The Littlest Cowboy (17 page)

“I have to tell you something, Garrett,” Chelsea said, and her voice was as soft as goose down.

“What’s that?”

She drew a breath, sighed again. Those damned sighs of hers were tickling his skin, and he battled the urge to pull her closer. So he could really
feel
her, as the singer kept suggesting.

“I’m scared.”

She said it in a sudden gust as if forcing the words out. Garrett’s feet stopped moving, and he looked down into her face. Her beautiful face. He was beginning to feel like a real jerk for leading her on like this. If it wasn’t for the fact that she’d end up dead if she ran off, he’d cut the act here and now. It wasn’t exactly the most chivalrous thing he’d ever done.

“Of me?”

“No. I tried to be, but…you’re just not a very scary kind of man.”

He lifted his brows. “Is that a compliment or a slam, lady?”

“Compliment. I’ve never met a man I wasn’t afraid of, deservedly or not. But you…you’re different.”

“Different how?”

She shrugged and moved closer, laying her head on his shoulder, nudging him into motion again. He tightened his arms around her waist and held her close, then began dancing again.

But now the singer was advising him to really taste her, and it was beginning to get on his nerves.

She’d probably taste just like sugar.

“I’m not sure,” she said, and he had to think a minute to remember the question. “You’re gentle, for one thing. Everything you do, you do…gently.’’

“And you like that?”

“Mmm.”

“Glad to hear it. I’m doing one thing right, then.”

“More than one thing,” she said, and her voice was beginning to take on a lazy quality that made him nervous.

“You’re also honest. You don’t play games, just say what you mean straight out. I like that, too.”

Garrett closed his eyes as a shaft of guilt the size of a Mack truck drove right through him.

“So the least I can do is be honest with you in return.”

Taken aback, he stopped dancing again. Hell, she had been. Hadn’t she? “About what?” he asked. He looked into her eyes again, saw them staring up at him, trusting him. He was scum.

“About…us. This…thing between us.”

Wait a minute. There was no
thing
between them. He’d made that up. No, Jessi had.

“I feel it, too,” Chelsea went on.

“You do?”

She nodded. “I….” She lowered her head. “I want you just as much as you want me.”

“You do?”
It was all Garrett could do not to stagger backward.

She looked up again, smiled just a little. “Yeah, I do. So you have to believe me when I tell you that if I was going to get involved with any man, it would be you.”

“It would?” Dammit, couldn’t he do more than repeat her every word?

“But I’m not. I made that decision a long time ago, Garrett. There will never be a man in my life. And I will never, ever, fall in love.”

He sighed in abject relief. Thank God. Thank God. At least this way, she wouldn’t be hurt when she found out this had all been an act to get her to stay here.

“I just thought you should know that. So you won’t be…you know…hurt. When I leave.”

“Leave?”

Was there an echo in here?

“I’m glad you told me how you feel about me, Garrett. It’s just one more reason for me to go. It will be easier on you when I’m back in New York.”

“But Chelsea–”

“I can’t stay, Garrett. Especially now.” She lifted a hand to the side of his face. “You’re a special man. You deserve so much more than I can ever give.”

“I didn’t ask you to give me anything,” he said, which was, he figured, better than parroting her words and adding a question mark, but not by much.

“That’s good, because I don’t
have
anything.”

He felt like swearing. Like stomping or hitting something. Jessi and her dumb ideas. All he’d done was give Chelsea another excuse to run off. Now what the hell was he supposed to do?

He gave himself a mental kick. “I moved in too fast, scared you, didn’t I?” She shook her head in denial, but he caught her chin and stared down into her eyes. “Chelsea, I want you to stay. I want you to stay because I like you and because I’m nuts about Ethan. And because I’m scared to death of what will happen if you run off to New York alone.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can. Hell, that’s what you’ve been doing your whole life, isn’t it? But this is different, Chelsea. You have to think about little Bubba now.”

“I am thinking of him. And I owe it to him to see that his mother gets a proper burial–at home, where she belongs.”

“Dammit, Chelsea, you can do it from right here. Ship the body. Make the arrangements over the phone.”

“And miss my own sister’s funeral?”

Garrett closed his eyes, trying hard to rein in his temper. She was frustrating!

“We can have a memorial service in Quinn. We can send a bushel of flowers. Hell, Chelsea, what do you think Michele would have wanted more? You and her son safe here with us, or standing beside a hole in the ground in New York waiting for that bastard to….” He bit his lip. Too late, though.

“What bastard?”

He shook his head.

“Garrett, you know something about Ethan’s father, don’t you? Something you’re not telling me. What is it?”

The timer bell pinged from the kitchen.

“That’s dinner.” He said it with all the relief of a boxer teetering at the edge of consciousness and saved by the bell.

“I don’t give a damn about dinner. What do you know?”

He sighed long and hard, seeing his own defeat in her sparkling green eyes. “All right. I didn’t want to tell you this because I knew it would scare you. But…I found out who Ethan’s father is.”

She stood away from him, braced and waiting.

He lifted his hands to her shoulders, but she pulled free. He cleared his throat. “Did you ever hear of Vincent de Lorean?”

“Maybe. The name is familiar, but…. Should I?”

He drew another long breath. “He’s one of the most wanted criminals in Texas, Chelsea.”

She jerked back as the shock hit her. But she recovered fast, and he saw something else forming in her eyes. “Wanted…for what?”

“You name it. He’s head of the biggest organized-crime syndicate in the state. A real mover and shaker in the drug trade. Suspected of tax evasion, conspiracy, fraud, extortion…and murder. But so far no one’s ever been able to get enough evidence to put him away. He’s a powerful man, with powerful connections.”

She closed her eyes slowly, backing up until her legs hit the rocking chair and then sinking into it.

“He has people watching your place in N.Y., waiting for you to show up there with Bubba.”

She swore, using words he never would have imagined were in her vocabulary.

“You can’t go back there, Chelsea. Don’t you see that by now?”

She swallowed hard and nodded.

“You’re scared. God, I knew this would shake you. That’s why I….”

Her head came up slowly. “That’s why you what?” Then she swung her gaze around to the table, the candles, the wine. And he saw knowledge there he’d much rather not have seen. “That’s what all this was about, then? You were trying to seduce me into staying here? You thought you could make me fall head over heels in love with you and never want to leave? Damn, Garrett, what the hell were you planning to do with me once the crisis was over?”

“Chelsea, it’s not like that.”

“Don’t make it worse by lying even more. You arrogant son of a…. God, you must really be vain to think a little attention from you would be enough to….” She shook her head hard, closed her eyes. “And I fell right into it, didn’t I? Sinking into your arms and telling you….” She got to her feet, but not too steadily. “You and your brothers will have one hell of a belly laugh when you tell them what a sap I was, won’t you, Garrett?”

“No! Dammit, Chelsea, shut up and listen for a minute.”

“No, you listen. I’m leaving here. I’m taking Ethan and I’m leaving. But before I go, I need to know one thing.”

He shook his head. She was not leaving. He wouldn’t let her leave. Dammit, not when he knew she’d end up….

“Where does this bastard live?”

His thoughts came to a grinding halt at the pure venom he heard in Chelsea’s voice.

“You can’t–”

“I damn well can. And I damn well will, and if you won’t tell me where to find this animal, I’ll find someone else who can. I’ve waited almost twenty years to….” She stopped talking, was breathing rapidly.

He shook his head and went to her, and he did touch her this time. He took her shoulders in his hands and stared hard at her. “Listen to yourself. Dammit, Chelsea, you’re transferring all the rage you feel toward your father–rage you’ve been hanging on to way too long–onto a man you don’t even know. What do you think you’re gonna do? Hunt the man down and kill him?”

“Yes! Yes, dammit!”

“No. Chelsea, you gotta let go of this. It’s eating you alive.”

“I can’t let go. They have to pay. Both of them. All of them. Every man who’s ever lifted a hand to a woman…or to a child. God, Garrett, when is it going to end? Somebody has to stop them. Somebody has to say it’s enough. It’s over. No more. No more!”

She was shaking all over and was as white as a sheet. He pulled her tight against him, stroked her hair. “Chelsea, you’re right, so right. Somebody has to stop them. But you can’t do it alone. I know you want to, but you can’t. No one can. And you can’t do it by hunting every one of them down like the vermin they are. You might take out a few, but then you’d end up in prison and all the passion you feel for ending this nightmare would be wasted.”

The first sob ripped through her, followed closely by another. It tore at his guts to feel the power of her pain wrenching through her small body. He ached, dammit. He bled inside.

“I…c-can get my father…and Vincent. And after th-th-that…it’s all gravy.”

“No, baby, no. Not that way. Not that way.”

“Then h-how?”

He hooked a finger under her chin, tipped her head up and saw the tears flooding her face. He meant to look into her eyes, try to see if he could make her see sense. But instead, he lowered his mouth to her trembling lips and kissed her. He tasted the salty tears. He tasted
her.
She shuddered with her inner anguish, but she held on to him. And she opened to him. He pushed his tongue between her moist lips and met hers. He licked the roof of her mouth and then drew her tongue into his, held it there, sucked at it. Wanted more.

Then she pushed him away, and he went. He released his grip on her at the first sign she’d had enough and stood there panting as she glared up at him.

“You don’t have to pretend anymore, Garrett. It’s not going to change my mind.”

She turned and fled up the stairs.

Garrett sank into a chair, whispering the words that had leaped to his lips without rehearsal. Without one of Jessi’s little cards. Without a well-laid plan.

“I wasn’t pretending.” He blinked, feeling as dazed as a shell-shocked warrior. “Hell and damnation, I wasn’t pretending at all.”

D
espite the liniment, Chelsea ached more in the morning than she had the night before. She rolled carefully out of bed, sending a jealous glance toward Ethan. He’d slept the night through in the hand-tooled hardwood cradle and still lay there, peaceful. Content. His legs drawn up underneath him made his little butt poke upward. Chelsea smiled, wondering how anyone could sleep in that position. He seemed comfortable, though.

She pulled on a bathrobe and slipped quietly out of the bedroom. Another steamy bath would have been nice, but the running water might disturb the baby. She’d just wait until later to soak her aching muscles again. Right now, she’d settle for a cup of coffee and the soothing feel of early morning.

The kitchen was deserted. Chelsea glanced at the little clock. Only 5:13. No wonder. The others wouldn’t wake for a little while yet. She put on a fresh pot, located a cup and waited for the coffee to brew. When it was done, she took her steaming mug out onto the front porch. She sat down on the swing, leaned back and let the morning work its wonders on her. The new day crept in with its fresh, dewy air and its bird songs. The horizon glowed with brush strokes of fire and gold.

She sipped the coffee. It was beautiful here. Tranquil. But she couldn’t stay. Not now.

Her serenity slipped a notch as she recalled what a fool she’d made of herself with Garrett last night. Telling him she wanted him. Confessing she had feelings for him. For God’s sake, the man must be sadistic to let her go on like that when his side of the exchange had been no more than an act to keep her at the ranch. And that would have been reason enough to run. But what clinched it was the reason he wanted to keep her here. To protect her from an abuser and a killer. Just the way her mother used to step in and try to protect her.

And look where it had gotten Mom.

No, Chelsea didn’t have it in her to watch anyone else, even someone as misguided as Garrett Brand, step in to take on a fight that belonged to her. She couldn’t see another person hurt in her stead. And she most certainly couldn’t stay here now.

The problem was, she couldn’t go home, either.

She stared out at the horizon. There must be somewhere in the world that would be safe for her and Ethan. Somewhere, there must be a haven.

Then again, Michele had thought the same thing. She’d been running, searching for a safe haven, too. But this Vincent what’s-his-name had found her anyway. And killed her.

A nicker came from the stable, just beyond the bigger barn. Then another.

Chelsea looked in that direction, frowning. A whinny followed, and she found herself getting to her feet, tilting her head, squinting. She knew next to nothing about horses. But what she’d heard struck her as odd. Not the normal, soft sounds animals made, but more a cry of alarm. Or something.

She took another sip from the mug and lowered it to the railing. Then she started down the front steps, pausing before she stepped into the still-moist grass to remove her slippers. No sense soaking them. She tossed them behind her onto the porch and hurried barefoot across the front lawn. The dew chilled her feet and sent a little shiver dancing up her spine. It felt good.