Cassie straightened and took her hand from his light grasp. “It’s lovely to meet you, señora, and I really appreciate your hospitality.”
“Y muy educada,” Conchita remarked joyfully to Mack as she took her hand. “First, call me Conchita, and I’m glad to have you. Second, please, come inside.” When her escort turned to head back to the truck she waved it off. Linking her arms through both of theirs, she led them into the massive dwelling. “Now, I didn’t know what you’d want to eat, so I made a little of everything. Is that okay?” the woman asked as she herded them in the door.
Mack leaned down and kissed the top of her fuzzy, cotton-ball white head. “Perfect. Thank you.”
Chapter 5
Being home was always an ambivalent thing for Mack. On the one hand, he adored Conchita, who’d been more of a mother to him than his own by a long way, and he loved spending time with her, but at the same time, that usually meant he had to be here, something he’d have just as soon avoided as breathed. Even without his parents’ overwhelming physical presence, it was still heavy in every tile, tapestry, piece of indigenous art, and antique buffet table.
The physical trappings, though, were much more easily ignored in the face of Conchita’s love and cooking. Keeping up a steady patter of conversation, she updated them on everything from his nieces and nephew to his father’s recurring bout of gout while she sat them at a table that practically bowed under the amount of food.
Cassie seemed to appreciate the attention, becoming more lively and happy than he’d seen her to this point. She has a great smile, he thought absently, and in the kitchen of his mamita, he saw her—really saw her—for the first time. He could draw her curves from the pictures in the magazines he swore he didn’t read, pictures of her in fashionable clothes or less, sometimes, though never so little as to be vulgar, but this view he had was different. Remarkably so. In her braided hair and Star Wars jammies, sitting at the kitchen table with this woman who loved him and raised him like her own, she was…his mind searched for a minute before circling back around to the only word that made any sense to him: beautiful.
Not like a priceless piece of art, or some faux-tawdry (fau-dry?) spread in Vogue or Maxim, but like sunshine in the afternoon as it peeks around the skyscrapers in New York City, unexpected and blinding, bringing all thought to a halt for a moment to process and proceed.
His phone vibrated in his pocket, alerting him only a moment before it sang out, in full voice, the chorus of ‘Gunpowder and Lead’. He could feel both eyes rivet to his flamingly embarrassed face as he awkwardly fished the phone out to answer before the caller hung up. “Hey, Ange, hold on a second,” he said as he rose from the breakfast nook to head into the hallway and then further into the center of the house, stopping when he got to the confines of the room his father used as an office. Normally it was not someplace he sought out, but in the interest of privacy, he ducked behind the ironwood door that matched the front one and leaned against it to get his bearings. “Okay,” he breathed. “How’s it going so far?”
“Did you know Bex was on the FTF? Apparently she was there right before I was and traded out just as I came in.” Ange sounded contemplative as she avoided answering his question, but told him quite a bit just the same. She’d made contact with Eli and Bex and hopefully—hopefully—had a lead on where to find this killer so he could return to his normal life.
“I learned that in Boston a few years ago, but I don’t see how that’s going to help our situation. You remember our situation, right? The one where I ask you to go to Sin City while I keep the pop princess at the one place on Earth neither of us would like to be? That situation?” He wasn’t given to impatience for the most part. That trait had served him well as a sniper and also as a Marshal, but now, hurrying this along was the thought leading up the jumbled pack in his head, with the fact that Cassandra Wittfield was probably the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen, his throwaway description of her notwithstanding. Ange would know, like any good partner, when something was up with him, the moment the game changed or shifted in any way, and he didn’t want to have a discussion with her that he couldn’t even have with himself first.
Ange’s slow laugh did nothing to calm him. “I remember. Eli and I have a couple things working right now. We’ve got the security footage from the party and the hotel, and with a little facial-recognition wizardry on his part, we were able to get a few names that might go with the sketch. We’re searching for info on them, plus looking at the vic, himself.” She covered the phone, and he could hear a deep voice in the background, though he couldn’t make out the words. When she returned to their conversation, she sighed. “I don’t have much more beyond that right now, since I’ve only been here a few hours. As soon as I know more, you will, so keep your phone on.”
The fact that she was not too much closer to knocking on doors and knocking in heads was disappointing, but not unexpected. “I will. And Angela?”
“Hmm?” Her response sounded suspicious at his use of her full name.
“Thank you for this.” He just wanted to make sure she knew he appreciated what an above and beyond favor this was. At this rate, he’d owe her both his kidneys and maybe a lung if she needed them.
“I gotcha. We’ll talk in a bit.” The phone died in his hand and that was just as well, really, since he had to return to the kitchen and report his findings. A part of him—the part that was starting to see Cassie as more than just his charge—did not look forward to telling her they were no closer than they were the night before.
As he sat down to his empty plate, he felt Conchita’s reproving glance as she rose from the table to get more orange juice. Taking some tortillas and scooping up some beans and huevos rancheros, he schooled his features into a pleasant expression. “Ange says hello.”
“And?” The naked eagerness on Cassie’s face as she asked made his stomach twist a bit.
“And she’s working on it.” That was all he could say truthfully from his end of the table. Ange was a damn good investigator, and he could speak to Eli’s thoroughness, so he wasn’t worried about that, but Cassie’s downcast expression did something to him. “Hey,” he gestured to her with a forkful of beans, “it’s gonna be okay. In the meantime, think of this as a vacation.”
She frowned and nibbled on the corner of a triangle of toast. “You’ll pardon me if I don’t find that comforting.”
Her sarcasm cut him closer than it should have, but he tried to keep them both positive. “I get it, but while you’re here, I can at least keep you comfortable. There are far worse prisons in the world.”
He hadn’t meant it as a barb, but the stricken look that chased across her features said she’d heard it that way. “I know, and I appreciate that you all are doing this for me. Truly, I’m grateful, but I’m in the way, and I don’t want you to lose your job over me.”
Her concern was touching, and so not in synch with his initial, but dwindling, idea of her as this self-absorbed twit who profited from her looks and the fact that she could pick a few chords. In fact, he found her refreshingly nice, pleasant even, though as soon as it occurred to him, his mind followed up with exactly why that was not an appropriate line of thought. “Let me worry about that, okay?”
Conchita snorted, breaking the moment between them. “Mi niña, you don’t need to worry about Mackenzie. He has the reflexes of a cat, always landing on his feet. You will both be fine.” Rising from the table with Cassie’s empty plate, she took it to the sink. Over running water, she asked, “Have either of you had any sleep?”
Right up until the moment she’d asked, Mack hadn’t given any thought to anything other than forming a plan to work, so sleep had been off the table. At its mere mention though, he yawned as he pushed his eggs around his plate. “Now that you mention it…”
She nodded sagely, and pulled her glasses off to make a show of cleaning them, an action he knew from as far back as he could remember. Her way of suggesting, perhaps, he wasn’t seeing t
he whole picture. When she replaced them on her face, she looked from him to his mostly empty plate. “Get your things from the car and I’ll deal with this.”
Cassie was already up and gathering dishes to take to the sink, and looked unsure of her place in this conversation, this house. “Are you sure? It’s a lot of—”
His mamita’s smile was full of compassion. “Please, let me. Mackenzie will show you to your room once you get your things.” Her eyes moved from Cassie, to him, to the door, and he needed no more prompting.
Cassie met him at the truck, and he’d already unloaded her two bags and her guitar onto the cobblestone driveway. “I’m really not going to be in the way?” she inquired after he shut the doors.
The uncertainty he’d seen at breakfast still lurked behind her eyes, and while a glib answer was on the tip of his tongue, he wanted her to understand his sincerity, though his reasoning was still a bit sketchy. “Not at all.”
* * *
The best she could reason was she was on a cloud. A cool, fluffy cloud in the sunshine of the afternoon that smelled like clover honey and sunflowers. Carefully opening one eye, she peered at her surroundings and found she wasn’t far off with her initial assessment. From the fluffy white pillows, the pristine sheets and duvet that covered her, the delicate cerulean of the ceiling, it was entirely possible to believe she was on a cloud.
Then her memories of the day before crashed over her like a bucket of cold water. She sat up and groaned. The sleep had been much-needed, and she had no sense of time other than her knowledge they arrived at sunrise, and dusk was beginning to gather in the mountains outside her balcony window. Stretching, she looked around the room done in early equinophile. Horse and riding memorabilia on every available surface, trophies on the desk at the far end of the giant room, paintings of rearing mustangs at pink-streaked sunsets on the walls, culminating in a portrait of a young woman with red hair not unlike Mack’s in a red jacket and black boots flying over an obstacle on an impossibly large Arabian. Feminine, yet classy, the giant bed was one of the many pieces of white painted antique furniture in a room that reminded her of the presidential suite at the Bellagio.
At the end of the room farthest from her was an open door with a crystal knob that led to a blue and white tiled bathroom. One look in the mirror as she washed her face and hands had her cringing. She looked as hollow as she felt with the matching set of luggage under her eyes and face all splotchy like she’d been crying for weeks. It was hard to imagine less than twenty-four hours ago, she was still on top of the world, playing a little girl’s birthday party and making everyone happy. She missed her family, Trista, her road crew, and Clint most of all. She wanted her phone back to reestablish a connection to them and the outside world, but first, a shower and a change of clothes.
Refreshed and dressed like someone fit for human consumption in a pair of cutoffs and a shirt that had been pink when she’d purchased it a couple years ago but had long since retired its pretense. She finished her ensemble with her worn in sparkly flip flops and set off to find her minder.
Her journey started in the other room that adjoined the bathroom. He’d put them there so he could be close to her while still giving her space, he’d said, and she’d appreciated his thoughtfulness. Mack was really going out of his way to take care of her, even going to someplace he admitted he was not comfortable being, all to keep her safe. Cassie felt a bit guilty for invading his privacy by entering his domain, but she felt weird being in what was essentially his house without him.
The door whispered open to a room of navy walls and dark woods with Mack’s open duffle on the floor by the bed. The pictures on the wall were tasteful but unremarkable. She would have thought it a guest room except for the picture wedged between the second and third shelves of an inset—and empty—bookshelf. Leery of touching it, she got just close enough to see a much younger Mack, red hair ablaze in the glow of stadium lights, his football helmet aloft triumphantly over his head. He looked like a kid who’d gotten the key to the world and knew what to do with it, and yet, why was it just shoved aside and discarded?
Nothing else indicated the room belonged to anyone, like he’d systematically erased himself from here. Walking over to stare out the window to watch the shadows of the evening roll slowly down the mountain, she saw the back of the house for the first time. A tennis court was off to one side, a lengthy garden vista off to the other with a path that wound through the center, and directly below, the pool, with cabanas on either side and numerous chaise lounges, but only one of them was occupied.
Finding the stairs had been easy enough, a sweeping arch with wrought iron accents that went along with the rest of the Western Americana theme of the house. The red tile of the ground floor was glossy with a fresh sheen of wax, and her flip flops squeaked as she made her way to the French doors that led out to the pool and associated cabanas. Once outside of the house, Cassie felt as though she was intruding on his space again. Something about being near him made her feel strange, not bad, just not her usual, and the last thing she wanted was for him to send her packing to whatever mayhem awaited her upon her return to her real life.
She shut the door as quietly as she could behind her and watched Mack for any signs of movement, but there were none. Taking advantage of her stealth, she watched him as he read his tablet on the lounger. Intriguingly, his black t-shirt was thrown over the back of the chair he occupied. The late afternoon sun burnished his hair to a bright copper, and a light smattering of the same color dusted his chest and slid down into his cutoff jeans. It was a nice chest, too, muscular but not so much it whispered of vanity, and an interesting set of tattoos that started on one pec and slid down his side and across his nicely-developed shoulder and down to beneath his heavy-looking silver watch. Normally that wasn’t something she found attractive, but Mack made it look more than a little enticing.
Realizing she had crossed the line from ‘observing’ to ‘leering’, she figured she should probably make herself known. “Hey,” she breathed as she sank onto the lounge next to him. Turning to face the same postcard-perfect view he appeared to be enjoying, she found the view to be nothing short of spectacular: across the azure pool to a palm-lined walkway that led, eventually, to what looked like it might have been a stable, and further on beyond the foothills of the mountain.
Mack didn’t look up from his reading. “You sleep okay?”
“Fine, thank you.” The words felt stiff on her lips, and though she tried to attribute the heat in her cheeks to the setting sun, some of it was definitely from her earlier perusal of him and now being close enough to touch. Making a show of stretching out before kicking off her shoes and settling in to enjoy the sunset, she asked absently, “So where are we?”
From the corner of her eye, she saw him turn his head toward her and resisted the urge to meet his gaze. “My parents’ house.”
That much she knew, but something Ange said had been poking at her curiosity. “On Jefferson Peak?”
“Yes.” He didn’t sound agitated, but she felt a fine tension kick up between them.
Figuring she’d go for broke with her supposition, she offered, “Named for your family, I assume?” She couldn’t imagine buying a whole mountain, but folks in her circles bought islands with an alarming regularity, so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. When he nodded, she shifted over on her side to face him. He watching her with a look on his face like he expected…something, she wasn’t quite sure what. “So then where is ‘here’ exactly?”
He didn’t answer, searching her face for a moment before turning back to his reading. “We’re outside Phoenix by a couple hours, and maybe twenty or so miles from Winslow. Just south of the Navajo Nation.”
Cassie resituated herself in the lounge chair, watching the strips of clouds try on new colors as the sun inched closer to the horizon. Winslow, Arizona. Her mind ran with it immediately and before she knew it, she was humming a song her dad used to play for her when she was ve
ry small.
Mack chuckled softly. “Yes. Like the Eagles song.”
If she didn’t know better, she’d think he sounded impressed. “Jackson Browne wrote it.”
“I’m aware,” he replied with a smile. Yeah, she could tell he was definitely impressed, which pleased her enormously.
The sun continued its leisurely sojourn to the horizon, and they sat in relative silence except for the lapping of the water against the stone edge of the pool or the occasional cry of a bird. Her first curiosity allayed, more had queued up to take its place, ranging from reasonably benign to horribly inappropriate. “So…what do you do?” She shifted in the seat again to find him with his tablet set aside and a raised eyebrow. “I mean, when you’re not rescuing damsels in distress?”
Mack’s light eyes narrowed, even as the corner of his mouth kicked up into a smirk. “I get paid to rescue damsels in distress.”
His non-response amused and piqued her at the same time. “I see, so then, since you’re not technically on the clock, does that make me a hobby?” Her mind cringed as soon as the words left her lips, but she was not going to back down now.
The smirk he’d tried to squelch bloomed full force, lighting his grey-green eyes up with devilry. “Not quite. Poker’s a hobby. Surfing is a hobby. Hookers might even be considered a hobby. You…” he looked up at the faint contrails crisscrossing the sky as he searched for his word, “You are complicated.”
The tastefully hidden exterior lights came on as the shadows settled over them and the sun gracefully swept off the stage, both of which concealed the blush at his description of her. The rational part of her brain knew he didn’t mean it how it sounded, but a small, vocal part squealed not unlike a twelve-year-old girl with her first crush. Given the circumstances, it was not an acceptable response to act on the squealing. “So does ‘complicated’ mean I can have my phone back?”
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