Kidnapped By The Cowboy (C Bar C Ranch Book 2) Page 8

  Sleeping.

  Side by side.

  We’ll get ready to turn in…

  “Now?” she asked and hated herself for it.

  “Plenty late as it is.”

  She scrambled for her bearings and didn’t move. “Where are we?”

  “Miles from anywhere.”

  She’d known they’d have to stop eventually. They couldn’t ride all night, and maybe she shouldn’t have suggested leaving the Coopers, after all.

  “What’s the matter, Callie Mae? Don’t want to sleep with me?” he taunted.

  “Don’t flatter yourself. I just wasn’t ready to quit riding yet.”

  Not altogether true given the fatigue that had settled deep in her bones, but because he was waiting, she resolutely swung out of the saddle. In her denims, borrowed from Stinky Dale, it was a cinch; yet once on the ground, her stiff muscles protested, and she had to take a step back to steady herself.

  TJ’s hand quickly settled on her waist. The warmth of his palm touched her skin through the cotton of her shirt, and the strength in his fingers assured her she wasn’t going to fall anytime soon.

  “Easy,” he said.

  He must think her nothing but a silly, skittish female, but honestly, with him standing this close, tall and dark and broad-shouldered, her mind just up and cleared. She couldn’t think of a thing to do—or say—but stand there and get used to him.

  “Are you afraid of me?” he murmured, frowning.

  Words of denial sprang onto her tongue. She held them in. He’d just given her an opportunity to gather her composure and make a thing or two understood.

  “On the contrary, TJ.” Her voice sounded flustered, in spite of her attempt to assert some authority over him, and she stood a little taller, so she could. “I quite enjoy the company of men. I find them fascinating and entertaining, most of the time.” As a cattlewoman for the C Bar C, Callie Mae had grown accustomed to being the center of their attentions, whether for business or pleasure. “However, let me remind you you’re responsible for my brother’s death. Witnesses will attest that I’ve been riding with you. Any harm done to me will most certainly lead to your hanging from the gallows.”

  His hand dropped from her waist, and he muttered a disgusted curse. “You really think I’d hurt you?”

  “I never thought you’d hurt Danny, so your point is moot, isn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t, Callie Mae. Not ever.” Anger shimmered from him, and he pivoted away. Then, he pivoted back. “I said what I did about Danny, but you’re here with me because we both want the truth.” He jabbed a finger at her, his control clearly precarious. “Until we get it, don’t ever accuse me of hurting him again.”

  Looking as furious as he sounded, he strode away.

  Callie Mae watched him go.

  Well. It seemed she’d pushed him to the edge, but it had to be done. Who knew what he would do when she fell asleep and turned vulnerable?

  Yet she remained rooted where she stood, her eyes staying on him while he moved past the horses to a clearing. And when she lost sight of him briefly, she shifted her stance a little, looking for him, then finding him, from over her mount’s neck.

  He’d gathered a small pile of branches, squatted and lit a fire, his back to her while he worked the embers. Flames flickered and flared, bathing the camp with a gossamer glow.

  Callie Mae had never been a coward, but she was reluctant to step from around her horse just yet. TJ could hardly see her here, deep in the shadows. Given his dark mood, he might not appreciate her staring.

  But she couldn’t help it.

  Her gaze dallied over his shoulders and the way his shirt stretched over their breadth when he moved. His torso tapered to a lean waist; the denim of his Levi’s pulled taut across the corded muscle of his thighs and the curve of his buttocks.

  Her veins stirred with awareness all over again.

  TJ Grier was pure cowboy. Pure male. Strong and capable and driven.

  As much as she hated to admit it, Callie Mae had always known that about him. He would never have earned her parents’ respect and that of the entire C Bar C outfit if he wasn’t those things—and more.

  Unexpectedly, something elusive and unsettling stirred inside Callie Mae.

  A softening.

  She had to stop it before it got worse.

  Thinking about TJ as anything more than being responsible for Danny’s death was foolish, and her staring was only a product of their circumstances. He’d put a gun to her head, for pity’s sake. Forced her to be alone with him. What else could she do but keep an eye on him?

  Callie Mae dragged her gaze away, began untying her bedroll from behind the saddle and put Kullen in her thoughts instead.

  Dear, handsome Kullen.

  Thinking of him gave her comfort and reminded her how well-groomed he always looked with his hair combed and shined with tonic. How delicious he smelled with expensive cologne smoothed on his skin, too. He had impeccable taste in his clothing, his suits a perfect fit. Charming and intelligent, often amusing and insightful, Kullen was as far from a cowboy as one could be.

  Which was why she loved him, she reminded herself firmly. He was different than the other men she’d known while growing up on the C Bar C. Refined and worldly.

  Boot steps crunched the dirt, and her thoughts jumped right back to TJ. He approached his horse and busied himself untying his bedroll, too. Ignoring her. As if he didn’t care if she stayed or left.

  Her lips thinned. He acted as if she’d offended him with her warning not to hurt her. What did he think she should do? Trust him? After what had happened with Danny?

  Yet, a tiny voice insisted if he intended to hurt her, he would’ve done so by now. God knew he’d had plenty of opportunity while they’d ridden together tonight, both of them alone on the Texas range these past hours.

  She pulled off the bedroll and threw it over her shoulder.

  Maybe she’d been wrong to accuse him.

  “Set it over by the fire,” TJ ordered, dropping his own bedroll to the ground while he took off the saddlebags.

  The gruffness in his voice did little to soothe her mood, but she knew better than to argue. After doing what he instructed, she headed back toward her horse and busied herself unbuckling the cinch.

  She took a breath, then let it out again.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Carrying the saddlebags in one hand, the bedroll in the other, he turned and headed toward the fire, adding his gear to hers.

  “For what?” he asked, coming back.

  “You know very well ‘for what.’”

  “Remind me.”

  Damn him. “For saying you’d hurt me and for thinking you might.”

  He grunted, bent over the cinch on his own saddle. “What changed your mind?”

  The strap on hers dangled; she reached up to grasp the cantle and horn, a hand on each, and paused. “I suppose it’s from having known you for so long. It’s not something you—” she hesitated, searching for the right words “—you would’ve done. Before Danny died, at least.”

  “Not after, either.”

  Rising up on tiptoe, she tightened her grip and pulled off the saddle. “Time will tell, won’t it?”

  He scowled. “I’ve known you since you were a scrawny kid in pigtails, Callie Mae. I’ve watched you grow up into a beautiful woman.” He tugged the saddle from his horse, too. “The C Bar C is the only home I’ve ever known. I don’t even want to think what kind of life I would’ve had if Carina hadn’t taken me in.”

  In that, Callie Mae believed him. Maggie hadn’t latched on to mothering like most women did. She’d never been strong enough for it. TJ had been left to fend for himself at an early age, but he’d thrived at the ranch, among the C Bar C outfit, and his skill with horses had grown year after year.

  “So why would I throw away a damned good life by hurting the only real family I’ve ever known?” he demanded. “Maggie excepted.”

  “Do
you think I haven’t asked myself that very thing, oh, a million times or so?”

  “Well, you can stop asking yourself, Callie Mae,” he shot back. “Because I wouldn’t.”

  An unexpected welling of tears had her whirling away from him. If he didn’t sound so sincere, so blamably determined to make her believe him…

  She didn’t want her hate for him to slip. She didn’t want to feel this ridiculous doubt.

  TJ was guilty of killing Danny. He’d admitted as much in front of the judge, so why should he stand here and expect her to believe anything but that?

  She missed Kullen. When she was with him, she never had doubts about TJ. Not like this.

  “In case you have any crazy ideas about running back to your precious intended the minute my back is turned,” TJ said with appalling perception, his voice low with warning. “Don’t.” He dropped his saddle next to the pile of bedrolls. “You’re liable to get lost out here. And the range is full of the wild.”

  “It’d serve you right if I did run back to him.” Callie Mae knew she sounded petulant, but there was no help for it. It was how she felt about this predicament she found herself in, being with TJ and all confused. “But I’m not stupid.”

  “I’ve never known you to be, so don’t start now.”

  She dropped her saddle next to his and gave full concentration to readying her bedroll for the night. She shook out the blanket, laid it over the patch of grass nearest the fire, then smoothed it on top, hoping if she pretended he wasn’t there, he’d go away.

  He didn’t.

  “Have you slept with him, Callie Mae?” he demanded.

  Her gaze darted to him on a small gasp. “Kullen?”

  “And don’t tell me it’s none of my business, because I’m making it mine.”

  She stood and faced him square. Firelight flickered across the strong angles of his face. The hard line of his mouth. He held her gaze with his own, intense beneath the Stetson’s brim.

  The tentacles of a lie formed on her tongue. It’d serve him right if she told him she’d shared a bed with Kullen before their marriage. She could make up all sorts of lurid details and throw them in his face. Retribution for his audacity in asking such a personal question.

  But she didn’t.

  She was a Lockett, after all. She refused to stoop so low.

  “Think what you want about me marrying Kullen, TJ, but the answer to your question is no. I’ve never slept with him or anyone else, for that matter.”

  The barest hint of a smile softened his hard mouth.

  “Good,” he said. “Very good.”

  He poked his bedroll, then, with the toe of his boot. The thing began to unfurl, little by little, until it stretched out straight, right next to hers.

  Seeing those blankets laying so close together, Callie Mae’s mouth went dry.

  “Well, then, Miss Lockett,” he drawled. “Looks like I get to be the first.”

  Chapter Eight

  “Will I walk again?”

  Kullen’s voice shook from dread as he pinned his gaze on the white-haired surgeon bent over him.

  “I removed the bullet, but it hit the bone and scattered fragments. I cleaned the surrounding muscle as best I could.” Doctor Feldman lifted Kullen’s sleeve and injected the morphine that would stave off pain so fiery that Kullen was tempted to chop off his leg to be free from it. “However, the chances for blood poisoning are high.”

  Kullen’s flesh turned clammy. The man avoided looking at him—and had yet to answer his question.

  “But will I walk?” he demanded.

  “With help.” Feldman removed the needle, pressed a piece of cotton against the skin to blot a drop of blood. “I hope.”

  Kullen swallowed. “What kind of help?”

  “Until the leg has a chance to heal, I’m afraid you’ll be on a long period of bed rest. Then, once you’re strong enough, a wheelchair will be necessary. Perhaps you’ll use a cane, eventually, if you’re able.”

  Kullen’s heart pounded in horror.

  A wheelchair? A cane, if he was able?

  “The leg will always be weak,” Feldman continued, straightening. “Unfortunately, you won’t walk unassisted in some way—” he hesitated “—for the rest of your life.”

  The news was worse than Kullen feared. Nausea roiled in his stomach. Rage. TJ Grier had cold-bloodedly maimed him, and if Kullen could, he’d heave himself out of his hospital bed, hunt TJ down and put him through the same kind of misery. Or maybe he’d just shoot TJ dead where he stood—

  “Right now, rest is the best thing for you, Mr. Brosius.” The surgeon gave him a medicinal smile. “I’ll be by in the morning to check on you.”

  He patted Kullen’s shoulder and left.

  Kullen gaped at the closed door. Wasn’t there something else Feldman could do? Another kind of surgery to make him whole again?

  His head fell back against the pillow. He didn’t deserve this. Not when he was so close. So damned close to marrying Callie Mae.

  Despair rolled through him. A cattlewoman like her, heiress to the almighty C Bar C ranch, she could have any man she wanted.

  She wouldn’t want a cripple who couldn’t walk across the room by himself.

  Kullen’s breathing quickened. He could get sick, too, like Feldman warned.

  The chances for blood poisoning are high…

  He might die.

  The despair intensified, the certainty he’d all but lost his chance to get his hands on the C Bar C and that pile of beautiful money Callie Mae stood to inherit.

  But the worst, the absolute worst, was being deprived of a prime opportunity for revenge against her stepfather.

  He closed his eyes and groaned, allowing himself to fall backward in time to remember how Penn McClure left him orphaned and penniless a decade ago.

  As the son of Bill Brockway, a master counterfeiter, Kullen had been given a taste of the riches that illicit boodle could bring. Until McClure, then a government agent, found his father and killed him in the hallway of Denver’s Brown Palace Hotel.

  Not even the drug numbing Kullen’s mind could help him forget his struggles to survive afterward. His vow to get even.

  Callie Mae had given him the perfect opportunity, thanks to her grandmother, Mavis. The old biddy never suspected that he intended to use her precious granddaughter for his revenge. Even better, Callie Mae never did, either. The spoiled bitch was too busy living her life of comfort to ever guess his intentions.

  Kullen gritted his teeth. He’d worked hard at getting this far with his plan. Years’ worth of hard work. He’d changed his name to Brosius. Plotted and schemed. Spent half of his life waiting to triumph.

  And now TJ Grier had ruined it for him.

  “Kullen. You doing all right?”

  Kullen dragged himself out of the past and opened his eyes. His cousin, Emmett Ralston, stood beside his bed. He still wore his faded blue shirt and dirty denims from earlier in the day when he played groomer for TJ at Preston Farm.

  Kullen hadn’t heard him come in. He strained to focus on the bearded face.

  “Does it look like I’m all right?” he muttered, tried to sit up and failed. He cursed his pain, his weakness. “Where have you been?”

  “Following Grier and the Lockett woman, but I lost them in the dark.” Emmett’s hooded gaze took him in. “Did the jockey and Grier’s mother bring you here?”

  “Yes.” Kullen had been forced to lie in the back of the wagon like a helpless sack of potatoes, and the ride to Amarillo had been agony. “Took forever to get to this damned hospital.”

  “How bad’s your leg?” Emmett asked, frowning.

  “Bad.”

  “What’re you going to do?”

  “Not much I can do but lay here, is there?” he snapped.

  Kullen closed his eyes again. He had to find a way to track down Callie Mae and convince her he could still be the husband she’d always believed he would be. He had to salvage his dream for revenge befor
e it was too late.

  “He knows something,” Emmett said.

  Kullen’s thinking wavered, and he opened his eyes again. “Who?”

  “Grier.”

  He fought to comprehend. “How do you know he does?”

  “He claimed it, back at Boomer’s.”

  Kullen tried to remember and failed. He blamed the morphine, the way the drug turned his brain soft.

  “What did he say?” The demand sounded slurred, but he couldn’t help it.

  Emmett kept watching him. “He said you were responsible for killin’ McClure’s kid. That the way you were acting proved it.”

  Kullen replayed the scene in his mind and couldn’t think of what he’d done to make TJ know he was responsible for anything. Except being determined to take Blue from him. “He can’t prove a thing.”

  “No,” Emmett said.

  “You were careful, weren’t you?”

  “I told you I was.”

  Sleep beckoned. The bliss of peace. Freedom from pain. The worries of revenge and fears of failure.

  “Tell me what you want me to do,” Emmett said quietly.

  Kullen took comfort in his cousin’s loyalty. They were like brothers, the two of them. They needed each other to survive. To triumph. Emmett would do whatever Kullen told him. He always had. That’s how it was between them.

  Kullen gave the orders. Emmett obeyed them.

  And time was running out.

  “Find TJ and kill him,” he whispered. “Then bring Callie Mae to me.”

  TJ woke the next morning knowing he had to tell her what he’d done.

  He stacked his hands beneath his head and stared up into the inky sky. Dawn had yet to dribble hues of pink and orange along the horizon, but it would soon. By then, TJ intended to be up and ready to ride.

  Which meant if he wanted to talk, he had to do it now.

  He’d spent most of the night debating the wisdom of telling Callie Mae what little he knew. His secret had been secret for so long, it downright scared him to bring everything out into the open with her.

  He had no idea how she’d handle what he had to say, but she deserved to know. Might be she’d quit fighting him on his need to find Blue. Maybe quit hating him so much, too. Regardless, TJ hoped to convince her she couldn’t marry Kullen Brosius. By the time things were said and done, she’d know TJ would fight to keep her from it.