Peace River (Rockland Ranch Series)

by Jaclyn Hawkes

  Earnestly she tried to make him believe her. “Eli, listen to me. I either need to leave now, or I’m going to put the whole farm in your name and hope and pray that that’s the end of it.” But she didn’t really believe it would be.

  Eli quietly looked into her face and gently said, “Your grandfather wanted this farm to be in both our names. He died trusting it would be that way, and that’s the way it will stay. They wouldn’t let us take it out of your name legally anyway. Come. Dry your tears and we’ll figure something out. The Good Lord is in His heaven, and He is in control. Remember His promise in Isaiah, ‘And I will extend peace to her like a river.’ Have faith. He will send His peace like a river. Somehow, some way, or maybe someone. With God‘s help we will be free of your father.”

  The tears started again. “Oh, Eli, you silly.” She sniffled. “Judd’s not my father. He never was and never will be. He’s just some jerk who took advantage of an innocent and foolish girl. You’re my father. You always have been. Don’t you know that by now? I love you.” She smiled through her tears and kissed his leathery black cheek.

  He’d long used that particular scripture to encourage her to not give up hope on someday having a peaceful home without the anger and violence of Judd. She hugged him again and pushed him away. “Go. Get back to the barns. I’ll clean up this mess, and then I’ll come out to your office and work until lunch.” She turned to Dante. “Maybe you could come and help me get lunch today. I don’t really want to be in here cooking alone in case he comes back.”

  Nodding thoughtfully, Dante said, “Actually, I think I’ll help you clean up and walk over to the office with you.”

  At first they were quiet as they swept up the glass and garbage, but she finally looked up into his eyes and asked, “You know I’m right, don’t you?”

  Their eyes held for a silent moment and then he admitted, “Yes, you should go somewhere safe for awhile. I just don’t know how or where.” Sometimes he was a tease, but she adored this tall, sweet man. They had grown up side by side here on the farm. He was six years older, but they were as close as any brother and sister could be. He continued, “Although, Dad’s right. God is in control, and He’ll provide an answer. Just keep praying. We’ll find your river of peace.”

  Later that evening, Carrie could feel the results of her last restless night and earlier than usual morning. She was tired to the bone when she finally had all the loose ends tied up and headed for home. Thinking she was safely inside her house, her heart nearly surged out of her chest when someone spoke to her out of the shadows in her dimly lit hall.

  It was Deek and she could smell the alcohol on his breath as he said, “Hey, Baby.” His eyes were leering as he blatantly looked her up and down.

  Backing from him, she asked, “What do you want?” She hoped she sounded more confident than she felt.

  “Oh, I think you know exactly what I want.” He reached out to touch her long blonde hair and she instinctively pulled away. Anger flickered in his eyes and he grabbed a handful of her hair and jerked her toward him.

  She slapped him and he swore viciously as he yanked harder on her hair and twisted her arm up behind her back and snarled, “Now that ain’t no way to treat your future husband, is it? I came here tonight so we could get to know each other a little. And you acting like this don’t help promote romance.” His breath in her face made her ill.

  In fury, she ground out, “Let go of me and get out of here, before I call Eli and Dante!”

  Through clenched teeth, he said, “You just call all you want, darlin’. There’s not a soul except Judd to hear you, and I think you know he would love this!” He pushed her away and his voice became almost silky. “Don’t you fret. Our time will come soon enough. I’m definitely looking forward to it.” With another revolting grin, he turned away. “I have more important things to see to tonight unfortunately, but yes, I’m definitely looking forward to the future.”

  Carrie stepped into her suite, slammed the door and locked it behind her. For a moment she leaned her back against the door to catch her breath, and then rushed to make sure the windows were all shut and locked. She picked up her cell phone, speed dialed Eli and after a short explanation hung up with him and called the police.

  Two and a half hours later, after having been politely told by the police that they would try to find Deek and question him, and since Judd hadn’t been involved they couldn’t charge him, Carrie shut the door behind them, discouraged to tears. The police didn’t even seem to think there was a problem.

  Eli had called a locksmith who had come and changed the locks in case they had a key to her house. Other than that, for the time being, they weren’t sure what else to do except have Eli and Dante stay at her house for the night.

  The farm had a security company and there was a night watchman who would keep an extra close watch on her house as well. More tired than ever, she told Eli and Dante goodnight and once again headed for her room.

  She dug into the top of her closet and pulled out the slim black gun case her grandfather had given her. Removing the tiny pistol, she checked the loads, then carried it in to her bathroom, locked that door too, and slipped out of her clothing to shower. Deek had made her feel filthy.

  As the steaming water pounded her tired body, she thought about the long talk she’d had with her dear friend Anna this afternoon. With lunch over, she’d gone to run a few errands and stopped in to see her childhood playmate and they’d reminisced.

  She and Anna had been friends as long as she could remember. They’d spent a hundred afternoons playing dress up and pretending to be damsels in distress, waiting for their knights in shining armor. What Carrie wouldn’t give for a knight to rescue her just now.

  With a wry smile to herself, she remembered trying to talk Dante into being a knight, but he would have none of it. Shutting off the water, she began to towel dry as she whispered, “O Lady Lillian, where did I ever lose Princess Isabel?”

  Dressed in a silky night shirt, she knelt beside her bed to fervently ask again for help in her life. “Please, God, help me find a way to keep us all safe and put an end to this.” After she finished praying, she felt a warm peace seep into her heart as she climbed into bed and tried to let her tired body rest.

  Forty minutes later, she felt on the bedside table for the third time to make sure her gun was still there beside her Bible. Weary as she was, sleep wouldn’t come. Even with her comforting prayer, she was unable to rest. Turning on her side, she thought back to the counsel Dante had given her to ‘just keep praying.’

  It was her mother who’d taught her to pray. It was the one good thing that had happened to her mother when she ran away to find excitement as a rebellious young girl. When her days had been darkest, after she realized what a mistake she’d made in marrying Judd only to find she was pregnant and had also involved a baby, she’d met some young women missionaries. She’d only begun to learn about Christ’s true church when Judd had become furiously angry and had forbidden her from ever seeing the two young missionaries again. They moved and she’d never been able to learn more. Later what little she’d learned she had told Carrie she knew in her heart to be true. She’d done her best to teach her small daughter all she could remember.

  At first when Carrie’s parents had come back to live at the horse farm, her grandfather had questioned the religion, but Eli had encouraged it and that was enough to make Hugh approve.

  Through the years Carrie had often wondered about the two young missionaries. What had ever become of them? She didn’t even know which church the young women represented. She did know she was grateful for the beliefs her mother had taught her. They’d helped her to get through the toughest times of her life. Still wondering about the church she wished she could find out more about, she finally fell asleep.

  Deep in the night, she was awakened again and was immensely grateful for Eli and Dante’s presence in her house. She could hear voices coming from the back yard and crept to her window in th
e dark to find out what was going on. There were two men she didn’t recognize, as well as Judd and Deek, having a quiet, but heated, conversation on the drive. Carefully, she silently cracked her window open and listened.

  She could distinguish a word here and there, but had no idea what was going on until she very clearly heard one of the strangers threaten Judd, saying, “Come up with the boss’s money or we’ll have to do what he sent us to do.” Judd actually seemed to be afraid of them and hurriedly assured them he’d have the money soon.

  The stranger threatened further, “You’d better. If you don’t have it soon, we’re just going to nab the horse. You know we’d get as much ransom money for that big black as if it were a kid. You get this estate thing settled or we’ll be back. Once we physically have her, Tony can have the attorneys do whatever they need to do to contest the old black man‘s claim to half, and then have her deemed permanently incompetent. The boss has a place just for people we need to keep around, but want out of the way.” The two men laughed and climbed into a dark sedan and drove into the night.

  Judd and Deek began to argue viciously and walked around the corner of the house in the dark. Minutes later Carrie heard another vehicle start up and drive away.

  She closed her window and sat down on the edge of her bed. It was almost 4:00 in the morning, but there was no way she would get back to sleep again on this night. She put on a robe and sat in her chair in the dark, trying to come up with something, anything, that would end this nightmare.

  The whole idea that someone could grab her, and physically force her to marry someone she didn’t want to marry, then take control of her assets sounded ridiculous, until she came into contact with people like this. Whether they could make it stick legally when all was said and done wasn’t nearly as big a concern to her as the thought of what would happen to her in the meantime. Dealing with Judd on a day-to-day basis was awful enough without the thought of basically being kidnapped and held at his and his criminal friends’ mercy until the legal system worked it all out. She wanted nothing to do with any of them, ever. And now, he was threatening others and her magnificent horse as well.

  Even after mulling it over and over, she could think of nothing. She always came back to the fact that she needed to quietly disappear for a time, and ideally, she needed to have Ebony Wind disappear with her. Finally, as it got to be time to get up and go exercise horses, she came back to what Eli had counseled yesterday. God is in His heaven. He was aware of her troubles and He would provide a way. She knelt and prayed for help and then slipped into her riding gear, picked up her helmet and headed for the stallion barn. This morning racing in the dawn wouldn’t free her spirit.

  Chapter 3

  When Slade and Rossen walked into a diner in a small rural California town, they were hoping for nothing more than a mediocre bite to eat. They were both somewhat disgusted with the way the day had gone so far. They'd done well at the rodeo in Flagstaff a couple days before, but things had gone downhill from there.

  Rossen’s hazing horse had thrown a shoe and then come up sore. They’d run over something on the highway that had flattened one of their rear dual tires and then flipped up and damaged the trailer lights. Then, after pulling off into this small town to make repairs, the local policeman had ticketed them for not having working trailer lights.

  There wasn’t a thing they could do but hang around while the repairs were made. They parked the trailer in the shade and it was the cop who recommended they grab a bite to eat in the diner while they waited.

  They were seated by a pretty, dark haired, young waitress with a ready smile and a contagious laugh. There was no one else in the diner at this mid-afternoon hour, so she stopped to chat with them occasionally and she’d brightened Kenney’s day considerably. He was also encouraged when their food came and he found it surprisingly good.

  Also pleased, Rossen said, “Mmmm, maybe this day is going to turn out after all!” He took another bite and seemed to savor it. To the pretty waitress, he said, “Ma’am, would you marry me immediately and go rodeoing with us, so we can eat real food like this and not die of our own cooking?”

  Her laugh brought out dimples. “I just serve it. Which is a good thing, ‘cause I’m a terrible cook and then you really would be at risk of dying!” She laughed again as she worked around the tables near them refilling the salt and pepper shakers.

  Rossen shook his head in mock disgust. “Aw, I knew it. We haven’t found anyone yet willing to travel around the country with a trailer full of horses.”

  ****

  Pacing in the kitchen a few minutes later, Anna became absolutely thoughtful. She did usually wear a smile, but as she remembered more about the conversation she had had the afternoon before with her dear friend Carrie, her face became downright pensive. She thought about another conversation she’d overheard just that morning.

  Carrie’s father Judd had come into the diner with a man who had to be the disgusting nephew and another of their frightening cohorts. They didn’t know her, but she recognized Judd. They were so slippery they were slimy. How sweet, beautiful Carrie ever came of such a man Anna would never know.

  They sat at a table near her section, and talked in low tones about horseracing and gambling. The nephew made a comment about how Eli and Carrie would never go along with their schemes. Then Judd himself had said something about how it didn‘t matter if they went along or not. Lowering his voice marginally, he had said that once they’d forced Carrie to marry, they would take over management of the farm and just keep Carrie out of the way.

  The way they all laughed, made Anna wonder what in the world they meant for Carrie. Anna knew Carrie had feared for herself from the time she was little and now was wondering if even her stallion was being targeted.

  By the time the men left the diner their conversation had made Anna’s heart sink. Carrie had always had trouble with Judd and it had gotten so much worse lately. They all knew exactly what he was capable of after the way he’d treated Carrie’s mother. Anna hadn’t doubted his hatefulness, but she’d been hoping that Carrie had just been tired yesterday and things hadn’t really gotten this bad. After hearing their conversation, she knew Carrie had been right.

  But what if Carrie could find a way to disappear? Anna wiped a few more ketchup bottles, praying silently to herself to know if what she was thinking was a good idea then, sure of herself, she walked back over to the cowboys’ table.

  ****

  Slade and Rossen were quietly eating when the pretty waitress approached and soberly asked, “Are you serious?” Several minutes had passed since Rossen’s teasing remark about marrying a cook and for a second they both just looked at her. Slade wondered what had happened to the cheerful waitress to make her look so earnest, and what she was asking.

  Breaking a tentative smile, she repeated, “Are you serious about wishing you could find a cook who would be willing to travel with horses?” Slade was a little taken aback, especially when she sat right down at their table and he was sure Rossen was, too.

  Skeptically, Slade said, “I thought you said you couldn’t cook. Are you offering?” He was disappointed. He’d really thought this pretty, happy waitress didn’t seem like that type of girl.

  Back pedaling, she quickly said, “No, no, no! Not me! I’m actually thinking about a friend of mine. Were you serious?”

  Rossen answered almost disgustedly, “Girlfriend, the only kind of woman who would go traipsing off across the country with two men she doesn’t know, isn’t interested in the kitchen.”

  “No.” Hurriedly, the girl shook her head. “You’re wrong. My friend would go and she’s not that kind of girl. I’m sure it would have to be strictly business or she wouldn’t even consider it. She’s a great cook, loves to travel, and recently finished her spring semester at UC Santa Barbara.”

  She seemed to be warming up and became more enthusiastic. “Just yesterday she was telling me how much she wanted to get away, but didn’t want to leave her horse.
This might work out perfectly!” Her brown eyes were shining as she stood looking from one cowboy to the other. After a minute of silence, while Rossen gave Slade a searching look, she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. “Come on! At least meet her. If you don’t like her, no harm done.”

  “How do you know we’re not muggers or politicians or something?” Rossen broke the tension with a grin and a twinkle in his eye. “For that matter, how do we know she’s not a mugger or politician or something?”

  ****

  She turned to study the two cowboys at length. Slade knew exactly what she was seeing. Even with the crease in their hair from the hats that were resting on adjoining chairs, they were both good looking enough.

  Slade was quieter, was tall and dark with slightly curly hair and heavy shoulders. He was clean-shaven and the brown hands that rested on the table in front of him were heavily calloused. His bright green eyes were steady as he returned her gaze.

  Rossen was also tall. Blonde hair bleached by the sun and blue eyes framed with tiny smile lines looked back at her with the same steady gaze. She studied them for a moment, apparently weighing something in her mind.

  It had to be obvious that they were a little skeptical where women were concerned. It always seemed that they’d had more than their fair share of females who would like to mug them. The waitress scrunched her lips to the side as if she were considering, as she said, “Hmm, I can see how you two might need some protection from questionable women.” Her teasing smile was back. “You are kinda cute. We may have to blindfold her to ensure your safety!” With that she laughed and dialed her phone.