The Lonesome Lawmen Trilogy

by Pauline Baird Jones

  Jake knew Chet watched them, but he found that the closer Phoebe got, the harder it was to concentrate on anyone else. Her hand closed around the cold can, her fingers meshing with his for a moment. Instead of telling her he wanted a job, he stared into brown eyes that didn’t give much away and said, “I really enjoyed the show.”

  She took the can, drank, then rubbed away the moisture that lingered on her mouth. “Thanks.”

  “Well, I’m damned.”

  She looked at Chet, her eyebrows arched. “I thought you’d been saved by the blood of the Lamb.”

  “Yeah, well,” he shrugged, then grinned, gesturing toward the back. “I’ll just go do something—”

  “Good idea.”

  Chet looked relieved as he left Jake alone with Phoebe in the echoing barn of a room.

  Phoebe turned back to Jake, her eyes showing amusement against a background of sad. He wondered if it ever went away. She tilted her head back for another drink, the movement exposing the smooth column of her throat. That drew his eyes down to plunging cleavage framed in lace that the denim jacket she now wore did little to hide.

  The air was close, still heated from the recent press of bodies, thick with smoke, and smelled of beer and sweat. He ran a finger around the neckline of his tee shirt and realized she was looking at him with question marks in her eyes.

  What did she want to know? Jake narrowed his eyes, probing deep because he had a knack for reading eyes, but before he hit pay dirt, she lowered her lashes and took another drink of her soda. When she looked at him again, there was nothing to see but cool inquiry.

  “So, what can I do for you, cowboy?”

  “Name’s Jake Kirby.” He thrust out his hand.

  “Phoebe Mentel.” Her voice was cool and she kept her hand to herself.

  He wiped his on his pants and held it out again. “I’m pleased to meet you, Phoebe.”

  With a laugh that shattered the cool of her face and eyes, she relented. His first thought was how right it felt when his fingers closed around hers, his second, that he was on the edge of deep trouble this time.

  The sudden widening of her eyes that told him she felt it, too, only made it worse.

  He’d always prided himself on being the heart-whole Kirby brother, the free-spirited marshal tracking down the bad guys, a modern-day Marshal Dillon whose Dodge City was the world. A tracker with few opportunities to stay in one place long enough to meet a Miss Kitty who would cheer him on, let alone wave him off into the next sunset.

  Phoebe didn’t look inclined to cheer. Retreat was wisdom but not in his job description, so he indicated a chair sitting askew by a table, mutely inviting her to join him.

  Phoebe turned and straddled the chair next to the one Jake had pointed at, needing any barrier she could find to put between them. His eyes were wary, which meant he’d gotten the same jolt she did when their hands touched, but his smile was still loaded with enough wattage to take her breath away. She opened her mouth to say—what? The door behind her opened, and Jesse came out, trailing a woman. What a surprise.

  “You ready to go, darlin’?” he asked, looking at his companion with a dazed expression that could have been from the beer he’d consumed, the woman or both. To Phoebe’s surprise, it was the woman she’d noticed watching her earlier. Right before she ran into Jake. For some reason this made her uneasy, but a quick scrutiny found no indication that the two knew each other, and the woman looked like a natural to play bimbo to Jesse’s bozo.

  Phoebe hesitated, but even if the woman wanted more from Jesse than sex, she wouldn’t get it from him while he was plastered. “You can go without me. I’ll catch a ride with Chet when he’s—”

  “Or I can take you home,” Jake said.

  It was crazy. It was dangerous.

  It was irresistible.

  Phoebe liked games almost as much as Phagan, but this was one she hadn’t played in a long time. It was more dangerous than B&E, but that she shouldn’t be playing it only made it seem more enticing. What kind of opponent would Jake make? Was he worth the risk?

  Professionally, Jake needed her to let him take her home. The personal part of him was hoping she’d say no. Her gaze locked with his. Hard as a drill bit, it mined for motive. Jake didn’t flinch, but it wasn’t easy. He was used to giving, rather than receiving, penetrating looks. Just when he was sure she’d bored straight through to his ulterior motive, she smiled.

  “I’ll catch a ride with Jake.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Jesse approached them with a weaving, uncertain stride, not stopping until he was in front of Jake. He leaned forward, sending a strong wave of sweat-and-beer-drenched air in Jake’s direction. “Who the hell are you?”

  “Jake Kirby.” Jake didn’t lean toward or away from the cowboy. He chose his move, his spot to hit, if Jesse turned nasty.

  “He’s looking for work. Jake, this is Jesse. You may have noticed him singing and getting plastered up on the stage tonight.”

  “Howdy.” Jesse held out his hand, intensity at the back of his blurred eyes.

  “I wouldn’t if I were you,” Phoebe cautioned Jake. “He can chin himself with his pinkies.”

  Jake looked puzzled, so she added, “Rock climbing.”

  “Done a bit of climbing myself,” Jake said and held out his hand.

  Jesse tried to grab it but missed. Phoebe gave him a shove with her booted foot. “Go home and sleep it off, Jesse.”

  Jesse tried to grab her but missed again. Bryn moved forward, wearing a pout that looked almost real. “I thought you were taking me home, honey?”

  Mert came out the office door and Phoebe turned to him with relief. “Would you drive these two?”

  “I was—whoa!” Mert caught sight of Bryn. “Have we met, darlin’?”

  “I don’t think I’d forget meeting you,” Bryn said, fluttering her lashes.

  Role was the right description, Phoebe thought. Quite the performance, if you didn’t look in her eyes.

  Mert offered his arm, shoved his brother out the front door, then turned and said to Jake, “Mind how you go with her, mister. She’s family.”

  Jake nodded, no sign of worry in his eyes or manner. Either he didn’t consider the guys a threat or he wasn’t planning to hit on her, Phoebe decided. When the door closed, Phoebe said, “Sorry.”

  “I’ve got two brothers,” Jake said. “Both older than me. And dedicated to keeping my ass in line.”

  Her smile was slow but potent. “All God’s children need a goal.”

  Jake’s laugh came natural, felt good. “Yeah,” he said, “they do.” Then his brain reminded him what his goal was, and he sobered.

  Her eyes registered this. Her lashes flickered, turning her expression into bland and pleasant. She stood up with an abrupt movement that tipped over the chair.

  “Got a bit of a performance buzz to burn off. Can we go?”

  “Sure.” She vibrated with tension, her gaze bouncing around, looking everywhere but at him. He stepped close, and she stepped back, reaching for her can of soda.

  With a quick movement, Jake pulled it out of her reach. “You won’t work off a buzz chugging caffeine. Come on, let’s go get some food into you.”

  She looked startled, then grinned.

  “You might regret the absence of buzz,” she said with a sidelong glance as they headed for the door. “When I crash, I’m out like a light.”

  “You think my ego can’t take a girl falling asleep on me?” he said, as he stepped past her to push open the door.

  “Don’t know what you can take, now do I?” She stopped for a moment, rendered briefly breathless by the fit of blue jeans across his very nice ass. She gave a little shake and stepped through the doorway, but couldn’t resist murmuring her thanks for the courtesy—and the view.

  “What?” Jake looked at her, as if sensing her layered emphasis.

  “Nothing.” She grinned. “But you’d best—feed me, Seymour.”

  He matched her grin as he opened th
e truck’s passenger door for her. “Are you dangerous when you’re hungry?”

  She paused in the act of sliding across the car seat, leaving her long, bare legs extended for maximum viewing. He inhaled sharply, then looked up. She gave him a provocative look. “There are those who say I’m always dangerous.”

  * * * *

  Earl watched them from the shadows as they got into the truck, which pulled away and turned toward town. He slid into his SUV, pushing aside his snoring date. In a moment, he took off with a spurt of gravel, turning in the same direction.

  * * * *

  “Not exactly what I had in mind when I offered you food,” Jake said, pulling limp pastries from the convenience store’s microwave oven. The pungent scent of hotdog wrapped around—without making palatable—a body of smells comprised of stale cigarette smoke, popcorn, gasoline, various body odors, wet dog and something that fell under the general heading of dirt. The mix permeated every corner of the dingy store, even the pastries Jake carried to their tiny table. A scratchy radio dispensed a country-sounding wail into the chilled air while the middle-aged clerk desultorily turned the pages of a tattered National Enquirer.

  “Small-town Friday night,” Phoebe said, the look in her eyes equal parts amused and resigned.

  He crowded the pastries onto the tabletop with her watery juice drink and his over-strong coffee, then squeezed into the seat across from her. The table, wedged between a line of self-serve soda machines and the bathrooms, put them knee to knee and nose to nose. Since she had a nice nose, it wasn’t a problem.

  Even with tiredness and fluorescent lighting bleeding the color from her face, she gave off a wholesome, sexy vibrancy that was dangerous to someone who’d been on the go for over twenty-four hours and without feminine contact for longer than that.

  Bryn, being a colleague, didn’t count.

  He rubbed the back of his neck, hoping exhaustion was why he was having trouble routing out a pesky elemental masculine response to Phoebe Mentel. Suspect he reminded himself, adding with more emphasis, prime suspect who could lead him to Dewey Hyatt. Just thinking about catching Hyatt helped Jake to sharpen his gaze, probing her expression for weak spots. What he found was strength in her steady gaze and in the line of her strong jaw. He’d seen unlikely people in unlikely places before, but Phoebe wasn’t just an odd peg in a strange hole.

  She was on the wrong pegboard.

  She sat on the cheap plastic bench in her long-tall-Texan getup with the natural aplomb of a royal, systematically crumbling a cardboard pastry into cardboard crumbs.

  A sign she wasn’t stupid.

  Her body hummed like a banjo from her performance high, one booted foot tapping out a tune only she could hear while her sad, cynical eyes went over him with laser-powered thoroughness. What she concluded, she kept to herself. A sign she was smart or just had nothing to hide? No way to know without delving into the puzzle of her mind and life further. He did wonder why he kept seeing her sitting under the spreading branches of a magnolia tree. She seemed made to wear something white and drifting, one of those wide-brimmed hats framing her face, her dark eyes slumberous with longing, her full lips parted for fine crystal instead of Styrofoam, and a big old plantation as a backdrop.

  The straight line to knowledge begins with a question, so he asked, “What’s a nice accent like yours doing in a place like this?”

  The well-defined line of her eyebrow rose. “From where I’m sitting, cowboy, you’re the one with an accent.”

  He acknowledged the hit with a lift of one eyebrow. “Georgia?”

  The pause before she answered was just a beat too long. “Texas, actually.”

  “I could’ve of sworn I heard Georgia in your voice.”

  She pushed aside her mangled pastry, picked up her napkin and dabbed the edges of her mouth. “You have a good ear. My mama hailed from Georgia—moved to Texas when she married.”

  Nice and cool. He almost bought it. He took a cautious sip from his Styrofoam cup. “How did you end up in Colorado?”

  “Colorado’s got more up than Texas.”

  “Up?”

  Jake’s puzzled look shored Phoebe’s shaken confidence. She smiled lazily, relaxing in her seat so that her leg brushed his long enough to maybe be an accident, maybe not. Her jacket fell open a bit. A deep breath raised and lowered her cleavage.

  Nothing. Not even a quick look. She’d swear his gaze hadn’t left her face since that first thorough scrutiny when they’d bumped into each other back in the bar.

  “Rock climbing requires vertical terrain; otherwise it’s just hiking.” She moistened her lips with her tongue while her cool gaze turned back his probing one.

  He swallowed, a dry sound, and rubbed the nape of his neck.

  “Okay.” He met her gaze and raised it a grin that curled fire in her belly and her toes in her boots. She took the charm of it on the chin, a glancing blow that nonetheless went deep, mining for a response she couldn’t afford to feel. Before she could stop it, an answering smile bloomed on her mouth. That only made it worse. His grin deepened, and his blue eyes opened on his soul, giving her a quick, tantalizing peek at things she could never have.

  Regret hit her next. She wasn’t expecting it. She’d committed to her course and never looked back. Until today. To stop her fingers from forming fists, she grabbed her napkin and started folding it in an intricate pattern. It calmed her mind, muted despair. To distract him, she added, “And then there’s the garage—”

  “Garage? I thought—”

  “Climbing is too expensive to support just by playing honky-tonks. The guys are stupid about girls and booze, but they can make an engine purr like a satisfied woman. So they also run a garage here in Estes Park.” She finished her tattered origami bird and set it between them. What could she do with her hands now?

  “Everybody’s gotta be good at something, I guess.” He picked up the bird she’d made from the napkin and studied it, giving her a brief respite from his X-ray gaze. “Nice.”

  Just when she needed the knife-edge of tension to keep her head clear, it dissolved, letting exhaustion rush in to fill the void. Heaviness settled around her eyes, pulling down the lids with an insistence hard to ignore. She fought a yawn and lost. When it faded, she felt boneless and drifty. Made it harder to remember why she couldn’t lean across the tiny table and taste his yummy mouth for herself. The guys claimed denial wasn’t good for you, but that was just because denial didn’t suit them.

  “I can understand the climbing bit, but—” He looked puzzled. A very good look on him, Phoebe conceded, her defenses eroding faster than sand on an ocean beach. “—I thought Texans couldn’t leave Texas?”

  “Why not? It’s just a big, flat place.” She heard the words leave her mouth and tensed, waiting for God to strike her down, but He didn’t have to. All He had to do was leave her in the sun of Jake’s smile and wait until she melted from the inside out.

  Her gaze slipped its leash, running over the lean, lanky lines of his body as a lazy heat built in her midsection. She huddled in on that warmth. She’d been cold so long, she’d almost forgotten what warm was. Her gaze continued roving. Until she ran into a big question mark in both eyes.

  That cleared her head faster than a lightning bolt. She’d heard him asking Chet about the bar. If he was looking for work, why hadn’t he asked one question about a job?

  Past his beckoning eyes, past the uniform of worn jeans and flannel shirt worn over his tee, beyond the relaxed air was something else, something that put him outside her world, with its rare questions and rarer confidences. The people in her world usually had something they wanted to keep in the back of the closet.

  To distract him from her closeted secrets, she leaned forward and held out her hand. “My turn.”

  “For what?”

  “Your hand. I wanna read it. Learned from my mama, during one of her rare moments of sobriety.”

  The tiny piece of truth came out so naturally, Phoebe almost mis
sed it. Phoebe’s mama hadn’t been a drunk. She hadn’t lived long enough. She was mixing her real past with her fictional one. Not smart. Adrenaline entered her bloodstream in a slow but steady stream, then subsided as the question marks in Jake’s eyes faded like snow in the sun of his smile.

  A pity truth was so dangerous. It was so effective.

  “Hand? Isn’t it palms?”

  “Anyone who reads just your palm is a quack—according to my mama. The palm tells only part of the story.”

  “Okay.” He opened his hand for her viewing.

  The pouting curve of his full lips started that warm stuff shooting through her blood again. It fused the tiny split in her personality, patching over the pain that tried to push out through the gap. But now she’d have to touch him.

  Good move, Phoebe. The skin of her palm tingled in anticipation—

  The jangle of the bell over the door as a customer came in made them both jump. Phoebe tucked her hair behind her ear. Jake looked back her way, then, as if he knew she couldn’t do it, did the touching for her.

  The feel of his hand on hers sent a tiny shock of delight spiraling up her arm. It felt warm and heavy, the skin pleasantly abrasive where it brushed against hers. Phoebe let her fingers curl up around it, shivering when the pads of her fingertips found skin. Her gaze lowered, a move both defensive and imperative. She wanted to see, smell—she inhaled filling her lungs with his singular scent—and hear, wanted to engage all of her senses, if only in her imagination. Her exhalation came in a shaky rush.

  Good thing restraint had been one of her first, hard-learned life lessons.

  Her free hand hovered over his before making a soft landing so she could lightly trace its narrow length. His long, strong fingers were well kept but showed no sign of pampering. The pads were softly callused, the flesh beneath firm and capable. Her nose quivered as it homed in on his scent under the smell of soap and an echo of aftershave, as if it had been awhile since he’d shaved. Going for a Don Johnson scruffy look, or just circumstances?

  “What do you see?” he asked, his voice turning husky. Did that mean he felt the current running between them?