Winchester Christmas Wedding

by B. J Daniels

  She stared at Waters’s strong, broad back and thought of the orders the agency director had given her.

  “She thinks I’m dead,” TD said without turning around.

  Lizzy felt a jolt. She hadn’t realized he knew she was there. “Your mother?” she managed to say around the lump in her throat.

  “Maybe it would be better if she continued to believe that.” He turned to look at her.

  She felt a little piece of her heart break off and float around in her chest like a kite cut loose in a strong wind. She didn’t know what to say in the face of his obvious torment. Something must have happened while she’d been gone, because he seemed different—morose, sad and almost disappointed.

  Lizzy had to fight the urge to reach out to him. How easy it would have been to try to comfort him, to tell him that it would all work out. But she knew the truth was far from that.

  He stepped through the gate, closing it carefully behind him. She hadn’t moved, could hardly breathe. The weight of what she had to do was like an elephant lying on her chest, and seeing him like this…

  “TD.” It was the only sound she could get out as his gaze found hers and she looked into his eyes and saw raw need so stark that it triggered a desire inside her that had lain dormant and unknown even to her.

  “Lizzy.” The sound sent a shudder up her spine.

  She raised a hand to ward him off, but she wanted this like she had never wanted anything before. She needed him as much as he needed her.

  No, don’t do this. Lizzy, stop.

  But it was too late. He pulled her into his arms. The kiss sealed the deal. She was lost in the warm wanting of his demanding mouth. Lost in the depths of his dark eyes. Lost to his body as he dragged her to him and wrapped strong, unrelenting arms around her and deepened the kiss.

  She didn’t remember getting to the cabin. Vaguely she heard the door slam and lock, felt his fingers working at the zipper of her coat, the buttons of her shirt and then his mouth was on her breasts, sucking her nipples into hard aching points.

  There was the sound of her jeans dropping to the floor, then the feel of his fingers slipping beneath her panties. She arched against him, feeling the cool air caressing her naked back and breasts, and then he swung her up in his arms and was carrying her toward the bottom bunk.

  It happened in a passion-filled haze of stroking and kissing, wet mouths and static-charged fingertips, bodies melded together by a common fire of pleasure and pain and ultimately release. It ended in a rush of panting breath, clutching each other as if the ground beneath them might be torn apart at any moment.

  Lizzy lay in his arms, still breathing hard, her body slick with perspiration, her heart a hammer pounding out a death knell. What have you done?

  She dragged herself from the bunk and moved to her own, grabbing the railing of the top bunk for support. She leaned into it, putting her forehead against the edge of the top bunk, fighting tears, waiting for her years of training to kick in.

  It had gotten dark out and the temperature had dropped. The floor beneath her bare feet felt like an ice block and the air in the room sent goose bumps exploding over her naked body, rippling across her skin and making her shiver.

  Her arms trembled as she slowly slipped her hand into her bag, wrapped her palm around the grip of the pistol…

  Behind her, she heard TD get up from the bunk. But he didn’t move toward her. She turned around, pointing the weapon at his chest. The tiny red dot of the laser moved restlessly just over his heart.

  She steadied it and met his gaze. For one startled moment, she felt her resolve fail her, but when she spoke, her voice sounded stronger to her ears than she felt. “I’m Agent Elizabeth Calder. I’m going to have to take you in.”

  TD Waters looked down at the laser now settled at heart level, then up at her. His smile was sad, heartbreaking. He knew! He’d known before he made love to her.

  “You weren’t ordered to take me in,” he said slowly.

  “You were ordered to kill me.”

  How did he… “Well, I’m taking you in. Whatever you’ve done—”

  “That’s just it. You know I haven’t done anything except try to learn the truth about who I am.” His dark gaze locked with hers. “You’re too smart not to wonder why Roger Collins decided that is an act of treason.”

  “He says you have some classified information in an envelope that you plan to sell to the highest bidder.”

  TD let out a laugh. “I’m sure you searched my things.” His eyes darkened as he must have read the answer on her face. He shook his head. “I never saw you coming. Kudos to Collins. He definitely picked the right agent to come after me.”

  “If you just give me the envelope—”

  “There is no classified information, Lizzy. Haven’t you figured it out yet? I saw you with the photograph of me when I was eight. You’re too sharp not to have seen the date and the name on the back of the frame. Who do you think gave me a new name, a new birth certificate, found me foster parents in another state?”

  She couldn’t speak.

  “Roger covered up not only the fact that I was adopted, but why my adoptive parents were murdered, their house burned to the ground. I was too young to understand it all then, but it is clear now. They were agents and he had them killed and me taken away. It is no coincidence that I ended up working for him. You don’t still think it was a coincidence that you ended up working for him as well, do you?”

  Lizzy thought of the photograph she’d seen of her father and Roger Collins. The laser dot on TD’s broad chest began to move as her weapon wavered.

  “How long have you known I was an agent?” she asked.

  One dark eyebrow quirked. “You aren’t the only agent in this room. I went through your things when I got back from the kitchen. I found the photograph with Will Calder and Roger Collins with their names written on the back. I assume Will was your father?”

  That damned photo. She hadn’t been able to leave it behind. Just as TD hadn’t been able to leave the photograph of him as a boy behind. What had he called it? His fatal flaw. Hers, as well.

  She slowly lowered the weapon, glancing down at it as if she suddenly realized if he’d found the photo, he’d also found her gun.

  “It’s still loaded,” TD said, as if reading her mind.

  Her gaze flew up to his. He shrugged as if he had his reasons why he hadn’t taken out the ammunition.

  “How did you know I wouldn’t kill you?”

  TD let out the breath he’d been holding. “I didn’t.” His pulse pounded in his ears and he still felt off balance from the lovemaking and believing just moments before that there was more than a good chance he was going to die at the hands of a woman he’d fallen desperately in love with.

  “Is that why you made love to me?”

  He let out a bark of a laugh as he met her gaze. “I’ve been wanting to make love with you from the first time I saw you. Once I realized who you were, I knew why you’d been sent here. I didn’t want to die before I got the chance to hold you in my arms.”

  She was still holding the gun, though now it was at her side. Had she expected him to cross the room and try to take it from her?

  Instead, he reached for his jeans.

  “Roger said if I didn’t finish this assignment, he would send someone else,” she said behind him.

  TD looked over his shoulder at her as he buttoned his jeans. “That means we don’t have much time. We need to check that shed you told me about. I’m afraid your friend Janie McCormick is planning something special for the Winchesters,” he said as he continued getting dressed.

  Lizzy still hadn’t moved. He knew from his training how hard it was to go against orders. Like him, she’d been trained not to ask questions. Complete allegiance was demanded and beaten into you.

  He suspected that for the two of them it was even harder to disregard a direct order because Roger Collins had had a hand in them coming to the agency. He’d made them both belie
ve he’d done them a huge favor. They were his special agents. They didn’t want to let him down.

  He turned to look at her as he shrugged into his Western shirt and began to button it. “I know how hard it is to go against orders. Collins handpicked us, made us feel as if we owed him. I know it is almost impossible to let him down.”

  Lizzy nodded and looked down at the pistol in her hand.

  “Collins was right about one thing. There is an envelope he doesn’t want getting into the wrong hands,” TD said as he finished buttoning his shirt.

  Her eyes widened in surprise as she looked at him again.

  “After I searched your belongings, I took that old frame off the photograph of me when I was eight.” He started to reach behind him but saw her tense. “I was just going to show you what I found. An envelope hidden behind the photo. I had no idea it was there, but it explains a lot. You’re welcome to read it.”

  “You opened it?”

  “My parents were agents working with Collins. It was before he became director. It’s all in the letter they left me. They must have known once Collins knew they were on to him that he would have them killed. And he did. Collins can’t let this letter get into the hands of the proper authorities. He must have suspected they’d left something behind that could incriminate him. That’s why he had the house burned down. Fortunately, he never knew about the photo I’d sneaked out of the house. But he must have feared they had left something up there for me. Why else would he be so afraid for me to come here?”

  “What are you going to do with the information?”

  “Hide it behind the photo again for now until I can get it where it needs to go,” he said. “If something happens to me—”

  “Don’t.”

  He nodded. “Did I mention who my alleged birth parents are?” He tossed her her clothing.

  She caught her jeans in her free hand, her shirt dropping to the floor at her feet, as she looked at him, waiting for the answer.

  “Pepper Winchester and Hunt McCormick. Small world, isn’t it?”

  “Too small when Roger Collins is in it,” Lizzy said. He could see that she was reeling from all this.

  “You realize there’s a target on my back—and now on yours?”

  She nodded slowly, then put the weapon away and he could finally breathe freely again. He watched her pull on her clothing, wanting to stop her and make love to her again. He already knew how dangerous Lizzy Calder could be, he thought, remembering her in his arms. Look how she’d stolen his heart. He couldn’t bear to think how this all might end. Right now he just had to check out a shed on the McCormick Ranch, after that…

  He pulled on his shoulder holster and grabbed an extra clip for his pistol, then he turned to look across the small cabin at Lizzy.

  “Ready?” he asked as he saw her pull on her shoulder holster, grab a couple of extra clips and shrug on her coat.

  He smiled to himself. He had to give Roger Collins credit. He’d sent the perfect woman for the job. He’d made only one small mistake: he’d sent a woman with a heart.

  Still, if Lizzy hadn’t found that photograph of her father and Roger Collins…

  Not that he kidded himself that she might not change her mind about the order she’d been given. This wasn’t over by a long shot. Lizzy was right. If she didn’t follow orders, Collins would send someone who would.

  Or maybe that person had already been sent. TD couldn’t help thinking about the McCormicks. After all, Roger Collins had been a visitor on their ranch. What were the chances Lizzy was the only one he’d recruited from there?

  LIZZY SAT ON THE PASSENGER seat of the pickup as they drove slowly off the Winchester Ranch. There were no lights on up at the house, no sign of life. The caterer, rental and floral vans and trucks had all left. Stars had broken out all over the huge canopy of sky. Only a sliver of moon graced the horizon. Glancing at her watch, she was surprised at how late it was.

  Her skin still felt warm and soft, tingly at even the thought of TD’s touch. You let him get to you. Is that what happened? Or had common sense kicked in? There’d been red flags. TD and his quest not to destroy the world, but to find out the truth about his past. The photograph of her father and Roger Collins. The feeling she couldn’t shake that there was something wrong with this assignment from the moment she learned it meant coming back here.

  “Are you all right?” TD asked as he turned down the road toward the McCormick Ranch.

  She was still shaken by the letter TD’s father had left with dates and times, enough evidence to put Roger Collins away for life—if he didn’t get the death penalty.

  “There’s a place up here where you can get behind the ranch house,” she said, trying not to kick herself mentally for being taken in by Collins.

  As TD swung onto the narrow path of a road that followed an old fence line, he turned out the pickup’s lights. The starlight shining off the fallen snow made it plenty bright enough to see where they were going.

  “Stop up here,” she said. “The shed is just on the other side of that draw.”

  He parked and shut off the motor. They sat in the semidarkness of the pickup cab, the only sound the slow ticking of the engine as it cooled. The night was cold and clear, but when they got out of the truck, Lizzy felt the wind in her face and smelled snow on the December air.

  She looked toward the west and saw the bank of clouds huddled on the horizon. A storm had been brewing for some time. With a start, she realized that tomorrow was Christmas Eve. She couldn’t help but think about Christmases when she was a girl as she and TD walked through the snow toward the outbuildings in the distance.

  She would come back to the McCormick Ranch each Christmas break. Her father and Hunt would decorate the house. Her father used to dress up like Santa Claus and pass out presents to her and Anne and Janie. They all knew who he was, but played along because he seemed to enjoy it so much.

  A thought moved through her like the cold December wind. Something Pearl Cavanaugh had said about placing the adoptive children with older couples who couldn’t have children of their own. Like her parents.

  Where had that thought come from? TD, this assignment, Roger Collins, all of it had her thinking crazy things. Or was she finally realizing the truth?

  She shook her head, slowing as they reached the back side of the shed. TD had his weapon drawn. She drew hers, as well. Through the cracks in the boards at the back, she could make out a dim light glowing inside the shed.

  TD stopped at the back corner of the building, waited for her to take the opposite side, then disappeared out of sight. Lizzy moved as quietly as possible along the dark side of the shed, the whole time listening for any sound inside. As she reached the corner, she hesitated, then took a quick glance. No one in sight in the direction of the house.

  She moved to one side of the door. TD did the same. He glanced down at the lock, then at her. Lizzy holstered her weapon and took out her lock picks. TD produced a small flashlight and positioned himself so the light wouldn’t be visible up at the house.

  It didn’t take but a minute once she went to work. The lock fell open. She stepped back, retrieved her weapon and braced herself as TD opened the door.

  THE SMELL HIT HIM FIRST. Diesel fuel. Then TD saw the fifty-pound bags of ammonium nitrate fertilizer in the corner. On a makeshift table were blasting caps and a coil of fuse. Under the table was an old wooden box. There were several sticks of dynamite in the box.

  He shot a look at Lizzy as he holstered his gun and began to inspect the items on the table.

  “She’s making a bomb.” Lizzy had made the same connections he had. “The Winchester wedding.”

  “Very good,” said a familiar female voice behind them.

  TD started to go for his weapon, but stopped short as he saw that Janie held a gun to Lizzy’s head. “Pull that gun and Lizzy dies.”

  He could only watch as Janie took Lizzy’s weapon from her and pocketed it.

  “Take his gun,” Jan
ie ordered, shoving Lizzy forward.

  TD met her gaze, silently warning her not to try anything. One look at Janie’s eyes and he’d seen that she was like the bomb she’d been making—a short fuse ready to blow at any moment. He had the feeling she would have loved nothing better than to kill them both right here. Hell, she might have already been ordered to, if he was right about Collins’s connection to this place.

  So why hadn’t she just gone ahead and killed them, he wondered as Lizzy took his weapon and Janie snatched it away, pocketing it, as well.

  Because she had something worse planned for them? Or had been given a different order?

  “Sit down on the floor,” Janie ordered him as she grabbed a roll of duct tape and handed it to Lizzy. “Bind his wrists and ankles. Make it good or I will kill him. Try anything and you can both die here.”

  Lizzy knelt down in front of TD and he stuck out his wrists, his gaze never leaving hers as he tried to tell her to stay calm and go along for now. Janie was as highly combustible as the ingredients in this shed.

  “Bind his hands behind him,” Janie ordered and smacked Lizzy hard on the side of the head with the gun barrel.

  TD felt anger boil up in him. But if there was one thing he’d learned as an agent, it was not to let emotion make him react in a way that could get not only himself but everyone around him killed.

  Lizzy wrapped his wrists and ankles and stood. Janie checked the job she’d done just as Lizzy had expected.

  “Janie, what are you doing with all this stuff?”

  “Oh, come on, Lizzy. You already guessed it. The Winchester wedding is going to be such a blast.” She laughed at her joke.

  “These materials are highly combustible and unstable. Anything could set them off at any time and blow up half this ranch.”

  Janie smiled. “Yes, I suggest you remember that. One misstep from either of you and kaboom.”

  “You don’t want to do this,” Lizzy said.

  “Do what? You’re the ones trespassing on my land. Getting into things that are none of your business.”