Jake reached for the car door as a second thought struck him just as powerfully as the relief. She didn’t like him, and without seeing his good looks and raw physical presence, she never would. Jake tossed the errant thought away and climbed out of the car. Who cares? he thought indignantly. There were plenty of women who would be more than happy to see him for who he was.
Maybe I just see through the masks people use to hide who they really are.
Her words to him that night in Mcgoo’s rang in his mind as he walked to the stables slowly. “Maybe if you were the man you are trying to convince everyone you are, I wouldn’t have to see anything at all.” Jake felt the sting of those words as if she were slapping him with them right now, the jagged tips of every one like a flogging in his heart. What did she see? Who showed up in her mind when she heard his voice, but couldn’t see his face? Jake thought back over his words, his abruptness with her, his comments about Natalie, and the way she had become more and more mistrustful in his arms as they danced.
She was misunderstanding; she could only hear and get the wrong impression. That guy who showed up at Mcgoo’s was empty and sweet, charming and stealthy. Casanova. The actor. Cassie knew Jake Caswell the Hollywood heartthrob, but she had never seen him. Jake stopped suddenly in the dimming light of the sunset.
They all knew Jake Caswell the actor. That was why the women cared nothing about anything but the way he looked. He didn’t have to show anyone else more than that, and he didn’t want to. Had she been right about him? Had she seen the man he was showing her, and without his looks that guy was a snake? Jake leaned against the doorway to the stables feeling tightness in his chest that made it difficult to breathe. Was that who he had become? Casanova?
• • •
Jake lost himself in the farm, the mustangs, and the women. Sustaining this complex juggling act kept his mind from sinking into deeper thought. In the weeks since Heidi’s revelation about Cassie, Jake found it took more energy than he had to avoid thinking about her and observing her every move. He noticed now the way she held out her hand to meet obstacles, the lift of her nose into the air when a slight breeze would blow, the tilt of her head toward a sound too quiet for most ears. The slight signs that gave away her disability had seemed quirky habits before. They were survival skills, he saw that now. And he wondered how he had ever missed them.
July was excruciatingly hot in the desert. The hard work and the distractions were loosening their grip on his mind, and a part of him thought he should go face Cassie again, but his pride over her rejection, and his stupidity about her blindness kept him trapped on the farm.
His father was growing annoyed with his restlessness and put him to work with the horses for distraction. The sleek black Arabian, Starlight, had been given to Caswell Farms when Miriam had gleaned her herd three years ago. The horse was a beauty, but her canter was far too spirited for therapeutic purposes, and The Rocking J had not had the resources to keep her. Now his father’s roan stallion, Ruiando, had taken possession of her, and Jake was going to need to move him and the other mares into the outer corrals before Starlight laid down to birth their colt. He admired her power and beauty and wondered what would be the result of foaling her with Deseo. The prospect of her spirit and Deseo’s sheer power intrigued him.
Jake’s lack of focus with the cattle was costing him, though. His father had hired Carter part-time, and Jake found himself in infuriating confrontations with the guy daily. As the wave of angry heat rolled from the barn that day, Jake was finished. Finished placating Carter’s mean streak, and finished trying to understand the guy’s attitude.
“You take the roan out to the paddock.” Carter snarled, his hands in fists and a sneer disfiguring his face. “I’ll stay with Starlight.”
“I don’t have time to argue with you about this. Just take the horses out.”
“I don’t take orders from you, Casanova, and I’ll do what I want … or whoever I want to. I’m surprised your little friend didn’t tell you that.”
Jake removed the halters and bridles from the wall and brought them back to Carter. “I have no idea what your problem is, or what you’re talking about. Take the horses; the filly is fragile, and I’m staying with her.”
Carter threw the bundle of gear to the dirt floor, kicking them back at Jake. “I’m good with fillies. Especially the sleek, high-spirited ones. No one knows how to teach them how to be rode better than me.”
Jake shook his head again, in an attempt to ignore Carter’s snide remarks. The hint of sinister in the other guy’s words suddenly pricked in the back of Jake’s heart, and his blood began to race. “Carter, if you think this is going to work, you’re dead wrong. Whoever you’re threatening or have threatened doesn’t change anything. Do your job or get the hell off my property.”
“Is that what Lilly was, your property? I was all over her, and there wasn’t a damn thing you could do about it.”
Jake was turning back to Starlight’s stall when the icy fingers of Carter’s words seeped into his heart. He whirled back toward Carter.
“Jake!” Robert Caswell’s voice was quiet and dark, and Jake automatically took a half step back from Carter’s enraged features. Jake’s hands uncurled from fists, and he relaxed his furious scowl. Carter’s expression only darkened with Robert’s appearance but he, too, stepped back from the boiling confrontation. Robert stalked through the swishing of mares’ tails to stand between the two young men. Robert’s black hair salted with sun and age caught dim lights from inside the horses’ stalls.
“I thought the two of you were moving the horses to the pasture. What’s the hold up?”
Robert did not dignify the hands with responses when their anger erupted in more shouting. He simply reaffirmed his instructions to them and turned his back to leave as soon as they had both responded with “Yessir.”
Heat and tension still hung heavy in the air, but Robert only glared at both of them, then left them to their jobs. Jake strode to the rear of the stable and began haltering the few sorrels that had not made the grazing pasture. Fighting with Carter was a losing proposition, but his dad was right. Carter’s problems would have to wait for Starlight’s needs to be met first. Carter was silently compliant as well, forking dry straw into Starlight’s stable while Jake released the horses into the pasture, turning back to choke on the brown cloud of dust Carter’s fancy Ford truck was leaving as he exited Caswell Farms.
Jake coiled the bridles around his fist as he cleared the heavy dirt from his nostrils and glared after the hand. They would have been all right to finish this job if Carter had not started in about Lilly. Jake couldn’t afford to let his temper get the best of him, and he was fairly certain that had been exactly what Carter had wanted. Jake spit into the dirt at his feet and fought the urge to call Lilly as fast as he could. Starlight and her foal would not wait for that, and he needed to keep his head.
Glancing at the mares Jake turned back for the horse stable, catching the sound of Ruiando’s irritated snorts and clomping feet. Jake picked his pace up to a jog as the horse’s discontent grew more desperate, and Jake feared Starlight was in labor.
Chapter Ten
Jake? Cassie thought forlornly, as she twisted her hair into a clump at the back of her head. She was sure to run into him today, and the idea prickled the skin at the back of her neck. He was never close enough for them to have more misunderstandings, but she could feel his eyes on her and his unmistakable presence, almost lurking.
Troy climbed into the truck beside her. “Trailers ready. You?”
“Explain this to me again,” she said, latching her seat belt as Troy pulled away from The Rocking J. “Miriam just told me that Heidi won’t come to work with Applesauce without Jake, and he’s working with the horses today and can’t bring her.”
As the truck pulled onto the paved highway three miles from Caswell Farms, Cassie rolled down her window and let the warm wind blow across her hot skin.
“So we’re taking App
lesauce to the farm?” she shouted above the noise.
Troy grunted in affirmation, and Cassie frowned out the windshield. Jake’s reckless comments at their last meeting had been more detrimental to Heidi’s state of mind than Cassie had realized. Miriam said Debra Caswell was having difficulty getting her anywhere near any of the horses; instead, she shadowed Jake everywhere he went. When Miriam talked to Heidi on the phone, she said she would work with Cassie and Applesauce, but only if she could be where Jake was. Cassie sighed and fought back the trepidation she could feel rolling in her stomach. It was hard enough to work in unfamiliar circumstances, but with Jake hovering nearby … she didn’t see this going well.
Cassie heard Troy slow down and flip on his blinker. Her body jiggled with the bumps of the truck as the pavement beneath the tires gave way to gravel.
Cassie rolled down her window as they pulled up the gravel driveway, sniffing the air and sorting the smells of cattle, dirt, water, and alfalfa. Turning in her seat, she unfastened her seatbelt, and leaned her head out the window to feel the morning sun from across the cab of the truck. Troy slowed their progress even further as a bawling calf startled Cassie back into the cab.
“Tell me about this place, will you?” she asked, gesturing with her hand out the window, as they started moving again.
“This road goes for about five miles into the heart of the farm. There are a few side roads leading to different pastures and feed buildings. All of the fields between where we turned in and the farm house are alfalfa and corn to the west. And the same except for soy beans on the east.”
Cassie frowned as she picked up the slight scent of summer corn but couldn’t decipher the soy. “Why do they grow corn and soy?”
A smoky smell drifted on the breeze and she wrinkled her nose.
“They use the corn for feed, and they sell the soy for grain. They grow both because the ground gets depleted of its nutrients when you don’t alternate your crop base. Robert and Jake spent a good deal of money and time setting up a fancy irrigation system and reservoir from the San Madera to keep the farm self-sufficient. This part of the country is too hot and dry for the crops that Caswell Farms grows. Thanks to the reservoir and the irrigation, they are the only ones who can do it.”
Troy’s voice paused, and Cassie rolled her window up to block out the flying dust and acrid smell of smoke now growing stronger. “How did Robert Caswell get permission to take water from the San Madera?”
The uneven travel of the truck paused as Cassie heard the rumble of another vehicle passing by. The pungent odor of the complaining cows overwhelmed all other scents and she listened to Troy once more. “Jake has a government land grant in the San Madera Valley. He found a herd of wild mustangs living near the river and got the grant to protect their native land. Because Caswell Farms uses the irrigation to enrich the land and provide for the natural habitat of the mustangs, there is no mortgage on the farm, and they receive federal funding for its upkeep. That’s why Jake spends so much time here, not for the cattle, but for the mustangs. He wants to be involved in their protection.”
Cassie nodded, but kept her expression blank as the truck continued to make its way through the alfalfa fields. Jake loved horses? Wild horses? And he was willing to give up screaming fans and fainting women to be near them and care for them? His deep protective instincts of Heidi and Kirstie now seemed to ring a bit more genuinely in her ears, and she frowned as she actually found this part of him somewhat … attractive? She shook her head now.
“Sorry,” Troy mumbled quietly. “None of that is going to help you find your way around, is it?” Cassie gave a weak smile, and Troy cleared his throat. “When we pull up to the house there will be a six-foot-wide wooden porch with a set of steps that lead to the front door. There is a stone path that leads to them, and I’ll drop you off there while I go unload Applesauce in the horse barn. It’s about a hundred yards south and west of the house, and the stables are about fifteen feet west of the barn. The stables are a stone structure on the north and wooden on the south. The only access is from the south, and I believe that is where Jake will be birthing a foal. If Heidi is not at the house, you will probably find her down in the stables with him.”
Cassie nodded again and unrolled her window as she felt the truck slow.
A gasp escaped Troy’s lips, and then the bark of a sharp command as Cassie’s nose suddenly filled with caustic smoke and her ears rang with the sound of screaming horses.
“Stay in the truck,” Troy snapped as her hand reached for the door handle. She grasped the arm rest tightly as the truck lurched forward and began speeding west away from where they had slowed to stop.
“What’s burning?” Cassie yelled as the truck and trailer moved toward the smell and a flare of heat washed back into the truck.
“The stables!” he shouted and then leapt from the driver’s side door.
Cassie could hear panicked horses and men rushing about. The heat whipped back across the windshield and smoke grew thick all around her. Despite Troy’s instructions, Cassie jumped from the truck and used her cane to make her way to the rear of the truck until she found the trailer. Applesauce’s own frightened whinnies met her ears, and she moved around to the side and rear of the trailer until she located the bolt to release the gate.
Letting Applesauce hear her voice, Cassie moved into the trailer and worked her way to the horses twitching head. Taking a lead rope from the rear of the trailer, she hooked it to the horse’s bridle and backed her out of the trailer. Cassie could hear the agitation of other animals grouped further down the fence line. The level of anxiety she could feel from them was significantly less, so she told Applesauce to move toward them.
The old gray mare moved faster than Cassie had known she could, stopping at a fence rail and neighing to a few other mares. Cassie tied the lead rope to the fence, patting Applesauce reassuringly and whispering in her ear. Cassie remained with the pastured horses listening and praying that the running men had gotten all of the animals out of the structure.
Troy had said the stable was stone in front, a condition that would reduce the fire’s effect, but the wooden portions along with the hay and feed would make it a tinder box, and if there were any horses inside or … Jake … and maybe Heidi … the bitter taste of bile rose into her throat and she fought back smoky tears.
Panic and fear burned up her throat more intensely than that she felt from the fire. Helplessness boiled all around her now, leaving her trapped in its hold. Her hand wrapped around the top rail of the fence where she stood and the world balanced. Stables to the left, she thought. Fence heads north beside the corral.
Using her cane to feel her way along the fence, Cassie drew closer to the heat and fumes and heard Troy’s voice drifting in the wind.
“He’s in the northwest corner with Starlight and the foal, but they can’t get past the flames. He said if we douse the ceiling on the western side it would help but …”
Troy’s words were lost as he moved beyond her range and Cassie’s heart jumped again. He … Jake? Cassie moved further up the fence line, trying to picture in her mind the description of the building Troy had given her. He said it was stone in the front and wood in the rear. It was possible the stone was just a façade, and if she could find a crack or break in it, it would at least give Jake more air.
Cassie stepped away from the fence rail stretching out her arms until her fingertips touched the rail lightly and her other hand was straight out from her side. With the morning sun against her cheek, she stepped away from the rail and toward the scent and heat of the fire. She had taken less than ten steps when her outstretched hand found the outer corrals Troy had told her ran the length of the western wall of the stable. Cassie dropped her cane and climbed under the rails of the corral and worked her way north until she felt the stones of the corner pieces beneath her fingertips.
Collapsing to her knees and trying to ignore the heat and smoke she could feel choking her eyes and throat, Cassie b
egan digging along the cracks of mortar between the smooth stones. Her sensitive fingertips felt for a hint of air seeping from between the edges of the sturdy stone, and her frustration nearly overtook her as there was nothing. Laying her palms against the warm stones, Cassie reached higher until her palm found a stone, scalding beneath her touch, and she pulled back in surprise and elation. The rest had been warm, but the fire’s heat had penetrated to engulf this one.
Cassie reached for it again, ignoring all other sensation, to focus on the heat. Running her fingers carefully along its outer edge, she found the mortar dry like clay fired in a kiln.
Cassie dropped back to her knees, pulling a splinter of wood from the corral rail beside her. The wood was dry and brittle in the fire’s heat, and the sharp chunk broke away easily.
Cassie found the heated stone again, and then slipped the broken protrusion into the fragile mortar until she felt the hardened grout come away from the rock. Prying beneath it with her fingers and the stick, Cassie managed to dislodge the stone from its placement. She let it fall to the ground at her feet, dropped the awkward pieces of wood, and retrieved the stone. With the heftier weight in her hands, Cassie began battering against the inner wall of the stable.
The space where the rock began breaking through, gushed smoke, pungent with an acidic burnt hide smell mingled with obnoxious chemical fumes.
Cassie instinctually held her breath against the toxins and felt around for the size of the hole in the wall where the stone had been. Smoke poured through the gap, seeking escape, and Cassie became overwhelmed by the choking smell. Coughing uncontrollably for a minute, and gasping on the ground for clearer air, Cassie’s eyes watered and stung with the thick air all around her. Tearing a strip from the bottom of her T-shirt, she fell to her knees and reclaimed the fallen rock. She tied the strip of cloth around her mouth and nose, then gripped the rock in both hands.
The shouting of men, crying horses, and even the intermittent shrieks of women’s voices drifted only briefly to her ears as Cassie blocked out the swirling sounds and focused only on the sound of rock battering against stone and wood. The roar of the flames reverberated in tempo with the pounding of her arms against the edge of the two-foot gap she had opened up low on the western wall of the stable. As she drew her aching arms back for one more thrust against the building, Cassie caught a low, gasping voice as it drifted through the opening.
Killing Casanova Page 6