The Littlest Cowboy (23 page)

But nothing could make him look at her. Or talk to her. Not now. If he so much as opened his mouth, he was going to make a blubbering fool out of himself by telling her what had happened to him tonight. And she’d probably laugh at him. Hell, the way she acted, it was easy to imagine she’d had plenty of sex, with plenty of men. Men she hadn’t cared for any more than she cared for Garrett. She probably thought he was just a big, dumb cowboy. He probably thought she was right. He must be pretty dumb to let himself fall so hard.

I
f Garrett so much as looked at her, she’d lose it. She knew she would. If he said a word, those gut-wrenching sobs she was battling would break loose and tear her apart.

She’d never dreamed she could trust any man enough to do…what they’d done. She’d never believed herself capable of letting herself be utterly free and unreserved in a man’s arms. But she had been just that with Garrett. And it was only possible because of his exquisite tenderness, the caring in his eyes when he looked at her, the gentleness of his every touch.

There would never be another man like him.

She hoped to God little Ethan would try to emulate the big, gentle man who was going to raise him. It was the right decision. It was what Michele had wanted, what she’d known all along. Her sister must have sensed how perfect Garrett would be for Ethan. Somehow, she’d known.

Chelsea was no good for him, because she was too filled with anger. Only the anger had changed now. It had eased and softened. It was no longer the futile raging of an abused child against an omnipotent parent.

This was different. Not wild and undirected anymore. She knew Vincent de Lorean had murdered her sister. But that wasn’t why she had to kill him. The need for revenge had somehow lost its force. Or maybe she’d just lost her taste for it.

No. Her reasons now were utterly different. Ethan. Little Ethan would never be safe until Vincent de Lorean was out of the picture, eliminated from the baby’s life. It had to happen. If it didn’t, Ethan might grow up the way Michele and Chelsea had. Oh, not the poverty. De Lorean was a wealthy man, Chelsea knew that.

But the abuse. The lack of love. The broken heart. She couldn’t let that happen.

And as long as de Lorean lived, no one who cared for Ethan would be safe from his wrath. Not Chelsea, even if she took the baby and ran away and hid. Not Garrett. Not any of the Brands. De Lorean would extract his own kind of vengeance on every one of them. And that would destroy them. All of them.

It was up to Chelsea. This was her ball game, and she was calling the shots. By herself. Just the way it had always been.

The horses stopped in front of the house, and she slipped down. Garrett took the reins from her without a single word and headed out toward the pasture where the other horses grazed. Chelsea watched him go, blinking back tears. Then she went inside and directly up to Garrett’s room.

The house had a still, eerie feeling that told her everyone inside was asleep. Garrett would be a while coming back inside. He’d rub those horses down and hang the saddles and bridles along the split-rail fence, where the few others that had survived the fire were already hanging. He’d go out to that big barrel Wes had filled with grain from the feed store, and he’d scoop some out and feed the horses. Then he’d check their watering trough to be sure it was filled.

He’d take care of everything, Garrett would. He’d take care of her, too, if she’d let him. Just the way Mom always had. And he’d probably get himself killed the way she had, too.

Chelsea opened Garrett’s nightstand drawer and took out his revolver. As an afterthought, she grabbed a box of bullets. Then she slipped out of the room and across the hall, ducking into the guest room she’d begun to think of as her own. Well, hers and Ethan’s. She tucked the gun and bullets into her purse before turning to the cradle. She stood staring down at the sleeping angel inside. Her fingers stroked his satiny dark hair, and a single tear dropped from her cheek to dampen Ethan’s. “I love you, baby,” she whispered. “And I’m gonna make this world safe for you. I promise. You’re never gonna go through what your Mamma and I did. You’ll be raised with love. You’ll have a real family just like I promised you, Ethan. Right here.”

She bent low and gently kissed his pudgy cheek. Then she turned back to the bed and sat down, pulled out a notepad and pencil from the stand beside it and began her note to Garrett.

“I have to leave,” she wrote, struggling because her hands were shaking and because she couldn’t say the things she was longing to tell him. If she did, he’d come after her. He’d never stop until he found her.

“I have a life to get back to. And I know Ethan will be better off here with you than he could ever be with me. Don’t try to find me. I’m going to change my name and start over somewhere fresh, where de Lorean can never find me. Thanks for the laughs. Chelsea.”

She’d like to add a warning about Lash because she’d finally remembered why the name de Lorean had sounded familiar to her when Garrett had first mentioned it. But that might give too much away. She’d just handle Lash the way she did everything else. Alone.

She dug out the slip of paper he’d dropped, unfolded it again, staring at the name and address, memorizing it Vincent de Lorean. 705 Fairview. Ellis, Texas. She hadn’t known this name when she’d found the note. And then she’d tucked it away and forgotten about it. But now….

She sat very still and quiet, waiting for the sound of Garrett’s tired footfalls on the stairs. His steps paused outside her door…briefly. And then moved on, over to his own room. Hinges creaked. The door closed. Bed-springs squeaked. Two boots thudded to the hardwood floor. She waited longer. And still longer. And then, carrying her shoes and her bag, she slipped down the stairs.

L
ash answered the door wearing a pair of white boxers and a frown. Bleary, pale blue eyes and tousled brown hair completed the look, and he stared at her, shaking his head. “What do you want?”

“I want you to get out of town,” Chelsea said, thinking that she sounded like an old spaghetti Western.

“Huh?”

“I know about your connection to de Lorean,” she went on. For emphasis she handed him the slip of paper. “You dropped this the other day.”

He took it from her, blinked down at it and came more fully awake. His eyes sharpened as they scanned her face. “Why didn’t you just hand it over to the Brand brothers?”

“Because they’d have probably killed you. They’d probably assume, as I do, that you were behind that stampede. And the fire in the stable. My guess is that you’re just hanging around, doing de Lorean’s bidding and waiting for the chance to kidnap a helpless baby. Hell, I oughtta kill you myself.”

“Now wait a minute. You don’t know–”

“I know plenty. I know if I tell Garrett about you, your hide will end up nailed to the barn wall. Or at least sitting in the town jail. So you get out of town. Tonight. If I see you again, I’ll tell him everything.”

His blue eyes narrowed, and he glanced past her at the car that sat alongside the curb. “How come you’re out at this time of night alone?”

“None of your business.”

“Where are you going, Chelsea?”

“I told you–”

His hand shot up fast, gripping her arm as if to haul her inside. Panic gripped her, especially since she knew this creep worked for a killer. She brought her knee up hard and fast into his groin, and he grunted at the impact, stumbled away from her and doubled over. His face turned six shades of purple as he gasped and swore. But still he forced himself to straighten up and take an unsteady step toward her.

Until he saw the gun in her wavering hand, pointing dead center at his leanly muscled chest.

“Damn it straight to hell, what are you–”

“Shut up!”

He shut up.

“Now just step back inside and stay there. I mean it. If you so much as poke your head out the door, I’ll–”

“I get the idea.”

“And you be gone from Quinn by morning, Lash. You be gone or I’ll be back.”

“How am I s’posed to leave town if I can’t poke my head out the–”

“Shut up!”

He lifted his hands and shoulders in compliance and stepped away from the door. Chelsea backed all the way to the car, got inside and shot away into the night.

There. Safe. She’d done it. She didn’t think Lash whatever-his-name-was would dare show his pretty face on the Texas Brand again. Once she accomplished her mission, Chelsea would call or send a note telling Garrett of Lash’s duplicity, just in case. But if she’d told Garrett now, he’d have known she was leaving and tried to stop her.

G
arrett lay on his bed feeling sorry for himself for a very short time. Then he gave himself a mental kick in the seat of the pants. Because the whole time he’d been lying there, he’d been remembering every single second of his time with Chelsea tonight, and one instant kept coming back to him. That second he’d held her to him and pushed himself inside her. That incredible feeling of completion, of union, of rightness.

But gradually, he realized those feelings were only his own–she’d reacted a little differently. She’d been real enthusiastic before he entered her. And seconds afterward, she’d been as into it as he had. But at that moment in between, there’d been the slightest hint of resistance. She’d stiffened a little. Her fingernails had dug into his skin, and she’d bit her lip. And he’d felt something.

Something….

Garrett sat up in bed, blinking. Couldn’t have been that, though. Couldn’t have been….

Frowning, he got up and trotted down the stairs again. He’d tossed the saddlebags into the corner after unpacking them earlier and dumping the leftover food into ol’ Blue’s dish. The tablecloth lay atop the garbage pail, where Garrett had thrown it in an act of sheer, foolish pride. He reached for it now, held it up by two corners and let it fall open.

He saw the small red stain that told him all he needed to know. He’d been Chelsea Brennan’s first lover. She’d trusted him that much. And there was no way in hell she felt as casual about what had happened tonight as she was pretending to feel.

Garrett dropped the tablecloth again and started up the stairs. But when he got to Chelsea’s room, she wasn’t there. His heart slowly broke, and the only thing that kept it from shattering completely was the happy gurgle coming from the cradle beside her bed.

“Bubba?”

“Dadadadadadadada,” the little squirt sang, and his arms began to flail in time with his music.

The relief that surged through Garrett was tinged with bitter sadness. Thank the good Lord Chelsea hadn’t taken this child away from him. But God, what it must have done to her to leave him behind.

Garrett went to the cradle and bent over it, reaching down to check the diaper and stroke the silky fuzz that passed for Bubba’s hair. Ethan blinked slowly, his eyes still sleepy, but he smiled a little bit all the same. Gently, Garrett turned him over so he lay on his tummy, and then he ran his hand in the slow, clockwise circles that he knew the boy loved. His palm skimmed the baby’s back over and over, and those heavy eyes fell closed more often between peeks at Garrett.