Chapter 7

Joe came rushing down the stairs when it seemed to him that his fiancée was being pressured. He quickly took her into his arms. "Stop it, stop hounding her," he said, but he followed up with a glare of his own down to Serena. "What's going on, Serena? What is this about?"

Jose turned toward Chonez and in Spanish said, "You tell the truth or I will turn you out into the night without a horse or a gun, right now."

Jarrod understood the Spanish words, and he would not let that happen because he wanted Chonez turned over to the sheriff in the morning, but he waited for Chonez to answer. Chonez didn't say anything against the threat, not yet.

Chonez in fact said nothing at all. Jose reached down and grabbed him by the shirt front.

Jarrod intervened now. "No, Jose, don't turn him out. We need to give him over to the sheriff in the morning. Tonight we'll lock him up in the springhouse and put a guard on him." Jarrod looked up toward Nick then.

Nick got the message. He came to Chonez and grabbed him by the arm. "Come on, boy. That springhouse is nice and cold this time of year, and maybe there won't be any snakes to bother you tonight."

Chonez still said nothing at all. Nick hustled him out the front door.

Jose turned his ire toward Serena, but she would not even look at him. He then turned toward Annamaria, but the anger in his eyes faded. Joe was still holding onto his fiancée. Jose said, gently, "I do not want this to go on anymore. Please, mi hija, tell me what your sister said to you tonight."

Annamaria looked up at Joe. "She is in love with you."

Serena almost blew up, but one hard glare from both her parents sent her slumping. Embarrassment was all over her now. She would not look at anyone, and she started to cry.

"With me?" Joe said. He was genuinely surprised. "How could she - ? I never gave her any reason to think I could be in love with her! Annamaria, I swear I didn't!"

Theresa sat down hard on the settee. Jose sat beside her and took her hand.

Jarrod looked toward Annamaria. "Did Serena say she had anything to do with her and her mother being taken today?"

"No," Annamaria said. "She would not have said she was in love with Joe, but it slipped out."

"Because you already suspected it," Jarrod said.

Annamaria hesitated, but nodded. "I didn't want to, though. I didn't know what to do about it." She turned to sink more closely into Joe's arms. "I never knew what to say."

Jarrod turned toward Serena. "You came up with this idea of the threats, didn't you? You were behind the abduction, and you've been behind the threats. What did Chonez do? Get the two men who abducted you, or did you do that too?"

On the settee, Theresa leaned toward her daughter in the chair opposite her. She spoke to her in Spanish. "Serena, how could you? Why didn't you just come to me and talk to me?"

But Serena said nothing, looked at no one, and stopped crying.

Jarrod tried one more time. "Serena, who are the two men who abducted you? What are their names?"

She still would not talk or look up.

Jarrod heaved a sigh. "All right. The sheriff and I will talk to Chonez in the morning and to you again too. We'll get to the bottom of this, Serena. We'll find the men who abducted you and your mother, and I am absolutely certain they will talk rather than take all the blame for you. You think about what you've done. You save yourself and talk to us in the morning. Heath – "

Heath came closer. Jose said, "Annamaria, you will stay with your mother and I tonight. Serena, you will stay alone in your room."

Jarrod said to Heath, "Take her up there and keep a watch on her room until I can get Nick to send somebody up there to do it. Serena, if you think this through and you want to talk, you let whoever's watching you know and you come down here to me. I'll be here for the next few hours. There's no one else around here who can help you with the law."

Serena still did not look at anyone. Heath took her by the arm, but gently, and she got up. He took her upstairs.

"You're staying up?" Victoria asked Jarrod.

Jarrod nodded. "Just because we stopped these two tonight doesn't mean there might not be more to stop. The schedule holds."

The Cabrillos and the Mitchells all heard what he said and did not know exactly what "the schedule" meant. They just all looked upset, but resigned.

Jarrod said, "Why don't you all try to get some sleep? Tomorrow's going to be another long day."

All of their guests went back upstairs, all of them walking heavily, all of them very, very tired.

Jarrod, Victoria and Audra were left alone in the parlor. Audra shook her head in disbelief. Victoria said quietly to Jarrod, "What else do you suspect?"

"I don't know," Jarrod said. "Maybe nothing. We know there are two men who are not here who are involved. I know that Serena and Chonez are behind it, because she's in love with Joe, but exactly how Chonez is involved I don't know. And I don't know if there's anyone else in this, but it seems logical to me that if Serena is in love with Joe, then perhaps someone else involved is in love with Annamaria."

"Chonez. But you don't have any evidence of that," Victoria said.

Jarrod had to smile a little at her use of the word "evidence." The lawyer in him was rubbing off of everyone around here.

Nick came back in through the front door before Jarrod could respond. "Well, well, well," Nick was saying with a sigh.

"Something new?" Jarrod asked as Nick came closer.

"Maybe," Nick said. "Senor Chonez had his hands in his pockets and when I shoved him into the springhouse he pulled them out. And he pulled a bit of money out with them."

"How much is a 'bit'?" Jarrod asked.

"Quite a bit of paper a driver shouldn't have," Nick said. "I let him pick it up and keep it. He knows I know he has it. If it disappears tonight, we'll know where to look for it."

"So you think he was paid to help out in this thing somehow," Jarrod said.

"Looks like it to me," Nick said.

"You think the money came from Serena," Audra said.

"Maybe," Jarrod said, "or maybe from one of the men who took her and her mother."

"You think one of those men might be behind this, instead of Serena?" Victoria asked.

"Or maybe with Serena," Jarrod said. "Nick, is there anybody in the bunkhouse we can have guard Serena in her room tonight?"

"I can get Kegel to do it," Nick said. "You want me to add him to the schedule?"

"Add him to the schedule," Jarrod said. "We'll all have to catch up on our sleep tomorrow night."

"If we can," Victoria said. "Maybe the sheriff will take Chonez and Serena off tomorrow, but that still leaves the men who abducted her and her mother out there somewhere."

Jarrod nodded. "And if there's somebody else in here who's involved…". He sighed. "Go get Kegel, Nick. Let's get back on schedule."

"This is the last time I agree to having somebody else's wedding here," Nick muttered as he went back to the front door.

"This is the last time I'll ask," Victoria said.

Jarrod smiled a little, put his arm around his mother and kissed her on the forehead.