Wyoming Cowboy Protection

by Nicole Helm

  “And Seth.”

  Vanessa’s eyebrow winged up as she went back to searching the trees. “How’s that going to work?”

  “I don’t know. I’m taking ideas.” Addie sighed and stood to her full height. “Here’s the next.”

  A huffing sound caught both women’s attention and they looked toward it. Addie nearly cried from relief as Vanessa ran the few yards to Annabelle.

  “There you are, sweetheart,” Vanessa offered to the horse, running a hand over her mane. “I bet you’re cold. Let’s get you home, yeah?”

  Addie approached as Vanessa pulled some feed out of the saddlebag and fed it to Annabelle by hand. Vanessa looked at her and Seth and then pressed her lips together.

  “This is going to be tough and slow going. We’re going to have to do this bareback so we all fit, and go slow so Seth is safe.”

  Addie swallowed at the lump in her throat. “Do you think we’ll make it?”

  “We won’t know until we try. Once we get somewhere warm, we’ll figure out a way to make it look like Seth’s... Well.”

  Addie didn’t like to say it, either, even if it was just a ruse they were planning. It felt too possible, too real, especially on the run from Peter.

  “The dark is going to be a problem,” Vanessa said flatly. “I could maneuver Bent blindfolded and turned around, but these forests and mountains? It’s another story.”

  “Can’t we make our way to the road?” Addie asked as Vanessa unbuckled the saddle and dropped it to the ground.

  “Noah thinks Peter has men on the road. Any ideas on where to hide the saddle? If we’re trying to hide the fact more than just me and Seth escaped, we can’t leave this lying around.”

  “We’ll bury it,” Addie said resolutely.

  “It’ll take time.”

  “I think it’s time we have.” She had to hope it was time they had. As long as Peter wasn’t after them, they had to do everything they could to hide the fact that she was still alive. “We could use it maybe. Make it look like the horse threw you and Seth and the saddle. A horrible, bloody accident. Then we see if Laurel can get someone at the hospital to forge records or something.”

  “Far-fetched. A horse couldn’t throw a saddle, and that’s only for starters.”

  “Peter wouldn’t know that. He’d see a saddle and blood and then we’ll leave the horse’s prints and go straight for town. Get someone, anyone, to drive us to the hospital and see what we can fabricate from there.”

  Vanessa considered. “We’ll need blood.”

  Addie shifted Seth onto her hip, then pulled the sheathed knife out of the back of her pants.

  Vanessa swore under her breath. “You aren’t really going to cut yourself open for this, are you?”

  “Better me doing the cutting than Peter.” Addie grimaced at the thought. “Well, you might have to do the cutting.”

  Vanessa swore again. “I don’t know how you got into this mess, Addie, but boy do you owe me once we’re through it.”

  “Then let’s get through it.” With that, Addie set about to create quite the fictional scene.

  * * *

  NOAH WANTED TO give Addie and Vanessa as much time as possible to get a head start before he engaged with Peter and his men, but the longer Ty stayed in there at the mercy of a mobster, the less chance his mouthy brother had of escaping unscathed.

  When Noah had returned to the door after watching Vanessa, Addie and Seth disappear into the woods, it had been closed so there was no hope of overhearing more. Maybe he could sneak down the road and try to pick off Peter’s men? Then there’d be no one to come running if he and Ty overpowered Peter.

  But the problem remained: he couldn’t see inside the cabin. He had no idea what weapons Peter had or what he might have already done to Ty.

  And how much longer did he give Addie and Seth and Vanessa before he stepped in and helped his brother?

  He frowned at a faint noise. Something like horse hooves off in the far distance. Couldn’t be Addie and Vanessa, because the sound was more than one horse. Could they have reached help already?

  Noah stayed where he was, scrunched into a little crevice in the outside logs of the cabin that gave him some cover. A horse came into view, but it wasn’t anyone Noah recognized, which meant it had to be one of Peter’s men.

  How the hell did he get a horse? Noah seriously considered shooting the stranger, but he stopped himself. He didn’t know what Peter was doing to Ty in that cabin, and he couldn’t risk his brother’s life.

  The man dismounted stiffly if adeptly. Almost as though he’d been given rote instruction on horseback riding but hadn’t had much practice. He went straight for the snowmobile, far too close to Noah for any kind of comfort.

  But the man didn’t look his direction. He tried to start the vehicle and was met with silence. He swore ripely, then pulled a walkie-talkie out of his coat pocket.

  “Snowmobile’s been tampered with,” the man said flatly into the radio.

  Static echoed through the yard and Noah tried to think of some way to incapacitate the man without making sound.

  “Leave it. Search the woods on horseback. Someone has my kid and is trying to get to Bent. We can’t let them.” It was Peter’s voice, Noah was fairly sure.

  Noah didn’t have time to worry anymore. He had to act. As silently as he could, he pulled his rifle out of the back case. He couldn’t risk shooting the man and having anyone hear the gunshot, so he’d have to use it as a different kind of weapon.

  He took a step out of his little alcove, and the man was too busy fiddling with the snowmobile to notice. Another step, holding his breath, slowly raising the rifle to be used as a bludgeon.

  Without warning, the man whirled, his hand immediately going for the gun he wore on his side. Noah had been prepared for the sudden movement, though, and used the rifle to smack the gun out of the man’s hand before he could raise it to shoot. Noah leaped forward and hit the butt of the weapon against the man’s skull as hard as he could.

  The man fell to his feet, groaning and grasping the ground—either for his own weapon or to push himself up, but Noah pressed his boot to the back of the man’s neck. The man gurgled in pain.

  Before Noah could think what to do next, the front door was flung open and Noah raised his rifle, finger on the trigger, a second away from shooting.

  But Ty was the one who emerged, and immediately hit the deck upon seeing Noah’s rifle.

  “Help me out here,” Noah ordered.

  “Thought I was going to die at my own brother’s hand,” Ty muttered, and it was only as he struggled to get to his feet that Noah realized he was tied up.

  “What the hell is going on?”

  “Oh, that idiot burst in and I let him think he had the upper hand so Van could get the kid away. He tied me up. Yapped at me till I thought I was going to die of boredom, but he was searching the house the entire time.”

  “Where’s he now?” Noah asked, pushing his boot harder against the squirming man’s neck.

  “He found the passageway,” Ty muttered disgustedly. “Smarter than he seems. He’s got radio contact with his men. Somehow they got horses. Can’t imagine they know how to ride them, but the idea was to start searching the tree perimeter. He’s got some fancy GPS and all sorts of crap. They’re out there, looking for them.”

  “Get over here.”

  Ty complied. When the gasping man on the ground grasped for his leg, Ty kicked him in the side.

  Noah retrieved his Swiss Army knife, then used it to cut the zip ties that were keeping Ty’s hands together and behind his back.

  “Managed to get out of the ones around my feet, but the hands were a bit harder.”

  “Thought Army Rangers could escape anything.”

  “I’d have done it eventually. But I heard a commotion. Figured I didn
’t have much time. Luckily it was just you.”

  “And Peter is out there.”

  “Van’ll keep Addie safe.”

  Noah glanced down at the man, who was still struggling weakly against his boot. “Addie’s dead,” Noah said flatly.

  “What?” Ty demanded on an exhale.

  Noah brought a finger to his lips, mimed being quiet, and his brother seemed to catch on. “Peter set a fire on the property. She died in it.”

  “Then he’ll pay,” Ty said, his voice nothing but acid, which Noah wasn’t even sure was all for show.

  “Yes, he will. Get me something to tie this garbage up with.”

  Ty nodded and disappeared back inside. He returned with some cords. “These will have to do.”

  They worked together to tie the man’s hands and legs together around an old flagpole in the front yard. He fought them, but weakly, and in just a few minutes he was tightly secured to the pole.

  Noah moved to the back of the cabin, searching the perimeter for any signs of Peter or his men. Peter had left tracks from the back of the cabin to the trees, so that was something.

  “We’re outnumbered,” Ty said from behind Noah. He slid the other man’s gun into his coat pocket. “We’ve got one horse and no vehicle. How are we going to catch this guy?”

  Noah looked around at the trees and the mountains as shadowy sentries in the dark. The moon shone above, bright and promising. The night was frigid, but he and Ty had survived worse. “Wyoming is how we’re going to catch this guy.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Addie’s arm burned where she’d had Vanessa cut it. Without warning or discussion, Vanessa had subsequently made a rather nasty-looking cut on her own arm.

  “Sure hope we can get a tetanus shot or something at the hospital,” Vanessa had muttered before grabbing a handful of snow and mixing it with the blood.

  Seth was pretending to ride the saddle that they’d placed in the snow as Addie and Vanessa worked to make two arm cuts look like enough blood to have been blunt force trauma to the head. Once they’d done as much as they could and were teeth-shatteringly cold, they bandaged each other up with the first aid kit that had been in Annabelle’s pack.

  Addie shot Seth worried glances as they did all this, because despite the layers he was wearing, the snow would make him wet and it was nightfall. The temperature had been dropping steadily, seemingly every minute.

  Vanessa used her weakened flashlight to survey their supposed accident scene. It didn’t look nearly as gruesome as Addie had hoped, even in the mix of silvery moonlight filtering through the trees and faded yellow glow of a too-small flashlight. “How will they even see it?”

  “I imagine they’re a little better equipped than we are. High-powered flashlights, headlights if they can get that snowmobile out here. Besides, they might not even be after us yet. Maybe they won’t start looking till daylight.”

  “True.” But if that was the case, they might not see it at all, and all this work for nothing. She shook her head. She couldn’t think like that. As long as they got to safety without Peter knowing she was alive, they’d succeeded. The rest of the plan could still work.

  She scooped Seth off the saddle, much to his dismay. He began to kick and scream. “He needs food. A diaper change.”

  Vanessa nodded, then moved the faint glow of her flashlight to Annabelle. “Let’s get going, then. I think we’ve done the best we can.”

  It was some doing getting back on the horse without a saddle and getting Seth situated between them, but eventually they were on their way. Seth fussed and fidgeted, small mewling cries in the middle of a dark forest.

  But moonlight led their way, and Addie focused on the hope. She didn’t allow herself to consider if Noah and Ty were okay, if Peter knew what was going on. She didn’t think about the future any further than them reaching Bent without problem.

  Seth was beginning to doze, something about the rocking motion of the horse soothing him enough to be taken over by sleep. Addie was feeling a little droopy herself, but holding on to Vanessa and Seth between them kept her from nodding off.

  Addie wasn’t sure how long they trotted through the freezing cold night. The wind was frigid and rattled the trees. The moon shone high and bright and yet gave off no warmth and very little hope.

  Seth finally went totally limp in her arms, asleep despite all the danger around them—from people and from the elements. Every once in a while Addie thought it’d be simpler to just lie in the snow and sleep. She was so tired—exhausted physically, tired of fighting a man who’d never give up.

  Then Vanessa slowed the horse on a quiet murmur.

  “Are we there?”

  Vanessa shook her head. “I hear something,” she said quietly. Moonlight glinted her dark hair silver, but the dark shrouded her face so Addie couldn’t read her expression.

  Then Addie heard it, too, and they both winced as a beam of light glanced over the trees. Faint, far in the distance, but coming for them.

  “Maybe it’s Noah,” Addie whispered.

  “Not with that kind of light.”

  Which Addie knew, but she’d just wanted something to hope for. But what would false hope get her? Dead probably. All of them dead. “Let me off. Take Seth. I’ll create a diversion.”

  “No.”

  “It’s the only way. They’ll catch us, and I can’t let Peter ever get his hands on Seth. I just can’t.”

  “He’s supposed to think you’re dead.”

  “Then it’ll be even more of a diversion when I’m not. I can’t control the horse, Vanessa, and even if I could you have a much better chance of finding Bent than I do. Let me off. I’ll scream bloody murder while you ride fast as you can to town.”

  “They’ll kill you, Addie.”

  “Maybe.” She’d made her peace with that in the burning building. She would die for Seth. She had to be willing. “Seth is the most important thing. That was an agreement Noah and I made when we came back here. Peter doesn’t care much whether I live or die. I’m a game for him, but he does want Seth or at least convinced himself he does if only to punish me. So we do everything not to give him what he wants. I’ll scream—you ride toward town. I’ll lead them back to our little scene saying Seth is dead. If I don’t make it, I trust you Carsons will make sure Seth is safe.”

  “Addie...”

  But she could tell Vanessa was relenting, so she shifted Seth until she could push him forward into Vanessa’s lap. Seth began to whimper and Addie awkwardly slid off the horse. “There’s no time. They can’t hear him crying. Go. Fast. As fast as you can.”

  “Cut the little bastard open with that knife of yours. Do whatever you have to do to stay alive. I’ll send all the help here the minute I get to town.”

  “Just go,” Addie said. “Keep my baby safe.”

  Vanessa hesitated. “I’m going to keep Annabelle walking slow and quiet until I hear you scream. Then we’ll gallop. Scream as loud and long as you can and hopefully they won’t hear me. If you see any split off and come after me, scream ‘bear.’ It might be enough of a distraction to give me a leg up.”

  “Okay,” Addie agreed. The thought of one of Peter’s men breaking off and going after Vanessa scared her to her bones, but splitting up was the best way. The only way. She’d wail and scream and pretend Seth was already dead and pray to God it didn’t turn out to be true.

  Vanessa urged Annabelle into motion, a quiet walk the opposite direction of the murmuring noise and moving lights. They were definitely closer, but a ways off.

  Addie started to walk toward them. Her heart beat hard in her chest, and fear and cold made it hard to move through the snow, but she marched forward. Closer and closer until the swath of light started to hit her.

  Then she began to scream.

  * * *

  NOAH WAS TIRED of the woun
d on his side holding him back, and yet he couldn’t seem to push himself or the horse beneath them harder than he already was. He had no idea where Peter’s man had gotten this horse, but it wasn’t as adept as his horses back at the ranch.

  The snow was deep and the air frigid cold, and while he’d been used to cold his whole life, something about the fear of losing the people he loved made it heavier, harder.

  Or was that the gunshot wound to his side that he may or may not have accidentally ripped the stitches out of?

  He didn’t mention that to Ty. He didn’t mention anything to Ty as they rode on, following the trail of Peter’s men.

  “Don’t know where this horse came from, but it’s not used to this kind of weather or terrain,” Ty said grimly.

  “Maybe not, but we’ve covered more ground than we would’ve on foot.” Noah surveyed the tracks in front of them. Peter’s tracks converged with two pairs of horse’s tracks not too far from the cabin. They’d been following the horse tracks back down toward the road, but then the tracks abruptly turned back into the trees toward the mountains.

  “You think these idiots have any idea what they’re doing?” Ty asked disgustedly.

  “Doesn’t look like it. Doesn’t mean they’re not dangerous.”

  “True enough.”

  Out of nowhere, causing both Noah and Ty to flinch in surprise, a bloodcurdling scream ripped through the night.

  They didn’t even exchange a glance before they leaned forward in tandem on the horse, urging it to move toward the scream as fast as it could. The horse might not have been experienced or used to the terrain, but it seemed to understand panic.

  There was moonlight, but far in the distance an unnatural light moving around as well. And the scream. It just kept going, with only minimal pauses for the screamer to breathe.

  He tried not to think about who the screamer was, though there were only two possibilities, and he knew it wasn’t Vanessa. But he couldn’t allow himself to ponder what Addie might be screaming about, or why.

  He only had to get to her. To the screaming, whoever it might be and for whatever reason.