by Riser, Mimi
“It all worked out for the best, I suppose, because that’s when Black Elk showed up, and Aunt Lydia gave him the cocoa and sandwiches she’d fixed for you.”
“I’m glad they didn’t go to waste,” Slo deadpanned. “So it was Black Elk who told you to run away?”
“I didn’t run away. I said I was on a Vision Quest.”
That’s right, she had.
“Sorry, Gracie. I forgot.”
“Gracie?”
Now she was eyeing him as if he were the one missing his marbles. And she was probably right. He must have flipped. Slo couldn’t think why else he was beating this dead horse of a discussion, why he was so drawn to Roxanne in the first place. It wasn’t just a sexual attraction. Everything about her, every part, attracted him. Even the crazy parts. She fascinated him, mesmerized him, stirred dangerous sensations in dangerous places. Like his heart?
He had a sudden unsettling image of himself as a moth being lured into a flame. Which made him wonder if Roxanne had also been right in telling him to keep away from her. He didn’t believe a word of that pyro-shit, but he still saw a real risk of being burned. This woman might be too hot to handle.
Chapter 6
The storm had been bad, but Ina Lorene had seen worse. She’d seen a lot in her long life, and expected to see a lot more before it was through. She wouldn’t be dying anytime soon, not her, not with a wedding on the way!
The bride and groom might not know it yet, but Ina Lorene did. She always knew. Just like she’d known those Bullfinch boys would cause trouble for Roxanne if they got the chance. That’s why she’d been taking her rifle to bed recently, just to be ready in case she was needed next door. Randy and Andy were lucky Slo had caught them first. Slo only punched and stomped. Ina Lorene would’ve peppered their pants with buckshot, and smiled while she did it.
She was smiling now as she sat in her recliner, sorting through her collection of yarns, looking for pretty pastel colors. It was never too early to begin knitting baby booties and caps. She anticipated a big bunch of great-grandkids. Ina Lorene was a happy camper.
* * * *
What had woken her? More importantly, where had she woken?
Roxanne lay curled on her side, disoriented, blinking groggy eyes. She was in a small, shady enclosure surrounded by the smell of damp earth, a rhythmic throbbing…and Slo Larkin’s arms. The throbbing was his heartbeat.
Ack. The tent. The tempest. The cave. She remembered it all in a rush. Everything except how and when she had fallen asleep with her head on Slo’s chest. Maybe she’d developed narcolepsy along with her other problems. Wouldn’t that be great? Not. Mortified, she scooted away.
Feeling her move, Slo opened his eyes. He hadn’t been sleeping himself, just slouched back, sitting still, so he wouldn’t wake Roxanne. She must have been exhausted to have conked out so suddenly. One minute, they’d been playing George Burns and Gracie Allen – the next, she’d collapsed against him as if she’d fallen into a coma. Odd, but then everything about her was.
That had been some time ago. A long “some.” Slo was now numb from the neck down and doubted he’d ever be able to move again. Grunting with the effort, he tried anyway, and miraculously made it to his feet, then endured several minutes of pins-and-needles torture while his circulation returned. Roxanne sat a few feet away, squinting up at the sky through the cave’s opening.
“The storm is over.” She made it sound like an accusation. “Why are we still here?”
This was the thanks he got for letting her sleep.
“Good mornin’ to you, too,” Slo drawled. Obviously she hadn’t taken a really thorough look outside yet.
“How long have we been here?” she persisted.
Ten years, Slo almost answered. That’s what it felt like to him. But he checked his watch just to be certain. “An hour, maybe a little more.” He retrieved his vest from the cave’s floor, shook it out and put it on, waiting. Roxanne stood up, dusted herself off, gazed out of the cave again – and shrieked.
“The gully’s flooded!”
“It’s an old creek bed with a clay bottom. It’s always flooded after a heavy rain,” Slo said.
He seemed so unconcerned, Roxanne wanted to smack him. A little below her swirled a murky river. It probably wasn’t very deep, but it still looked pretty nasty, and from what she could see, the muddy water was in no hurry to recede. They could be stuck here for days. Weeks. Years!
“Slo, how are we supposed to get out of—”
An ungodly cry came from somewhere above. The mating call of a bull moose? A water buffalo in heat? Someone being disemboweled?
Roxanne winced. Her hearing aid seemed to be working too well. Ever since waking up, noises had been strangely increasing in volume, but this noise was the strangest yet. “What is that?”
Slo gave her a small tight smile. The people who’d pointed him toward the gully knew where to find him, of course. They also would have called his grandmother and Lydia Jones to let them know the situation and alleviate any fears. That’s why he hadn’t worried about the flooding. With the storm now over, the cavalry had arrived.
“Either there’s a hog calling contest on the ridge above us, or Cody Carston is still laboring under the delusion he can yodel.”
“I heard that!” Cody hollered. “Slo? That you?”
“No, it’s Little Bo Peep. I’m looking for my sheep. Have you seen them?”
“Yep. They were delicious.” Cody smacked his lips. “Hey, stick your ugly face out, and I’ll toss you a rope. Harp said it’d be okay to leave the Harley here for now. No one can ride her through this mess. We’ll come back for her later.”
Yeah, Slo had already figured that. The bike would be safe in the cave till the gully dried. He leaned out of the hidey-hole.
Cody let fly with the rope.
It hit Slo in the head.
“Ow!”
“Dang. Sorry ’bout that.”
As a yodeler, the young rancher left a lot to be desired. As a tosser, his aim was impeccable.
“He did that on purpose,” Slo grumbled to Roxanne.
Cody’s chuckle rolled down from above. “I was just tryin’ to knock your brains back into place.”
Slo flashed an evil grin upward. “I’m gonna knock yours out the minute I get up there.”
“Yeah, I heard that before. Ain’t seen it happen yet though. Now shut your mouth and put that lasso around Roxy. I’ll pull her up first.”
“Like hell.” With his hands on the rope and his feet braced against the rock face, Slo was already climbing. “I don’t hand over any woman to you, Casanova, unless she has an armed escort,” he panted out as he reached the level stretch of range above the gully.
Roxanne heard a mocking guffaw from Cody.
“Look who’s talkin’. I ain’t the one who’s been holed up with her in the Kissin’ Cave.”
Kissing Cave? Roxanne blushed. Given the steamy flood of visions that had swamped her earlier, the name shouldn’t be a surprise, but somehow she had assumed this cave had been Slo’s secret love nest. Discovering it was a well-known make-out spot put a whole new slant on things. This was a small, gossipy community. All of Star would now be talking about her and Slo. Her reputation was ruined.
Did she care?
Damned if she knew.
Having spent most of her life in an institution, Roxanne had never before had a reputation to worry about. For years the only people she’d had any contact with had been lunatics and the staff who cared for them. She could imagine this might have warped her perspective a bit regarding group dynamics and human nature in general – although she had to admit she hadn’t noticed much difference yet between the inmates of her asylum and most other people. The others perhaps drooled a little less, but that was about all.
Whatever.
“Roxy? You’re awful quiet down there, angel. Everything okay?” Cody called.
“I’m fine!”
“She says that a lot,” Slo commented. “I’ve l
earned not to take it too seriously.”
“Uh-huh.” Cody slanted him a suspicious glance. “You sure you’re all right?” he asked Roxanne. “You tell Cousin Cody now if this boy’s been botherin’ you. I’ll be happy to kick his butt for you.”
“You and what military defense unit?” Slo said. He and Cody had grown up together, almost like brothers. And like brothers, they often barked at each other but rarely bit. In this instance, however, Slo was willing to rethink that policy. There was something in the way Cody spoke to Roxanne that sounded a little too friendly, too familiar. Exactly why this rankled him, Slo wasn’t sure, but it did. Besides, Roxanne belonged to the Jones family, not Cowboy Cody’s.
“What’s with this cousin shit?” he demanded.
“We’re related by marriage. Her new cousin-in-law Jack, Jileana Jones’s husband, is my new cousin, too, on account of my Aunt Vangie marryin’—” Cody paused, interrupting himself. “You in a rush?”
“Yes.” Slo felt a headache coming on. It was tall and annoyingly handsome, and stood before him in faded denim, cowboy boots, and a white Stetson. Slo knew it wouldn’t shut up now regardless of what he said, but he’d answered yes anyway out of pure stubborn contrariness.
“Good. ’Cause this is kind of a long story, and I don’t wanna tie you up none,” the headache said, and dived headfirst into it – telling how Evangeline and Harper got together after years apart, and how Jileana and Jack did the same thing at the same time – a tale of love lost and found, of family and forgiveness.
It showed Slo a side of the Joneses he had never suspected. A bighearted, generous side. It made him wonder if maybe he’d underestimated the family. Which led to the thought that maybe he’d underestimated their crazy cousin as well. And himself. Meaning maybe he didn’t care how crazy she was. Like a kamikaze moth drawn to bright heat, maybe he’d crash and burn, but what a way to go…
Maybe he was falling in love?
Roxanne stood in the cave’s entrance, listening. This was a good story, almost like something you’d read in a book, but she’d heard it several times already, from several different sources, and didn’t really need to hear Cody’s version right now. She was tired, grubby and grumpy, and her Vision Quest had been a near disaster. She wanted to go home, take a long bath – a cool one – and sleep for a week or three.
She wanted a lot else, too, but didn’t dare think of those dangerous desires – except for a perverse regret that she had ruined her reputation without even getting anything to show for it…
Oh hell, this line of thought could only lead to trouble.
She grabbed the rope—
Cody’s eyes bugged when he saw her standing a few paces away from him.
Slo’s brow furrowed. “How did you get up here?”
He looked and sounded incredulous. It set Roxanne’s teeth on edge. In the first place, she was an agile female; the fancy asylum where she’d lived had sported a gymnasium and a swimming pool for physical therapy, and she had used both regularly. And second, it was only several yards from the cave to the range above. Why should Slo think she couldn’t manage the climb almost as easily as he had?
Oh, right, she reminded herself, according to him she was a helpless idiot.
She smiled. Sweetly. “I dematerialized down there and rematerialized up here. You can add that ability to the list of my others.”
“Shoot, she just flew up on wings,” Cody said. “I always figured she was an angel, but now I’m sure.” Grinning like a devil himself, he ambled over to a couple of pinto geldings, quarter horses, tethered to a huge bushy sagebrush and unhitched their reins. “Y’all ready to head back?”
Slo was more than ready, but wasn’t sure he’d be able to walk straight let alone make it into a saddle. The angel comment had called forth a vivid memory of the painting in Sam’s studio. Roxanne in all her glory soared before his mind’s eye on widespread wings of flame. And the original article stood not far away, dirt smudged and disheveled, but somehow looking more like an angel than the painting, her eyes bluer than the storm washed heavens above. Sunlight turned her tawny, tousled hair into a fiery halo.
In that instant, Slo could almost believe she did have magical powers. She sure bewitched him.
Suddenly green-eyed, he watched Cody give her a leg-up into the saddle. Cody was whistling “Home on the Range.” Roxanne smiled like a kid at a pony ride. She murmured something to Cody, who laughed and murmured something back, which made her smile again.
Slo stalked toward them, wondering how well Casanova Carston would be able to whistle without his front teeth.
Cody beamed him a big lazy grin. His gaze slanted from Slo to Roxanne, and he gave her a sly wink. “Winslow looks like someone put a burr under his saddle.”
“Is that a simple observation, or a hint?” Slo grinned, too. Not nicely. “Maybe I should check beneath my saddle pad?”
Cody looked cut to the quick. “Would I do something like that to you?”
“Yes. And you have. More than once.”
“He’s a real stick-in-the-mud, ain’t never been able to take a joke,” Cody said to Roxanne. “You’re safe. Aunt Vangie saddled these,” he told Slo. “You remember how to mount, cowboy, or do you need a leg-up?”
“Not from you. The last time we tried that, I ended up on my head on the other side of the horse.”
“Hey, can I help it if I don’t know my own strength?”
“The only thing strong about you is your mouth. If it was connected to your brain, you’d be dangerous.” Slo eyed his frisky transport with trepidation – bracing himself like a swimmer about to dive into icy water – then drew a deep breath, grabbed the pinto’s mane, and sprang into the saddle, bypassing any use of the stirrup.
“Not bad,” Cody complimented him. “I could make a rider out of you yet, if you’d ever stick around long enough to give me the chance.”
Slo shot him a warning look. “Don’t start.” He glanced about the open scrubland, absently patting the pinto’s neck. A sudden suspicion prickled his backhairs. “Where’s your horse?”
“Right here.” With a smug little smirk, Cody swung himself up behind Roxanne. “Roxy hasn’t learned how to ride yet, so we figured if she was gonna double with anyone, it better be me. I told her you got enough trouble keeping yourself in the saddle.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Wanna race?”
“No.” Slo wanted to get back to town, get cleaned up, and get his arms around a fire angel. How, precisely, he was going to accomplish the latter, he didn’t know. Yet. But he was nothing if not determined.
“Suit yourself.” Reining toward Star, Cody waited for Slo to do likewise, then took the lead as they nudged their mounts from a walk to a trot to an easy rolling canter.
“Ready?” Cody called.
“For what? I told you I’m not racing.”
“I know. We’re just goin’ home!” Cody punctuated the holler with a sharp kick, and both horses broke into a gallop, his and Roxanne’s shooting forward – while Slo’s wheeled about in the opposite direction.
Shit.
The key word there had been “home,” Slo realized as rugged range whizzed past him. Joker Cody had given him a homing pinto. The horse was headed cross-country straight for the Carstons’ ranch.
It’s not easy to turn a twelve-hundred-pound animal in one direction when it wants to go in the other. Slo didn’t even try. He just hung on and pondered whether he should kill Cody quickly, or drag it out as long and painfully as possible.
-------
Roxanne strained around for a puzzled glance at Slo’s fast disappearing figure. “Where is he going?”
“Beats me,” Cody said, skillfully slowing his own double-burdened pinto down to a walk so as not to tire it. “Guess he decided on a little trail ride. Don’t worry, if he ain’t back by Christmas, we’ll send out a search party.”
Chapter 7
Bong… A single tone, the half-hour mark. “Eleven-thirty and all’s well,” the church chi
mes seemed to say.
Ina Lorene hung up the phone. She’d taken a lunch break, then decided to call Lydia Jones and tell her the news. It was too good not to share, and Lydia was the obvious one to share it with, of course, seeing as how they’d soon be related by more than neighborliness.
“I don’t think it’ll take ’em too long to wake up and smell the coffee,” Ina Lorene had said.
Lydia had agreed. “I saw it in their eyes last night. Just like Romeo and Juliet! They fell in love at first sight, too, you know.”
Actually, Ina Lorene didn’t. She’d left school early to help on her parents’ farm, and had only a vague notion who Romeo and Juliet were, but she was willing to accept Lydia’s word on that point.
There remained only one question.
“Do you suppose he’ll ask her to move to Houston?” Lydia had worried aloud. “That could ruin everything. She’ll want to stay here, I’m sure, but I doubt he will.”
Hmm, now that’s where Lydia was wrong. Ina Lorene might never have read the classics, but she knew plenty about people in general, and one person in particular – knew him better than he knew himself. The boy wasn’t nearly so tough as he tried to pretend. He had a tender heart and a loyal nature, and was more country than he cared to admit. He just bored easy was all. But Ina Lorene had always known the right girl would fix that. A girl who could capture his imagination as well as his eye, who could spark his interest on all levels and keep him fired up.
Ina Lorene wasn’t worried at all.
* * * *
The horse’s name, Evangeline had informed Slo, was Homer – big surprise – although “Lightning” would have been equally apt. Homer had made it to the Carstons’ ranch in record time. Slo made it back to Star in Evangeline’s old Cadillac even faster, intent on heading someone off at the pass. With a little luck…
Yep, there they were, just entering the main street of town. Slo scanned the area for oncoming traffic, but this being Star, there wasn’t any. So he tapped the accelerator and sped forward, then turned the wheel sharply and slammed on the brakes. The Caddy skidded to a sideways stop, barricading the route.