She Can Tell by Melinda Leigh Page B

the real you.”
    Exactly
. She’d briefly let her guard down with Blake, and look how that had turned out.
    Rachel stopped at the traffic light. “Enough about Mike already. There is nothing going on between us.”
    Sarah’s eyebrows shot up. “Mike? You’re on a first-name basis with the police chief?”
    “I’m not talking about that anymore.” Rachel’s cheeks warmed. She glanced at her sister.
    Sarah was clearly biting back a grin. “Whatever.”
    Time for a change of subject. Though it was nice to see her sister’s long-forgotten sense of humor. “I’ve been thinking about something. What if this vandal guy isn’t out to get me? What if he’s out to get the farm? I never had any trouble until I moved there, and most of his efforts have been aimed at the business.”
    She’d been thinking about Mike’s questions. Frankly, she’d be thrilled if the threats weren’t a personal attack.
    Sarah frowned. “I don’t know. The place is a disaster. Except for your new barn, nothing else has been renovated since the fifties.”
    “I was thinking maybe there was something about the place we don’t know.”
    “What, you think there’s an oil field under the meadow?” Sarah started humming the
Beverly Hillbillies
theme.
    “Something like that. Though there aren’t many oil rigs in the Poconos.” Rachel laughed, and the tension in her chest loosened. “It was Chief O’Connell’s idea.”
    “Don’t you mean Mike?” Sarah teased. Her grin spread across her face. She cupped her bruised cheek. “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts my face.”
    Rachel turned down a small side street. “We have some time before Mrs. Holloway brings the girls home from school, and the alarm guy isn’t coming until after lunch. Mind if I make a quick stop at the library?”
    Sarah stopped laughing abruptly. “Not as long as you don’t make me go inside.”
    In the parking lot, Sarah slid down in the passenger seat and hid her bruised face with one hand. Rachel checked out four books from the local history section at rapid speed. Sarah didn’t sit up again until the truck was in motion.
    Ten minutes later, Rachel turned into her driveway. Down by the barn, the Johnson’s Well Service truck was still parked in the same place it had sat when they’d left for the courthouse. But Rachel was staring at the large commercial van that occupied the parking area in front of the house. Ladders were mounted on the roof. A huge man leaned against the vehicle. As they approached, he turned to face them. David Gunner. A small bubble of long-buried anger surfaced. And the past she’d worked so hard to suppress came rushing back, a barrage images that left her as battered and bruised as any of Troy’s blows.
    Sarah gawked out the window.
    Rachel swallowed the bitter taste a lifetime of jealousy had left in her mouth. None of what happened had been David’s fault. Not directly, anyway.

Chapter Nine

    “What is he doing here?” Rachel eyed the large man with suspicion.
    Sarah squinted out the windshield. “I don’t know. He did some work for Vince awhile back, but I haven’t seen him lately.”
    “I haven’t seen him since Dad sold him the company.” Right after their mother’s funeral. Of course, Neil Parker hadn’t offered the family business to either of his daughters. No, he’d practically adopted the neighbor’s kid instead.
    “Daddy needed to retire,” Sarah said in a sad voice. “He couldn’t function after Mom died.”
    “Retire? Is that what you call sitting in a recliner and drinking twenty-four-seven?”
    “You can’t hold that against David,” Sarah answered in a sad voice. “He isn’t responsible for Daddy’s actions. Mom dying like she did took a huge toll on him.”
    On her daughters too.
    “I know.” Rachel took two slow, deliberate breaths. Didn’t help. “Also wasn’t David’s fault that Dad wanted boys, and all he got was us.”
    Or that their unstable mother had dragged their father into