by Linda Grimes
Dave scratched his head. “Could have been longer, I guess—he didn’t come down for breakfast, so I had Rosa take a tray up. She knocked and left it outside his door. Guess she didn’t want to risk catching him in his skivvies—might’ve made her faint dead away. I didn’t get worried until he didn’t come down for lunch and I found out he’d never touched his breakfast tray. But it doesn’t matter now, does it? He’s back, safe and sound.”
I nodded. “Hey, do you mind walking back with Billy? I think Trigger wants me to go with him,” I said. Also, I felt the need to ride on something I was in control of. Horses don’t scare me, not one bit.
“Sure thing, honeybunch. Trigger would rather haul you than my fat ol’ tuchus any day. Here, let me give you a leg up.”
I laughed. While not exactly roly-poly, Dave was starting to fill out—and above—his jeans more than he had when he was living in Manhattan. He blamed the healthy Arizona air for stimulating his appetite, resulting in what he called “Dunlop’s Disease”—his belly had “done lopped over” his belt. Which was a slight exaggeration, but after being skin and bones most of his life he seemed to get a perverse joy out of complaining about his few extra inches.
“Sure, boost away,” I said. I could have made it myself, with a hop and a pull on the saddle horn, but why spoil his obvious pleasure at being a cowboy gentleman?
Once I had the reins in my hands, I was off, tossing a “See ya at the barn!” over my shoulder. Dave hadn’t even had to adjust the stirrups for me. He carried his height in his torso—his legs weren’t much longer than mine.
I felt mildly guilty about leaving them to deal with my luggage. Okay, not really. It wasn’t as if Dave would have let me carry it anyway, and we weren’t all that far from the ranch house.
Now that I knew my client was safe and sound—and sleeping—I figured taking a time-out for a short ride before dumping bad news all over his world wouldn’t hurt him, and it would do me a world of good. It had been too long since I’d been in the saddle.
Trigger had his own ideas about where to take me. I wasn’t picky, so I gave him his head. He turned west toward the pond. Good choice on his part—a quick spin around the water would be refreshing, and I should still be able to get to the barn about the same time as the guys.
It felt good doing something that didn’t scare the poop out of me. Horses, I knew. I’d had some pretty wild rides in the past, even been tossed a time or ten, and once had my foot stomped on (accidentally, I’m almost certain) by a horse who’d objected to being curried in a ticklish spot, but for some reason the huge animals didn’t scare me. When I was on one, I could breathe. I could go.
I like being able to go.
I was halfway around the pond when my cell phone chimed in with the theme from Jaws. My brother, Thomas, the lawyer (a legal shark if ever there was one), which immediately worried me because he never calls when he knows I’m on a job—his overdeveloped work ethic won’t allow it. As an adaptor himself, he knows not to interrupt me when I’m not myself.
“You rat,” he said, skipping the preliminaries.
Gulp. Uh-oh. “Hi, Thomas. Listen, kinda busy here—”
“I know it was you, so don’t deny it.”
“I can explain—”
“I can’t believe it. After everything I do for you!”
True. Home, office, business advice … you name it, he was there for me.
“She had my back to the wall, Thomas! There was no way out—I had to tell her. You would have done the same thing. Besides, it was only a matter of time before she found out anyway. I just ripped the Band-Aid off for you, so now you don’t have to. When you really think about it, you should be thanking me.”
Okay, that last part was a stretch.
“The plan was that Laura and I would tell Mom after we were married. Do you know what she’s doing? Do you?”
I held my phone away from my ear. Trigger flinched. I grabbed the pommel, holding on to it and the reins both while I squeezed my legs reassuringly against the saddle. Trigger was a steady horse, but Thomas’s “annoyed” voice could startle a rock.
“No…” But I can guess, I thought with a guilty wince.
“Our mother is planning a wedding. A full-on Halligan event. You know what that means. She’s already enlisted Mo’s help.”
Better you than me, buddy. “Well, Auntie Mo is really great at organizing. I can see why Mom would—”
“Ciel, why in the hell couldn’t you keep your mouth shut for one more week? Laura and I had already booked time with a justice of the peace in a town far away from everywhere, with a cozy B and B where nobody could find us. We would have been home free.”
“Can’t you tell Mom you’ve already made your plans?” I suggested hesitantly. “I’m sure she’ll understand.”
The silence roared in my ear. Yeah, our mother would never understand eloping. She’d take it as a personal insult. “Look, tell Mom you can’t wait. Theoretically, she should be so thrilled you’re finally taking the leap that she won’t want to risk giving you time to back out.”
“I tried that. She said fine, no waiting. The wedding is in ten days, sooner if I want.”
Yeah, that was Mom all right. And she’d pull it off, too.
“By the way,” Thomas continued, with a sudden, gleefully evil edge to his voice, “Laura wants you to be her maid of honor—call her. Your dress fitting is tomorrow at noon—Mom’s paying the seamstress triple to squeeze you in on her lunch hour, so do not be late.”
Well, at least Laura apparently wasn’t mad at me. “But I’m in the middle of a job. I can’t—”
More ominous silence. I coughed. “Yeah, okay. Right. I’ll be there.” Or at least a reasonable facsimile of me, I thought but had the good sense not to say.
Chapter 4
Billy was waiting at the barn. It was small—four stalls, a tack and feed room, and the wash area—but it was sufficient for our needs. Aside from Trigger, there were only two other equines in residence. One was a docile black mare named Licorice, who was a dependable mount for any of our guests, no matter their level of riding experience. If a client wanted a more spirited horse, Dave would let them have Trigger while he rode Licorice.
Then there was Eeyore, the unofficial king of the Circle C, a dapple gray Shetland pony. The nasty-tempered little thug was my childhood mount, the love of my preadolescent life, now retired. To my knowledge, of all the people who’d ever been close enough to touch him, I was the only one he’d never bitten.
I tossed Trigger’s reins to Billy and hurried to Eeyore. I thought he liked it here better than his old boarding stable in the Bronx, but it was hard to say for sure. He’d earned his name—a gloomier, grumpier hoofed creature would be tough to find. But I knew he loved me in his own way.
Billy had no warm, fuzzy feelings for good ol’ Eeyore. My pony’s gimlet glare—backed up by bared teeth—was one of the few things I knew that could make Billy flinch. (Yeah, that had warmed my heart as a girl. Still amused me, if I was honest.)
“Eeyore, you old son of a gun, how are you?” I said, leaning over the shortened door to the roomy box stall that was his plush (by horsey standards) home. He squealed a greeting and nuzzled me as I scratched his neck.
“Hey, Billy, are there any apples in the barrel?” I knew if I didn’t offer up a treat soon, Eeyore would turn his grumpy wrath on me, love notwithstanding.
“Yeah, hold on.” He hung the bridle he’d removed from Trigger on a peg, grabbed a few apples, and tossed one to me. The other he gave to Trigger, who munched it with gusto. “Watch yourself with that little demon, cuz. I like your hands the way they are—with fingers.”
I laughed as I held out the apple to Eeyore, but I was, in fact, careful to keep my hand flat. Eeyore snatched his favorite fruit, downed it, and nuzzled for more. “Sorry, bud. That’s all.” In response, my darling pony lifted his tail and dropped a pile behind him.
“Opinionated little bugger, isn’t he?” Billy said a
s he led the now unsaddled Trigger past us to another roomy stall.
“Eeyore has always been creatively expressive,” I said. “He’s smart that way. Hey, wait—we should curry Trigger before you put him away.” Anything to delay giving the bad news. Destroying a client’s world wasn’t my favorite activity.
“Dave said he’d take care of it while we’re talking to Jack—special bonding time between a cowboy and his horse or some such. I told him I’d meet you at the barn and bring you back—that’ll give him time to wake up Jack and make sure he’s sober.”
After Trigger was safely shut in his stall, Billy wrapped his arms around me from behind, bent down, and whispered, “We have a few minutes. There’s a handy pile of hay in the loft—”
Eeyore lunged, narrowly missing Billy’s forearm with his teeth. Billy pulled back, swearing, taking me with him. “You know, euthanasia is considered the kind option for deranged animals.”
“Bite your tongue,” I said, turning in his arms. “Better yet, let me do it for you.” I pulled his head down to my level and followed through. But gently. I was too fond of that tongue to risk damaging it.
Billy tore himself away from my mouth and dragged me toward the loft. “Up you go. Now.”
As waiting activities go, sex with Billy was a way better option than currying Trigger. Still, I figured I should put up a token resistance, for form’s sake. “We should be getting back to the house soon. We don’t have time for—”
“Trust me, it won’t take long.” He lifted me to the third rung of the ladder.
“Is that supposed to be an enticement? Whatever happened to foreplay?”
Hot on my tail (so to speak), he leaned close and nipped my neck, ending with lingering lips that left me tingling. “There. Foreplay. Now, unless you’re up for experimentation on a ladder, get your delectable ass over to that pile of hay.”
Ten minutes later, naked and thoroughly happy, I gazed into dreamy blue eyes and wondered how it had taken me so long to appreciate this aspect of Billy. The guy had phenomenal hands, an innate knowledge of where to put them when, and what to do with them when he got them there.
“Not too disappointed, I hope,” he said, voice full of lazy satisfaction, with a glimmer in his eye that dared me to lie.
“Shut up. You know damn well it was incredible. Where the hell did you learn to do that, anyway?” I said, trying—and failing—to hold in a clichéd sigh.
He grinned. “You sure you want to know?”
Not really. The thought of him with other women, no matter how past tense, opened an ugly little hole in my ego. But I brazened it out anyway. “Sure. Names and addresses, please.”
He arched a brow. “Planning to send out a hit man?”
“Nope. Thank-you cards.” I winked.
When he was finished kissing my laughter away, I told him about the wedding. “… and the best part is, this will keep both our moms off our backs for a while. It’ll get the wedding bug out of their systems.”
Ever since our mothers had discovered Billy and I were involved, they’d been looking at us with wedding lust in their eyes. I might have tripped and fallen ass over teakettle for my best-friend-slash-nemesis-slash-honorary-cousin, but that didn’t mean I was ready to marry him. I was new to this relationship stuff, and I figured proceeding with caution was the wisest course of action.
Plus, I was allergic to weddings. It was going to be hard enough for me just being Laura’s maid of honor, but I could suck it up for the day.
Billy looked at me with delighted speculation. “You totally threw Thomas under the wedding bus, didn’t you?”
“Well, yeah. Of course. I mean, come on, he and Laura are planning to get married anyway, whereas we haven’t even discussed the possibility. What’s the harm in providing a distraction for Mom? It won’t kill Thomas to put on his big-boy tuxedo pants and make her and Auntie Mo happy.”
A softer speculation shaded Billy’s eyes. “Do you want to discuss it?”
“What? Getting married? Us? God, no.”
He laughed and rolled me onto my back. “See, that might hurt my feelings if I didn’t feel exactly the same way.”
* * *
Jackson Gunn was still pretty well oiled when Billy and I joined him in the lounge. Guess he’d resumed hydrating as soon as he woke up from his nap. He greeted us with a billboard smile and sauntered over to the bar. While Gunn’s back was turned, Billy hastily pulled a few more pieces of straw from my hair. He’d been plucking them off me ever since we’d left the barn.
Jack put two fresh glasses on the bar next to his, added ice, and poured. “So, may I assume by your early arrival that the god-awful snakes-in-a-cave scene is complete, and it’s safe for me to return to the set?” He handed us amber-colored liquid on the rocks, his voice full of his legendary self-deprecating charm. Seemed like a really nice guy—I was sure Billy was wrong about his earlier suspicions—and now here I was, about to drop a bomb on his world.
I sniffed my drink cautiously before I sipped, avoiding those friendly eyes. Bourbon. I tended to prefer my bourbon in Manhattan form (because cherries), but plain will do in a pinch.
When I couldn’t put it off any longer, I cleared my throat and said, “Well, about that, Mr. Gunn—”
“Call me Jack. As intimately as you must know me by now, I think ‘Mr.’ is a bit formal, don’t you?” Again with the charming smile.
I forced a return smile (only a small one, out of deference to the news I had to deliver), trying hard not to think about everything I did happen to know about him. He was a tall man, but not everything was in proportion, if you get my drift. And, no, that wasn’t the reason I hadn’t wanted Billy to use his aura back at the trailer. Well, not the only reason.
Ack. Stop it, Ciel. Do not go there—you’ll never be able to look him in the eye.
“Jack.” I cleared my throat again, focusing on his top shirt button, left casually undone to show his manly chest hair. “Um, let’s sit down, all right?”
He nodded agreeably and sat on the closest overstuffed leather chair. I sat across from him, in a matching chair. Billy remained standing.
“You see, there’s been a…” I squirmed. Being the bearer of bad news sucks. It was the first time I’d ever had to tell someone anything like this, and I didn’t like it a bit. “… well, what you might call a…” A what? Certainly not an accident. “… a development.”
Jack’s brow furrowed, and he opened his mouth to ask a question. Before he could frame it, Billy said, “Your wife is dead.”
I glared at him. “Nice, Billy. Way to break it gently,” I said.
Billy gave a tiny shrug, all the while staring intently at Jack’s shocked face.
Jack swallowed. “What happened?”
“Um … well, she was … it appears she was, um, looks like she was … murdered.” Yeah, that’s me. Always a smooth delivery in times of stress.
“What? Murdered? But when … how…? Who would…?”
“It happened when I was on set, during the snake scene,” I said. “Somebody shot her at your Las Vegas home. Several times. The police are still investigating, of course. They’ll be contacting you at your home tomorrow—they think you’re there now, recovering from the shock—so we should get you there soon.”
Jack leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees and his face on his hands. “I can’t believe it. It doesn’t make any sense. Who would want Angelica dead? She’s—oh, God, was?—the sweetest, most wonderful woman in the world.”
I glanced at Billy, whose face remained carefully neutral. It was the soundless crying that finally seemed to convince him. It started slowly, tears streaming down Gunn’s face, no histrionics.
“Jack, I am so, so sorry,” I said, laying a hand on his shoulder. I didn’t know what else to say. Nothing seemed adequate, so I just patted him.
Billy put a hand on Jack’s other shoulder, offering some sort of manly support. “Look, I know it’s a shock, man. But we have to get you to
Vegas before the police find out you didn’t go where you—or rather, Ciel as you—told them you were going. I’ll go fuel the plane while you pack.”
Crap. “It’s not that far to Vegas. And, um, maybe Jack doesn’t like flying. Let’s take the ranch car.”
Jack, still looking numb, said, “I’m fine with flying, as long as there aren’t any snakes on the plane. Whatever’s fastest.”
I sighed and went to the kitchen for some of the candied ginger I knew Rosa kept on hand. I wasn’t about to risk barfing in front of my screen hero.
Chapter 5
Jackson Gunn’s face was all over the TV in the corner of the fitting room. Mom had taken me to the ultra-exclusive bridal boutique as soon as I’d stumbled off the commercial flight I’d hopped in the dark, wee hours of the morning. Other than dozing fitfully in between medicinal martinis, I hadn’t slept since the night before the big snake scene in L.A. The world was starting to take on a distinct air of unreality.
I still wasn’t sure why I needed to be here. Mom could have easily stood in for me—as me—and had the dress fitted to her exact specifications. But that wasn’t the point, she’d explained when I’d dared to suggest it. The point was, it was my brother getting married, and if his sweet fiancée was kind enough to ask me to be her maid of honor, well then I better step up to the plate and be her maid of honor myself. It was the right thing to do. The honorable thing.
Gah. The honor argument. There was no winning with Mom once she brought honor into it.
Gunn was safely inside his Las Vegas mansion. Or, rather, he had been inside until he’d walked out his front door into the suffocating embrace of the paparazzi.
“Lift your arms, dear. Judy needs to pin you,” Mom said, paging rapidly through her lengthy to-do list. Short and strawberry blond, like me, she still somehow managed to convey a large presence. Her pecan-shell brown eyes dared anyone to try and look down on her.
