Flinging back the blankets, Rachel rubbed her prickling arms and clicked on the bedside lamp. As light flooded the two-room cottage, she peered at the closet door she had left open—and sighed to see that it was empty of all but her clothing and her fears. Even so, it infuriated her, that one whacko hounding her from Pennsylvania had so much power over her that she had had to look.
Like mother, like son, Rachel couldn’t help suspecting. For the longest time, she had blamed a few unbalanced fans of Kyle’s mother, a popular news anchor and Philadelphia morning talk show host, for taking it upon themselves to avenge the famously personable blonde’s all-too-public grief. Most of the callers had admitted that much, but this woman, this incredibly persistent head case…could the Psycho Bitch be Mrs. Underwood herself?
Heaven only knew the woman had been rocked off her foundation. Rachel had sympathized with the tearful breakdown that had been played and replayed on the news, had even tried to reach out to tell the woman how sorry she was for her loss. But Kyle’s mother had flipped out on her, then gone public with accusations that Rachel had seduced her “baby” and shot him down when he tried to end their sleazy, secret sex. The grand jurors had been sympathetic—enough to hand down the indictment that Rachel’s lawyer had been certain wouldn’t happen.
But whoever her tormentor was, Rachel wasn’t about to let the woman push her back into the habit of self-medicating. After Rachel had been charged, her attorney insisted she meet with a clinical psychologist who worked with victims of violent crime. Not only had Dr. Damien Thomas later testified on her behalf, he’d helped her wean herself off the sleeping pills she had used to get through each long night after the shooting. It had been hard, harrowing work with the pressure of the trial looming, but she hadn’t fought to save her life from her attacker only to end up as an addict…or a suicide.
Reclaiming your life’s the best revenge. Dr. Thomas had been right about that, Rachel reminded herself, even though he was wrong—dead wrong—about the evening she’d forgotten.
From outside, she heard gentle hooting, the soft call of a nearby owl to her mate. It was a sound she remembered from her childhood, something as familiar to her as the drone of an airplane or the sweep of winter winds down from the mountains. But not even the owl’s serenade could lull her back to sleep now. A little after five, she gave up and crawled from the bed, then used the coffeemaker to heat water from the bathroom. While her tea brewed, she pulled on sweats with fuzzy slippers and switched on the radio. She needed friendly chatter but had to settle for the country tunes that had already been relics in the days her mother had enjoyed them. Still, it was something else familiar, something more to pull her back to the years before she’d first heard the name Underwood.
Soon, Rachel was sitting at the room’s small writing table with a mug of hot tea and reaching for the prints she’d created using her laptop and a high-end printer. Though she hadn’t finished tweaking values or yet printed onto acid-free archival paper, the proofs convinced her she’d been right about the shots of Zeke Pike at his work.
Especially about the one shot she was holding, where soft light gilded sweat-beaded biceps and highlighted a strong man’s absolute absorption in his work. He was at once humility and pride and the embodiment of power, captured at a moment she felt privileged to have witnessed.
Yet there was something more as well, an undercurrent of sexuality that made her ask herself—would probably make any living woman ask—what it would be like to be the object of such total focus. Rachel wrapped her hands around her mug and shivered, at once deeply attracted and repulsed by the idea.
She had already been the object of one man’s total focus—a focus that had sharpened into sick obsession. She’d had enough of male attention to last her for two lifetimes. Her reaction, she decided, had nothing to do with Zeke Pike, and everything to do with the most perfect photograph she’d ever taken.
The trouble was that no one else would see it. Because once Zeke Pike saw the proofs, he’d never sign the release that she needed to use a photo with his likeness. The image was so personal, so revealing of the man behind the misanthrope, she felt certain he’d demand that she destroy it.
And that would be a crime, every bit as much a crime as if she took a blowtorch to the gorgeous table he’d created. Both were art, and art counted for something more than the stubbornness of one of its components.
So what are you going to do about it, Rachel?
She worried at the edges of the question for a long while, until the earthenware mug grew cool between her hands. Finally, she put her tea down and pulled one print from her stack.
By the time she parked beside The Roost a half hour later, the small airport had already sprung to life. A mechanic tinkered with the innards of a small plane, and a uniformed pilot was giving one of the Learjets a preflight check. A curl of fragrant smoke rose from the café, a sign that Patsy had started serving breakfast.
Rachel climbed out and zipped her jacket, then paused and decided her meal could wait until she dealt with the contents of the envelope she was holding. As she made her way back toward the gold van, she raised a hand in greeting to her father and his two assistants, who were pulling a fifties-era German sailplane—a restoration project—from its hangar. Both Lili Vega, a tiny twenty-something whose shoulder-length, dark hair bore a fresh streak of magenta, and the more experienced Bobby Bauer waved back, but Rachel’s father stopped what he was doing, jumped on a golf cart used to tow the gliders, and made a beeline for her, irritation written on his ruddy face.
Uh-oh. Her father didn’t get mad very often, but when he did, he was no subtler about it than any other of his emotions.
“What’s the matter with that phone of yours, Rusty?” he asked before the cart stopped. “I tried you three or four times this morning, and it kept going straight to voice mail. Or didn’t you want to be bothered talking to me?”
She pulled it from her purse and feigned surprise. “Sorry, Dad. I—uh—I guess I must’ve accidentally switched it off when I meant to hang up last night. I’m still figuring out which button does what on this new phone.”
She regretted the lie but decided there was no need to worry him by explaining the real reason for her actions. With the young day bright and blue around her, Rachel felt light years away from her tormentor. “What’d you need?”
His expression eased, assuring her he’d accepted her explanation at face value. “I wanted to let you know this afternoon looks perfect for us to take up a sailplane. Weather’s great, and Lili tells me the schedule is wide open.”
Since Rachel had been home, she’d noticed that her father relied more and more on his assistants—especially Lili—to take care of the scheduling and nearly all the office work. Apparently, he’d finally learned the art of delegating those tasks he least enjoyed.
“I thought you told me earlier it would be too busy for us to fly today.”
Little by little, he was dragging her back in the direction of the family business. Every evening, they had been reviewing flight rules at his kitchen table, where her dad rattled off regulation after regulation from memory. And yesterday, he’d insisted on flying her to El Paso for her physical. Though she wanted to be a help around the airfield—heaven only knew she owed him that much—she still felt ambivalent, even a little queasy, about returning to the skies.
He shook his head. “That group coming in from Reno canceled, and Lili says she’ll take care of any tourists who show up.”
“So Bobby’s available to fly the tow plane?” When she was still a girl, he’d started hanging around the airfield, taking flying lessons. People had talked, since only a few years before, a fatal drunk driving wreck had cost him his own wife’s love and his career as a Border Patrol agent, to say nothing of the guilt he carried over the death of a young father in the accident. More than a few thought Walter Copeland insanely soft-hearted to give such a man a second chance. But over the years, Bobby had repaid Rachel’s father’s faith by
becoming a top-notch aviator and a respected mechanic, not to mention a close friend.
Since he’d always had a soft spot for her, was in fact the only other person she allowed to call her Rusty, maybe she could talk him into having something else to do today….
As quickly as the thought popped into Rachel’s mind, she dismissed it as unworthy. But was it any more dishonest than what she planned to do this morning?
“This afternoon will be fine,” she promised her father. “I have a couple of errands to run now, photography-related errands.”
It was important to remind him she had work of her own. Not a whole lot at the moment, but she was praying that the photo of Zeke Pike was going to change that. She was hoping that with the publicity related to the showing, she could once more become capable of financially standing on her own feet, maybe starting to repay some of the money her dad and Patsy had put out. Though neither one had said a word about it, Rachel needed to pay them back, not only for her family but for herself.
Her conscience nudged her once more. As important as her goals were, did she really mean to achieve them by deception?
“Your stepmother will have something to say about it if you don’t let her feed you.” With a shrug of his sky-blue coveralls, her father flashed a grin. “And since I’ll be the one who’ll have to hear her grousing, I’d count it as a personal favor if you’d—”
“All right, already. I’ll stop to say hello and grab a muffin,” Rachel told him. Afterward, she had to run back to the casita and add one photograph, the photo, to the stack of proofs she meant to take to Zeke. Because as much as she wanted his permission to display it, she wasn’t going to jump-start her new life with what amounted to a lie.
“Damned pain-in-the-butt conscience,” she muttered under her breath as her father drove the cart back toward his work.
Zeke was leaning forward, cleaning one of Cholla’s big hooves, when he heard the crunch of approaching tires on the gravel. Rachel Copeland’s tires, he suspected, for who else would come by so early in the morning?
“What’s she want now?” he grumbled, bothered by the unexpected—and plain stupid—pinch of pleasure at the thought that she’d come back.
The buckskin gelding used his owner’s moment of distraction to snatch free his rear leg and stamp down hard on Zeke’s booted foot. When Zeke swore in pain, Cholla squealed and pulled against the lead rope that tied him to a stout rail. Eyes rolling with terror, the outsized animal threw himself backward until the rail groaned and the halter attached to the rope snapped. Off balance and suddenly free, the horse threw a shoulder against Zeke, flinging him onto his back.
For one terrifying instant, Zeke was sure Cholla would fall on him. But somehow the buckskin recovered his balance, then clattered past the corral and out onto open range.
Behind him, a vehicle’s door opened, and Rachel cried, “Oh, God, Zeke. Don’t move. Let me call the paramedics.”
“Don’t do that. Shit. I’m all right,” he insisted, though he wasn’t quite sure yet. As he pushed his aching body into a seated position, his gaze followed the cloud of dust that marked the buckskin’s flight. The pinto mare and the mule both raced around their enclosure, whinnying, braying, and bucking in excitement.
“I’m so sorry,” Rachel said. “I must’ve startled him when I drove up. Are you sure you’re all right?”
“Yeah.” He nodded, more certain of his answer this time. At least until he stood and put weight on the foot Cholla had stomped. He winced and shifted, then saw Rachel looking out after his horse.
“Do you think he’ll be all right? Can I help you catch him?”
Zeke’s first impulse was to tell her he’d had enough of her damned help this morning, but her contrition seemed as real as her concern. Besides, his shouting had caused enough trouble already.
Shaking his head, he gestured toward the loose horse. “Look. He’s slowing down. He’ll turn around and trot back this way as soon as I toss some hay in the corral. But let’s give him a few minutes to settle.”
“I really am sorry,” she repeated.
“Was my fault more than yours.” Zeke shrugged. “I yelled when he came down on my foot and it spooked him. Bastard that owned him before I did used to beat him pretty bad—you can still see scars on his neck. So he’s always on edge when I have to tie him. That isn’t the first halter or lead rope Cholla’s broken.”
That look came over her again, the softening of her brown eyes as she imagined him as someone noble, some softhearted animal crusader. He wanted to argue that she had it wrong, that he was simply a man with an eye for decent horse flesh, a man who saved himself a bundle by rehabilitating others’ castoffs. But instead of saying so, he looked down at the small paper bag she was holding, a brown bag dotted with several small grease stains.
With a sheepish look, she held it out in his direction. “Oh, I—uh—I brought you breakfast, a couple of cranberry-walnut muffins from The Roost. They’re pretty good. I was just nibbling one before all hell broke loose here.”
Accepting it, he smiled at the crumbs clinging beneath the curve of her lip. “I can see that.”
An old reflex—a foolish reflex—had him lifting his hand to brush those crumbs free. He stopped himself from touching her, but not before she stiffened and jerked back, her eyes flaring as if she’d thought he might hit her.
“You know how it is with my animals.” He shrugged and set the bag down on the flat top of a post. “Whatever else you think of me, I’d never hit a woman either.”
His words shimmered in the space between them. Their gazes locked, hers gleaming with moisture.
“Especially the kind that brings me breakfast,” he added quickly, discomfited by the hard tug of attraction.
The spell broken, she turned away and swore.
“I hate Kyle Underwood.” She stared toward the faint bruising of distant mountains against the blue horizon. “I hate him for making me afraid of everything from ringing telephones to my damned closet to someone reaching out to—”
“It’s okay, Rachel. A thing like what you went through, it’s bound to take some time to get over.”
When her head swung back in his direction, he saw that the lioness was back. “I’m not one of your damaged horses. I don’t want to be soothed and petted, and I especially don’t need anybody’s pity. I just needed you to know I hate that sorry shit. And no matter what I told reporters, I don’t regret that he’s dead.”
Zeke understood what it was to lose everything of value, to be left with nothing but a battered façade of pride. When Rachel had flinched at his movement, she had undermined that final bulwark, so she’d tried to prop it up with harsh words.
He nodded. “You might not be sorry he got himself killed…but are you sorry you had to be the one to do it?”
She hesitated before nodding and admitting, “That’s what makes me hate him most of all.”
Her expression shifted from defiance to concern. “Um, you’re favoring that left foot. You need to get off it. Can I bring you some ice?”
A plea shadowed the words, a plea to let the discussion of her recent history drop. Zeke had no trouble empathizing, considering how very far he’d gone to avoid speaking of his own past.
“He’s not breathing.” The panicked whisper skated across the surface of a memory. An image formed like a phantasm: Willie’s limp, pale body, shaken like a rag doll. Shaken, but completely unresponsive. “Holy shit. What now?”
Zeke forced it down, as he had forced down so many others.
“Let me drop some hay into the corral first,” he said, “and maybe shake some grain around a bucket. See if Cholla has a change of heart.”
His first pained step shot off starbursts in his vision.
“You’re limping,” Rachel pointed out. “Why don’t you just let me help—”
“I’m fine.” He blinked to clear his head. “Just need to walk it off.”
“You keep telling yourself that—” There was a smile
in her voice as she called after him. “—maybe it’ll come true.”
By the time she’d helped him to lure back, console, and corral the prodigal, Zeke was hobbling worse than ever. His left foot throbbed inside the boot.
“Hate to say this,” he admitted, “but you might’ve been right about that ice and elevation. Could probably stand to have a little of your help with that.”
Sleek reddish eyebrows lifted. “Before, I was merely notorious. But today, my name passes into legend.”
“What?” He couldn’t help grinning at her mock-sincerity.
“You know,” she said with an offhand shrug, “getting you to talk, smile, and accept help, all in the same day.”
He laughed at that, then nodded in agreement. “And it’s still early. Hate to think what you could get me doing if you hung around much longer.”
Another of those charged silences descended, with Zeke thinking of what he’d like to do and Rachel flushing as if she’d read his mind. And this time, it was more than physical attraction. It was the realization that the millstone weighing down his spirit lightened in her presence, evaporated with her smile.
But nothing would come of the attraction. God help him, nothing could. So he cleared his throat and turned away from her, then hobbled through his workshop. When he reached the red door to his private rooms, he stopped and glanced over his shoulder, only to find her hanging back.
“You don’t have to come in if you don’t want—if I make you nervous…”
He hadn’t meant it as a challenge, but something sparked in her eyes, and her chin rose slightly.
“I’m not afraid of you, Zeke Pike.” She strode toward him, past him, and across the threshold, the bag containing his breakfast clutched so tightly that her knuckles were white.
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