Cowboy's Strict Commands: Submission Burns Deep!

by Nicole Snow

  Mister Adams turned beet red. His hand shot up, waving the slip of paper, before crashing down and slapping against his knee.

  He wasn't kidding about the outrage! I caught a glimpse of the ridiculous numbers writ large on the side and gasped.

  “You realize this is going to put me under until I get a new line of credit? We blew our rainy day fund on expanding this place last summer. I'll have to shut the whole damned saloon down...” Mister Adams trailed off.

  I couldn't tell if he was numb or waiting for an inch of mercy. If it was the latter, they gave him nothing.

  “You gotta do what you gotta do,” the man said. “Sorry. We're just doing our job upholding the law.”

  With that, the trio turned and trounced out of the bar. My body created a cold chill as they walked past, and I crumpled up against the counter.

  Alan Winkman. This is his disaster. His revenge.

  I'd never really believed in coincidences, and I wasn't about to start. Gabe had humiliated Winkman Jr. in a bar. What better way to get back at me than by closing down mine?

  It was getting hard to breathe. Izzy staggered past me, without even stopping to gossip. There was only one thing to do: continue on until the end of the night.

  I didn't even fret about my lackluster tips.

  An hour later, Mister Adams went around to each table, politely but firmly telling everyone the bar would be closing a little early. When he was finished and the last customer grabbed his cowboy hat and pushed out into the cold, our boss waved us over.

  I hung my head sadly as he delivered the bad news. Almost everyone had overheard the conversion with the regulators – I think it was only a surprise to two new girls. They stared at him, wide eyed and frightened.

  I waited until he'd finished and the group broke apart to approach him. Fists balled at my sides, I took a deep breath, nerves ablaze. As much as I didn't want to, I had to tell the truth – had to tell him this whole mess was my fault.

  “Mister Adams,” I said coldly, reaching gently for his beefy shoulder. “There's something you need to know...”

  I told him about the nasty encounter Gabe and I had with Alan. All through it, my boss' eyes grew darker, narrower, as if he were an eagle zeroing in on its prey.

  I inwardly trembled. When I finished with Alan's threat, I was on the verge of tears, barely holding in my sniffles and blubbering sloppy apologies.

  “Ashley, stop!” He snapped. “This isn't your fault.”

  My heart buzzed with relief. But the sullen, angry, and weirdly forgiving look on his face only made me a little sadder.

  “You've been a good worker and I'm going to keep you, if I manage to get this place back in order. Never liked those Winkman clowns anyway.” He glanced around the empty bar and cleared something stuffy in his throat. “The old man robbed the town blind when he ruined logging. Pretended to be a regular environmentalist, but everyone saw through his act.”

  Even through my sadness, I cocked my head, wondering what he was going on about.

  “This was before you were old enough to follow the news. Winkman turned out the logging businesses and gave their land to the silver mine. Of course, karma's a bitch, as they say. When the old mine shut down a few years ago, he gave his pals one last bailout by turning the old collection pit into a landfill. All for more pennies in his campaign coffers, of course. Bastard brought a new meaning to corruption by marrying pollution with bribery...”

  How crooked. I never thought much of Mayor Winkman, whatever I once felt for his rotten son, and now I knew why...

  “I'm sorry,” I said weakly.

  “Don't worry about it. You know how it goes. Like father, like son...only in this case, I can't tell which apple's more rotten and petty. I'd hate to see what they'll be like two generations down the line.”

  “Me too. Try to get some rest, sir. I know you'll do everything you can to get us up again.”

  We exchanged sharp nods and I made my way out, leaving him alone with his thoughts. I walked a little more slowly to the car, wondering what would happen to the reams of silver coins plastered on the walls if Mister Adams had to close down for good.

  He could probably buy himself a comfortable retirement if they were all auctioned away. But he didn't see them as his, and it would be his absolute last resort. He'd always said the coins belonged to everyone, every donor and tourist who'd ever brought one to the bar to have their name tacked up next to it in tiny letters.

  Until then, I'd never really gotten what he meant. But as I stepped out the door with tears in my eyes, I understood. Funny how impending loss has the power to make things crystal clear.

  I didn't drive home. Knowing I had nowhere else to be tomorrow, I kept going along the frosty country road, pushing my old Ford Contour deeper into the night.

  Scrambling up on his doorstep, I rang the doorbell. Gabe didn't come down soon enough. I began to knock, gently at first, but soon my fist moved with its own energy.

  The door tore open. He barely caught me as I fell into his arms, sobbing and still flailing my hands.

  “Ashley? What the hell happened?”

  For once, the long walk through his old house didn't fill me with needling lust. He walked me to his kitchen table, sat me down, and brought out hot tea.

  I sipped it slowly, the ceramic mug trembling in my fingers. He sat cross from me, brow furrowed, and reached for my hands.

  I took a deep breath and started to tell him everything. I didn't think it was possible to look angrier than Mister Adams from one of my stories, but Gabe quickly proved me wrong.

  “That sniveling little creep. That fucker!” He yelled, wasting no time after I finished.

  His big fist fell on the table. The vibration made my cup dance, and the jarring sensation made me jump.

  “Sorry,” he said quietly, but the current in his eyes said otherwise. “We've got to do something about this.”

  “Like what? Seems to me he's checkmated us pretty damned good. And it's all my fault.”

  “I was the one who hit him.” Gabe stared at me. His eyes were honest and unapologetic. “And I'd gladly do it again.”

  “No,” I said sternly. “Any violence is just going to get us both in deep trouble. Gabe, please. Promise me you don't do anything crazy.”

  His lips twitched. Now, he looked even more like a hard lion than ever, and not a happy one.

  I gripped his hand tightly. “If you go after Alan like that, there's no telling what he'll do. Hell, he might not be finished yet. Screwing with Mister Adams may have been his revenge on me, but as for you...”

  I trailed off and closed my eyes. Stupid mistake. The last thing I needed to do was rile up the cowboy even more.

  Gabe leaned back and stared into the living room, where the large trophies sat cold and silent. The animals returned his stare, their glassy eyes looking into his soul, encouraging the instincts a family of hunters had put to good use for generations.

  Ugh. I have to put a stop to this fast. But how?

  The question circulated in my mind again and again. I cursed Alan Winkman for the two millionth time, knowing it wouldn't change anything.

  “Gary Adams,” Gabe said. “You need to let me talk to your boss.”

  “What good's that going to do?” Heat beaded on my brow. If I wasn't so flustered and afraid, Gabe would've looked sexier than ever with his Alpha-in-defense mode switched on.

  “He might know something. Maybe he could give us something – anything we can use to fend off that little bastard. Uncle Steven still has legal ties in this area. Maybe he could bring us together with somebody, if we just had the evidence.”

  “And what kind of stupid lawyer's going to risk going after the Mayor's son?” I bit my tongue fast, swallowing my cynicism when I saw the warning look in his eyes.

  And what kind of evidence does he think there is? Alan's well educated and he's got a lot of money backing him. He's scheming, but he's not a slob.

  Flashes of the conversati
on with Mister Adams came to me. Suddenly, I smoothed the sad worry from my face, slowly drawing back my hands from his.

  “Wait. Maybe we're focusing on the wrong person here.” Gabe leaned forward, waiting for me to finish. “Alan hasn't done anything wrong, and he probably has those city regulators in his pocket too deep to ever spill the beans if he did. But what about his dear old dad?”

  Very slowly, a wicked smile began to creep across Gabe's face. “Mayor Charles Winkman. He's been in office damned near forever. Twenty years, isn't it? There's got to be some dirt on him somewhere.”

  “There is,” I said. “And I think I might know where to find it.”

  I told him what Mister Adams said about the silver mine, the pollution, the kickbacks. Gabe's face flashed from fascinated to furious.

  Just as I finished, he spread his fingers out on the table and rose. “We've got to get those files. The local media would eat it up like like hens in a seed store.”

  “I don't know...will any of it even be in the public record?” I tensed, rapidly realizing this wasn't going to be as easy as it seemed.

  “No. We need to go right to the source.” He stared at me until I began to guess at what he meant, and then I got very, very cold.

  Everything in the town's center closed after midnight.

  It was rare to see anybody out past twelve, let alone a policeman. The whole county only had a couple dozen officers, and they rarely did much on long winter nights except patrol the mountain roads for wrecks and breakdowns.

  My head was spinning when we pulled into the town center beneath a full moon. I was tired, eyes sore and puffy from suffering so much in one evening. But Gabe's plan, crazy as it was, had to happen tonight if we wanted to catch the Winkman's by surprise and turn this around.

  “Stay in here,” he told me, just as I put my hand out to pop the passenger door to his truck. “If I get caught, they won't be able to come after you.”

  “No, Sir!” I whispered sharply. “I'm the reason you're here. Let me help.”

  His powerful jaw bulged a little, as if he were chewing on his own reluctance. Like a good commander, he decided that he didn't have much choice, and certainly didn't need more complications just then.

  “Alright. But you stay behind me, and don't hesitate to run at the first sign of trouble. I'll take the fall if anything happens. At least give me that.”

  Serious faced, I nodded. A second later, we were out in the night, speed walking around the corner to the back door of the small office complex.

  His shadow looked much taller than me with the hat on his head. When we reached our destination, Gabe produced a long, cool crowbar from inside his coat.

  I watched behind us nervously as he wedged it near the door's lock. Luckily, crimes against businesses were unheard of in our town, so nobody had the high tech security systems.

  Bang! My ears bristled when I heard the sound behind me, and I almost leaped out of my skin.

  It took me a second, bent and holding my knees to suck in cold breaths to recover, before I followed him inside. Gabe flashed me a small smile and held the door open for me.

  We made our way through the old dark office building the Mayor shared with several small service businesses. We both swore when we found the glass door leading into the main office locked.

  “What now?” I hissed.

  “There's only one way to do this.” He didn't hesitate. “Stand back against the wall over there, beautiful, and let's hope to heaven there aren't any alarms inside.”

  He waited until I was safely out of range. Then he put one fist through his cowboy hat and smashed the whole upper pane to the door in one blow.

  We waited ten breathless seconds, waiting for our ears to ring with screaming alerts, or maybe even sirens.

  Nothing. Thank God!

  Gabe popped the door and we rushed inside. He clucked his tongue when he saw the small tear in the top of his hat, crushing it under arm.

  “Damn! Did Adams tell you what year all this stuff was going on?” His big hands rifled through the large filing cabinet, filled to the brim with folders and tags of every color.

  Apparently, Winkman's office hadn't gone digital yet.

  “No, but it was in the last ten years...” I pushed my way in, eyes desperately scanning the ranks of chronological tags we saw in the heavy drawers.

  I began to claw at everything in the last decade, flipping through one for the evidence we needed. I almost missed a small folder-in-a-folder labeled 'Campaign Receipts.'

  KELLY-SHARPE MINING jumped out at me.

  Several papers plopped out in a heap on the floor as I fingered my way down the spreadsheets. The mining company had made lots of contributions to the Committee to Keep Our Mayor! They went on and on, big cash landing in his account through several election cycles, and every year in between.

  “This is it! Right here, Gabe.” I pointed, and he paused to look at the numbers. “The money's constantly rolling in. I don't know much about finance limitation laws, but something tells me this is way over their maximums.”

  And how! The monthly deposits often range well over five thousand dollars.

  “That's good. Now, what about that damned landfill?”

  I'd forgotten all about that. We didn't have anything unless we had more corruption to tie everything together, something to show the local news writers that this went way beyond breaching some campaign contribution caps.

  Come on. Come on! We just need one more little break...

  As if someone had answered my prayers, my eyes fell into the shadowy depths of the drawer in front of me, straight back to the a tiny row of files marked with gray flags.

  I evaded a dozen paper cuts as my hands jerked them out. I flipped through the first folder and saw KELLY-SHARPE MINING again, but this time there were land diagrams, and letters to officials in other towns touting our ability to store everyone else's toxic trash.

  “Jesus. Look.” Gabe leaned over my shoulder and exhaled slow and heavy. “If this doesn't create some fury, I don't know what will.”

  “That's it! Hold those close to your chest and don't let go. We've got what we came for.”

  We burst out into the night, leaving our carnage behind us. The broken wood door barely snapped into place, but it held, and we left it at its haphazard angle.

  But it would have to do until morning. We were almost to the truck when a couple of the folders slipped out of my fingers. The oversized leather gloves I'd borrowed from him made carrying the precious contents difficult, and now they'd made it even worse.

  “Shove it into a pile!” He ordered, diving at the ground. “We just have to get it into the truck. We can sort it all out later.”

  Our breath smoked out of our mouths into the wintry air. We were so absorbed in getting the stray papers together that we didn't see the shadow until it was right on top of us.

  I let out a small scream. Gabe spun, ready to send his fists flying. Or maybe to offer them to the cops, if worst came to worst.

  “Buddy, you got a cigarette?” Heavy breath steamed into Gabe's face from the drunk.

  I watched his huge body relax, but only a little. He rifled through his pockets. My heartbeat didn't start to lessen until I watched him shove a crumpled ten into the man's leathery hands.

  “Not a smoker, friend. But buy yourself something to warm you up on me.”

  “Gee, thanks Mister!” The drunk's eyes were still beaming like an excited child's as we got in the truck and sped away.

  We passed up his place in favor of mine. Gabe explained it would keep the stuff safe in case there had been any slip ups and someone got caught.

  I couldn't argue with that logic. But my discomfort started to creep up at the prospect of spending a night with him at my poor, barren place. We hadn't spent any time there at all since making the mad proposal that brought us together.

  I hopped out and started walking toward the house, careful not to lose my footing on the ice. I nearly spilled the pre
cious folders all over again when he grabbed me and spun me around.

  “No, not in here. Let's find a place for them in the barn, Ashley. We can grab them in the morning, make our copies, and drop them off at the Mountain Register.”

  I swallowed, hopeful it would be as easy to deliver our documents to the local paper.

  A couple animals snorted as I turned on the lights. We were halfway up into the storage loft above us when he spoke.

  “Those are some fine looking animals. We'll have to take 'em riding sometime, your land or mine. It's been too long since I've been on horseback.”

  I smiled as I reached the top and waited for him to join me. I still had more than half the hay I'd loaded up on, mostly thanks to him.

  “It was all that money I got from the job I did for your cousin. They haven't been this well fed for a long time. And believe me, they deserve it.”

  We found an old trunk that belonged to my Pa. The folders fit neatly there, and I checked the seal to make sure there was no chance of moisture or anything else would seep in and cause damage.

  When I turned around, I saw him leaning on a hay bale, bathing my body in an intense stare.

  Not again. This is hardly the time or place...is it?

  I shrugged it off as my own imagination. But as I stepped toward him, his eyes didn't blink, didn't stop beaming his masculine, eager energy onto my flesh.

  “Let's go home,” I said softly. “I can make us some tea or hot cocoa to fight back the cold.”

  “I've got a better idea,” Gabe said, walking a few steps past me and blocking the ladder leading down. “How about something better than sugary sweetness to warm up? Unless you count the honey I always taste on your lips...”

  I gasped, surprised as he took my wrists and held on tight. His body forced me to the nearest wall and then some.

  Old wood creaked behind me as I strained beneath him. The wet pulse between my legs I'd tried to ignore opened into a fiery flood, pounding my brain with its commands.

  Just. Give. In.

  “Sir! Are you sure you really want to do this out here?” It sounded even stranger to say it than to think it.