Undercover Cowboy

by Beverly Bird

  Carly’s jaw dropped. “What?”

  “I said no. And don’t give me that business about this being your ride. This is too important. We have to stay on high ground.”

  She stared at him, aghast. She had been holding herself back from him all morning, watching where he rode, never drifting too far in his direction so it would look as if she was willing to chat. Now she didn’t need to make an effort. Jack looked back at her through the impersonal eyes of a stranger.

  Something inside her bled. She tried to reach him anyway.

  “Are you crazy? Do you know what we’ve got heading toward us here?”

  “A class-A prairie-type storm.”

  “No, Jack, no. Look how hard it’s coming at us.”

  Jack did. Already the thunderheads seemed close enough to touch. Where once they had been on the horizon, now they were boiling up, black and violent, nearly peaking over their heads. At any moment now, the thunder would start and the rain would drum down.

  At any moment now, everything would start happening.

  “I can see that,” he said tightly, checking on Scorpion again.

  “You can see, but you don’t understand. Don’t you remember what I told you that day at the chutes? A storm’s one thing, but when one comes in fast like this, then the cold air collides with the hot air and we’ve got major problems!”

  His eyes came back to her, narrowing. “Spit it out, cowgirl. Are we flying to Kansas?”

  She couldn’t believe this. What was the matter with him? Suddenly fury burned hotly through her.

  “Maybe you are,” she snapped. “I’m going to save my daughter and my herd and my guests.”

  She sawed on her reins, turning her mare around. Before Jack could answer she was galloping away from him.

  Scorpion was still sitting close to the wagon. When Carly peeled off, his eyes sharpened on her, like a hawk spying a rabbit in midleap. Jack took off after her and caught up with her just as the assassin began gathering up his reins. To follow her?

  She was shouting at the cowboys, trying to get everybody to head for the chasm. Jack reached over and grabbed her reins out of her hands.

  She struck him away, enraged.

  “Not the cattle, cowgirl, and not the wagon,” he said again. “They stay up here. If you’re serious, if you think a tornado’s coming, then take the people to safety. But you’re going to have to leave the rest of this caravan behind.”

  She fought him, grappling for her reins, her mare skittering beneath her in panic. “No! Not more than three hundred head, Jack! No!” Oh, God, she couldn’t let that happen!

  “They’re cows, goddamn it!” And he was trying to save her life!

  “They’re steers! Most of them are steers!”

  “I don’t care if they’re leprechauns, they’ve got to stay up here!”

  “I want my herd!” she screamed. “I’m not going to lose 355 animals just because you’re some kind of heartless, predatory fool!”

  She was beyond all reason. Jack knew that if she lived through this, she would look back and admit that she had been out of control. But now she was wild, crazy. He got the reins away from her again and he jerked her mare around hard. It reared up as thunder boomed out overhead, but she stayed on. The thunder was a single loud reverberation and the confused cattle began lowing.

  The cowboys had started moving them at Carly’s command, but now they stopped them again, watching her uncertainly. Faced with their argument, Scorpion had paused, too. He was still far enough away that Jack gauged there was no way he could hear them.

  “Listen to me,” he hissed. “Scorpion has been waiting for this storm so he can get the wagon away. He’s going to take the whole wagon, Carly!” And he’s going to try to kill me so he can take you.

  Something in his tone finally reached her. Carly stopped fighting him but she was still breathing hard.

  “Fine,” she said finally. “He can have my wagon. I just want my herd.”

  “You can’t have your herd, Carly,” Jack said more softly. “You can’t save them.”

  “But—”

  “Take the people,” Jack said. “Take them to low ground. It’s going to happen now, cowgirl. Come on, I need you on this one. I need you to do what I tell you and before you know it, this’ll all be over.” The man wouldn’t be able to grab her if Carly was in the chasm and they were on high ground, he reasoned. Then he would literally have to kill Jack first to get to her.

  Being needed steadied her a little. But the Draw needed her, too. She shook her head frantically.

  “I want my cattle. I need them. I have to go to Dodge.”

  “We’ll take care of that later.”

  There wasn’t going to be a later. She finally understood that. There had never really been much of a possibility that they would make it all the way into Dodge. He’d known it, too. It was just something else he hadn’t bothered to tell her. In that moment, she purely hated him.

  She felt her whole life, her world, slipping through her fingers like sand, and it left her oddly numb. The rain started, a few huge drops at first, then the clouds opened up. The sky rumbled again and water began sheeting down.

  “You want me to go in there alone?” she asked shakily. “You’ve been standing guard over me like a pit bull for days.” It had something to do with that picture, she realized, and then she finally understood, whether she wanted to think about it yet or not. Her heart stalled.

  She was right in the middle of this somehow. Had both Scorpion and Jack come to Oklahoma precisely because of her?

  Why? Dear God, why?

  She would have screamed at him for answers, right then and there, no matter how much of her heart it cost her. But Jack was already urging her mare toward the chasm. She twisted around to shoot him one last, wild look.

  “Tell Sure-Shot Rawley to keep his gun loaded and ready. If he sees Brad before I get back, tell him to shoot to kill.”

  Cold washed through her. Then her spine hardened.

  Jack watched her shoulders square. Way to go, cowgirl. He wondered if he had ever appreciated anyone more, and if he had ever been more terrified of losing them.

  “Go on,” he went on hoarsely. “I’ll cover you until you’re down, then Rawley can take over. And for God’s sake, don’t let your ego get in the way here. If it comes to it, let him shoot. I don’t care if it chokes you that he’s better than you are. I want you to stay alive.” Jack didn’t add that the only way it would come to that was if he died first. He saw her understanding on her face. She paled and her eyes went a little wild again.

  “Go on,” he said again. “Go!”

  She jerked as though he had struck her, but she went.

  Scorpion didn’t move to go after her this time. The assassin sat in the rain, watching, waiting. He knew how this was going to have to play out, too, Jack thought, and it was long past the time for false identities and disguises.

  Carly shouted at the guests to ride down into the chasm. Scorpion still hadn’t moved. The wind began screaming. Lightning arced across the sky and this time the thunder was a roll, traveling through the clouds.

  Jack dragged his forearm across his eyes to clear the rain from them, then he rode toward the chasm as well. When everyone was down, he went over the lip. Even above the storm, he could hear Carly’s voice, strident with nerves as she called out instructions to the others.

  Hang on, cowgirl.

  Jack dismounted, gauged where the cattle was and climbed back up the chasm on that side to come up behind them. He moved from one cow to the next steer, trying to find the wagon, keeping low behind each animal.

  He found the wagon.

  He saw Scorpion’s horse, and his heart stopped beating for a breath-robbing second. It was already riderless. He didn’t see Scorpion.

  “Looking for me?”

  The voice came from behind him, slow, even, eerily toneless. The skin at Jack’s nape crawled. He forced himself to turn around calmly and smile.


  “Yeah. And I always find you, don’t I?”

  “Only when I let you.” Scorpion held his gun hand out, his finger through the trigger, dangling the weapon. “Okay, let’s do it, comrade. What do you say? One on one. May the best man win, and, of course, take the lady.” His face twisted. “You’re going to have to die for that, you know. Did you think I was just going to let you get away with touching her like that?”

  “She doesn’t want you,” Jack growled.

  “She doesn’t have to.”

  “What are you going to do? Hold her for the rest of her life against her will?”

  “She’ll come around eventually. And if she doesn’t, I’ll kill her.”

  Jack’s blood froze. “You’re going to have to kill me first.”

  Scorpion chuckled. “That’s what I’ve been counting on.”

  The assassin dropped his gun suddenly and charged at him. Jack went for his own weapon, got his fingers around it as they struggled and pulled it free. Then Scorpion struck a chopping blow to his arm, making him lose it again.

  The man had another weapon on him. Jack was sure of it. There had been a certain cunning in the assassin’s eyes before he’d let go of his own gun, the knowledge that he wouldn’t be defenseless without it. Jack figured that his last edge was to attack hard and fast before Scorpion could get to the knife or whatever it was that he was hiding. He brought his right fist upward into the man’s belly. Jack was enraged enough, wild enough, that he managed to drop him with that single blow.

  He followed that shot with one to the man’s jaw. Scorpion rolled, staggered to his feet again, then he came back at him. He crouched down and shot up this time, driving into Jack headfirst, his crown ramming squarely into his gut.

  It drove the air out of him. Jack managed to wrap his arms around the assassin and drag him down again, wrestling with him, rolling on top of him, even as he gasped for his own breath. He straddled him and smashed his fist into his jaw, once, twice, again. Exhilaration suddenly made him feel unconquerable. Blood flew. He was going to get him. He was finally going to get this bastard and he knew somehow that once he did, he would be free. The consuming chase would be over and he would have nothing left to hide behind, but that was good, cleansing, even exhilarating. He might even be able to plant a few trees.

  Scorpion managed to get his hands on Jack’s throat. Jack knew a brief moment of triumph. The assassin would try to squeeze and that would be that. It would be fine, because one more punch, maybe two, and Scorpion’s strength would be gone, fractured by pain. Jack felt bone crunch and grind beneath his next blow, then he knew that he had underestimated the man.

  Scorpion didn’t squeeze. The assassin knew better. His fingers probed almost delicately, looking for that single place on Jack’s neck that would stop the flow of blood and the oxygen to his brain. When he passed out, Scorpion would use his knife, the knife Jack wouldn’t let him get to.

  Jack twisted his neck, trying to ease the pressure. Finally he was forced to roll away. He came to his feet again fast, braced for Scorpion again, then he saw the funnel cloud growing behind the man.

  He stared at it dumbly for a split second. In his rage, in his driven fury, he had forgotten about the storm.

  Like a snake slithering down from the boiling blackness of the clouds, it winded and writhed, trying to reach the earth. The rain had stopped, and it lent an eerie, dreamlike quality to the atmosphere. Then the wind came suddenly, pitching Jack down, barreling into him with impossible force.

  Jack felt the ground begin to tremble. Not from the twister, not yet, he thought. It hadn’t touched down yet. It was the herd stampeding. The roar of the air became stitched with their bleats and bawling.

  The force of the tornado’s birth began sucking the air from Jack’s lungs. He dragged for more and there was none. If he didn’t breathe, didn’t find a way to move, the cowgirl was going to die. One of them—either he or Scorpion—was going to seek shelter in that chasm first. He couldn’t keep Scorpion up here if he couldn’t even stand upright to fight him. He had to be the one to find her.

  The earth began trembling more violently beneath him. It shook as though with a horror all its own. The air bellowed. The tornado had touched down somewhere, and he couldn’t get up to look. He began crawling toward the chasm.

  There was a muted, clanking sound and the wagon team crashed past him. The conveyance rocked wildly over the hard ground as the horses fled in terror.

  Scorpion screamed in protest as his money went bouncing away. Jack smiled and felt the immense wind flatten the grin against his face like a grotesque caricature.

  He managed to get to his feet. He staggered a few steps and went down again. He got back up to his knees and crawled. He rolled over the rim just at the point where the force of the wind was enough to sweep him away.

  Scorpion had been behind him, not even close to the lip, but that wasn’t good enough. It brought no satisfaction, no sense of victory.

  The bastard was up there somewhere, still alive, and Jack had to find Carly.

  Chapter 19

  It was so close.

  Carly had lived in Oklahoma all her life. Once she had seen a twister pick up a hog shed but leave an elm standing right beside it. She knew they were live, capricious things with unique wills of their own. She had learned to fear them less than she respected them. And she knew, given the millions of prairie acres that they had to choose from, the odds of one coming down on the exact place she stood were on her side.

  In all her life, it had never come close to happening. But this twister seemed to be almost directly over her head.

  She knew she and the others were relatively safe. The chasm was deep enough to keep them pretty far below ground level— that was why she had chosen it. But when she looked up at the sky, she could see the debris the tornado had claimed spinning by, and fear and awe trembled inside her.

  Fear and awe and horror. What was happening up there?

  They had to be dead, both of them.

  Carly knew it with her head even as her heart rebelled. An ugly, clawing pain filled her chest. She’d barely had time to touch him, had scarcely explored him. There was so much about him she had yet to learn, and she wanted to, oh, yes, she wanted to. She wanted to get past the secrets, the lies, because there was a really good man inside.

  She realized in that moment that he had never lied to her. He had evaded her questions. He had given her half-truths. But he had never blatantly told her anything that was untrue. Though God knew others had hurt him, he would never willingly hurt anybody else. He wouldn’t betray anyone.

  Not at all like her father and ex-husband, she realized much too late.

  A thin, almost mewling sound escaped her throat. She held Holly tightly, but then she motioned at her that they should crawl down the chasm wall. The others were huddled closer to the northern rim.

  Myra was dwarfed in Rawley’s big arms. Only her dark, disbelieving eyes peered out from the man’s embrace. Leigh was lying down, protected by Gofer’s long, skinny body. Reggie was stricken and mute, and she thought Winston might actually cry.

  “You’re all right,” she managed. “You’ll all be fine.”

  Rawley nodded and spoke, and Carly realized that she could hear him now.

  “It’s passing.”

  She looked up dumbly at the sky again. There was no more debris overhead. The earth still rumbled, but the rain had come back. The tornado sounded more like a freight train than the earth trembling on the brink of explosion.

  Rawley was right. The twister had torn past them.

  Carly got to her feet, staggering a little when her legs wouldn’t quite hold her. “I’ve got to find him.”

  She’d thought she’d accepted that he was dead, but now she knew she hadn’t. She couldn’t give up without looking. She wouldn’t accept it until she saw for herself, until she went up there and there was no sign of him.

  “Not yet,” Rawley shouted at her over the weather. “Don’t
go up there yet. We don’t know where Brad is.”

  But she scarcely heard him. The twister hadn’t come down right there, her thoughts raced on. Almost—yes, it had been almost right on top of them, but it hadn’t touched down right there. And if Jack was still up on high ground, then he might just be hurt. He might need her.

  “Go get him, Mom,” Holly urged, not knowing the true danger involved, but Carly didn’t hear her daughter, either.

  She hauled herself back up the slope. She reached the top and struggled to her feet, looking around. The wind was still strong enough to buffet her, to snatch her voice as she shouted Jack’s name. There was no answer.

  Carly choked on a harsh, indrawn breath. Everything was gone—the cattle, the wagon, everything, and she could see the tornado’s path. It had cut a distinct swath of destruction across the land and her eyes followed its trail. She saw the twister easing up from the earth again, maybe ten miles away now.

  Where it had passed there were no rocks, no grass, just churned, scoured mud. And it had passed no more than two hundred yards away.

  Two hundred yards. And she had last seen Jack come up out of the chasm right about here. Unless he had ridden in that direction, right at the twister, he could very well be okay. And his horse was down in the chasm. She knew he hadn’t ridden anywhere.

  She shouted for him again. The storm howled and the rain came down harder. Then she felt something sharp prick into the small of her back.

  Her heart seemed to stop. Rawley had warned her, but she had forgotten to watch out for Brad, for Scorpion.

  “Come on, now, babe, you didn’t think I was going to leave without you, did you?” His voice was soft, eerily pleasant. “Your old man’s money never came with the condition that I stayed away. So now let’s find out who’s gonna be taking you home from this party.”

  The rain started again as Jack got to his feet and began maneuvering the rest of the way to the bottom of the chasm.

  He heard a horse whinny from somewhere distant, from the other end, around the bend. He started that way, finally dropping to his knees to crab his way around a curve where swells of earth came together in another huge knot. He kept a wary eye open for Scorpion as he picked his way along. He didn’t see him, but when he reached the other side of the tangled bend, he found the others.