Anna said nothing, but thought a lot. What-ifs were terrible. What if Elisha had turned bad and had no qualms about shooting at Gabe? Much less her? He couldn’t be trusted, that was for sure.
She saw the torture for a split second when Gabe lowered his mask. It was then she realized just how much this was tearing Gabe up. He didn’t know what Elisha would do if it came down to a fight at the OK Corral. And could Gabe shoot Elisha? Would the past stop him any more than it would his childhood friend?
“I didn’t realize the depth of your predicament,” she said softly, reaching out, touching his closed fist resting on the table. “I’m sorry. This is a real conundrum. You can’t just suss this out and know what Elisha will do if we get into a firefight with him and cartel soldiers at some point.”
“Yeah,” Gabe gritted out, “that’s my continuing nightmare, Anna.” He looked up, pinning her with a thoughtful stare. “I don’t know why I’m confiding all this to you. We’re professionals. We’ve both worked in the drug world’s underbelly for a long time. We know what can happen.”
She removed her hand, feeling his knotted fingers relax beneath hers. “You keep surprising me, Gabe.” He tilted his head, a quizzical expression on his face. “You aren’t the typical undercover agent nor are you like the ATF, DEA, or FBI guys I routinely bump around in the night with. There’s a sensitive side to you and you’re not afraid to share it with me. Most of the men I work with are locked up tighter than Fort Knox. But you aren’t.”
“Does that bother you?”
She gave a short laugh. “No. But that’s what is surprising about you: You aren’t afraid to really talk with me. You’ve got your ego in check and I find that incredibly refreshing coming from a man. You remind me so much of my father growing up. He was always an officer of high rank in the Marines. I saw that stoic, gruff side to him, but never when he came home.” Her voice lowered with fondness. “He would pick me up, smother me with kisses, cradle me in his arms, and talk with me, not at me. We had real conversations at the table and he always educated me, but not in a way that made me feel stupid. He would trade nights with my mother, reading a book to me before I went to sleep. I looked forward to hearing a story every week and I loved it. He always supported me, was kind, and never stern or harsh with me. I know now how lucky I was growing up because, as an adult, I’ve discovered most fathers are not like that with their children. They are more or less absent from their lives due to their work. My father never allowed work to interfere with big moments in my life. He was always there for me.” She looked away, a lump forming in her throat. “To this day, Gabe, I miss the hell out of him. My mother has never gotten over losing him. They were so in love with each other.”
“Your father sounds like mine. He’s the same as your father was.”
“I saw that the week we were staying at their ranch. We were both lucky and I think”—she gave him a faint smile— “that Steve rubbed off on you and you’re very much like him.”
“So,” he teased, withdrawing his hand from the table, “does that mean you can stand having me around for months to come? That I’m not a pain in the ass to you?”
She pushed back on the two rear legs of her chair, balancing herself. “You’re spoiling me, Whitcomb. If I’m honest, I look forward to our time together, times like this,” she said, and she gestured to him. “I just find it so refreshing to have a genuine, down-to-earth honest discussion with a man. That’s rare or maybe it’s just the men I draw. I don’t know.”
“No, most males are stoved up,” he agreed, sipping his coffee. “It’s the way they were raised, the expectations of the father to emulate him. I did emulate my father, but it was a healthy, positive thing in my mind.”
“Mine too.”
Silence settled in the kitchen.
“I kind of like having this wavelength with you,” Gabe quietly admitted, studying her beneath his short, thick lashes. “For whatever that’s worth.”
“I do, too. It brings back good memories of my father.” She touched her heart with her fingertips. “A warm fuzzy.”
“I don’t mind being a warm fuzzy in your life if you don’t,” he teased, smiling a little at her.
A flush of heat rushed up into her face and Anna realized she was blushing. If Gabe saw it, he didn’t mention it, thank goodness. “I’ve worked alone for a long, long time,” she admitted, her voice low. “I was thinking the other day that maybe I’ve grown lonely for some social interaction, that I need people . . . well ... maybe I should qualify that. I’ve been unconsciously looking for someone who I could let down my guard with and just be myself. Share.”
“And you can’t share out on a sniper op,” he agreed, holding her glistening gaze.
“You’re an enigma to me,” Anna admitted, “and I’m not sure how to deal with you.”
“On a personal or professional basis?”
“Oh, I’m solid on your professional stature.”
More silence.
“Maybe,” Anna ventured, her voice barely above a whisper as she looked toward the kitchen, “we’re both lonely and we’re both wanting something different, something good to walk into our lives.”
His brow arched as he thought about her admission. “That’s another facet of you I like, Anna. You aren’t afraid of calling the shots and laying it all out on the table. To me that’s refreshing. I’ve always had problems understanding women because they have their own language they speak to one another. But when they speak it to me, I’m trying to translate it and”—he grimaced—“I’ve failed spectacularly at it at times. With you? There’s no translation needed. You’re straight to the point and I appreciate that. It helps me know where I stand with you, and if things get dicey outside this door someday with the Elsons, I won’t have to second-guess what you need or tell me. Does that make sense?”
“Sure it does,” she murmured, setting the chair down on four feet. She folded her hands on the table, holding his darkening gaze. There was something pure and good swirling between them and like a beggar who was starving, she secretly lapped up his openness with her. “Maybe we’re both hungry for some good ole-fashioned socialization between a man and woman?”
“I’ve thought about that, too,” he said hesitantly, opening his palm on the table. “In our business you know there can’t be anything personal between a working team.”
“I know that.” She gave him a humorous look. “But we’re not robots or heartless, either, Gabe. We might be in our cold-blooded business, but that doesn’t make us less human.”
“That was why I was glad to get out of undercover. I was having a helluva time stuffing my emotions so they wouldn’t interfere in my daily survival.”
“I couldn’t ever go undercover like you did. I really couldn’t. You have my everlasting respect.” She sighed. “And in a way with the Elsons, and especially Elisha if he wants to make amends and become your friend again, you’ll be undercover on this mission, too.”
“I know,” he growled, unhappy. “Elisha was always loyal to me and I to him. He respected what we shared until his father forced him into drug dealing. I always knew he didn’t have a choice in it. It was either fold and give up or run away from that toxic family.”
“In the end, he did the best he could, but my instinct tells me there’s still something good and unspoiled in him. My money is on him coming over to try to bandage up the past and then move forward as friends with you once more.”
“I hope not,” he said sourly. “I don’t want to lie to him, but I know I’ll have to.”
The sadness in his voice was harsh with recrimination. “Let’s take it a day at a time. Maybe you can flip Elisha if he does show up and you two start to bond again. He could work for the DEA.”
“That will never happen. The Elson family is tighter than fleas, Anna. They would never be a traitor to one another.”
“Just a thought. You know them a lot better than I do.” She scooted the chair back, stood, took their emptied cups to th
e sink, and rinsed them out. All the Elson boys had, at one time or another, gone to federal prison on drug running charges. Hiram was still there. As torn as Gabe was about Elisha and his past with him, she never questioned if he would do something to mess up the mission. And if she read between the lines of their burgeoning relationship, he was protective of her even though she didn’t need that kind of shield. She worried more about that part of him because in a firefight, decisions were made in nanoseconds, and there was no way she wanted him to take a bullet for her. That concerned her more at this point.
She heard him push the chair back, and she turned as he headed to the living room to put a couple of logs into the fireplace. It was nicely warm in here without being hot. With so many leaks in the house, it was never going to get overly hot inside. However, there was heat in her heart toward Gabe. He was different in a good kind of way. What did she want out of this discovery? To grow closer to him because he seemed open to it without saying so? What then? What did SHE want? Her love life was more off than on. She craved a long-term, serious, deepening relationship with a man. Not a one-night stand and not one based just on sex. As a sniper, she was ultraconservative, taking her time, having the patience to let a situation develop and see where it was going before she made decisions. Still, Gabe called to her sexually as well as emotionally. She didn’t see any faults in him—yet. And she knew everyone had them. Maybe his fault was the broken relationship with Elisha and how it might affect him when the chips were down.
That left her feeling uneasy. Maybe Elisha wouldn’t come over or try to make amends. That would keep things nice and tidy. Anna had too many hunts go south on her, too many missions take an unexpected turn where she had to throw her plans out the window and start all over again as she tracked her enemy.
It would be no different this time, she told herself, wiping off the counter with a wet washcloth. There were enough unknowns on the table right now without this new one. And Elisha was now a huge question mark: enemy or friend? And how would they know? And when would they know? The mother, Roberta, was harmless. She hated weapons of any sort. Sarah Carter had told her Roberta wanted peace, not war. Roberta wished throughout her marriage that her abusive husband would get out of the drug trade, but it never happened, and so she lived with more weapons than any one army needed in a home. She was the peaceful person in the group.
Maybe Elisha was the peaceful one, too? Anna wished she knew more. She washed out the cloth, wrung it, and hung it over the faucet. Hearing several logs being thrown on the fire, she turned, watching Gabe. He was ruggedly handsome no matter what he was wearing. Strictly female curiosity, she wondered just how beautiful he looked when he was naked. She buried that thought because it had no place in their mission.
What would tomorrow bring? Feeling unsettled, she knew her gut was never wrong. Did it involve Elisha? Roberta? Or worse, Kaen, presently the overlord and Darth Vader of the family? Grimacing, she dried her hands on a towel and headed for the door. Today they were going to patch the roof and stop the major leaks before another storm rolled in. At least she’d be working with Gabe, and that lifted her spirits. Anna didn’t ask herself why.
Chapter Six
April 15
Rain fell heavily against the roof as Gabe woke up the next morning at six. Luckily, they beat the bad weather and got both holes in the roof patched yesterday. No more rain inside! It also meant that they’d be working inside, not outside today.
Sleet pinged against the frosted-over window. The empty room, with the exception of his bed and the electric heater that couldn’t keep the place warm, didn’t feel homey at all. Glaring at the cracks between the logs here and there that needed to have new mortar made and applied to close the leaks, Gabe pushed himself out of bed. He took a quick, hot shower, warming himself up, and dressed. Anna had gotten up earlier as evidenced by the damp bath towel hanging nearby, and the welcoming smell of fresh coffee met his nose as he opened the door. Ace was standing expectantly, asking him to please let him outside to do his business. Time to get going.
In no time, they had made breakfast after he had gone out to feed and water their horses. Ace loved having the horses around, going to each stall to smell each horse’s muzzle as a “hello.” Anna wasn’t exactly good at American food and, instead, she’d made huevos rancheros, complete with some tasty, hot salsa on the side. For Ace, she made a four-egg scramble with bacon bits, which he happily slurped down.
Gabe and Anna sat at the table, eating the hearty breakfast along with fresh, hot coffee.
“We got work out in the barn and in the house,” Anna said, wiping her mouth on a paper towel that doubled as a napkin.
“Let’s work inside today,” Gabe suggested. “I want to stuff paper into all those mortar cracks until we can hire a handyman to come out and fill them. In order to do that, the temperature has to be at least over sixty degrees and it’s not going to reach that until maybe early afternoon.”
“I’ll help you,” she said. Anna gazed at the cracked mortar. “Do you have someone in the valley who knows how to fix log mortar like this?”
“Yes,” Gabe said, “his name is Charley Haverman, and I’m calling him today to get him out here to fix it. Mortar needs a certain temperature to set and it doesn’t do well below freezing, so we’ll probably have to deal with this in late May,” he muttered unhappily.
“But it’s warmer in here than outside. Can we have him fill mortar in when it’s above freezing in here, then? At least, it would be a start.”
“I intend to talk to Charley about just that. He’s sixty-five and was raising log cabins in this valley since he was in his late teens. He knows raising and mortar like no one else.” He grinned a little. “He’ll be able to help us out.”
“Mmmm,” she agreed, thinking that they could be nice and warm if they slept together. The thought jarred her. Something was happening between them, almost magical and out of her control, for sure. She’d never been drawn to a man like she was drawn to Gabe. He was all at once intense, focused, and yet, laid back. Maybe being undercover taught him how to be like that, and it earned even more of her respect.
Disgruntled by the errant thought, she went about cleaning up the table after breakfast. They got to work plugging the worst offenders around the house with paper. By nine A.M., Gabe was on the only phone with Charley Haverman, and they settled on a time and day for him to come out and help them with the mortar.
Ace growled and went to the front door, tense and staring at it.
There was a heavy knock at the kitchen door. Ace barked.
Gabe called him to his side while Anna took a quick peek out the curtained kitchen window near it. Shock rooted her to the spot. It was Elisha Elson! He stood in a blue plaid flannel hoodie, his hands stuffed in the pockets, hunched over, dressed in his Levi’s and work boots, making him look like a typical working hand at a ranch. His brown hair was partly hidden by the hoodie. What did he want? Instantly, she moved away from the window.
“Elisha Elson is at the back door,” she whispered. She saw Gabe’s brows rise and then draw into a scowl.
“Let me take this,” he said. “Hang back in the kitchen, but stay alert.” He gave Ace orders to guard Anna as she stepped deeper into the kitchen, her focus on the door.
Anna wasn’t wearing her revolver, and she turned and walked into the nearby pantry, taking out her weapon, which was covered with a terrycloth towel on the third shelf. Gabe watched her as she came and placed the gun beneath a small kitchen towel sitting on the counter, well within reach if they needed that kind of weapon, but out of sight of Elson. Her throat closed momentarily as she watched Gabe draw himself up, as if to shield himself.
Gabe opened the door, meeting his old friend’s gaze. “Elisha.”
“Hey, Gabe, I had heard rumors of you buying this broken-down ole place. I came over to thank you and your lady friend, Anna, for bringing over cookies to my ma yesterday. We got back late last night and she told us about your kindness.�
� He pulled one work-worn hand out of his pocket. “I wanted to come over and say hello and thank her for what she did.”
Internally, Gabe relaxed a little. “Nice to see you again. Want to come in and have a cup of coffee with us? You can thank Anna yourself. Maybe catch up a little?”
“Oh . . .” Elisha said, and turned, looking toward his pickup truck parked out in the driveway. He returned his gaze to Gabe. “I s’pose I could. I was just makin’ a neighborly call to thank her, was all. I don’t mean to intrude or anything. . . .”
“She’s my foreman, Anna Dominguez. Come on in. You can meet her. We were just sitting down for a break. We’ve been stuffing newspaper into cracks between these logs all morning. Colder than hell inside this place.”
Laughing a little, Elisha pushed the hoodie off his head. “Yeah, I know that one. Ma’s been on our backs about callin’ Charley Haverman to do just that.”
Gabe stepped aside.
Anna moved the hidden pistol farther back on the counter, behind the coffeemaker. Ace remained standing at her side, but his focus was on the man coming into the house.
Stepping inside, Gabe closed the door. There was a large hog bristle rug inside, and Elisha wiped his boots meticulously on it.
“Elisha, meet my foreman, Anna,” he said, gesturing toward her in the kitchen.
His dark blue eyes gleamed as he turned, catching sight of her. “Hello, ma’am. I’m your next-door neighbor, Elisha Elson. I just dropped over to thank you for those mighty good-tastin’ cookies you made for my ma yesterday. She was nice enough and left some for me and Kaen. We liked ’em, too.” He stepped forward, his large hand extended in her direction.
Anna smiled slightly and nodded. “You’re welcome, Mr. Elson,” she said, and she shook his hand.
“Shucks, call me Elisha, will you? Ma said you were like a guardian angel dropped into her life. She was very touched by your kindness, ma’am.”
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