by Rachel Lee
Then Nora did the most surprising thing. She leaned over the guy and said loudly, “Now who has the power?”
That was probably the last thing Langdon ever heard.
* * *
There were cops everywhere. EMTs treated the rope burns on Nora’s wrists, declared that her concussion should be checked out if she developed any symptoms, but judged her to be okay for now.
At last Jake squatted in front of her, taking her hands gently. “I have to go out for a while. Two of my cattle were poisoned with something really bad. The sheriff and I have to take care of it before it spreads.”
“Spreading poison?”
“If it’s what I suspect it is, yeah. If an animal eats the flesh of a poisoned animal, it gets poisoned, too. The decaying flesh can let poison seep into the groundwater. We have to deal with it now. I’m sorry.”
“Could that creep have done it?”
He shook his head. “Why would he? Anyone with half a brain would realize that the instant I found the animal I’d call the cops. How would that help him? Besides, the stuff was banned back in 1989. These days it has to be sold in sealed collars by USDA-approved vendors. Even if Langdon had known about the collars, he likely would have killed himself by puncturing one. It’s that toxic. No, most likely some coyote moved in for a kill and got a mouthful of collar instead of ewe or cow.”
She freed one hand and touched his cheek. “I haven’t thanked you. But go. I understand. I’ll thank you later.”
“Keep a close eye on her,” he told Rosa, then he and most of the deputies departed, leaving only one who wanted to ask her questions about what had happened.
Unlike last time, this time she wanted to tell the whole story.
But it seemed like forever until Jake returned.
* * *
Gage and Jake stood over the wrapped bait and the two dead cows.
“This is bad,” Gage said. “Nobody’s supposed to be using that stuff anymore.”
“Well, it’s allowed in a few states in livestock collars. I locked my dogs in the barn. They seem fine right now, but I have no idea if they ate any of that carcass.”
Gage swore. “The cows wouldn’t eat that bait, so it must be in the water now.”
“At least the meltwater from the snow.”
“This could kill the whole county and beyond, and no way to tell where that dead animal came from.”
“None.”
Gage swore again. The vet was on his way, and a flatbed was coming to take the carcasses. They touched everything with thick rubber gloves now. If it was the poison they were both thinking of, it could kill them, too. “The vet needs to take the dogs, too. To check them out.”
“Dr. Windwalker will find out what it is,” Gage said finally.
“I hope I’m wrong.”
“Me, too. More than I can say.” Then he turned to give Jake a half smile. “Get back to your woman, Jake. We’ll handle this. There’s going to be a hell of an investigation, but right now, the important thing is that Nora is all right.”
“Amen,” was all that Jake said. Even now, getting back to Nora seemed more important than the poisoning. That would change, but right now he was more concerned with the woman who had brought so much joy into his life.
Chapter 15
When he got back to the house, not all was what he’d hoped to find. Fred Loftis had called and Nora was livid.
“He told that creep where I was! My own father! Said he thought it was a cop from Minneapolis. How stupid can you get? Claimed the guy had come all this way to tell me they’d caught Langdon.”
Jake wrapped her in his arms and held her close. “He called?”
“Yeah. He wanted to know if I felt better now. Better?”
Jake continued to hold her. The deputies were gone now, at least from his house. He heard Rosa say dinner was in the oven, then heard her go out the back door and head home.
And still he continued to hold Nora. Through her anger, through the reaction that left her shaking like a leaf, holding her until she at last became quiet against him.
“I’m proud of you,” he said finally. “The way you took that creep on... God, Nora, my heart is bursting with pride. You’re so damn brave.”
“I was terrified out of my mind,” she admitted in a small voice.
“So was I,” he answered truthfully. “All I wanted was to get to you and kill him.”
At last she hugged him back. He felt her sag a little, so he settled in the armchair, swinging her onto his lap.
For a long, long time, as the events of the day rolled through them both, they didn’t say much. But at last the emotional storm began to recede as night settled over the world outside.
“I’m free,” Nora said finally. “Free of him forever.”
“I can testify to that.”
She lifted her head and gave him the first smile since that morning. “I’m just starting to believe it. I don’t have to be afraid anymore.”
“I think you did a damn good job of getting past it these past few weeks. It didn’t just happen in an instant.”
“Maybe not.” She kissed his cheek. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Everything.”
“I didn’t do that much.”
“You gave me a haven, a place to get my strength back and reason to believe in myself again. Confidence.”
“I think you always had that. You just had to rediscover it.”
Then he gave her the kiss he’d been wanting to give her for hours: deep, hungry and possessive. Even though he didn’t have the right to claim her, the claim already existed in his heart.
“What will you do now?” he asked her.
“That depends.”
“On what?”
She lifted her head and looked straight at him. “On you, Jake. On you.”
His heart leaped. His head whirled. God, she had come so far from the woman who had arrived here. “On me? You really want to know what I want?”
“Yes.” She faced him unflinchingly.
“I want you. Forever. As my wife. Mother to my kids. In my bed and at my side. But Beth couldn’t stand it here.”
“I love it here. I love you. I love everything about this place.”
“But your career...”
“I’ll find one here. I know I can. If not, well, I do love taking care of the horses.”
“You won’t get bored?”
“I think I’d like to get bored once in a while, but around you, I never do.”
He squeezed her so tight, she squeaked. “I love you, Nora Loftis. I love you beyond words. But don’t say yes unless you’re sure. It hurt when Beth left, but if I lost you... Well, I figured out today that losing you would leave my life empty forever. There’d be nothing left worth living for.”
She cupped his cheek. “I feel the same way about you. Part of me always has.”
He frowned, but she touched his lips. “It’s in the past, Jake. I needed it, and you did what you had to do, given your promise to Beth.”
“There’s no excusing my cruelty.”
“Youth,” she said finally. “What I did was pretty stupid, too. I was embarrassed for years that I’d try to pay you with my body to take me to the prom.”
“Oh, no. No, don’t feel that way.”
“Then stop feeling the way you do. We’re older and wiser now, I hope. And I’ve found heaven with you.”
He kissed her hard and long, never wanting to let go. “I’ve found heaven with you, too. You’re in nearly every thought I have. I can’t want to set eyes on you again when you’re away. I even hate your damn job at the library.”
She gave a little laugh. “It hasn’t been as much fun lately because I’m away from you.”
“Marry me, Nora,” he said, catching her face and turning it toward him. “A big fancy church wedding. All the trimmings.”
“Not at my dad’s church.”
He laughed, feeling his heart grow lighter than it had i
n years. “Not at your dad’s church,” he agreed. “So, will you?”
“Of course I will.” She sighed, lifting her arms, wrapping them around his neck and burrowing into the only place that she had ever felt was home: his arms. “I love you, Jake Madison.”
“And I love you. Wedding tomorrow?”
She tipped her head, laughing joyously for the first time in forever. “What about the trimmings?”
“Okay, I’ll wait a few months,” he agreed.
Then, without another word, he rose with her still in his arms and carried her up the stairs. They were going to begin their new life in the best way possible: wrapped in each other.
* * * * *
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Chapter 1
The three Colton sisters sat in the parlor area of Catherine’s bedroom suite, each of them pretending to carry on a casual conversation while ignoring the reason they were gathered together.
The pregnancy test Catherine had just taken was in the adjoining bathroom and none of them had looked at it yet to see the results.
The suite was three rooms: the sitting area, the bedroom and the bath. All were decorated in a splendor of pinks and black with silver accessories. This was Catherine’s haven, the place she felt most safe and secure, but at the moment her nerves screamed inside her.
“Jim Radar’s bull got himself all tangled up in a mess of barbed wire this morning. It took me hours to get him unwound and cleaned up,” Amanda said. At twenty-eight, Amanda had a successful large animal veterinarian practice and a six-month-old daughter, Cheyenne, who was the love of her life. “I gave Jim a lecture about the dangers of barbed wire, but I think it went in one ear and out the other.”
“How’s the barn project coming along?” Catherine asked her younger sister, Gabriella. Gabby had a dream of turning an old red barn on the property into a center for troubled teens. She was not only devoted to her project but also planning a Christmas wedding with Trevor Garth, head of security here at the Dead River Ranch.
“Slowly,” Gabby admitted, her green eyes sparkling with happiness. “I keep getting distracted by wedding plans. It’s already October and that doesn’t give me much time to have a perfect wedding by December.”
“It’s going to be a beautiful wedding and hopefully it will bring some joy into this place,” Catherine replied.
Amanda sighed with a touch of impatience. “We’ve only got an hour before dinnertime. Shouldn’t somebody go in there and check and find out if the answer is yes or no?”
Once again Catherine’s nerves jumped erratically inside her veins, as if attempting to make a hasty escape. How had she gotten herself into the situation where she’d even have to take a pregnancy test? Before the question fully formed in her head, she knew the answer. She’d been such a fool. They’d always been so careful, always had what she assumed was safe sex, but apparently it was possible that at some point a condom hadn’t done its job.
She stood from the dainty pink-and-white chair where she’d been seated, an anxious dread attempting to weigh her back down. “I guess I’ll go find out.”
Gabby jumped up off the chaise where she and Amanda had been seated. She grabbed hold of Catherine’s cold hand. “I’ll go with you, Cath.”
The whole thing felt surreal. When Catherine had missed her first period she’d chalked it up to all the stress and madness that had been taking place over the past couple of months at the ranch. When she’d missed her second period, she’d finally decided it was time to take the test. And now it was the moment of truth.
She squeezed Gabby’s hand tightly as they entered the large, plush bathroom. The plastic test container was on the back of the stool and within five steps of it she could see the result. The positive sign glared up at her.
She was vaguely aware of Gabby’s small gasp, but a curious numbness swept over Catherine. Pregnant. She was pregnant. The words went around and around in her head, but she couldn’t grasp the concept.
She picked up the test and threw it into the small trash can next to the commode and then she and Gabby returned to the sitting room. Gabby gave a nod to Amanda as Catherine sank back down on her chair.
“So, what are you going to do, Cath?” Amanda asked.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure. I need some time to think,” Catherine replied. “Neither of you can tell anyone about this. It has to be our secret until I figure things out.”
Amanda nodded solemnly. “My lips are sealed.”
“Pinky swear,” Gabby said. “You know your secret is safe with us.”
Catherine did know. She and her sisters had always been a team, confiding in each other, trusting each other, especially lately when there was such tension, such a sense of uncertainty and a faint simmer of danger in the house.
“I need to go check on Cheyenne,” Amanda said as she stood.
“And I’ve got some things to get to before dinner.” Gabby gazed at Catherine in concern. “Are you going to be all right?”
“Of course.” Catherine forced a smile to her lips.
“Do you need to talk or something?”
Catherine shook her head. “I just need some time to process everything. I think I’ll head out to the petting barn for a little while before it’s time to eat.”
She’d be able to think more clearly there among the little creatures that depended on her for their care. She’d always found peace in the petting barn and she definitely needed some peace at the moment.
Thankfully, as she made her way downstairs and to one of the back doors, she encountered nobody. She didn’t want to see anyone right now, didn’t want to have to indulge in idle chitchat. She needed to embrace the fact that she was pregnant by a man she’d thought she might be in love with, a man she now abhorred.
The Dead River Ranch was one of the most prosperous spreads in Wyoming. The two-thousand-acre ranch was located in the Laramie Mountains, forty miles from Cheyenne.
The enormous mansion housed not only the three sisters, but also their sickly father, other relatives and staff and ranch hands. It was an entire community unto itself, and for the past three months the community had been folding in on itself, but she couldn’t think about all that right now.
Not only was the house huge, but there were outbuildings everywhere and the remains of several that had burned in a horrible fire that had occurred two months before.
Old barns competed with new ones, stables and sheds dotted the landscape against a backdrop of blue endless skies and thick woods of a variety of trees.
As she stepped outside, she drew in a deep breath of the fresh, slightly bracing October air. It smelled of evergreen tinged wind from the mountains and of pastures browning with the cooler air. Cattle were visible in the distance, enjoying the late-afternoon sunshine while they grazed.
She headed toward the miniature barn where the petting area was located next to the huge stables building. The petting barn had been built two years ago when Catherine had found herself the unexpected owner of two friendly ferrets.
The owner of the ferrets, a friend of Catherine’s, was getting married and moving and she didn’t want to take her little babies to the local animal pound. Catherine had taken them an
d then had talked her father into building the petting barn.
She’d known her father, Jethro, would like the idea of a place where school and scout groups could come. He loved the idea of anyone visiting the ranch and admiring all that he’d built here.
The minute she opened the waist-high white gate that surrounded a small outdoor arena, Inky and Dinky, the two miniature donkeys brayed a greeting and competed with two sheep, three pygmy goats and a pot-bellied pig to get her attention.
She laughed as she was nudged and head-butted by the variety of animals all vying for an ear scratch, a belly-rub or the nuggets of grains she often carried with her before coming into the enclosure. “Sorry, kids, nothing for you this afternoon,” she said. Her words didn’t lessen the enthusiasm of the furry, fluffy creatures who loved her with or without treats.
It took several minutes for her to make sure that each and every one of them got a little special time and then she headed inside the miniature barn that housed the smaller animals. Rabbits ran in a fenced area and ducks quacked their happiness as they swam in a small pool that was continuously fed fresh water. A large cage held Frick and Frack, the two ferrets who were favorites among the school and scout troops that came to visit the hands-on animal barn.
During those visits, Catherine acted as spokeswoman, educating the kids on each type of animal and their natural habitats and origins. It was something she loved to do when she got the opportunity.
There were stalls to house the outdoor animals during the harsh, cold winters and the entire barn was heated to keep everyone toasty while the snow flew outside and the temperatures dropped to subzero.
Today, as she checked food and water containers, petted and stroked each and every animal, her mind was a million miles away.
Pregnant.
She was pregnant.
Catherine admired Amanda her veterinarian business and Gabby for her commitment to troubled teens. At twenty-six years old Catherine hadn’t yet figured out what she wanted to do with the rest of her life.