“Then, you know about goats?” Cade had thought she was a city girl. He saw the discomfort in her eyes for just a second.
“Oh,” she stammered, walking forward, “it was just something I heard. I had an artist friend who grew up on a farm in the Midwest and he told me about the Angora goats his family raised for the wool.” Would Cade buy that lie? Actually, it wasn’t totally a lie. Her family had a herd of one hundred Angora goats. One of her brothers sheared them twice a year and the wool, which was always in high demand, sold for a lot of money.
Cade stepped aside to let Rachel look at the four nannies straining their necks over the wire fence within the box stall. “Your friend is right. You let a goat loose on your property and everything is fair game. My dad lets these four nannies out after milking.” He glanced at his watch. “Which is about 10:00 a.m. He then releases them into a specially built paddock so they can’t get down on their knees and escape under the rungs.”
Looking at the goats, Rachel felt her terror melt just a little. She walked in and petted the adorable animals who seemed eager for contact. “Oh, they’re so pretty!”
Cade couldn’t tear his gaze away as he watched Rachel pat them on the head, scratch their ears and run her gloved hand down their slender necks. His discomfort escalated since he wanted that kind of attention from her. He felt conflicted by what his heart and body wanted versus the right thing to do. Rachel had a special touch, a special aura around her that he, Jenny and the animals automatically responded to. He was transfixed as her hair fell over her shoulders. When one of the nannies tried to get up on her hind legs and grab a strand, she pulled back out of the way.
“They sure are hungry, aren’t they?” Rachel said, gently pushing the nanny back down so she was on all four feet once more.
“They like your hair,” Cade said, jealous of the goats. He’d touched those strands, threaded his gloved hands through it moments before. He wanted to do it again. His hands itched, and Cade purposely curled them into fists at his side.
Rachel pushed the strands across her shoulders, turned and looked at him. “No kidding!” Again, she saw a frown on Cade’s face. Automatically, her heart shrank in worry. Had her stupid comment set off his warning signals? It was hard to think straight, when his male mouth sent a tremor of longing through her. Even now, her scalp continued to tingle from the snow he’d brushed from her hair. It had been an intimate, unexpected touch. In that moment, Rachel ached to discover him, not as a protective law-enforcement officer or employer, but as a man.
“Come on, let me show you around,” he muttered. “It’s time we got you out of the house and into fresh Wyoming air.” Cade was anxious over the power of his impulses. He couldn’t touch her again. For a moment, he’d seen what he thought was yearning in her eyes as she glanced over at him. Yearning for what?
Once more, Cade placed his hand beneath her elbow as he walked her out of the barn and into the surrounding area of the corrals. Rachel didn’t want to pull away from him. It was as if being near Cade erased all her fears, anxieties and worries about Dirk finding her. And for a moment, Rachel convinced herself that everything was all right, that Cade was interested in her. It was an idealistic thought beneath a daydream. Rachel knew it was only that: a dream. But Cade’s strong, supportive hand on her arm was not. It was real. He was real.
The Grand Tetons rose like sharp, jagged peaks out of the snow-covered plain. Rachel loved looking at them. The snow gleamed on their blue granite slopes, the pine trees below ten thousand feet were a green-and-white mantle about their bases. As they walked to the corral where the four Belgian plow horses stood happily munching on hay, Rachel asked, “Do you ever get tired of looking at the Tetons? As an artist, I find myself wanting to paint them every time I look at them.” How badly Rachel wanted to lean against Cade, but it was wrong. He was her employer.
Keeping her close as they crunched through the little-used path around the Belgian’s pen, Cade said, “I never get tired of it.” Monitoring his support of her elbow, Cade felt himself wanting Rachel on purely a physical basis. For so long, he hadn’t felt the need for intimacy. Abby’s death had snuffed out his life in all respects. The loss of his daughter had traumatized him into numbness. Now, his body was awakening because of Rachel. Or had he transited through the worst of his grief over the loss of his family? Cade was unsure, and tension sizzled through him.
Her elbow tingled with heat. Rachel swallowed nervously. She cast about for anything to talk about. “Do you hike in them?” Their breath looked like miniature clouds around them. The temperature was ten degrees and, luckily, no wind was blowing to make it even colder.
“Yes, quite a bit. My dad is a hunter. I’m not, but he is. I go with him during elk-and moose-hunting season. But when my schedule allows me, I like to hike with my camera.” Cade decided to simply absorb and appreciate Rachel. He couldn’t do anything else, not under the circumstances.
“Ah,” Rachel said, stopping at the metal rail behind which the horses stood, “you shoot with a camera, not a rifle. That’s good.”
Releasing her elbow as if he’d been burned, Cade moved to the pipe railing and leaned against it. He kept plenty of space between them. “Maybe being in law enforcement and carrying a weapon you know can kill someone has taken the edge off my desire to hunt. When I was a kid, I did hunt. But after I had to shoot and kill someone about four years ago, hunting didn’t seem as important to me.”
Rachel heard the pain in Cade’s tone. He leaned his elbows across the pipe rail and watched the horses eat their hay. She walked up to him. “I couldn’t do what you do. I—well, taking a life…any life…it just isn’t something I could do.” His profile was clean and strong. Yet, the corner of his mouth flexed inward. Rachel sensed pain and sadness over taking that life. Reaching out, she placed her gloved hand on his shoulder. “I’m really sorry that had to happen to you, Cade. I can’t imagine what I’d do if I’d been in your shoes.” She shivered.
Quirking his mouth, Cade felt the butterfly touch of her hand, tentative on his shoulder. He twisted a look toward her. “I didn’t want to do it.” And then, the words came tumbling out of his mouth. “He was a local drug dealer in cocaine and knew that the feds had figured it all out. We were working with them and going to pick him up and charge him. I couldn’t believe it when he came out of his house firing that automatic weapon at all of us.” Stunned that he’d talk about something so personal, Cade was angry with himself. Was it her hand on his shoulder? Is that what had caused this avalanche of personal information to come out?
Her fingers tightened on his shoulder. How badly Rachel wanted to step closer, slide her arms around Cade and just hold him. Because right now, that’s exactly what he needed, a little protection from the storm of life and what it had handed him. “How do you know you killed him?”
“I was the one who had walked up to the house,” he muttered, remembering that day too well. Helpless, Cade added, “I don’t know how he missed me, but later the coroner said he was pumped full of cocaine, he couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn the shape he was in.”
Cade hungrily absorbed Rachel’s touch. Two years without a woman’s touch or voice had left him feeling raw and needy. Cade had had plenty of chances to start up a relationship, but no woman had interested him—until now. What was it about Rachel? Her gentleness? That wonderful vulnerability that she couldn’t hide from anyone? Her obvious love and affection for Jenny? Cade didn’t know. He swallowed hard.
“I’m so sorry it happened, Cade. You didn’t deserve that.”
Her soft, trembling voice cut through his sadness. In that moment, Cade saw and felt something else around Rachel as they stood together at the corral. His gut and heart told him something terribly tragic had happened to her. And then, that look in her expression and eyes disappeared. Her hand left his shoulder. “Bad things happen all the time to good people,” he offered gruffly as he searched her soft blue eyes. “In my job, we see that all the time. Even people
who are bad, like this dude was, I didn’t want to shoot him. But I had to or he’d have taken me down. I had no choice.”
Rachel nodded. “I understand, Cade.” More than he would ever know. Giving him a sad smile, she offered, “When bad things like that happen, it makes us appreciate the goodness that life can bring us.”
Without meaning to, Cade reached out and grazed her hair with his glove. “Yes,” was all he managed to choke out. For whatever reason, Cade sensed that Rachel did understand on such a deep, visceral level that it shook him to his core. What was happening to him? To them?
CHAPTER EIGHT
“IT’S ALREADY FEBRUARY fourteenth and law enforcement hasn’t found Dirk yet,” Rachel’s mother Daisy said, her voice despondent.
Sighing, Rachel looked out the large plate-glass window that framed the Grand Tetons. “I know. I can’t believe it. No one has a clue where he is.”
“Are you feeling anxious?” Daisy asked her daughter.
“Of course. What’s worse is I’m with a wonderful family. A family I worry about. What if Dirk finds me? What will he do to them? Half the time I’m thinking of just disappearing one day. But I can’t, because of the baby I’m taking care of. I go through minutes of sheer terror followed by calm logic.”
“I’m getting jumpier by the day myself,” Daisy murmured. “My handler said that Payson could target the farm and your brothers, me or you.”
“Knowing Dirk, he has some dark, devious plan for all of us,” Rachel said, terror eating away at her. It was a warm February day for freezing Wyoming. Gwen had come earlier and told her it was their annual February thaw. Warmer weather would arrive for about a week. Snow and icicles would start to melt. The sun was bright at 1:00 p.m. and the sky a brilliant blue, unlike most days when it was cloudy and gray.
“What does your handler advise? Should you leave? Be on the move more?” Daisy asked.
“She said to stay put. I’m new to this area and few people know me. As a matter of fact, the last couple of months I think I’ve been in town only two times. I’m trying to keep a really low profile here until they can capture him.”
“Hmm, good idea. I don’t have that luxury. I have to go out and do all my running around for myself. The police do drop by and I do have increased security here. It’s good, you have people who can do your errands for you and you can stay in a house. That makes me feel more at ease.”
“Don’t worry about me, Mom.”
“Are you starting your illustrations with your school online yet?”
“Yes, I am. Not only that but I’m rediscovering how much I love being in the country again. About a week ago I was out at the barn and I saw my first moose! It was enormous and looking longingly at the hay inside the corral.”
“Wonderful! I’ve never seen one, but then Iowa doesn’t have them,” Daisy laughed.
Rachel warmed with love for her mother. “I remember.” In her eyes, Daisy Donovan was the epitome of farm values and strength. No matter what had happened in the lives of her brothers and herself, Daisy had been their eye of the hurricane. She was always practical, sensible and had a quiet voice that commanded attention and immediate respect. Her mother had abilities Rachel wished she had.
“I wish so much that they’d let us talk more than once a month for ten minutes, Mom. I really miss you. Especially now.”
“I’m sorry,” Daisy murmured. “I wish I was there to hold you, to tell you it would be all right.”
But it wasn’t all right. Rachel loved her mother fiercely for her desire to try and make her feel better than she did. “I know. I wish you were, too. Why couldn’t we have entered the witness protection program together? That way, we wouldn’t have to suffer this awful separation.”
Daisy chuckled. “Oh, I agree completely! But listen, buck up. I refuse to let that monster ruin the rest of my life. And you should try to get on with yours. He’s going to get caught. I know he will. You hold on to that, Rachel.”
“I’m trying to, Mom.” She looked around the living room. Soft instrumental music floated from the kitchen where she had a small radio on the counter. Rachel liked unobtrusive music when she was cooking, taking care of Jenny, sketching and writing.
She heard the crunching of tires on snow near the house. “Mom, someone is here. I have to go. I’m sorry…”
“Oh, don’t be, honey, I understand. I love you and you’re always in my prayers and heart. Keep your head high and keep your hope alive. Love you. Bye…”
Putting the throwaway cell phone in her pocket, Rachel got up with a frown gathering on her brow. She couldn’t see who had driven in, but the icy crunch of snow beneath the tires couldn’t be ignored. Maybe the propane truck had arrived. The driver came once a month to fill the tanks at the various houses. Walking out of the living room, Rachel went into the kitchen.
“Cade!” she said, surprise in her tone.
Feeling nervous, Cade closed the door behind him. “I was trying to surprise you and you caught me red-handed. I’d thought you would be at the barn or over at my parents’ home.”
Shock bolted through Rachel, but not from fear this time. Cade looked handsome in his sheriff’s uniform of tan slacks and dark green shirt. He wore his pistol and his Kevlar vest beneath his shirt. What got her attention were the dozen red roses he held in his hand along with a box of candy beneath his arm. He appeared unsure.
“Oh, Cade, you shouldn’t have.” Rachel came forward. The past couple of weeks he had been standoffish and she’d seen very little of him.
“It’s…uh…just a small gift for Valentine’s Day,” Cade managed. Somewhere in the past two years he’d lost his social skills. He’d hemmed and hawed over whether to get Rachel a gift at all. Was it proper for an employer to give chocolate on Valentine’s day? Cade didn’t know. His heart, however, had insisted. “I figured you could use a boost. Come February, most people are pretty sick and tired of the cold and snow.” He awkwardly thrust the bouquet of red roses toward her outstretched hand. Their fingers met unexpectedly and he absorbed her warm contact for those brief seconds. The look on Rachel’s face was one of utter surprise mixed with tenderness. She took the roses, buried her nose in them and inhaled deeply.
“This is so nice.” Rachel smiled as she lifted her face from the roses. She saw him put his hands on his hips, frown and take a step back. For the past few weeks, Cade had become a shadow in her life. Then, suddenly, he showed up at lunchtime with flowers and chocolate! She would never understand Cade’s personality.
“Well,” he said, a bit embarrassed, “there’s more.” He pulled out the candy from under his arm. “A little chocolate always makes a person smile. Happy Valentine’s Day…” Cade watched her eyes grow misty for just a second. Then, the tears disappeared. Shuffling his feet, he stared down at his boots.
Rachel held the heart-shaped red velvet box of candy. “You know my Achilles’ heel—chocolate.”
Taking off his coat and hanging it up, Cade decided it would be rude just to turn around and leave. It was lunchtime and he was hungry. Still, he continued to feel jittery over his gifts. “Every time I go to the store for you, there’s always ‘chocolate bar’ written on the list. I think I got the message.” He managed a smile he didn’t feel. Cade felt trapped—by himself. And by his own thumping heart that took off in beat when Rachel looked at him.
Heat swept up her neck and into her face. Rachel couldn’t handle the tender fire burning in his gray eyes. In uniform, he looked dangerous—in a good kind of way. Just seeing Cade at midday like this, unexpectedly, made Rachel’s heart race. “Well, you certainly surprised me.” And then she gave him a helpless look. “I didn’t get anything for you, Cade. Now I feel bad about it.”
Cade shook his head and walked to the counter. Bending down, he retrieved a glass vase from one of the cupboards. “Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t sure I could pull this off today, anyway,” he groused, closing up. “We’ve had so many calls this morning, I didn’t think I would get an ho
ur off, but at the last minute, it happened.”
Turning, Cade didn’t know what to do next. The thought struck him that the roses would need to be put in water. He took the vase, filled it with water and set it on the counter. Rachel came over and began to cut the stem of each rose. He leaned against the counter and watched her put the roses into the vase. The redness staining Rachel’s cheeks only enhanced her beauty. Her hands were graceful and spoke eloquently of her vulnerability and artistic talent. There wasn’t anything to dislike about Rachel, he had discovered in the past two months. His house was now a home. She lived with him and Jenny. And the baby had bonded completely to Rachel, like mother and daughter. Happiness thrummed through Cade. It was a feeling he’d thought he’d never experience again. Ever. And he wanted to kiss her. Right now. Here.
Stunned by his need, Cade needed to divert himself. He asked, “How’s the little one?”
“Oh, she’s fine.” Rachel looked up at the clock above the sink. “In about forty-five minutes she’ll be awake and fussing for her goat’s milk.” Cade’s nearness intoxicated her. Rachel tried to still her beating heart. He was so near. So masculine. Even though he was gruff once more, Rachel now realized that beneath that hardened, rough exterior was a man with a heart of gold. He appeared restless, his gaze moving around the room. He shifted his stance, as if wanting to run away once more. Rachel gave up on trying to figure him out.
“Right on schedule,” Cade said, furtively looking around. “I’ve got about fifteen minutes before I have to go back on duty. Think I’ll make myself a grilled cheese sandwich. Have you eaten yet?” He needed to move away from her. Rachel was too close. Too available. Getting his hands busy on something else other than touching her was what he needed right now.
“No…not yet,” Rachel said, putting the roses and vase on the kitchen table. “If you’re making yourself one, I’ll have one, too.” She was pleased with his offer. This was a new side to Cade: the man in the kitchen. Another surprise: he knew how to cook.
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