Undercover Cowboy

by Beverly Bird

  If there were heavier implications to any of it—such as why she had succumbed to wanting him after so many years alonethen she would deal with them after he was gone. And she would survive his leaving, too, she told herself, assuming he wasn’t killed. Unlike the guests, she had a full appreciation of how suddenly and brutally the end of the trail could come. When they got to Fort Dodge, if Jack was still alive and it came time to say goodbye, she’d be ready.

  She wondered if being on the trail also made it easier to accept that there was a cold-blooded killer in their midst. Probably, she reasoned. Everything was so unreal out here anyway, what was a little interference from an assassin?

  A high-pitched laugh escaped her at the thought.

  “Can’t sleep?”

  Carly jumped, then shook her head. She couldn’t see Jack. He was just a disembodied voice in the night.

  “I’m going to feel like hell tomorrow,” she answered just as softly.

  “You’ll get by,” his voice said.

  “Probably.”

  He finally left his sleeping bag on the other side of the barely smoldering fire. He stood up and came to the crate to sit beside her. If he noticed the gun, he didn’t comment on it.

  For a long time he just studied her face in the moonlight. “What’s the matter?” she asked warily.

  Jack shook his head. He already knew that she didn’t handle compliments well. She was suspicious of them, as though the person giving one might want too much from her in return. What would she do if he told her that she wasn’t actually pretty—that her mouth was a little too wide for that, her eyes a little too arresting—but that he had just realized again how beautiful she was?

  Her hair was down, the way he liked it. With her eyes so worried and haunted, and the last of the firelight flickering across her face, he found it hard to pull his own eyes away from her.

  “Which tent is Holly in?” he asked suddenly, because, impossibly, he wanted her again, as strongly as if he had never had the pleasure just a few short hours ago. He already knew the answer, but he had to divert himself.

  Carly looked around the camp. “The last one over there to the right, next to Rawley’s.” She hesitated. Her voice cracked. “Please don’t hurt her, Jack. She thinks you’re…great.”

  His heart spasmed. What did she think he was? Some kind of animal? A cold-blooded killer himself?

  “And you know better,” he answered shortly.

  Carly hesitated. “I know that she doesn’t need to know who—what—you really are.”

  Sometimes Jack wondered if he really knew himself.

  “She asked me if I had kids,” he said finally. “She seemed to think I was too old not to have any.”

  Carly surprised herself by laughing softly. “She says what’s on her mind.”

  “Like mother, like daughter.”

  “So how come you don’t have kids?” she asked suddenly. “Didn’t you and Zoe get that far? Do you like them?” She already knew it made him relatively frantic when one was involved in a…what would he call this? A case? A job?

  “I don’t think I ever really thought about it before,” he muttered.

  “So think now.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “You don’t want to think, or you don’t want to like them?”

  “The former.”

  “Oh, come on. What else is there to do while we sit here waiting for dawn?” She waved a hand at the timeless, immense sky.

  Jack scowled and shrugged and finally answered her. “Kids are okay.” He hated to see them die, he thought.

  “Well, now there’s an earth-shaking revelation of your inner feelings. Do you want any?”

  “I’m forty-three years old, Carly. It’s kind of late to be thinking about it.”

  “On second thought, you’d better not have any,” she decided.

  He eyed her warily. “Why?”

  “Because they make you love them. You can’t hide from them. You can’t not give them your whole heart, all your energy, even when it hurts and tears you apart.” She thought of the problems she’d been having with Holly lately and frowned.

  “Well, I don’t have time for that whole scene anyway,” he said tightly. She was doing it to him again, he realized. She was digging…or trying to, trying to get deeper than he wanted her to get. He wasn’t going to get sucked into arguing with her this time, and ultimately saying things he didn’t mean to say.

  “If you finally get your bad guy,” she whispered, “you’d be sort of retired, right? I mean, he’s essentially been your whole job.”

  Sometimes her insight amazed him. “Yeah,” he answered warily.

  “So maybe you’d have time for kids then.”

  “I will.” What was he saying? “I would, if I wanted to. I don’t want to.” He stood up again suddenly. “Go to sleep, cowgirl.”

  Carly hesitated. “Are you going to stay awake now?”

  “I never slept in the first place,” he whispered back to her. And he felt like he hadn’t slept. God, was he beginning to feel the strain of this job. No wonder his emotions were running all over the board, wild.

  He was getting too old for this, he thought again.

  Carly pushed to her feet as well, but then she only put her gun back in her bag and wandered off to the edge of the camp, her arms crossed protectively over her chest. Jack swore and followed her.

  “To sleep, Carly. I can’t protect you if you’re all the way out here.”

  “Is it me you’re protecting?”

  He looked at her oddly. He felt his heart thump. “You and nine others,” he said carefully. “Well, eleven, now. Come on. Let’s go back.”

  “What I mean is, if you kill this Scorpion guy, if you don’t have to chase him all over the place anymore, then you’ll have all kinds of time on your hands,” she said suddenly. “Have you thought of that, Jack? You said you’ve been on this guy’s tail for more than ten years.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Yes, you did. And that’s almost like a marriage.”

  Something inside him clenched hard and painfully. “Not quite. We’ve never shared a bathroom.”

  “He must be like a part of you by now,” she went on doggedly.

  Jack flinched noticeably. He looked sharply back at the camp, but that was just an excuse not to meet her gaze. They were far enough away that no one could hear them, and she was talking quietly.

  “Cancer can be a part of you, too,” he said grimly, finally, “but only a fool would hesitate to have it cut out.”

  “But I guess you’d still miss the part that you lost.”

  “And then you’d get used to it being gone.”

  Carly shrugged, but she didn’t look convinced. Jack felt himself getting irritated.

  “Damn it, cowgirl! What’s your point here?”

  “As long as you’ve had this guy to chase, you’ve had an excuse not to settle down and get comfy with anyone. You were the one who said your marriage didn’t work because you were never home.”

  “When did we decide I had a thing about not settling down?”

  “Last night.”

  “No. You decided.”

  “Well, it’s just the way you are, Jack. It shows. Like how you weren’t really loving me last night. You were listening to what was going on outside in the hallway.”

  “That’s garbage.”

  “It’s true.”

  “You don’t know a thing about me or my feelings, cowgirl. You don’t know what I was thinking.” He realized, surprised, that he was getting genuinely angry. He felt cornered again, like when she had started this business last night.

  “Well, I know that you didn’t hang on to Zoe,” she went on. “Because you travel a lot, you said. And you travel looking for Scorpion.” She changed tacks suddenly. “So where are your parents? Do you have any family?”

  Jack jolted. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  Carly found herself thinking of that pict
ure she’d seen in his wallet. “Well, do you?”

  “My father walked out on me—on me and my mother,” he corrected carefully, “when I was ten. Apparently Mom couldn’t handle single parenthood, so she dropped me off at the nearest orphanage. No brothers or sisters. Now, are you satisfied?”

  Carly’s heart kicked hard. It had been his father’s picture he’d kept. There’d been no trace of his mother in his wallet. But then, when his mother had taken off, she’d been all he had left. That would be very hard to forgive.

  Something inside her bled for him. “See?” she said softly.

  “No.” His voice was hard. “I don’t.”

  “Scorpion is all you’ve got, Jack. He’s the only person in the whole world you’ve let yourself get close to.”

  “What are you? A damned shrink?” he demanded angrily. “I’m still close to Zoe. I mean, if I see her, I say hello. We live in the same city. We parted amicably. We’re…friends.”

  “Yeah, I can tell. That’s why you just made love with me.”

  “That was sex, cowgirl. Great sex, but it was still just sex, and love didn’t have a damned thing to do with it.”

  She flinched.

  He didn’t know why he needed to hurt her…or maybe he did. Maybe something inside him was just frantic for her to shut up, to stop psychoanalyzing him, stop making him examine, think, feel, because if he looked too closely, he would just see too damned many holes in his life.

  “I rest my case,” Carly managed after a moment.

  “You don’t have a case, damn it!” His temper burst all over again, and he didn’t know why he felt so defensive. “I don’t know you well enough to love you. No man could love you inside a few days!” But what about a few years? an inner voice taunted him. Could a man fall in love with a picture, especially when the image had turned out to be so much like the real thing? He had always thought that he saw hearth and home in her eyes. And he had, he realized. He had. She was that kind of woman.

  “So what about Scorpion?” she persisted.

  “What about him?” he growled.

  “You’ve certainly known him longer than a few days. Do you love him?”

  He looked at her, dumbfounded. “He’s a man, for God’s sake!”

  “Love doesn’t have to be sexual, Jack. You can love a father, a brother, a best buddy.”

  “You’re crazy, do you know that?”

  “Well, I just see what I see.”

  Jack took a deep, careful breath. “Okay. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that there’s something…personal between Scorpion and me, after all these years. That doesn’t mean the man doesn’t deserve to die.”

  “Well, now you’re getting into the whole moralistic issue of capital punishment,” she pointed out.

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” he exploded.

  Carly thought maybe she’d pushed him too far. “Okay, okay. Calm down. We’ll assume that he does deserve to die, just for the sake of argument. You’re still going to be lonely, Jack, when he’s gone.”

  Jack turned away from her. “On second thought, stay out here by yourself if you want to. It’s your life.”

  She didn’t really expect him to go back to the camp, to leave her alone, but he did. Carly hugged herself. She guessed she must really have struck a nerve.

  And she knew suddenly that everything she had said was true. She thought of his parents, and she could have wept for the boy he had been. How could a mother do something like that? She could understand a father leaving—oh, she could understand that very well. But how could his own mother have yanked the last of the rug out from under him that way?

  She finally followed him, slowly, feeling a chill despite the warmth of the June night. She crawled back into her sleeping bag and hugged it close around her. For the first time she wondered what would happen to all of them if it turned out that Jack couldn’t shoot Scorpion, whoever he was. What would happen if he found that he couldn’t actually pull the trigger to cut out the cancer? Because whether he’d admit it or not, she thought it might be a very real possibility. She thought maybe this Scorpion was the only person Jack had ever let get under his skin.

  Then she had another jarring thought. How could Jack possibly believe that Scorpion didn’t know who he was? It seemed perfectly clear to her, to someone outside looking in. After all this time, after so many years, the assassin would almost have to recognize him, would have to know his walk, his grin, his scent. Those things didn’t change with disguises. She was suddenly very, very sure that she herself was going to be remembering those things long after Jack Fain was gone.

  So Scorpion had to know, too, she reasoned. Carly groaned softly. Maybe Scorpion saw the possibility that Jack couldn’t really shoot him.

  Maybe he was gambling on it.

  Chapter 13

  While Carly and the cowboys made breakfast, Jack managed to snag one of the loose threads that had been bothering him. After he rolled up his sleeping bag, he sauntered over to the cook wagon.

  “Can I help with anything?”

  Plank handed him a coffeepot. “Beans are already ground,” he answered. “They’re in the third crate inside the wagon, right hand side.”

  Jack went to the wagon. He found the crate easily. He dug the scoop into the cask, then he promptly spilled the grounds.

  Plank looked over and made a sound of amazement when he saw him bend down to pick up the mess. “We ain’t serving it after it’s been in the dirt!”

  “Just cleaning up after myself.”

  “The coyotes won’t mind.”

  Jack straightened. He had seen what he’d needed to see, what he had more or less expected to find.

  He’d known the money was in the wagon. Now he knew where. The bottom was all fresh, new plywood. He had long since stopped wondering how Scorpion managed such things. He wasn’t amazed that the assassin had located the materials and found the time to construct the false bottom. All that mattered was that now he had some idea how the man was going to have to go about getting his money before he could leave. That simplified things immensely.

  Jack filled the coffeepot and took it back to the fire, then he looked around. The door flap of Scorpion’s tent tugged back and the man stepped outside.

  For the briefest of moments, the assassin seemed to watch Jack. Then fury blazed in his eyes unconcealed.

  A strange chill spread through Jack. He fought the immediate and urgent impulse to go for his gun, then, there, and caution be damned. He didn’t like that look. That look seemed even deeper, hotter, than what losing his lady to another might have warranted. But then Scorpion turned away toward the creek.

  Soon now, Jack thought again, still feeling the adrenaline. Very soon.

  And if he could just get his mind and his hormones off the cowgirl, he might even be ready for it.

  Carly was finally forced by circumstance to acknowledge the other men in the group. All three of them—Reggie and Winston and Brad—were seated on the opposite side of the fire from where she stood.

  After a brief hesitation, she determined to ignore them. She refused to allow this whole nightmare to affect her appetite any longer. She had already missed dinner because of this mess, so she moved closer to the fire to pile her plate with eggs, sausages and potatoes.

  She sat down, her eyes doggedly on her food. As her stomach gradually filled, she realized that she felt more rested and replete than she had any right to. She wondered how Jack was holding up. She wondered if he had slept last night at all.

  Her gaze wandered over to him and her eyes widened. She felt as though she was walking on glass, and he was leaning lazily against the wagon as though he hadn’t a care in the world. One elbow was hooked back to rest upon the wooden side. He sipped coffee from the cup in his other hand and when he saw her looking at him, he raised a brow at her with a private smile.

  Something both warm and cold trembled through her. She found herself wishing fiercely that they didn’t have to worry about cattle and ki
llers, that they could somehow greet the day the way they had greeted the moon last night. And she was thoroughly irritated that he could handle this whole situation so calmly.

  She stood, no longer interested in finishing her eggs. Winston stepped around the fire to meet her.

  “This isn’t as hard as I thought it would be,” he told her happily. He stuck his hands into his pockets and rolled back on his heels as if he really thought he was a cowboy.

  Carly took a deep breath and dredged for her manners. “You get used to it after a few days,” she agreed politely. “Your body parts stop hurting.”

  He nodded. “You’re sure having fun,” he went on.

  Her heart skipped. She looked at him more closely. Was he leering at her? Fat, nervous, innocuous Winston?

  He was.

  Her first instinct was to snap at him that she wasn’t up for grabs. Her second was to get defensive, to protest that anything she had done with Jack had come straight from the bottom of her heart. Then that same heart stalled.

  Why should this man even care what she was doing? Why, unless he had some interest in Jack, some professional interest. Oh, God, she thought, was she wrong? Was Scorpion not Brad?

  No, she thought, no. This was all just wearing on her. She was getting paranoid and crazy.

  “We’ll leave in fifteen minutes,” she said tersely, turning away from Winston to include everyone. “Come on, Plank, ride with me for a few quick miles. Let’s make sure none of the herd has strayed too far.”

  “I’ve got my new bull over on my southernmost corner,” Rawley called out.

  Carly nodded. “Then we’ll ride in that direction first.”

  “Why?” Myra asked.

  “Because he either caught the scent of the cows, or they picked up on him,” Rawley explained. “Ten to one, he’s gotten together with a few of them overnight.”

  “How interesting,” Myra breathed, as though he had just imparted the most fascinating information in the world.

  Carly looked at her and raised a brow.

  Rawley watched Carly.

  Jack followed the man’s gaze carefully, weighing it, trying to see what it might reveal about their friendship.