The Secret Sister

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “He ain’t gonna die in that meat locker, is he?” Hammond asked.

  “Not real quick. It’s only about forty degrees. But when we drag him out in half an hour, he sure won’t be running his mouth at us anymore.”

  The deputies came down the hall from the kitchen as far as the entrance to the display room.

  Christy shrank back from the door. If she went out that way, she would be spotted and recognized instantly.

  “Look here,” the senior deputy said.

  “Where?”

  “There. See? He must of had someone with him.”

  “What?” Hammond asked.

  “Jesus, Jack, get some glasses. See those shoe prints on the tile? They’re way too small to be ours, much less Johnny’s.”

  “Oh, Christ. They’re still damp. We’d better go through the place again.”

  “Yeah. And this time we’d better do it right, or Autry will kick our asses right out of Colorado.”

  The closet wouldn’t be good enough this time. Christy had to get out of the house, and she had to do it now.

  She ran for the door that connected Jo-Jo’s room with Hutton’s. The door was still ajar. She leaped through, raced across the bedroom, and headed for the French doors. The door latch wouldn’t work.

  Come on, come on, open!

  She wrenched and twisted the lock until it finally opened. The doors seemed way too heavy to her frantic, fumbling hands. Suddenly cool, clean air rushed over her.

  She was free.

  She sprinted across the big deck. There was an eight-foot drop down to the bushes. She hesitated, heard a man’s voice from Hutton’s bedroom, scrambled over the railing, and hung by her hands for a moment. Before she could change her mind, she let go and fell into the shrubbery below.

  The ground had just been worked by the gardeners. It was soft and loose, cushioning her fall. She scrambled to her feet, tripped over a sprinkler head, fell, and tumbled into the decorative shrubs. The low branches of an evergreen raked over her.

  She didn’t fight the prickly embrace. She just curled tightly beneath the branches, terrified that she’d hear the guards yelling after her—or worse, shooting at her. She prayed that the black of her clothes would blend completely into the moon shadow of the thick shrubbery. But she didn’t look up or try to see anything happening on the deck. She knew how an animal’s eyes gleamed when caught by a flashlight.

  Breath held, heart pounding, she heard a guard walk to the edge of the deck and stop.

  “See anything, Jack?” the other guard called from the bedroom.

  “Thought I did.”

  “Check out the front. I’ll take the side.”

  Hammond cursed but did as his boss said.

  Barely daring to breathe, Christy waited while steps overhead faded away into the house. She gathered her courage, pushed herself to her feet, and fled down the back side of the knoll, racing for the best safety she could find.

  Off to the right, a graceful stand of spruce marked the bottom of the slope. Straight ahead, across the meadow, runway lights flared and graceful, leggy women glided like colored shadows through the night.

  Once Christy got to the barn, she could blend into the crowd. No one would know she had ever been inside the house. But the meadow between her and the party was drenched in moonlight.

  If she went that way, the guards couldn’t miss her.

  She sprinted for the trees off to the right. As their shadows closed around her, she caught a flicker of movement from the corner of her eye. With a hoarse sound she flung herself aside.

  Too late.

  A hard hand clamped across her mouth, stifling her scream. A long arm went around her shoulders and jerked back, pinning her, dragging her farther back into the trees.

  Silently, desperately, she twisted and clawed against a strength much greater than her own. Suddenly her feet were kicked out from under her. She went face first onto the cold ground.

  The man followed her down, pinning her until she no longer struggled. She would have screamed then, but she didn’t have the breath or the strength to get away from the hand clamped over her mouth.

  She went slack, hoping to make him believe that she’d given up.

  The world spun dizzily as the man flipped her over with frightening ease, like she was made of shadows rather than solid flesh. He turned her head toward the moonlight. His smile was a bleak flash of white against a face hidden by darkness.

  “Jackpot,” he said softly.

  Christy recognized the voice and stiffened.

  Aaron Cain.

  Chapter 12

  “Settle down, Red,” Cain said in a low voice. “I’m not going to hurt you. Do you hear me?”

  Christy heard.

  But she didn’t believe him.

  “I’m going to lift my hand,” he said calmly. “Before you scream, think about it. You listening?”

  Slowly she nodded.

  His white smile gleamed briefly. “Good. You keep on thinking and listening and you’ll be all right. Hutton’s guards are local boys—cowboys and hunters and miners. You run fast for a city girl, but they’ll track you down real quick.”

  Cain’s matter-of-fact tone cut through her fear. So did the fact that he wasn’t hurting her. He was just holding her hard enough to make sure she didn’t run or scream, giving away her position.

  And his.

  Hesitantly she nodded.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said again. “I’m going to help you get out of here. Is that what you want? To get out of here?”

  She nodded again.

  After a long moment, the hand covering her mouth lifted slightly. She drew in quick, aching breaths, her body jerking against his while she pumped air into lungs starved by effort and fear.

  He looked down into her eyes and saw that she was frightened but not panicked. Watching him. Wary of him. She wasn’t screaming, but she was a long way from trusting him. He rolled aside and waited to see if she would try to get away.

  The sudden freedom was as dizzying to Christy as being captured had been. After the heat and weight of Cain’s body restraining her, the night felt cold and limitless.

  “Ready?” he asked softly.

  “Why are you helping me?” she whispered.

  White teeth flashed.

  This time she was calm enough to understand that his smile was cold rather than comforting.

  “Good question, Red. When I have an answer, you’ll be the second to know. Got your breath back yet?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “Don’t take too long. The word has gone out.”

  She followed his glance. On the hillside leading to the house, four flashlight beams swept the grass. Other flashlights flickered on the flats as more guards abandoned the dance floor and headed toward the house.

  Sooner or later, someone was bound to notice the trail she’d left across the recently watered lawn.

  “I’m ready,” she said quickly.

  Cain didn’t waste any time talking. He came to his feet, pulling her with him.

  His casual strength irritated Christy, reminding her all over again how much of a disadvantage she was at when stacked against the average male, much less one with Aaron Cain’s height and lean power. When he took her arm to lead her through the night, she pulled back.

  Or tried to.

  His hand tightened, chaining her as efficiently as the deputy’s steel manacles had chained Johnny.

  “Easy,” Cain murmured. “I know the way. You don’t.”

  “I can walk without—”

  “Quiet.” Though soft, there was no doubting the command in his voice.

  She wanted to yell at him, but it was the wrong time and place to tell him how she could get along just fine without him. Silently she let him draw her through the trees to a narrow game trail.

  “Follow me,” he said in a voice that carried no farther than her. “Try not to make any noise.”

  He was like the night. Qu
iet. He blended into the darkness with no more fuss than a wolf. He moved like a wolf too. Tireless, relentless, following a trail she couldn’t see.

  She followed as quietly as she could, not complaining even though the pace was just short of a run. It irritated her that she wasn’t nearly as quiet as Cain, but what really made her mad was that she was rapidly running out of breath.

  She’d have to double her time at the gym.

  Cain didn’t stop until he came to a small dry ravine cutting through the trees. The sides of the ravine were four feet high and nearly vertical. He slid halfway down the bank until he found solid footing. Then he reached back up, caught her beneath her arms, and lifted her down.

  She barely bit back a startled cry. She wasn’t used to being lifted. Her fingers clenched around his shoulders. When she felt dry sand under her feet, she stumbled, still off balance.

  He steadied her, then released her slowly.

  Her heart jerked. She was certain she’d felt his palms brush the sides of her breasts as he let go.

  But nothing in his manner suggested that he’d noticed the intimacy, or cared about it if he had. He was already walking off through the lighter shade of darkness that was the bed of the ravine. His low voice floated back in the darkness.

  “Move, Red. Or do you want me to carry you?”

  With a muffled word, she followed. She felt breathless, off balance, thoroughly irritated with herself, with him, and with the night itself.

  Moonlight turned the sand into a pale, rumpled highway. When the dry watercourse deepened and widened, Cain waited until Christy came alongside.

  “No noise, now,” he said in a voice that barely carried to her ears.

  She nodded. Together they walked carefully, quietly, following the gently winding ravine.

  Men’s voices came from somewhere off to the right.

  She froze even as her heart raced. When Cain’s hand closed around her arm and pulled her toward deeper shadows, she didn’t fight him.

  Flashlight beams flickered through the woods, but no cry of discovery followed. So far no one had found Christy’s trail across the grass.

  Standing in the chill clarity of the night, she was aware once more of the thin air at seven thousand feet. That, more than fear or exercise, was making her breathless.

  Cain tugged at her hand, urging her forward once more. His long legs covered the ground at a speed that made her work. She concentrated on controlling her breathing so she could keep up. After five minutes, he finally slowed.

  She noticed that his breathing was easy yet quick. She wondered if the altitude was getting to him. Then she remembered that he’d been shot not very long ago. He might move like a wolf, and she had no doubt that he could run or walk her into the ground, but he wasn’t a machine. He had to breathe too.

  The thought comforted her. She let out a long breath.

  He turned and looked at her in silent question. She smiled in equally silent reassurance. He squeezed her hand and turned back to the trail again.

  She wondered where it led.

  Safety would be good.

  Then she smiled at her wistful thought. Cain might be helping her right now, but anywhere he went had to be a long way from safe. He just wasn’t a safe sort of man.

  After a few more minutes, a second dry wash came in from the left. Cain pulled Christy into the shadow of a clump of willows. Then he pulled her right up against his body. Before she could protest, he was speaking against her ear. His mouth was so close she could feel the warmth of his breath.

  “Quiet,” he breathed.

  She wanted to ask why. She didn’t. Even if he answered—not likely—this wasn’t a good time for questions.

  Motionless, silent, she stood close to him in the black and silver darkness, feeling the heat of his body on one side and the cold of the night on the other. She heard nothing but the soft sound of breathing, her own and his. The sense of isolation and intimacy was both disturbing and strangely exhilarating.

  She’d never been so completely alone with a man, any man, much less a stranger.

  “All right,” he murmured.

  He tugged on her hand and started walking again. Within fifty steps they turned a bend in the ravine. A low, open Jeep loomed out of the darkness. The vehicle all but filled the narrow watercourse.

  “Yours?” she whispered.

  “Your fellow burglar’s.”

  “What?”

  “That’s his Jeep.”

  “He’s not my burglar,” she said.

  “Quiet.”

  “But—”

  “Later,” he interrupted ruthlessly.

  He circled the Jeep and kept walking quickly, pulling her along in his wake. A quarter mile farther down the dry wash, the black bulk of his truck loomed beside a clump of willows that looked silver in the moonlight.

  Cain led Christy to the passenger side, unlocked the door, and opened it. No interior lights came on. She was still absorbing that—and the fact that it was a big step up into the truck—when his hands closed around her waist. Before she could say a word, he tossed her up into the passenger seat.

  The door closed quickly and very quietly behind her.

  He circled around and got into the driver’s seat. The truck’s engine fired instantly. Smoothly he eased into gear and started forward.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Headlights.”

  His smile gleamed coldly. “No, I’m not forgetting them.”

  Cain drove expertly despite the darkness and the obstacles in the streambed. The truck made twice the pace a fast-walking man could have managed.

  Christy knew she was staring at him, or at least at his black profile against the lighter side window, but she couldn’t help it. His long, lean hands held the wheel with a casual skill that fascinated her. She’d forgotten how much harder driving was in a riverbed as opposed to a highway. There weren’t a lot of dry riverbeds to drive in Manhattan.

  I’ve been away too long.

  Or maybe not long enough. It was just this kind of lean, confident, take-charge-or-else man that had made New York look good.

  Chapter 13

  Cain drove several miles in the bed of the creek before he came to a dirt road that led down through cuts in the bank. He turned onto the road and shifted out of four-wheel drive. Little more than a dirt track, the road was almost as rough as the creek bed had been. Ruts led up a steep hill and then across a flat red-rock mesa. After more than a mile, the road dropped down through a slot into another canyon.

  “Time for headlights?” Christy asked.

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  Silence.

  A deer leaped out of the scrub right in front of the truck. Cain hit the brakes hard.

  There wasn’t any red flash from the brake lights. Like the interior lights, the taillights had been put out of commission. The big truck was nearly invisible as it moved over the backcountry.

  And this “Moki-poaching son of a bitch” accuses me of being a burglar? she thought sardonically.

  Finally he snapped on the headlights and picked up speed. The black truck rattled and banged over the rough surface of the dirt.

  “Home free?” she suggested.

  “We’re getting there.”

  “How did you and Johnny get separated?” she asked. “Or were you the lookout?”

  “What?”

  “Oh, come on. I don’t think that ravine is one of the usual parking spots for Peter’s guests.”

  Cain grunted.

  “You weren’t in the house with Johnny,” she said, “but you were watching the house. You called him a burglar, so you knew he was inside with a handful of lock picks. It stands to reason you were the lookout.”

  “Got it all figured out, haven’t you?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “Do you spend a lot of time with burglars and ex-cons?” he asked.

  The question w
as so calm that it took a moment for her to understand. “Excuse me?”

  “You don’t seem worried about being off alone in the ass end of nowhere in the middle of the night with a man who you think is a burglar and you know is an ex-con.”

  That answered the question of whether Cain had noticed Christy eavesdropping in the Two-Tier West.

  He had.

  “So,” he said, “either you’re used to crooks or you’re the kind of woman who just can’t wait to get in a murderer’s jeans and see if he’s different from the other men you’ve screwed.”

  Her breath came in sharply. His voice was calm, but so bitter she felt like she’d been slapped.

  “Stop the truck,” she said flatly. “Now.”

  He ignored her.

  She reached for the door handle.

  He flipped the master lock switch.

  “Let me out!” She tried to keep the fear out of her voice, but didn’t quite make it. Not surprising.

  She was frightened.

  “Settle down,” Cain said. “The truck is going too fast for a dramatic exit. You’ll break your silly neck. Waste of effort. I’m not going to hurt you.”

  His tone was tired and disgusted, though whether it was with himself or with her was up for grabs.

  “Go to hell,” she said distinctly.

  “Been there.”

  She didn’t doubt him. It didn’t make her feel better.

  “What do you want from me?” she asked finally.

  “I saved your ass. Don’t you think you owe me something?”

  “Forget it. I’m not going to crawl into bed with you just—”

  “I want answers, not sex,” he cut in coldly. “Jesus, why do women think that all a man wants is to get laid by any woman who’ll spread her legs?”

  “Because it’s true.”

  “Not always.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Surprisingly, he laughed. “Come down off the adrenaline jag, honey. You’re safe with me.”

  “How stupid do I look?” she retorted.

  “If I was thinking about raping you, I’d done it back when I had you laid out beneath me on the ground. You felt real good that way, especially when you breathed hard.”

  The matter-of-fact words literally took away her breath. She started laughing, only to stop abruptly when she heard echoes of hysteria in her own voice.