Dark Paradise

by Tami Hoag

  “Ah. Big, hairy, smelly things that spit. It's like junior high revisited,” Mari said dryly, narrowing her gaze on the one that had gotten a firm hold on her shirt cuff. “In fact, this one looks exactly like the guy who sat behind me in science class. I'd recognize those ears anywhere.”

  She leaned toward the llama as she gently extricated her sleeve from its teeth. “You didn't happen to be called Butt Breath in a past life, did you?”

  The llama drew its head back and regarded her with what looked like offense. Mari arched a brow.

  “What did Lucy do with them?” she asked as she watched J.D. pour their feed pellets into various tubs. The llamas abandoned her for their supper. They took dainty mouthfuls and chewed delicately, following her and J.D. with their eyes.

  “Made money, I expect,” J.D. said, his mouth twisting. “I can grow a steer that'll feed a family of four for a year and get next to nothing for it. Grow a llama—which is good for exactly nothing—and the whole damn world beats a path to your door.”

  Mari gave him a look as they slipped back out the gate. “Not everything has to be edible to be worthwhile.”

  He just grunted and headed back toward the barn, his long, powerful legs absorbing the distance so that she had to almost jog to keep up to him.

  “This is all a little overwhelming,” she said, scooping her hair back behind her ear. “I just can't picture the Lucy I knew toting feed and shoveling shit.”

  “She didn't. She had a hired hand.”

  That news stopped Mari in her tracks. The ranch, the llamas, a hired hand, the Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous friends. Christ, just how much had Lucy inherited in the windfall that let her move here? This all had to have cost a fortune. Check the bank balance, heiress.

  “Who? Where is he now?”

  Rafferty's broad shoulders rose and fell. “Just some hand. They drift around, pick up work here and there. I imagine he took off after the accident. Guess he figured a dead woman wouldn't pay him.”

  The news he delivered so matter-of-factly rested uneasily on Mari. Lucy had been shot. Her hired hand took off immediately afterward. She caught hold of J.D.'s arm as he reached for the barn door. “Did the sheriff ever question this guy?”

  “There wasn't any call for it. The dentist or whatever the hell he was 'fessed up.”

  “But he claimed he never saw Lucy.”

  “Idiot shoots a woman instead of an elk. Doesn't surprise me he claims he didn't see her.”

  He opened the door for her and closed it behind him. The feed buckets rattled as he set them down next to the bins.

  “What about your uncle?” Mari asked, following him as he dumped dry cat food into half a dozen dishes and felines of all descriptions came running from every nook and cranny of the barn. “The one who found her body? Did he see anything?”

  He turned around abruptly, suddenly much too close and much too large. He loomed over her, his features set in angry, uncompromising lines that were exaggerated by the shadows of the gloomy barn. “I told you last night to steer clear of him,” he said, his voice a low growl. He poked her sharply in the sternum with a forefinger, making her blink. “I meant it.”

  “Why?” Mari asked, amazed she'd found the nerve. “What has he got to hide? If he didn't do it—”

  “He didn't do it,” J.D. snarled through his teeth. “Leave him alone. He's been through enough.”

  Mari swallowed hard as he stepped around her and stalked out of the barn. She rubbed at the sore spot on her breastbone, dimly aware that her heart was knocking hard behind it. A dozen questions rushed through her mind about the mysterious Del Rafferty, about the hired man who had conveniently slipped away. She bit them all back. Rafferty's temper was at the end of its leash, straining for an excuse to rip into her. She really didn't feel up to giving him one.

  The sun was disappearing behind the mountains to the west, casting the ranch yard into long shadows and tall silhouettes. J.D. stood beside his horse, snugging up the cinch, preparing to leave. Thoughts of drifters and faceless men with guns slid into Mari's mind like dark, oily serpents. The eerie sense of abandonment the place had given her that first night began creeping in with the shadows.

  “Rafferty, wait!” she called, trotting away from the barn.

  He swung into the saddle and settled himself, resting his hands on the saddle horn, waiting.

  “Look,” she said, laying her free hand against the sorrel's warm neck. “I don't know anything about llamas—except that they seem very . . . spiritual. I don't know what I'm going to do with this place or with them. This has all happened so fast, I'm not so sure it's even real.”

  He didn't say a word, just sat up there, staring down at her from beneath the brim of his hat.

  “What I'm saying is, I need some help.”

  What she wasn't saying was that she wanted him to answer her questions. She needed answers. She needed to achieve some kind of closure concerning Lucy's sudden departure from the present tense. What she wasn't saying even to herself was that the idea of seeing him again held a certain attraction. Ornery, obstinate jerk that he was, he wasn't hard to look at. And those small chinks in his armor intrigued her—his affection for animals and his reluctance to let her see it, the gentle way he had held her while she cried. Besides that, he was a link to Lucy, she reminded herself.

  “If you wouldn't mind,” she stumbled on, uncertain of the local etiquette, wishing he would simply pick up the ragged threads of the conversation and finish the thought himself, as anyone in her past life would have done. “It's just for a week or two. I'll pay you—”

  “I don't want your money,” he said sharply, offended. “I don't take money from neighbors.”

  A part of him was sorely tempted to turn her down all the way around. He didn't like the feelings she shook loose inside him. He didn't like where she came from or who her friends were. But she owned this land now, land that he wanted. If he didn't help her, she would turn elsewhere.

  She looked up at him, her dark brows tugging together in consternation. “But—”

  “I'll see to the stock,” he said, pulling down the brim of his hat. He lifted his reins and Sarge instantly brought his head up, ready for the next command. “I just won't take money for it.”

  Mari shrugged, at a loss, feeling once again like a visitor in a foreign land. “Suit yourself.”

  “Yes, ma'am,” he murmured, nodding. “I usually do.”

  She watched him ride away, frustration and weariness rubbing at her temper. Something else thrummed beneath it all, something she didn't have the patience to deal with. She didn't have the patience to handle attraction to a man who made her want to scream and tear her hair out. Men like that, attractions like that, were good for only one thing—wild, hot, mind-numbing sex. She hadn't come to Montana for wild, hot, mind-numbing sex. She had come for friendship and a fresh start.

  But as she walked toward the house with the Mr. Peanut tin tucked in the crook of her arm, her mind drifted to a line from Lucy's letter and a warm blush washed through her from head to toe. Ride 'im, cowgirl . . .

  She climbed the porch steps and sat down on a bench with her back against the log wall and her eyes on the hillside where Rafferty had disappeared among the trees. She had more important things to think about, such as what she was going to do with this ranch and the llamas, and what she was going to do about the uneasiness that tightened like knots inside her when she thought of Lucy's death.

  The sun slipped farther behind the mountains. Shadows crept in from all sides. The knots twisted in her belly.

  A killer who never saw his victim. A drifter who vanished. A man J. D. Rafferty didn't want her near. A lifestyle that cost the moon. A last letter that made no sense.

  “You've got a lot to answer for, Luce,” she muttered, her arm around the peanut tin, her eyes on the hillside that suddenly felt as though it were staring back.

  He watched the woman through a Burris Signature 6–24X bench rest/varmint scope, click
ing the iris adjustment to get the lighting just right. A Ruger M77 Mark II held tight into his shoulder, he rested against the trunk of a fir, silent, still, so still he blended in with his surroundings as if he were a rock or a tree. It was that quality of stillness that had made it possible for him to live as long as he had.

  Not that that was such a good thing.

  Automatically, his mind calculated range and bullet drop. He had learned the ballistics tables not long after he had learned the multiplication tables, and he knew them better. He wouldn't use the figures now. It was just good to work the mind, that was all. Keep the wheels oiled and moving.

  He had told himself to stay away from this place, to stay away from the blonde. But she had haunted him badly the last two nights and he had finally decided he needed to see if she had come back to the house.

  This wasn't the woman he had expected. She was blond, like the other one had been, but different. Much different. He could tell not only by the way she dressed, but by the way she moved, the way she sat. Relief flooded through him, weakening his limbs. The Ruger bobbed in his hands, suddenly weighing a thousand pounds. She wasn't the one.

  The woman laughed, a husky, healthy sound that floated up the mountainside and brushed across his ears like sweet music. Not like the other one. Her laugh had held an edge to it, a bitter sharpness. The echo of that laugh brought flashes of memory, like a strobe light in his head. Darkness. Dogs. The crack of a rifle. The sight of blood. The smell of death.

  He dropped the Ruger down and pressed the heels of his hands against his eye sockets, as if the pressure might blot out the scenes. Panic rose inside him, clogging his throat, stiffening his lungs, making him shake. The images in his head tumbled into a confusing mix of the distant past, the recent past, the present. Sounds of war, sounds of laughter, screams of the wounded and the dying, orders, shots, explosions, the stench of death and decay and swamp. His heart pounded like an angry fist against his sternum. Sweat soaked his clothing, robbing his body of heat as the cool evening air closed around him.

  Sucking in as much air as his aching lungs would allow, he held the breath and concentrated on pushing every thought from his mind. As the mental screen went blessedly blank, he exhaled slowly, counting the seconds, concentrating on slowing his heart rate.

  Every moment of his life was like taking a shot—he had to stay centered, in control, tight within himself. Focus, aim, take a breath, exhale half, caress the trigger, start again. That was how he made it. One shot at a time. No distractions.

  No pretty blondes with husky voices.

  Taking up the rifle, he rose from his crouch and started up the mountain, letting the darkness swallow him up like a phantom.

  CHAPTER

  8

  SAMANTHA finished work at four for the first time in a week. The evening was hers. The thought made her stomach cramp with dread. She hated the idea of spending time alone in the small house she had shared with Will. It was so empty without him. The quiet pressed in on her until she could stand it no longer.

  She couldn't go into the tiny kitchen without seeing him standing there with messy dishes and pots and pans stacked around him, his grin exuberant as he cooked spaghetti. He always made enough for an army. The freezer compartment of the old refrigerator was virtually an icy wall of frozen spaghetti in Ziploc bags. She couldn't go into the bedroom without seeing him sprawled across the mattress, naked, frowning in his sleep, or with those devilish blue eyes locked on her, one hand reaching out to her, inviting her to come make love with him.

  Longing as strong, as desperate as the need to breathe, dug into her heart and tore it open all over again. The pain flowed through her like fresh, hot blood.

  What went wrong, Will? Did I need you too much? Did you need more?

  She thought of the way she had jumped at his offer of marriage. In her memory it was the most casual of questions. He had asked her with no more concern than if he had asked her to go off on a wild ride with him. And in her memory she all but pounced on him, grabbing on to him with greedy hands that threatened to choke the life out of him.

  No matter how she looked at it, the blame always came back to her. She had been too demanding, too clinging, too needy. She wasn't pretty enough or woman enough or experienced enough in bed. As angry as she was with him for walking out, as hurt as she was by his cheating, she always blamed herself.

  That truth made her think of her mother, slinking around her father like a whipped dog, her eyes downcast, always apologizing for imagined sins. She hated to think that she compared with her mother in any way, had always hated to think that she was even related to any of those people in that shabby house with the weedy yard and the dirty-faced children. The guilt that thought brought was no more welcome than the truth that the Neills were her family.

  She looked around the bar as she untied her apron, folded it, and tucked it into a cubbyhole. People were drifting in for happy hour. Smiling, beautiful, wealthy people. Couples. Her focus homed in on the women, who all seemed to hold some secret wisdom in their eyes that she couldn't even guess at. They had it all. They had their husbands and their fancy cars and lavish homes and beautiful clothes. She imagined that when they looked at her they knew that she had nothing, was no one. All she had waiting for her at home was Rascal, the puppy Will had given her for her birthday two weeks before he left her.

  “Are you all right, Samantha luv?”

  Mr. Van Dellen leaned close to her, brows knit in question. She fought down the lump in her throat and murmured an answer she hoped would satisfy him.

  “You're sure?” he asked. “Because if you need to talk to someone or—”

  “No, really, Mr. Van Dellen. I'm fine. I'm just tired, that's all.”

  He pressed his lips together in way that made her think he was holding back a challenge to her statement. She tried to smile, shrugging off his concern. He didn't look convinced, but he didn't call her on it either.

  “All right,” he said on a sigh, and moved off to answer a call from one of his customers.

  Samantha felt the tension seep out of her like air from a balloon. She couldn't talk about her troubles with him. He was nice and all, but everybody knew he and Mr. Bronson were . . . well . . . queer.

  She didn't like the way the word sounded even in her own mind. It seemed harsh and mean, when Mr. Van Dellen and Mr. Bronson were both very kind to her. But she couldn't get past her upbringing either. The thought of two men . . . together . . . She gave a little shiver of revulsion. No, she couldn't talk with Mr. Van Dellen about Will. He couldn't possibly understand.

  The problem was, she didn't know a soul who would understand. Not for the first time in her life she wished for a real friend and for the courage it took to be a part of that kind of friendship.

  With a heart that felt as heavy as the purse she slung over her shoulder, she started for the side exit and stepped directly into the path of Evan Bryce.

  “Samantha!”

  The smile that stretched across his face was one for old friends, and it threw her off balance more than their near collision had. “I'm sorry, Mr. Bryce,” she mumbled. “I wasn't looking where I was going.”

  “Don't apologize,” he ordered with a mock frown as he settled a hand on her shoulder. “And you call me Bryce. All my friends do.” She started to object, but he gave her shoulder a little squeeze, his pale eyes shining. “Come on. We are friends, aren't we?” he said with a big square grin. “I don't loan my handkerchiefs out to just anyone, you know.”

  Samantha ducked her head, blushing at the memory of crying on his shoulder. God, he was Evan Bryce and she was just Sam Neill from the wrong side of town, just a little nobody. She couldn't be a part of Bryce's crowd any more than a mutt dog could run with greyhounds.

  Bryce studied her reaction from under his lashes. “Come join us,” he said, steering her toward his table.

  “No, I can't.”

  “Why not? You're off duty. There's no reason you shouldn't join us for a dr
ink, is there?”

  There was every reason. She didn't belong. She wouldn't fit in. She was married. She needed to get home— To what? The thoughts tumbled through her head, clearly visible in her dark eyes.

  “You deserve a treat, I think,” he said softly, their shared secret warm and kind in his gaze as he tilted her chin up with a forefinger. “Don't you?”

  Samantha stared at him for a moment, feeling herself needing his attention like a parched plant needed water. Her loneliness swelled inside her. The thought of going to her empty home had tears pressing against the backs of her eyes.

  “Come make some new friends,” he murmured.

  She looked at the people sitting at his usual table along the back wall. Smiling, beautiful, wealthy people. Laughing. Happy. She could be a part of that for a little while. She thought of Will, feeling that she was somehow betraying him. Then she thought of Will with the blonde from the Hell and Gone . . . and she thought of her empty house, and her empty life. She deserved something more, didn't she? A drink, a friend, a little time away from the aching loneliness.

  “Yeah,” she said, nodding to herself. “Yes, I'd like that.”

  “Good girl,” Bryce said, flashing his Robert Redford grin again as he herded her toward his table.

  Mari walked toward the Mystic Moose, hands jammed in the pockets of her denim jacket. She hadn't been able to manage the idea of dinner in the elegant dining room at the lodge. Even after a shower to wash the smoke and dust off, she felt something of the ranch lingering on her, something that made her long for simpler surroundings and country music on a jukebox. Supper at the Rainbow Cafe had seemed the perfect thing. Chicken-fried steak and white gravy. Lyle Lovett and his Large Band on the side. Nora Davis in her pink uniform and her air of world wisdom.

  Replete, she strolled down the sidewalk, letting the town fill her senses, letting the tensions of the day drift away. Main Street was fairly busy. There was a line of big old pickups out in front of the Hell and Gone, lined up like horses at a hitching rail. Even from more than a block away she could hear Garth Brooks advising folks to go against the grain, the sharp clack of billiard balls breaking over his cowboy voice.