Twice in a Lifetime

by Merline Lovelace

  “I gotted you first!” her adversary cried, wriggling into position to return fire. “You’re dead, Kasey.”

  “Nossir! You’re dead, ’n’ smellier ’n a pile of cow poopy.”

  “Kasey Anne Henderson!”

  The ominous exclamation silenced the ray guns instantly. A petite blonde in well-washed jeans and a moss-green sweater that matched her eyes swept around the corner. She grimaced apologetically at the three adults before addressing the older of the two combatants.

  “Did I just hear you call your cousin cow poop?”

  The curly-haired cherub assumed a look of wounded innocence. “I just said Matt smelled like it. ’N’ he does! ’Specially when he goes potty in his pants like he did this afternoon.”

  The boy’s face crumpled at the reminder. With the smug superiority of one who’d already graduated from training pants, the girl smirked at her vanquished opponent.

  “That’s okay, sport.” Maneuvering the toddler up onto his shoulders, Jake soothed his injured pride. “Accidents like that happened to all cowboys in their younger days.”

  “Did I hear someone mention accidents?”

  With a note of wry resignation in her voice, the boy’s mother joined the group gathered in the tiled hall. Her dark hair cascaded in shimmering waves over the shoulders of a cobalt-blue sweatshirt that announced the 2001 Cannes International Film Festival.

  “What kind of accidents are we talking about here?”

  “Nothing worth repeating,” Jake answered in an obvious attempt to mend the breach between cousins.

  His answer raised skeptical brows, but the newcomer didn’t press the issue. Smiling, she offered her hand to Alice and Rachel and started the introductions.

  “I’m Sydney, Reece’s other half.”

  “And I’m Molly,” the blonde supplied, ruffling her daughter’s curls. “The mother of Princess Leia here and the two you hear squalling in the other room. One twin can’t hiccup unless the other announces it to the world at the top of her lungs.”

  So this was Sam’s wife. With her tip-tilted nose, slender figure and laughing green eyes, Molly Henderson didn’t give the impression of a harried mother of three small girls. In fact, Rachel thought with only the tiniest trace of envy, she looked like a woman who loved life and was well loved in return.

  Cocking an ear toward the living room, Molly issued another warning. “Oh-oh. Brace yourself. Sounds like the girls are working up to full volume. I hope Jake gave you and Alice some idea of what you’re getting into tonight.”

  “He did.”

  “We’ll try to keep the noise down to a roar but…”

  “Gotcha!”

  Molly rolled her eyes as her daughter fired off another round. With a triumphant snicker, the girl raced away. Matt instantly demanded to be put down and gave chase the moment his feet touched tile. His noisy ray gun filled the hall with a shower of green and blue sparks.

  “Go outside!” both mothers shouted in unison.

  Shaking her head, Sydney gave up. “Why don’t Molly and I take Alice to the living room and get her comfortable? The men are in the kitchen. Martina’s off tonight, so they’re cooking,” she warned. “I hope you like biscuits, beans and beef, all smothered in barbecue sauce.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  Actually, the combination smelled a lot better than it sounded. Rachel’s mouth started watering the moment she stepped through the swinging door into the huge, eat-in kitchen that obviously constituted the main gathering spot of the house. And if sizzling beef and yeasty biscuits hadn’t stirred her appetite, the three Hendersons ranged around the table would have done the trick.

  Good Lord! She’d never encountered so much rugged masculinity aggregated in one spot. Sam had firmed up considerably since that long ago summer when he was more rangy muscle than meat. Rachel certainly didn’t remember his T-shirt straining across bulging biceps. Or an upper chest like a tank. Reece and Marsh obviously kept in shape, as well.

  Yet as good as the younger Hendersons looked individually and collectively, it was their older brother who set off seismic tremors under Rachel’s skin when he took her arm to guide her through an obstacle course of high chairs, playpens and jumper swings. She was still experiencing the rippling aftershocks when Sam and the others caught sight of the newcomers.

  A grin lit the youngest Henderson’s face. “Hey, Rachel,” he said, rising with the innate grace that must come with the genes. “It’s been a while.”

  “That it has.”

  “I hope you’ve forgiven me for whatever I said or did on our last date that landed me on my butt.”

  “If you can’t even remember what it was,” she answered with a chuckle, “it doesn’t need forgiving.”

  “Whew! I skated on that one. Do you remember Reece and Marsh?”

  “I do now. You’ve all, ah, matured a bit.”

  “So have you,” Reece replied with a grin. “Jake noticed it right away.”

  “Did he?”

  Rachel flicked a quick glance at the man beside her and caught the tail end of the warning Jake flashed his brother. Without missing a beat, Reece directed the conversation into different channels.

  “I was sorry to hear about Alice. Hope she’s adjusting to her new hip joint.”

  “She’s getting around a lot better than either I or the doctors expected her to.”

  The other brother—Marsh—gave Sam a good-natured shove between the shoulder blades. “Let’s go say hello while Jake gets Rachel something cold to drink. Keep an eye on the beans,” he ordered on the way out.

  The three men trooped through the swinging door, letting it swoosh shut behind them. Mindful of their parting orders, Rachel slid her hand into an oven mitt and lifted the lid on a simmering bean pot. Steam bathed her face and had her scrunching her eyes against the heat.

  “We’ve got beer, white wine and iced tea,” Jake told her. “Or I can mix you something stronger to get you through until the terrible twosome you met in the hallway hit the hay.”

  “Iced tea is fine.”

  She stirred the beans with a long handled wooden spoon while Jake retrieved a glass from the cabinet.

  How odd that she felt right at home here in the spacious, cluttered kitchen. Back in D.C., her work kept her so busy her kitchen rarely saw even weekend duty.

  With a smile, she accepted the glass of sweetened tea he handed her. He was drinking the same thing, she saw, and remembered how he’d opted for a soft drink last night at the fair instead of joining her in a beer. She doubted if his abstinence stemmed from religious principles, given the fact that his brothers obviously enjoyed their icy brews.

  She caught herself making a mental note of the fact that Jake Henderson didn’t drink. Dammit, she hadn’t even been in the house ten minutes and she was already compiling a mental profile of the man for Russ Taggart.

  This was going to be a looooong evening, Rachel thought as she tipped her tall, dew-streaked glass to his.

  Contrary to her expectations, the hours flew by.

  Dinner was a noisy affair, with banging spoons and as much food dropped onto the tiles as made it into the youngsters’ mouths. Conversation ranged from Sam’s job as commander of an air force test facility to Sydney’s current chances for the independent film critics’ award to the current bestseller about a serial killer with a taste for human organs that both Alice and Molly had read with ghoulish fascination.

  The noise levels diminished exponentially when Kasey and Matt were fed, bathed, and carted off to bed. It decreased even further when the twins curled up like pretzels in the portable playpen that served as their crib.

  Breathing collective sighs of relief, the adults settled into the comfortable sofas and chairs clustered in front of the living room’s massive stone fireplace. With various extremities propped on handy footstools or coffee tables, they downed dark, rich coffee swizzled with chocolate-coated cinnamon sticks.

  “This,” Sydney announced with a purr of pl
easure, “is the best part of my day.”

  “It is, huh?” Reece gave her a lazy grin. “Guess that means the honeymoon is finally over.”

  Wrinkling her nose, his wife declined to be drawn into that patch of quicksand. Instead, she asked Rachel about her job.

  “Jake said you’re with the National Transportation and Safety Board.”

  “That’s right.”

  “What exactly do you do?”

  “I’m a senior safety analyst. I run tests on the composites used to manufacture trains, planes, trucks and automobiles. Pretty routine stuff most of the time.”

  “Don’t let her kid you.” With a huff of pride, Alice touted her niece’s accomplishments. “She’s an expert in accident reconstruction. Rachel’s analysis helped determine that inadequate reinforcement of a brake shoe lining led to a seventeen car pileup on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Just last year she was tapped for the special task force investigating the crash of the jet that flew into the mountains about a hundred miles from here.”

  “I remember that!” Molly exclaimed. “It made all the headlines.”

  Rachel’s muscles tensed. Her glance slid to Jake. If the DC-10 crash held any special significance for him, he didn’t show it.

  “Did the investigation board ever determine the cause of the accident?”

  Rachel pulled her gaze back to Sam. All air force pilot now, he leaned forward, wrists hooked over his knees, a frown creasing his forehead.

  “The findings are still under review.” She tossed the question back at Sam. “Military and civilian aviation organizations receive copies of preliminary accident reports. Did you see them?”

  “Yes.”

  “What did it look like from your perspective?”

  “Like a cargo hatch blew and the resulting drag threw the pilots into an emergency mode,” he said flatly. “The blizzard finished them off. The only question is what caused the cargo hatch to blow.”

  Or who, Rachel thought with a quick swallow. Her eyes flicked back to Jake.

  No! There was no way he could have been involved in a scheme that ultimately sent four people plunging to their deaths.

  Her belief became conviction as the evening wore on and she gathered more information about the oldest Henderson brother. Careful listening and a few casual questions elicited the information that the drop in beef prices last year had hit Jake as hard as the other ranchers in the area. The difference, Rachel learned, was that his brothers all still owned shares in the Bar-H. The Hendersons pulled together, in good times and in bad. The infusions of cash into the Bar-H’s operating account must have come from its co-owners, or from Jake’s mother Jess, who still apparently took an active interest in the operation.

  With a sinking feeling, she guessed that Taggart would no doubt widen his probe to include everyone associated with the Bar-H, Jess Henderson included. Rachel had certainly opened a Pandora’s box, one that might never close again.

  When she and Alice finally rose to leave, she’d carried out at least two of Taggart’s instructions. She’d kept her eyes and ears open, and she’d learned as much as she could about Jake Henderson.

  She didn’t consciously attempt to carry out Russ’s third order and try to get close to Jake. It just…sort of happened when Alice made a detour to the bathroom before setting out on the drive home.

  Rachel and her host drifted outside to wait for Alice. The bawling calves had quieted, thank goodness. A million stars pinwheeled through the sky. The honeysuckle blossoms had folded their petals, but their fragrance perfumed the night.

  Jake didn’t intend to kiss her. That much Rachel deduced later, when she’d recovered her senses enough to reconstruct the sequence of events with the same analytical precision she employed at work. Nor did she intend to do more than pluck a twisting strand of honeysuckle, breathe in a delighted whiff and lift it for Jake to enjoy.

  He brought his head down to take a sniff.

  The hand she raised almost clipped him on the chin.

  He caught her wrist with a loose hold, grinning as he dodged the blow.

  Their eyes locked.

  It was as simple as that. And as shattering. In that brief moment of contact, his grin faded. The fingers he’d wrapped around her wrist tightened.

  Those damned chemical signals coursing through Rachel’s system started flashing red alert again. She murmured something. Or maybe Jake did. She wasn’t sure. Didn’t care. Raising up on tiptoe, she met him halfway.

  The kiss was cool at first touch, not much more than a slide of lips on lips, but heated up fast. Shifting, Jake fit his mouth over hers. His hands framed her face. Fingers callused by rope and wire brushed her cheeks.

  With a little sidestep of her own, Rachel fit her body against his. Need spilled into her, fast and greedy. She slid her hands up his arms, and her screaming endocrines went berserk. Everything that was female in her responded to the feel of his corded biceps, his hard mouth, the faint scent of leather and clean, sharp wind that clung to his shirt.

  Yet some faint corner of her mind shouted that this was more than just a mindless, hormonal response. That it was Jake who’d found her hair trigger.

  And only Jake, dammit!

  Chapter 5

  “I don’t like this.”

  Her mouth set in stubborn lines, Rachel scowled at the FBI operative seated across from her in the back booth of the Downtowner Café. The noontime noise of the popular eatery Aunt Alice had owned and operated for so many years provided a protective shield for their conversation. Waitresses sang their orders to the cook at the grill. Customers laughed and chattered. Heavy platters in bright fiesta colors clunked on the Formica-topped tables and counter.

  The new owners had wisely retained Alice’s menu and decor—a mix of utilitarian diner, garish tourist kitsch, and stunning black-and-white photos taken by a long-ago student at the University of Northern Arizona who’d worked part-time as a dishwasher. The photos captured the area’s skyscraping mountains, deep box canyons, windswept high deserts, and ancient Anasazi ruins in dramatic visual detail. A spectacular series shot from the bottom of the Grand Canyon filled one whole wall.

  Rachel’s favorites, though, had always been the portraits lined up like a gallery of movie stars above the pass-through to the grill. Miners with coal-blackened faces stared down through raccoon white eyes. Broad-cheeked Navajos looked out over the diners impassively. Helmeted loggers, National Park Service rangers in their Smoky-the-Bear hats, and leather-tough wranglers ranged beside them.

  It was one of those wranglers who now drew her gaze. Big John Henderson’s photo had graced the wall for as long as Rachel could remember. He must have been in his late twenties or early thirties at the time the picture was taken. A hired hand then, Aunt Alice had told Rachel. Saving his wages to buy the first few acres that would eventually grow into the Bar-H. Eyes narrowed against the sun, gloved hands absently looping a lariat, he gazed at something beyond the camera’s range. Like his sons, he was all lean muscle and sun-weathered skin.

  And like his sons, he’d become a respected member of the Flagstaff community. Dragging her gaze back to Taggart, Rachel repeated her objections to continuing the charade he was still insisting on.

  “I’ve been out to the Bar-H twice now. Once for dinner, once to return the favor by delivering the pecan-raisin pies Aunt Alice baked for the family.”

  Even now, her stomach hollowed at the memory of the scene that had greeted her when she’d pulled up at the ranch house the second time. She’d spotted Jake and his brothers down at the corrals, working alongside the Bar-H hands as they wrestled vociferously protesting calves into the transport trucks lined up like silvery dominoes. They had to ship this batch off to the feeder lots in Kansas and Oklahoma to make room for the next, Jake had explained when he saw her car and took a breather. Swiping his sweat-sheened forehead with his arm, he’d helped her carry the box of pies into the house.

  Rachel had given Taggart an expurgated account of their conversa
tion when they’d huddled together at the kitchen table for a slice of the still-warm pastry. She saw no reason to include unnecessary details. Like the way her glance had slipped to the neck of Jake’s work shirt, where he’d left the top two buttons undone. Or how her stomach had jumped when he leaned over to wipe a trace of gooey pie filling from the corner of her lower lip with a fingertip. Or her shivery delight when she thought he was going to kiss her again, and biting disappointment when he didn’t.

  Taggart was only interested in Jake’s casual invitation for Rachel to join him and the crew when they rode up to Three Rock Canyon tomorrow to bring down the next batch of calves.

  “You’ve got to go,” the agent insisted for the third or fourth time. Shadows circled his eyes. He hadn’t slept much since her call three days ago, Rachel guessed.

  Neither had she.

  “We’ve run every member of Henderson’s family through the computers. I can’t come up with any connection to the downed aircraft.”

  Frustration added a sharp edge to his voice…and to Rachel’s when she leaned forward and shot back, “Maybe that’s because there isn’t a connection. Why don’t you just ask Jake where he got the bill?”

  Like a bulldog with a ham bone between his jaws, the FBI operative had crunched down hard and refused to let go. “I’m not ready to tip my hand yet. Give me another day, Rache. Go with him tomorrow to… Where was it? Hard Rock Canyon?”

  “Three Rock Canyon.”

  Her fingers beat a fast tattoo on the Formica tabletop. Brow furrowed, she weighed her responsibilities as a former member of the task force against her increasing attraction to Jake Henderson. For the life of her, Rachel couldn’t have said which swayed her decision.

  “All right. But this is the last time, Russ. I don’t like lying to him.”

  “You’re not lying. You’re just not telling him the whole truth.”

  Somehow Rachel didn’t think Jake would appreciate the fine distinction.

  He didn’t, but Rachel had no inkling of how explosive his reaction would be when she showed up at the Bar-H at six-thirty the next morning wearing jeans, boots, a long-sleeved shirt, and a lightweight jacket as instructed.