Saved by the Rancher

by Jennifer Ryan

  Jenna forced an indulgent smile. “It’s your time to waste.” She grabbed her purse and headed for the door. Tired to the bone, her feet scuffed along the hardwood.

  The cab pulled up outside and she rushed into the back seat. “Bayfair Fitness, please. Quickly.”

  The police pulled out of the drive and her adrenaline kicked in again. No protection. She turned and checked out each window, making sure he wasn’t coming after her. She couldn’t let her guard down. He might be out there, following her. She had to get away. Fast. Her mind screamed at her, “Hurry! Run! Hurry!”

  “Are you all right, lady? You don’t look so good.”

  “I’m fine. Please, just hurry. I need to get out of here.” Her voice shook and rasped out after all the screaming.

  “Looks like someone beat you good.”

  Jenna held his gaze in the rearview mirror, unable to think of a single thing to say. She caught sight of her own face and winced. She looked like a wounded animal backed into a corner, shaking, her eyes wide and watchful.

  “I hope the other guy looks worse than you do, missy.” She must have indicated she didn’t have the pleasure of beating the other guy bloody because he went on, “The cops’ll get him. You make that bastard pay.” He gave her a stern look.

  Jenna wished she could make him pay. One day she would. Right now, she wanted to lie down and go to sleep. Impossible, at least for several more hours. Probably not a good idea anyway with the splitting headache, telling her she had a mild concussion.

  Now, the long process of running and finding someplace safe to hide began. Ben, the only person she allowed herself to count on, would help her. That’s what she paid him to do. After all, this was the sixth, no seventh, time she had to run. With all her practice, they had come up with a system. And it worked this last time. Or so they thought.

  She never accessed her bank accounts directly. She didn’t use any credit. She had several aliases set up. None of it mattered. Rich and spoiled, he would use all his influence and power to hunt her down for his own sport. No one ever said no to him. Until she stood up to him and dared to say no. The more times she refused him, the worse things got for her.

  Those first few times he found her, he sent her pretty gifts and notes, showed up unexpectedly while she was out shopping or eating in a restaurant. The police couldn’t do anything to stop him. Stalking laws were specific—and often inadequate to protect victims. Each time he showed up, she left and found a new place to hide, never giving him an opportunity to truly stalk her. He never left enough damning evidence for the police to collect and arrest him. If they’d arrest him.

  She simply couldn’t endure his unwanted attention. Then he got tired of playing contrite and demanded her return. With her resounding no came a shove, a push, a slap, a punch. Again, the police did nothing. He shielded himself behind his wealth, family name, and a battalion of lawyers, leaving him untouchable.

  She’d waged a futile battle trying to get justice in a system not set up to protect against a powerful man’s obsession. Other stalked women suffered similar circumstances, oftentimes listening to the police say the same thing she’d heard too many times—until and unless he hurts you, we can’t do anything. Even then, they didn’t help her. Her ex had the ability to make people say what he wanted them to say and evidence disappeared at his convenience. Money can buy silence.

  “Hey lady, we’re here.” Frowning and looking unsure, he said, “Maybe I should take you to the hospital and have them take a look at that cut on your head.”

  She appreciated the thought, but couldn’t take the time to tend to herself. She had to get away. “I’ll be okay. What do I owe you?”

  “Twenty-seven fifty-eight.”

  She handed him a fifty. “Keep the change and forget you ever saw me.”

  “No problem. I hope you’ll be okay.”

  He smiled, but sadness filled his eyes. The sympathetic expression told her he wished he’d never seen her battered and bloody face. “I’ll be fine. I just need to find a new hole to hide in,” she added under her breath and exited the cab.

  Slamming the door, she headed for the side entrance of the twenty-four-hour fitness club. The few people at this end of the club stared, but she kept her head down and walked directly to the locker room and her hidden emergency supplies. Relief swept through her when she palmed the orange plastic-handled key she found in her purse. The small suitcase and satchel, containing her camera bag, money, IDs, and a secure cell phone were still inside. Ben had friends in high places and guaranteed the cell phone was untraceable. Securing the bag on top of the suitcase, she rolled it behind her back out to the curb, hailed another taxi, and headed for the airport.

  Next stop, the airport rental car counter. She used one of the credit cards and IDs under an assumed name to rent a car. She exited the terminal and found the waiting vehicle. Finally, safe behind the wheel, she drove out of the city and away from the terror. Constantly looking in the rearview mirror, she tried to rein in her emotions. Her head pounded, pain and exhaustion slowed her mind and body. On her way to parts unknown, after all these years, it didn’t matter where she ended up. So long as she escaped him, she would drive.

  Two hours later she dug out the cell phone and called Ben. Annie answered.

  “It’s Rabbit. I need Ben.” Annie put her through without a word.

  “How bad is it, Rabbit?” Ben’s anguished voice came on the line.

  “I’m okay. Is my identity still safe from your staff?”

  “Yes. No one knows who you are, just what to do if they hear the password. Now, how bad?”

  “Pretty bad.” Tears filled her eyes. She refused to cry. Not now. Not when running meant safety, meant her life. Later, when she was safe and able to take the time to fall apart. She blinked back tears. “I’ll send the pictures when I can. Promise you won’t open them. Just stick them in the book.”

  “Rabbit, you know I can’t make that promise. Now, tell me how bad.”

  His genuine concern prompted her confession. “I have a bad gash on my head, bruises from him slapping and punching me, a bad cut on my thigh, and welts on my back.”

  Silent tears streamed down her face. Her voice so soft, detailing all the injuries. She sounded like a small child reciting her lessons. The weakness in her voice irritated her. She’d held it together with the cops, but with Ben she let down her guard.

  Barely able to pull the car over to the side of some quiet suburban street, she parked.

  “What do you mean welts on your back? Did he punch you in the back?”

  “A belt,” she whispered, knowing he probably didn’t hear her.

  “What did you say?”

  She spit out the ugly truth. “I said, a belt.”

  “Oh, God. Oh, God, Rabbit. Do you need to go to the hospital?”

  “No. No hospital. He’ll only get angrier if I do.” Her anxiety kicked in again and the adrenaline pumped through her veins and amped up her system. When it finally wore off she’d crash. Hard.

  “I can’t explain away these kinds of injuries. They’ll have police and reporters there asking more questions. They’ll find out who I am. He doesn’t want the publicity. He’ll take me from the hospital and do worse to me.” He’d kill her if she went to the hospital. She knew it like she knew her name.

  “I don’t know what happened this time. He worked himself into a rage before he even got me in the door. I can feel the gash on my leg oozing blood, and I can barely sit down in the seat to drive this car for the strapping marks across my backside.” Her whole body shook and she sucked back a wracking sob.

  “Rabbit, I’m so sorry. Tell me where you are. I’ll come get you. Protect you. I promise.” His voice pleaded and the sadness overwhelmed her.

  “Please no. So far, we’ve been lucky he hasn’t discovered you’re helping me. You know what he did to my bodyguard. I couldn’t stand it if he came after you, or hurt you too. All I can do is give you the evidence and wait for the righ
t time to end this.”

  “Please, Rabbit, he’s going to kill you.”

  She swiped the tears away with the back of her hand and took a deep calming breath. “I need to do this my way. It’s the only way. Have you started making arrangements?”

  Resigned to the fact she refused to let him come and get her, he resumed with their business arrangement.

  “I contacted the Berringers. They told me about the cottage and the police. They’ll total the damages and send me the bill. They’ve agreed to throw out your belongings. Most were destroyed anyway. They’re worried about you.”

  “I hope you told them how truly sorry I am for what happened. The rest, well, it was only clothes. Oh, if he didn’t destroy my computer, try to get that back.” Her mind shut out the pain and terror and shifted to more practical matters. Easier to think about the mundane than her crazy, evil ex. Time to put the attack on the back burner and get on with hiding again.

  “I spoke to the police. They’re not happy you left. If you refuse to identify him as your attacker, they can’t move forward. Let’s file charges, fight him in court, and let people see what a monster he is.”

  “He wore a mask and gloves. No prints. No other witnesses. My word against his. Play that scenario out in court and I lose.”

  “We can build a case based on past behavior and the evidence we’ve collected.”

  “It’s not enough.” She sighed, the weight of the last few years too much to bear right now. “Ben, I’m tired. Get me to a safe place.”

  “Actually, I thought ahead this time and already have a place ready.” His voice was filled with how much he hated anticipating another attack and the need for a new place to run to. All he could do for her, all she’d let him do.

  “Just so happens, a friend recently moved back to his family ranch in Hidden Springs, Colorado. A huge spread, about three hundred and forty acres. I’ve secured a cabin for you on the property. Jack says it’s away from the other buildings, across one of the pastures. He’s a friend, but he doesn’t know anything about you.”

  “If he’s your friend, I don’t want to put him in jeopardy.”

  “He’s an old college buddy. I haven’t seen him in years. When we ran into each other, I asked about his place and thought it would make a great hiding spot for you if you needed to run. I paid the rent for the next year. I’ll call Jack and tell him you’re coming. Don’t worry. You’ll be safe there. Jack is ex-military. He’ll protect you, Rabbit.”

  “No one can protect against his kind of madness.” A chill ran up her spine. What she wouldn’t give to have someone in her life to protect and love her, instead of hurting her all the time.

  “Either way, it sounds nice. Thanks for working so fast. I’ll spend the next few days driving around a few of the southern states. You know, the usual misdirection and roaming should get him, or anyone watching me, off my trail, so I can safely get to Colorado.”

  “I’ll send your usual stuff to the ranch. You’ll have plenty of money and your accumulated mail. There’s a card from your mother. You should call her.”

  “No. If she doesn’t know where I am, he can’t hurt her and get information from her. You’ve been checking on her? She’s okay?”

  “All is well. I make sure she has enough money. She’s getting along fine. She has her friends and her Thursday night poker parties.”

  Jenna thought fondly of her mother. She hadn’t seen her since all of this began. The thought of her sitting around playing poker with a bunch of rowdy men and women from work made her smile. Her mother, always the life of the party, loved with her whole heart and treated everyone as a dear friend. She missed their long talks and confiding in her. After her father died, they’d grown very close. Now, she didn’t let anyone close to her, not even her mother. He destroyed everything in her life, and she wouldn’t let him destroy her mother’s, too. “I miss her.”

  “I know. I’ll let her know you’re okay.”

  “Tell her . . . I’m sorry. I should have listened when she said he was no good for me.”

  “He’s one of the wealthiest men in the country, who knew he’s such a bastard?”

  “Money can’t buy you happiness, or sanity. Look at me. I got one of the largest divorce settlements ever awarded, and I’m on the run, hunted by my ex-husband. What I wouldn’t pay for peace and safety. But money can’t buy my way out of this. Nothing can.” She rested her forehead on the steering wheel. “Sorry, the past is haunting me. Thanks, Ben, for everything.”

  “You know, Rabbit, Jack might be able to help you. Trust him.”

  “I don’t trust anyone. Except you. I’ll call if I need anything, or if the hunt begins again.”

  “I hate it when you say that. You don’t deserve this.”

  “To him, I’m only the prey. Unless or until he kills me, I don’t think this will ever end.”

  “Then let me do more than just find you a new place to hide.” His words came out tight with frustration.

  “How is my project coming along?” she asked, reminding him he was doing more.

  “Slowly.”

  “Then all I can do is run. For now,” she said, hoping to placate him.

  “Stay safe, Rabbit.”

  “I’ll try, Ben.”

  She disconnected the call and turned off the phone. Staring out the windshield for a moment, she tried to gather her strength for the long drive ahead.

  Birds chirped in the trees outside. The neighborhood was quiet with charming houses that probably had loving families living in them. Just like the one she grew up in. Sad, she’d probably never have a home and a family of her own. He would never allow it.

  Unless she stopped him.

  Chapter Two

  * * *

  “THE POLICE DON’T have a thing on you. They will not pursue the matter further,” David’s lawyer guaranteed.

  David hit the END button on his cell phone. Attacked by a masked man, Jenna had survived, but couldn’t positively identify him . . . without lying, or making herself look the fool. The airtight alibi his lawyer supplied the cops ensured he wasn’t a suspect.

  “They can’t touch me. I win again, Jenna.”

  He smiled at his reflection in the shabby motel’s cracked mirror over the rust-stained sink, not far from Jenna’s most recent hiding place. He wrinkled his nose against the smell of stale beer, sweat, and moldy carpet. She’d brought him to this dilapidated place and it pissed him off. Already shaking from the adrenaline wearing off, he fisted his hands, blood dripping into the sink from the cut on his palm.

  He moved his hand through the air, imagined cutting Jenna’s thigh again, and felt the rush of power and satisfaction that line of blood down her pale skin had invoked.

  David inhaled deeply to settle the charge of energy memories of making Jenna pay unleashed in him. He smelled the blood, tasted its coppery scent on his tongue, and smiled at himself in the mirror.

  No doubt Jenna was on the run again. Good. He so enjoyed finding her.

  Chapter Three

  * * *

  JENNA SAT IN her car outside a diner in Hidden Springs, Colorado. The last four days a haze of highways and back roads. She exhausted herself zigzagging all over the south before heading west toward Colorado. She changed rental cars three times, finally buying a new SUV in Kentucky. Ben arranged for the vehicle using one of her many trusts.

  The trusts hid her name behind company after company. At this point, she didn’t know which were real companies, or just on paper. Ben hid her name and whereabouts, using the millions from her divorce settlement. Funny how the money she used to hide came from the very man who hunted her. The irony wasn’t lost on her.

  In the last four days, she’d slept about ten hours. When she had to, she slept an hour or two in the car at truck stops, having stopped at only one fleabag no-tell-motel the first night to tend her wounds as best she could with her limited first aid kit. She would buy fresh bandages in town before heading to the cabin. She longed to be
at the ranch, relatively safe, able to relax and rest.

  The welts on her back and legs throbbed after sitting in car after car. The cut on her thigh pulsed with heat and pain, probably infected; no amount of ibuprofen took the edge off. She’d been eating it like candy. To top it off, she had a fever.

  Jenna eased out of the car, careful not to move too quickly and send her back muscles into spasm again. Stiff, she limped on her right leg because of the cut. She slid on her sunglasses to hide the dark circles and bruises. She didn’t have anything to cover the cut above her temple, or hide the dark bruise along her jaw where he slugged her. She made her way across the street to the local grocery store. For the first time, she noticed the quiet street and picturesque town. She inhaled deeply the crisp clean air, hoping to revive her tired body and mind.

  Surrounded by beautiful mountains, the town had an old west quality. The buildings weren’t large, but small storefronts lining the main street. In addition to the diner, the quaint storefronts offered a jewelry store, bank, ice cream parlor, hair salon, clothing stores, and antique shops. Just what you’d expect to find on Main Street in a small town. Benches and pots of red and white flowers sat in front of some of the stores and several people window-shopped.

  The grocery store was the largest, most modern building with a big parking lot on the side. She shopped for bandages, medicine, and a few essential food items for the cabin. In a few days, she would come back and stock up. For now, the most important thing on her mind was mending her leg and getting some sleep.

  The teenage checkout girl stared at her face, unable to hide her curiosity. She knew the picture she made; everyone she passed gawked. After all the times she had been bloodied and bruised, she expected the stares. In a small town like this, people would talk about the battered woman who came into the store, but they wouldn’t get involved.

  She just didn’t care anymore. Not today. Her nerves were shot, and she wanted to get to the cabin before she really lost it. She paid the girl with shaking hands, grabbed her bags of groceries, and headed back to her car aware that people watched her every step.