Free Broken Promises by Patricia Watters Page B

better if I was along too," Zak said. "I'll meet you at my cabin and we can go from there."
    "Curt's back at camp and I need to talk to him first," Tess said, "so give me a few minutes."
    Zak nodded and returned to his truck.
    When Tess arrived at the compound, she found Curt in the machine shed working on the bulldozer. He repeated to her what he told Zak, that he found Jed Swenson hauling the tree and when he started asking questions, Swenson confronted him. Tess felt uneasy with Curt's attitude, sensing a feud building, and as she headed to the cabins, she wondered if her father had had this many problems running Timber West, or whether she was somehow jinxed.
    She met Zak, and they walked up the dirt road that wound through the forest while following the clink and rumble of Jed Swenson's Cat, and found him grading the road. When he saw them approaching, he cut the throttle and waited on the Cat for them to come up to him. Tess looked up, realizing her low vantage point put her at a disadvantage. "Swenson," she said, "would you please step down. I'd like to talk to you about the two trees that were cut earlier."
    Swenson looked from Tess to Zak, then he shifted the plug of tobacco to the opposite cheek and climbed down. Looking at Tess, he said, "What about the trees?"
    "That's what I want you to tell me," Tess said, determined to listen to Swenson's side of the story in spite of what she believed. "From what I understand, you claim Broderick cut them."
    Swenson held her gaze. "That's because he did. He was standing by one of them right after it fell."
    Tess folded her arms and looked at Swenson. "Did you hear Broderick's chain saw?"
    Swenson shifted his gaze to Zak, then back to Tess, and said, "I was running the Cat and couldn't hear anything.”
    "Where, exactly, were you at the time?" Tess asked.
    "Over near the hollow," Swenson replied, pointing.
    Tess's eyes narrowed. "You just happened to be operating there and saw Curt Broderick?"
    Swenson shot a spate of tobacco juice to the ground. "I saw the tree falling and found Broderick standing over it when I got there so I told him to get the hell away from the tree, that it belonged to de Neuville, and he told me to mind my own damn business."
    "So you jumped him."
    "Hell no. He jumped me."
    Tess felt the aggravated beating of her heart. "Was anyone else around?"
    "Hell, how should I know. Broderick had me pinned to the ground."
    Tess arched a brow. "You don't look like someone who could be easily pinned, Swenson. Are you sure you have the story right?"
    "Are you sayin ' I'm lyin '?"
    "I'm not saying anything. I'm just trying to find out what happened."
    "I told you what happened. Now, you can believe anything you damned well please. I have work to do." He swung up onto the Cat, shoved it in gear, and lowered the blade. When the bulldozer started moving forward, Tess felt Zak's hand on her arm, drawing her out of the way.
    "I don't think we're going to get anything more from him," Zak said, watching the bulldozer disappear over a rise. "That's about the same story I got from him earlier."  
    Tess parked her hands on her hips. "Well, I refuse to pay your father for those trees until we get to the bottom of this."
    "I'll see if I can get more out of Swenson later," Zak said." Meanwhile, I've opened one of the old trails through the woods. We can go back that way."
    As they walked together along the trail, it was eerily like it had once been, and Zak couldn't help thinking that Tess would be aware of it too. She couldn't avoid it. But back then they would have been holding hands, and stopping to hug and kiss before dashing to the grotto where they'd have only a short time alone together. Wanting to take her back to a time when she loved him, he said, "I remember the time you wrapped her arms around a telephone pole and sniffed it and claimed you liked the smell of creosote. Do you still?"
    Tess laughed. "Heavens, no. Whatever made you think of that?"
    "I guess, being in the