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“Mrs. Hartfield, I’m Joel Saxon.” He didn’t offer her his hand.
Winifred’s eyes narrowed. Like a hawk eyeing its prey. “Yes, Mr. Saxon. I know all about you. What my private investigator found made for very interesting reading. I know all about your perverted ways. That is not an environment I want my grandsons to grow up in.”
“For God’s sake,” Aspen muttered.
The other woman’s gaze turned to hers, her sharp blue eyes as cold as ice. “I should have known that someone who’d grown up as you did wouldn’t think twice about what you are subjecting your sons to.”
“My sons mean everything to me. They’re my world. I love them. I certainly wasn’t going to get rid of them like you wanted me to.”
The older woman stiffened. “I told you before that you misunderstood me.” She looked around. “I suppose I should invite you in.”
“Oh, we’re not staying,” Saxon told her in a dark voice. “Why are you here?”
“I told you, I’m worried about—”
“Stop wasting my time,” Saxon told her. “I’ve very low on patience having just come home to find you’ve upset my family, and created havoc in my town. Now, what do you really want? What’s it gonna take for you to leave?”
She straightened and gave them both a haughty look. “Two million.”
Aspen sucked in a breath. “What?”
Saxon nodded, not looking shocked in the slightest. “I thought that might be the case. You don’t have the funds for the bribes you’d need to get the boys away from Aspen. But I’m guessing in that report from your investigator, it had how much I’m worth and you figured out another way to get your hands on some cash. You’d come here, threaten to take the boys then offer to disappear and forget about the boys if I paid you off.”
“You bitch!” Aspen stepped forward. Saxon grabbed hold of her arm, keeping her back. “How dare you try to blackmail him!”
“I don’t know what Aaron ever saw in you. Piece of trash—”
“Enough,” Saxon said sharply. “You’ll not speak about my fiancée that way. And you are not getting your hands on a cent of my money. We know all about your financial difficulties. I wonder what your friends at the country club will think when you lose everything. When it all comes out what you’ve spent all your husband’s money on.”
Her eyes darted back and forth between them.
“They might not understand that such an upright, church-going, pillar of society is engaging in illegal gambling.”
“You’ll regret this! I’ll find someone to help me get those boys! I’m going to shut you down! I will—”
“You will do nothing,” Saxon told her quietly. “Because if you try to cause us any sort of trouble, if you ever show your face here again I will make you suffer. And do not think I won’t. I will dig up every piece of dirt I can on you. I’m pretty certain there are skeletons in your closet you don’t want exposed, aren’t there, Winnie? For instance, I find it very interesting that a man as fit and healthy as your husband had a heart attack and died.”
“Wh-what are you implying?” Winifred looked like she was about to faint. Her eyes were wide and wild.
“I think you understood me. Now, to show that I’m not a completely bad guy, I’m going to pay your B&B bill and get you an escort out of town.”
Winifred’s face turned white then bright red and she flung herself at Saxon, fists flying. Aspen stared in shock as Saxon easily subdued her, placing her hands behind her back and holding them there.
“Meg, love?” he called out, over Winifred’s screeches of fury.
Meg, who had obviously been close by and listening to it all, appeared in the doorway. “Yes?”
“Could you call Jake for me, tell him I was just attacked.”
“Oh, I would be delighted.”
“Wait, where’s her lawyer?” Aspen asked.
“Left town this morning,” Meg told her. “Said he wasn’t getting paid enough to put up with this town.”
Aspen climbed into Saxon’s Jeep, watching as Jake escorted a still screeching Winifred into his car. “Will he really lock her up?”
“I expect not. He’ll probably give her a warning and send her on her way. She won’t be back.”
