Danger on the Ranch

by Dana Mentink

  “Yarrow. My dad makes it.”

  She smiled. “He was kind, the one time I spoke to him on the phone. Does he live nearby?”

  “Lives on a boat. He’s paid as a ranch carpenter, but he’s got a garden plot on the property.”

  Jane’s smile vanished. “We have to tell him that Wade’s escaped.”

  “I’ll call him as soon as I can.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Get you to the nearest US marshal.”

  Her breath hitched. “They won’t be able to protect me.”

  “It’s their job.”

  “They couldn’t find him. Only you could. And they couldn’t keep him in prison. He escaped from them.”

  “It’s the only option.”

  She shook her head. “Do you figure Wade will leave you alone then? After you hand me over?”

  “No. He’s gonna come for me, and I’ll send him back to prison or one of us will die. That’s how it’s gonna end, but you and the kid are not going to be in the middle of it.”

  Her chin went up. “Ben. His name is Ben.”

  Ben. Wade’s son. How much of his father did he inherit? Mitch wondered. Don’t go there, Mitch. You share genes with your brother, too. “Where is he?”

  She remained stubbornly silent.

  He let the quiet spool out for a few minutes, waiting for her to speak. Cop trick. She didn’t. “Wade said you’d been storing things for him.”

  “What things?”

  “My granddad’s gun, for one.”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t.”

  “Then how did he get the gun?”

  “I have no idea.”

  He drank some tea. “Before daybreak, we’ll go to the ranch and call the marshals.”

  Her throat worked convulsively, and then she took a deep breath. “Wade will find me, Mitch, no matter what kind of safe house they put me in. He’ll find me, and he’ll take Ben.”

  Her last words broke, and it made his gut go tight. He hardened himself against the feeling. Remember what she is, whose she is.

  “Should have thought of that before you married the guy, right?” It was cruel, but what she’d let Wade do, turned a blind eye to, made her complicit. Just because her plans had backfired for some reason didn’t mean he was going to let himself be manipulated.

  The lamplight picked up the glittering sparks of moisture in her hair as she stared at him, small in her oversize clothes, but the ferocity in her eyes was bigger than life. “Go ahead and think that I’m stupid, gullible and blind. Believe me, I’ve thought all of those things and more. How did I not see Wade for what he was? I’ve wrestled with that every day of my life since the police showed up on my doorstep.”

  He shifted, not wanting to hear anything more, but she went on.

  “Maybe I had a desperate need to be loved, or maybe it was low self-esteem or just plain insanity, but in the beginning I believed Wade was a good man, and I thought he loved me.” She tipped her chin up to look at him. “Wasn’t there a time when you believed your brother? When he fooled you?”

  Fooled you. More times than Mitch could remember in their younger years. Wade was a master manipulator, and he’d bamboozled his own kin, misled their parents for decades, skated away from consequences by deceiving, charming, lying to teachers, cops and, yes, to Mitch also. Finally, he allowed one curt nod.

  She sighed, shoulders slumping. “I would give anything to do it over again, to ask questions about where Wade went all those times he told me he was away on business trips. If I’d walked those acres he’d insisted were infested with rattlesnakes, I might have heard those women call for help. Instead I was asleep in my cozy little house, in my make-believe world.” Her voice squeezed off, the barest glimmer of tears pooling, fingers clenched into white fists. “How do you think it feels to know I could have saved those women and didn’t?”

  The tears began to trickle down her face, paralyzing him, confusing him. Jane was his enemy just like Wade.

  But the anguish she spoke of was one he’d experienced, too.

  When he’d left for the police academy, he had intentionally walled his brother out of his life, leaving him loose to destroy, as Mitch knew deep down he would. He’d left it to other jurisdictions, other cops, until the damage was done, until lives had been lost.

  How do you think it feels to know I could have saved those women and didn’t? It was the same accusation he’d leveled at himself, too.

  He could not order the mess of confusion in his thoughts, so he set down his mug and took the other from her trembling hand, putting them on the crate that served as a coffee table. “Lie down on the bed and get some sleep. I’ll keep watch. We’ll leave at oh four hundred. That’s...”

  “Four a.m. I know.” She followed him to the bedroom. He took the old quilt down from the closet and laid it on the bed.

  “It’s cold back here. I’ll move the heater in.”

  “Thank you,” she said in a very small voice. She stood there for a moment, scanning the tiny room. “I’m sorry for the pain I know I’ve caused you by running here. Wade hurt you, too, probably more than me.” Her chin went up then. “But I’m not sorry I came. I would do anything to save my son. He’s all that matters, and, God willing, I’m going to protect Ben.”

  There it was again in her voice, the twined strands of pain and strength, hints of anguish, an echo of a strange kind of certainty she had no right to. If she was telling the truth...

  He brushed the thought away. He had no energy left to consider anything but the most pressing matters—keeping them both alive and getting her delivered safely to the US marshals. Then he would be free to go to war with his brother until they’d decided the winner once and for all.

  * * *

  She approached Mitch cautiously, shortly after midnight. He was sitting in the dark living room, the rocking chair pulled near the window, the rifle lying over his knees, so still she was not sure whether he was awake or asleep. The temperature had dropped, and she clutched the blanket around herself.

  “Jane?” he said, making her jump.

  “I came to take my turn at watch.”

  “No need. Go back to sleep.”

  “There is a need. You can’t stay up all night. I’ll watch for a couple of hours. I’ll wake you if I see anything.”

  “No, you...”

  “What? You think I can’t use my two eyes as well as you use yours? Believe me, I’ve been looking over my shoulder for two years now. I’m pretty good at it.”

  He didn’t answer.

  She heaved out a breath. “Oh, right. You still think I’m somehow in league with Wade.”

  The room was dead quiet, save for the moan of the wind that skimmed the roof.

  “Mitch, I risked my life to drag you into that boat. I could much more easily have let him kill you or never shown up here at all. No offense, but this isn’t exactly the Ritz-Carlton.” Her attempt at humor fell flat. He sat there, cradling the rifle like some monolithic statue. A sigh escaped her, and she turned to go.

  “One hour,” he said.

  “What?”

  “I’ll sleep for one hour. Then wake me, if I’m not out here.”

  “Okay,” she said. She ran a finger over the rocking chair. “I had an old banged-up glider rocker. Sitting there with Ben, even when he was crying...” She shrugged. “Those were the best moments of my life. I miss that rocker.”

  He hesitated a moment, as if he were about to speak, then took the rifle and checked out the window for one last look. She wandered the small space, over to the corner she had not examined earlier. Peering closer, she hardly managed to hold back an exclamation. The long rectangular board housed a train track, which wound through little snowcapped mountains. A miniature train stood ready, as if to start off on a journey, past the cluster of horses
and the painstakingly painted trees.

  Mitch stopped on his way to the bedroom.

  “You like model trains?” she said.

  He nodded. “Since I was a kid.”

  “Does it run?”

  “Of course.” There was a slightly offended tone in his reply. He reached past her and switched on the train. It slowly chugged to life and began its journey around the tracks. He watched it for a few minutes. From the corner of her eye, she caught an expression on his face that she could not decipher... Satisfaction, regret?

  The longing for her son sprang to life so suddenly it almost choked her. Mommy, twain? she could hear him say, pointing with his chubby finger when she’d risked taking him to the train station. He had not yet mastered the r sound, but his passion for trains was already well developed, and when she had extra money to spare there was no better way to please him than with the purchase of a new toy train to add to his meager collection. If there was no money, as there usually wasn’t, they would watch the tracks, free entertainment. “Ben loves trains, too,” she managed to say without crying.

  They both watched the locomotive chug around until Mitch switched it off. “Wake me if there’s anything and...”

  “I know. One hour. Got it.” She waited until he was almost through the door before she added, “And I promise I won’t touch your train.”

  Again there was no answer from Mitch as he closed the door. She heard the bed springs groan as he eased his huge frame onto the mattress. As she was about to turn toward the rocking chair, she noticed the name painted in delicate gold letters on the engine... Paige Lynn.

  She had only ever seen Mitch Whitehorse in the courtroom, austere and silent in his marshal’s uniform, his glittering stare hard as diamond. Unmarried and childless as far as she knew. So who was Paige Lynn? And who, really, was Mitch Whitehorse, the immovable mountain with a soft spot for toy trains?

  Doesn’t matter who he is deep down, she told herself. She had to persuade him to help her, to make an ally out of an enemy.

  Gathering the blanket around her, she eased into the rocking chair, listening to the wind, straining to hear any whisper of danger.

  SIX

  Mitch slept. He dreamed, as he often did, of a black snake rising from the water, fangs dripping. As the fleshy maw gaped toward him, he stood paralyzed, unable even to scream. He jerked to consciousness with a shout, grabbing out at the viper, only to find himself clutching Jane’s wrist.

  He let go and bolted from the bed so fast sparks danced in his vision. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.

  “It’s okay. You were muttering to yourself.”

  Great. And she heard.

  “I have nightmares, too. I saw a counselor when I could, and she said it’s the mind’s way of processing what the heart can’t.”

  He didn’t answer, wiping the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve.

  “Ben has them, sometimes. Night terrors, they’re called.”

  Well, whaddya do about them? he wanted to ask but did not. As if she read his thoughts, she answered anyway.

  “My mom used to sing me the ‘Jesus Loves Me’ song. Know it?”

  He nodded.

  “That’s what I sing to myself and Ben when we have nightmares.

  He shook his head with a grunt. “Figures.”

  “What?”

  “That ‘Jesus loves you’ stuff. How can you believe that after what you’ve experienced?”

  “I didn’t for a long time. After Wade, I can’t trust my own heart or head to separate what’s truth from what isn’t. God is the one thing, the only thing, I know is true.” Her voice dropped to the barest whisper. “It’s the only thing that keeps me alive.”

  He didn’t know what to say to that. He’d heard it, of course, particularly from Aunt Ginny, Uncle Gus’s wife, and from Pops, too, but did he believe it? No way. Some mythical, fanciful love from an invisible god was far away from the reality of his world—a mother who drank herself into the grave, and a brother who killed a series of women who had probably prayed with their very last breaths to a god who hadn’t saved them.

  He pulled on his boots and jacket before he noticed the time on his mother’s old mantel clock. “It’s three thirty,” he snapped.

  “Yes. I tried to wake you before, but you were sleeping soundly.”

  He grimaced. “You should have tried harder.”

  “I’ve heard it’s a bad idea to disturb a hibernating bear.”

  Her face was serious, but there was a glint of humor in her eye.

  Humor, incredible. It banked his ire. He sighed. “Yeah, well, I guess that’s fair. Best get going soon. We’ll take the horses.”

  “How long a ride is it to the ranch?”

  “An hour, give or take. The trail winds along the coast. There are...exposed parts.”

  The fear flashed anew in her eyes, so he tried to disarm it. “We’ll be okay. Hungry?”

  “Yes. I didn’t eat yesterday. You?”

  “Yeah, but I’m not much of a cook. Got some cereal. Maybe some bread and canned things.”

  “May I try to fix us something?”

  That threw him off. No one had cooked a meal just for him since Paige Lynn. The thought lashed through him. Her departure had cut a scar worse than the one on his face. “Uh, you don’t need to do that.”

  But she had already taken his silence as assent and gone off to clatter around the kitchen. He used the time to feed and saddle the horses. Jane hadn’t seemed like much of a rider, but Bud was placid and easy, as long as Rosie was there to take the lead. The air was rain washed and cold, which only aggravated his stiff muscles.

  When he returned to the cabin, he was greeted by a tantalizing smell, which made his mouth water. He sat at the table, and Jane slid a plate of pancakes toward him and another for herself.

  “There was no syrup, so strawberry jelly will have to do. You have a lot. Who made it?”

  “I did.”

  She laughed.

  “What’s funny?”

  “I’d never peg you for the jelly-making type.”

  He shrugged. “My mom showed me how.” In one of the precious weeks when she wasn’t intoxicated. The moment with her in the kitchen, up to his wrists in berries, was one of his dearest memories, but there was no point in sharing that. “Lots of wild berries up here in the summer. Strawberries and blackberries.”

  “Then I guess you do know a little something about food preparation.”

  “Only jelly, that’s it. Dunno how to cook anything else.”

  She held out her hand to him.

  He gaped, unsure.

  “Okay if I pray?”

  Was it? He didn’t know.

  He tried for a joke. “You should pray for a fancier meal, better digs.”

  She cocked her head. “I take things moment by moment. Right now I’m safe, my son is safe and I have a delicious pancake to eat with strawberry jelly. That’s a whole lot to give thanks for.”

  Hesitantly, he took her small hand. It was cool, and the bones felt delicate, like a bird’s. She said grace, ending with a soft amen.

  He wanted to stare at her, to see if she was for real, this woman he’d been so certain about only a day earlier. She was pretending, assuming a facade, had to be, but he saw only earnest pleasure in her expression as she daintily ate the sticky pancake with a knife and fork.

  He stacked one on top of the other and rolled, eating it sandwich style, which made her laugh again. “Ben does that, too.”

  “It’s faster, eating them that way. We’re always turning out early at the ranch.”

  “I used to sleep late, until...” She shrugged. “Anyway, I get up early now, too, and stay up late. Good thing Ben is a napper.”

  Ben, always, in her comments, in her thoughts—unless she was making the whole thing u
p to pull on his heartstrings. He helped her clean up and grabbed his rifle. “Ready?”

  She swallowed and raised her chin. “I think so, but I’m not good on a horse.”

  “Bud’s gentle. You just have to stay in the saddle.”

  “Story of my life,” she said.

  He had to smile at that. “You and me both,” he said.

  * * *

  Jane clutched the saddle horn with one hand and the reins in another. Bud seemed content to amble along in the dark, staying close behind Rosie. Mitch kept their pace slow, stopping every so often to listen. Whenever he did, her skin crawled, picturing Wade tracking them, waiting for his chance. All she could hear was the crash of the water against the rocks, though fog obscured the ocean from view.

  They’d been traveling a scant twenty minutes by her reckoning, along a road with sea cliffs on one side and grassland on the other. She’d put her own clothes back on, and they were still slightly damp, the clamminess chilling her deep down. A spray from the dew-spattered branches caught her in the cheek and trickled down her neck, freezing her skin inch by inch.

  Mitch did not seem perturbed by the cold or the early hour, but she knew he had to be sore from their encounter with Wade. She was wrestling through whether or not she should ask him about his head when a shot echoed through the air. Jane would have screamed if she hadn’t been trying so hard to remain on the horse. Mitch urged Rosie forward, Bud lurching behind. She’d barely kept her seat on the animal, fear pinching hard at her stomach.

  “Get along, Rosie,” he whispered urgently, guiding the horses forward behind an outcropping of rock. He stopped suddenly, sliding off Rosie and whirling toward her. Her heart slammed into her ribs as she took his hand and leaped from the horse. Mitch grabbed up both sets of reins.

  “Come on.”

  She followed him as quickly as she could, stumbling over the rocks she could not see in the dark. He led the way deep into a fringe of shrubbery, which yanked at her hair. Pulling the reins, he guided the horses away from the trail and let them loose and pulled her to her knees next to him.

  “Where did the shot come from?” she whispered.