by Beverly Bird
She started to turn away. Jack cleared his throat carefully. “I just don’t think you should be riding across twelve miles of pitch-darkness by yourself tonight.”
“I ride these same miles four times every summer.” But something inside her squirmed nervously. All of a sudden, twelve miles of night shadows sounded decidedly unnerving.
She groaned, feeling something hot spring to her eyes, and that was ridiculous. Ever since this man had set foot on her ranch, her emotions had been unruly and wild, and she hated that, hated it more than anything, because her emotions had always toed the line before.
“Leave me alone, Jack,” she said quietly, her voice breaking. “Just…leave me alone, will you, please?”
She trotted away. Jack hesitated, then he followed her.
If he thought about it rationally, he knew he could safeguard against Scorpion getting to her from either end. He could watch over her, or he could keep his eye on the assassin. And it made a lot more sense to watch over Scorpion, he realized, so that he could interfere at the very first sign of any move. Jack knew he couldn’t really tag along with Carly, no matter how much he wondered who the hell Rawley Cummings was.
“All right, how about this?” he suggested neutrally. “Can you take someone else with you? Plank or Gofer or Mazie?”
She reined in suddenly. “Damn it, Jack! Why?”
He didn’t answer.
“Scratch what I said earlier about liking you,” she muttered. “I’m starting to hate you.”
“I know. Please take Plank. And Holly, too, while you’re at it.” As long as one of them was gone, he decided, it was easiest to get both mother and daughter out of the immediate picture, to keep them together. And safe. Yeah, that would definitely make him feel better.
Carly glared at him, then she looked doggedly out to the horizon. Put that way, how could she say no? Her throat started to hurt again.
“You’ll have to help Gofer keep an eye on the herd,” she said finally. “They tend to stray.”
“I’ll do the best I can.”
“Reggie might be able to help you. But leave Winston out of it. He’s as likely as not to send them bolting into Kansas without us.” She laughed nervously. “As for Brad…” She trailed off, shaking her head noncommittally.
Jack nodded. She was stalling. They both seemed to realize it at the same time. She took up her reins again.
“Listen, don’t stop for anything, okay?” he said suddenly.
She frowned. “Like what?”
“Like the sound of a calf in distress, or a call for help, anything that would ordinarily get you to stop.”
She closed her eyes hard. “You’re scaring me, Jack.”
“Good.” Scorpion would have to kill him to be able to go after her, he thought, but that sort of thing had happened before, to other agents.
Carly gave him a long, worried, last look, then she rode off to get Plank and Holly. This time Jack let her go.
A few minutes later, the three of them headed off into the darkness at a steady canter. Jack watched her go with a very bad feeling, but he had done all he could think of to keep this turn of events from blowing things sky-high.
Chapter 10
Rawley was waiting on his porch for Carly. It was five days before auction time up at Dodge, and she always stopped in when she was making use of her lease. He leaned forward in his wheelchair, watching them approach.
Carly swung down from her mare, tied her to the fence post and jogged up the steps. Plank called out that he was going over to the bunkhouse to try to scare up a game of cards. Holly wanted to tag along. Carly seemed to hesitate before she let her daughter go.
Carly’s hug was tight and long.
“Keep it up and you’re gonna choke me. You want a drink?”
Carly finally straightened. “I’d love one.”
“Come on in.”
She held the screen door for him and followed him into his kitchen. He was a good-looking man. He had the Cummings Welsh-bred appeal with black hair and startling blue eyes. She had gone through school with him and he had been her friend for as long as she could remember. He’d been the first boy she’d ever kissed, and then he had taken a hellacious fall off a cantankerous stallion a week later. Sometime after that, they’d grown up and apart.
Still, his reputation with the ladies hadn’t suffered after his accident, at least not anywhere near as much as she would have expected. Probably because he was such a good, uncomplicated man. Why couldn’t she have fallen for him? Carly wondered suddenly, wildly. Why was she interested in someone like Jack Fain?
“What’s with Plank?” Rawley took a bottle of bourbon from beneath the sink.
Carly’s hand faltered as she reached over his head into a cabinet for glasses. Not your brother, not your sister, not the IRS. She had to assume that Rawley Cummings fell into that category somewhere.
She clenched her jaw against answering. She knew he’d find it odd that she showed up with Plank when she normally stopped by alone. But she just couldn’t tell him the real reason.
Rawley’s eyes narrowed, then widened. “Oh, man!” he burst out. “Did they go over to your place? They did, didn’t they?”
“Did who go to my place?” She took the bottle from him and poured for both of them. Her knuckles looked funny, she noticed absently. White and bony.
“The guys with that rogue plane over at the airport.”
“I don’t have a clue as to what you’re talking about.” But Carly’s heart constricted and her hands went suddenly clumsy. She spilled the bourbon and found a dishcloth to wipe it up, then she tossed back her shot, closing her eyes, shuddering a little as its warmth tried to thaw the block of ice that her stomach had become.
“Hell of a way to savor fine liquor,” Rawley commented.
Carly picked the bottle up again to examine the label. “Right,” she said dryly. She put it down again with a sharp thunk.
“So what’s wrong with you tonight?” Rawley went on.
“Nothing. I’m fine.”
“Do you know something about that plane?”
“No!” She almost shouted it, then she carefully got a grip on herself again.
“Still not much for TV, huh?” Rawley asked.
“When do I have the time?”
“Have you even listened to the radio lately?”
I don’t want to hear this.
He was trying to tell her something, and Carly knew instinctively that she didn’t want to know what it was, because it was just going to make everything worse. She didn’t want him to tell her because if there was a plane somewhere where it wasn’t supposed to be, as innocuous as that might sound on the surface, it almost had to have something to do with Jack Fain, and whatever crazy thing it was that was happening with her ride. And maybe Jack was right. Maybe she just didn’t need to know.
She shook her head and paced to the window. “Nope,” she answered, her voice strident. “The generator blew two nights ago. No electricity. And we set out late this morning, so I’ve pretty much been on the trail all day.” Please, please, shut up and don’t tell me any more.
“What’s happening, Rawley?” she heard herself whisper.
Rawley sipped his own bourbon. “Some plane came in down at the airport in Oklahoma City on Monday. It was all over the news because it didn’t file a flight plan and it almost went nose first into a commercial jet. Then it turned out that a bunch of federal agents were waiting for it. Clyde Messenguer—you know, that guy from KLTP News—was catching a flight out at the same time, and he caught wind of the whole business. I guess he did some digging and found out that the guy in the plane was wanted for some pretty nasty business. Gotta be, I guess, if the feds are involved. Clyde tried to follow the dude himself and he got as far as our neck of the woods, then a bunch of Very Important Suits caught him and warned him off. So we don’t know what happened after that. Everybody I’ve talked to lately has been panicked. The Bucking B even cancelled their trip
to auction.”
Carly brightened a little at that. It might drive the price up on her own steers. Then Rawley kept talking.
“Bobby—over at the B—didn’t want to take the chance of crossing his herd over two hundred miles of empty land if there’s a manhunt going on.”
“A…manhunt?” Carly repeated. She dragged a chair out from the kitchen table. She sat in it carefully, her legs feeling wobbly. And Jack hadn’t thought she needed to know this?
“So what you’re saying here is that there’s some felon on the loose, hiding out somewhere on the panhandle, and the government is chasing him?” she asked Rawley. “And at any given moment this guy is liable to come jumping out from behind a clump of mesquite, shooting away?” Holly. No wonder Jack hadn’t wanted to bring Holly! Why hadn’t he just told her? Oh, God, she had to get back to her daughter, couldn’t let her out of her sight now! But even as she jumped to her feet, Rawley answered her.
“Hey, don’t yell at me. Messenguer’s good, he’s won all those awards and all, but I guess he’s not God. Like I said, the federal authorities are involved somehow, and when they say back off, you back off. Messenguer didn’t have a chance to tell us anything more.”
The federal authorities. Jack had said that he was government. And as for her suspicions of Brad…
Oh, God, she thought again. He was the…the felon. Oh, my God.
Suddenly, white, hot fury exploded in her head. Why hadn’t Jack seen fit to tell her any of this? She had a sudden, wild scenario of how it might play out.
How’s everything, Brad? Having fun?
No, not really. Bang, bang, you’re dead. Oh, and while I’m at it, let me kill your daughter.
Carly gave a thin, high-pitched laugh.
“Are you going to lose it or something?” Rawley asked warily. “Are you having problems? Well, hell, you must be. I’ve known you for more than thirty years, and you’ve never brought a bodyguard for the ride to my house before.”
Carly nodded, shook her head, nodded again. “I don’t know.”
Should she tell him? She didn’t know what to do! She didn’t know what to think! She hurried into the hallway. The only emotion that seemed to come through loud and clear now was a sense of betrayal, and it had to do with Jack. It was gathering fiercely right in the pit of her stomach.
“Where are you going?” Rawley called after her. “Do you want me to call the sheriff?”
She didn’t answer. First she was going to be sick, she thought. Then she’d go back to camp and find out what was going on. Everything. The truth.
She wasn’t sure what she’d thought was happening, but it wasn’t this. She’d trusted Jack—at least enough to reason that if they were in terrible danger, he would have told her.
But he hadn’t. He hadn’t.
Carly sank down onto the tiled floor of the bathroom and leaned her forehead against the cool porcelain. One thing was certain. She couldn’t keep riding into Kansas under the circumstances.
Except then she’d have to give the money back to her guests. She’d be right back to square one with the IRS. Think, she told herself, think. But everything she thought was bad.
She wouldn’t even have the revenues from the auction if she didn’t get the herd into Dodge! Forget the tourists, she thought desperately. She could think of some way to pay them back later. It would be months before any of them got around to suing her anyway. But if she didn’t get the herd in, the Draw would literally be bankrupt by Wednesday.
Carly groaned aloud, feeling worse by the moment.
When she returned to the kitchen, she felt shaky and defeated. She looked at Rawley and blinked. There was a duffel bag beside his wheelchair. His .44 revolver was in his lap. Josh Carpenter, his foreman, was standing on his other side, and Plank and Holly hovered behind Josh.
“Mom?” Holly asked nervously. “What’s going on? I’m scared.”
Carly moved instinctively to put an arm around her daughter.
“We’re going with you,” Rawley said. “You can’t turn around and go home. You need the money too badly. Can’t see any other reason why you’d let Michael talk you into taking a bunch of tourists to Kansas, unless you’re almost broke.”
Carly swallowed carefully. Almost was an understatement.
“We’re going to get those steers of yours into Dodge,” Rawley went on. “If you don’t want to call in the law, then I guess we’ll just have to handle it the way we’ve always done around these parts since the days of the pioneers.”
“By ourselves,” agreed Josh, nodding.
Carly was tempted, but then she shook her head. “I can’t do it,” she said quietly. “I can’t ride four more days not knowing if there’s a gun aimed at the back of my head or who’s aiming it.” She shuddered, and dragged in a deep breath. She heard Holly cry out softly, and she tightened her hold on her. “I think I’ve just finally come up against something here that I can’t climb over or move by sheer force of will. This is…big.”
Rawley’s face reddened with anger. “You’re not a quitter, Carlotta. And you’ve been through more than most anybody I know, except maybe me. You just need a little help this time.” He started rolling his chair toward the door. “Me and Josh and Mr. Magnum here are gonna be right behind you, watching the back of your head every step of the way.”
Carly sat down hard in the kitchen chair again. Josh helped Rawley get through the door. Plank and Holly hesitated uncertainly in the kitchen, watching her.
“Well, you coming?” Plank asked after a moment.
“I guess so,” she said softly, rubbing her eyes.
“What’s going on, Mom?” Holly asked again. Her own eyes shone, and her lower lip trembled. “Is it Mr. Fain?”
Carly bit back on what she really wanted to say. Holly didn’t need any more disillusionment where men were concerned.
“No,” she said softly. “Jack’s actually the good guy.” She stood up again before she could choke on how badly she had wanted to believe that herself, and tried to ignore Holly’s beatific smile.
Two more people? She had brought two more people back with her, and one of them was an invalid?
Jack watched Carly return to camp, unsure if he was stunned, furious or overwhelmed. A sense of things unraveling hit him hard. He felt as if this whole situation was a ball of twine, spinning fast, faster, faster still.
Everyone was sitting at the fire, a reasonable distance from the wagon. That was the last thing that had gone right as far as Jack was concerned. He remained seated while Carly and her entourage approached. She wouldn’t look at him.
He watched her make her way to the wagon. The second newcomer helped the lame man out of his special saddle. He carried him to the fire and helped him to sit there.
“This is Rawley,” Carly called out without looking at any of them. Her voice sounded strange, flat. “And that there is Josh, giving him a hand. They’re going to Dodge with us. I’m going down to the creek to wash.”
Rawley? Rawley Cummings was in a wheelchair? Jack spared the man a glance, then he put his eyes back on Carly.
“I saved you a steak,” Gofer called out to her.
“I don’t want it.”
“You don’t…” Gofer’s jaw dropped. Jack rubbed his forehead. Now there was a serious indication that something was amiss. Carly had never turned down food in the several days he had known her.
Her duffel bag was stashed inside the wagon. Carly tossed her hat inside, found the bag and slung it over her shoulder. She had a plan now, the only one left after she had thrown out half a dozen others on the ride back to camp. Unfortunately, a great deal of her plan depended upon just how much Jack Fain genuinely wanted her.
He’d backed off last night, but he had sort of mentioned it again today, and she would gamble that with a little provocation he could be enticed again. She would gamble that he had told her at least one truth last night—that he really hadn’t just been setting a scene when he’d touched her.
&n
bsp; She checked to see where Holly was—settling down beside the fire near Rawley. That was the next best thing to Carly staying in the camp herself, she thought. Holly was as safe as she could be under the circumstances. Carly knew Rawley would protect her with his own life. And in the meantime, she had a few things to take care of.
She headed off toward the water. The creek was down on the other side of a rise. When she reached the highest point of land, she deliberately paused and pulled the braid out of her hair as she had done that night at the barn. Could he see her? The moon was finally coming up, so she was pretty sure it was possible.
She bent over, swishing her hands through her hair, then she straightened again, tossing it back. Grimly she began unbuttoning her shirt.
She guessed she really ought to give it a little bump and grind, but the truth of the matter was that she wouldn’t know where to start, and she didn’t have the heart for it right now anyway. She finally started down the other side of the rise again, remembering at the last moment to grab her bag. Her hands were shaking.
When she got out of sight at the creek, she dug her revolver out of the bag. She sat down on the far side of the bank to wait. Jack came no more than five minutes later.
“Stop,” she said quietly. “I’m armed and I can be considered truly dangerous.”
He went still. She had kind of thought that might get his attention.
“I suggest you start talking and tell me the truth this time,” she went on, “because more lies are going to burn me royally, and then I won’t be responsible for my actions.”
“What happened at Rawley’s?” he countered.
Carly ignored his question. “You’re too easy, cowboy.” Her throat hurt abominably. “I guess if I had actually taken my shirt off, you would have gotten down here before I could blink.”
“That had nothing to do with it,” he said carefully.
“You blew out the generator, didn’t you? You didn’t want me to catch the news. Is that why you didn’t want me to go to Rawley’s, either, because I might hear something?”
As aggravated as he was, he felt another jolt of respect for her. She was quick. But in this case, she was also wrong.