Distrust

by Lisa Jackson

  “And you work for Caleb Johnson,” she said, leaning over the saddle horn and pinning him with her wide gray-green eyes. Her braid of sun-streaked hair fell forward over one shoulder to settle over the swell of her breast and she forced a cold smile. “Well, let me tell you, Mr. Chase not-related to-the-tennis-star McEnroe, this is my land and I don’t like anyone, especially one of Caleb Johnson’s hands, snooping around. So you can take a message to your boss and tell him the next time he sends one of his flunkies around here, I’ll call the sheriff.”

  McEnroe’s blue eyes sparked and his square jaw slid to the side as he stared at her. “I think the line you’re looking for is: ‘Tell your double-crossing boss that the next time one of his low-life ranch hands steps one foot on my property, I’ll shoot first and ask questions later.’”

  Dani fought the urge to smile and arched an elegant dark brow at the man. “You’re an arrogant S.O.B., aren’t you?” Not like the usual scum Caleb Johnson hired. Too smart. McEnroe wouldn’t last long with Johnson. Oddly, Dani felt relieved.

  His brilliant blue eyes narrowed and his lips twisted cynically as he glanced again at the rifle. “Look, I’d like to sit around and trade insults with you, but I’ve got work to do.”

  “Work? Like trespassing?”

  “I was just looking at the stream.”

  “On my side of the fence.”

  “I know.”

  “That’s your job?” With a disbelieving sigh, she sat back in the saddle, balanced the rifle on her thighs and crossed her arms under her chest. “Surely you can come up with a better excuse than that.”

  Lifting a shoulder as if he didn’t really care what she thought, he stuffed the tail of his shirt beneath the waistband of his jeans and tightened his belt buckle.

  “So why are you here? I’ve already told Johnson that I’m not going to sell my land to him. Ever. He can build his resort right up to the property line if he wants to, but the only way he’ll get this land from me is over my dead body.”

  “Look, lady,” McEnroe said, his face relaxing slightly as he yanked off his hip waders, poured the water out of them and stepped into his scruffy boots. “I don’t really give a damn one way or the other what you do. Johnson just asked me to check out the stream, and I did. Since it runs through your property, I climbed through the fence and took a look.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t really know if it’s any of your business.”

  “You’re on my land aren’t you?”

  “A mistake I intend to rectify immediately,” he said, grabbing his waders and creel before walking toward the sagging fence. He slipped through the slack barbed wires while keeping his eyes focused on the Winchester.

  “You can tell Johnson one more thing,” she said as he turned toward the Jeep parked in the middle of the field next to hers.

  Chase faced her again, impatience evident on his angular features. “What’s that?”

  “Tell Johnson that I’ve hired a ]awyer and if he tries any of his underhanded stunts again, I’ll sue him.”

  “Tell him yourself,” McEnroe replied furiously. “I’m out of this mess—whatever the hell it is.”

  With his final remark, he shook his head angrily, strode to the Jeep, climbed in and forced the vehicle into gear before starting it. The Jeep roared through the parched field, leaving a plume of dust in its wake as it disappeared through a stand of pine.

  “I will,” Dani decided, once she was sure Chase McEnroe, whoever the devil he was, had left and wasn’t returning. “And that’s not all I’ll tell Johnson!” With the reins curled through the fingers of one hand, she turned the gelding toward the house and leaned forward in the saddle while gripping the unloaded rifle in her other hand.

  Traitor got the message and eagerly sprinted up the slight incline toward the house. The wind whipped over Dani’s face, cooling her hot skin as the quarter horse sped toward the barn, moving effortlessly over the cracked earth.

  “I won’t let them beat us,” Dani said, as if Traitor could understand her. “Not while there’s an ounce of life in my body. Caleb Johnson can hire all the new hands he wants, I won’t sell! This land belongs to me and some day it’s gonna be Cody’s!”

  She thought back to the man wading in the stream. He was different from the rest of Johnson’s crew, less rough around the edges. “Just give him time,” Dani muttered, reining Traitor to a stop near the weathered barn before dismounting.

  After just two weeks of working for Caleb Johnson, Chase McEnroe would forget to shave, learn to spit tobacco juice in a stream between his teeth and drink himself into a drunken stupor every Friday night at the local bar in Martinville.

  “What a waste,” Dani said, shaking her head sadly as she thought about the furious man. She tied the reins of the gelding’s bridle around a fence post near the barn, removed the saddle and started brushing Traitor’s tawny coat, but thoughts of Chase kept nagging at her. She remembered his cool, blue eyes, his hard, tanned muscles, the thick thatch of dark blond hair that glinted like gold in the late summer sun and the leashed fury in his rigid stance.

  “It just doesn’t make any sense,” she thought aloud, removing the bridle and giving Traitor a quick slap on the rump. With a snort, the horse took off to join the rest of the herd. Why would a man like Chase McEnroe hook up with the likes of Caleb Johnson?

  * * *

  Chase ground the Jeep to a halt in front of the two-storied farmhouse. Swearing loudly, he stormed into the building without bothering to knock. The sharp thud of his boots echoing on the polished hardwood floor announced to the entire household that he was back . . . and he was furious.

  “Okay, Johnson,” Chase said, every nerve ending screaming with outrage as he pushed open the door of Johnson’s office and forced his way into the room. “Just what the hell have you gotten me into?”

  Caleb Johnson had the audacity to smile. He didn’t look much different than he had the day that Chase had met him two and a half years ago. Johnson was still a robust man who had grown up in Montana, been prominent in local politics and acquired land around Butte for less than fifty dollars an acre. At seventy, his eyes were still an intense shade of blue, his tanned skin was nearly wrinkle-free and only the slight paunch around his middle gave any indication of his age.

  “What do you mean?” Caleb was already pouring bourbon into a shot glass. He set the drink on the corner of the desk, silently offering it to Chase, and then poured another stiff shot for himself.

  Chase ignored the drink and crossed his arms over his chest, pulling the fabric of his shirt tight across his rigid shoulders. “That woman! Danielle Summers. She’s got one helluva bone to pick with you and I’m not about to get into the middle of it!”

  Caleb seemed almost pleased. He fingered his string tie and settled into the oxblood cushions of the leather couch. “You met her, did you?”

  Chase’s eyes darkened. “Met her? She almost used my butt for target practice, for crying out loud. Look, Johnson, getting myself shot was not part of the deal!”

  “She wouldn’t shoot you.”

  “Easy for you to say!”

  “She doesn’t like violence . . . Caleb sipped his drink and smiled.

  “Like hell!”

  “Dani Summers wouldn’t harm a flea.”

  “Then what the hell is she doin’ out riding her property like some goddamned sentry!” Chase shook his head and pushed his sweaty hair out of his face. He saw the untouched drink on the desk, decided he needed something to calm him down, reached for the glass of bourbon and drank a long swallow. “I don’t like being threatened, Caleb.”

  “ Don’t worry about Dani.”

  “Don’t worry about her!” Chase was flabbergasted by the older man’s calm. He took another swallow of bourbon.

  “Okay, you’re right. I won’t worry about her, because I won’t deal with her or anyone else who points a rifle in my gut! Let’s just forget the whole deal, okay?”

  “No dice,” Caleb
said, “this is important.”

  “So is my life.”

  “ I told you; the woman detests violence. She just wants to be left alone.”

  “So why was I walking on her property today?” Chase demanded, his jaw tight.

  “Because it won’t be hers for long.”

  Chase circled the scarred oak desk and leaned one hip against the windowsill. Rubbing his chin, he surveyed his partner and the place Caleb Johnson called home with new eyes. Braided rugs covered hardwood floors, pine walls were little more than a display case for weapons and tools of the Old West, a stone fireplace filled one wall and the furniture within the room was heavy, masculine and slightly worn. “She gave me a message for you. Words to the effect that you’d better leave her alone or she’d call a lawyer.”

  “She can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Hasn’t got the money.” Caleb downed his drink casually and lifted his feet to place them on the magazine strewn coffee table.

  Chase’s gut twisted and he experienced the same feeling he had felt on the day when he’d reluctantly accepted two-hundred-thousand dollars from Johnson; the feeling that he was just a marionette and that Johnson was pulling the strings. “How do you know how much money she’s got?”

  “Common knowledge.” Caleb smiled smugly and balanced his drink between his hands. “Her husband left her and her kid about six or seven years ago. The guy just vanished. Word has it that he took off with a hotel clerk from Missoula, but that’s just gossip. Anyway, all Dani Summers had left is a nine-year-old kid and a dust bowl of a piece of property that she tries to scratch a living from.”

  “So why doesn’t she irrigate and make the land more productive?”

  “Irrigation costs money.”

  “Which she doesn’t have.”

  “Right.”

  “But surely a bank would loan her the money, unless she’s mortgaged to the hilt.”

  “Who knows?” Caleb took a swallow and lifted his shoulders. “Maybe she’s a bad credit risk.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to be on the board of the local bank?” Chase asked, suddenly sick with premonition.

  Caleb’s smile widened.

  “You are a miserable son of a bitch!”

  “Just a practical businessman.”

  “And you want her land,” Chase said with a renewed feeling of disgust. “Dani Summers is the same neighbor that wouldn’t sell to you two years ago, isn’t she?”

  Caleb grinned and a satisfied gleam lighted his eyes. “Her two hundred and forty acres sit right smack in the middle of my property. I can’t very well develop the entire piece into a resort without it.”

  “If the land is so useless, why doesn’t she sell?”

  Frowning into his drink, Caleb shrugged. “Who knows? Just some damned fool notion. You know women.”

  Not women like Dani Summers, Chase thought with a sarcastic frown. She was the kind of woman who spelled trouble and Chase prided himself in avoiding any woman with problems. The way he figured it, he had enough of his own. Now it looked like he was right in the middle of the proverbial hornet’s nest.

  “Can’t you build Summer Ridge without her property?”

  Caleb’s scowl deepened. “No.”

  “Why not?”

  Caleb hesitated and studied Chase’s intense features. The kid had so much to learn about business. It was about time he started. Caleb gambled with the truth. “Her place, the Hawthorne place, goes up to the foothills. And the hot springs are right there, at the base of the mountains.”

  Chase eyed his partner with new respect. “The Hawthorne place?”

  Caleb swatted in the air as if at a bothersome insect. “Yeah, the Hawthorne homestead. She was a Hawthorne before she married Summers.”

  “So Dani Hawthorne Summers’s land isn’t as worthless as you’d like her to believe.”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” the older man said testily. “I’ve offered her . . . a reasonable price for that pathetic farm.”

  “But she won’t sell and you’ve come up against the first person you’ve ever met who wouldn’t bend.”

  “I wouldn’t get so lofty, if I were you. Remember, I bought you a couple of years ago.”

  Chase didn’t bother to hide his cynicism. “I remember.”

  “Good. Then as long as we understand each other, why don’t you find a way to get Dani Summers to sell her land to me?”

  “That wasn’t part of the bargain. I said I’d check out the streams and do the work to make sure that the trout will run again, but I’m not dealing with that woman. No way.” Chase finished his drink and placed his empty glass on the windowsill.

  “What if I said that I’m willing to sell you back my part of your company if you can get her to sign on the dotted line?”

  Chase tensed. He’d wanted to get rid of the yoke of Caleb Johnson’s partnership for nearly as long as he’d agreed to it in the first place. Coming to Caleb’s ranch had been the first step and now Caleb was dangling the final carrot in front of Chase’s nose; the remaining twenty-five percent of the company would be his again, if he could convince Dani to sell her land. In all conscience, Chase could hardly afford to turn the offer down, yet he regretfully answered, “Can’t do it.”

  “Why not?”

  “The lady doesn’t want to sell. She does have that right.”

  “Persuade her.”

  “Ha!” His gaze centered on Caleb’s calm face. “She doesn’t look like the type who’s easily convinced.”

  Caleb smiled again. “Well, it’s up to you, McEnroe. Either you want your company back, or you don’t.”

  “I just don’t like all the strings attached.”

  “Think of it this way, without Dani Summers’s land, you won’t be able to make Grizzly Creek viable for restocking of the trout, will you? The stream cuts right across her property. One way or the other, you’ve got to convince Dani Summers she has to sell her land to me.”

  Chase felt his back stiffen. “And how do you expect me to do that?”

  “That’s your problem.” Caleb winked wickedly. “Use your imagination. She’s been without a husband for over six years. Almost alone all that time.” He took a long satisfied swallow of his bourbon. “Women have needs, y’know.”

  Chase laughed aloud at the arrogance of the man. “You expect me to try to seduce her?”

  “Why not? Pleasant enough business, I’d say. Good lookin’ woman.”

  “You’ve got to be out of your mind! That lady wanted to kill me today!”

  “What can I say? She’s passionate. I bet she’d be a regular she-cat in bed.”

  “And you’re a ruthless bastard, you know that, don’t you? I can’t believe we’re having this conversation!” Chase moved off of the sill and looked through the window at the well-maintained buildings comprising the center of the Johnson property. He tried to ignore the unwelcome sensation stirring inside him at the thought of making love to Dani Summers. In his mind’s eye he could envision her supple, tanned body, her rich, honey-brown hair streaked by the sun, her small firm breasts . . . God, it had been a long time since he’d been with a woman....

  Caleb smiled to himself at Chase’s reaction. “I didn’t get where I am today by letting opportunities slip by me.”

  “And I’ll wager that you’ve made a few of your own.”

  The older man smiled. “When I had to.”

  Chase stood and shook his head. “This time you’re completely on your own. I don’t bed women for business.”

  “Your mistake.”

  “Look, I’ve already told you that I’m out of this problem between you and Dani Summers.” Chase walked to the door, placed his hand on the knob and jerked open the door. When he turned to face Caleb again, the fire in his eyes had died. “Why don’t you just leave her alone? From what you’ve said tonight, I think the lady needs a friend rather than another enemy.”

  “Precisely my point,” Caleb agreed with a crooked smile as Chase walke
d out of the room. “Precisely my point.”

  * * *

  “Did we get any mail today?” Cody asked as Dani came into the house. The boy was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking a glass of milk. Sweat was curling and darkening his hair and dripping from his flushed face. A dusty basketball was tucked under one of his arms and Runt, a small Border collie, was lying on the floor beneath the table.

  Silently cursing her ex-husband, Dani shook her head and offered her son an encouraging smile. “I don’t know. I haven’t been to the box.”

  “I’ll get it.” Cody finished his glass of milk, dropped the basketball and ran out of the room with the dog on his heels.

  “Damn you, Blake Summers,” Dani said. “Damn you for getting Cody’s hopes up.” She stood at the kitchen window, leaned against the counter and watched her son run the quarter mile down the dusty, rutted lane to the mailbox. In cut-off jeans and a faded T-shirt, the black dog at his heels, Cody sprinted along the fence.

  Dani’s heart bled for her son each time the boy brought up the subject of his father. Maybe she should have told him all of the painful truth—that Blake had never wanted the boy, that he’d had one affair after another, that he’d only married Dani because she’d inherited this piece of land, the Hawthorne property, from her folks, that the property Blake had owned, the Summers’ place, he’d sold to Caleb Johnson and then gambled the money away....

  She squinted against the late afternoon sun and watched as Cody, his slim shoulders slumped, his tanned legs slowing, walked back to the house. Maybe It was time she talked to him about his father. At nine, Cody was nearly five feet and was just starting to show signs of preadolescence. Perhaps he was mature enough to know the truth.

  She met her son on the porch.

  “Nothin’ much,” Cody said, handing her a stack of bills and shrugging as if the missing letter didn’t mean a thing to him.

  “You got your fishing magazine,” she said, trying to hand him back a small piece of the mail. He didn’t lift his eyes as he pushed open the screen door.

  “Cody—”

  The boy turned to face her. “Yeah?”