She grinned. “If you’ll pardon the pun. I’ve really got to clear my head, Thunder. But to do it, I’m going to need your help. I just don’t know what to do,” she confessed. Leaning her head against the stallion, she patted his muzzle. “Part of me wants to stay here, to marry Whit and become part of a family. But another part of me feels like I’m selling out. Following my heart instead of my head.” She sighed, straightening up. “Ever have days like that?”
She looked around for the horse’s saddle. She knew she could always ride Thunder bareback. She’d done it more often than not on her uncle’s ranch. But if for some reason the stallion got spooked, there was more of a danger of her sliding off his back if she didn’t have a saddle. She knew she had to be careful.
She was very fortunate that her fall down the stairs hadn’t hurt her baby, but she knew that she shouldn’t try to push her luck. Luck had a fickle habit of running out just at the wrong time.
“Where do they keep your reins and saddle, boy?” she asked Thunder as she continued looking around.
Just then, though she had her back to it, she thought she heard the barn door being closed. She’d deliberately left it open to let in the natural light. The door had closed too securely to have been accidentally shut by the wind.
With daylight being shut out, the interior of the barn would have been thrown into darkness— except for the sudden burst of light that erupted right in front of the barn door.
“Hello? Is anyone here?” Elizabeth called out. She hurried toward the entrance, but stopped abruptly when she saw the flames.
Someone had thrown a lit torch into the barn just before shutting the door. A sense of panic threatened to seize her.
Stay calm, stay calm. You’re dead if you fall to pieces. And so are the horses.
Circumventing the growing flames, she managed to reach a section of the barn door. When she tried to push it open, she found that it wouldn’t give. Using both hands gave her the same results.
Someone had locked the barn door from the outside.
Panic worked its way through her. She knew she couldn’t give in to it. If she did, she was a dead woman. She had to focus on escaping before the smoke got to be too much for her.
Elizabeth looked around for anything to help her.
Grabbing a shovel that had been used to muck out the stalls, she held on to the shaft as if it was a bat and swung at the barn door with all her might. Over and over she continued hitting the door in the same place, hoping that she could weaken the wood enough to make it break just enough for her to be able to get her hands on it and bend it back. All she needed was an opening.
Coughing, her eyes smarting, she kept swinging. The horses were panicking and their whinnying sounded dangerously like screams to her.
She kept swinging, her arms feeling like lead weights. When she heard the crack she could have cried.
* * *
When he reached for her, his eyes still closed against the morning light, Whit’s hand came in contact with nothing except the comforter.
Opening his eyes, he saw that her side of the bed was empty.
The clock on the nightstand told him it was still fairly early.
“Elizabeth?” he called out.
No one answered.
Picking his head up, he looked toward the bathroom and saw that the door was wide-open.
So much for Elizabeth not hearing him because she was in the shower, he thought.
So where was she?
Whit sat up, the sheet pooling around him. He dragged his hand through his hair, trying to focus his still half-asleep brain.
The first thing that came to him was last night.
Vivid details suddenly came rushing back to him and he smiled to himself as he relived every moment, every nuance.
The discovery he’d made by the end of the night had overwhelmed him—and scared the hell out of him. But in a good way.
Each time he’d made love to her, it seemed better than the last time. Was better than the last time. He wasn’t accustomed to that, to being surprised over and over again by the same woman. Moreover, he really wasn’t accustomed to wanting the same woman over and over again, he mused.
The same—but different.
He rather liked that.
Whit slid his hand along her side of the bed. The area was still warm.
She hadn’t been gone that long, he judged. Maybe she’d gone downstairs for breakfast. He needed to find her, to repeat his proposal and convince Elizabeth to marry him.
Determined to succeed even though he still didn’t really know how he was going to convince her, Whit got dressed quickly.
He’d just pulled on his boots when he heard an alarm being sounded. Even without knowing why the alarm was going off, he suddenly felt his gut twisting almost into a knot.
Elizabeth!
He needed to find Elizabeth!
He flew out of the bedroom and down the stairs. The front door was standing wide-open and he saw members of the household staff running outside.
He grabbed the person closest to him. It turned out to be the cook. “What’s going on?” he wanted to know.
“The barn is on fire!”
He wasn’t sure if it was the cook who had answered him or if it was one the staff members who were running out the door, intent on fighting the fire. It didn’t matter. There was only one thing that mattered—the fire had to be put out before it spread across the grounds and reached the main house.
The wind was already picking up. Whit prayed that wasn’t an ominous sign.
Breaking into a run, he made it from the main house to the barn in what felt like both nothing flat and a century.
Whit could see the smoke and the flames long before he reached it.
The barn door looked like it had been broken open, the wood splintered and cracked in the middle. The horses that were kept stabled there were streaming out of the barn. The terrified sounds they made mingled with the crackle of the fire, forming an eerie, frightening cacophony.
When he saw his brother, Whit immediately hurried over to him. In all the years that they had lived here, there’d never been a fire, even during the driest of times.
“How did this start?” he wanted to know.
But Carson had no answers. “Beats me.” He was busy manning one of the giant fire extinguishers that were kept on the ranch just for this sort of an emergency. It was the first time one had been put to use.
The fire department had been called, but everyone knew that the few minutes between the call and the firemen’s arrival could well be crucial. They had industrial-size extinguishers, and a fire hydrant had been installed on the property just for such an eventuality. Their late father had left nothing to chance if he could help it.
The irony of this being put to use after his untimely death was not lost on Whit. The man might be gone, but his foresight lived on.
“Did you get all the horses out?” Whit asked one of the ranch hands. The flow of horses had abruptly terminated. There was a goodly number in the corral now, but it was impossible for him to get a head count at the present time.
“I think there’s a complete count,” the ranch hand replied, then added, “I was just going to double-check, sir.”
Whit nodded his thanks. “Do that, Diego. Meanwhile, I’m going to—”
He didn’t get to finish his sentence. It was almost impossible to talk with his jaw practically on the ground. It had dropped the moment he saw the bedraggled figure emerging from the barn.
Elizabeth!
Even at this distance he could see that the smoke had left its mark all over her face and clothing. In addition, she was coughing fitfully as she stumbled out of the burning building.
Forgetting everything else, his heart pounding wildly, Whi
t ran over to her. He made it just in time to catch her. Her legs had buckled beneath her without any warning.
He knew she was still in danger, he just knew it. Very gently, he carried her away from the highly trafficked area in front of the barn. Picking a place where they wouldn’t be in the way, or assaulted with questions, he lowered her to the ground and sank down beside her.
Having her life threatened twice in two days was almost more than he could handle. “Elizabeth, what were you doing in there?” he cried.
He was struggling between wanting to hug her to him in overwhelming relief and wanting to shake her because she’d almost gotten herself killed—again.
“Trying to stay alive,” she told him in between coughing fitfully.
He saw his sister and beckoned her over. “Get me some water for Elizabeth.”
Landry’s eyes were huge as she stared at the other woman. “What happened to her?”
“That’s what I’m hoping she’ll tell me after she gets her water,” he told Landry.
His sister dashed off to get the water.
The moment she left, Whit turned his attention back to the woman he realized he had almost lost to the fire.
“What happened?” he wanted to know. “Did you accidentally knock over something in there?” Even as he asked the question, he realized that unless she had brought something flammable—like an old kerosene lantern—with her, there was nothing in the barn to knock over that could have caused this blaze.
The sound of sirens grew louder as Elizabeth answered in a raspy voice, “Someone threw in a torch and locked the doors.”
She said the words so softly, Whit honestly couldn’t hear her the first time. He bent his head so that his ear was next to her mouth. “Could you repeat that?” he requested.
Elizabeth took a deep breath, desperately trying to get the harsh, oppressive feeling of smoke out of her lungs. After a moment, she repeated what she’d said. “Someone threw in a torch—just before they locked the barn door.”
Whit looked at her, dumbfounded. He had trouble processing what she’d just said. She was talking about arson, as well as attempted murder and just possibly the attempted slaughter of the ranch’s herd of horses. Here, at Adair Acres. That meant that someone on the inside was responsible.
“Are you sure?” he pressed, shaken.
“I’m sure,” she replied stoically. “I saw the flames starting. And when I pushed the door, it wouldn’t open. Someone had locked it from the outside. I found a shovel and started beating against the door with it until the wood finally cracked.” Shaking her head, she just couldn’t understand. Elizabeth looked at him, her brow furrowed. “Why would someone want to kill those horses?”
“It wasn’t the horses that they were trying to kill,” he replied, his eyes on hers. “The horses would have just been collateral damage.”
Just then, Landry returned with a glass of water for Elizabeth. Offering the glass to the other woman, her hand shook slightly when she heard the last of Elizabeth’s statement and what her brother said in reply. Landry exchanged looks with Whit.
“Mother,” she said, stunned and numbed at the same time.
“Mother what?” he wanted to know. His eyes never left Landry’s face.
This wasn’t easy for her. All her life, she had done everything her mother asked of her. She’d gone to the schools her mother wanted her to, dated the boys her mother selected and was even now engaged to someone of her mother’s choosing—someone who wasn’t of her own choosing. Landry had always tried to please her mother. And now she was in a situation where she had come in conflict with the course of her whole young life.
But she had grown very fond of Elizabeth and she looked up to Whit. So she answered honestly, “I saw Mother hurrying into the house just before someone yelled that the barn was on fire.”
Stunned, not wanting to believe what he was hearing—yet knowing in his heart that it had to be true—Whit took hold of his sister’s shoulders and asked her, “Are you sure, Landry?”
Landry nodded. “I’m sure. She didn’t see me, but I saw her. It was Mother. She ran into the house and then headed off in the direction of her private apartment.”
Furious, Whit rose to his feet. Elizabeth scrambled to hers and caught his hand before he could walk away. He looked angrier than she had ever seen him look. “Where are you going?”
“If she started that fire, then our mother or not, she’s going to be made to pay to the full extent of the law,” he declared fiercely.
“Whit, she’s your mother,” Elizabeth said. “You can’t do that.”
“Yes, I can,” he answered stoically. “Don’t you realize that you could have been killed?” he asked Elizabeth.
Having said the words out loud, he was convinced that had been his mother’s intention—to kill Elizabeth. What he didn’t know and couldn’t understand was why. Why was his mother trying to kill the woman he was involved with? Patsy had never taken an interest in any of their lives before, why the sudden change now?
What did she stand to gain by getting rid of Elizabeth? Because that was what it all had to boil down to—the way it affected Patsy. It was always about his mother, no matter what.
“I know, but I wasn’t killed,” Elizabeth pointed out patiently. “And the horses are safe. Maybe if you just talk to her, you can work things out to your satisfaction,” she suggested.
“Oh, I’ll talk to my mother all right,” he told her. He began to stride toward the house, only to realize that Elizabeth was hurrying right behind him, trying to catch up.
He stopped and swung around to face her. “Where are you going?” he demanded.
“With you,” she answered with no hesitation.
“No, you’re not,” he said with finality. Things could get very ugly and he didn’t want her to have to witness that. She’d already been through more than enough in his opinion.
“Yes, I am,” Elizabeth insisted. She was not about to back down. “Someone’s got to be there to stop you from doing something stupid. I’m not going to have my baby have to visit his or her father in prison.”
He stared at her in disbelief. Just how forgiving was this woman? “My mother just tried to kill you. Not the horses—you,” he all but shouted.
In her heart, she knew that. She just hadn’t wanted to face it immediately. “So I have more of a say what happens to her than you do,” she said.
Whit shook his head, surrendering this round to her. “You are a damn stubborn woman.”
“Yes, I am,” she agreed, then added with the smallest of smiles, “Deal with it.”
Whit looked at her for a long moment. “I will—I want to. I want to for the rest of my life.” These past few minutes had made him see his life in a whole new light. Made him realize things about himself that he hadn’t even been aware of. “If anything had happened to you in that barn—I don’t know what I would have done.”
“You would have dealt with it,” she told him simply. “And gotten over it.”
“No, I wouldn’t have.” He took her hands in his as he swore, “Ever.”
With that, he dropped her hands, turned on his heel and continued back to the house.
It was all Elizabeth could do to keep up with him. But she did. Now was not the time to fall behind. All sorts of questions were popping up in her mind, but despite the dire situation and what she had just endured, she couldn’t help smiling.
In the end, everything would be all right.
She could just feel it.
Chapter 16
“Mother!” Whit called out as he entered the suite of rooms that Patsy Adair had taken to occupying more than a decade ago. “Mother, get down here! Now! Trust me, you are not going to be happy if I have to go upstairs to get you,” he promised angrily.
“Whit,�
�� Elizabeth chided, trying to get him to rein in his temper.
“She can’t be allowed to get away with this, Elizabeth,” he told her firmly. Elizabeth had much too kind a heart, he thought. But his mother had really crossed the line this time, and he wasn’t about to look the other way any longer. “Now, Mother!”
The next moment, Patsy appeared at the landing. She assumed the stance of a queen regally looking down at her subjects.
She was far from pleased at the tone he was using, especially in front of a woman she thought was her late husband’s mistress.
“I am your mother, Whit, and you will show me respect,” she informed him coldly.
“Respect?” Whit echoed in disbelief. “You mean the way you show respect for everyone else?”
“Change your tone this instant, Whit. I don’t answer to you,” Patsy told him haughtily.
Whit took a couple of steps up the stairs, cold fury in his eyes. The fire department had arrived and the fire was being dealt with, but it could have been so much worse.
“Well, you’re sure as hell going to have to answer to someone for what you’ve done.”
Patsy’s eyes narrowed as she glared at Elizabeth, then shifted that look back to her son. “She has you believing her lies now, does she? The king is dead, long live the king—is that your little game, whore?” Patsy demanded, all but shouting the words into Elizabeth’s face.
Patsy reached the bottom step, crowding her son out of the way. “Your father was carrying on with her for years. I finally had enough of it and hired a private detective to follow this two-bit tart around. She and your father spent a hell of a lot of time ‘working together’ after hours. Given your father’s appetites, it’s not hard to put two and two together even if the PI couldn’t manage to get any compromising pictures of them. He did hack into her medical file, though. Did you know that she’s pregnant with your father’s bastard?”
“Watch your mouth, Mother. And that’s not Dad’s baby,” Whit informed her coldly.
Carrying His Secret Page 17
