Chapter One

"I wish I could go, John. But the Rothchild account's taking up so much time these days, I just can't," Phillip Anderson said, looking out his 37th story window onto the Chicago skyline as the phone dangled at his ear. "I know it's important, but now's just not good for me. Can't you go? … Yeah, I know…" He closed his eyes and sighed heavily. "Okay. Well, I'll see what I can do. Yeah, I'll get back to you… I will. 'Bye."

The phone hit the cradle with a clang, and Phillip shook his perfectly-groomed head before looking across the expanse of desk into the questioning eyes of his son, Jaxton, who sat with pen poised, listening.

"Bad news?" Jaxton asked indifferently.

His father swiped the glasses off his face and frowned. "It's your grandfather again."

Grandfather Snyder. During the past two months more than one conversation about him had bounced across the phone lines between Jaxton's parents in Chicago and Uncle John Snyder in Los Angeles.

Phillip leaned forward, stressing the pinstripes of his silk suit. He squeezed the bridge of his long nose with two fingers. "That stupid man's going to ruin us all."

"How could he do that?"

"It's just the whole Kansas thing-you know how those people are. They wouldn't know an asset if it jumped up and bit them on the behind."

"Mom can't talk to him?"

"You know your mother. She wouldn't call him if the earth was going to spin off its axis," Phillip said in exasperation. "And John's not much better. He thinks someone should go down there and at least make sure the estate's in order, but do you think he'll go? No way. He'd sooner go to hell on an ice floe."

"You can't get somebody in Rayland to look it over?"

Phillip rubbed his temple with the edge of his glasses. "Are you serious? I wouldn't trust anybody down there with something like this. We'd really have a disaster on our hands then."

Jaxton nodded, seeing in his mind his only brother, a few personal possessions in a box under his arm, boarding the elevator and slipping out of their lives three years before. "Too bad Blake isn't around anymore. He'd have been perfect."

"Yeah, no kidding," Phillip said with a slight shake of his head.

Jaxton dismissed the memory and looked back to his notes, already tiring of the subject. He tapped his pen on his notebook three times and then moved back to the real reason he was in the office on Memorial Day weekend. "So, what do you think about the Manning books? Did you get a chance to look at them yet?"

***

Over the rolling green of the Kansas Flint Hills, the sky hung painted in color combinations only God could get away with. Periodically the scene outside the balcony doors caught her gaze, and Ami Martin would pause to take in its beauty for a moment.

Beyond the nearly full-grown red cedar trees, the land stretched in an endless parade of emerald until it rolled right off the earth's edge. That land, this house, those trees-together they comprised the only true home she'd ever known. Even now with her life devoid of any real family, the safety of those hills enveloped her like a warm hug.

She returned to her task, carefully pulling books off the shelf and stacking them onto the tiny coffee table. The books were a link-a precious, priceless link to the past. The sadness in her chest expanded with each volume she took down. How many times had she and Grandpa Martin sat in this room, the balcony doors open to the sunset beyond, reading the works of the great ones? Emerson, Thoreau, Keats…Even when she couldn't understand the words, he had seen fit to share them with her. In this room, sitting by his side, she could always pretend, if only for a moment, that this someone would never abandon her. That he would be there for her even if it wasn't convenient for him, even if she made his life more difficult, even if he didn't really like the idea-he would stay. That had been her one and only lifeline for 24 years, until last Thanksgiving.

She pulled the black-bound Emerson anthology off the shelf and ran a loving hand over it. Even now if she listened hard, she could almost hear his low baritone lilting over the words.

The sunset beyond the doors blurred, and she brushed a stray brown tendril out of her face. Slowly she dropped the book to the table.

The wisdom of Grandpa Martin's years was tucked safely in her soul. However, as she pulled another volume off the shelf, she couldn't help wondering what his advice would be at this moment. It was true Grandpa Martin was only a simple farmer, but she knew in her heart that he had been much more than that. He was the only person who'd ever welcomed her into his home and insisted that she stay-no questions asked.

Not even her mother had done as much. She had left before Ami was two, and her father wasn't much better. His decision to send her to Rayland wasn't about making her life more stable-it was about making his less complicated.

She pushed that thought away. Don't think about him. Not here.

Absently her hand ran the dust cloth over the book in her hand. If she could just hear Grandpa Martin's assurance that everything would be okay, then somehow she would have the strength to keep fighting. But with the money dwindling, and her father calling every other day to ask if she was ready to give up and simply sell the place, her determination was waning quickly.

She pulled the Poe volume down and laughed softly. If only her scariest problems were ravens and casks of amontillado, as they had once been when she was tucked safely in the crook of Grandpa Martin's arm. Yes, this was the only place that had ever truly been home, and it was the place she wanted to spend the rest of her life-right here in Rayland, Kansas.

***

"I know you've got Manning," Phillip said the next morning as he watched Jaxton pace the room in front of him, "but your mother and I discussed it, and it's the only thing that makes any sense."

"You can't be serious about this," Jaxton protested. "What about Easley?"

"Linda can take it."

"Linda?" Jaxton raised a sarcastic eyebrow. "Easley'll bury her the first day, and you know it."

"Okay, then we'll get Bob."

In a slow crawl the room began closing in on Jaxton. "What about Chambers?"

"Karen can handle it for a few days."

Jaxton scrambled for any excuse that might change his father's mind. "Dawson. Now, you know I know more about that account than anyone else here."

"Look, Jax," Phillip said, his voice suddenly hard as stone, "I didn't say I was happy about this, but Fowler called me again last night. He says the old guy's going fast. We need to get this done, and we need to get it done now. Uncle John can't go, your mother won't go, I can't go, and Blake's gone. So the next most logical person is you."

Anger coursed through Jaxton, but, with one look at his father's rigid face, he knew better than to argue. He was the good son, and he wanted it to stay that way-although the thought of having to go to Rayland pulled him much closer to Blake's side of the table. But Jaxton was the one who would never question a direct command, and his father knew that as well as he did.

"I really don't think it'll take very long," Phillip finally said, softening only slightly, and Jaxton felt the yank of the puppet string. "And I promise you'll get your accounts back the second you walk back through that door. Besides it's not like you can't keep in touch. You can take your fax and your laptop…"

Jaxton laid a heavy hand against the wall, set his jaw, and examined the painting hanging there without seeing it. At one time, he could have discoursed for hours about the artist's brushstrokes and brilliant use of subtle back lighting, but now all he wanted to do was yank it from the wall and rip it to shreds.

"So, that's it then?" he finally asked.

"Here's your ticket to Kansas City." His father pulled the thin sheaf from the desk drawer. "Your plane leaves at two. It's a two-hour drive from Kansas City to Rayland. You can rent a car when you get to…"

Jaxton didn' hear the rest of the itinerary. His mind pulsed with red hot flashes of anger, and a bright resolve to get this job done the quickest way possible so he could get back to his real life-back to something other than fields full of nothing but dust and old, worthless dreams.

***

Ami surveyed her to-do list over her sandwich, marking each entry with a one through ten. The pickup sitting immobile in the garage received a one; painting the porch got a three; repainting the guest rooms, a four; hanging wallpaper, a five; cleaning the chicken coop, a two. By the time she got to the end of the list, she was exhausted. There was so much to do. So much to get ready before she could even think about putting her plan into action.

She pulled out her calendar and check book and laid them on the table next to the to-do list. September 1, circled in purple, stared back at her. She had less than three months to get the place in order and a dwindling amount of funds to do it with. In March the money her grandfather left her along with the place had seemed like plenty, but it didn't take long for the bulk of it to evaporate.

In frustration, she replaced the to-do list in the calendar and closed the checkbook. Sitting here worrying about it wasn't getting anything finished any faster. She carried her lunch dishes to the sink and ran water on them. The dishes could wait; the pickup couldn't....

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