Here Comes Trouble (22 page)

Joel took her hips in his hands and lifted her
then in one motion he buried himself in her body. He groaned and
Terri could feel his heart pounding against her breasts.

"That feels...incredible," he hissed near her
ear. After a few short shallow breaths, he lifted her a little
higher then slid out of her and back in slowly. The burn and
stretch of her body to accommodate him had Terri gasping and her
fingers digging into his shoulders.

"Am I hurting you, baby?" he asked, his body
stilling.

"No, feels...incredible," she repeated his
words and dug her heels into the mattress to move against him.
"More, Joel..." she told him frantically.

With a growl, he rocked his hips against hers
and set a rhythm that brought her upward toward another climax with
every stroke. Her body tightened around him as she reached another
peak and Joel's fingers dug into her ass as he shouted his
release.

Joel collapsed onto the bed beside her and
pulled her into his arms. Terri snuggled her nose into his neck and
kissed him there. "That was amazing," she whispered then felt sleep
pulling at her. She was exhausted, it was morning and she hadn't
slept all night. In Joel's strong arms, it didn't take her long to
relax and drift off.

After a minute, Joel looked down at her and
kissed the top of her head. "You're amazing, sweetheart," he told
her with emotion clogging his throat. He had to get Karen out of
here, before she found out. There was no way he was going to let
Terri go, or hurt her again.

Laying there for a few minutes, until he was
sure she was asleep, he eased his arm from under her head without
waking her. He'd gotten pretty good at doing that during his flavor
of the month stage. This time though, he was sneaking out to make
sure she stayed with him, not to make sure he got away.

Quietly, he put on his clothes and boots, then
slipped out of the door closing it silently behind him. Once he got
down the hall, he headed out the front door and stalked toward the
bunkhouse. He didn't see any lights on out there yet, so he figured
Karen was still sleeping. The sun was just coming up beyond the
trees behind the bunkhouse. Peace settled over him and Joel took a
deep gulp of the fresh morning air. His gaze moved to the patchy
morning fog rolling over the pasture. This is why he chose to come
back to the country, he thought. It was the place that always made
him feel safe, where he could relax and be himself.

Even with all the preparations and chaos of
the construction, he felt like he'd come home at this ranch. There
was peace to be found here, calmness for his soul.

That's what Terri was like for him too, he
thought. She was a city-girl, but the country for his soul. Joel
felt better than he had in years. His insides were light, his
problems didn't seem insurmountable. As long as he could get rid of
the one sleeping in his bunkhouse.

He walked to the door and went inside, it was
unlocked which surprised him. Joel had left Karen at the front door
yesterday, so he had no idea which room she'd chosen to occupy. He
went through the kitchen and down each of the halls, checking the
rooms, until he found the one he assumed she'd picked, because the
door was open. Shoving it open wider, he looked around the room and
saw the bed was messed up, clothes were strewn over the floor, but
there was no sign of his ex-wife.

Joel headed back down the hall and checked
both bathrooms and found no sign of her. He went back outside to
see if her car was still in the back, but stopped on the doorstep
when he heard a faint scream split the quite morning. It came from
the direction of the big house, and it had to be blood-curdling,
because the house was not nearby. Fear slammed into his gut and he
took off running. Terri was alone at the house and the thought that
something had happened to her scared the shit out of
him.

A ray of sunlight came through the window by
the bed and pierced through the veil of Terri's eyelids. She opened
one eye and the light pierced her brain. Turning her face to the
side she inhaled Joel's scent on the pillow next to her and smiled.
Patting the mattress beside her, she realized that Joel wasn't in
the bed with her anymore and her smile slipped.

Looks like Joel was the love 'em and leave 'em
type, and that pissed her off.

Terri had always believed if she was good
enough to rip up the sheets with, she was good enough to stay the
night and sleep with. That was one thing she was going to get
straight with him right now.

There would be no sneaking out after she went
to sleep like she was a dirty secret.

She threw back the covers and yawned then
rubbed her eyes. Her clothes were scattered everywhere, so she
picked them up and slid them on then went to find Joel. He was
probably in his bedroom, so that's where she headed. After she
knocked and there was no answer, she twisted the knob expecting it
to be locked, but it wasn't. She pushed open the door and her
breath froze in her throat.

Terri had seen dead bodies in her line of
work, knew what they looked like, and it was obvious to her that
the woman lying sprawled half-on and half-off the bed was dead. A
scream worked itself up from her toes, gathered in her chest then
forced itself past her frozen lips. It felt like it took a full
minute for the scream to conclude, and her heart to start working
again.

Her dazed brain finally comprehended what she
was seeing. Karen Rhodes was in Joel's bed, naked and dead. Or she
thought she was. Terri's whole body shook violently as she ran over
to the bed to see if the woman was alive.

She wasn't moving, and it sure as hell looked
like she wasn't breathing either. Terri knelt beside her body and
felt her neck for a pulse and her skin was cold to the
touch.

"Good, god what happened?" she heard Joel
shout from down the hall, then he ran into the room. She didn't
look at him, she couldn't. Terri wasn't even going to start
speculating about the whys of the situation.

"Joel, call 911!" she instructed then got off
the bed and shoved Karen's legs up onto the bed. Straddling her,
she ran her fingers up the woman's breastbone, Terri found Karen's
sternum and started chest compressions. She glanced back over her
shoulder at Joel who was standing there with a dumbfounded look on
his face. "Move, Joel!" she yelled and kept up her
compressions.

Dark purple bruises on either side of Karen's
neck caught Terri's attention. The pattern looked a lot like
fingers had squeezed her there. Someone had strangled the woman she
thought, and fear shot through Terri. Karen and Joel had been
arguing when she left, she hoped like hell it hadn't gotten this
bad.

He wouldn't do this, she tried to convince
herself. But he had been extremely angry with Karen last night. If
he knew she was in here dead though, surely he couldn't have made
love to her just down the hall?

The fact that Karen was naked in Joel's bed
didn't escape Terri either, but she filed it away to think about
later. While she was trying to breathe life into a dead woman was
not the time.

Terri stopped and felt for a pulse again, and
found nothing.

She couldn't wrap her mind around Joel doing
something like this to his ex-wife. He might hate her, but Terri
didn't think there was any way he was capable of murder.

If it wasn't Joel though, who could it
be?

Why the hell was Karen still at the ranch
anyway?

Questions flew rapid fire through her dazed
mind, and she couldn't answer any of them. Figuring out who did
this to her wasn't Terri's job though. Trying to revive this woman
was, but she didn't have much hope of success. Karen's body was
cold and Rigor Mortis had started setting in, her lips were blue
and so was her skin. Evidently, she had been unresponsive for quite
a while. Definitely longer than an hour or two, which is how long
she'd been sleeping and Joel hadn't been in bed with
her.

If Joel did this, he would have had to do it
before he left the ranch to come to the hospital. The guests had
been upstairs, and everyone except Dylan had been at the bonfire
when she left. Surely someone would have heard her
scream?

After twenty minutes of working on Karen,
Terri looked at the bedside clock and noted the time, then she
scooted off the bed and picked up the comforter from the floor and
tossed it over Karen's body. At least in death, she wanted to give
the woman some dignity. Everyone, even someone like her, deserved
that. Tears burned behind her eyes and bile pushed up into her
throat.

"Keep trying!" Joel said frantically when he
walked back into the room a minute later. He ran over to the bed
and grabbed the edge of the comforter, and Terri grabbed his arm to
stop him.

"She's gone, Joel," Terri told him
sympathetically, then put her arm around him and led him out of the
room. He stumbled along with her and she could tell he was in
shock. At the end of the hall, he stopped and leaned down with his
hands on his knees, then dry heaved a couple of times. She rubbed
the middle of his back then led him over to the sofa and told him
to sit down.

It was early in the morning, just after eight
o'clock, but he needed a drink. Terri did too, but she wasn't going
to have one until she talked to the authorities who were going to
be here any minute. Walking over to the liquor cabinet, Terri
pulled down a glass and filled it with whiskey she found on the top
shelf. Joel needed the good stuff. Maybe it would help
him.

If he'd done this to Karen though, she was
afraid nothing was going to help him.

At this point, all she could be thankful for
was that the guests and cowhands were out on the cattle drive. She
and Joel were the only ones in the house. Terri walked back over to
him and closed his hand around the glass.

"Drink, baby," she told him and lifted his
shaking hand and the glass to his white lips. He shook his head and
pushed it back to her.

His voice was hoarse and trembled when he
said, "Who the hell could have done this?"

Although his words gave her comfort, she still
wasn't convinced. Who else would have hated Karen Rhodes enough to
kill her? Terri was afraid the police were going to ask the same
question, and hearing the sirens getting closer, she knew they were
going to be here any minute.

Terri took the cell phone from Joel's hand and
scrolled through his call list until she found Chase's number. Joel
needed his brother, because Terri wasn't sure she was going to be
able to help him. She wasn't sure she was even going to stay here.
Her head was swirling with doubts, concerns...fear.

Terri cared about Joel, hell she might as well
admit it, she loved the man. Even though she wanted to believe he
had nothing to do with Karen's death, all the fingers in her mind
pointed toward him. And that made her feel damned guilty. He isn't
that kind of man, she reprimanded her runaway mind.

If he had done it though, there was no way she
could support him, or stay to see him sentenced for it. She would
give her statement, but she was telling the truth. There wouldn't
be any sugarcoating of the facts from her. The guests had heard the
arguments, the cowhands had heard them too. Terri had heard them,
and Joel was here with Karen after she left for the hospital. He
had time, he had the opportunity, and definitely had the motive to
kill her. If he didn't do it, on the outside the facts were pretty
damning.

If they arrested Joel, Terri might as well go
back to Henrietta and try and put her life back together. She felt
sure her brother would let her stay with him for a little while to
get her head right. She and Ethan had their arguments, mostly about
the danger he sought out in the name of entertainment, but she knew
Ethan loved her, and would support her.

Ethan was rarely home anyway. When he
wasn't working as a firefighter and a search-and-rescue paramedic,
he was off on his next adventure. The more extreme the adventure,
the better in Ethan's eyes. He'd climbed mountains, run with the
bulls in Pamplona, dived at the Great Barrier Reef with sharks, and
regularly rock climbed, hang-glided and rode his motorcycle like a
bat out of hell.

His job as a firefighter and paramedic in
Henrietta and on the Texas Task Force 2 Urban Search and Rescue
Unit kind of went hand in hand with his adrenaline junky
personality, and was just as dangerous as his hobbies. The
situations he encountered and the people he rescued were often in
precarious places where he could get killed. Wells, caves, river
rapids, wrecked cars, collapsed and burning buildings, you name it
and he threw himself into danger without thinking about himself
first.

Although she was proud of him and what he did,
Terri thought her brother had a death wish, and it scared the hell
out of her.

Wasn't she just as crazy as Ethan though? She
had just admitted to herself that she was in love with Joel Rhodes,
a potential murderer. Maybe she had a death wish too.

The sirens got louder, and their wail broke
her from the haze that had seized her brain. She pushed Chase's
number and waited for him to answer.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Cold from head to foot, Terri stood right
inside the doorway of the bedroom, as the paramedic who'd just
arrived examined Karen's body. The police that arrived with the
first responders were in the front room talking to Joel. Chase was
on his way, Terri sure wished he'd hurry up.