Night Thunder

by Jill Gregory

  A grin spread across his face. He didn’t say a word, just grinned, then tipped his hat to her and strode away toward the stables.

  She sank down on the porch swing, wondering what in the hell she was doing. There could be only one logical explanation for her agreeing to go riding with Ty Barclay.

  She needed her head examined.

  Chapter 10

  LACING UP HER RUNNING SHOES, JOSY TRIED NOT to grimace. She was going to have an awful time today— she’d probably fall not only off her horse but off a cliff, despite whatever promises Ty Barclay had made to her, and she’d be lucky if she didn’t break her neck.

  Why on earth had she agreed to this?

  Because Ty Barclay had the deepest, most intense blue eyes she’d ever seen? And the most intriguing, sexiest smile?

  Two terrible reasons, she told herself.

  She sighed and glanced out her balcony window overlooking the parking lot. It was a gorgeous day, of course. There were a few clouds over the mountains, but they looked far away and the sun was bright as a ball of melted butter.

  Where was rain when you needed it?

  Maybe if she got to Ada’s late, Ty wouldn’t bother waiting for her.

  She pondered this option for a moment, then bolted to the full-length mirror on her bathroom door, took a quick glance at the image of herself in her jeans and a dark green T-shirt, her hair captured in a ponytail, and darted to the pantry. One glance inside, to the very back, just to assure herself that Ricky’s package was still there, and she was out the door, a miniwallet hooked to her belt.

  She felt very basic, very low-key, her only makeup a touch of lip gloss and a dab of mascara to darken her pale lashes. She wasn’t trying to impress anybody, least of all Ty Barclay, but she was determined to show him she wasn’t some frivolous Barbie doll, obsessed with soy lattes and nail polish and afraid to hoist her butt into a saddle, as he’d so inelegantly put it.

  Besides, she asked herself as she hurried along the hallway, what else did she have to do? Her coffee table was littered with unworkable sketches. The change of scene had done zip so far to light a fire under her muse. And there’d been no word from Ricky—no response to her e-mail in all this time.

  She was worried sick that she’d done something wrong in sending the e-mail and that she and Ricky would never connect. But even that was not as terrible a scenario as the other possibility that presented itself—that Ricky couldn’t communicate with her. That he’d been caught by whoever was after him, and he was hurt—or dead.

  That isn’t what happened, she told herself as she ran down the stairs to the first-floor exit door. Ricky’s on the move, and he simply hasn’t had a chance to get back to you yet.

  When she reached Angel Road she saw that Ty was already at the end of the driveway, leaning against his sheriff’s cruiser. As she pulled up behind him, he glanced at his watch.

  “Thinking about leaving without me?” Casually, she sauntered over and leaned a hip against the car.

  “Didn’t think you were coming.”

  She saw his gaze flick over her, from the ponytail down to the T-shirt, all the way down to her beat-up Pumas.

  “You’re missing something.” He reached into his backseat and came up with a baseball cap, which he tossed at her.

  “The sun’ll fry you if you’re out all afternoon without a hat. Wear this.”

  She grimaced, but pushed the Phillies cap on her head, grateful Francesca couldn’t see her now. The very thought made her smile.

  At that moment Ty Barclay happened to glance over at her. He wondered what had brought that cute little smile to her lips as he led the way to the corral.

  Then told himself he didn’t care.

  He’d awakened this morning wondering why in hell he’d badgered her into going riding with him, then decided it had been a spur-of-the-moment mistake. But not such a costly one. He’d simply take her for a ride to Blue Moon Mesa, show her the view, then they’d ride back. He’d get her home by four and head over to Roy’s to catch the Phillies game on ESPN. The afternoon would be over with before he knew it.

  Yet he found himself glancing at her again as they walked toward the barn. She looked different today— younger, not nearly as coolly, distantly sophisticated. But she still looked good—and anything but ordinary. Even in jeans and a T-shirt and worn sneakers she was gorgeous as a model, and sexier than ever with that slight, catlike smile playing across her lips.

  “You ought to try that more often,” he commented. “Smiling, I mean.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  “In my line of work, there isn’t much to smile about. Besides, why ruin my image?”

  “Good point.”

  The tartness of her reply made him grin. He opened the barn door and held it wide for her. A soft whicker came from one of the stalls.

  “You’re sure you want to do this?” he asked as she stopped just inside. “I didn’t mean to twist your arm the other day.”

  “You’re going to feel real guilty if I fall off and break something, aren’t you?”

  “I told you. I won’t let you fall off.”

  “Seems to me that’s going to be between me and the horse.”

  He laughed, then studied her face, still looking amused. “Are you scared?”

  “Not at all,” she lied. Then as he held her gaze a moment, and those penetrating eyes pinned hers with a glance so acute it would have made Billy the Kid squirm, she sighed.

  “All right, I’m scared. A little,” she admitted. “But not enough to chicken out. Did Ada say it would be all right for me to ride her mare?”

  “I didn’t ask her. Actually, I thought I’d get you started on Moonbeam.”

  “Moonbeam?”

  “My big roan you saw yesterday. I’ll take the buckskin.”

  Panic skittered through her. “You said your horses weren’t right for me, they’d be too much to handle.”

  “I was just trying to get a rise out of you when I told you about Ginger. That’s Ada’s mare,” he added. “She’s grown fat and lazy over the past few years and she’s actually as slow as a turtle. I wouldn’t put anyone over seven years old on her these days.”

  “But you said—”

  “Look, you’ll do fine with Moonbeam. He’s well trained and if he likes you, he rides like a dream.”

  “If he likes me . . .” she muttered. “And how exactly am I going to get him to like me?”

  “Sugar cubes. Moonbeam loves sugar cubes. I brought some along for you to feed him. Don’t worry, you’re going to be racing along the rim of Dead Man’s Canyon in no time.”

  “Racing along the rim . . .” Josy glanced warily along the stalls, wondering if there was still a way out of this. “You’re joking, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah.” He grinned at her then, a slow, sexy, very male grin, and she wasn’t sure if she wanted to punch him or kiss him.

  “About the canyon,” he added cheerfully.

  Josy punched him in the arm as he laughed out loud. “You’re a sadist, you know that?”

  He chuckled. “Don’t worry about a thing. We’ll take it slow.”

  To her surprise, he turned out to be a surprisingly patient teacher. After several minutes of getting to know her mount inside the barn, with Ty demonstrating how to bribe him with sugar cubes, Josy stepped back and waited uneasily while Ty saddled both horses and led them out to the paddock.

  She wished she could skip the lessons and get to the part where she flew across the meadow like the kids she’d seen on that long ago day, but she knew that like everything else in life, that sort of mastery only came in time.

  Still, she started to relax as he showed her how to mount on the horse’s left, how to hold the reins, and explained how the stirrups worked.

  When she was up in the saddle and he’d adjusted her stirrups, Ty led Moonbeam around in a circle to give her a chance to get used to the gait. After a while he mounted the buckskin, and they proceeded to walk both horses sing
le file in another wide, sedate circle around the paddock.

  “Just relax and get the feel of it,” he told her, pulling up alongside. “Don’t pull on the reins so hard, their mouths are sensitive. Here, hold them like this.”

  She tried to imitate the easy way he held the reins, the relaxed way he sat the buckskin, his feet resting easily in the stirrups. But she felt like she was about to topple off.

  “You have a good sense of balance,” he reassured her when she voiced this fear. “Are you an athlete?”

  “Not really. Although I was on the track team in high school. And I took a few kickboxing classes last year. My friend Jane is a real pro at it and she convinced me to drop in a few times.”

  “By the time you go back home you might be able to add horseack riding to your jock résumé. But if that’s going to happen, you’ll have to graduate from a closed paddock to an open trail. So what do you say? Are you game?”

  “Now? Already?” Panic rushed back and she nearly dropped the reins.

  He studied her from beneath the brim of his black hat. “Unless you feel you can’t handle it.”

  Josy took a deep breath. “Open the gate.”

  Her stomach was churning with equal parts excitement and apprehension when he unlatched the gate and led the way out of the paddock.

  He was true to his word, though, Josy had to admit. They took it slow. The horses remained at a walk as, side by side, they crossed the meadow behind Ada’s house, heading toward the foothills north of Thunder Creek. Josy found her body adjusting to the horse’s stride, and though she wasn’t exactly relaxed, she was comfortable enough to glance around, appreciating the warm, sunlit air and the glorious open sweep of meadow.

  “This must be boring for you,” she said at last, aware that if Ty were riding alone, he certainly wouldn’t be doing it at a walk.

  She was surprised when he turned to look at her as he answered. “No. Not at all.”

  “Have you ever taught anyone else to ride?”

  “Sure. My kid brother, Adam, and my sister, Faith. And Meg, my wife.” He broke off suddenly, as if surprised that he’d even mentioned her name. His voice tightened.

  “My . . . late wife,” he amended tersely.

  She almost heard the thunk as the wall around him shot up and locked into place.

  Nice going, she mentally reproved herself. Nothing like bringing up a sore subject.

  But now that she’d accidentally wandered into what must be forbidden territory, there was no point in pretending it hadn’t happened. For years, Josy had tried to hide from everyone that she’d grown up in foster homes, until she’d forced herself to say it, over and over, to make it public, to accept it.

  “When did you teach her? After you were married? Did you bring her here to Thunder Creek?”

  For a moment she thought he wasn’t going to answer her. There was a silence during which the wind raced through the tall grass and a hawk wheeled in the sky overhead.

  “We did come here after we were married. Spent a week at my family’s cabin—which happens to be on Blue Moon Mesa—but that’s not when I taught her to ride. Meg and I knew each other from the time we were kids. She was friends with my sister. One year when we were teenagers she came up with our family for part of the summer—and that’s when I taught her to ride.”

  “Faith already knew how by then?”

  “Yeah. She learned when she was eight—we all learned young. Riding was a big part of the summers we spent here. I taught Adam first and then Faith. Since I was the oldest, when it came time for Faith to learn, it was left to me.” He grimaced.

  “You make it sound difficult. Was she afraid?”

  “Faith?” He shook his head. “That brat’s never been afraid of anything in her life. No, if it had been up to her, she’d have headed at a gallop for the mountains all by herself the very first day. She begged me to put her on our dad’s stallion, Fury. We had to keep watch at all hours so that she didn’t saddle him up and sneak out for a ride when no one was paying attention. She finally did it when she was eleven, got herself thrown, and we had to search for her for five hours before we found her sitting with a sprained ankle halfway up Cougar Mountain.”

  He laughed, sounding so proud that Josy stared at him. “And is she still like that? Fearless? What does she do now?”

  “She’s a prosecutor. Goes after the bad guys. Nothing fazes Faith.” He sounded pleased, and Josy had the impression that Faith Barclay was a woman to be reckoned with.

  Just like her big brother.

  “Was Meg fearless too?”

  He shook his head. “Meg was adventurous and fun-loving, but she had a healthy respect for staying intact. She wasn’t reckless like Faith—she thought things through. She paid attention. She wanted to learn the right way to ride, to handle a horse. Just like when she was in the police academy she wanted to learn the right way to shoot, to hit her mark every time, the way to talk down a suspect, to try to avoid violence if it was possible. She specialized in hostage negotiation,” he added after a moment.

  “It came in handy during domestic violence disputes. You know those guys who lose it and take their wives or kids hostage? Meg had a way of talking them down, a knack for getting through to them without anyone getting hurt.”

  “She was good with people,” Josy murmured.

  She saw the bleakness suddenly enter his eyes. “The best I ever saw. Everyone loved her.” His tone had become curt.

  But no one loved her as much as you did, Josy thought, a tinge of sadness pressing against her heart.

  “Let’s try a canter.” He spoke abruptly, closing the subject. “Let Moonbeam follow Pepper’s lead. Nudge his flanks lightly with your heels, but hold on tight with your knees. Easy does it.”

  The faster pace kept Josy busy balancing, but she tried not to bounce too much in the saddle and concentrated on not falling off. There was no more time to think about Ty Barclay or Meg or Faith, there was only the sensation of rolling movement, of air whipping past her, of the smooth flow of the horse’s muscles beneath her.

  After a while she felt like she was getting the hang of it, and though she wasn’t quite flying, she was moving at a good clip, with only the flower-adorned foothills rising gradually before her, and seemingly endless meadowland surrounding her beneath the great aquamarine dome of the Wyoming sky.

  Exhilaration surged through her. She was riding—riding across wide open spaces just as she’d always imagined all those years ago. Not galloping full speed, not bounding across the earth faster than the wind, but definitely riding.

  A burst of sun ignited the larkspur and the tips of the leaves, and the scent of sage filled the air with a fresh fragrant aroma that made her feel intensely alive and almost connected to the very earth beneath her.

  Ty slowed his mount to a walk and fell back so that they were riding side by side again.

  “Had enough or do you want to go on?”

  “To Blue Moon Mesa? Yes.”

  “It’s at least another forty-minute climb,” he warned. “The terrain’s rougher. Think you can handle it?”

  “No problem.”

  Was that a flash of approval she saw in his face?

  “You really think I’m a wimp, don’t you?” she asked.

  His smile was slow and unexpected. “I’m not sure what I think,” he replied, studying her face beneath the rim of the baseball cap. “I’ll have to let you know later.”

  She smiled smugly. “You do that, cowboy.”

  Suddenly she urged Moonbeam forward, into a canter once again, surging past Ty Barclay and the buckskin. She heard his chuckle, and an answering laugh escaped from her own throat.

  “Try to keep up,” she called over her shoulder as she saw the start of a dirt trail winding upward toward the pines that rimmed the foothills.

  Ty let her stay in the lead for a while, enjoying the view of her slender frame and rounded bottom ahead of him. She had good form for a beginner and she was a good sport too, he
reflected.

  And had a backside that was sexy as hell.

  Not that any of that mattered. Inviting her to go riding had been a whim—a strange one at that—but he doubted they’d do it again. She might get ideas. Like they were going to start seeing each other or something and that wasn’t about to happen.

  Still, he might as well enjoy the day—she was good company and it was surprisingly easy to talk to her. She hadn’t once started murmuring all kinds of platitudes about being sorry about Meg, questioning him about how long ago she’d died, telling him he’d get over it.

  That was unusual. And refreshing.

  For another few moments they rode in silence, until they neared the switchback that would take them to Shadow Point, and from there, to the trail that led to Blue Moon Mesa.

  Ty spurred Pepper ahead and took the lead. “The path we want is this way—you can’t see it outright unless you know it’s there. Slow down here—the trail up to Shadow Point is going to be narrow.”

  They followed the switchback at a walk, and rode along an increasingly rocky trail, where buttercups and forget-me-nots dotted the sloping hillside.

  “See that clearing up ahead?” Ty reined in Pepper and she drew up beside him, looking where he pointed to a wide ledge not far up the trail.

  “That’s Shadow Point. It’s famous here as a makeout spot—has been for generations. Unfortunately, that’s as far as we’re going to get today. No way we can make it all the way to Blue Moon Mesa. Those clouds are moving in too fast.”

  He was right, she saw in surprise. She’d been so intent on the ride, she hadn’t noticed that the sun was no longer beating hot on her shoulders, that the white puffy clouds had drifted away and been replaced by darker ones moving in from the west.

  The air had changed too—it smelled of rain, and the breeze that whipped down from the hills felt cool against her bare arms. All of a sudden, it seemed, rain was moving in and moving in fast.

  “Do you want to head back now or try to make it at least to Shadow Point?” he asked. “I can’t promise you won’t get wet.”

  “We’ve come all this way.” Josy bit her lip, studying the clouds. “I like to finish what I start. And I’d like to see Shadow Point—even if we only stay for a few minutes.”