Tall, Dark and Cowboy (23 page)

“What can I do for you?” Chase wanted to be polite, but he wasn’t about to ask the woman into the house. She made him uneasy with her Wicked Witch shoes and cold stare.

“I’m a friend of Lacey’s,” she said. “I heard she was here.”

Chase bit back a swear. Cody must have told her. There was no other way she’d know.

“She’s not here.” He edged to one side, trying to get a look inside the car at her jug-headed companion.

“What’s your name?”

“Janice.”

Chase didn’t remember Lacey mentioning that name. “Where are you from?”

“Conway.” Her eyes narrowed, as if she was daring him to contradict her.

She wasn’t being friendly, so he didn’t bother either. “I went to school there. I don’t remember you.”

The door to the sedan clicked open, and the driver emerged. He was jug-headed, all right, and he barely had a neck at all—just massive, muscle-bound shoulders that blended into his head. His face was pockmarked, his lips fleshy and purple. He had pale blue eyes that should have been attractive or at least striking, but they were just scary.

Maybe because Chase knew the guy.

“Wade Simpson,” he said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Wade stepped away from his car and shoved his hands in his pockets, looking left, then right with exaggerated ease. “Nice spread.”

“I like it.”

“Guess you did all right after Trent Bradford stole your land. Not as pretty as Tennessee, though, is it?”

“Suits me fine. And yeah, I’m over it.”

As he said it, he realized he really was. He’d been coming to terms with his new life gradually, but today, enjoying the ride with Lacey and Annie, he’d appreciated the ranch in a new way. He was proud to show it to Lacey, proud of what he’d accomplished. Proud of his new life, of being a real cowboy instead of a goat farmer.

“You doing okay with the way your dad died too?”

All Chase’s newfound contentment whooshed out in a single, pained breath. He couldn’t help knotting his fists up and stiffening at the memory.

“Shame, that was, the way your dad killed himself. You must wish you could get ahold of Bradford, choke him with your bare hands.”

Chase looked down at the ground and collected himself, letting his fists relax and consciously easing the tension in his shoulders.

“No,” he said. “I told you, I’m over it.”

Wade laughed—the same nasty, knowing laugh Chase had heard over the phone days before. “Yeah, I guess you are. Amazing what fucking a guy’s wife’ll do for you, huh? I guess you got your revenge.” He leered. “Guess that would work for me too. She any good?”

The woman, who had been standing silently by the car, cleared her throat and cast a killing glance toward Wade, giving Chase time to take a deep breath and swallow the urge to shove his fist into Wade’s face.

“Well, it would if I didn’t have Janice here,” Wade said, looking nervous. “Sorry about that, honey.” He turned to Chase. “Janice here was Lacey’s best friend. She’s so worried about her that she made me drive all the way out here to check on her.”

“Really.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So you and Janice are…”

“We’re friends,” Janice said. “Acquaintances, really.” She shot Wade a murderous glare. “So where’s our Lacey?” She simpered, which was kind of scary. She wasn’t an unattractive woman, but the expression was so at odds with her personality that Chase would have been more inclined to help her if she’d scowled.

“Lacey?” He’d been developing a strategy since the phone call to deal with this very moment—but he’d expected the moment to occur at the car lot. He’d never expected Wade to find the ranch.

“Lacey left,” he said. “Skipped town.” He did his best to look brokenhearted.

“What’d she do? Walk?”

“No. I gave her a car from the dealership.”

“Well, I guess she’s still a whore then,” Wade said. “Guess you were worth fucking.”

Chase stepped up to him as Janice stepped away. She seemed to be making room for him to swing a fist. Apparently she didn’t like Wade any more than he did.

Wade himself grinned like a jack-o’-lantern, the expression creasing his flabby cheeks. Unfortunately, that was the only part of him that was flabby. His muscles were swollen and laced with tortuous blue veins as if he’d spent most of his life since high school in the gym and the rest of it popping steroids. He stood in a fighting stance, fists clenched, legs apart, waiting for Chase to swing. His skin had taken on an unnatural flush, as if all the blood was flowing into his corded arms and clenched fists.

Chase suspected he could win a fight. Wade might be bulky with muscle, but Chase was taller. Ranch work didn’t build a lot of visible muscle, but he was strong. And he was angry.

Really angry.

The realization made him take a step back and struggle for composure. Anger was liable to make him do something stupid, something that would get him in trouble and wouldn’t do a damn thing for Lacey.

Wade sneered with such venom, he might as well have called Chase a coward, but Chase reminded himself he really didn’t give a damn about Wade’s opinion and turned to Janice.

“So is there anything else I can do for you?”

“You can tell me what kind of car Lacey’s driving.” She tried to look concerned, but the expression didn’t fit her any better than the simper. “I really need to find her. She’s just not equipped for life on her own.”

“She’s fine,” Chase said.

“No she’s not. She’s helpless.” She blinked in an effort to look sympathetic, but the predatory gleam in her eyes ruined the effect. “So what kind of car is it?”

Wade stepped forward and reached for his back pocket like he was going for a gun. Adrenaline surged into Chase’s brain, but despite the sudden euphoria, he knew he’d never dodge a gunshot. When Wade whipped out a wallet, he felt like a popped balloon, stretched to the breaking point and then suddenly limp.

Flipping the wallet open like a TV cop, Wade held up a polished brass badge. “I’ll need the make and model,” he said. “That woman’s a fugitive from justice. You’re harboring a criminal.”

“Oh, Wade, for God’s sake,” Janice said.

“Yeah, for God’s sake,” Chase echoed mockingly. “You’re not a federal agent, Wade. Being a Conway flatfoot isn’t going to do you any good here.”

Wade started to swell up again. If he’d been a little taller and greener, it might have reminded Chase of the Incredible Hulk. As it was, all he could think of was an angry toad he’d found in the garden one summer.

“Go home, Wade,” he said. “I’m not telling you a damn thing about her.”

“I’m not going home until I find her,” Wade said. “You’ve really fallen for her lies?” He leaned against the car, affecting a relaxed posture, but a telltale vein still twitched in his neck. “She pretends to be so fuckin’ helpless, so fuckin’ sweet. Don’t you believe it. She was as much a part of that whole thing as her husband.”

He cleared his throat and turned to spit a gob of phlegm into the dirt. “Always had to have more money for her fancy clothes. I worked with Trent on some projects, and I know he was desperate to keep her. She drove him to it.”

“Lacey doesn’t care about money.”

“No, but she cared about tennis at the club and tanning memberships and pricey clothes. That stuff added up, and Trent was chasin’ his tail to keep her happy. She used to flaunt it, too, always struttin’ down the street like she owned the place. She used to brag about how Trent had taken your farm and was gonna plow the whole thing under. How everybody would be better off when they got rid of those dirty goats and stuff.”

Chase folded his arms over his chest. A week ago, he might have believed that, but he knew Lacey now. She might not be a big fan of goats, but she wasn’t cruel and she wasn’t selfish. “You done yet?”

“She laughed when your dad died. Said he was a loser anyway.”

Chase lunged forward. “Lacey wouldn’t say that. But you just did.”

Anger buzzed in his brain and power surged in his body as he hauled the man toward the car. He couldn’t close his hand around Wade’s massive biceps, but he managed to tilt him off-balance and shove him through the open door, savoring a rush of satisfaction when the back of the man’s head thumped the edge of the roof as he fell inside.

“Get lost, Wade,” he said. “You ever set foot on this property again, I’ll call the folks who
do
have jurisdiction over this place. Better yet, I’ll shoot you and bury you out back. It’s not like anybody’s watching.”

Actually, someone was. He’d seen Annie’s face appear at the window to one side of the barn door. Hopefully she couldn’t hear him. He turned to Janice, who was already getting in the car.

“You too, bitch,” he said. “Don’t let me see you back here again.”

Chase watched the dark sedan kick up dust as Janice sped down the driveway, taking Wade with her. He tried to feel a sense of victory from chasing them away, or at least satisfaction, but all he felt was foreboding.

Annie ran out of the barn, her eyes wide. “Uncle Chase, who was that? Why was that lady dressed so scary? How did she walk with those shoes on? Was that guy from the WWE? He looked like one of the bad guys. Is that why you didn’t want me to come out?”

“Yeah.” He ruffled her hair. “Thanks for being a smart kid and staying in the barn.”

“You’re welcome. But you said a bad word.”

Shoot. So she
had
been listening. Pam had always cautioned him that Annie was the ultimate big-eared little pitcher, and it looked like she was right. Dang, the kid would probably tell on him too, and Pam would give him a lecture. He cast around for a change of subject that would make her forget what he’d said.

“Are you really going to bury him in the yard?” she asked. “Because I think you should bury him farther from the house. On
Law
& Order
, there was a guy who buried his wife in the yard and the cops found her right away.”

“How ’bout ice cream, honey?”

“No, I’d rather help you plan this out. What about Aunt Lacey?”

He didn’t want to go back to the woods too soon after Wade had left, but he didn’t want to tell Annie that and scare her more than he had to.

“She won’t mind waiting,” he said.

“No, I mean do you think she could help? That guy said some really mean things about her. I bet she’d help you dig the hole. But you’d better not leave yet. Then those people will see which way you go. And then you’d have to kill that guy without having time to think this through. Do you think we could hide the body in the barn?”

“Annie, I’m not going to kill anybody.”

“Oh. Okay.” She sounded disappointed.

He wished he had something in the freezer besides low-fat vanilla. Now that the subject had turned to detectives and police work, it would take Super Calorie Chocolate Fudge Chip Chunk Ripple Delight to make Annie forget what they were talking about.

Sure enough, she chattered about murder methods and burial plans the entire time he dished out the ice cream. By the time he settled her at the table, she’d come to the conclusion that they should chop Wade up into manageable pieces, melt his flesh off in an acid bath, and haul him into the woods—where, conveniently, Lacey was waiting to help dig the hole.

He assured her again that he wasn’t going to kill anyone and left her dejected over her bowl of plain-Jane vanilla while he went out and hooked up the horse trailer. He’d just gotten it hitched to the pickup when she came running out of the house, heels and hair flying.

“I went upstairs and looked out the window and I saw those people. They didn’t leave. They parked on that hill across the road, and I think they have binoculars too.”

Maybe Annie’s obsession wasn’t such a bad thing. He’d been just about to lead Wade and Janice straight to Lacey. Apparently, he wasn’t smarter than a second grader.

“Let me see.”

Annie led him back to the house and up the stairs to the second-floor hallway, which looked out over the front of the house. She brought the binoculars to her eyes and gazed down the driveway, then nodded and handed them to him.

“Yup. Still there,” she said.

Chase peered through the glasses and saw the car parked on a hill not far from the house. It wasn’t an easy place to get to in a four-wheel-drive truck, so Chase couldn’t imagine how Wade had managed to get the sedan up the rocky, little-used cow path.

He focused in on the car and made out the figures of Wade and Janice standing nearby. Something caught the light of the setting sun and reflected it back. Annie was right. Wade had some kind of lens trained on the house. But it might not be binoculars.

It might be a rifle sight.

He refocused the binoculars, but the two figures were in silhouette and whatever Wade had was pointed his way, so he couldn’t tell if it was a gun, binoculars, or a camera. But it was definitely aimed at the house.

They must be watching for him to go to Lacey. Then they’d follow him, and then—then who knew what they’d do? The only thing he knew was that he had to get Annie out of there. Lacey would understand.

But meanwhile, she was probably wondering where he was. And she was probably scared—with good reason. He hadn’t been kidding about the bears and the mountain lions. It wasn’t likely that either one would find her, but it wasn’t impossible. He’d heard there had been a big cat in the area. Someone had lost a couple of stray lambs, and another neighbor had found scat that didn’t look like it came from a bear.

“You keep an eye on them,” he said to Annie. Watching them would keep her busy and give him time to think.

“Okay.” She grabbed the binoculars and refocused them, then swung them briefly toward the corral where she’d turned out her pony. “Look at poor little Sheba. She’s just running up and down the fence, up and down. She misses Captain.”

“She does, doesn’t she?” Chase watched the horse a moment. She was nervous and agitated, tossing her head and prancing. As he watched, she let out a shrill whinny. If Wade and Janice noticed her, they’d realize she was pointing the way toward Captain and Lacey.

But they probably wouldn’t figure it out. Wade didn’t know a thing about animals, and judging from her footwear, Janice wasn’t exactly the horsey type.

He went downstairs and got out his vet kit. Staring down at the supplies neatly slotted into the canvas, he pulled out a plastic splint and a roll of self-stick vet tape for Captain’s leg. The splint came with instructions, and he unfolded them to make sure they were clear enough for Lacey to follow.

Grabbing a pen from the counter, he thought a moment, then wrote his own set of instructions. Folding it carefully, he laid it on the splint, then tore off a piece of vet tape and bound the rest of the roll with the instructions and the splint.

“Annie? They still there?” he called up the stairs.

“Yup. They haven’t moved,” she said.

“Stay and watch them, okay? I’m going to go put the horses out.”

She appeared at the top of the steps, her forehead creased with confusion. “But it’s almost nighttime. You usually put them in the barn now.”

“Not tonight,” he said. “You’d better watch. If those people leave, I need to know which way they go.”

“Sorry!” Forgetting all about the horses, she ran back to her station at the window.

Out in the barn, Chase spread Sheba’s cool-out blanket on the floor. He carefully bound the medical supplies and instructions into a bundle, then taped them to the inside of the blanket, placing them just behind the horse’s shoulder. They wouldn’t bother her too much there. He muttered softly to Sheba as he settled a blanket on her back and turned her out into the paddock.

While Sheba stamped her foot, shook herself, and gradually gave in to the odd sensation of the splint tickling her side, he blanketed Jimbo. The gelding turned his head and looked at Chase curiously, then poked him with his nose, obviously wondering why he was getting all dressed up so late in the afternoon.

“I know, buddy, it’s kind of weird.” It wasn’t a cool night by any means. Hopefully Janice and Wade wouldn’t realize how odd it was to put horses out to pasture on a warm summer night dressed like they were headed for a fall horse show.

He wondered how Lacey was doing. He’d been gone almost three hours now, so she had to know something was wrong. Maybe she was halfway home already, leaving Captain alone in the woods. Or maybe she was still sitting under the tree where he’d left her. If she was still in the woods, was she scared? Or was she angry, cursing him for leaving her? Would she need comforting when he finally got back to her, or placating?

He didn’t have any idea. He didn’t know a damn thing about women.

But he did know horses, and he knew Sheba would run straight to Captain if he gave her the chance.

He led the mare out to the corral, where she started up her nervous pacing again. Jimbo followed, snorting and stamping, picking up her nerves and getting agitated. When Chase opened the gate, both horses stormed out like wild mustangs being released from a holding pen and thundered off into the deepening twilight. He saw Sheba’s dark, draped form leading the way as the horses headed straight for Captain—and for Lacey.

***

Lacey sat with her back to the tree trunk, watching the sun sink in the sky. She might not have a watch, and she might not be any kind of woods-woman, but she knew Chase had been gone well over the hour he’d promised. Captain had resigned himself to his pain and stood beside the tree with his head drooping low, but Sinclair was still hyperalert, his ears perked as he stared into the forest. Occasionally a shudder rippled down his back.

“You’re making me nervous, boy,” Lacey ran her hand down the dog’s back and kneaded his bony shoulders. “Why did I have to find a sissy dog at the gas station? Why couldn’t you be a mastiff, or a Doberman? Something that would protect me?”

Tilting his nose in the air, Sinclair closed his eyes in an expression of doggie bliss. “I’m surprised you didn’t insist on following your new mistress. Maybe you like me a little after all.”

She scanned the woods as she petted the dog, watching for shadows. As the sun sank and the light began to dim, it was getting harder and harder to see what lay beyond the nearest trees. Twice now she’d thought she’d seen a shadow, large and lithe, moving through the shadows under the pines. Both times, Sinclair had growled. She’d thought at first his reaction confirmed her fears, but then she realized he was just responding to her own tension.

She wanted to go to the edge of the woods to see if she could see Chase heading her way, but that would mean leaving Captain, and if she really had seen something stalking them from the shadows, they’d all be better off together.

She scanned the sky. The sun was almost to the horizon, and the clear, watery blue of day was giving way to the deeper tones of sunset. The shadowy depths of the woods were growing darker by the minute.

“Can’t you be more like Lassie?” she asked Sinclair. “Go home, boy, and bark at that man until he comes and gets me.” She made a shooing motion. “Go on. Tell him Timmy’s in the well.”

The dog trotted a few steps down the trail, then turned and gave her an aggrieved look.

“Go,” she said, flicking her fingers. “Go.”

He walked back to her, sighed, and lay down beside her, resting his head on his paws.

“Damn dog,” she said. But she was secretly pleased.

She rested her head against the tree, stroking the dog and letting her eyes close. She was tired from the week’s stress, and the day’s fresh air and exercise had added to her exhaustion. The clatter and cheep of birds settling themselves for the night faded in and out of her consciousness.

At some point, she must have fallen asleep because she woke with a start, gazing around her in confusion. It was almost dark. Where was she? The forest gradually slid into focus as she took in the horse, the dog, and the scattered leaves. But what had woken her up? Sinclair was awake too, standing with one foot lifted like a pointer, his ears and tail trembling, his body rigid.

A hoarse, high-pitched scream tore through the night. Sinclair took a step forward and growled. She grabbed him and clutched him to her chest.

“Forget everything I said about Lassie,” she whispered into the dog’s fur. “Whatever that was, it’s way bigger than you. You don’t have a chance.”

Neither did she. Neither did Captain. That had to be a mountain lion, and it sounded close. Her instinct told her to run for the cabin, but she had no idea what direction the cry had come from. It had surrounded her, filling the air.

She scanned the woods all around, looking for the gleam of predatory eyes, the glide of a shadowy form through the dense undergrowth. Listening for the snapping of a twig that would indicate stealthy footsteps.

The silence that surrounded her was almost more unnerving. The thing could be anywhere—two yards away or twenty. She’d seen a house cat stalking a bird once, all stealth and steely eyes. A mountain lion would probably move just as quietly and pounce just as fast. She held the dog tighter and waited for the rustle of approaching doom.

But when the sound came, it was no mere snapping of twigs. It was an explosion of noise, as if something was crashing through the underbrush just down the path from where she sat. It didn’t sound like a mountain lion; it sounded like an elephant. Or maybe a whole herd of elephants. How big was the damn thing? Maybe there was more than one.

Sinclair jumped to his feet and let out a sharp bark as Captain reared up on his hind legs, jerking away from the tree. He took off down the trail as fast as his injury would allow, reins trailing behind him, stirrups flapping at his sides. He was headed toward home—toward home, and toward whatever was crashing through the trees.

“Wrong way! Oh, you stupid horse,
no
!”

Lacey dropped to her knees and grabbed the dog, clutching him to her chest. There was nobody to save her now.

She’d wanted to be on her own, and now she truly was.