Wild Texas Rose (11 page)

He didn’t look the part of a horse thief.

He scarcely looked the part of a cattle rancher.

“What am I doing here?” Sonny glanced around him in fake surprise. “This is my land. The question is — what are you doing here?”

“Let me tell you about the rules, Sonny. The man who has the drop on the other man asks the questions. Put that pistol down real slow-like and tell me — what’re you doing here?”

Sonny’s examination of Thorn confirmed that he did, indeed, have the drop on him. Loosening his grip on the Remington, Sonny placed it carefully in the dust. Without a pause, he fell back on the weapon that had proved so successful for him: bluster. “I’ll tell you what I’m doing here. I’m taking a look at that corral down below. It’s got horses in it. Miss Rose’s horses, I bet, and I bet you know all about it.”

“Good bet, Sonny. And I bet I know who stole them and stashed them there.”

“Yeah.” Sonny narrowed his piggy eyes.

Together the men said, “You.”

“Me?” Sonny yelped, struggling to sit up. “Not me.”

Thorn straightened his arms and pointed his Colt at Sonny’s head. “Lay back down.”

Sonny hit the ground.

When they were boys, Sonny had been taller, bigger, and a bully. But after they passed their seventeenth birthdays, Thorn grew tall and Sonny filled out, acquiring fat where Thorn acquired muscle. Then the balance of power had shifted.

Now Thorn didn’t even try to subdue the niggling thrill he felt at having Sonny grovel at his feet. In his strongest Texas Ranger voice, he said, “It’s your land, Sonny, and you’re always bragging that you know everything that goes on on your land. You going to tell me you didn’t know about this corral and Miss Rose’s horses?”

“My cowboys just now told me.”

Sonny’s whiny denial infuriated Thorn, and he snarled, “Or your cowboys built it for you, stole those horses for you, and have been shipping them off for you while you ply Miss Rose with phony concern.”

“I wouldn’t do that!” Sonny writhed on the ground in protest.

“Your family’s been branding new calves since the Dead Sea was only ill.”

“Maybe.” Sonny had the guts to look self-righteous. “But that’s not horse-thieving!”

“You’ve got motive here. Stealing Starbright from Miss Rose is a damn sight better business than paying for her.”

“I didn’t do that.” Sonny looked as agitated as a mule with a bee up its butt. “My Sue Ellen would skin me alive. Why, Rose is her best friend, and if you think I’m going to make my life a living hell over a lousy horse or a few lousy acres, you’re missing a few dots on your dice. My men have been watching Rose’s place, and I knew her horses were disappearing, but I didn’t know why until you came back. It’s you who’re stealing those horses, goddamnit. You!”

“Don’t swear,” Thorn answered automatically, but Sonny’s protestations shook him. He’d seen Sonny lie before and knew Sonny’s methods well. Sonny got all slick and smiling like some big butter-and-egg man from the East. He sure didn’t turn red and act like some sour-bellied lizard on a hot sand bed.

Thorn had been so sure it was Sonny, he’d never given thought to another explanation. Trouble was — if Sonny hadn’t taken the horses … who had?

Carried on the wind, Rose’s lament lifted the hair on Thorn’s head as cleanly as if he’d been scalped.

“You!” she cried. “How could you?”

Thorn waited, but heard nothing more. Running to the edge of the cliff, he saw her facing off with a squat cowboy — Thorn couldn’t see who — her carbine dangling uselessly in her hand.

Sonny stumbled to Thorn’s side.

“Would you look at that?” Thorn indicated the woman below with an exasperated gesture. “She’ll point that damn thing at me for doing my duty, but show her her horse thief, and all she does is scold.” Thorn headed down the steep, gravelly trail, mumbling to himself. “Damn woman. Won’t stay where I damn well put her. Gotta go face a damn horse thief on her own. Get herself damn well—” His litany failed him as the image of Rose, blasted by a shotgun and lying in a pool of blood, surged into his mind, and he concentrated on his booted feet, afraid that one wrong step would lose him time.

Then he’d be too late. Too late.

As he rounded the last corner, he drew his Colt — and saw them. Rose and … he squinted. Patrick? Wasn’t that Patrick, the ranch hand who’d caught them in the hay and soundly humiliated them nine years ago?

Still dumbfounded, he said, “Patrick?”

The two figures before him whirled around, and Rose looked almost as dismayed as the quaking Irishman.

“Mother of God!” Patrick grabbed for his holster.

But Thorn was too quick. His lifted his Colt, and his aim never wavered.

“Now, Thorn.” Calm as you please, Rose walked to Patrick. “There’s nothing to get excited about.”

“Get away from him!” Thorn barked. Damn the woman, couldn’t she see Patrick was on the verge of blind, total panic?

“Patrick’s not going to hurt me.” She put her hand on Patrick’s shoulder.

The old man nearly jumped a foot in the air.

“I’ve been discussing this situation with him. And he knows—”

Speaking slowly and clearly, Thorn commanded, “Get away from him, Rose. He’s liable to do something stupid.”

“I want to make sure you don’t do anything stupid.” She was using that soft voice, the one she used to curb fractious stallions. “This is a personal matter between Patrick and me. We don’t need you to interfere.”

Thorn ground his teeth so hard he could barely speak. But he could yell. “Interfere? The man’s been stealing your horses, and you don’t want the law to interfere?”

Wide-eyed, Patrick shook his head.

Rose, too, shook her head. “The law would be too rough on him.”

“The law—” Thorn began.

“Don’t you worry about the law, Miss Rose.” Sonny stepped out from the pile of stones beside the trail and pointed his Remington right at Thorn. “I’ll take care of this for you.”

Thorn’s jaw dropped to his chest. “
What the hell
?”

“Drop the Colt, Maxwell. I’ve got you covered.”

Sonny did have him covered. Two cowboys stepped out from behind him. One stepped up on the cliff and aimed his rifle. Another stepped over the rise.

“Godda—” Thorn glanced at Rose. “Dognation, Sonny, can’t you see what’s happening here?”

“Sure can.” Sonny smirked like a fat pony in high oats. “You’re pointing your fancy Colt Peacemaker at Miss Rose and her ranch hand. Drop it!” The crack of Sonny’s voice sounded like the crack of gunfire.

Thorn dropped his Colt. “Sonny, listen to me,” he began.

“The other one, too,” Sonny said.

Sonny was excited and scared — a dangerous combination, and one Thorn diagnosed as potentially disastrous.

He eased his other pistol out of its holster.

“Sonny, you idiot!” Rose’s irritation bubbled up. “Thorn is doing his duty, asinine as that sounds. He’s a Texas Ranger.”

“He’s a” — Sonny giggled nervously — “what?”

“A Texas Ranger,” Thorn answered. “Wanna see my badge?” He heard the cowboys murmur among themselves and knew a strong sense of achievement.

Exactly as he’d told Rose, the mere mention of the Rangers had its effect on the men.

The mention of the Rangers had
no
effect on Sonny. “Your badge? You mean you stole a badge?”

“He’s been a Texas Ranger since he got out of prison,” Rose said, as she walked toward Goliath. The big stallion came to her eagerly, and she petted his nose. “I mean, think about it, Sonny. Look at him — at Thorn, I mean. He’s either been an outlaw or a law-keeper, and the fact is, I sent for a Ranger when someone started stealing my horses.”

Both Patrick and Sonny squawked like gospel birds on Sunday, and she turned on them impatiently. “Did you think I was going to roll over and let some … dishonest … person—”

Thorn grinned. She couldn’t stand to hurt Patrick’s feelings.

“—steal my horses and ruin my livelihood?” She faced Patrick. “Not even for you, Patrick, would I be such a fool.”

But while she talked, Patrick had slipped his pistol out of its holster, and now he pointed it right at Thorn’s chest.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Exactly as Thorn had predicted
.

The Irishman had panicked. Panicked to the point of having his brain scrambled.

Deliberately, Thorn started backing toward Sonny, his hands open and extended.

“Patrick, you put that away!” Rose’s voice was sharp with command.

“That isn’t the way to do this.” Thorn’s voice was soothing.

Neither seemed to have an effect on Patrick. Although he was shaking all over, he kept the pistol pointed at Thorn.

Pompous and stupid to the bitter end, Sonny asked, “What’s going on here? Patrick, there’s no need to get ugly about this. I’ve got Thorn covered.”

Patrick laughed, loud and high. “Ugly?
He’s
going to hang me.
Ye’re
going to hang me. I might as well do what I can to get out of this on my own.”

“Patrick, no.” Rose started toward him.

“Get away!” Patrick swung his gun at her.

Thorn jumped toward Sonny.

Patrick swung the gun back toward them.

Thorn grabbed Sonny’s hand, gun and all. He aimed. He pressed his finger into the trigger. He fired.

“Patrick!” Rose leapt and collided with Patrick.

Patrick and Rose flew backward in one tumbled heap under the impact of the bullet.

The blackness of terror narrowed the world to one precious being. “Rose!” Thorn knocked Sonny aside and ran. He knelt by her side, fear bitter in his mouth. “Goddamnit, if I shot you—”

She muttered, “Don’t swear.”

She was speaking. She was alive.

But that didn’t mean she wasn’t hurt, and hurt bad. Thorn knew she would chide him on her deathbed.

He ran his hands over her. “Where are you hurt? Where did the bullet—”

Beside them, Patrick shrieked, “I’m dying. I’m dying, and I’m goin’ straight to hell.”

“Serves you right,” Thorn snapped, still seeking the bullet wound on Rose.

She pushed his hands away and sat up. “We’ve no time for that.”

No blood. No blood at all. She was fine. The bullet had hit Patrick. Only Patrick.

For the first time in all these long, dreadful moments, Thorn could draw a breath. He put a hand on his chest over his thundering heart.

This woman would be the death of him.

Crawling to Patrick, Rose crooned, “Where are you hurt?”

“My shoulder.” Patrick held out a bloodstained hand. “It’s blown clean away.”

“That’s the least of your problems.” Because Thorn wanted to kill the scrawny little thieving Irishman.

Instead he crawled over beside Rose and examined Patrick’s wound. “Bullet went right through,” he pronounced. “At your age, it won’t do you much good, but it won’t kill you, either.”

Patrick set up a wail to wake the Indian spirits. “Then I’ll hang. I’ll hang for horse stealing.”

Sitting down in the dirt, Thorn took off his hat and fanned his face. The steadily increasing wind wasn’t enough, he realized, to cool the sweat of fear that covered him. This shivering, whimpering Irishman had almost gotten Rose killed. Had almost made Thorn shoot her himself. When Thorn thought how close he’d come …

And she sat there in the dirt, mussed and prissy and worried for her ranch hand.

Thorn fanned harder. Love wasn’t supposed to be like this. Love wasn’t supposed to be so difficult, so scary. Was he going to spend his life worrying about sensible, tractable Rose, who wasn’t proving so sensible and tractable at all? “If you didn’t want to be hanged, what’d you steal ‘em for, you stupid old man?”

Patrick’s lip trembled, but he confessed, “Gambling.”

“I need something to stop the bleeding,” Rose announced.

Thorn took off his bandana and handed it to her. “What do you mean, gambling?”

With a guilty, sideways glance at Rose, Patrick said, “I’ve been going to Fort Davis and gambling with the troops, and sometimes I … lose a little more than I should.”

Sidling up in time to hear, Sonny admonished Rose. “I told you he wasn’t worth a damn. I told you Irishmen were nothing but trouble.”

“Shut up and give me your bandana,” she said.

Sonny obeyed.

Sue Ellen had him well trained.

“No, he’s right, Miss Rose. Ye’ve been nothing but good to me. Ye and yer folks, and this is how I repay ye.” Patrick winced as she wadded one bandana over the wound, then tied it on with the other. “Yer pa knew about me. He knew I got chased out of Ireland with the threat of a rope around my neck.”

“For what?” Rose asked.

Thorn stared at her. How dare she act so calm, as if all was well? Didn’t she realize she’d almost been killed? He was still as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rockers.

“For gambling and thieving.” Patrick wiped his nose on his sleeve. “Just like here.”

“I knew you were in trouble.” Rose, too, took off her hat and fanned her face. “But I never thought to say you couldn’t go to Fort Davis.” Wisps of hair escaped from her braid and chased each other in the breeze and dirt streaked her face.

Thorn thought she’d never looked prettier.

Patrick nodded, then moaned as if the motion caused him terrible pain. “Ye didn’t tell me because ye respected me. I was like yer uncle, Rose, and I took advantage of it.”

“You sure as hell did,” Thorn said.

Rose sent him a reproving glance. “Go on, Patrick.”

“Once I got in deep, I didn’t know how to pay my debts except with the horses. But I tell ye” — Patrick’s eyes gleamed with the conviction of an addicted gambler — “my luck was about to turn. Just about.”

“You know that’s not going to happen,” Rose said.

“I only wanted to make some money to help ye,” Patrick answered.

Thorn looked at him sharply.

Patrick appeared to be sincere. “I kept thinking if I could bring in a little more cash, we’d be having the best stable in Texas right away.” Patrick’s blue faded with a sheen of tears.

“We
are
going to have the best stable in Texas.” No edge of doubt marred Rose’s expression.