Deceived (9 page)

Jack cursed under his breath. “Hal was right, then. We do have a leak.”

“Yeah,” Will confirmed. “And if I'm right about who's behind it, my father won't have died in vain.”

Sarah didn't realize she'd dozed off until her head bumped the window. She moaned, rubbing the point of impact. “Damn it.”

“Sorry.”

She turned to Luke and laughed a little. “There are nicer ways to wake me up, you know.”

His dark eyes seemed to go darker. “I'll keep that in mind.”

The intensity of his gaze made her look away, the innuendo in his words impossible to mistake. “So where are we?” she asked, glad to divert her attention to the surrounding area. The landscape had changed considerably since the last time she'd noticed. Gone was the interstate and the heavy traffic. They were now driving along wooded roads with only the occasional passing car or truck.

“We're about half an hour from my house,” he told her. “I called ahead and asked my caretaker to go shopping for groceries and stock the pantry, but if we need to get anything else, we should still be able to make a quick trip to town and back before they roll up the sidewalks.”

Sarah turned her attention back to him. “How remote is this place?”

He grinned. “Remote enough.”

“Did you grow up in this area?” she asked.

The question seemed to make him squirm a little. “No. Not really. When my mom left my dad, we went back to the rez for a while, but she was a horse trainer, so we traveled wherever the job was—and my dad wasn't. He showed up every now and then, drunk, looking for us and determined to persuade Mom to come back to him. Which usually cost her whatever job she had at the time, so off we'd go again.”

Sarah shook her head a little, trying to put together all the pieces of information he'd just imparted. Clearly, his upbringing had been far different from her own. “The rez?” she repeated. “You're Native American then?”

He gave a terse nod. “Cheyenne. Well, my mom was. My dad was white—and a drunken, abusive asshole. Mom met him when she was in college. He was from a wealthy family, trust fund kid. Mom had grown up with next to nothing. The way she told it, he was charming when he wanted to be, and she was swept off her feet. But they'd only been married a couple of years before things went to shit.”

“I'm sorry,” she told him. “My parents went through a nasty divorce as well. My mom left and never looked back. Did you spend much time with your mom's family?”

He shook his head. “Nah, I never saw my family. My grandparents were already dead, and my mom wasn't close to her siblings. They were traditional and saw her as a sellout, like she left because she thought she was too good for them. I wasn't really raised in my culture, never had any roots.”

“So how did you settle here?” she prompted, curious to hear the rest of his story.

His expression grew dark, filled with sorrow, and his voice was heavy with emotion as he continued, “My mom got a job with a rancher named Jim Hadley. He was a widower with a young daughter. After a while, he and my mom fell for each other and got married. I was a smart-mouthed, asshole teenager—always getting in trouble, skipping school, barely passing. I seemed hell-bent on following in my useless father's footsteps. But Jim was a good guy and forced me to pull my head out of my ass and see I was breaking my mom's heart. He turned my life around. It was a good couple of years.”

After a long pause, Sarah prompted, “But?”

“But my mom got cancer,” he said. “She died right after my high school graduation. Jim tried to convince me to stay on and help him with the ranch, learn the business so that I could eventually take things over with his daughter, but I couldn't handle it. Had to get away. So I joined the army, eventually moving into Special Forces for a while.”

Sarah waited, studying his profile as he drove. His jaw was clenched, his gaze intent, but she had a feeling he was focused more on the past than the present, reliving that time in his life. “So you were in Special Forces when you were recruited to the Alliance?” she supplied.

He seemed to snap back to that moment and sent a guarded glance her way. “No. I was working on a special assignment for the government when I was recruited.”

She shook her head a little, confused. “With whom? The CIA?”

“No.” Clearly, he wasn't comfortable sharing any more about that time.

“And your home here . . . ?” she pressed, switching gears.

“I received a signing bonus when I joined the Alliance,” he told her. “I was told to create a ‘safe haven,' a place where I could go to decompress—because I'd need it.”

Sarah's eyes went wide. “Well that sounds ominous.”

He acknowledged her comments with a brief glance and shrugged. “I was used to ominous. Anyway, I used the money to purchase a couple hundred acres of Jim's land—”

“—and built my own ranch, purchased my own horses and cattle to help Jim supplement his income. This was the only place I'd ever really been happy, the only place that'd ever felt like home. It seemed like the best place to settle.”

At that moment, Luke turned off the main road, such as it was, and onto a dirt and gravel path that Sarah assumed was supposed to be a road, based on the two well-worn tire tracks.

After maybe a half mile on the road, they came to a split-rail fence with two tall posts and a rail across the top with a carved sign bearing the name H
AVEN
R
ANCH
.
They traveled for maybe a couple of miles more along the road, which was now lined with the split-rail fence, before a log cabin came into view.

But it was a log cabin only in the sense that it was made from stone and logs. The two-story structure had three stone chimneys, one of which already had a fire going in it, as evidenced by the curl of smoke that tickled the sky. A porch stretched the entire length of the house and had at least half a dozen bentwood rocking chairs arranged in three groupings perfect for intimate conversations.

In the distance, Sarah spotted a barn nearly as large as the house itself and another outbuilding of some sort. Beyond that was a corral where two horses meandered. And as they drew closer, Sarah saw the last of the early evening sunlight dancing upon a river that curved behind a copse of trees and disappeared into the low hills. And all the beauty of the property was framed by snowcapped mountains.

“My God,” Sarah breathed. “Luke, I've never seen anything so beautiful.”

He offered her a smile that made her heart trip over itself. “I'm glad you like it.”

“Like it?” Sarah said with a laugh as he parked the SUV in the gravel driveway. “How could I not? It's breathtaking. It's—”

Sarah's words died on her lips as the front door opened and a statuesque woman with a long, thick blond braid draped over her shoulder stepped out onto the porch, waving enthusiastically. The woman jogged toward them, her smile pure sunshine in her lovely face.

Luke chuckled low and got out of the SUV, meeting the woman halfway and sweeping her into a hug that lifted her from her feet.

“Who's that?”

Sarah glanced back at Eli, who'd finally removed his earbuds and turned off the e-reader Luke had bought him at the mall. “I have no idea.”

“Whoa. Is this Mr. Rogan's
house?
” Eli asked, losing interest in the woman chatting animatedly with their host. Sarah wished she could do the same. But it was difficult to plaster a smile on her face as she got out of the Expedition and followed Eli toward the house.

“Hi!” the woman said, her eyes dancing. She was gorgeous, Sarah had to admit. “Welcome to Haven!”

“Sarah,” Luke said, “this is my caretaker, Melanie.”

Melanie grasped Sarah's hand and shook it with a laugh. “Caretaker? That's putting it mildly. This guy might look big and tough, but he'd be totally lost without me looking after this place while he's away on whatever new secret mission the army has him on.”

Sarah sent a glance Luke's way and received an almost imperceptible shake of the head. Obviously, Melanie thought he was still in the military.

“This is Eli,” Sarah said, bringing her son close.

Melanie then turned the full glory of her smile on Eli and had a new admirer in an instant. “Hey there, big guy! Welcome to Haven. Do you want a tour while Luke and your mom get everything settled?”

Eli sent a pleading glance up at Sarah, who in turn sent a silent question Luke's way. He nodded, indicating it was safe to let Eli go.

“All right,” she agreed. “But listen to Ms. Melanie and do what she says.”

As soon as Eli and Melanie were on their way to the horse corral and safely out of earshot, Sarah said, “She's very pretty.”

Luke sent a frown Sarah's way as he started pulling out the bags of clothes and other supplies from the back of the SUV. “Mel? Yeah, I guess.”

Sarah cleared her throat and grabbed her fair share of the bags. “You two seem pretty close.”

Luke nodded as they headed toward the porch steps. “I wouldn't trust anyone else to help me run this place when I'm away.”

Sarah hadn't thought her heart could sink any further, but it did. “Have you been together long?”

Luke came to such an abrupt stop on the porch that Sarah nearly collided with him. “Together?” He turned and peered down at Sarah for a long moment, his eyes narrowed, a slight grimace curling his lips. “We're not together. Mel's Jim's daughter. She's my stepsister.”

Sarah closed her eyes, her face going warm in an instant. If Luke had had any doubts about the fact that she was attracted to him, she'd pretty much shown her hand with her idiotic assumptions.

“C'mon,” Luke said, giving her a slight nudge with his elbow. “Let me show you around the house.”

Sarah opened her eyes in time to see him no longer attempting to smother a grin as he strode into the cabin. Fortunately, her humiliation was replaced by awe when she entered the house.

The front door opened into a great room with vaulted ceilings supported by exposed beams. A fire blazed in a stone fireplace along one wall. On the other side of the great room was the entrance to what Sarah could see was a kitchen, but she wasn't prepared for how large and modern the kitchen was. She'd expected something far simpler—but aside from the décor, the only thing remotely rustic was a brick oven.

He gestured to a wooden door tucked into one side of the kitchen. “That leads down to the basement. My gym's down there—you're welcome to use it, if you'd like. And I'll give you the code to the storage room in case of an emergency.”

Her brows lifted. “What exactly do you store there?”

“Weapons.” He jerked his head. “C'mon. The dining room's this way.”

The dining room could've seated twelve easily—and maybe then some—but it didn't look like it had ever been used. The library was a different story. The furniture had the look of having been sat in often, and the books weren't just showpieces.

There was another room at the end of the house, but Luke skipped over that one, instead leading Sarah upstairs to the loft overlooking the great room. Inside the loft was a huge TV mounted on the wall and several different gaming consoles.

“Bit of a gamer?” Sarah said, brows raised.

Luke shrugged. “Helps me unwind. Plus, I have to keep my skills up or the other guys'll kick my ass.”

Along the hall were four doors. They passed the first one—presumably Luke's bedroom, based on the glimpse Sarah got of a huge carved bed and simple, masculine comforter. The next room was just as simple, but the bed was covered in a patchwork quilt of red, blue, white, and green, and lovely landscape paintings hung on the walls. The room had its own en suite as well as a separate sitting and dressing area.

“You can sleep in here,” Luke said, ushering her inside, then setting down all but two of the bags just inside the doorway. “My office and a room for Eli are down the hall. I'll let you get settled.”

Sarah turned to thank him again for harboring her and her son, but he'd already gone without a sound. She shook her head with a laugh. “I've got to find out how he does that. . . .”

She didn't waste any time putting away the clothes and other items they'd purchased to get them by for a few days. Then she took a few moments to explore the room a little. On the bedside table, in a silver frame, was a photo of a beautiful Native American woman with a radiant smile and wide dark eyes that even in the photograph seemed to dance with light. Her arms were lovingly wrapped around a dark-haired boy of maybe Eli's age. He was laughing so hard his eyes were squeezed shut, but there was no mistaking the boy's identity.

Sarah picked up the photo to study it a little closer, grinning at the obvious love between mother and son. “So Luke
did
know how to laugh at some point. . . .”

She was still grinning when she set the photo aside and strolled around the room, studying the paintings. They were skillfully done, but not museum quality—more a labor of love. She squinted at the signature. LYLA YOUNGBEAR.

Pounding footsteps in the hallway brought her out of her thoughts, and a moment later, Eli raced into the room, his cheeks flushed with excitement. “Mom! Have you seen this house? It's so cool! It's like four
times
the size of ours! And Mr. Rogan has a huge TV and all kinds of games like
Halo
and
Fallout
and
Mass Effect
and
Call of Duty
.... And the horses are
so
awesome! Ms. Melanie said that she'd teach me how to ride, too. Is that okay, Mom? Is it?”