. along. But I overheard him prodding her to make her move. I intend to be there when she does.”

      Dylan studied him for a long moment and Jesse wondered if the cowboy realized just how involved Jesse had gotten in this case.

      “She’s a beautiful woman,” Dylan said quietly.

      Jesse laughed. “She’s also a Crowe and she’d cut your throat in a heartbeat.”

      “Just don’t forget that. Jesse, I know this news about the newspaper clipping comes as a shock to you,” Dylan said.

      “Yeah.” He loved his parents, his family and he’d always felt a part of them. This was more than a shock. He felt as if the earth under him was no longer solid. As if nothing was as it seemed.

      “Take it slow, okay?” Dylan advised. “Give it a little time.”

      Time. Right. Too bad that wasn’t his nature.

      Jesse called the Crowe compound at a little after three. Mr. Crowe was with his daughter. Both had asked not to be disturbed. Nor had they changed their minds about needing Jesse’s services, Eunice assured him. They would be dining in tonight together.

      After he left the compound, he called his boss at the Dallas P.D. and told him what he’d overheard J.B. Crowe say the night before about the governor’s daughter Diana. His boss said he’d handle it and hung up.

      He had time. Enough time he could drive up to his parents’ house in Pilot Point and back. It wasn’t but a couple of hours. Amanda wouldn’t dare try to sneak out with her father home and dinner planned for the two of them. Would she?

      MARIE MCCALL MET HIM at the door, excitedly kissed him on the cheek then noticed something was wrong. “What is it, honey?”

      His mother. She knew him as no one else did. Her hand went to his forehead, just as it had when he was a child.

      “Are you feeling ill?” she enquired, regarding him with concern as she ushered him in.

      “Stop fussing over him,” Pete McCall called jovially from the kitchen. “You’re just in time,” he said to Jesse. “How about a beer before dinner? We were getting ready to throw some steaks on the grill.”