Harlequin Romantic Suspense March 2021

by Anna J. Stewart

  It was probably a low blow to attack his morals, but it was high time someone hit him over the head with a big, fat dose of reality.

  Yes, he’d been wronged. But she wasn’t entirely at fault in being drugged, either. A tiny bit of wrong had been done to her, too. She hadn’t asked to be threatened and blackmailed nor to be put in the impossible situation of trying to protect a man she cared about deeply by having to hurt him. And she surely didn’t deserve his hate for choosing to save his life.

  She glared at him, hoping that at least a tiny bit of what she was thinking showed in her eyes. He deserved a swift kick in the shins, and she was apparently the person the universe had chosen to deliver it.

  Lord knew, those bullets flying at her on an isolated mountain road—when she’d thought she was safe—had been a kick in the shins to her.

  Wes interrupted her internal rant, which she privately thought was a pretty good one as rants went. “Look, Jessica. I get that you’re enjoying playing house with me. But we both know this won’t last for you. You’ll get bored and restless, and then your wild streak will rear its ugly head and you’ll do something unpredictable.”

  Her wild streak was ugly? “Gee, I thought you rather liked my wild streak,” she retorted. “Particularly in bed. I dare you to tell me you don’t.”

  He opened his mouth. Closed it again.

  Uh-huh. That was what she thought. She pressed her point, continuing, “Without my wild streak, you’d be just another boring stick-in-the-mud. I keep you stirred up. Feeling alive. Admit it.”

  “Being around you is...interesting. I’ll grant you that.”

  Ha. Just interesting? She was a three-ring circus of fun! And he loved it, whether he admitted it or not.

  “You disappoint me, Wes. I thought you were more honest than this. But now I see you’re lying to yourself in addition to lying to me.”

  She scored a hit with that salvo. He whirled away from her and stomped across the bare living room to stare out the big windows at the back of the room, opening onto a magnificent Rocky Mountain tableau.

  He looked as solid and immovable as the mountains beyond him. And, face it, his strength was one of the reasons she loved him a little. She never had been the kind of person to hold a grudge. And as she stared at his broad shoulders, narrow waist and long legs, her irritation at him waned, replaced by aching longing.

  She said more reasonably to his back, “I don’t have to stay here. I’ll be perfectly safe at Runaway, and if I’m there, you and I won’t have to keep tearing each other apart.”

  She still had little more than the clothes on her back by way of possessions, and it was an easy matter to fetch the keys for her repaired car and her purse from the guest room and head for the front door.

  Wes moved fast, meeting her at the door, his big hand closing around hers as she gripped the door latch. “Stay,” he said roughly.

  She looked up at him candidly. “I’m sorry. You can’t have it both ways, Wes. You can’t hate me and want me with you.”

  His frown deepened even more. She felt a frisson of sympathy for him, but this wasn’t her problem. He had to work it out for himself.

  She continued gently, “I know how I feel. But until you figure out how you feel, I can’t be with you. I’ll see the renovation through, of course. And then I’ll honor your wishes and leave for good.”

  * * *

  Wes stared at the closed front door that Jessica had just left through. A combination of high indignation and impotent fury tore through him. His head might acknowledge the validity of her arguments, but his heart howled in frustration that she’d walked away from him and left him here, alone. Again.

  What was up with that? He shouldn’t care if she left. Hell, he should be relieved that she was gone. He’d survived a near miss with getting tangled up in her insane life once more. He’d barely escaped the last time; no way would he have made it clear of her twice. The odds just didn’t stack up that way.

  He turned and stared at the war zone she’d made of his house. Somehow, it was an apt analogy for what she did to his head and heart.

  Gah! He stomped out to the calving barn and was relieved to see the signs that another cow would give birth tonight. Something, anything, to keep his mind off the most exasperating female he’d ever had the misfortune of knowing.

  When he finally made his way back to the house in the wee hours of the morning as mama and new calf, a nice-looking bull, rested comfortably, he prayed that Jessica had at least left him a bed to sleep in. He was startled to realize she’d torn the entire ceiling out of his bedroom. The wood beams that held up the roof were visible now, and the space felt huge and cavernous. Wow. What a change. The last thing he wanted to do was acknowledge that she was good at her job, but she really was a talented designer.

  And there was no place in his life for her.

  * * *

  Jessica felt bad shacking up with Wes’s parents again, but it wasn’t like she had anyplace else to go. Miranda had thrown her an understanding look that communicated her sympathy at loving a Morgan man, and then insisted she stay in the newly renovated cabin. Sure, she could return to the B and B in Sunny Creek, but after having been shot at she would hate to draw trouble to Annabelle Cooper’s doorstep, and the B and B wasn’t exactly an armed fortress.

  As it was, she couldn’t avoid going into Sunny Creek and doing a little shopping for herself soon. She needed more clothes and toiletries and an actual computer. If she was going to do design work, she couldn’t keep doing it on her phone.

  Hank Mathers, who turned out to be a fascinating man of deep thoughts and few words, acted as her driver and bodyguard. He was a full-blooded Lakota Sioux Indian, and his people had lived on the land that was now Runaway Ranch for as long as there was oral history of it in his family, apparently.

  She finished her impromptu shopping trip in Sunny Creek with a visit to Pittypat’s for another piece of lemon meringue pie while Hank ducked into the hardware store across the street for something he needed. The pie tasted just as amazing as it had the first time.

  Patricia came out of the office when Jessica was about halfway through her dessert and sat down in the booth with her. “So, you’re still in town, are you? Did you get your business with Wes Morgan taken care of?”

  Jessica smiled politely. “For the most part. But then his mother hired me to redecorate a hunting cabin, and here I am. Still in Sunny Creek.”

  “Well, we’re glad to have you. A pretty girl like you will have every young man in town sniffing after her before long.”

  That sounded purely awful. Besides, there was only one man whom she cared about doing any...sniffing.

  In a blatant attempt to change the subject, Jessica asked, “I need to order some custom kitchen cabinets. Do you know anywhere around here I can get something like that?”

  “Most folks drive into Butte to shop for major purchases.”

  “And how do I get to Butte from here?”

  She listened carefully to the woman’s directions and supplemented them by pulling up a portable GPS system on her phone. Hank was up for a road trip, and they reached Butte around two in the afternoon. It wasn’t that big a city, and she found a kitchen design and supply store without too much trouble.

  Hank took off, leaving her the truck’s keys and his cell phone number, promising to be ready to go whenever she was done with her decorating stuff.

  She spent a couple of hours finalizing the design for Wes’s kitchen, ordering everything she would need and paying extra for rush delivery. Across the street from the kitchen design store, she spotted a gaming store and internet café and jogged over to it.

  She had been avoiding her email account on the assumption that someone might be able to track her location if she opened her mail. But now that a shooter clearly knew where she was, she wasn’t so worried about electronic security.
And it had been weeks since she’d checked her email. Which, in her life, was tantamount to having been in solitary confinement for a year.

  A bunch of her girlfriends had sent her worried and increasingly frantic messages. She replied to all of them, apologizing for worrying everyone and explaining that she had decided at the last minute to go on a personal retreat to get her head together. She scrolled through a bunch of junk and then a recent post caught her eye. It had been sent last night.

  She opened it and started to read.

  You may have slipped away from me on that mountain road. But I’ll get you next time. I know where to find you.

  Of course, it wasn’t signed. And it was clearly a reference to the shooting outside of Sunny Creek. With the exception of Wes, his family, the sheriff and his men, no one else knew about the attack. Which meant this was almost certainly from the shooter himself.

  She eyed the exit of the little store warily. Even the hundred feet of asphalt between her and the truck now loomed threateningly.

  Who kept coming after her like this? It made no sense. She pulled out her cell phone and called the police officer who had taken her statement after the incident in the club.

  “Officer Demoyne,” a brisk voice said at the other end of the line.

  “Hi, this is Jessica Blankenship from the roofie case you worked on a few months back in Washington, DC.”

  “Miss Blankenship, of course I remember you. What can I do for you?”

  “I’ve received a couple of threats recently. I just got a threatening email, in fact. I was wondering if there’s any way they’re connected to my case.”

  “It’s possible. If you’ll forward me the email, I’ll have our cybersecurity guys track down the IP address. Maybe we can ID who’s harassing you.”

  “That would be great.”

  “In the meantime, do you need personal protection?”

  She debated before answering. “I don’t think so. I’m not anywhere near Washington, DC, and the local sheriff seems competent. Also, I’m staying with people who seem well able to defend themselves. Can I call you if that changes?”

  “Of course. I’ll be in touch.”

  She sat back, staring at her phone. Would this nightmare never end? It was just one mistake. One drink from a stranger. One bad decision to go out alone without being with friends. A handful of words in a military court of law. How could so little be screwing up her life so much?

  And it wasn’t all about her anymore, either. Wes was still paying for her mistakes.

  CHAPTER 12

  Jessica glanced at the time and realized with a start that she needed to get back to Runaway Ranch to tell the furniture delivery guys where to put the pieces she’d ordered for the hunting cabin. She texted Hank, who showed up in a matter of minutes, as promised. They hurried outside, climbed in the truck and headed back to Runaway Ranch.

  Partway there, her cell phone rang. “Hey, Miss Blankenship. It’s Sheriff Westlake.”

  “Call me Jessica, please.”

  “Only if you’ll call me Joe.”

  “That’s a deal, Joe. What can I do for you today?”

  “It’s what I can do for you. We got a preliminary report back on the slugs we dug out of your car. They came from a rifle called an M21.”

  “I’m familiar with it. The military used to use them for short-range sniping. They were replaced a while back by the M24 and more exotic weapons.”

  Joe laughed. “Color me impressed. A girl who knows her guns!”

  “My father is a Marine and didn’t have a son. He taught me more than I ever cared to know about military-grade weapons. And for what it’s worth, I hate guns in all forms.”

  “Too bad. At any rate, we sent the slug off to the FBI to run through their weapon identification database. It’s a long shot that the bullets came from a registered weapon, but we’ll check anyway.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate the update.”

  “You’re sure you don’t want my guys to keep an eye on you until we figure out who took those shots at you?”

  “I’m fine. I’m sure it was just a random nutjob out messing around. After all, not a single shot hit me. And given the number of rounds fired, even pure luck would suggest that at least one bullet should have hit me.”

  “You’re a lot calmer about this than I expected,” Joe commented.

  She smiled. “I’m nothing if not my father’s daughter.”

  “Still. Don’t hesitate to call me if you get scared or even get a funny feeling that something’s not right.”

  “I will.”

  “Promise?” he demanded.

  She laughed. “Cross my heart and hope to die. Or in this case, I hope not to die.”

  She rode back to the ranch in a reflective frame of mind. M21s had been common during Vietnam and then retired as military weapons. There had to be mass quantities of them available in military surplus stores pretty much everywhere. So, the fact that a military weapon had been used didn’t necessarily mean someone from the military had shot at her. The good news was her father had more or less kept her away from his career—he’d hated the idea of horny young Marines sniffing around her skirts. She doubted someone she’d met in conjunction with her father’s work was behind the shooting in McMinn Pass.

  Which left them no closer to knowing who had it in for her.

  She spent the next few hours putting the finishing touches on the hunting cabin. As the sun set outside in glorious streaks of orange and purple behind the black silhouettes of the mountains, she stepped out onto the porch, well satisfied with her work. The porch swing was comfortably cushioned, and she sat down on it while she waited for Miranda to drive up and give the cabin her final approval.

  Crickets were starting to sing, and some sort of frog was making a high-pitched chirping sound that she’d always associated with early spring. The air smelled of melting snow and wet dirt and the first hints of green, growing things. The colors of nature faded around her into the soft gray of twilight, and she found herself breathing more deeply and slowly, inhaling the night as it fell gently around her.

  A ranch truck came up the road, its headlights cutting through the encroaching darkness. Miranda stepped out of the vehicle and immediately began to smile. “You didn’t tell me you were redoing the porch, too.”

  “I just spruced it up a little. I refinished the floor, cleaned and stained the railing and posts, added some flowerpots and hung this swing.”

  Miranda surprised her by not being in a rush to go inside. Instead, the older woman sat down on the swing beside her. “Sometimes I forget how pretty it is up here.”

  Jessica nodded. “And loud.”

  “Those are spring peepers drowning out the crickets. They signal that the snows are over for the year. Ranchers love to hear them, especially when calving season is getting going.”

  “It’s really all about living with the land out here, isn’t it?” Jessica asked.

  “Indeed it is,” Miranda replied. “It gets into your bones. People born and raised in these mountains, who make their livings off the land, can’t ever really shake it. It stays with you, no matter how far you try to run from it. I tried to tell my children that, but they’re all having to learn it for themselves.”

  “Wes seems to be settling in at his ranch. I think maybe he’s figured out that he’s part of all of this,” Jessica commented.

  Miranda smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. I just worry about him spending too much time alone on that wreck of a ranch. Getting started in the ranching business is damned hard work. My grandparents built this cabin and started Runaway Ranch in this very valley. They raised four children in this house.”

  Jessica looked over her shoulder at the tiny cabin in surprise. “That had to be a tight fit.”

  “Folks spent all their time outside. They only slept indoors or stayed
in when the weather was terrible. But, even then, I suppose there’s a reason they only had four kids. It had to have cramped their style to sleep in a two-room cabin with the children listening in on everything.”

  They traded knowing grins.

  “I was born in this cabin,” Miranda commented. “But my mother insisted on a bigger house before she had any more children. Hank and Willa Mathers live in the house I grew up in.”

  Jessica knew the structure. It wasn’t unlike Wes’s house—a long, single-story log cabin with a huge, inviting porch.

  Miranda continued, “My boys were born in that house. We started building what’s the main house now right before I had the twins. You haven’t met them, but you’d like them. They’re strong young women. Like you.”

  Jessica shrugged. “I don’t feel all that strong. I had a bad scare a few months back, and I still jump at my own shadow.”

  “Joe told John and me about the attack on you up on the Westlake Road. Any idea who did it?”

  Jessica’s eyebrows lifted. “He told you?”

  “Sweetie, this is a small town. Everyone tells everyone else everything. You won’t have any secrets around Sunny Creek for long.”

  Huh. Was that one of the reasons Wes had left in the first place? He never had been fond of other people interfering in his business.

  “You’ll get used to it,” Miranda said as she stood up.

  “I’m not planning on staying for the long term—” Jessica started.

  Miranda cut her off. “I’ve seen how you look at these mountains and how you look at my son. You’ll be staying.”

  Jessica stared. The last thing she would ever consider doing would be settling down in some tiny town in the middle of nowhere. Sure, she had feelings for Wes, but did they run that deep?

  “Show me what you’ve done to the cabin,” Miranda declared.