by Cindi Myers
“Why? Because I led you into an ambush?”
“No! Do you really think I blame you?”
All the teasing and laughter had left his eyes. “I’m trained to track people. I ought to know when someone is tracking me.”
“You had no reason to believe anyone would follow us,” she said. “Much less attack us. It was a fishing trip. And I was having a good time until the shooting started.”
“Me, too.” He reached out with his uninjured arm and pulled her closer, then kissed her. She sank into that kiss, the tension of the past few days easing. She had missed this—she had missed him.
He raised his head and looked into her eyes. “Do you know what one of my favorite memories of yesterday is?”
“What?”
“When you sacrificed your bra to bandage my wounds.”
She laughed. “You would say that.”
He shaped his hand to her breast, a mock look of disappointment pulling down the corners of his mouth. “You’re wearing a bra now.”
“I have more than one.”
“I’ll buy you a new one.” He slid his hand around to her back and deftly undid the clasp. “Something low-cut. With lace.”
“I might have guessed.” The last word came out in a rush of breath as he pulled down the neck of her sweater to expose the tops of her breasts. He began kissing his way along them. “Cody, what are you doing?” she gasped.
“This.” He pulled the sweater lower, and dragged his tongue across her nipple. “And this.” He addressed the other breast.
“But, um, you’re wounded,” she said.
“Not where it counts.” He unzipped her jeans.
“I’m worried I’m going to hurt you,” she said.
“Sex is a great pain reliever,” he said. “I think you told me that once.”
He was definitely making it hard for her to think straight. Then again, what did she need to think about? She wanted him, and she was more than relieved to be with him again. Making love seemed right. Healing. She slid both hands under the sweatshirt he wore, skimming the taut muscles of his stomach and over his chest. “Let me help you undress.”
“Best idea you’ve had in five minutes.”
She helped him out of his clothing, with a minimum amount of pain on his part, and multiple apologies on her part. “Maybe we shouldn’t do this,” she said, after she managed to get the sweatshirt off over his head.
“We definitely should,” he said, and slipped his hand inside her panties to persuade her.
“All right, we should,” she agreed, a little breathless. She moved toward the bed, then stopped. “Should you lie down, or should I?” What would hurt less for him?
“I have an idea.” He grasped her hips and backed her toward the bed, which, like the one in Bette’s room, was an old-fashioned iron-framed model that sat high off the floor. With her sitting on the edge of the bed and him standing, they lined up perfectly.
“Oh.” She wrapped her legs around his hips. “Good idea.”
He leaned over and reached for the condom packet on the bedside table. “I see now you didn’t really want help with that cow,” she said. “You planned to seduce me.” She took the packet from him and tore it open.
“I still need help with the cow.” He kissed the side of her neck. “Later.”
She took the condom from the packet and reached for him. “Allow me.”
“There are...definitely...some advantages...to being one-handed,” he breathed as she rolled on the condom. Then he wrapped his arm around her and drew her to him, kissing her fiercely.
The man knew how to kiss—deftly setting every nerve on fire with the pressure of his lips or the sweep of his tongue. She reveled in the feel of him in her arms, tracing the line of his spine with her fingers, cupping his firm ass. She let out a sigh when he slid into her, and opened her eyes to stare into his as he began to move. She grasped his hips and met him stroke for stroke, watching as passion etched deeper lines on his face and darkened his eyes. Then he raised her legs, tilting her back slightly, and her breathing grew ragged and her vision blurred. She was dimly aware of the bed knocking against the wall, and her own rising cries as a powerful climax shook her. Cody gripped her more tightly and drove harder, until he came with a shout.
They fell back together on the bed. Bette rolled over and he slid up beside her. “Careful of your shoulder,” she cautioned.
“What shoulder?” he breathed.
They lay, not speaking, for a long time. She trailed her fingers through his hair, eyes half-closed. “Did you ever think you’d be involved with a former bank robber?” she asked.
“No.” He lifted his head to look at her. “Did you ever think you’d take a US marshal as your lover?”
“Never.”
“What’s going to happen to us?” he asked.
“Someone is trying to hurt me—maybe kill me,” she said. “This isn’t a great time to talk about the future.”
“Call me an optimist,” he said. “I think it is.”
“Since when is any lawman an optimist?”
“Since I met you.” He kissed her cheek. “You have me believing all kinds of improbable things.”
Improbable. That’s exactly what they were. Yet here they lay, together, and in spite of the fact that her life might be in danger and she didn’t know what she should do next, she was happier than she had ever been.
Chapter Sixteen
“I can’t believe how beautiful everything turned out.” Emily stepped back and admired the array of white-clothed tables, each with a centerpiece of white lilies and silver plumes. The buffet table featured similar arrangements, as well as carved-crystal snowflakes and drifts of glittery fake snow.
“Most of the decorations were Lacy’s idea,” Bette said. “I stuck to what I know best—food.”
“And what food.” Emily lifted the plastic wrap off a tray of silver-and-white-frosted petit fours. “They look so good—you don’t mind if I take just one, do you?”
“Go ahead,” Bette said. “But just one.”
Grinning, Emily chose a petit fours and bit it in half. The delight on her face transformed into a grimace. She spit out the cake, choking.
“What is it?” Bette asked. “What’s wrong?”
“The cake!” Emily stared at the mangled pastry in her napkin. “I don’t mean to criticize but—did you taste these?”
“No. I mean, I did taste the batter, and I sampled the frosting—they were fine.”
“This one wasn’t fine.”
Bette pulled another cake from the tray and bit into it. The bitterness brought tears to her eyes. She spit it out and looked around for water, but there was none. “Someone has done something to my petit fours!” she wailed. She scanned the buffet table. The finger sandwiches and cream puffs were still in the refrigerator. She wouldn’t put them out until after the guests arrived. But the scones, chocolate-dipped apricots and hazelnut shortbread were already arranged on the table, covered with plastic wrap. “We’d better taste everything,” she said. “The refrigerated food, too.”
Looking doubtful, Emily followed Bette down the table. They sampled cakes and scones and cookies, and by the time they reached the end of the table, Emily was smiling again. “Everything else is delicious,” she said.
Bette remembered Rainey’s interest in the petit fours, and how she had left the cook alone in the kitchen with the cakes while she went to Cody’s cabin. She turned and raced toward the kitchen, Emily in pursuit. “Where are you going?” Emily called.
Bette burst into the kitchen. Rainey looked up from the dishes she was washing. “Is something wrong?” she asked.
“You know what’s wrong.” Bette crowded the other woman against the sink. “What did you put in my petit fours?”
Rainey’s eyes widened in fear. “What are you t
alking about? I didn’t touch your petit fours.”
“I left you alone with them and you put something in them,” Bette said. “You wanted to embarrass me in front of Lacy and her guests, so you ruined them.”
Rainey leaned away from her. “I swear I didn’t.”
“Taste this!” Bette shoved a cake at the older woman.
Hesitantly, Rainey took the cake and put it in her mouth. She immediately made a face and spit it out. “That’s horrible! It tastes like pine cleaner.”
“Bette.” Emily tugged on Bette’s arm. “I think Rainey is telling the truth. Why would she doctor your cakes that way?”
“If she didn’t do it, her son did.” Bette glared at the cook. “Has Doug been in here this afternoon?”
Rainey hesitated. “He helped me with lunch,” she said after a pause.
“Did you see him messing with the cakes?” Bette asked.
“No. I swear I didn’t.” She swallowed. “He asked me about them, and I told them they were petit fours for the party tonight, and that you were coming back later to frost them.”
“Was he ever alone in the kitchen after that?” Bette asked.
Rainey looked panicked. “Maybe,” she said. “But why would he ruin your beautiful cakes? And try to ruin Lacy’s party? He likes Lacy.”
“But he doesn’t like me,” Bette said. “And you said he’s afraid of me. He would like me to leave here.”
Rainey hung her head. “He was in here alone while I cleared the table. When I came back, he was acting funny. He left before we had even finished the washing. He told me he had something he needed to do.”
“Where is he now?” Emily asked.
“In his room, I guess,” Rainey said.
“We’d better talk to him,” Bette said.
Rainey led the way up a set of back stairs, to a room at the rear of the house. She knocked on the door, but there was no answer. “Doug?” she called. “Doug, it’s Mom. Please open the door.”
Silence. Rainey frowned. “I can’t think why he’s not answering.”
“Is the door locked?” Bette asked.
Rainey tried the knob. It wouldn’t turn.
“We’ll have to wait until he comes back or wakes up,” Emily said.
“No we don’t.” Rainey reached up and took a cotter key from atop the door frame. “All the doors around here unlock this way.”
“I always forget about those,” Emily said.
Rainey slipped the angled bit of metal into the hole beneath the doorknob and they heard the lock pop.
Doug’s room was dark and crowded, the blinds drawn and items piled on the floor, the bed and every flat surface—clothing, shoes, magazines, video games—and on a bookshelf by the door, a bottle of pine cleaner and a syringe. Bette stared at the items. “He must have injected the cakes with this,” she said. “He could have even done it after I iced them. If he used just a little bit you wouldn’t even be able to tell what he had done by looking.”
Behind her, Rainey began to weep. “Why would he do something so horrible?” she sobbed. “Why would he ruin your beautiful cakes?”
The woman’s distress moved Bette. She was angry about the ruined petit fours, but Rainey was devastated. “I don’t blame you,” she said. “Doug is responsible for his own actions.”
“What are you going to do about the party?” Rainey asked.
“We have plenty of other food,” Emily said. “I’m betting the sandwiches and cream puffs are all right.”
“But the cakes—you have to have cake at a party,” Rainey said. She sniffed and wiped her eyes. “I can help you make more. I’ll do whatever you need me to do.”
Bette considered the offer. “We don’t have time to make more petit fours.”
“We could make cupcakes,” Rainey said. “They don’t take long, and you could decorate them all fancy.”
Bette nodded. “Cupcakes are a good idea.” Not as impressive as petit fours, maybe, but the women would like them. She patted Rainey’s arm. “Come on. Let’s get to work. We have just enough time before Lacy’s guests arrive.”
* * *
“SURPRISED TO SEE you here, Cody,” Dwight said as he entered Moe’s Pub that evening and spotted the marshal at the end of the bar with Travis and Gage. “How are you feeling?”
“About like you’d expect someone to feel who’s been shot and carved up.” Cody wrapped his hand around a glass of iced tea. He would have preferred a stiff whiskey, but before leaving the ranch he had reluctantly taken one of the pain pills the doctor had prescribed and he knew better than to mix narcotics and alcohol.
“You could have stayed back at the ranch,” Travis said.
“He didn’t want to miss seeing you attempt to cut loose and enjoy yourself,” Gage said.
Travis looked as if he wanted to cut something, all right. Or someone. “What’s the plan for this evening?” he asked.
“I wanted to hire dancing girls, but you nixed that idea,” Gage said.
“There are no dancing girls in Eagle Mountain,” Dwight said. “What’s plan B?”
“Plan B is to buy the groom a beer.” He signaled to Moe, who was behind the bar. He slid over a pint and Gage handed it to Travis. “Then we have a little gift for you.”
Cody and Bette had eventually gotten around to attaching the antlers to the stuffed cow—they poked out of the top of the shopping bag he handed to Travis. The sheriff set aside the pint glass and accepted the bag with the stoicism of a man who has resigned himself to eating a live worm. He pulled the cow out of the bag and his cheeks pinked. The rest of the men, who had already heard the story behind the gift, guffawed. “You never got a trophy from your first deer hunt,” Gage said. “So we thought you deserved one now.”
“You can hang it over the fireplace,” one of the groomsmen, Ryder Stewart, said.
“Very funny.” Travis set the cow aside and stood. “How about a game of pool?”
Someone put money in the jukebox, and most of the men teamed up to play pool at the two tables at the back of the room. Cody remained at the end of the bar, sipping tea and wondering if he would have been better off staying home. Gage slid onto the stool next to Cody. “You should have been the one to have a bachelor party,” Cody said. “You would have enjoyed it more.”
“Oh, Travis is having a good time.” They watched as the sheriff bent over the pool table and lined up his cue. “He’s a shark and this lets him show off his skills, plus I’m going to make sure he drinks more than he should. He needs to forget about this serial killer business for a while.”
“Is he getting a lot of pressure from the town to solve the crime?”
“Eagle Mountain’s new mayor thinks Travis hung the moon—but he doesn’t need to apply any pressure. My brother is good at doing that himself.”
“It’s a tough case,” Cody said.
“It is. We can’t catch a break, and meanwhile, this guy goes around murdering more women.” He set down his beer. “This conversation is too depressing. We need to talk about something else.”
“Such as?”
“Such as—what’s up with you and that pretty blonde caterer?”
“Bette.”
“Yeah. Bette.” Gage gave him the look of a cop interrogating a suspect. “Travis said you went to bat for her pretty hard over those stolen rings. You don’t think she took them.”
“Travis doesn’t, either,” Cody said. “Not really.”
“Travis said she was pretty upset about you getting shot,” Gage said.
“The guy was shooting at her, too. That would upset anybody.”
“She was the first person you asked about when I picked you up this morning.”
Cody sipped his tea. “Why are you interested in my personal life?”
“I’m a nosy guy. It’s a good quality for a cop.”
“Go nose into someone else’s life.”
Gage stood. “Maybe I will.”
The door to the bar opened and a man stepped in. He scanned the room, taking in the half a dozen men playing pool and the two at the bar. A tall man with hunched shoulders, he had a few wisps of gray hair about his balding head and a ragged gray goatee. Moe moved from behind the bar. “This is a private party,” he said. “Didn’t you see the sign on the door?”
“It’s okay, Moe.” Cody put up his hand. He motioned to the newcomer. “Come on in. I’ll buy you a drink.”
The man hesitated, but apparently the prospect of a free drink won him over. He shambled to the bar and took the stool a few down from Cody. Moe had just served him a beer when Travis and Gage joined them. Travis slid onto the stool beside the man. “Hello, Carl,” he said.
The man flinched. “Are you talking to me?”
“Carl Wayland, right?” Travis asked.
“I don’t know anybody by that name.” He turned his attention to his drink.
“How about Charlie Fergusen?”
“I’d better go.” The man stood, but Gage put a hand on his shoulder. “Stay a minute and talk to us.”
Carl looked around. All the men had gathered at the bar now. Dwight and Ryder still carried pool cues. “What is this?” he demanded. “Can’t a man come in out of the cold and have a drink?”
“What are you doing in Eagle Mountain, Carl?” Travis asked, his tone genial.
“None of your business.”
“Where are you staying since you checked out of the Eagle Mountain Inn?” Cody asked.
“Again—none of your business.” He hunched over the bar and sipped his beer.
“Where were you yesterday afternoon?” Travis asked. “From, say, three o’clock until seven?”
Carl remained silent.
“What about Wednesday morning?” Cody asked. “Where were you then?”
Carl shoved back from the bar. “I gotta get out of here. It stinks too much of cop in this place.”
He moved past Travis and Gage, but Cody blocked his exit. “Bette Fuller doesn’t want to see you,” he said. “If you come anywhere near her, I’ll have you back in jail, charged with harassment.”