Cowboy's Bride: A Secret Baby, Ranch Western Romance (Rainbow Canyon Cowboys Book 6)

by KC Crowne

  His expression suggested he was disappointed, but not surprised. “Alright, then. The offer’s on the table. But it is final – not up for negotiation. You have three days to consider, speak with your partners, and get back to me. But I can assure you this is the best you’re going to get.”

  I wanted to crumple up the paper and toss it in his face. I sat back and eyed him. “What does a man like you want with a B&B anyway? You gettin’ into the hospitality business or somethin’?” I was going off-script, but I didn’t care. I wanted to see if there was something, anything, I could get him to say.

  “I have my reasons,” he said blandly. “And like I said, I’ve been looking at the property for some time. If it weren’t for you, it’d already be mine.” He opened one of the folders and passed me a small packet of papers, stapled at the top corner. “This is all the paperwork – everything you need to get signed. Bring this back to me with your signature and that of your partners, and I can have a check ready for you. Until then, there’s nothing more to be said.” He rose and nodded at his companions, who moved for the first time since I’d walked in. “Hope to speak to you soon, Ms. Peterson. Until then, be safe.”

  He and his men left. And the true intention of his words – a threat – hung in the air.

  Chapter 22

  GERALD

  Chance, Crystal, and I were seated in the booth of Richie’s, one of the local diners. We sipped our coffee, picking at a plate of onion rings. But we were all far more interested in the meeting that had just ended.

  “He wants to buy the B&B?” Chance asked. “Why? What does he want with a bed and breakfast?”

  “He doesn’t want to run it,” I informed him. “He wants to use it as a money-laundering operation. It’s the perfect set-up, too – all sorts of shit you can use to cover money moving through the place. Restaurant attached is even better.”

  “The fucker offered me next to nothin’,” Crystal huffed, anger in her voice. “Insulting as hell – I wanted to tell him to screw off.”

  “Smart thing you didn’t,” I said. “We wanna let him think you’re ignorant about what’s goin’ on. If he gets wind we’re onto him, he might do somethin’ drastic.”

  Chance popped an onion ring in his mouth, chewed it thoughtfully, and spoke. “Fuckin’ racket he’s got goin’. He screwed with your place, brought the value down, and now he wants to scoop it up for dirt cheap, hopin’ he’ll be able to just take it off your hands.”

  “You know what?” Crystal asked. “I’d bet anything he’s done that kinda shit all around town. I’d bet if you asked the car dealership, for example, they’d tell you they lost a couple of cars before sellin’ to him.”

  “You’re probably right about that,” I said, nodding in agreement. “First, he comes in with the soft touch, and if that doesn’t work, he starts playin’ hardball. And if he still gets resistance…” I didn’t even want to think about what he might do in that case.

  “But he knew what he was doin’,” Crystal mused, chewing on her lip. “He was cagey, didn’t say anything that I might be able to use against him, or anything that might hint he was doin’ somethin’ illegal. But there was still the air of a threat in his words.”

  “There were men with him though, right?” Chase asked. “Hard-hittin’ motherfuckers?”

  “That’s right. Probably the same pricks who wrecked my bed and breakfast.” She scoffed, shaking her head. “Asshole tried to tell me some bored teens did it. Like I’m an idiot or somethin’.”

  Chance frowned. “Flimsy excuse to let you know what’s at stake. But that doesn’t matter. First thing is we need to get some dirt on this guy, try to build a case.”

  “Don’t know if that’ll do us any good,” I said. “This guy’s got reach – city hall, the cops, anyone else in this town that’s got any power.”

  “Then what do we do?” Chance asked. “How can we bring this guy down?”

  “Maybe we can establish the case is bigger than just Idylwood,” Crystal suggested, looking at me. “If we can prove it goes beyond Texas or even into Mexico, then we might be able to get the FBI involved, go over the heads of the local cops. He made it clear some of them are his friends.”

  It was an idea worth considering. As much as I wanted to avoid getting the law involved, it might have to come to that.

  We finished our lunch and stepped out into the parking lot a few minutes later.

  “Chance, why don’t you ride back with Crystal.”

  He appeared confused, and so did she. “What?” he asked.

  She stared at me. “Why?”

  “I wanna stop by the mayor’s office again, see if he’s found out anything else.”

  “Then I’m comin’ with,” Crystal said without hesitation.

  “You and Chance go back to the ranch and wait. I need you back and ready in case Diaz tries to get in touch again.”

  “And what about backup?” Crystal asked. “Isn’t that somethin’ you’re big on?”

  The woman had a point. “How about this – I do this, and I’ll keep you both posted. But it’ll be nothing – just a stop at City Hall and I’ll meet you back at the ranch. Sound good?”

  Crystal appeared to consider refusing to let me go on my own again, making a case for why she ought to come. She sucked in a breath. “Fine. But if you find out anything else, I wanna be the first to know.”

  “You will. See you guys back there.”

  Crystal gave me one last look, one I couldn’t quite understand, before following Chance. As soon as they were gone, I took out my phone and called the mayor’s office.

  “He’s not in today,” his secretary told me. “Not sure when he’ll be back.”

  “The mayor’s just…not in and you don’t know where he is?”

  “He called this morning and said he was out on business.”

  “Did he say what kind of business?” I was overstepping my bounds, but I asked anyway.

  “I don’t know, and even if I did, I’m not in the business of divulging that to anyone who calls.”

  “This is his friend, Gerald Walker – we go way back. I need to talk with him, and it’s important.”

  “Wait…you said Gerald Walker?”

  “That’s right.”

  “He said that if you called, I was to tell you to call him.”

  I thanked her before getting off the phone, eager to talk to Josh. But when I called the number, the phone rang and rang and finally went to his voicemail. I left a message, asking him to call me back when he could. But I didn’t like it. The mayor not coming in and also being out of touch…it put a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  I was eager for some answers, so I decided to head over to the car dealership and have a little chat with the manager again, see if I could find out anything new about Diaz there.

  About ten minutes later I pulled up to the dealership. The lot was still packed with overpriced cars, not a single one selling since I’d been there last. I parked and got out. Like before, no one greeted me, no salesman swooped in to see what he could do to put me in a car.

  I looked around and noticed not a single customer on the lot. How the hell did this place manage to survive? Was it really nothing more than a front for whatever Diaz was into? Was he making so much money that he could write off this business as a total loss just to have a place to launder cash?

  I stepped up to the building in the center of the lot and knocked on the door. A voice inside shouted to come in. A man, looking no older than twenty-five, was seated at the manager’s desk. He had his feet propped up, a video game controller in his hands, some shooter game playing on the screen in front of him.

  “Howdy,” I said, taking off my hat.

  “Hey,” he replied without turning his eyes from the TV. “What’s up?”

  I couldn’t help but chuckle. In what fucking universe was that the behavior of a salesman? “The manager in?”

  “The who?” Machine gun fire sounded from the TV, the salesman’
s character exchanging bullets with nameless men onscreen.

  I wasn’t in the mood for wasting time, so I stepped over to the PlayStation and pressed the off button. The screen went blank.

  “Hey!” the kid shouted, jerking his head up to glare at me. “What’re you doing?”

  I dropped into the chair across from him. “Where’s the manager? Manuel? I wanna speak to him.”

  The salesman was clearly steamed about the video game and, frustrated, tossed his controller onto the desk like a spoiled kid. “Don’t know.”

  “You don’t know where Manuel is? What if you needed to get ahold of him?”

  He shrugged. “What difference does it make? You wanna buy a car? I mean, I’m here if there’s one you wanted to look at.”

  I decided another angle. “I am here to buy a car. I was lookin’ at that Silver Ranger in the back. Manuel told me he’d cut me a deal, I told him I’d think about it. Now, I wanna buy, but I’ve still got some questions.”

  He looked more annoyed than anything. But when I sat forward and narrowed my eyes, that was enough to change his behavior. “Yeah, if Manuel gave you a deal then sure, I can honor it.”

  “But I had some questions for him specifically. When’s he going to be in next?”

  Another annoyed shrug. “You don’t need to speak to him is what I’m saying. You can do the deal through me.”

  Annoyance flitted through me as I stared at the kid. “Dammit, will you just tell me where the hell Manuel is?” My tone was hard – I wasn’t in the mood to get jerked around.

  “Fine, geez,” the kid said, finally sitting up. “Honestly, I don’t know where he is. A few days ago he said he was going on vacation with his wife, and I haven’t heard from him since.”

  “Seriously? He left on vacation and that’s it? He hasn’t called to check in or anything?”

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” the kid said. “I mean, it’s kind of weird, to be honest. Manuel basically lives at this place. But maybe he needed some time off or something, you know?” He stood up and scratched his belly. “I need to take a leak. Be back in a second.” He headed down the hall and into one of the doors along it.

  I turned the computer around and clicked into the files, quickly locating the employee database. I found the file for Manuel and snapped a photo of his address just as I heard the toilet flush. I turned the computer back around quickly and sat back.

  “Alright,” I said, rising from my seat. “I’ll come back later, see if he comes back.”

  “Sure,” the kid said with another shrug before dropping into his seat and turning on the video game with his foot.

  I left without another word, eager to get to Manuel’s house and find out what I could. He lived outside of town, the address taking me into the woods where the houses were hidden in the trees far off the road. Manuel’s house was down a winding, dirt road.

  I pulled in front of the house, a two-story cabin that was actually pretty damn nice. And to my surprise, a big, brand-new truck was parked in front, a sleek, dark red convertible next to it.

  I hopped and out and approached the house. Despite there being a pair of cars in front, there was no other sign anyone was there. I heard nothing but silence. The claim he was on vacation seemed more and more like bullshit by the second.

  My fist stopped inches away from the front door as I prepared to knock. Something caught my eye. Off on the far end of the house, one of the windows was broken. Something wasn’t right. I hurried back to my car and grabbed my Glock 17 from the glove compartment, tucking it into the back of my pants as I approached the broken window. Glass was on the ground, and it looked like someone had shot through it.

  I didn’t think twice before slipping my gun out of my waistband and holding it close. Then I peeked through the window at the inside of the house.

  It was a damn mess. Shit was everywhere. The coffee table in the living room was smashed, one of the couches was flipped over onto its back. Something bad had happened here – not a doubt in my mind. I took a quick look around to make sure no one was watching before ducking around the side of the house toward the back. Once there, I spotted more evidence of a struggle. The back door had been kicked open and was swaying back and forth on its hinges.

  The skin on the back of my neck tingled – my instinct’s way of letting me know danger was near. I flicked the safety off my Glock and positioned myself next to the open door, taking a deep breath before swooping inside.

  No one was there. But more signs of struggle were all around me. Taking in the evidence, I quickly put together a series of events. Someone had shot a single round, likely from a distance, into the kitchen. After that, the shooter – or whoever had been with him – came in through the back and finished whatever they’d come to do.

  I checked the bedrooms. The only one that looked used was the master – the other one had no signs of children or anything like that. Only Manuel and his wife lived here alone, but both bedrooms had been torn apart.

  I’d seen stuff like this as a Ranger. When a gang wanted to make a hit and have it look like nothing more than a home invasion gone wrong, they’d always wreck the entire house, going through drawers to steal enough valuables to make it look like that was the motivation.

  I checked and found the wife’s jewelry cabinet ransacked, nearly everything of value stolen. But an expensive laptop on the nightstand hadn’t been taken. Any thief looking for goods would’ve snatched that up in a heartbeat.

  Back in the living room, the signs of struggle were everywhere, looking like a fight had broken out – one that didn’t last long. Then, on the carpet, I spotted a light red stain that looked like it’d been hurriedly cleaned up. Blood.

  I walked into the kitchen in front of the bullet hole and noticed the floor where someone would’ve been standing was much, much cleaner than the area around it.

  Now there was no doubt. Manuel’s wife had likely been in the kitchen, a sniper taking her down from afar. Manuel, when he saw what had happened, took cover. More men came in the back, struggled with him for a brief time before finishing the job. The attackers quickly cleaned up the bodies and took them God only knew where. Then they staged a robbery.

  But the job was sloppy. Or, I realized, only the bare minimum of what needed to be done to point to a robbery. Any cops who weren’t all that interested in figuring out the truth would have all the proof they needed to write it off as a home invasion with the two victims killed in the process.

  A soft pop assaulted my ears, followed by the crisp ping of glass breaking. My eyes dropped to the window in front of me, and I noted another small circle in the pane. I turned around and spotted a hole in the wall just to the right over my shoulder.

  I was under attack.

  I dropped to the ground behind the couch, another pair of gunshots cutting through the air and hitting the wall right behind where I’d been standing only moments before. Gun in hand, I waited.

  I heard footsteps outside, followed by the crash of the front door being kicked in. I stuck my head out from behind the couch and watched as a pair of black-clad men, ski-masks on their faces, rushed into the living room with pistols drawn.

  I lifted myself just enough to see over the couch and fired a couple of shots in the general direction of the men, causing them to drop and take cover. It’d been a long time since I’d been in a firefight, but all of my training allowed me to stay calm.

  The men dropped to the ground behind the chairs on the far side of the room, and I shot a quick triplet of rounds into the air above them, not giving them the chance to get up. I’d been outnumbered more than a few times in my life, but that didn’t mean I wanted to tangle with two likely trained men, and almost certainly a third in the woods providing cover.

  I kept low to the ground, firing another couple of shots behind me as I hurried toward the back door. Once I was out, the footsteps resumed. I took position behind the opened door, waiting for the men to approach. When one did, I slammed the door ha
rd in his face, hard enough to split the wood and send the man tumbling back. After another shot into the air to give them pause, I rushed around the side of the house toward my truck.

  Another vehicle had arrived, and black truck was parked far enough away that I hadn’t been able to hear it approach. I ran to it and fired a pair of rounds into the nearest wheel, the air escaping with a hiss. Then a shot cracked through the air from the unseen man, hitting the passenger-side window of the truck with another crash.

  Keeping low, I rushed to my truck and climbed inside. As I gunned the engine, another shot hit the side of the truck with a metallic pang. I spun the wheels, getting the hell out of there, pulling my truck onto the road leading away from the house. The men appeared on the front lawn as I drove to safety.

  Once I was on the road headed back to town, I took out my phone and called Mayor Simms. This time it went straight to voicemail.

  Shit had gone to another level, and now the mayor was MIA. However bad this was before, now it was even worse.

  And the stakes couldn’t have been higher.

  Chapter 23

  Crystal

  “Where the hell is he?”

  I hated to admit it, but I was nervous as hell. Gerald had left more than two hours ago, and I hadn’t heard a thing from him. My stomach was tight, my palms sweaty as I paced back and forth in the library, Adie and Sabrina sitting with me.

  “I’m sure he’s fine,” Adie assured me. “He’s a tough guy with a lot of training. I bet he’s got no problem handlin’ himself.”

  “But he shouldn’t be out there handlin’ himself,” I grouched, my tone worried and frustrated all at once. “I told him he didn’t need to be goin’ alone, and now he might be in some kind of danger. It was a stupid, stupid move.”

  There was something else too, something I didn’t want to admit. I missed him. Sure, I was worried knowing we were all likely in some serious danger. But I wanted him back. I wanted Gerald with me, his body close to mine.