Using the pasture gate, Melinda climbed up on Star’s back. It’d been one thing to ride a horse with no bridle or saddle with Nobody or Jamie leading the way, but this? She was basically powerless up on the back of this horse.
“Here we go,” she said more to herself than to the horse. Star nickered and headed toward the wide-open spaces. “Good girl.”
“Mellie, wait!” Madeline came jogging out of the house.
Melinda cringed. Must be time for another lecture about how irresponsible she was being and how she just needed to go to her room until she could calm down, as if she were still eight. “I’m going, Maddie. You can’t stop me.”
“I’m not stopping you. Here, you forgot the walkie talkie.”
Melinda looked down at the proffered device her sister was holding. “What?”
Madeline shot her a look that was part glare, part grin. “First off, when has trying to talk you out of something impulsive ever worked?”
“Really?” She gaped at her sister. “Have aliens taken over your brain?”
“Don’t make it worse,” Madeline scolded her. “And second, you’re trying to do right by a kid. I couldn’t stop you from that even if I wanted to. But I don’t. I asked you to come out here to take care of the kids and that’s what you’re doing.”
Melinda was aware she was staring at her sister, but she couldn’t believe that responsible, careful, boring Madeline was just going to send her on her merry way to confront a convicted murderer. Was she off the hook here or what? “Um … yeah. I am.”
Madeline gave her a look. Oops, not off the hook yet. “But, that said, I expect you to be careful. I don’t believe Nobody is a danger to you or that kid but that’s no excuse not to be smart about it, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, got it. Don’t sneak up on him in the dead of night and yell boo.” She touched her heels to Star’s side.
“Check in when you can,” Madeline called after her as Star headed down the hill and out toward the big, empty plain of grass. “Please.”
“Okay, Mom,” Melinda called back, knowing it would drive her sister bonkers.
“Mellie!” came the frustrated reply.
Star must have been ready to go home, because she didn’t plod along. She walked with purpose, only occasionally stopping to grab a mouthful of grass. Melinda busied herself with trying to memorize the landmarks. She kept looking over her shoulder, hoping to keep Rebel and Madeline’s hill in view. But after half an hour, it was just another hill, indistinguishable from the rest.
She looked forward. More hills, none of which had an obvious path running up them. Then it happened. Star stopped walking and began to graze in earnest.
“Come on, girl,” Melinda said, kicking her sides a little harder. “There’s grass at home, I bet. You can do it!”
Nothing.
Great. Just freaking great. She looked behind her again. Maybe the horse had bent enough grass that she could retrace her steps?
Nope. Nothing but amber waves of grain. Damn it.
She slid off, trying to get her bearings. Oh, crap. That was a bad idea. The grass in this prairie came almost up to her chest and she had no way of getting back on the horse. Looked like it was walking for her from here on out.
She patted the horse’s neck. “Good try. Close, but no cigar, right?” Now what? She had no idea if Jamie had taken the same route away from camp as Nobody had taken toward it. She remembered the horse making random turns in the middle of the prairie before finally getting to the trees, but she couldn’t replicate those steps if she’d been paying attention, and she’d been focused on making sure Nobody hadn’t fallen off the horse first.
As she turned in a circle, feeling hopelessly lost, she … well, she didn’t see something. But she almost saw something. Like the grass bending against the wind instead of with it.
“Hello? Is there someone out there?” Honestly, she didn’t know what answer she was looking for. If it wasn’t a someone, it might be a something and she’d heard the occasional howl of a wolf or a coyote or something that sounded hungry late at night.
She backed up against the horse, who seemed unconcerned. Okay, she would not panic. If the horse wasn’t concerned, that probably put the chances of being eaten by a wild animal pretty low.
Wait—the horse wasn’t concerned. Like, if there was someone out there, Star knew that person.
Like her owner.
Nobody was following her.
“You can come out now. I know you’re there.”
At first, nothing happened. She stepped away from Star and did another slow circle, trying to see where the grass was going the wrong direction again. It wasn’t until she’d made a complete turn that suddenly, he was there, like he’d just materialized out of thin air about five feet away from her.
“Jesus, Nobody, stop sneaking up on me!”
He looked funny without his hat—something he seemed to realize, as he eyed it resting on her head. “This the first time I’ve snuck up on you.”
“Yeah, okay, maybe.” He was right. Usually, she could see him there, which he didn’t always like. “Why didn’t I see you this time?”
He had the nerve to smile at her. It was a quick thing, barely a curve of his lips that softened his features from brutal to striking, but she saw it nonetheless. “Grass isn’t see-through.”
Now she felt silly. “And your horse? You have one, right? Red?”
“Sent her home.”
“Of course.” She glared at him. Because stalking her through the tall grass was easier on foot. He’d have been too visible on horseback. “Okay, talk.”
The look of panic on his face made it clear that he’d been happier if she’d pulled a gun on him. “Talk?”
“I know it’s not your strong suit, but I don’t care. You kissed me last night and then dropped this huge bombshell and ran away and I’m not going to stand for it. I’m so mad at you I can hardly see straight. I mean, I’ve got horrible taste in men. Really bad. My last boyfriend cheated on me with another guy—and that wasn’t the first time something like that’s happened. And then you come along and I think I’ve met someone who’s different—and dude, you are different—but to just announce that whole ‘killed a man’ thing in the middle of a really good kiss? Do you have any idea how much of an idiot I feel like right now?”
Her voice echoed back to her and she realized that she was yelling. But she did feel better.
“That—” He swallowed as his hands moved from his belt loops to his pockets and back. She almost wanted to give him his hat back so he’d have something to hold. “That wasn’t my intention.”
“Then what was your intention?” The moment she said it, she realized maybe she’d meant to say something else. Time to clarify. “And I’m not even talking about kissing me. You’re looking after that boy and you better have a damn good reason as to why I shouldn’t call social services and have him removed from his home.” At that, Nobody paled. His gaze dropped and he ran a hand over his ponytail. Yeah, she’d hit a nerve. “So talk. Who did you kill?”
The last word stuck to her tongue like cotton candy on a humid day. Was she seriously having this conversation?
He shrugged. “Didn’t know him. Only heard his name at the trial.”
“How old were you? What happened?”
She saw his Adam’s apple bob, but he didn’t look up at her. “Seventeen. I went to bars a lot. Drinking made it … easier to be me, I guess. Didn’t have to think as much. Didn’t have to remember.”
“Sheesh.” He flinched at this. “Sorry. It’s just seventeen is awfully young to be drinking yourself into oblivion. Please continue.”
“This girl … she kissed me.” The statement seemed to cause him physical pain. “I didn’t kiss her first,” he added in a desperate tone. “I fought a lot and sometimes, girls would get drunk and dare each other to kiss me. Because I was big and scary.”
“Okay …” she hadn’t anticipated a sexual element. “Can’t argue w
ith the big part. So she kissed you. How did that lead to you killing a man?”
“Her boyfriend didn’t take kindly to it.”
Lord, she could see this happening, too. A young, brazen Nobody Bodine getting wrapped up in a woman and then a bigger, older man getting pissed off.
“He threw the first punch, but he was drunk. I ducked. Punched back. He went down. Never got up.”
“That’s it? You punched a guy so hard you broke his neck?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“How long ago did this happen?”
“I was in prison until I was 24. Got out six years ago.”
She rubbed her eyes, trying to make sense of it all. Brutally attacked when he was thirteen. Living in the woods until he was seventeen. Fighting in bars. An arrest, prison time. Six more years of living in the woods. To think, her life was broken up into chunks by things like high school and college, first job and second—normal stuff. “How’d you meet Rebel? He said he didn’t know you before.”
There was a pained silence. “I went to see Albert after I got out. He was the only person who ever treated me kindly. Rebel was there. He didn’t treat me like a nobody who came from a nobody and would always be a nobody.”
The way he said that—like the way that gang guy Dwayne had said it—sounded rote. “Who said that? Who told you you’d always be a nobody?” He didn’t answer, but she figured it out anyway. “Your mom, right?”
That got her a sharp nod.
“Jesus, Nobody. What am I supposed to do here? Convicted felons don’t get to look after little kids. Hell, they don’t get to look after not-so-little kids.”
“I know.” He sounded defeated about it.
But she didn’t feel the same way she had this morning. Damn it all, she didn’t know what to do. He’d killed a man with one stupid punch. He was dangerous. And he knew it. But she wasn’t sure that made him a bad man. Not like he claimed he was. Just … not a good one all the time. “Why that boy? Why Jamie?”
Nobody shrugged. “He needed someone.”
“Like you needed someone?”
“Only I never had anyone.”
Dammit. “Why didn’t you just tell me this instead of springing it on me and then bolting last night? I swear, I’m not hiding a boyfriend who’d go all ape-shit on you. I need a reason, Nobody. A reason to trust you.”
He shrugged, looking more miserable than when he’d been stabbed.
“Did you burn your mom’s house down?”
“No.”
“Seriously?”
“Some people moved in, started a fire—it was winter. It got out of control.”
“Jesus, are they okay?”
“Yeah. They got out.”
Okay, so they could eliminate arson. That counted for something. What, she didn’t know. But something. “What else? How do you …” Her voice trailed off as she watched him.
Nobody was no longer staring at her or the ground. Instead, he’d gone on high alert. There was no other way to describe it. His shoulders dropped, his head popped up, and his body tensed as he—was he sniffing the air? “What?”
He looked over her shoulder, then up into the air. Without looking at her, he said, “Get on the horse,” in a voice so cold it made her shiver.
“What?”
Before she could process what happened next, he had her around the waist and had half-lifted, half-thrown her onto Star’s back with so much force that she almost fell over the other side. This was why normal people used saddles—something to hold onto. She grabbed at Star’s mane. “What’s happening?”
As she spoke, he launched himself up behind her. How did he do that? Then his arm was around her waist, holding her tight. “If you wanted to do this, you could have just asked,” she managed to get out as all of his muscles surrounded her. It wasn’t like she hadn’t touched him before. Hell, they’d already been in this basic position, bodies pressed together.
But there was a world of difference between her holding up a wounded man and a significantly less wounded man holding her. The sheer strength that surrounded her tried to take her breath away. For a man who was physically throwing her around, being in his arms felt safe. Not like a murderer kidnapping her. Like a man protecting her.
God, she hoped she wasn’t wrong about this.
He didn’t reply. Instead, he whipped his hat off her head and slapped it against the horse’s flank. “Hiiii,” he hissed, his voice low in her ear.
Star got the message. She leapt into a gallop like Nobody had jabbed her with a pin. A really big pin.
“Whoa!” Melinda yelled as the whole horse felt like she fell away. For a second, Melinda was flying through the air, anchored only by the arm around her waist.
Then she crashed back onto the horse’s back with enough force that she saw stars. Ow. “Jesus, Nobody—”
“Shh,” was the reply she got as he leaned forward, bending her body with his—asking the horse to go faster. And faster.
There was none of the random, meandering path toward the hills. This time, they rode hell for leather in a straight line to the trees. She held onto Star’s mane and tried to grip the animal’s side with her legs, but it was Nobody who kept her from sliding off. With each length, her body was pushed back into his and he never moved. Of course, he probably had a lot more practice galloping bareback than she did—which was to say none. Plus, she still had on her backpack. It’s not like she could sit back and enjoy the way his muscles pressed against her—not when water bottles were digging into her spine.
She had no idea what was going on. Nothing new there. But something had startled him and she was apparently along for the ride. So she held on tight. It was all she could do.
Star had closed the distance to about three hundred feet when Melinda heard it—a low, droning hum that filled the air around them. Helicopter, she realized as Nobody slapped his hat against the horse’s flank again. What the hell was a helicopter doing all the way out here?
Looking for something. Or someone.
Oh, hell.
She tried to look around to see if she could spot the helicopter, but when she turned her head, all she could see what Nobody’s face. His chin was on her shoulder and she could almost see his eyes. He wasn’t looking at anything but the trees.
Star ran faster—much faster than Melinda would have given the old mare credit for. They hit the hill and made it under the trees in what sure as hell felt like record time.
Nobody got the horse to slow down, somehow. A woman had to admire a man who was such an accomplished rider that he could control his animal seemingly by telepathy. Star did a half turn so that both of them could see out through the trees.
A few minutes later, a helicopter went by, far lower than normal. Maybe only a thousand feet off the ground, it flew down the center of the grass valley. As it passed, Melinda saw no police markings or guns. It appeared to be a standard two-seater helicopter. Didn’t even look like there was a camera mounted on the outside.
“What the hell?”
“Shh,” Nobody whispered in her ear. “Hunters.”
“Hunters? Hunting what?” Not him, she hoped.
He leaned forward, following the helicopter as it flew on. When it was out of sight, he said, “Mountain lions, most likely,” in a normal tone of voice. “Scouting out where they’ll drop a hunting party.”
“Did you just say there were mountain lions in these hills?” Oh, sweet Jesus. Rebel had informed her that the wolves and coyotes would not come anywhere near the house, but he hadn’t said a thing about lions. Lions!
He sat up and leaned back. The next thing she knew, he was peeling her pack off her back. “What’s in here?”
“Um, water, walkie-talkies, that knife.” So, effectively, he was disarming her.
He snorted behind her. She turned as much as she could, expecting to see him drop the pack onto the ground. But he didn’t. He slid the straps over his shoulders. Then he ran a hand down her back. “Hope it didn’t hurt
you too much.”
The slow, steady pressure of his hand against her took all the panic she’d felt during the race to the trees and turned it sideways. Her body shuddered as his touch lingered. “Not too much,” she admitted, suddenly unable to speak normally. Her voice was low and breathy.
In the distance, she heard the sounds of the chopper growing louder. “They’re coming back.”
“Yup.” He slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her back into his chest. This time, without the pack between them, she could feel his rock-solid chest pressing against hers. “We need to keep moving, in case they’ve got infrared cameras.”
There was no path here and the going was slow for Star. They heard the helicopter pass by again, but they were already deeper into the woods. She leaned back into him, which had more to do with the incline of the hill than the way his body surrounded her. Really. “What happens if a hunting party finds you?”
“Hasn’t happened yet.”
Yet. Not a terribly comforting word.
Chapter Twelve
They rode on. Nobody kept a firm grip on her. To keep her from sliding off the horse. It had nothing to do with the way she’d been furious with him—but hadn’t attacked him or called him names. It had even less to do with the way her back leaned against his chest, warm and soft and inviting. And it had absolutely nothing to do with the way her ass slid back into his dick with each step Star took.
“Are we going back to your camp?” It could have sounded worried. She had every reason to be concerned. After all, he’d heard the helicopter coming and reacted without thinking how she might feel about running for cover. But he didn’t hear anything in her tone that told him she was scared.
He hoped. “Not yet.” He felt her sigh, her chest rising and falling and pulling his along with her. “Going the opposite way first. Throw them off the trail.”
“You’re a little paranoid, you know that?”
He chuckled. He couldn’t help himself. When he’d heard the copter coming, he’d been terrified that it’d be someone who shot first and asked questions later. That wasn’t such a problem for him, but he couldn’t handle the thought of anything happening to her. “Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get me.”
Nobody (Men of the White Sandy) (Volume 3) Page 15