by Tina Leonard
Cord stared at him.
"My house? Not Tessa's?"
"Possibly both. But since you've had one visit"
"They might hang around. To watch me." Cord hadn't thought about that. All he'd known
was that his ranch was safer than Tessa's small house. He had guns; he had a running vehicle. As long as he kept Tessa with him, he could protect her from any possible danger. He never dreamed he might be putting her in danger.
"When will we know something? When will this be over?"
The colonel shook his head.
"At this time, I've confirmed all I really can in order not to compromise any ongoing operation." There was a flash of guarded sympathy in his eyes. "Your position is difficult, but we can't put anyone at risk."
He meant Hunt.
"I understand," Tessa said suddenly. "I appreciate your time in coming out here."
The man nodded.
"I was hoping to alleviate your concerns. I would suggest you have your local law enforcement officers run a periodic patrol through the area. If you are under surveillance, extra personnel may be a deterrent."
"Thank you so much," Cord said sarcastically. "Your assistance has been invaluable."
John nodded, seeming to understand his frustration.
"We'll be in contact." He stepped out the door and went to his car before glancing back at Tessa.
"John," Tessa suddenly called, startling Cord. He had nothing further to say to anyone in the military until they told him more than they already had.
Tessa joined the colonel at the car, speaking briefly to him, her hand touching her stomach. The man nodded once before sliding behind the wheel and driving away.
"Do you mind telling me what you said to him?" Cord asked when she had carefully traversed the icy patches to his side.
"I simply said I didn't want Hunt to know about the baby." She stared up at him.
He gently caught her arm as she moved to walk past him.
"Why not? I think Hunt should know. He'd be upset if he"
"It's my baby, Cord Greer," she snapped. "I don't want Hunt knowing about the baby. Not while he's missing. Not while he's obviously involved in something that has the military
operating under caution. Did you ever stop to think that if Hunt found out, he might try to come home? He might try to contact me? That could put him at risk. Worse, it could put my baby at risk. And that is something I will not do."
She was determined on this issue - and he unwillingly forced himself to admit that she was right.
"I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."
She rubbed one hand wearily over her forehead. “I know you weren't. It's hard to think straight. I just don't want Hunt's attention divided. He wouldn't have left me in Madrid if there hadn't been a compelling reason."
Cord agreed with that statement. Hunt cared for Tessa. The hardest admission Cord had ever been compelled to make to himself was that he badly wanted his brother to come home safely - despite the fact that he was in love with his brother's girlfriend.
Desperately. He wanted her so much he ached with it. He was a selfish man.
He turned away. Somehow he made himself climb the steps and go into the house. He went to his bedroom and closed the door behind him.
Silently, he sat on the mahogany bed, which had been devoid of female companionship for a very long time. He looked at the pictures of his parents and the pictures of Hunt, sitting in wooden frames on his bureau. Bowing his head, he shut his eyes. And prayed for strength.
Tessa knew she had hurt Cord's feelings. She had been sharper with him than she should have been, but her emotions were raw, twisted with fear. The colonel's visit hadn't exactly been calming. She felt more alarmed than ever about the danger Hunt might be in, the danger she might be in, and worse, the danger there might be to her baby. For the past two nights, she'd had horrible nightmares - ever since Cord had brought her to his house. She wanted her baby to be safe. There was enough to worry about with a pregnancy; the added factor of fear was slicing into her subconscious.
It all had to end soon. The uncertainty was making her tense and edgy. None of this could be healthy for her baby.
"Drat that dog," she murmured. The dog at least had given her some comfort. Cord certainly did not. The underlying currents they felt around each other were electrifying her nerves to the point she felt she couldn't breathe when he was in the room. Ellie gave her something to hold on to that was soft and gentle.
Now she would worry all night about owls looking for prey, and her little puppy being frightened in the dark, cold woods. No matter that Cord had happy memories of the forest, and that Nan tromped through them enjoying the flora and fauna. Tessa would not be brave enough to stay out there alone. Surely her pup would find its way home soon.
She prayed for the same with Hunt, if for nothing more than to know he was safe. For the sake of her baby. For all their sakes.
Something in the silence awakened Tessa in the middle of the night. Her eyes snapped open, staring upward in the darkness, her body suddenly on alert, her ears straining to hear. It was so still in her room that she could easily hear the slightest sound, yet it was eerily quiet. Too quiet.
She got out of bed, then slowly moved the curtain back from the window beside it. She opened the miniblinds and peered outside, but there was little to see in the darkness. Too dark.
Her scalp prickling, she reached over the bed to switch on the lamp.
Once the room was illuminated with the cheery light, she breathed a little more easily. Still, she knew she wouldn't be able to fall asleep again, so she put on her robe and went down the hall. If the puppy had returned and was somewhere outside. Tessa's heart beat with
hope. She sure hoped Nan's gift wasn't gone for good; she felt very guilty about its
disappearance.
Glancing in the den, she saw that the recliner was empty.
Cord's bedroom door was closed, so he'd apparently slept in there.
Tessa gave a sigh of relief. She didn't want him suffering sleep deprivation because of her.
But maybe Cord wasn't asleep. It would be safer if he went with her.
He would understand that she needed to give her puppy one last chance to come home; surviving the night would be nearly impossible for the dog. Quietly, she tapped on his door.
"Cord? Are you awake?" There was no answer. Tessa held her breath and opened it a crack.
"Cord?"
He lay sprawled across the bed as if he'd fallen like a tree onto the sheets. The bed was big to accommodate a big man.
Undressed, wearing only boxer shorts, he looked even bigger. He was stretched out flat, his arms flung up over the pillow as he slept on his stomach, either in utter relaxation or exhaustion. She hadn't realized how strongly built he was. Every muscle in his body visible to the naked eye ran long and true and toned.
She swallowed, her eyes caught by the fitness of the man. She forced herself to close the bedroom door.
There was no way she could awaken him. He needed the rest.
The truth was, she hadn't been prepared to see Cord nearly nude and breathstealingly sexy. The only man she'd ever seen naked was Hunt, and he was not as tall as Cord, and more slightly built.
What she'd seen overwhelmed her senses. Such a big man and yet he was so gentle with her. It made her heart pound with images and fantasies she knew she shouldn't allow herself to even think. Tessa slowly, quietly, opened the front door and flipped on the porch light.
She didn't hear a whimper or a bark. Easing the door open farther, Tessa poked out her head to peer across the porch.
Snow. Deep snow had built up around the porch, powdering the gravel driveway and the yard in white. Thunder rumbled and Tessa jumped, not anticipating the far-off noise. Nan had been right; the storm was coming in tonight.
Her little Ellie was shivering in those woods. Tessa couldn't stand the thought. A coyote howled its lonesome cry in the distance, sending goose pimples over Tessa. She c
losed the door, then hurried to put her boots and jeans on under her gown, tossed her robe on the bed and looped her gown into her jeans as she pulled on her coat. Quietly, she slipped past Cord's bedroom door. The all-weather flashlight attached to the kitchen wall had a nice wide path of illumination, so she took that with her. Making certain the front door didn't even whisper as it opened, she went out.
She could face the forest; she would only go to the edge where there was nothing to hurt her. Even the coyote that howled occasionally was too far away.
Fifty feet from the house, crunching on snow that seemed to blow from the sky ever faster, she whistled.
"Ellie! Come on, girl!"
Salvador's eyes flew open as he heard the urgent voice calling in the night. He'd just fallen asleep next to Rossi, after they'd both smoked cigarettes to give them an illusion of warmth. They had not counted on the cold of this hellish place, bone-deep and biting. Snow was
building up on the roof of the tree house, and though it was built securely, much more than a simple plank structure between two trees, it was not insulated. Still, the conditions were nothing to deter two men with a mission of honor.
"Ellie!" the cry came again.
Rossi was slower to awaken, the puppy inside his jacket keeping him a bit warmer. But at the next cry, he came wide awake.
"The golden woman."
"Yes." Salvador listened, his heart pounding. They could take her to the vehicle by the creek in the woods before she could cry for help.
They would abandon the vehicle at the airport. Waiting for a flight would be trickier if she was fighting, but Rossi would make certain she didn't give them trouble. It could all be over much faster than planned, and so much easier under cover of darkness.
"Come on," he whispered.
Rossi began silently packing the small duffel bag. Like panthers, they waited motionless as the voice came to the edge of the woods.
The woman called again. Without any warning, the puppy scrambled wildly inside Rossi's jacket as he bent to put his cigarette pack in the duffel. With a sharp bark, the puppy vaulted from the jacket, her feet scrambling for purchase on the boards. She found it, suddenly leaping forward off the edge. Salvador and Rossi both grabbed for the dog but caught air. She cried out when she crashed to the ground, then they could hear her little paws running as she stirred up fallen leaves and debris in the snow.
"Caramba!" Salvador swore under his breath. He couldn't believe their bait had gotten away.
"Caramba! " Rossi put a knife between his teeth and climbed over the edge of the tree house. Salvador knew he was going after the girl.
Hidden by the night, they had their best shot at her, whether the dog made it to its mistress or not. If necessary, the dog could be silenced.
Salvador grabbed a length of rope from the duffel and followed his comrade.
"You silly girl!" Tessa cooed with delight, snatching up the puppy as it raced toward her.
"You scared me half to death, disappearing like that!"
She snuggled Ellie to her, enjoying the feel of the puppy's fur – until she caught the scent of cigarette smoke. Alarmed, she pulled the dog away from her face to look at it. Ellie was warm, not cold and shivering as she imagined she would be. Puzzled, she stared into the
dog's brown eyes.
"Where have you been, young lady?"
"Tessa!"
The harsh call of her name whipped Tessa around to face Cord stomping through the snow toward her. He had the long rifle, carried at an angle to the ground.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"I came out to find Ellie," she said defensively. "Nan says there's a real bad snowstorm coming tonight, and I couldn't sleep thinking about her out here."
He practically growled down at the puppy in Tessa's arms as he drew near.
"I'm not going to tell you that no animal is worth traipsing out after in the darkness. I'm not even going to ask you why your field trip couldn't wait until morning."
"Then don't!" She tucked the puppy to her chest. "Something woke me up. I guess I couldn't sleep too well thinking about her. She doesn't like her paws to be wet and cold."
"I don't like my feet to be wet and cold, either, but I didn't get myself lost in the woods. A dog is not worth endangering yourself over."
"I wasn't in any danger." Tessa drew herself up, marching past the frowning rancher.
"I'm taking Ellie inside before she gets cold."
"She ought to have had better sense than to run off," Cord grumbled, following along after a brief, wary glance at the forest. "She'll feel like a lump of wet ice in your bed."
"She's all warm and toasty, thank you very much."
"How did she get so lucky?"
"I don't know." Tessa kept walking, refusing to slow down until they reached the house.
"She must have found a place to lie in a tree stump or woodpile, because she smells kind of funny. Maybe she was in a burned-out log or something. Or my nose is so cold I'm not able to smell very well."
They walked inside, and he leaned the rifle against the wall and locked the door, dead-bolting it. She handed the puppy to Cord, who took it unwillingly while Tessa pulled off her coat and hung it up on the peg beside the door. Tiny snowflakes dusted her hair and droplets of moisture glistened in her eyelashes.
Cord thought Tessa looked sexy as hell without the elaborate hairdo Nan had done for her earlier. Her face was clean, her lips bare and her cheeks just the slightest bit red from the cold. Her nose was running a little. It didn't matter. He wanted nothing more than to take her to his bed and warm her up, hold her close to him and keep her safe.
"The damn dog's name should be Refugee," he said instead, handing it back before shrugging out of his jacket to hang it next to Tessa's. "Could you get me the next time you decide to take a midnight jaunt?"
"I didn't want to wake you, Cord. I knocked on your door, but..."
She stared up at him, and all his anger melted away as he looked into her eyes. He didn't think he'd slept anyway, his ears attuned to the slightest sounds. He'd heard her calling the damn dog over the return of the late-night talk show he'd left on in his bedroom.
"I wasn't sleeping."
"You were. Cord." Her eyelashes lowered for a split second.
“I did open your door in case you were awake. You were sound asleep. And you need the rest. "
Though her gaze held nothing but honest emotion, his heart stirred in his chest at her words. Strangely, he found he liked her concern for him. It was different from Nan's concern, which was grandmotherly.
Tessa's worry for him brought desire flooding into him - and regret that her words only conveyed simple, friendly compassion.
"I'm fine." He turned to go down the hall.
"Did you notice that she smelled smoky?"
He frowned, reluctantly leaning over to take a whiff of the puppy. All he could smell was the fresh soap fragrance that clung to Tessa after she showered, which she'd done before she went to bed. Being so close that he could catch her scent did nothing to increase the possibility that he might get to sleep any time soon.
"She smells like a dog to me."
But she didn't. A dog that had been outside in the cold and wet would be shivering and smell dank. Ellie had very little moisture clinging to her coat.
Slowly, he took the puppy from its mistress, eyeing it as he cupped it in his big hands.
"Where have you been?"
Ellie yawned, showing a pink tongue as she disregarded his question.
"Your mother was worried about you. Don't go running off again." He put Ellie back under his nose for a more careful inspection. "I don't know. She does smell kind of smoky. Like you said, maybe she did find a burned-out log." The scent bothered him, but there was no logical explanation for it, and he didn't want Tessa worrying.
"You know. Nan smokes. Perhaps the smell clung to Ellie's fur from Nan's holding her, and we're just now noticing the smell because we're outdoors."
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Tessa reclaimed her pup from him with a smile.
"Everything does smell so crisp out here. Anyway, I'm glad you're back," she said, nuzzling the dog to her nose. "I'm sure going to sleep better." She gave Cord a look completely devoid of sexual innuendo.
"Thanks for worrying about us, but we're staying in our room for the night now. No more field trips."
Salvador watched from the stand of trees rapidly being coated with snow. The rancher took the woman inside the house with him, closing the door. Adrenaline curdled in Salvador's veins.
"Tonight we are not lucky. Tomorrow, maybe we are," Rossi comforted.
"Maybe." Salvador hungered for the right moment.
"Come on. I am going to find a place to stay."
"We cannot leave!"
Rossi blinked in the worsening storm, the blowing snow blinding. "We must, if we are not to die on this mission. There is a motel in town where we can stay until this passes. "
"Our car will be seen."
Rossi shrugged and turned into the woods.
"On a night like tonight, no one cares. Come on."
Salvador didn't like it, but as always, Rossi was right.
There was no reason to die of cold although Salvador's burning will would keep him alive. But Rossi wasn't blinded by the agony searing Salvador's vision. Cold reason settled into Salvador's anguished mind.
There would be another time. Soon.
Chapter Six
The snow didn't keep the customers from filling the beauty salon to overflowing the next morning. The road crews had been out, so it wasn't difficult for Tessa to drive Nan to work even though Cord had insisted he take Tessa over to Nan's in his truck. Then he'd salted
Nan's driveway so it would be safer to the main road. Ushering both women into Nan's car, Cord had driven them to the end of the driveway, then allowed Tessa to have the driver's seat. He had walked back up the driveway to his truck after telling her to take it easy.
She felt warmed by his regard for her and for Nan. Her mind occupied with that thought, Tessa was unprepared for the door swinging open with the last person on earth she wanted to see. Her heart dropped into her stomach as her mother, wild-haired and wilder-eyed, marched into the Beautiful Woman salon. With customers wanting to be gorgeous for